The corruption of science in popular culture - the image of Einstein in full jubilee for his revolutionary work
I wish I could have been there that day in 1951, so I could have grabbed the camera, ripped the film from it, and prevented the circulation of the stupid picture of the greatest scientist of the twentieth century with his tongue out. On second thought, that probably wouldn't have helped much. After all, this is the only famous and most marketed picture of Albert Einstein with his white hair. The inescapable fact is that since his death in 1955, Einstein's status has risen from something intellectual of the past to something even more culturally sublime: he has become a brand, his face is as familiar to everyone as the logo of Nike or Coca-Cola.
As a result, it has become common to see him engaged in everything from the Baby Einstein series of self-help books to reassure parents, DVDs to improve the brain capacity of babies - a business that brings in $170,000,000,000 a year. Around the world, 14 legal firms control his image and ensure that the applications rise on the same scale as the requests of the guardians of his assets, the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. For this reason, it does not advertise any tobacco products, feminine hygiene products - a condition that undoubtedly must be verified - and alcoholic beverages. However, many times there are those who violate these conditions. A Vancouver clothing manufacturer recently sold boxers bearing his image. And before all the consumer associations start boycotting me, let me make something clear: I don't have a problem with Einstein reaching for a pair of underwear, the problem is that it's the wrong Albert on those underwear.
There is a great gap between the white-haired scholar and the obscure theorist who, in a six-month period in 1905, published four papers that changed science forever. The scholar was an international celebrity who did not fear his status. The Einstein we refer to this year, on the centenary of the publication of these four great papers, did not enjoy such a luxury. He had to make a living, dress accordingly, and match his moustache. Outwardly he looks normal. The difference between him and his contemporaries was that although he could not even secure a doctorate, he believed he could understand the forces at work in the universe
The same Albert that emerged in his letters to Mileva Maric, his first wife, shows a young and very focused man who rarely writes a paragraph without referring to science. He is portrayed as a worker, not a natural genius. He moves quickly from epithets of love - in which he called his kitten Milba, cunning, bewitchingly beautiful, childish - to the summaries of James Clerk Maxwell's research in electrodynamics. Surprisingly, he even has a sense of style: in one letter he criticizes the design of his colleague Michel Basso's house. A detail like this is such a stark contrast to the pop culture version of Einstein that it makes me wonder if the professor's disguise is a ruse, a clever marketing ploy to bolster his status.
If we have this romantic young rebel to thank for relativity and E=mc², why do we prefer the figure of the elderly man? "People feel a stronger kinship to the beloved scattered professor than to a 26-year-old who works 24 hours a day," says a marketing consultant. Even so, for the sake of the scientific revolution, we should celebrate for once with the coffee-obsessed rebel who dressed and looked like anyone else while his thoughts competed with each other like rays of light. In the process, we might even create some new radicals. The possibility that there is another Einstein somewhere, who works diligently day and night while maintaining his livelihood, does not sound likely, but it probably was not likely in 1905 either. Almost half a century has passed since his death, and quantum mechanics and the theory of relativity are still popular. Time for another Einstein.
