Did Einstein really discover e=mc2?

Not really. The mass energy equivalence mc^2 was known long before his work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Friedrich_Hasen%C3%B6… And probably someone else did it even before Fridrich. It could be dated back to 1881.

He is often accused of plagiarism. But he was just smart to summarize thing already done. So somehow it stick to his name. He was also editor of a scientific journal, and in an age without internet, things could be rediscovered continuously in 30 years 🙂

And yes most of the thing in physics are known by someones else name, for contributions basically.

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Of course, virtually any discovery is built upon the prior discoveries of others. But in that usual sense of discovery, Einstein was indeed the first (as far as I know) to discover this equation. The fact that he did not cite any sources is not an indication that the work wasn’t based on prior work. He should have at least credited the work of Maxwell, because he clearly knew of Maxwell’s equations, which made the speed of light a fundamental constant in the laws physics. He should have also credited Galileo either directly or indirectly for the principle of relativity (Galilean relativity). And if he was aware of it (I suspect he was), he certainly should have cited the Michelson-Morley experiment for the fact that the speed of light was the same in all reference frames. Some of the work repeated what Lorentz had already done, so that should have been cited as well, again assuming he was aware of it.

I missed Poincaré, who did utilize that same equation in dealing with electromagnetic mass (see Wikipedia), albeit in a slightly different form and with a different interpretation. Hasenöhrl and others didn’t derive the same form of the equation, with an extra factor of 4/3 not present in Einstein’s derivation. The reason why Einstein would be credited with the equation is that his assumptions turned out to be valid, making his derivation the correct one. But even still, Poincaré should have been cited for having derived basically the same equation before, even if under different assumptions.

I take issue with the idea that Einstein just copied others, though. His contributions were clearly original, even if some parts of the work were considered previously. He was the one who brought all of it together in a coherent theory and certainly applied many of his own original ideas in doing so. Nevertheless, that doesn’t excuse him for not having credited those before him.

Also, derivations of equations pertaining to the laws of physics aren’t properly called creations or inventions. They are discoveries, because one *discovers* something about how the universe works. It would only be a creation if Einstein actually caused the universe to behave like that.

Source(s): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electromagnetic_mass

Yes. You should read some biographies of Einstein sometime. His life and works are very well documented and make for an interesting read. There are many reasons that Einstein is justifiably so well regarded, even though most people don’t understand these reasons.

Einstein showed that the Lorenz transformations inherent in Maxwell’s equations of classical electrodynamics also apply to mechanics, which leads to the total energy of a moving object being:

E = mc^2/sqrt(1-v^2/c^2)

where m is the rest mass, v is the object’s velocity, and c is the speed of light. Only when the object is at rest (v = 0) does this equation simplify to the famous statement for the rest energy of a moving object, E = mc^2. Note that Maxwell’s equations

(which showed that light travels at the same speed in all frames) already existed and Lorenz transformations already existed. Einstein just took the next step and applied the concepts to mechanics and showed in an elegant way that these ideas are fundamental and real.

Edison is not a well-regarded scientist. In fact, Edison is not a scientist at all. You could call Edison an inventor/engineer, but even that designation would be inaccurate as most of his successes came from zealous and shrewd business and management. I would call Edison a successful businessman/manager.

Yes, he really did:

The Derivation of E=mc2

Perhaps the most famous equation of all time is E = mc2. The equation is a direct result of the theory of special relativity, but what does it mean and how did Einstein find it? In short, the equation describes how energy and mass are related. Einstein used a brilliant thought experiment to arrive at this equation, which we will briefly review here.

First of all, let us consider a particle of light, also known as a photon. One of the interesting properties of photons is that the have momentum and yet have no mass. This was established in the 1850s by James Clerk Maxwell. However, if we recall our basic physics, we know that momentum is made up of two components: mass and velocity. How can a photon have momentum and yet not have a mass? Einstein’s great insight was that the energy of a photon must be equivalent to a quantity of mass and hence could be related to the momentum.

Einstein’s thought experiment runs as follows. First, imagine a stationary box floating in deep space. Inside the box, a photon is emitted and travels from the left towards the right. Since the momentum of the system must be conserved, the box must recoils to the left as the photon is emitted. At some later time, the photon collides with the other side of the box, transferring all of its momentum to the box. The total momentum of the system is conserved, so the impact causes the box to stop moving.

Unfortunately, there is a problem. Since no external forces are acting on this system, the centre of mass must stay in the same location. However, the box has moved. How can the movement of the box be reconciled with the centre of mass of the system remaining fixed?

Einstein resolved this apparent contradiction by proposing that there must be a ‘mass equivalent’ to the energy of the photon. In other words, the energy of the photon must be equivalent to a mass moving from left to right in the box. Furthermore, the mass must be large enough so that the system centre of mass remains stationary.

Let us try and think about this experiment mathematically. For the momentum of our photon, we will use Maxwell’s expression for the momentum of an electromagnetic wave having a given energy. If the energy of the photon is E and the speed of light is c, then the momentum of the photon is given by:

1.1) Pphoton = E/c

The box, of mass M, will recoil slowly in the opposite direction to the photon with speed v. The momentum of the box is:

1.2) Pbox = Mv

The photon will take a short time, Δt, to reach the other side of the box. In this time, the box will have moved a small distance, Δx. The speed of the box is therefore given by

1.3) v = del x / del t

By the conservation of momentum, we have

1.4) M*(del x/del t) = E/c

If the box is of length L, then the time it takes for the photon to reach the other side of the box is given by:

1.5) del t = L/c

Substituting into the conservation of momentum equation (1.4) and rearranging:

1.6) M*del x = EL/c^2

Now suppose for the time being that the photon has some mass, which we denote by m. In this case the centre of mass of the whole system can be calculated. If the box has position x1 and the photon has position x2, then the centre of mass for the whole system is:

1.7) x-bar = (Mx1 +mx2)/(M+m)

We require that the centre of mass of the whole system does not change. Therefore, the centre of mass at the start of the experiment must be the same as the end of the experiment. Mathematically:

1.8) (Mx1+mx2)/(M+m) = (M(x1-del x) + mL)/(M+m)

The photon starts at the left of the box, i.e. x2 = 0. So, by rearranging and simplifying the above equation, we get:

1.9) m*L = M*del x

Substituting (1.4) into (1.9) gives:

1.10) m*L = EL/c^2

E/c^2 = m

E = mc^2

http://www.adamauton.com/warp/emc2.html

Einstein is properly credited with the development of the special and general theories of relativity. He built upon the work of people like Poincaré, Michelson and Lorentz. Nearly all scientists work like that – they don’t work completely in isolation.

Edison was an inventor and thief of other people’s inventions. He was not a proper scientist. Einstein was not an inventor.

Yes, he did.

One should be careful to not confuse the theory of relativity with the equation E=mc^2. The equation is merely the formula to calculate the amount of energy released by the total conversion of a quantity of mass (both were discovered by Einstein, are related, but are not the same thing.)

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Einstein derived this relation in an attempt to reconcile Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory with the conservation of energy and momentum. Maxwell said that light carries a momentum, which is to say that a wave carries an amount of energy. Due to the principle of conservation of momentum, if a body emits energy in the form of radiation, the body loses an equivalent amount of mass that is given by E/c². This describes the relation between energy and mass. According to the conservation principle, in a closed system the sum of mass and its energy equivalent is always the same. The mass-energy relation tells us that any change in the energy level of an object necessarily involves a change in the object’s mass and vice-versa. The most dramatic consequences of this law are observed in nature, for example in nuclear fission and fusion processes, in which stars like the Sun emit energy and lose mass. The same law also applies to the forces set free in the detonation of an atomic bomb. Einstein was not directly involved in the creation of the atomic bomb, as some people assume. His credits are rather being the one who provided the theoretical framework. In 1939, Einstein and several other physicists wrote a letter to President Franklin D. Roosevelt, pointing out the possibility of making an atomic bomb and the peril that the German government was embarking on such a course. The letter, signed only by Einstein, helped lending urgency to efforts in the creation of the atomic bomb, but Einstein himself played no role in the work and knew nothing about it at the time

I have the real answer Man!.. See these formulas can be originally discovered by whom who actually worked on the basics of mathematics and physics and who is the orginator and first who stepped into cosmos. See when you try to find a topic on internet and read it on some blog then you will notice that all blogs are actualy copting something and pasting on thier own blog post. but the credit should go to the first and the one who never thought of publicity……so let me reveal the answer to you , may be , it won’t fit you but the truth is truth…ok guess it now….who invented Number System?? who invented algebra?? who invented the greatest constants PIE?? My friend if you dig down any topic and the final destination will certainly Ancient Bharat (India). whether you talk about meditaion (great way to feel the cosmos), Mahabhart stories (where the text mentioned about space travel and the time relativity which recently again copied in movie Intersteller ) or any real first basic inventions like email system( invented by inidian), first Chip (without one no computer can stand invented by indian)., (first university of world, nalanda university), first religion( no one can trace when it was founded),..here what i want to say that whenevr you want to go to the first you will definlety notice India. Hence my answer is this and many famous theories and formulas are stolen and copied from ancient Indian Texts.

Einstein has to be credited for thinking out of the box in negating ether and bringing space and time on equal footing and finally definitely for deriving E = mc², in an attempt to restructure Newton’s laws according to the requirement of theory of relativity expounded by him. It i snot really a discovery it is creation.

He didn’t really ‘discover’ that formula .. he DERIVED it from Maxwell’s equations .. you could do the same now you know what to look for … but the equivalence of mass and energy really has little to do with the Theory of Relativity ..

I believe he was the first to propose & publish Relativity in it’s ‘complete’ form .. of course he built on the work of Henri Poincaré and Hendrik Lorentz .. however all of Physics builds on what’s gone before – ideas on Gravity can be traced back to Newton, Galileo and perhaps even Archimedes ..

His genius was in realising WHAT IN MEANS if the speed of light is a constant … from that fact alone you can work our all of relativity = however no-one else did … although you can read all about the arguments in Wikipedia 🙂

Source(s): http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativity_priority_d…