Abstract

Albert Einstein read philosophy. It was not an affectation of a celebrity-physicist trying to show his adoring public that he was no mere technician, but a cultured thinker. It was an interest in evidence from the start. In 1902, Einstein was a poorly paid patent examiner in Bern seeking to make a few extra Francs by offering tutorials in physics. Maurice Solovine answered the advertisement. The tutorials quickly vanished when they discovered their common fascinations in reading and talking. They were soon joined in their raucous meetings by Conrad Habicht, completing what they dubbed their “Olympia Academy.” Their explorations where wide-ranging, devouring texts and sausages with gusto. They read the philosophers and philosophically-minded scientists of the day, including Pearson, Mach, Hill, Hume, Spinoza, Avenarius, Cifford and Poincaré