https://arstechnica.com/science/2015/12/general-relativity-1...
"General relativity priority dispute" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_relativity_priority_di...
"Relativity priority dispute" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativity_priority_dispute
Says someone that at best thought about starting it.
"It was noted by Sir Edmund Whittaker in his 1954 book that David Hilbert had derived the theory of general relativity from an elegant variational principle almost simultaneously with Einstein's discovery of the theory.[B 1] Hilbert's derivation of the theory predated that of Einstein by five days.[B 2]"
Be careful however, as unfortunately some, for other reasons, historically tried to appropriate this work, and use to try to diminish the contributions of Einstein. Something that of course, is very much incorrect.
"Did Einstein discover E = mc2?"
https://physicsworld.com/a/did-einstein-discover-e-mc2/#:~:t....
Who are the people? The Berlin Group, David Hilbert, Carl F. Gauss, Bernhard Riemann, Ernst Mach,Henri Poincaré, Hendrik Lorentz. The domain are the studies on the understanding the most basic fundamentals of physics derived from the analysis of electromagentism that most leading physicists of the time were busy with. Although Hilbert and Poincare are monsters of pure mathematics they were just doing physics by the side.
Looking at the biography of Hilbert, it starts to look like almost obvious what happened. In no way it diminishes the stature of Einstein to recognize it.
Hilbert was a monster:-) Hilbert did invariant theory, calculus of variations, commutative algebra, algebraic number theory, geometry, spectral theory of operators and its application to integral equations, mathematical physics. Einstein by the contrary, always needed help with Mathematics, since the times at University. That was how he met his first wife...
Hilbert was following the work of Einstein but this latest one was struggling to make any progress for years. In the summer 1915, Hilbert's was interested in general relativity, and he invited Einstein to Göttingen to deliver a week of lectures on the subject.
Suddenly within a few weeks, Einstein comes up with his Field equations while Hilbert follows with his foundations of physics. The fact that Hilbert fully credited Einstein as the originator of the theory, and did not engage in any public priority dispute is pretty clear was as a statement to the previous work Einstein did for years. With the collaboration and common work that happened its pretty clear, Einstein did not have the mathematical prowess and skill, to come up with those sudden breakthroughs...
"...a paradox upon which I had already hit at the age of sixteen: If I pursue a beam of light with the velocity c (velocity of light in a vacuum), I should observe such a beam of light as an electromagnetic field at rest though spatially oscillating. There seems to be no such thing, however, neither on the basis of experience nor according to Maxwell's equations. From the very beginning it appeared to me intuitively clear that, judged from the standpoint of such an observer, everything would have to happen according to the same laws as for an observer who, relative to the earth, was at rest. For how should the first observer know or be able to determine, that he is in a state of fast uniform motion? One sees in this paradox the germ of the special relativity theory is already contained.[p 1]: 52–53 "
It sure sounds like you're "diminishing the stature of Einstein" (which is not to say you're wrong)
It wasn't a few weeks, it was months. Einstein visited Hilbert in June/July 1915. He didn't publish his field equation until November 1915 (and even then it took him several tries before he got the final one).
EDIT: I don’t understand the relationship between the egos of writers and their estimation of Einstein’s role. “Shoulders of giants:” in fact, it was Einstein who jealously guarded his credit for GR and never seemed to mention, in public, the contributions of others, although he did in his private letters.
Minkowski came up with the concept of spacetime as a 4-dimensional geometric object. That was a crucial insight required for the development of GR: just take this geometric object, which was flat in SR, and allow it to be curved.
IIRC Einstein himself, who initially was dismissive of Minkowski's idea, later changed his mind and recognized its importance, and said so in a number of his writings about relativity. Unfortunately, Minkowski died the year after he came up with his idea, so he never got to see where it led.
I don’t think this work of Minkowski’s that you mention is directly relevant, but, even if it’s part of the mathematical background, Minkowski is not part of that particular story. Now we talk about "four dimensional" spacetime, and that point of view is largely due to Minkowski. But it wasn’t Einstein’s point of view, and for years Einstein remarked that he didn’t see the point—it seemed needlessly formal and academic to him. But he sort of came around later.
Probably you are right, but... maybe its just me, but this coincidence seems too much of a coincidence. I can't resist hypothesizing, would it be possible to Minkowski somehow influence Einstein, maybe indirectly. For example, Minkowski was interested in curved spaces, it is possible that he somehow implanted his ideas into Einstein's mind, isn't it? Not consciously, but as it happens with teachers passionate with their subject by bringing his favorite topic in his lectures for any reason or even without any reason.
> But it wasn’t Einstein’s point of view, and for years Einstein remarked that he didn’t see the point—it seemed needlessly formal and academic to him. But he sort of came around later.
This fact also can be incorporated into my hypothesis, though with an additional assumption: teenager Einstein was exhausted by his teacher's constant remarks about curved spaces, and was conditioned to roll his eyes hearing about curved spaces. So he naturally continued to roll his eyes at curved space-time.
Yeah, it is just a hypothesis, a wild guess, and even if it was true, it wouldn't mean that Minkowski was a collaborator, but what a fun story it may be. A story about a passionate teacher shaping a mind of genius into a curved space despite all lack of mutual enthusiasm.
On a more serious note, I can remark, that this hypothesis consistent with all I know about a human mind. Einstein might have a mental model for a curved space, and his mind might have used this model to propose new thought experiments, but Einstein disliked the very idea to the point of not noticing how his mind relies on it, and he worked hard consciously to find another model to rely on. Moreover there are psychological theories stating that a mind must have at least two different models/representations of a problem domain to deal with it successfully, so this hypothetical inner conflict might benefited Einstein's genius by urging him to construct his second mental representation of gravity.
Einstein got a lot of help with the maths, but I think he deserves full credit for the physical application.
The fact that there was so much discussion between the main players is underappreciated.
I strongly suspect that today GR would be a multi-author paper.
I felt the same way - it seemed like the early 20th century made so much progress with those visionaries compared what what is being made now. Obviously I am not well informed because that is likely not the case.