Discussion questions and problems

1. Do you think that symmetry is really so important for successful life?

2. How do we feel physical beauty and why do we place so much significance in it?

3. What goes into sex appeal?

ARE THEY CRAZY OR AM I?

He was one of the greatest scientists and thinkers in history. However, he was not considered very bright when he was a child. When he was nine, his father told his wife that he was very worried about Albert because the boy was "a little slow". His teachers complained that the boy had no sense of discipline and that he was a bad influence on the other students.

When Albert was fifteen, he was thrown out of school, but a few years later he was allowed to study mathematics and physics at a special technical university in Zurich. But even at the university, he was hardly "a good student". He rarely attended classes, and he was often in trouble with his professors because he constantly argued with them. One of them told him: "You're smart, extremely smart. But you have one real fault: you never let yourself be told anything!"

When he graduated from the university, he couldn't get a job—partly because none of his professors would recommend him for one. Finally, he found one in the Swiss Patent Office in Berne. One of his duties was writing descriptions of new inventions. This helped him learn how to write clearly and simply. He later said that the only thing that made many problems in science seem difficult was the language they were described in.

In 1905, when Einstein was only twenty-six, he published an article in a scientific journal. The article dealt with a theory which he called the Theory of Relativity. He became very famous for this theory.

All his life, he lived very simply and was totally uninterested in money, power, or fame! He could never understand why so many people admired him and wanted to meet him. He knew that most of them had never read anything he had written and that they didn't understand his ideas. "Are they crazy or am I?" he asked.