Einstein's miracle year and relativity
A patent clerk's four papers lay the base of modern physics
In 1905 patent clerk Albert Einstein published four papers on the photoelectric effect, Brownian motion, special relativity and mass–energy equivalence (E = mc²). Together they laid the foundations of modern physics.
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Meanwhile around the world (±25 years)
Whole world
- 1914–1918 World War I — 9 years later
- 1918–1920 Spanish flu pandemic — 13 years later
- 1920 League of Nations founded — 15 years later
Eastern Europe & Russia
- 1905–1907 Russian Revolution of 1905 — same year
- 1908 Tunguska event — 3 years later
- 1917 October Revolution — 12 years later
- 1917–1922 Russian Civil War — 12 years later
- 1929–1933 Collectivization in the Soviet Union — 24 years later
Middle East
- 1905–1911 Persian Constitutional Revolution — same year
- 1908 Oil struck at Masjed Soleyman — 3 years later
- 1908 Young Turk Revolution — 3 years later
- 1915 Armenian genocide — 10 years later
- 1916 Sykes–Picot Agreement — 11 years later
Africa
- 1885 The Mahdists take Khartoum — 20 years earlier
- 1886 The Witwatersrand Gold Rush — 19 years earlier
- 1897 The British sack Benin City — 8 years earlier
- 1904–1908 The Herero and Nama genocide — 1 year earlier
- 1922 Discovery of Tutankhamun's tomb — 17 years later
Asia
- 1883 Eruption of Krakatoa — 22 years earlier
- 1885 Founding of the Indian National Congress — 20 years earlier
- 1894–1895 First Sino-Japanese War — 11 years earlier
- 1896–1898 Philippine Revolution — 9 years earlier
- 1911–1912 Xinhai Revolution — 6 years later
Americas
- 1903 Wright brothers' first flight — 2 years earlier
- 1906 San Francisco earthquake — 1 year later
- 1910–1920 Mexican Revolution — 5 years later
- 1914 Opening of the Panama Canal — 9 years later
- 1929 Wall Street Crash and the Great Depression — 24 years later
Oceania
- 1893 New Zealand women win the vote — 12 years earlier
- 1893 Overthrow of the Hawaiian Kingdom — 12 years earlier
- 1911 Amundsen reaches the South Pole — 6 years later
- 1912 The death of Scott's polar party — 7 years later
Alive at the time
- Leo Tolstoy (aged 77)
- Dmitri Mendeleev (aged 71)
- Thomas Edison (aged 58)
- Nikola Tesla (aged 49)
- Marie Curie (aged 38)
- Mahatma Gandhi (aged 36)
- Vladimir Lenin (aged 35)
- Ernest Rutherford (aged 34)
- Winston Churchill (aged 31)
- Joseph Stalin (aged 27)