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Essays in Humanism (Wisdom Library Series)

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Einstein: Essays in Humanism (1933-1949)

Albert Einstein was undoubtedly the most famous and revolutionary scientist of the 20th Century, known especially for his special and general theories of relativity, his explanation of the photoelectric effect, his realization that matter could be converted into immense amounts of energy, and his studies in cosmology. But he also had wide-ranging beliefs about politics and social affairs. This book, now available as a Kindle e-book, is a collection of 43 essays and talks that were written for specific occasions. They cover a variety of topics that interested him and in several cases provide useful lessons for our own time.

The first part of the collection, through Essay 20, is concerned with pre- and post-World War II concerns. Einstein, himself a lifelong pacifist, argued for a world government that shared a common pool of armaments and was capable of keeping the peace among fractious national governments. He didn't think that the United Nations, as constituted with a Security Council and permanent-member veto power was going to work in the long run. He recommended a world government where delegates were directly elected by the people on a proportional basis. He recognized the great danger of atomic and nuclear weapons and advocated their strict control by the world government.

In politics, Einstein was a socialist and strongly advocated for such things as a planned economy, free education at all levels, and regulation of capitalist ventures. Today, he would be branded a Marxist, but he disapproved of the Soviet system as being too rigid and corrupt.

He advocated an active role for scientists in society and that science should help to shape government policies. He distrusted the military and spoke of the danger of a military takeover of science in order to use it for war-making purposes. In that, he anticipated Eisenhower's farewell address about the dangers of a military-industrial complex.

The next set of essays are brief descriptions of the scientific achievements of several famous scientists: Newton, Kepler, Marie Curie, Max Planck, and less well-known others. There is also a eulogy to Mahatma Gandi.

The final part of the book is devoted to Jewish issues and Zionism. Although Einstein was not religious in a traditional sense (his beliefs were strongly influenced by Spinoza), he nevertheless supported Zionism, with some misgivings, and was greatly concerned with the future of European Judaism after World War II and the Holocaust. Interestingly, he originally thought that it would be a mistake for Jewish refugees to migrate to Palestine and hoped that the U.S.would see fit to accept them. Then, he was initially opposed to carving out a separate Jewish state in Palestine, but advocated rather naively that Jew and Arab live side by side in peace in a unified Palestine. Later, he modified these views in light of actual developments. He was offered the mostly ceremonial position of President of Israel, but he declined.

Finally, there is an appended biography of Einstein, along with photographs taken at various stages of his life, and a list of acknowledgements.

I found this book to be fascinating to read, both for its historical perspective on problems of his day and for insights into problems that continue into our time. Einstein was a good writer and had a good grasp of English, so I assume (perhaps incorrectly) that he wrote all these essays himself. Occasionally, the writing is somewhat convoluted and not as clear as it could be for a modern reader, but mostly it is quite readable. Those who would like to know how a great scientific mind looked at problems of human society will value this collection of essays.

Einstein's ideas on the social questions of the day were very interesting. He made some very logical deductions about politics, which were refreshing. I plan to re-read this book soon, because I don't think I got the full effect the first time I picked it up. His ideas were a strong mixture of logic and compassion, two powerful qualities, a very positive synergistic effect.

I remember as a teen reading a biography of Einstein. I came away with the idea of a person who was clueless in everyday matters and, though I didn't know the term, Asperger's. Reading this collection of writings and speeches I would came to very different conclusion. Einstein cared deeply about people and the world around him. He was very empathetic to the plight of others.

As written in another review, this is divided into broad subject matters. I had to smile at the more political writings since they read like the current Occupiers: the biggest problem with the US is that the majority of the economic power is in the hands of a very small percentage of the people.

I had 2 problems. Since this is a Kindle book I couldn't easily jump back to the bibliography as I started each new essay. I was always curious about the date and circumstance. On a rare occasion it was included in the text, but most of the time I had to guess. The other problem is there was a lot of repetition. The writings came from different sources - he often said pretty much the same thing but aimed at different people.

OK, those are very minor problems. Over all I found the essays fascinating. Einstein was a very good writer and these essays were easy to read yet put a lot of information in their few words. Highly recommended as a way to see a different side of Einstein.