Translingual

Three-meter-tall sculpture of Einstein's 1905 E = mc² formula at the 2006 Walk of Ideas, Berlin, Germany

Pronunciation

• English: IPA^(key): /ˈʔi.ʔikwəlˌz.ɛm.ˌsi.jˈskweɹd/, /ˈiːkwəlˌz.ɛm.ˌsij.ˈskweɹd/

Phrase

E=mc²

1. An equation discovered by Albert Einstein that shows how mass and energy are related.
   • 1999, Mary Lynn Damhorst, Kimberly A. Miller-Spillman, Kimberly A. Miller, The Meanings of Dress, p. 351:

     "Beauty isn't about looking young." OK, so it's not E=mc² or even Newton's apple. But coming as it does from a top cosmetics company, it does represent an attitude readjustment that makes Saul's change of heart on the road to Damascus look like a passing fancy.

See also

• mass-energy (English)

English

Noun

E=mc²

1. Any formulation or realization that captures a profound thought in simple terms.
   • 2001, Neil Henry, Pearl's Secret: A Black Man's Search for His White Family, p. 282:

     What counted most through the generations, far more than any other factor, regardless of our race, was how we treated those we loved and how well we loved. That seemed the transcendent lesson or moral that my search had revealed. And it held true whether the figure was my mother or Fredda on one side of our family tree, or Rita or Anna Beaumont on the other. Simple as it was, it was my E = mc².

   • 2006, Jeff Byles, Rubble: Unearthing the History of Demolition, p. 70:

     Loizeaux's battle plan remains formidably elegant, the E = MC² of demolition.

   • 2010. Stephen Batchelor, Confession of a Buddhist Atheist, p. 154:

     If conditioned arising was the e = mc² of Gotama's vision, the eightfold path was his first move in translating that axiom from an abstract principle into a civilizing force.