Let see
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/michelson/michelson.html

I'm not sure what point you were making, but I've extracted the following from the abstract of the paper:

"...When these overlooked phenomena are taken into account, we see that a null result, in the Michelson-Morley experiment, is the natural consequence, resulting from the assumption of an absolute frame of reference and Galilean transformations. On the contrary, a shift of the interference fringes would be required in order to support Einstein’s relativity. Therefore, for the last century, the relativity theory has been based on a misleading calculation."

Are you saying that a re-interpretation of the M-M results suggests that "the theory of relativity has been based on a misleading calculation"? If so, the moderators may consider that a separate topic?

My argument is that there is a discrepancy between the accepted interpretation of the M-M results and Einstein's application of them. If there is evidence that the M-M results were misinterpreted originally, it sounds like that could support Einstein's usage. I can't see how that suggests that "relativity theory has been based on a misleading calculation"? At least, not within the context of this thread.

Well, based on the author claims that seem to answer your question.
What is the relevance of this to Einstein’s theory?

he goes futher with another demonstration.
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/brillet-hall/index.html

If so, the moderators may consider that a separate topic?
I dont know if it deserve another topic.Let the moderators decide if this answer your question or not.

Hi, Xiamnoblu. Apologies for the delay in responding. The question was intended to be rhetorical, because I went on to give my views of the relevance. However, I appreciate your input. A reinterpretation of the M-M results is an interesting idea.

I wouldn't take anything from that website provided by Xiamnoblu. The site claims, "We show that Michelson and Morley used an over simplified description and failed to notice that their calculation is not compatible with their own hypothesis that light is traveling at a constant velocity in all frames." I don't believe that this is an assumption made by Michelson and Morley. If the rest of the papers have such basic inaccuracies, then they are of little use.

Thanks for this input. You are right. M-M's assumption was that light would not travel at a constant velocity. Hence their surprise when they achieved a constant result.

You are in the realm of the relativistic wheel, with a rim traveling at near light speed. Sadly, this is not new idea. But if you have arrived at the idea on your own, then good thinking. Albert and others have explored it thoroughly. The big stumbling block for visualization is that the wheel, regardless of what it is made of, must be considered at the atomic level of individual atoms. That is, tiny little particles traveling at large fractions of c. Then all of SR and GR apply, including contraction in the direction of motion, and time dilation. Also there is a wicked rotation of the particle as it goes around the wheel, and various mechanical effects. Warning: Don’t try this at home.

There is a recent ATM thread about this.

I think you will appreciate that peer rewieved paper.

http://www.arxiv.org/pdf/astro-ph/0311576

If you go further in the text you can read....

"We acknowledge that, the basic idea suggested by Michelson-Morley to test the variance of space-time, using a comparison between the times taken by light to travel in the parallel direction with respect to a transverse direction is very attractive. However, this test is not valid, because there are two classical secondary phenomena, which have not been taken into account."

http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/michelson/michelson.html

Let see

The Michelson-Morley Experiment

"It is generally believed that the Michelson-Morley Experiment is a test to verify whether light takes the same time to travel an equal distance along the direction parallel to the velocity of the frame, than in the transverse direction. In the Michelson-Morley Experiment it is believed that a null result "proves" that the velocity of light is the same in both directions, as measured in the moving frame. There is so much confidence in the demonstration done by Michelson in 1887, that nobody bothers to make a thorough re-examination of that demonstration. In fact, if a paper is publish on that subject, nobody reads it, since all readers are convinced that nothing significantly new is expected to come out of such a paper. It is believed that the demonstration published by Michelson and Morley in the journal: "The American Journal of Physics" in November 1887 is obviously correct.
The Michelson-Morley demonstration is done using the analogy between the light trajectory traveling on perpendicular paths and a pair of swimmers, swimming crosswise and parallel to the water flow. Readers are so greatly fascinated by that comparison, that they overlook searching for differences. In fact there are at least two vital differences. "

More
http://www.newtonphysics.on.ca/faq/M...on-Morley.html

Hello X:

It looks like you like to jump into any thread and preach to gospel according to Paul Marmet. I find his work both comic and tragic. From the above URL:

>"When these overlooked phenomena are taken into account, we see that a null result, in the Michelson-Morley experiment, is the natural consequence, resulting from the assumption of an absolute frame of reference and Galilean transformations. On the contrary, a shift of the interference fringes would be required in order to support Einstein’s relativity."

Quite the switch! The null result means special relativity is wrong. That takes some imagination. One of the cool things about the Michelson-Morley experiment is that it is often done on a turntable. The null data was found at every possible angle.

Marmet is arguing that the light does not enter at a 90 degree angle. That argument sounds silly to me. The angle of the light is determined by a beam splitter, a good old mechanical device. The light, the table, the beam splitter, they are all moving, which makes his claims empty.

I don't expect X to accept this. So it goes in the ATM world.

doug

Most of the problems X and the like have with relativity and M-M stem from ignoring 100 years of confiming research since then. See Wiki on Michelson and Morley.

Welcome, belatedly, to BAUT, Xiamnoblu!

As jedaisoul has mentioned, the material you are introducing here is not, it seems, directly relevant to this thread.

If you wish to start a new thread, presenting an ATM idea based on (or related to) the posts you have made here, please do so. Before you do, please be sure to read the BAUT Rules For Posting To This Board, especially the one specific to this ATN section.

Thanks Nereid. I have not posted in this thread for a few days because the discussion seemed to have moved off-topic.

So far as the original topic is concerned, the discussion seems to have ended. As a newbie, I'm not certain whether it is normal for the originator to sum up a thread, but I'd like to have a go. Please feel free to object if you think I'm misrepresenting anything (I'm sure you would anyway)...

The original question was "Is there a conceptual flaw in the theory of relativity". I hope I've shown that there is a discrepancy between Lorentz's definition of the Lorentz effect and Einstein's application of it in his 1905 paper on Special Relativity. Whether that is a "flaw" depends to some extent on the purpose of scientific theories. I had hoped we'd get into a discussion on that point, but we did not. So please forgive me if I briefly touch on that...

It seems to me that a (the?) purpose of science is to expand our understanding of the universe in respect of what it is and how it works. However, it is perfectly legitimate for science to concentrate on "how it works". In that respect the discrepancy is not a flaw. It has no bearing on whether General Relativity accurately predicts physical phenomena. But conceptually there is a discrepancy, and that is relevant to the "what it is" objective.

Is that a fair summary? If so, I'd like to explore "what it is" in a future thread, without any preconceptions from SR or GR. I know that means stepping back a hundred years, but I hope that you will humour me. I hope you will find the ideas interesting, even if you are unlikely to be convinced by them...

My thanks to all of you who treated my ideas with respect, and contributed to this thread.

Hello jedaisoul:

Don't worry, there are no conceptual or empirical problems with special relativity, the physics of going fast. It can be tricky to learn, so don't feel bad if you have fallen into a small pit.

Do NOT focus on works from 1905! Like a human birth, the birth of an idea is messy. There is lots of drama, wrong things get said, and there is lots of extra slimy gunk around.

A much better approach is to find a few stellar teachers, and use their books. One I highly recommend is "Spacetime Physics" by Taylor and Wheeler. (an aside: two times so far when I have read someone's recommendation for a book on BAUT, I have jumped over to Amazon and got a used one. Books last long after I have clicked away from a web page.). I learned special relativity from Taylor as he was writing that very book, and he wanted feedback from the students. I also took classes on special relativity 3 times because it was that fun.

I have a rule which I always follow, but which is often skipped in discussions for the general public. The idea is that if you talk about any issue in special or general relativity, you MUST always define two things:

1. Those things that change in a way we understand (jargon: covariant quantities)
2. Those things that do not change in any way (jargon: invariant quantities)

Take for example Michelson and Morley's experiements. Do you know off the top of your head what fits into categories 1 and 2? For the readers who know the invariant - the speed of light c - but not the covariant quantities, don't feel bad. People often don't bring it up, which is very bad because there ain't no way to make logical sense of that experiment without knowing what does change. Blame bad teaching.

What changes is both the wavelength and the frequency of the light bouncing between the mirrors. In the direction of the spinning Earth, the wavelength has decreased, and the frequency has increased. It turns out that the amount of those changes - which can be measured - exactly cancel each other out so the velocity c is the same. Once I found that out, I was much more at peace with the experiment (something should change, and, well it does!).

There is a lot of sloppy talk on the net about clocks slowing down. Remember, your clock and my clock NEVER slow down. When we look at other people's clocks, we think that other people's clocks are not ticking like our clocks. The measurement of time is a Lorentz covariant quantity. What is the Lorentz invariant? It is known as the interval, and has this equation:

tau² = t² - x²/c² - y²/c² - z²/c²

All the different inertial observers will put different values of t, x, y, and z in here yet get the same results for tau. If the interval tau is new to you, you have to understand it to understand special relativity. Again, don't feel bad if the topic is not brought up often. It should be, every time, but alas, that is not the case.

A quick scan of this thread shows very little math, and that is a concern because these are math issues. Quite frankly, the words can confuse me, and I need to be looking at a wee bit of algebra to avoid getting sea sick. Not a LOT of algebra, but an equation to hold onto.

Special relativity is all about inertial observers, always travelling in a straight line, being free of acceleration. You'll see lots of "Lorentz"'s sprinkle around these parts: Lorentz transformation, the Lorentz invariant interval, yada, yada.

The next step is to skip out on all that inertial observer stuff. Up to this point, I have been true to the standard code of mainstream physics. Now I am going to put on my ATM hat in the name of logical consistency. My position is that for a noninertial observer, you MUST always define two things:

1. Those things that change in a way we understand (jargon: covariant quantities)
2. Those things that do not change in any way (jargon: invariant quantities)

In GR, and in my own work known as GEM, the interval tau changes for people located at different places in a gravitational field, so it is a covariant quantity. In my work, I know what remains invariant. The math here is so slick, it is hard to imagine making this up. Here goes...

Measure an interval, (dt, dx/c, dy/c, dz/c). Square it using the rules of quaternion algebra (basically like 3 complex numbers that share the same real, and an i, j ,k. Wikipedia for more):

(dt, dx/c, dy/c, dz/c)² =

(t² - x²/c² - y²/c² - z²/c²,
2 dt dx/c, 2 dt dy/c, 2 dt dz/c)

The first part is the interval, the second 3 terms don't have a name. Cool! Makes it feel like this is a discovery! I'll call it a 3-rope to make fun of people who work with strings.

If you are an inertial observer, and you change your inertial reference frame as happens in special relativity, then the interval is invariant and the 3-rope is covariant (we know exactly how it changes). In my GEM proposal, it is the interval that is covariant, and the 3-rope that is an invariant when the non inertial reference frame is changed due to gravity.

I should probably point this out more often, but it is another gem in GEM.

doug

good post

__________________
'The eye can only see what the mind is prepared to accept'

Hi Sweetser, I'm very grateful to have your input. I was hoping you would comment as you clearly have a far better grasp of the maths than I will ever have...

It is important (to me) to read the original works, as too many people make incorrect statements about what Einstein (and others) actually said. However, I acknowledge your second point. If there is a coherent conceptual argument in this book I will attempt to understand it. If it resorts to mathematics instead of words, I will get lost very quickly.

This is central to my understanding, and it is very welcome to hear you say it. There is no "real" discrepancy in the passage of time. The actual amount of time passing for all the observers is the same. I have a different way of expressing this which I intend to put in a thread, but first I intend to illustrate precisely this point in a thought experiment. Perhaps it's not ATM after all, but it is contrary to much of what I hear. So fot the time being I'll stick to the ATM section. I'm happy for you to say whether it is ATM, or just mainstream expressed a different way...

This is a difference beween you and me. You are a mathematician and need algebra to express your ideas. I'm a logician and need words. Algebra has a similar effect on me as words do to you.

However, I do not agree these are maths issues. Maths is context free. It is perfectly possible to describe n dimensional universes mathematically, but, as you have said, it bears no resenblance to reality. First and foremost these are conceptual issues. The maths is important in applying and using the ideas, but concepts are fundamental to understanding them.

Anyway, as I've said, I'm really grateful for your input, and hope that you will have time to comment on the threads I intend to raise to take these ideas forwards...

Hello jedaisoul:

The math in Taylor and Wheeler gets up to the high school algebra level. You do not need to know calculus. One of the central equations to know about is the one that is a variation on what the Egyptians knew:

d² = x² + y² + z²

To measure the distance between fingersnaps in spacetime, one uses this expression:

tau² = t² - x²/c² - y²/c² - z²/c²

The two things that make this topic difficult logically are the inclusion of time and those minus signs. Taylor and Wheeler look into a few of the consequences of this extension of the Egyptian's work.

Right now, we do not have images of most of the deep important issues in physics. It is my ATM opinion that there should be an animation of every equation that makes a confirmed prediction about anything in Nature. Should we ever reach that day, it will be more fun to visit a science museum.

doug