ABSTRACT
This chapter starts to ramp things up and begin to think about information and computation using a relative, rather than absolute, framework. Ultimately this leads to Einstein's door, but before we head in that immediate direction it is right to hold back for a while and fully appreciate where his groundbreaking ideas came from. The chapter pays tribute to James Clerk Maxwell, the nineteenth-century Scottish theoretical physicist and mathematician, as there's a remarkable parallel between Maxwell's development of the field equations of electromagnetism and Einstein's development of the field equations of general relativity. By introducing a corrective term similar to Maxwell's displacement current Einstein managed to bring back harmony to his theory. Another stop off on the road to relativity finds us recognising the great influence that David Hilbert had on Einstein's work. By early summer 1915, Hilbert's interest in physics brought him to relativity, and he invited Einstein to Gttingen to deliver a week of lectures on the subject.
