NOMINEE: Albert Einstein
NOMINATED BY: Henry A. Kissinger,
former U.S. Secretary of State
The ultimate test of the impact of an individual
or a group of individuals is twofold: whether the world they left
is qualitatively different from that which they inherited, and
what contribution they made to that change. By this standard, the
seminal event of the 20th century is the scientific revolution.
Einstein's theories of relativity, followed by discoveries by
other scientists in the field of quantum mechanics, toppled the
existing view of the universe and opened the way to discoveries
that eclipse all previous scientific achievements of recorded
history.
Not every scientific breakthrough has proved unambiguously
benign--unleashing the atom, for example--but all have expanded the
human horizon into spheres prior generations could not even
imagine. In the process, the growing ability to master the
universe has opened a new window into the human soul. Science and
metaphysics, the secular and the sacred, have begun to merge. As
science comes face to face with infinity--as it is forced to do by
Einstein's theories--it deals with a phenomenon it can barely
describe and has yet proved unable to explain.
The Einsteinian revolution has produced a paradox: while vastly
extending mankind's reach, it has also exposed the essentially
finite nature of the human scale. Living as we do on a speck in a
universe whose extent is beyond our capacity to fathom, the
unprecedented growth of human power has correspondingly created
an imperative for humility. It is no accident that during a life
of incomparable scientific achievement, Einstein often said, "God
does not play dice with the universe." --Henry A. Kissinger,
former U.S. Secretary of State
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