Hermann Minkowski and Special Relativity

Abstract

Hermann Minkowski was a mathematical physicist who believed that beauty and elegance were important in the mathematical expression of physical principles. Among his most important works and the work for which his name is, perhaps, best known is his beautiful reformulation of Einstein’s special relativity theory. The mathematical ideas and techniques introduced by Minkowski were fundamental in Einstein’s construction, a decade later, of the general theory of relativity. This paper explores the mathematical and physical development of “Minkowski Space-Time” and its application to Maxwell’s electromagnetic theory and which was presented in two fundamental papers by Minkowski shortly before his death in 1909.