journal of science education

About
Resonance

March 2005
(Contents)

Back Issues

Editorial

Jaywant H Arakeri, Associate Editor  

Genius as with most terms connected with human existence is difficult to define and maybe even more difficult to detect. A fair definition would be a person whose work has a positive influence for at least a few centuries. While there can be endless debate on who can be considered to be a genius, most people would include Leonardo da Vinci, Mozart, Newton, Shakespeare, Edison, Einstein, the list certainly biased by the dominance of Europe in world affairs in the past 500 years or so.

In the above list, only Einstein is from the 20th century, and with good reason. In a short time he became a household name. He competes only with Newton, in the number of profound contributions he has made to physics. His E = mc2 is perhaps more widely recognised than Newton’s F = ma equation. Amazingly, three of his seminal ideas were put forth in a single year, 1905. 2005, marking the centenary of that extraordinary year, has been declared the International Year of Physics. We join in the celebration, starting with the article, ‘Einstein's Miraculous Year’ in this, March, issue of Resonance. Coincidently March is Einstein’s birth month. Forthcoming issues will have articles on his work, sometimes several, offering different perspectives, on the same subject. Also, we remind readers of Resonance that the March and April, 2000 issues were devoted to Einstein.

The featured scientist in this issue, Paul Langevin, is well known for his work on Brownian motion and paramagnetism, and was the first one to develop a device based on the piezoelectric effect. For analysis of Brownian motion, he took an approach completely different from that of Einstein. As with many fundamental ideas, Langevin’s approach has been used in a number of seemingly unconnected areas.

Another person, whose influence will last a long time, is Mercator, though the name may not be familiar to most of us. The Mercator projection is routinely used in producing maps. Utpal Mukhopadhyay, in his excellent article, explains the difficulty of depicting a region on a spherical surface, such as the Earth, on a flat surface, and the inevitability of distortion during this transfer either in size or shape or both. In the Mercator projection, regions increase disproportionately in size with increasing latitude, but there is no distortion in shape. One never realizes from seeing a world map that Greenland is only 2 million square kilometres in area, compared to say, the continent of Africa which is 30 million square kilometres.

Often coffee time discussions veer to what happens to current day Newtons and Einsteins and Ramanujams. That there would be a significant number, especially in a populous country like India, no one doubts. How do you detect one? And besides the talent that a genius possesses, for final achievement what is required is a confluence of many factors, among them, a minimum exposure, an enabling environment, luck or fate, recognition, not too early and of the right amount. In some cases, and occasionally with tragic consequences, the work is never recognised in his or her lifetime. One thing seems clear. A genius, or indeed any scientist or writer or artist, would like to be left alone to do his or her work, with a minimum of external responsibilities and burdens, at home and work. For Einstein the Patent office, and for Newton his village, to which he escaped to from plague-infested Cambridge, seem to have been perfect settings of peace and quiet for contemplation. One wonders whether a present day Einstein will get caught in the webs of TV watching, internet surfing, and later, unnecessary paper publishing and citations chasing. But then, may be genius is irrepressible; at least, we hope so.

Email: jaywant@mecheng.iisc.ernet.in

Indian Academy of Sciences
C.V.Raman Avenue, Post Box No. 8005,
Sadashivanagar Post, Bangalore 560 080