Michele Besso - Biography

Michele Angelo Besso (25 May 1873 Riesbach – 15 March 1955 Geneva) was a Swiss/Italian engineer of Jewish Italian (Sephardi) descent. He was a close friend of Albert Einstein during his years at the Federal Polytechnic Institute in Zurich, today the ETH Zurich, and then at the patent office in Bern. Besso is credited with introducing Einstein to the works of Ernst Mach, the sceptical critic of physics who influenced Einstein's approach to the discipline. Einstein called Besso "the best sounding board in Europe" for scientific ideas.

At Besso's funeral Albert Einstein made his now famous quote "Now Besso has departed from this strange world a little ahead of me. That means nothing. People like us, who believe in physics, know that the distinction between past, present and future is only a stubbornly persistent illusion"

See also

• Einstein's Dreams

Notes

<references/>

• American Institute of Physics - The Center for History of Physics: Einstein, Image and Impact: The Formative Years, 3
• PhysicsWeb - "1905: Einstein's paper revolution". Review by Werner Israel (October 1998) of Einstein's Miraculous Year: Five Papers That Changed the Face of Physics (ed) John Stachel
• BBC World Service: Jottings Of A Genius
• The Einstein-Besso Manuscript: A Glimpse Behind the Curtain of the Wizard