Changes

Einstein’s famous formula [[E=mc²]] falsely maintains mc² says that mass and energy can turn into each other. It was first published by H. Poincare. Einstein published an alternate derivation that was corrected and improved by M. Planck. E stands for [[energy]], m is [[mass]], and c is the [[speed of light]]. So, allegedly if you increase the energy of a substance, for example by heating it, it gains a minute amount of mass. It was later suggested realized that if you split an atom apart, as in a nuclear explosion, it loses a tiny amount of mass and you release a huge amount of [[energy]].

The connection E=mc² to nuclear energy is not as direct or real as pop culture sometimes represents. Einstein did not discover the huge energy available from nuclear reactions. Early workers in radioactivity, such as Ernest Rutherford, understood clearly that the natural radioactive decay of radium released quantities of energy that could not be explained by chemistry, and were much larger than those of chemical reactions. Neither did Einstein originate the key idea that made nuclear energy a possible weapon or a practical energy source. That was Leo Szilard, who acknowledged having been inspired by a 1914 H. G. Wells novel. Szilard discovered or invented the chain reaction (and patented it). However, other people recognized the relation between Einstein's interpretation of the E=mc² formula and chain reactions. Einstein explained that matter releasing energy is also losing mass.

* Many ideas and quotes are falsely attributed to Einstein. He was did not responsible for the discredited concept invent very much of what is we now called call [[special relativity]]. The Principle of Relativity, that the law of physics should be the same in all inertial frames, had already been suggested published before Einstein.<ref>[http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0408077]</ref> He did not discover the [[Lorentz transformation]], or the Lorentz invariance of [[Maxwell's equations]] for electromagnetism.<ref>[http://eprint.uq.edu.au/archive/00002307/]</ref> He was not the first to propose that the [[speed of light]] is constant for all observers, or that "[[the aether]]" is superfluous and not observable.<ref>Lost in Einstein's Shadow, American Scientist, 2006. [http://www.americanscientist.org/template/AssetDetail/assetid/49611/page/1]</ref> He was not the first to propose that "recognize and explain how special relativity" causes an ambiguity in defining simultaneity.<ref>[http://www.everythingimportant.org/relativity/Poincare.htm]</ref> He did not combine space and time into a four-dimensional [[spacetime]] in his special relativity papers until others had been doing it for a couple of years.

* Einstein did not invent the term "relativity theory", and did not even like the term. He correctly called it the "so-called relativity theory" until 1911. Einstein did not banish the ether from Physics. In a 1920 lecture, he said, "More careful reflection teaches us, however, that the special theory of relativity does not compel us to deny æther."<ref>Quoted by Tulane astrophysicist Frank J. Tipler, http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=1271310</ref>