ELI5: Explain Like I'm 5

History of general relativity

Alright, kiddo, today we're gonna talk about something called the history of general relativity. Now, do you know what gravity is? It's the force that pulls everything towards each other. Like, how you feel pulled towards the ground when you're sitting or standing.

But did you know that there was a scientist named Albert Einstein who figured out something really cool about gravity? He said that gravity isn't just a force that pulls things together, it's actually something called spacetime bending.

Now, spacetime is like a big blanket that everything is on. And when there is a really heavy object, like a planet or star, it creates a dip or a hole in the blanket. And that's what we feel as gravity - being pulled towards the heavy object.

Einstein had this idea a long time ago, in 1915. He wrote down some equations that explained how objects move in this warped spacetime. But it took a few years for him to really figure out all the details. He had to work through some really complicated math to really explain what was going on.

But even when Einstein had all the math worked out, it was really hard for other scientists to understand what he was talking about. It's like trying to explain a really hard puzzle to someone who hasn't seen it before.

Eventually though, other scientists started doing experiments to test Einstein's new ideas. They found that he was right - the way things move in space really is affected by things like big planets or stars.

And so, over the years, Einstein's theory of general relativity has become one of the most important ideas in all of science. It's helped us understand the movements of planets, stars, and galaxies. It's even helped us develop new technologies like GPS!

So, in summary, Einstein was a really smart scientist who figured out that gravity is actually caused by the bending of spacetime. It took him a while to explain it to everyone else, but now we all know that he was right.