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Comment by kgarten | Hacker News Reader

Don’t understand the downvote. for a hacker it seems Tesla is a much more interesting and sympathetic figure than Edison. Also I don’t like putting emphasis on individual people ... the genius of Edison is also related to the genius of other people surrounding him and living during the same time. What would Einstein have been without Goedel etc.? We don’t know .... we don’t understand the influences.

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> What would Einstein have been without Goedel?

Gödel was a child when the theory of relativity was formalized.

> Gödel was a child when the theory of relativity was formalized

Relativity does away with the concept of simultaneity. Your statement may be true but unprovable :)

Einstein developing general relativity exists in both the past and future light cone of Gödel being a child.

Happy? :)

Sorry, it might have been a misleading example. Yet, for me Goedel showed actually the impact of the field equations of Einstein. Still I don't like the narrative of the genius ... It takes a lot of intelligent people to create sth. lasting. Goedel and Einstein contributed a lot to our current understanding of maths and phsysics (as well as a lot of forgotten geniuses).

interfixus has a point as well. If time is relative, you cannot be sure about your statement :)

Einstein became a worldwide celebrity in 1919 and was super well known among scientists and interested laypeople before that. Godel was 12 in 1919 and had yet to do anything of note.

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