E = MC2 = METAPHOR :

He's Still Ready for His Close-Up (DENNIS OVERBYE, May 12, 2002, NY Times)

In 1919, British astronomers returning from an eclipse expedition reported that they had measured the bending of light rays, thus confirming Einstein's revolutionary new theory, known as general relativity, which described gravity as the warping of space-time. At that moment, Einstein caught a wave that had been building for decades. The world was exhausted, materially, morally and intellectually, from World War I, a catastrophe that shattered the faith in progress and reason that had guided European civilization since the Enlightenment. Everyone was ready for something new. Einstein gave them a whole new universe.

In his fine book, The Metaphysical Club : A Story of Ideas in America, Louis Menand shows how American intellectual elites adopted the philosophy of pragmatism after the Civil War, quite specifically as a way of draining life of ideological disagreements. Einstein's discovery of Relativity was embraced so enthusiastically for exactly the same reason. If all is relative, then why fight wars? Posted by Orrin Judd at May 14, 2002 6:46 AM