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Cool Books Einstein’s Mistakes “Almost all of Einstein’s seminal works contain mistakes,” writes Hans C. Ohanian, in his new book, reviewed by Darrin M. McMahon in the Wall Street Journal. “Sometimes small mistakes — mere lapses of attention — sometimes fundamental failures to understand the subtleties of his own creations and sometimes fatal mistakes that undermined the logic of his arguments,” he continues. In the book, aptly titled, Einstein’s Mistakes, Hans notes that Einstein neither discovered nor ever totally proved his famous equation, E=mc2. The equation actually had been around “for several years” before Einstein wrote about in 1905, and it wasn’t until 1911 that another, physicist, Max von Laue, proved it. However, his point is not to discredit Einstein, but rather to provide insight into his “‘mystical, intuitive’ approach to problem-solving. That approach, coupled with a stubborn disposition and irreverent attitude toward established truths, meant Einstein could be right even when he was wrong.” “He may never have come up with a perfect proof of E=mc2, but his certainty that the equation was true led him farther than any physicist of the 20th century.” It was “Einstein’s ability to make use of his mistakes as ‘stepping stones and shortcuts’ that was central to his success.” The Success Effect “How many people get to ask questions of others for a living, and then get paid to ponder, analyze, and report on the thoughts and insights within their answers?” asks John Eckberg in the introduction to The Success Effect. That’s exactly how John, a business columnist for the Cincinnati Enquirer, makes his living. But he says he doesn’t see it as work. “It’s a job, of course,” he writes, “but it’s more like being paid to be a lifelong, curious five-year-old.” Take Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, the Steely Dan guitarist turned consultant to the U.S. Department of Defense. Jeff says his musician’s ability to improvise made his unlikely career turn possible. Or Donald Trump, who moved to Cincinnati for a year to manage a “miserable” apartment complex. Why? Simply because he “had a job to do.” As John puts it, “True stories are always more compelling than fiction, and so, too, I found, with these conversations about the corners of American commerce.” Bumping into Geniuses In his new book, Danny Goldberg uses one word to describe Neil Young, Patti Smith and, perhaps most of all, Kurt Cobain of Nirvana … and that word is “genius,” reports Jody Rosen in the New York Times. So, no surprise that his book is titled, Bumping into Geniuses, and chronicles Danny’s various close encounters with rock stars and legends. Danny got his start “compiling chart data” at Billboard magazine, and got his big break covering Woodstock. From there, Danny “did time as a rock critic, P.R. flack and personal manger, before his stints as president of Atlantic, chairman of Warner Brothers Records and president of Mercury Records.” On the one hand, Danny recalls Lee Abrams, whose “album-oriented-rock format … made multi-platinum successes of critically maligned groups like Boston, Kansas and Foreigner.” On the other hand, he observes that Bob Dylan’s decision to go electric was at least as much about marketing as it was about art — “he wanted in on the Beatles’ chart success.” And then there’s the late Kurt Cobain. According to Danny, Cobain’s bandmate, Krist Novoselic said Kurt actually “wanted to make it big” more than anyone else in the band, and even edited a press kit “to emphasize the band’s sense of humor and broaden its mainstream appeal … Beneath Cobain’s punk-rock glower … lurked a savvy brand-management specialist.” --
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