# Einstein and Philosophy
Johannes Siedersleben, Oxford, June 2022
“God does not play dice”. This, along with the enigmatic formula *E = mc2*, is probably the best-known
quotation from Einstein, from which some have concluded that Einstein believed in God and didn’t
believe in quantum mechanics. Both conclusions are wrong, as we are going to show. Einstein wrote a
great deal on physics but little on philosophy and other non-technical topics. He left us the booklet
*On Cosmic Religion*, and three short non-technical papers included in a celebrated collection, the
*Readings in the Philosophy of Science*. Let us see what these writings tell us.
Remark 1: The quotation is from a letter to Max Born from 26 December 1926. The original reads: “At any rate, I am
convinced that He doesn’t play dice”.
Remark 2: Setting *c = 1* (which is as mundane as replacing miles with kilometres), the formula boils down to *E = m*:
mass is a form of energy as the atomic bomb shows.
## Cosmic Religion and the Beauty of Physics
Einstein embraces what he calls cosmic religion. This has little in common with religions in the
ordinary sense: there is no anthropomorphic idea of God, no reward and no punishment, there are
no dogmas, no priests, no prayers. But what is there, then? “There is the nobility and marvellous
order which are revealed in nature and in the world of thought“, Einstein says, and goes on: “The
most important function of art and science is to keep alive this feeling in those who are receptive.”
This is the gist of Einstein's thinking: the beauty of science, the beauty of his own findings and that of
his fellow researchers overwhelmed him. But an eminent contemporary didn't agree. According to
Martin Heidegger, "there is no beauty at all in science, and the least perhaps in philosophy" ({cite}`heidegger1925prolegomena`, GA 20, p. 204). Who is right?
Einstein’s stance relies on the extraordinary gems of clarity and brilliance of modern physics such as
Newton’s theory, Maxwell's equations and his own theory of relativity.
Einstein was less happy with quantum mechanics which wasn’t quite
up to his standards of nobility and marvellous order. In *Fundamentals of Theoretical Physics* he
conceded that “it is probably out of the question that any future knowledge can compel physics again
to relinquish our present statistical foundation in favour of a deterministic one which would deal
directly with physical reality” but hoped, albeit with little confidence, that quantum mechanics would
not remain the last word when he said: “Some physicists among them myself cannot accept the view
that events in nature are analogous to a game of chance.“ At any rate, he never doubted the
soundness of quantum mechanics, always endorsed it as a useful theory, and indeed contributed to
it. The famous EPR paper questions the completeness of quantum mechanics rather than its soundness.
Einstein's picture of ideal physics, where everything is beauty and symmetry has been spoiled by
the standard model of elementary particles (see e.g., {cite}`wilczek2021keys`). This highly successful model presents
itself as a mess of 20 or so elementary particles, with no convincing structure and a lot of seeming
arbitrariness. And a world theory unifying general relativity theory and quantum mechanics seems to
be hard to come by (I am referring to loop quantum theory and string theory).
Realizing that the beauty of physics, as claimed by Einstein and denied by Heidegger, can at times be
compelling, at others blatantly absent, we must conclude that Einstein and Heidegger are both
wrong. Wrong at least for the time being, because a crucial question hovers above our heads: Is any
lack of beauty in existing theories just a temporary defect, due to our insufficient knowledge and
insight? Is there a higher beauty, invisible to us, visible only to geniuses not yet born, to artificial
intelligences not yet conceived, or to alien intelligences out there? Or is it just megalomania to ask for
nature to satisfy criteria of beauty some humans happen to share? The quest for beauty can be
misleading: the Greek thought that planets cannot travel anywhere but on perfect spheres.
Einstein’s religion resembles Spinoza’s pantheism in which God is represented by nature, including
science and art. Einstein finds sources of the cosmic element in Buddhism and, to some extent, in the
Psalms of David and in the Prophets, but otherwise considers religion and science as irreconcilable
antagonists. He says, again in his Cosmic Religion: “A God who rewards and punishes is unthinkable”
and: “For anyone who accepts the assumption of causality, the idea of a Being who interferes with a
sequence of events in the world is impossible.”
## Philosophy of Physics
Here is the one, big question: How true are the laws of physics? Can we trust them? What does truth
mean in physics? In his *Geometry and Experience*, Einstein only touches on the subject, using
geometry, which means earth-measuring, as a sandbox-example of physics. The following few
excerpts of his line of thought deal only with a tiny aspect of the towering problem of truth in physics.
Axiomatic geometry introduces points and lines as abstract objects, linked by axioms
(ex: Through two different points in space there always passes one and only one straight line), but purged of
all extraneous elements. Theorems are derived from axioms by dint of defined rules, the truth of a
theorem results from the proof, the correct application of logical rules. Practical geometry applies
axiomatic geometry to the real world, assuming that abstract points and abstract straight lines
correspond (or are sufficiently similar) to real points and real lines. This approach affords a new level
of evidence: We not only prove a theorem formally (say the Pythagorean), but we convince ourselves
of its truth by measuring the distance of dots on a sheet of paper, summits in the Alps or stars in
heaven. The points introduced in axiomatic geometry appear to be an appropriate abstraction of
dots, summits, and stars. What an achievement!
We are confronted with two types of truth: the abstract truth provided by proofs, and the tangible truth
provided by measurement. Modern logic
calls axiomatic geometry a theory, and practical geometry a model thereof. If theory and experiment
agree, we can relax. But neither models nor measurements are ever a hundred percent accurate: in
this world there are no points, no perfectly straight lines, no perfectly rigid bodies, and in no worldly
right triangle c2 has ever been exactly a2 + b2. So, how can you tell a faulty theory from a faulty
measurement? Here is how Einstein puts his sad conclusion: “As far as laws of mathematics refer to
reality, they are not certain; and as far as they are certain, they do not refer to reality”.
I’m stopping here; this topic would lead us too far.
## Philosophy of Ethics
Einstein’s paper *The Laws of Science and the Laws of Ethics* is an attempt to applying the
scientific approach to ethics: “Ethical directives can be made rational and coherent by
logical thinking and empirical knowledge.” One could start from axioms such as “Human
life shall be preserved”, or “Pain and sorrow shall be lessened as much as possible”. Are
these axioms arbitrary? Yes, they are, and we decide on them. Unfortunately, an exact
science seems to be impossible. Einstein was on the wrong track, but his conclusions
were sound: He was a military pacifist and a fervent advocate of disarmament. His idea
was that if, say, two percent of all conscripts refused to perform military service, the jails
would be too small to hold all conscientious objectors and war would be impossible.
## Was Philosophy of Central Importance for Einstein?
Einstein liked Spinoza and Hume; he would have presumably liked Popper’s *Open Society and its
Enemies*, namely Plato, Hegel, and Marx, and he disliked conventional religions. He had preferences
and resentments like the rest of us. The little he wrote about philosophy wouldn’t be remembered
were it not for his fame as the world’s leading physicist. Einstein was enthralled by the beauty of
physics but largely uninfluenced by any branch of philosophy. So, philosophy doesn’t seem to have
been of appreciable importance for his work, let alone of central importance.
Remark 3: The *Open Society* was first published in 1945. Einstein died in 1955, so he might have known the book.
## Was Einstein of Central Importance for Philosophy?
Yes, he definitely was and still is. He pulled the rug from under a large swath of philosophy; some of
Kant’s assertions were refuted, epistemology was to be rebuilt, the work being still in progress. As
Einstein had read Kant at the age of sixteen he knew what he was arguing against. The bitter lesson was
that human perception and common sense have always been misleading. Aristotle’s physics is
perfectly compatible with common sense but out-and-out wrong. Two thousand years later, Galileo
came up with the law of inertia (aka Newton’s first law) which is counterintuitive and requires some
getting used to. Three hundred years later, Einstein published his theory of relativity: The Lorentz
transformation is formally proven by one tricky application of Pythagoras; time dilation and length
contraction follow from it in a few lines of calculation and can be verified by experiment exactly as
Pythagoras’ Theorem, albeit not on a sheet of paper. But they are completely unfathomable for the
human mind, however many superfast trains travel through popular science textbooks. About ten
years later, Schrödinger, Heisenberg, and other physicists came up with quantum mechanics, an even
more blatant assault on common sense: replacing particles with probabilities shatters the very idea of
physical reality. How many future revolutions of physics await us? Which cherished habits of thinking
will they destroy? Which will remain, if any?
In the hall of fame of physicists who overcame parochial common sense, from Copernicus to Hawkins,
Einstein is in a league of his own. He developed the two theories of relativity more or less
single-handedly, with little support, little funding, few collaborators, and no laboratory. The insight he
gave the world, the huge gap he transcended, is second to none in the history of science. But the
world took about 20 years to appreciate this treasure: Einstein was awarded the Nobel Prize in
physics in 1922 not for his theory of relativity, but for “his services to theoretical physics and
especially for his discovery of the photoelectric effect.” The award text points out, however, “that this
distinction is independent of the value that, after possible confirmation, may be attributed to the
relativity and gravitation theory" ({cite}`tegmark2014mathematical`, p. 243). The theory of relativity has never been worthy of
a Nobel Prize.