Question: Who would you choose out of Isaac Newton and Albert Einstien?

Benjamin Bose answered on 14 Mar 2016:

I’d have to say Albert. To me, he was just the most ridiculous man to ever exist, and when I say ridiculous I mean in terms of achievement and insight.

It can be very easily argued that he should have won at least 3 Nobel prizes in his life (he only won one) – he won his Nobel prize in 1921 for work he did to show that light is actually made of ‘particles’ (photons). This was his photoelectric effect experiment BUT he never received a prize for his theory of gravity or his theory of special relativity or his mass energy equivalence (E=MC^2) or his work on Brownian motion, all of which groundbreaking and all of which incredibly correct.

In the past 25 years 2 more Nobel prizes were awarded to proving he was right. In 1993 a Nobel prize was awarded for indirect observation of gravitational waves – a prediction of HIS theory of gravity. In 2011 a Nobel prize was given to the discovery of the accelerated expansion of the universe – a prediction he called HIS greatest mistake (even his mistakes won Nobel prizes!) . And now with the direct detection of gravitational waves (100 years after he published his gravity theory) it’s very likely another Nobel prize will be awarded for HIS predictions. Note that these are prizes being awarded essentially for proving things he predicted were correct!

And when I mention the award of Nobel prize, it means people who represent the scientific community recognize this discovery as the most significant to science in that period. It’s a huge thing.

To emphasize even more (like I haven’t already), the hardest thing for people working in modified gravity is to overcome how good his theory of gravity is! It’s hard to believe a guy could be so correct. It’s almost easier to believe some alien from the future came and told him everything!

So like I said, he was just a ridiculous human being. Much more recent than Newton so perhaps I’m being biased, but I’d definitely choose him. Newton was amazing, and the father of gravity, so the choice should have been a bit closer than I probably made it seem haha.