Customer Rating: 
Summary: Enlightning
Comment: The book could have been structured a little better, but noone can argue with the words of Einstein. Several of the quotes in the book are about random and old-time topics that were lost on me, only being 23. However, this is still an amazing glipse into the man that changed the 20th Centery.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Brilliant Scientist and Great Humanitarian
Comment: Albert Einstein as I see it was one of the greatest humanitarians that ever lived. His brilliance and simplicity of thought shines through on many of his complex theories. You come away saying "Why didn't I think of that? It is so simple!" Einstein's humor is dazzling to match and rounds out my perception of this wonderful unique human being. I enjoyed this book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: There is a more comprehensive and cheaper book out there!!!
Comment: +++++
This book (first published in 1934) contains brief writings of physicist Albert Einstein (1879 to 1955), one of the most creative intellects of the twentieth century. It contains articles (speeches, letters, statements, etc.) from early in his career.
This book gives a personal portrait of the man behind the scientific legend.
The book itself is divided into four parts:
(1) The world as I see it (about 30 articles). This is my favorite part.
(2) Politics and pacifism (almost 20 articles). Einstein was a pacifist (one who opposes the use of force under any circumstances).
(3) Germany (3 articles). Einstein was born in Ulm, Wurttemberg, Germany. (He later emigrated to the United States in late 1932.)
(4) The Jews (just over 10 articles). Einstein was Jewish.
Finally, if this book is so good, then why did I give it the rating I did? Two reasons.
First, there is a much more comprehensive book that also has gathered Einstein's writings. It is called "Ideas and Opinions" (first published in 1954 and sold by Amazon). It contains almost all the articles (it excludes seven) contained in "The World as I See It." As well, it contains selected articles from other publications (most notably the books "Out of my Later Years" and "Mein Weltbild.")
As well, the book "Ideas and Opinions" has a fifth part called `Contributions to Science' (which contains almost 20 articles). Here, Einstein discusses topics such as relativity, theoretical physics, science, and gravitation. He even gives tributes to such people as Isaac Newton and Copernicus.
Second, this book's price. It costs $9.20 and you get 65 articles. But the hardcopy version of "Ideas and Opinions" costs about $6.00 and you get 120 articles (almost double the amount)!! (Note that all prices quoted are as of May 2006.)
In conclusion, instead of this book, I recommend the more comprehensive and cheaper book called "Ideas and Opinions." In my opinion, this recommended book is the definitive collection if Albert Einstein's popular writings!!!
+++++
Customer Rating:
Summary: great book!
Comment: I found this book in my uncle's library. After hearing some islamist authors were interpreting Einstein's book as a proof of "science without religion is not science etc" I have decided to read this book . Then I realized those writers never really read this book and they were talking non sense it was just a sentence from this book.
The book is nice, he is not only a scientist also a philosoph. It helped me to look at some of the things with a different point of view.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The world as Einstein sees it
Comment: This volume consists of writings of Einstein collected in the year 1932. Another Amazon reviewer has pointed out that it omits Einstein's writings on science which he rightfully says is something like speaking about Mozart without speaking about his music.
Yet Einstein was already by 1932 a world - figure. And one of the great tests of his life, and proofs of his being , beside a great genius, a very decent and moral human being , was the way he reacted to the Nazis. When they were beginning their racist attacks on the Jews, Einstein proudly announced his Jewish origin. Instead of trying to play up to authority as did for instance Heidegger he showed an ability to sacrifice his own private position within Germany , then the great center of scientific research.
This volume contains a chapter on his relation to the Germany of the time. It also contains a more extensive chapter on his relation to the Jews, to the building of a homeland , to the conception of peace between Jew and Arab in the Holy Land.
The volume opens with Einstein's reflections on the meaning of life, and on the way he sees the world. They come , I think, very much out of his own sense of himself. Einstein highly prized the private individual. He believed that the individual did not exist to be absorbed in or be a slave to the State, but rather the State existed in order to enable individuals to pursue their lives and creative endeavors. In this work he champions the political system of the United States because he believes it best enables individuals to find their way to real creative and productive human endeavor.
He says,"The real valuable thing in the pageant of human life seems to me not the State, but the creative, sentient,individual , the personality: it alone creates the noble and sublime."
Einstein in his humble away talks about the dependence of the individual, of himself on the contributions of so many others in society.
And he talks about the fundamental values for which he has lived, Truth, Goodness and Beauty.
When one thinks of the other outsized giant of science, Newton and compares Einstein with him, one is again struck at how remarkable it is that a person of Einstein's incredible genius in scientific work, should also have been in so many ways a decent, sane, moral human being.
Mankind is enriched by his being one of us.
Summary: Enlightning
Comment: The book could have been structured a little better, but noone can argue with the words of Einstein. Several of the quotes in the book are about random and old-time topics that were lost on me, only being 23. However, this is still an amazing glipse into the man that changed the 20th Centery.
Customer Rating:
Summary: Brilliant Scientist and Great Humanitarian
Comment: Albert Einstein as I see it was one of the greatest humanitarians that ever lived. His brilliance and simplicity of thought shines through on many of his complex theories. You come away saying "Why didn't I think of that? It is so simple!" Einstein's humor is dazzling to match and rounds out my perception of this wonderful unique human being. I enjoyed this book.
Customer Rating:
Summary: There is a more comprehensive and cheaper book out there!!!
Comment: +++++
This book (first published in 1934) contains brief writings of physicist Albert Einstein (1879 to 1955), one of the most creative intellects of the twentieth century. It contains articles (speeches, letters, statements, etc.) from early in his career.
This book gives a personal portrait of the man behind the scientific legend.
The book itself is divided into four parts:
(1) The world as I see it (about 30 articles). This is my favorite part.
(2) Politics and pacifism (almost 20 articles). Einstein was a pacifist (one who opposes the use of force under any circumstances).
(3) Germany (3 articles). Einstein was born in Ulm, Wurttemberg, Germany. (He later emigrated to the United States in late 1932.)
(4) The Jews (just over 10 articles). Einstein was Jewish.
Finally, if this book is so good, then why did I give it the rating I did? Two reasons.
First, there is a much more comprehensive book that also has gathered Einstein's writings. It is called "Ideas and Opinions" (first published in 1954 and sold by Amazon). It contains almost all the articles (it excludes seven) contained in "The World as I See It." As well, it contains selected articles from other publications (most notably the books "Out of my Later Years" and "Mein Weltbild.")
As well, the book "Ideas and Opinions" has a fifth part called `Contributions to Science' (which contains almost 20 articles). Here, Einstein discusses topics such as relativity, theoretical physics, science, and gravitation. He even gives tributes to such people as Isaac Newton and Copernicus.
Second, this book's price. It costs $9.20 and you get 65 articles. But the hardcopy version of "Ideas and Opinions" costs about $6.00 and you get 120 articles (almost double the amount)!! (Note that all prices quoted are as of May 2006.)
In conclusion, instead of this book, I recommend the more comprehensive and cheaper book called "Ideas and Opinions." In my opinion, this recommended book is the definitive collection if Albert Einstein's popular writings!!!
+++++
Customer Rating:
Summary: great book!
Comment: I found this book in my uncle's library. After hearing some islamist authors were interpreting Einstein's book as a proof of "science without religion is not science etc" I have decided to read this book . Then I realized those writers never really read this book and they were talking non sense it was just a sentence from this book.
The book is nice, he is not only a scientist also a philosoph. It helped me to look at some of the things with a different point of view.
Customer Rating:
Summary: The world as Einstein sees it
Comment: This volume consists of writings of Einstein collected in the year 1932. Another Amazon reviewer has pointed out that it omits Einstein's writings on science which he rightfully says is something like speaking about Mozart without speaking about his music.
Yet Einstein was already by 1932 a world - figure. And one of the great tests of his life, and proofs of his being , beside a great genius, a very decent and moral human being , was the way he reacted to the Nazis. When they were beginning their racist attacks on the Jews, Einstein proudly announced his Jewish origin. Instead of trying to play up to authority as did for instance Heidegger he showed an ability to sacrifice his own private position within Germany , then the great center of scientific research.
This volume contains a chapter on his relation to the Germany of the time. It also contains a more extensive chapter on his relation to the Jews, to the building of a homeland , to the conception of peace between Jew and Arab in the Holy Land.
The volume opens with Einstein's reflections on the meaning of life, and on the way he sees the world. They come , I think, very much out of his own sense of himself. Einstein highly prized the private individual. He believed that the individual did not exist to be absorbed in or be a slave to the State, but rather the State existed in order to enable individuals to pursue their lives and creative endeavors. In this work he champions the political system of the United States because he believes it best enables individuals to find their way to real creative and productive human endeavor.
He says,"The real valuable thing in the pageant of human life seems to me not the State, but the creative, sentient,individual , the personality: it alone creates the noble and sublime."
Einstein in his humble away talks about the dependence of the individual, of himself on the contributions of so many others in society.
And he talks about the fundamental values for which he has lived, Truth, Goodness and Beauty.
When one thinks of the other outsized giant of science, Newton and compares Einstein with him, one is again struck at how remarkable it is that a person of Einstein's incredible genius in scientific work, should also have been in so many ways a decent, sane, moral human being.
Mankind is enriched by his being one of us.