Customer Reviews

Einstein and the Ether

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"Einstein and the Ether" is a great book that changes our understanding of twentieth century physics in a fundamental way. I heartily recommend that every educated person read it, for at least two reasons:

1. It is a major cultural shock for practically all physicists and philosophers to learn that Albert Einstein himself was favourable to the existence of a relativistic ether during the last forty years of his life. I experienced this shock myself when Ludwik Kostro first told me about his book and I read his preliminary papers on this subject. Now I witness everyone else's surprise when I lecture on relativistic physics and cite these new historical findings about Einstein's acceptance of the ether.

2. The book is a fascinating voyage into the mind of the greatest scientist of the twentieth century. Even a great physicist like Einstein cannot avoid having doubts, changing his opinion and making mistakes. Kostro guides us in a fantastic cultural adventure, a guided tour through the brain of the founder of relativity at work building ever better physical theories.

Kostro's touch is light but firm. His great gift is his ability to make the reader forget that there is an author between Einstein and himself. And yet a little reflection about the tremendous amount of information gathered in the book's two hundred forty-odd pages immediately shows how important, painstaking and intelligent his role has been.

My deepest gratitude goes to Ludwik Kostro for this wonderful gift he has made to all people interested in the history and philosophy of science.

The clairification that Ludwik Kostro provides about the true ideas Einstein had conclusively to express about space (the ether) and spacial interactions is a very important contribution to the understanding of major problems tackled by contemporary physics. In particular, it seems an important call of attention for all those who are interested in finding new ways for involving "the substance" of which the physical space consists, with a view to defining more satisfactory and manageable theories concerning gravitation.
The book by Kostro relies upon a remarkable amount of largely unknown documentation about Einstein's views and activity, whith the consequence of dismantling many superficial and misleading myths currently accepted about Einstein and his theory of relativity.