ATDDTA(11) Don't Bogart That Joint [324:17-21]

[Keith]

[324:17-21] "Minkowski and Hilbert, in fact, will be holding a joint  
seminar at Göttingen next year in the electrodynamics of moving  
bodies, not to mention Hilbert's recent work on Eigenheit theory--- 
vectors right in the heart and soul of it all, mightn't it be, as you  
lads say, 'just the ticket'?"

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Eavesdropping on a Quantum Physics blog, we see a direct reference to  
the joint seminar of 1905 (highlighted and set apart by double- 
asterisks below):

I (ed., blogger 'S-P Sirag') will quote from the biography *Hilbert*  
by Constance Reid
(Springer-Verlag, 1970) pp. 141-142: (with comments in square  
brackets by
'S-P Sirag'):

[Note: this was in 1915 during WWI, Einstein was in Berlin, Hilbert in
Göttingen.]

In Göttingen, in the weekly Hilbert-Debye seminars, it seemed to those
few students who were left that the "living pulse" of physical  
research was
at their finger tips. The work of Einstein as he pressed forward  
toward a
general theory of relativity was followed with great interest. Also  
followed
was the work of the others who were trying to reach the same goal.  
Hilbert
was especially fascinated by the ideas of Gustav Mie, then in  
Greifswald,
who was attempting to develop a theory of matter on the fundamentals  
of the
relativity principle; in in his own investigations he was able to bring
together Mie's program of pure field theory and Einstien's theory of
gravitation. At the same time, while Einstein was attempting in a rather
roundabout way to develop the binding laws for the 10 coefficients of  
the
differential form which determines gravitation, Hilbert indirectly  
solved
the problem in a different, more direct way.
Both men arrived at almost the same time at the goal. As the western
front settled down for the winter, Einstein presented his two papers "On
general relativity theory" to the Berlin Academy on November 11 and 25;
Hilbert presented his first note on "The foundations of Physics" to the
Royal Society of Science in Göttingen on November 20, 1915.

**It was a remarkable coincidence -- reminiscent of Minkowski's work on
special relativity and electrodynamics in the joint seminar of 1905  
[where
Minkowski and Hilbert discussed the ideas of Lorentz and Fitzgerald,  
being
totally unaware of Einstein's work (in the patent office) at Bern, until
Einstein's paper appeared] -- but even more remarkable, according to  
Born
(who was now in Berlin with Einstein), was the fact that it led, not  
to a
controversy over priority, but to a series of friendly encounters and
letters.**

Hilbert freely admitted, and frequently stated in lectures, that the
great idea was Einsten's.
"Every boy in the streets of Göttingen understands more about four
dimensional geometry than Einstein," he once remarked. "Yet, in spite of
that, Einstein did the work and not the mathematicians."
On another occasion, in a public lecture, he demanded: "Do you know why
Einstein said the most original and profound things about space and  
time in
our generation? Because he had learned nothing at all about the  
philosophy
and mathematics of time and space!"
Each man, however, was essentially a man of his own science. Originally
Einstein had believed that the most primitive mathematical principles  
would
be adequate to formulate the fundamental laws of physics. Not until much
later did he see that the opposite was the case. Then it turned out  
that it
was Minkowski, whose lectures he had found so uninteresting, who had  
created
the mathematical conception of Space-Time which mad possible his own
formulation of general relativity.
"The people in Göttingen," Einstein once wryly observed, "sometimes
strike me, not as if they want to help one formulate something  
clearly, but
as if they want only to show us physicists how much brighter they are  
than
we."
To Hilbert, the beauty of Einstein's theory lay in its great geometrical
abstraction; and when the time arrived for the awarding of the third  
Bolyai
Prize in 1915, he recommended that it go to Einstein "for the high
mathematical spirit behind all his achievements."
   http://destinymatrix.blogspot.com/2004_01_01_archive.html

--

"Hilbert’s interest in physics seems to have originated in a joint  
seminar
with his friend Hermann Minkowski in 1905 on the then hot topic of
electrodynamics, simultaneous with but independent of the work of
the still unknown patent clerk Einstein. His interest was renewed and
intensified around 1914 by the developments in the ”old” quantum
theory, Gustav Mie’s attempt to create a non-linear, special  
relativistic
electrodynamic theory which was intended to explain the structure of
charged particles, and Einstein’s work towards a theory of gravitation
which was to generalize his special theory."
   http://tinyurl.com/3x9v8n

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