"Assassin of Relativity" Lecture: Peter Galison

January 21 2009. Peter Galison, Joseph Pellegrino University Professor of Physics and the History of Science, Harvard University. A lecture about Albert Einstein's friendship with schoolmate Friedrich Adler. Adler, the son of the leader of the Socialist Party in Vienna, was, like Einstein, a physicist very much engaged with both epistemology and politics. Einstein and Adler spoke often about their efforts in physics. In the midst of World War I, Adler assassinated the Prime Minister of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Einstein rallied to Adler's defense and-between death row and Berlin-Adler and Einstein began an extraordinary correspondence about the meaning and validity of relativity.