Albert Einstein (1879-1955) - photo 1
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) - photo 2

Albert Einstein (1879-1955)

Lot 95
11.12.2024 00:00UTC +00:00
Classic
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CHRISTIE'S
AuctioneerCHRISTIE'S
Event locationUnited Kingdom, London
Buyer Premiumsee on Website%
ID 1349653
Lot 95 | Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Estimate value
£ 10 000 – 15 000
Albert Einstein (1879-1955)
Autograph letter signed (‘A. Einstein’) to [Otto Lehmann], Zurich, 1 December 1910
In German. 3 pages, 207 x 129mm, including three mathematical formulae. Provenance: by descent from the recipient.

'This does not indicate a violation of the principle of relativity': Einstein rebuts an attempted contradiction of special relativity, emphasising the difference between frames of reference which are in relative motion and those which are not. Einstein makes three points in response to an example put forward by Lehmann: '1) Your consideration must still take into account that the lines of force emanating from a rod become denser as a result of the Lorentz contraction': Einstein provides the mathematical ratio by which the electric field strength – and thus the electrostatic energy – is increased. He goes on: '2) The relative lessening of the repulsion through electrodynamic forces that you observed has the value v2/c2; it is therefore only halfway compensated by the increased repulsion mentioned under (1). The energy is therefore in fact smaller than if the rods were at rest. / 3) This does not indicate a violation of the principle of relativity, however, because with moving rods one must distinguish between the force K, acting between them, from the standpoint of a frame of reference not moving along with them, and the force K', from the standpoint of a frame of reference moving along with the rods. If K' differed from the force between the rods at the same distance while they were at rest, there would be a contradiction with the principle of relativity ...'. The letter concludes with a polite refusal of an invitation to give a talk in Karlsruhe: ‘whenever possible I avoid giving talks before larger audiences’.

Einstein was at this date still an associate professor at the University of Zurich, but moved to a full professorship at the Charles University in Prague in April of the following year. Otto Lehmann (1855-1922) was a German physicist and pioneering investigator of liquid crystals, working at the time of this letter as professor of physics at the Technische Hochschule at Karlsruhe. Einstein letters of such an early date are rare at auction, especially those with direct discussion of special relativity (according to RBH, only 15 letters dating from 1910 or earlier have been offered at auction in the last 25 years). Published in the Collected Papers, Vol. 5, 235a.

Address of auction CHRISTIE'S
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United Kingdom
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11.12.2024 – 11.12.2024
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