The story is that Einstein was shown a German newspaper that claimed "One hundred German physicists claim Einsteins theory of relativity is wrong." Einsteins reply was supposedly, "If I were wrong, it would only take one." I have looked and looked for this story and I can't find it anywhere. Did I just dream of it?
6
$\begingroup$
$\endgroup$
-
3$\begingroup$ en.wikipedia.org/wiki/… $\endgroup$ – David Hammen Mar 1 '16 at 12:59
-
$\begingroup$ If Einstein were right about his theory of relativity there would be an English translation of the work: 'One Hundred Author's Against Einstein'. The fact this book has never been translated into English raises both of my eyebrows. How about you? $\endgroup$ – HenryB Sep 25 '18 at 19:32
5
$\begingroup$
$\endgroup$
From The Ultimate Quotable Einstein p. 170:
If I were wrong, then one [author] would have been enough!
Einstein’s retort with regard to his theory when he heard that a book titled 100 Authors against Einstein was published in Germany. Quoted in Stephen Hawking, A Brief History of Time (London: Bantam, 1988), 178
-
3$\begingroup$ Hawking (1988) is not a primary source for something that is supposed to have been said in 1931. $\endgroup$ – fdb Mar 5 '16 at 23:36
-
$\begingroup$ This is an answer to the question "Did I just dream it?" which is the only question in the OP. $\endgroup$ – Gerald Edgar Sep 25 '18 at 21:44
-
1$\begingroup$ There is the title question. The quote has all the signs of being apocryphal — e.g. collected works of one of the 100 (Salomo Friedlaender, in book pp. 8–10) has the alleged German version with footnote: “source undetermined”. $\endgroup$ – Francois Ziegler Sep 26 '18 at 1:08
