Word: einsteins
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...physicists thought Einstein's lonely quest was hopeless, and in fact he never succeeded. But Einstein was convinced such a basic harmony and simplicity existed in nature...
Even after the pace of Einstein's career slowed and his resistance to quantum mechanics earned him the scorn of some scientists, he still epitomized science in the public eye. As Carl Sagan notes, his example inspired numerous Depression-era youngsters to choose scientific careers. His persona and pronouncements became legends. Asked why he used one soap for washing as well as shaving, he replied, "Two soaps? That is too complicated." Even when receiving visitors like David Ben-Gurion (who later offered him the presidency of Israel), Einstein often would be tieless and sockless. Recalls Physicist-Biographer Banesh Hoffmann...
...Einstein had enormous powers of concentration. When the wind died down while he was out sailing, he would whip out his notebook and do his calculations. Stymied by a thorny problem, he would tell his colleagues in accented English, "Now I will a little tink," pace slowly up and down, while twirling a lock of his unruly hair, or perhaps puff on his pipe, then suddenly erupt in a smile and announce a solution. Interrupted by parades of visitors to his Mercer Street house, he could resume his work almost as soon as they stepped out of his second-floor...
...when Einstein's fellow refugees Leo Szilard and Eugene Wigner learned that German scientists had managed to split the atom, they sought Einstein's help. Einstein himself may have had only the faintest idea of the recent progress in nuclear physics, but after a briefing by Szilard and Wigner he agreed to write a letter to President Roosevelt alerting him to the possibility that the Nazis might try to make an atomic bomb. That letter is popularly credited (though its precise effect is unclear) with helping to persuade Roosevelt to order up the Manhattan Project, which produced the first atomic...
Later, when A-bombs exploded over Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Einstein expressed deep regret. After the war, he apologized personally ?and in tears?to visiting Japanese Physicist Hideki Yukawa. On another occasion, he said, "Had I known that the Germans would not succeed in developing an atomic bomb, I would have done nothing for the bomb...