Séminaire :
Séminaire manuscrits scientifiques / 2022-202310/02/2023, ENS, 45 rue d'Ulm 75005 Paris. Salle INFO 1. De 10h30 à 12h30.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) left a considerable number of unpublished scientific manuscripts which pose a challenge for the editorial project of his Collected Papers. In my presentation, I will briefly review some prior historical analysis of some of his scientific manuscripts and notebooks and then focus on a batch of some 2’000 pages of undated and unsorted notes and calculations. In spite of some recent penetrating analysis, these pages remain in large parts unanalyzed and unidentified. The notes cover a span of some 30 years and deal mostly with problems of his unfinished program of a unified theory of the gravitational and electromagnetic fields. Defying traditional editorial techniques and approaches, the material becomes more accessible using a combination of rational reconstruction with tools of digital humanities.
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Tilman Sauer is professor for history of mathematics and the natural sciences at the University of Mainz and a co-editor of the Collected Papers of Albert Einstein.