立委按：甜甜在老友客栈向叔叔阿姨请教了一个问题：爱因斯坦比牛顿谁更伟大？饱学五车的长辈对这个问题给了详细的解析，甜甜看得一头雾水。说了半天，到底谁伟大呀？我告诉甜甜，你应该谢谢叔叔们的解答，并写一下你的体会。孩子也有意思，面对没有简单结论的论述，她来个删繁就简，总结如下： 

甜甜：我觉得爱因斯坦比牛顿伟大 
因为爱因斯坦发明一个很难的theory。牛顿发明的theory不难也不是全对。Besides,爱因斯坦更好玩。 

谢谢Uncle Wu and Uncle Happy. 

甜甜：I want to ask you people of Old Buddies (17132) 
Posted by: liwei999 
Date: August 05, 2006 02:06AM 

one of you people tell me who is better EINSTEIN OR NEWTON, this question has been haunting my every waking moment for ages!!!!! It's driving me nuts!!!!!!!! 

甜甜, that's a great question! (17137) 
Posted by: 吴礼 
Date: August 05, 2006 05:20AM 

Both Newton and Einstein are great scientists. Note that I said scientists, not physicists. This is because their work impacts not only physics, which is where they do their researches, but the whole science. From a layman’s point of view, Einstein is cooler, because his relativity theories really stretches our power of imagination, and challenges a lot of common wisdom that we take for granted. But remember he is several hundred years later than Newton. I would imagine that in Newton’s years, it would also be fascinating to think that the same force that makes an apple fall would hold our solar system together, and in fact keep our whole universe turning like clockwork! 

Philosophically, Newton is considered as the father of modern science. He showed people that the whole universe is predictable from a simple set of equations, and all we need from the God is the first push. After that, we don’t need any external management to keep everything working. This predictability and the belief that nature’s rules can be understood are pillars of modern science. In fact, people took it to the extreme and try to model human body as a machine, a much elaborated one. 

Einstein also changed our view of the world. He showed that time and space are not separated. Instead, they are like two sides of a cube. If you turn the cube, time and space mix and change with each other. This is very hard to understand, but it solves some major difficulties that people had with physics at that time. Einstein’s success also shows that great theories like Newton’s laws are not absolutely correct. They are only approximations under certain conditions. This encouraged people to keep searching for new laws of the nature. 

Newton once said that he could make great discoveries because he was standing on the shoulders of giants. This meant that he was building on the work of people before him. This is true for all the scientists, including Einstein, as well. So, although Einstein’s theory is far more advanced than Newton’s, and far closer to the truth, he was building on top of many other great works, including Newton’s. Now you can see that it is hard to say who is greater. But if I have to pick, I’d say Newton. If God took away Einstein, science will suffer a lot. But people would more or less still think the same way. If God took away Newton, we would probably live in a very different world. 

It’s a long answer, and it is probably not easy to understand by a young girl. But I know you are a very smart girl and probably this is helpful. If you are really interested about Newton and Einstein, I recommend the book “A Brief History of Time” by Stephen Hawking. You can skip the parts about physics that you don’t understand. But the way he talks about Newton and Einstein is very interesting, and I think you can understand it. 

Have a great weekend! 

In the history of science, Newton happened to be more (17155) 
Posted by: habpi 
Date: August 05, 2006 10:19AM 

important. As a human being, Einstein was more interesting. After all, one is a citizen before a scientist. Professional achievements are a result of many social and historical factors on top of personal efforts. But one can always have his/her way to make the world a better place. That is how, I think, one is truly measured.