Relativity is by itself a very cross-disciplinary subject. Not only from the point view of Physics, Mathematics, Astrophysics, Philosophy... but also from that of Ethics, History and other Social Sciences.
For instance, why there has been no Nobel Prize awarded for the theory of relativity ? If Albert Einstein got the Nobel Prize in 1921, no mention of relativity was made :
http://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1921/
The Nobel Prize in Physics 1921 was awarded to Albert Einstein "for his services to Theoretical Physics, and especially for his discovery of the law of the photoelectric effect".
(end of quote)
Actually, a Nobel Prize for special relativity could well have been awarded already in the period 1905-1910. But then, it would have been impossible to ignore the role of the French mathematician Henri Poincaré. Who was against a Nobel Prize including Henri Poincaré ?
Henri Poincaré was not only "a mathematician" (and "not a physicist"), as seen by some of his French colleagues, but also the first cousin of the French politician Raymond Poincaré, who became later (in 1913) the President of the French Republic. Henri Poincaré died from an embolism in July 1912.
Relativity and beyond is indeed a vast subject.
Luis Gonzalez-Mestres
