EINSTEIN, ALBERT

2 pages on single sheet (11 x 8 1/2 in.) signed "A. Einstein" in German, on letterhead of The Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, New Jersey, with typed envelope. Creases where previously folded, 1 autograph correction in Einstein's hand. Together with a typed note signed "A. Einstein" (6 1/2 x 5 1/2 in.) expressing his hope that Kondo will be able to have the letter translated into English, as well as a typed copy of Stachel's 1986 English translation. Crease where previously folded.   

By descent to current owner. 

Einstein Archives Online, 14-303 in response to Kondo, Herbert 14-302; Beller, Cohen & Renn, Einstein in Context, p. 286; Colodny, From Quarks to Quasars: Philosophical Problems of Modern Physics, p. 380;  Kennedy, A Student's Guide to Einstein's Major Papers, p. 281; Stachel, Einstein B-Z, p. 415

Creases where previously folded.
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"WITHOUT [FARADAY'S] FIELD AND MAXWELL'S EQUATIONS BASED ON IT, THERE WOULD PROBABLY HAVE BEEN NO SPECIAL THEORY OF RELATIVITY AND CERTAINLY NO GENERAL THEORY OF RELATIVITY...THE DISCOVERY OF THE CONCEPT OF THE FIELD BROUGHT WITH IT THE MOST IMPORTANT MODIFICATION OF THE BASIS OF PHYSICS SINCE NEWTON."

A fantastic letter from Einstein demonstrating his deep respect for the work of Maxwell and Faraday, while at the same time, in an oft-cited passage, expressing pessimism about the prospects for the field-theoretical approach. As translated by Stachel, in part:

"I agree with you completely when you see in the introduction of the concept of the field by Faraday one of the greatest creations of the scientific mind. Up to Faraday there existed apart from space only one fundamental concept from which one attempted to derive all phenomena: the material point...

Faraday recognized intuitively that one needed a new concept for the natural representation of electromagnetic induction, namely the concept of the field... 

This concept then provided the key to Maxwell's electrodynamics and especially to reducing light to electromagnetic fields in space. Without the concept of the field and Maxwell's equations based on it, there would probably have been no Special Theory of Relativity and certainly to General Theory of Relativity...

In present day physics, there is manifested a kind of battle between the particle concept and the field concept for leadership, which will probably not be decided for a long time. it is even doubtful if finally one of the two rivals will be able to maintain itself as a fundamental concept.

In any case, it seems to me that the discovery of the concept of the field brought with it the most important modification of the basis of physics since Newton."  

Herbert Kondo (1924-2012) worked as Senior Science Editor for the MacMillan Co, and later as the Editor-In-Chief for Grolier/Scholastic Publishing. He wrote numerous articles and books treating the history of science, including two on Einstein; Adventures in Space & Time; The Story of Relativity (1966), and Albert Einstein and the Theory of Relativity (1969).