Einstein, Durkheim, Russell and Chomsky: Science, Society and Language

1.1 Who are these four thinkers?

Albert Einstein was a physicist. Émile Durkheim was a sociologist. Bertrand Russell was a logician and philosopher. Noam Chomsky is a linguist.

A linguist studies human language. A sociologist studies how societies work. A logician studies the rules of correct reasoning.

1.2 What do they share?

Each began in one expert field. Each then said something important about right and wrong in public life.

Einstein and Russell warned the world about nuclear war. Durkheim showed that society shapes even private acts. Chomsky asked intellectuals to tell the truth about power.

2.1 When was he born, and what did he win?

Albert Einstein was born on 14 March 1879 in Ulm, Germany. He died on 18 April 1955 in Princeton, USA.

He won the Nobel Prize in Physics for 1921. The prize was for his services to theoretical physics. It named his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect. He received it one year later, in 1922.

2.2 What is the photoelectric effect?

When light falls on a metal, it can free tiny charged particles called electrons. This makes sparks jump more easily between metal electrodes.

Old theory said the strength of the light should matter most. Einstein explained something different. Light comes in packets called quanta. Each packet has a fixed energy that depends on its frequency.

One such packet is a photon. A photon needs a certain minimum frequency to free an electron. Weak light of high frequency can do what strong light of low frequency cannot.

3.1 Why did Einstein leave Germany?

Einstein stayed in Berlin until 1933. In that year he gave up his German citizenship for political reasons. He then went to America, as Professor of Theoretical Physics at Princeton.

He became a United States citizen in 1940.

3.2 What causes did he support after the war?

After the Second World War, Einstein was a leading figure in the World Government Movement. He was offered the Presidency of the State of Israel. He declined.

4.1 What was the manifesto?

It was a warning against nuclear war. It was issued in London on 9 July 1955. Einstein had died several months earlier.

Eleven people put their names to it, including Einstein and Russell. It urged peaceful settlement of disputes among nations.

4.2 What did it say?

It said the writers spoke “not as members of this or that nation, continent or creed, but as human beings”. It asked readers to set aside their loyalties for a moment.

It also warned about the new bombs. One A-bomb could obliterate Hiroshima. One H-bomb could obliterate the largest cities, such as London, New York and Moscow.

It asked readers to learn to think in a new way. The question was not how to win a war. The question was what steps can prevent a military contest that would be disastrous to all parties.

4.3 How did it end?

It put a plain choice to the world. It asked: “Shall we put an end to the human race: or shall mankind renounce war?” Then it closed with a short appeal.

The appeal was: “Remember your humanity, and forget the rest.”

5.1 Who was Bertrand Russell?

Bertrand Russell was born on 18 May 1872 at Trelleck. He was left an orphan at the age of three.

In 1903 he wrote his first important book, The Principles of Mathematics. With Alfred Whitehead he went on to extend the mathematical logic of Peano and Frege.

5.2 Why was he jailed?

During the First World War he took an active part in the No Conscription Fellowship. He was fined £100.

In 1918 he was sentenced to six months in prison for a pacifist article. Pacifism means opposing war. He wrote his Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy (1919) in prison.

5.3 How was he honoured?

Russell won the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1950. The prize was for his varied and significant writings in which he champions humanitarian ideals and freedom of thought.

The Nobel page calls him a defender of freedom of speech and freedom of thought. It notes that his views were often controversial.

6.1 Who was Émile Durkheim?

Émile Durkheim was born in April 1858 in Épinal, France. At Bordeaux he taught the first official sociology courses in France.

His major works include The Rules of Sociological Method, Suicide and The Elementary Forms of Religious Life.

6.2 What is a social fact?

A social fact is a pattern that belongs to a society, not to one person. Durkheim said society cannot be explained in biological or psychological terms.

In Suicide (1897) he treated the suicide rate as such a fact. He said each society has a definite aptitude for suicide, which can be measured as a rate.

6.3 What did he find about religion?

He compared Protestant and Catholic areas of Western Europe. Where Protestants were most numerous, the suicide rate was highest. Where Catholics predominated, it was much lower.

He explained this by integration. The stronger the integration of a religious community, the greater its preservative value. Being bound to a group protects people.

7.1 What are the three kinds of suicide?

His book centres on three types: egoistic, altruistic and anomic. The egoistic person sees nothing real in the world besides the individual.

The altruistic person acts from a serene conviction that duty requires it. The anomic type comes when social rules break down.

7.2 What is anomie?

Anomie means social deregulation. The rules that guide people stop working.

Durkheim said even good change can cause it. He wrote that every disturbance of equilibrium is “an impulse to voluntary death”. This holds even if it brings greater comfort.

7.3 What is the collective conscience?

Durkheim used the French term conscience collective. It is translated as collective conscience or collective consciousness.

It is a fusion of individual consciences. Once formed, it follows its own laws.

8.1 Who is Noam Chomsky?

Avram Noam Chomsky was born in Philadelphia in 1928. He worked for decades at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

In 1957 he published Syntactic Structures. His work gradually changed the field of linguistics.

8.2 What is universal grammar?

Chomsky argued that language is an innate and universal human property. Innate means a person is born with it. Universal means all people share it.

He compared it to the organs of the body. It develops as a person matures. All languages are variations on a Universal Grammar. They differ only in surface details.

8.3 Is the theory accepted by everyone?

No. Chomsky’s programme has been revolutionary but contentious. Critics say he discounts the diversity of human languages.

9.1 What did he write in 1967?

On 23 February 1967 The New York Review of Books printed his essay The Responsibility of Intellectuals. It dealt with scholars and the Vietnam War.

He wrote: “Intellectuals are in a position to expose the lies of governments.” He said they have the power that comes from political liberty. They also have access to information and freedom of expression.

9.2 What did he say in 2011?

In a lecture at MIT he updated that essay. He said, “You should hold yourselves to the same standards that you apply to others.”

He called this the principle of universality. He said it is almost universally approved in words and almost universally rejected in practice.

9.3 Did he act on his views?

Yes. He was heavily involved in the anti-war movement over Vietnam. He was arrested several times.

10.1 How do the ideas compare?

The last column is the ethical lesson a student can draw from each person.

Use this table to link each name to one idea and one lesson.