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Albert Einstein

Currency:USD Category:Collectibles / Autographs Start Price:NA Estimated At:80,000.00 - 100,000.00 USD
Albert Einstein

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Auction Date:2016 Apr 13 @ 18:00 (UTC-5 : EST/CDT)
Location:236 Commercial St., Suite 100, Boston, Massachusetts, 02109, United States
ALS - Autograph Letter Signed
ANS - Autograph Note Signed
AQS - Autograph Quotation Signed
AMQS - Autograph Musical Quotation Signed
DS - Document Signed
FDC - First Day Cover
Inscribed - “Personalized”
ISP - Inscribed Signed Photograph
LS - Letter Signed
SP - Signed Photograph
TLS - Typed Letter Signed
Extraordinary pair of ALSs in German, each signed “A. Einstein,” totaling three pages, June–July 1913. Both are to his fellow theoretical physicist Dr. Arthur Schidlof, a professor at the Geneva Technical School. The first, one page both sides, 5.25 x 8.25, June 17, 1913, in full (translated): “Naturally, I too have occupied myself intensely with the question addressed by you, whether the general radiation formula can be obtained by the route currently pursued. But it seemed to me that the improper thermodynamic equilibrium loses its meaning in the case of finite radiation densities. Unfortunately, serious objections must be raised against your way of handling the problem, only two of which I shall point out: 1. It is not permissible to set the radiation density in the gas space equal to zero, even if the gas can be considered ‘black,’ which is always possible to achieve with sufficiently great expansion. 2. You set RT/P8=a (universal constant). This cannot be done even for regular thermodynamic equilibrium. Because at a given T, I can still freely choose the pressure P8 of the reaction mixture. The route chosen by you does not seem feasible to me, but your confidence is contagious. Perhaps it will nonetheless prove possible to work out the case of improper thermodynamic equilibrium even for finite radiation density.”

The second, one page on a 5.5 x 3.5 postcard, postmarked July 5, 1913, features a small sketched diagram drawn by Einstein in an attempt to clarify the meaning of the equilibrium state he is referring to. In full (translated): “Unfortunately, I cannot accept your new derivation either. For there does not exist any kind of thermodynamic equilibrium, between 1 and 2 if the radiation densities in 1 & 2 are different. For that reason it is impossible to carry out (reversibly) the virtual displacement conceived by you.” Addressed on the reverse in Einstein’s hand.

Additionally includes a 9.5 x 6.5 mailing envelope addressed to Schidlof, postmarked July 31, 1909, signed in the lower left corner as part of his return address, “Dr. A. Einstein.”

In overall fine condition. Accompanied by a custom-made leatherbound clamshell case. Both of these letters are published in the Collected Papers of Albert Einstein, Volume 5: The Swiss Years. These letters concern Einstein's investigations into the law of photochemical equivalence, which he first published a paper on in 1912. The particular question that he had not yet resolved was whether Planck’s radiation law could be related to photochemical processes. Pursuing an answer in the years to follow, he concluded with his important 1916 study of Planck’s law based on the concepts of spontaneous and induced emission, ‘Emission and Absorption of Radiation in Quantum Theory.’ In this seminal paper Einstein showed that Planck's quantum hypothesis E=h? could be derived from a kinetic rate equation. Einstein began to realize that quantum mechanics seems to involve probabilities and a breakdown of causality, a major step on the way to his theory of general relativity.