Einstien's Relativity Error

[Sam5]

The constancy of the speed of light is one of the two basic postulates of SR. No matter how many times Einstein revised his papers, Sam, he never changed this postulate.


He changed it in 1911 and he kept the change in his 1916 GR paper and he mentioned it in his 1916 book. He knew very well after 1911 that the speed of light is not a constant in space, because by then he knew that strong gravity fields slow down the speed of light. This is universally accepted now, and in books and threads about black holes you can find this information. The light travels slow when leaving the surface of a massive body, and it speeds up when it gets away from the surface. Light travel so slow at the surface of a balck hole, it never escapes.

[AstroSmurf]

Sam5, would you care to explain where your theory predicts the MM experiment would give a non-null result? "Deep space" is, well, to call it vague would be overly generous.

[Sam5]

Sam5, would you care to explain where your theory predicts the MM experiment would give a non-null result? "Deep space" is, well, to call it vague would be overly generous.

It could give a non-null result if their apparatus were moved rapidly here at the surface of the earth. It could give a non-null result anywhere it is moving relative to the local medium.

We don’t notice the c – v or c + v effect here at the earth, because it takes place in deep space, such as when the earth is moving relative to a star that is fixed relative to the sun. The light travels through space at about c, the earth is moving toward the oncoming light, where the interface between the earth’s local medium blends with the local medium of the sun the c + v light (the speed relative to the earth) changes speed to c relative to the earth, and this is where the blueshift takes place.

What Michelson and Morley did was like running a flag up an indoor flagpole and wondering why it did not wave due to an 18.6 mps wind.

[Tensor]

Light travel so slow at the surface of a balck hole, it never escapes.

There is another way to explain it. At or within the event horizon (there is no "surface" to a black hole) , gravity curves the path of the light (which is traveling at c) so much that the light's path never gets beyond the event horizon.

[Eta C]

The constancy of the speed of light is one of the two basic postulates of SR. No matter how many times Einstein revised his papers, Sam, he never changed this postulate.


He changed it in 1911 and he kept the change in his 1916 GR paper and he mentioned it in his 1916 book. He knew very well after 1911 that the speed of light is not a constant in space, because by then he knew that strong gravity fields slow down the speed of light. This is universally accepted now, and in books and threads about black holes you can find this information. The light travels slow when leaving the surface of a massive body, and it speeds up when it gets away from the surface. Light travel so slow at the surface of a balck hole, it never escapes.

Your understanding of how gravity effects light is naive at best. Gravity will indeed bend light, but it doesn't "slow it down." An observer outside a black hole does not see light from inside because the warping of space-time causes light be be trapped in an "orbit" around the hole (to make my own naive picture, this really isn't the case). An observer inside the Schwartzhild radius would see light moving away from himself at c and have no way of determining his motion relative to any hypothetical ether or even knowing he was inside the radius.

As to Einstein believing that gravity changed the speed of light, I think that this is your misinterpretation of his theories. Since you're so conversant with his papers, I invite you to post an exact quote where the man himself states this. I'm willing to bet that even should such a quote seem to exist that the error is in your interpretation, not in the quote.

As to your explanation of the doppler effect, again I quote you:
Wavelength chaange is a Doppler effect, and the Doppler laws require the speed to shift.
Sure sounds to me as if you think the doppler effect requires shift in velocity in the classical sense. My post was intended to point out that they don't. Again, I'll state my argument point by point.

1) All observers measure the same speed for light regardless of the motion of its source.
2) This means they cannot measure their speed relative to any hypothetical medium.
3) This means that they cannot determine any properties of that medium.
4) Therefore it is reasonable to believe that no such medium exists (or to put it conversly it is unreasonable to believe that such a medium doesexist).

You argue that this is a local effect and that the bending of light by gravity wells implies a change in its speed and therefore there is an interstellar medium. I argue that the bending of light does not change its speed and that any papers you quote to the contrary are either wrong or mis-interpreted by by you.

[Sam5]

So, to sum up. The constancy of the speed of light is one of the two basic postulates of SR.

You need to understand that the original SR theory was close, but not exactly accurate. It was close because it was a copy of and a modification of the 1895 Lorentz theory. It was not accurate because in it Einstein modified the Lorentz theory too much.

SR theory became more accurate as Einstein modified it in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, and 1920.

By 1918 Einstein had modified it so much, he had turned it into the GR theory (especially regarding the clocks), so the original SR theory no longer existed after 1918.

I’ve explained before why the local speed of light at the surface of an astronomical body is measured to be “c” at various elevations, even though local light speed is slower at lower elevations than at higher elevations.

Atoms emit light. Light speed is slow in a strong gravity field. Atomic oscillation rates are also slow in a strong gravity field. So, a slow ticking atomic clock will measure the slow local speed of light in the same gravity field to be “c”. But, if you use one clock as your base clock, and if you measure light speed traveling around in space at different places, just as Shapiro did, then you can determine that light speed changes as it moves in and out of various gravity fields. Einstein discovered this in 1911 and this became a fundamental feature of his GR theory. I know this is a little confusing, but I hope you can understand what I’m talking about.

When Einstein first deduced this unusual situation about the speed of light slowing down where atomic oscillation rates (atomic clocks) show down, he said, “The principle of the constancy of the velocity of light holds good according to this theory in a different form from that which usually underlies the ordinary theory of relativity.”

A year later, Max Abraham mentioned this in one of his papers, when he said, “Already before period of one year A. Einstein, by accepting an influence of the gravitation potential on the speed of light, gave up the postulate of the constant speed of light essential for his earlier theory 1); in a work appeared recently 2)......”

Do you undertand now that the 1905 postulate was overturned and changed in 1911 and has been changed ever since 1911?

You can not continue to read the 1905 theory and think that Einstein never changed it. I’ve got the papers in which he changed it. You need to study those papers and realize how he changed it.

[Tensor]

By 1918 Einstein had modified it so much, he had turned it into the GR theory (especially regarding the clocks), so the original SR theory no longer existed after 1918.

So you are saying that Newtonian gravitational theory no longer exsists either, right?

You can not continue to read the 1905 theory and think that Einstein never changed it.

Well, he changed how he explained the math. But you have yet to show us exactly where he changed the math of SR.

I’ve got the papers in which he changed it. You need to study those papers and realize how he changed it.

You keep showing papers that explain it differently, but not how the math is different. And you have yet to explain why if Relative non accelerated motion cannot cause time dilation in SR, why relative non-accelerated motion can cause it in GR.

[Sam5]

Gravity will indeed bend light, but it doesn't "slow it down."

These guys explain the situation properly. If you can’t understand what they are saying, then I suggest that you ask them to explain it to you in a simpler way, or just face the fact that you might not be able to understanding these complex concepts.

LINK (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:bRQvl1A7hzsJ:www.physlink.com/Education/AskExperts/ae13.cfm+gravitational+potential+light+speed&hl=en &ie=UTF-8)

“Contrary to intuition, the speed of light (properly defined) decreases as the black hole is approached. In fact, one way to understand the bending of light by the gravitational field of a star is to regard it as resulting from the refraction of the wavefront due to the fact that the part of the wavefront that is nearer to the star moves more slowly than the part farther away from the star.”

“So, it is absolutely true that the speed of light is _not_ constant in a gravitational field [which, by the equivalence principle, applies as well to accelerating (non-inertial) frames of reference]. If this were not so, there would be no bending of light by the gravitational field of stars.”

LINK (http://66.102.7.104/search?q=cache:Z48FPjGkBWoJ:www.physicspost.com/articles.php%3FarticleId%3D101%26page%3D12+light+s lows+down+physics+near+sun&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)

“The light pulse moves with a velocity less than "c" along the curve relative to reference observers far away, but it still travels with the velocity "c" to the slower aging observers on the local metric since their clocks run slower and they are aging slower. I can't draw speed into the picture, so you'll need to imagine that in figure 25, the light pulse slows down as the wavelength decreases.”

[Taibak]

So, to sum up. The constancy of the speed of light is one of the two basic postulates of SR.

You need to understand that the original SR theory was close, but not exactly accurate. It was close because it was a copy of and a modification of the 1895 Lorentz theory. It was not accurate because in it Einstein modified the Lorentz theory too much.

What's so special about the Lorentz theory? Last I checked, that theory made several egregiously inaccurate predictions, which just shows that Lorentz was wrong.

SR theory became more accurate as Einstein modified it in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, and 1920.

By 1918 Einstein had modified it so much, he had turned it into the GR theory (especially regarding the clocks), so the original SR theory no longer existed after 1918.

No, that's not what he did. In 1905, Einstein clearly stated that SR only applied to inertial reference frames. That shows that he was aware from the very beginning that the theory did not hold for an accelerating object, nor did it hold when a gravitational influence was present. His work on the theory between 1905 and 1916 was an attempt to extend the theory to account for those situations. You need to understand that general relativity reduces to special relativity in any situation with neither gravity nor acceleration. You've said before that you don't understand the math and - forgive me for being blunt - but that's a huge problem here. It's not enough to read the theories. You need to understand the math and when you do you'll see where you're wrong.

Incidentally, special relativity is still used. Like others have mentioned, it accurately predicts the extended lifetimes of muons and pions travelling at high speeds and does so without using general relativity. Lorentz's theory, on the other hand, is pretty much just a historical bit of information en route to SR.

I’ve explained before why the local speed of light at the surface of an astronomical body is measured to be “c” at various elevations, even though local light speed is slower at lower elevations than at higher elevations.

Atoms emit light. Light speed is slow in a strong gravity field. Atomic oscillation rates are also slow in a strong gravity field. So, a slow ticking atomic clock will measure the slow local speed of light in the same gravity field to be “c”. But, if you use one clock as your base clock, and if you measure light speed traveling around in space at different places, just as Shapiro did, then you can determine that light speed changes as it moves in and out of various gravity fields. Einstein discovered this in 1911 and this became a fundamental feature of his GR theory. I know this is a little confusing, but I hope you can understand what I’m talking about.

I understand what you're talking about, and you're still wrong. For starters, you're overlooking the true nature of light. Atoms don't emit continuous wavelengths - they emit individual photons (and yes, light can act as a particle). Once the photon has been emitted, it travels at c. The rate at which the atom emits photons is completely irrelevant once the photons are emitted.

When Einstein first deduced this unusual situation about the speed of light slowing down where atomic oscillation rates (atomic clocks) show down, he said, “The principle of the constancy of the velocity of light holds good according to this theory in a different form from that which usually underlies the ordinary theory of relativity.”

Exactly - it's 'in a different form.' That doesn't mean it doesn't exist in GR.

A year later, Max Abraham mentioned this in one of his papers, when he said, “Already before period of one year A. Einstein, by accepting an influence of the gravitation potential on the speed of light, gave up the postulate of the constant speed of light essential for his earlier theory 1); in a work appeared recently 2)......”

No dice. You need to provide the rest of that sentence. I suspect that you're taking things out of context again.

Do you undertand now that the 1905 postulate was overturned and changed in 1911 and has been changed ever since 1911?

I understand what you're saying, but I remain unconvinced that what you're saying is right. Every single version of general relativity I've ever seen - including Einstein's work on the subject - insists that light travels at a constant speed. In addition, other successful theories - most notable quantum mechanics - rely on c being a constant. None of those theories have yet to be proven wrong.

You can not continue to read the 1905 theory and think that Einstein never changed it. I’ve got the papers in which he changed it. You need to study those papers and realize how he changed it.

Bull. You're thinking like an historian and not like a physicist. If you want to talk about how Einstein developed his theories over time, you need to study the intervening papers. If you want to study the theories for the science, you ONLY need to look at their final form. That means the 1905 paper for special relativity and the 1916 paper for general relativity.


And I'm still waiting for answers to my list of questions on page seven.

[Eta C]

Read the rest of the quote. It goes on to say that a local observer would measure light moving at c which is what I've been saying.
The reason for the qualification 'properly defined' above is that the speed of light depends upon the vantage point (frame of reference) of the observer. When we say that the speed of light is decreased, we mean from the perspective of an observer fixed relative to the black hole and at an essentially infinite distance. On the contrary, to an observer free falling into the black hole, the speed of light, measured locally, would be unaltered from the standard value of c.

Which sounds a lot like what I said in my post.

You take the next step to say that this implies an ether. I say that it's perfectly described by the bending of space-time. The link says as much.

Local inertial frames in general relativity are just those frames of reference in which the observer is in gravitational free fall. A fancy way of looking at it is that the _local_ frame of reference of a free falling observer corresponds to a small patch of _flat_ spacetime tangent to the globally curved spacetime. As long as the observer confines measurements to a small enough local region, the approximation provided by the small tangent patch of flat spacetime can be made to be an arbitrarily good approximation to the true spacetime, which is actually curved in the main. The speed of light in flat spacetime is, of course, the usual value of c.

For example, if one had a closed laboratory in orbit (i.e., in free fall) around the earth and one did an experiment inside that laboratory to measure the speed of light, one would get the usual published value of c. All such observers would get one and the same value for c.


Nowhere in the quote is there anything to support your idea of local ethers, or even a mention of an ether. That's your interpretation. If you asked Dr. Davis, who wrote the quote, if the change in light speed inferred an ether he'd probably laugh in your face.

Now I will admit I wasn't overly clear in my dogmatic insistance on the constancy of the speed of light. But I hope this clears it up some more. In any case, my point from the earlier post stands. You try to support your view of the existance of an ether based on mis-interpretations of other work.

[Normandy6644]

He changed it in 1911 and he kept the change in his 1916 GR paper and he mentioned it in his 1916 book. He knew very well after 1911 that the speed of light is not a constant in space, because by then he knew that strong gravity fields slow down the speed of light.

SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space, only that all observers will see light as c regardless of motion in a locally flat reference frame. Gravity isn't involved!! He did not know about gravity slowing down light until he worked on GR, and this did not cause him to go back and "change" SR because GR, as we have said many times, is an extension of SR to cover curved manifolds.

We don’t notice the c – v or c + v effect here at the earth, because it takes place in deep space, such as when the earth is moving relative to a star that is fixed relative to the sun. The light travels through space at about c, the earth is moving toward the oncoming light, where the interface between the earth’s local medium blends with the local medium of the sun the c + v light (the speed relative to the earth) changes speed to c relative to the earth, and this is where the blueshift takes place

We don't notice it because it doesn't happen. Einstein introduced the c+v, c-v in SR to show why Galilean relatitity doesn't work at high speeds. Before you tell me to "Go read Einstein's papers" etc, from Einstein's Relativity: The Special and General Theory on page 23,

In view of this dilemma there appears to be nothing else for it than to abandon either the principle of relativity or the simple law of the propagation of light in vacuo. Those of you who have carefully followed the preceeding discussion are almost sure to expect that we should retain the principle of relativity...The law of propagation of light in vacuo would then have to be replaced by a more compicated law comforable to the principle of relativity.

...and this is exactly how special relativity came to be. It was the solution to the problem of the constancy of the speed of light, introduced mostly by Lorentz, and the principle of relativity. That's his story, and he stuck to it.

[Sam5]

Read the rest of the quote. It goes on to say that a local observer would measure light moving at c which is what I've been saying.
The reason for the qualification 'properly defined' above is that the speed of light depends upon the vantage point (frame of reference) of the observer. When we say that the speed of light is decreased, we mean from the perspective of an observer fixed relative to the black hole and at an essentially infinite distance. On the contrary, to an observer free falling into the black hole, the speed of light, measured locally, would be unaltered from the standard value of c.

Which sounds a lot like what I said in my post.



No, it’s not the same thing that you said in your post.

You said, “I argue that the bending of light does not change its speed”. You also said, “The constancy of the speed of light is one of the two basic postulates of SR.”

It is the speed of light change at the sun or any astronomical body that bends the light. So the speed of light does change as it passes near the sun or any other astronomical body.

You don’t seem to be able to understand the complex situations involved, but let me try to explain it again.

First, atomic clocks “tick” at different rates (i.e. atoms oscillate at various rates), depending on what type of gravity field they are in. They tick fast in a weak field, and they tick slow in a strong field.

Ok, next, light speed changes as light beams (photons/waves) travel though the various gravity fields of space.

It just so happens in nature that atomic clocks slow down their rates in the same gravity fields where light speed slows down, and this causes a slow ticking atomic clock, located inside a gravity field, to measure the local photon speed at the place where that clock is located to be “c”, even though the photon is slowing down at that place.

So, you can say that atomic clocks will “measure” the local speed of light to be “c” at the places where the clocks are located, but you can not say that the speed of light in space is “always c”.

This, at first, might seem to be a contradiction, but it is not. If you use your own atomic clock, where ever you are located, to measure the speed of light (or a radar signal) when it leaves the earth and bounces off Venus and returns to the earth, as long as the signal does not pass near the sun, you will measure a certain normal time for the round trip. But if you send the signal out so that it passes near the sun, the return of the signal will be slightly delayed, because the signal slows down slightly as it passes through the sun’s gravity field.

If you use an atomic clock based at the sun, the clock will measure “c” for the speed of the signal as it passes right past that particular clock, even though the signal speed is slowed down at that place near the sun. The reason you will measure “c” with that particular clock at that particular location at the sun is because that atomic clock “tick” rate is slowed down slightly at the place where it is located, and the speed of the EM signal at that place is also slowed down.

This seems to be one of the most difficult parts of GR theory for people to understand.

[Normandy6644]

This seems to be one of the most difficult parts of GR theory for people to understand.

I would have gone with differential geometry, but to each his own. :lol:

[Sam5]

SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space,

The 1905 SR theory specifically states:

”light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c”

I’m not going to debate you when you make up your own stuff and claim that SR theory says something that it does not say.

[swansont]

An obvious conclusion drawn from the results of this experiment is that the “ether” could be a “local” phenomenon, with the earth’s local ether being earth-centered and moving through space with the earth, just as the earth’s electric, magnetic, and gravitational fields are earth-centered and move through space with the earth. Just as the earth’s atmosphere is earth-centered and moves through space with the earth. If this is the case, then at the surfaces of all astronomical bodies, the local speed of light will be determined by the locally-based “ether”.


According to Dr. Su, the earth-based gravity-related “ether” does not rotate with the earth.

Which is it Sam? Are moving through an ether or aren't we? Earth rotation through an ether should give a fringe shift in the M-M experiment. Gotta pick one here. Does it rotate with the earth or not?

[Tensor]

This seems to be one of the most difficult parts of GR theory for people to understand.

I thought you had trouble with the math.

[Eta C]

Excuse me for not adding all of the necessary qualifiers, (empty space, inertial frame, no gravitational field, etc.) The point remains. Regardless of where he is located, empty space, or the center of a black hole, a local observer will see light emitted at a speed c. Your own source said so although you chose to omit that part of the quote.

I still see no need to add a medium for light when no experiment can observe it and the the curvature of space-time as defined in GR explains the gravitational bending of light and its slowing down (as observed elsewhere) perfectly well. No need to bring clocks and other stuff into this at all. Also no need to patronize me. I'm a physicist and I understand the issues perfectly well, if not better, than you, although I don't always make myself clear in the posts I make in a hurry.

So, I'll state my points again (slightly modified to make up for my earlier omission). I challenge you to come up with an experimental observation that contradicts them and requires an ether to exist. The burden is on you to explain why GR does not explain the observation as well, if not better, than your hypothesizing.

1) A local observer always sees light moving at a speed c.
2) Because of this it is impossible for him to observe any motion relative to a medium.
3) Therefore there is no need to postulate a medium for the transmittal of light.
4) Light from distant sources does appear to move slower than c due to the effects of gravity. However, this effect is well described by GR and does not require any interstellar ether for explanation.
5) Since we cannot observe any local medium, and distant effects can be explained with requiring the existance of a medium, said medium does not exist.

[Sam5]

According to Dr. Su, the earth-based gravity-related “ether” does not rotate with the earth.

Which is it Sam? Are moving through an ether or aren't we? Earth rotation through an ether should give a fringe shift in the M-M experiment. Gotta pick one here. Does it rotate with the earth or not?

MM’s interferometer wasn’t sensitive enough to notice a 700 or so mph motion. It was set up to detect an 18.6 mps motion. More sensitive interferometers have detected the shift due to the movement of the apparatus caused by the earth’s rotation.

See this:

“Using a neutron interferometer of the type first developed by Bonse and Hart for x rays, we have observed the effect of Earth's rotation on the phase of the neutron wave function. This experiment is the quantum mechanical analog of the optical interferometry observations of Michelson, Gale, and Pearson.”

LINK (http://prola.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v42/i17/p1103_1)

Also see:

LINK (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:O-BFyPNC6dIJ:arxiv.org/abs/physics/0208082+local+ether+su+Sagnac&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)

And also:

LINK (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:WtydZFgEB7EJ:www.eps.org/aps/meet/MAR00/baps/abs/S5110007.html+local+ether+su+Sagnac&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)

[TheAtomium]

...

Tensor and I agree that under the terms of the SR theory, I will see the other guy’s clock as ticking slow and the other guy will see my clock as ticking slow. So, do you still want to disagree with this and say that the other guy will see my clock as ticking fast?

Yes, I do. Here's some basic SR. A rocket launched in 2000, on a ten year journey, travelling the whle time at 0.9c, will arrive back home in, suprise suprise, 2010. But, the human occupants, their clocks, their goldfish and their goldfish's wristwatches, and all the little fundamental particles whizzing around inside will all be convinced that the journey has only taken 5 years, and that the year is 2005. Well, for them, it really has only been five years, but the year really will still be 2010 - they will have travelled forwards in time five years.

Now, in light of this (NPI), can you please explain how they could possibly see my clock ticking slowly, when they will see my clock go from 2000 to 2010 in only five years?

Tensor and I agree that under the terms of the SR theory, I will see the other guy’s clock as ticking slow and the other guy will see my clock as ticking slow.
Your words.

You are confused about the 'relative motion' part - ie, how can SR know wether the rocket is travelling away from me at 0.9c, or wether I travel away from the rocket at 0.9c? How does it know who's clock to slow down? Simple - the situation isn't quite as symmetric as it first seems; the rocket accelerated, I did not.

We are trying to help you out of your pit of perpetual wrongness here, but you keep on digging deeper and deeper.

[Sam5]

Excuse me for not adding all of the necessary qualifiers, (empty space, inertial frame, no gravitational field, etc.) The point remains. Regardless of where he is located, empty space, or the center of a black hole, a local observer will see light emitted at a speed c.

Hmm, so you are backing down a little, huh? Light speed does indeed slow down at different places in space, in a gravity field, but a local atomic clock will measure the local speed to be “c” (at that particular clock) because the local speed of light is slower than normal in a gravity field, and the local atomic clock is ticking slower than normal in that same gravity field.

Now, are you sure you want to put a human being in the center of a black hole?

[Sam5]

...

Tensor and I agree that under the terms of the SR theory, I will see the other guy’s clock as ticking slow and the other guy will see my clock as ticking slow. So, do you still want to disagree with this and say that the other guy will see my clock as ticking fast?

Yes, I do.

Tensor, what do you think about this? TheAtomium disagrees with you an me about what the other relatively moving observer will see in the tick rates of our clocks, under the terms of the SR theory.

[Donnie B.]

MM’s interferometer wasn’t sensitive enough to notice a 700 or so mph motion. It was set up to detect an 18.6 mps motion. More sensitive interferometers have detected the shift due to the movement of the apparatus caused by the earth’s rotation.

See this:

“Using a neutron interferometer of the type first developed by Bonse and Hart for x rays, we have observed the effect of Earth's rotation on the phase of the neutron wave function. This experiment is the quantum mechanical analog of the optical interferometry observations of Michelson, Gale, and Pearson.”

LINK (http://prola.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v42/i17/p1103_1)

Also see:

LINK (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:O-BFyPNC6dIJ:arxiv.org/abs/physics/0208082+local+ether+su+Sagnac&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)

And also:

LINK (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:WtydZFgEB7EJ:www.eps.org/aps/meet/MAR00/baps/abs/S5110007.html+local+ether+su+Sagnac&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)
Your first link is to PRL, to which I don't subscribe. Do you, or are you basing your argument solely on the abstract? If so, I for one can't tell whether it's even relevant.

Your second and third links are to a theoretical paper, and a conference presentation on the same topic, by Su. They predict a small (and, as you point out, hard-to-detect) effect that differs from the M-M result. Until such time as such an experiment can be performed, the paper is no more than one (non-mainstream) opinion. Theoretical Physics has to agree with repeatable empirical observation before it is accepted. Thus until such time as the experiment is performed, this paper has no more validity than one predicting the existence of Never-Never Land.

[Sam5]

But, the human occupants, their clocks, their goldfish and their goldfish's wristwatches, and all the little fundamental particles whizzing around inside will all be convinced that the journey has only taken 5 years, and that the year is 2005.

So you are going to slow down their molecular vibration rates too? This will freeze and kill them, so they won't be alive when they return to the earth.

[AstroSmurf]

Alas, TheAtomium's scenaro requires the rocket to turn around. Therefore, there are not two inertial frames involved, but three.

Assume that there's a transmitter both on the Earth's surface and on the spaceship, both tuned to the same frequency before the voyage starts. We're counting the number of received wavelengths to check the other side's clock.

During the voyage outwards, both the observer on the Earth and the observer on the spaceship, discounting straightforward Doppler effects consider the other's clock to be slow. That is, even accounting for the increasing distance to the other transmitter, it's running slow.

During the voyage back, both the observer on the Earth and the observer on the spaceship, discounting straightforward Doppler effects consider the other's clock to be slow. The actual detected radio signal is of course blueshifted, but accounting for the decreasing distance to the other transmitter, it is still running slow.

However, when you land the ship and compare the total number of transmitted wavelengths throughout the journey, the spaceship will have transmitted a lower total count than the Earth-bound transmitter has.

[Sam5]

They predict a small (and, as you point out, hard-to-detect) effect that differs from the M-M result.

The experiments have already been performed. The Sagnac effect is already incorporated into GPS clocks. Hafele-Keating showed that motion through the non-rotating gravitational field slows down atomic clocks. But you are free to ignore the experiments if you wish.

Here is a US Navy website that refers to a paper about the East/West differences in the speed of light. This has been known for some time:


“Differential Comparison of the One-Way Speed of Light in the East-West and West-East Directions on the Rotating Earth” (http://216.239.57.104/search?q=cache:CAg6N2AUU3YJ:tycho.usno.navy.mil/ptti/index9.html+%22One-Way+Speed+of+Light+in+the+East-West+and+West-East+Directions+of+the+Rotating+Earth%22&hl=en&ie= UTF-8)

[Sam5]

Assume that there's a transmitter both on the Earth's surface and on the spaceship, both tuned to the same frequency before the voyage starts.

I don’t debate that subject anymore, not since I obtained a copy of Einstein’s own 1918 correction and resolution of his “clock paradox”. He uses atomic clocks, accelerative forces, and gravitational fields, which solves the problem, but it also does away with the SR theory.

[AstroSmurf]

So you are going to slow down their molecular vibration rates too? This will freeze and kill them, so they won't be alive when they return to the earth.
They'll be running slow, but not frozen. Since all of their physical processes, including optical, thermodynamical, nuclear, quantum mechanical and whatnot are running slow at exactly the same rate, the water in their bodies will not freeze, their hearts will function, the music will keep playing and they will be very surprised to hear you tell them that they should be dead.

The only one who thinks that thermodynamical processes are exempted from relativistic effects is you, Sam5. That you choose to misrepresent the theory you're attacking is in fact your problem, not ours or Einstein's.

[Sam5]

During the voyage back, both the observer on the Earth and the observer on the spaceship, discounting straightforward Doppler effects consider the other's clock to be slow.

Einstein's 1918 resolution:

"According to both descriptions, it is the clock U2 which lags by a certain amount behind clock U1 at the end of the process considered. With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest. But the time lag gets overcompensated by the faster rate of U1 during procedural step 3. Because, according to the general theory of relativity, a clock has a more accelerated rate the higher the gravitational potential is at the clock’s location; and during procedural step 3, U2 is indeed at a location of higher gravitational potential than U1. Calculation shows that this running-ahead amounts to precisely twice as much as the lag-behind during the procedural steps 2 and 4. This analysis clarifies completely the paradox you referred to."

[AstroSmurf]

GR might be considered practical to solve the so-called paradox, but it is by no means required. SR suffices perfectly, and with the change in the velocity of the rocket considered instantaneous, GR and SR predict the exact same difference in the elapsed voyage time as measured by the stationary and moving observer.

[Sam5]

They'll be running slow, but not frozen. Since all of their physical processes, including optical, thermodynamical, nuclear, quantum mechanical and whatnot are running slow at exactly the same rate,

In 1907 Einstein said their “absolute temperature” would go down, based on how fast they traveled. They would freeze at 90% the speed of light. Sorry.

If their clocks really slow down and all their biological functions really slow down and all their molecular vibration rates really slow down, then they would freeze. Sorry.

[AstroSmurf]

If their clocks really slow down and all their biological functions really slow down and all their molecular vibration rates really slow down, then they would freeze. Sorry.
It might look that way just from checking their temperature from afar. However, every single atom in the moving rocket will see its surroundings as being perfectly normal - however, that planet over there seems darn chilly. Just consider every single atom in the rocket an observer, and the physical results are perfectly consistent with the theory - in fact, any other result would contradict it.

Einstein was talking about their absolute temperature in the sense that we're talking temperature using the Kelvin scale as opposed to Fahrenheit or whatever. We may of course debate what he intended to say until doomsday, but there is no confusion among physicists about what the theory would indicate.

[SeanF]

During the voyage back, both the observer on the Earth and the observer on the spaceship, discounting straightforward Doppler effects consider the other's clock to be slow.

Einstein's 1918 resolution:

"According to both descriptions, it is the clock U2 which lags by a certain amount behind clock U1 at the end of the process considered. With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest. But the time lag gets overcompensated by the faster rate of U1 during procedural step 3. Because, according to the general theory of relativity, a clock has a more accelerated rate the higher the gravitational potential is at the clock’s location; and during procedural step 3, U2 is indeed at a location of higher gravitational potential than U1. Calculation shows that this running-ahead amounts to precisely twice as much as the lag-behind during the procedural steps 2 and 4. This analysis clarifies completely the paradox you referred to."

I think either your source has a typo in that paragraph, or you do. Check it again.

Also, what is the "lag-behind during the procedural steps 2 and 4"? Don't steps 2 and 4 take place during non-accelerated relative motion? If you accept this paragraph, you're accepting a relative-motion induced slow-down, aren't you?

[Normandy6644]

SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space,

The 1905 SR theory specifically states:

”light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c”

I’m not going to debate you when you make up your own stuff and claim that SR theory says something that it does not say.

Jesus Sam, you only pick out what you want to see. My point was that Einstein did not include gravity in SR. We've been trying to drill this into you for quite some time now. Also, if you read the rest of my post, you will notice that I was talking about the velocity of light in a locally flat reference frame. Since empty space can be essentially considered locally flat, I was saying exactly what you think I didn't say. You then chose to ignore everything else I said. Well done.

[Tensor]

Here is a US Navy website that refers to a paper about the East/West differences in the speed of light. This has been known for some time:


LOL, Sam5 did you actually find and read that paper or even a summation of it? hoo hoo. Evidently not.



fixed extra quote so quotes are correct

[Donnie B.]

Here is a US Navy website that refers to a paper about the East/West differences in the speed of light. This has been known for some time:


LOL, Sam5 did you actually find and read that paper or even a summation of it? hoo hoo. Evidently not.
I doubt it too. But I did find out that one of the paper's coauthors, Prof. Christopher Hunt, is an Associate of CSICOP. I very much doubt whether he would claim that his paper contradicts relativity or provides support for a hypothetical local ether...
[Edited to correct Dr. Hunt's affiliation with CSICOP]

[Eta C]

Excuse me for not adding all of the necessary qualifiers, (empty space, inertial frame, no gravitational field, etc.) The point remains. Regardless of where he is located, empty space, or the center of a black hole, a local observer will see light emitted at a speed c.

Hmm, so you are backing down a little, huh? Light speed does indeed slow down at different places in space, in a gravity field, but a local atomic clock will measure the local speed to be “c” (at that particular clock) because the local speed of light is slower than normal in a gravity field, and the local atomic clock is ticking slower than normal in that same gravity field.

Now, are you sure you want to put a human being in the center of a black hole?

No need to be smug Sam. Unlike you I can admit to an error in a post I made. I do not however, admit to any error in my understanding of relativity. And you still have not addressed my points. You're very good at pulling in stuff from Google, but I'd point out a few things.

1) The PRL abstract you quote is quite dated. From 1979 no less. Remember that just because something is published in a refereed journal doesn't guarentee it's correctness. It just makes it more likely. Did you do a further search for any comments or a possible retraction by the same authors? Also, before you read any significance into the result, be sure you read the paper itself even if that means paying for a paper copy.

2) Quoting abstracts from conferences is no way to guarentee quality. Every physics conference has its "crackpot" session. I could quote you abstracts from American Physical Society conferences that are so ATM that they make you look mainstream in comparison. Did Su publish his results elsewhere, or are his only references conference abstracts? If it's the latter, I see no reason to take his theories seriously.

[Tensor]

Here is a US Navy website that refers to a paper about the East/West differences in the speed of light. This has been known for some time:


LOL, Sam5 did you actually find and read that paper or even a summation of it? hoo hoo. Evidently not.
I doubt it too. But I did find out that one of the paper's coauthors, Prof. Christopher Hunt, is an Associate of CSICOP. I very much doubt whether he would claim that his paper contradicts relativity or provides support for a hypothetical local ether...
[Edited to correct Dr. Hunt's affiliation with CSICOP]

I found a paraphrased reference to the paper, (yeah I know, not a very good technique, but it's the best I could do). From the paraphrasing, one of the things it talks about is the SR corrections that were applied to what basically was Sagnac effect test. So if Sam5 is giving us , as a proof, a reference to a paper where SR effects are applied, I guess he now agrees with SR.

[SeanF]

So if Sam5 is giving us , as a proof, a reference to a paper where SR effects are applied, I guess he now agrees with SR.
Guess so. He also quoted Einstein from 1918 saying, "clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest," so he's apparently also given up on his claim that Einstein removed "relative motion" from Relativity in his later papers.

He's not going to have anything left to argue, pretty soon!

[Sam5]

It might look that way just from checking their temperature from afar.



All we have to do is put a thermometer on the ship, and put a live video camera on it. If the molecular vibration rates on the ship really go down, the thermometer will show a lower reading. If they don’t, then there is no “time dilation” on the ship.

Let me see if I can explain this to you.

If “time itself” actually slows down 50% on the space ship, then the rms velocities and vibration rates of the molecules in and on board the space ship will slow down 50%. When this happens, all the water on the ship will freeze, and the water inside all living things on the space ship will freeze, so no living thing will come back alive.

If the water doesn’t freeze, then the velocities and vibration rates of the molecules have not slowed down and there is no “time dilation” on the ship.

If you are watching a TV picture coming in from the space ship and you see everyone on board moving in very slow motion, but if they are not frozen, then you are observing the classical Doppler effect because of the shift in the TV signals. Everyone on board the ship will be watching you move in slow motion on their TV. On the return trip, you will see them, and they will see you, moving in fast motion.

If someone tells you that everything on the ship “time dilates”, including the vibration rates of the molecules really slowing down by 50%, but if the water on the ship really does not freeze, then you are listening to a “science fiction” story.

[freddo]

All we have to do is put a thermometer on the ship, and put a live video camera on it. If the molecular vibration rates on the ship really go down, the thermometer will show a lower reading. If they don’t, then there is no “time dilation” on the ship.

No, because the thermometer will not show anything anomalous. Why? Because relativity is more or less something that happens to other people. You are always normal and everybody else has the problem. What makes it interesting is the other people think the same thing that you do.

Let me see if I can explain this to you.
You don't understand it - ergo you can't explain it.

[Sam5]

you only pick out what you want to see.


You only say what you want people to think. You don’t care if it is scientifically or historically accurate or not.

You said, “SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space,”

But in the actual paper, Einstein specifically said, ”light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c”.

So you told something about the theory that is untrue, only in an attempt to try to salvage the theory’s public image.

[Sam5]

No, because the thermometer will not show anything anomalous. Why? Because relativity is more or less something that happens to other people.

LOL!

I wondered why it never happened to me!

It has certainly happened to you, and pity you because of it.

It sort of does something funny to your brain, doesn’t it.

You are always normal and everybody else has the problem.

LOL!

No comment.

[daver]

If you are watching a TV picture coming in from the space ship and you see everyone on board moving in very slow motion, but if they are not frozen, then you are observing the classical Doppler effect because of the shift in the TV signals. Everyone on board the ship will be watching you move in slow motion on their TV. On the return trip, you will see them, and they will see you, moving in fast motion.

Thanks, Sam5, for discussing this in Against the Mainstream.

I haven't been following this thread all that closely; I see Sam5 is still going on about relativistic temperature.

Anyway, the reason I highlighted this portion was because it was actually almost correct. Sam5 calls this effect the classical Doppler, but in fact it's relativistic Doppler. The difference is significant--it's classical Doppler as modified by relativistic time contraction.

The caveat against the people in the transmission not being frozen is unnecessary.

Otherwise I think the description is correct.

[Musashi]

It has certainly happened to you, and pity you because of it.

It sort of does something funny to your brain, doesn’t it.



Oh look, more name calling!

[freddo]

I wondered why it never happened to me!

It could happen to you, but you couldn't measure it.

It has certainly happened to you, and pity you because of it.
I can only take other people's word for it, because as far as I can percieve, I am normal and everyone else has the problem.

It sort of does something funny to your brain, doesn’t it.
It doesn't freeze it, if that's what you're thinking.

[Sam5]

Anyway, the reason I highlighted this portion was because it was actually almost correct. Sam5 calls this effect the classical Doppler, but in fact it's relativistic Doppler. The difference is significant--it's classical Doppler as modified by relativistic time contraction.

Relativistic Doppler effect, invented by Lorentz in 1895 (I’ve got his earliest text and equations about this), is a combination of the classical Doppler combined with the slowdown of atomic oscillation rates (i.e. a slowdown in the “tick rates” of atomic clocks). Observation tells us that in such things a gravity fields due to large masses, such as on the sun, the atomic oscillation rates go down while the molecular vibration rates go up. So the oscillation rate slow-down is not a slow-down in “time itself”, since the molecular vibration rates go up. This is why a more massive star has a shorter, not a longer, lifespan.

Einstein’s original theory, which was copied and modified from Lorentz’s book, contained many errors, and he corrected several of them in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, 1920, and even as late as 1952. That was the year when he finally said in the 5th Appendix to his 1916 book that space is not “empty”. (I’m sure you will recall that he had previously said in 1905 that light speed is c in “empty space”. By 1952 he realized that as far as light and light speed is concerned, space is NOT “empty”.)

This whole problem we’ve been debating has come about by people in these modern times reading his 1905 paper in the book “The Principle of Relativity” (which was printed in 1952 and it has been reprinted many times since then), and not realizing that he gradually changed and corrected the errors of the 1905 theory over the years.

I took the time to track down his changes and his corrections. When I first read the 1905 paper, I saw some of the errors, so I figured that he surely must have corrected them, so I conducted a long search for some of his rare papers in which he did correct them.

When I bring up some of these papers, when I mention them, when I quote them, some guys get mad at me, because they don’t want this information known. Because if it is known, then everyone who claims that the original 1905 theory is correct and flawless, will, all of a sudden, seem a little silly, including all the many physics professors who have been teaching the original SR theory since the 1952 book was published.

But I would not be sitting here saying that the original SR theory is “wrong”, if I had not found Einstein’s own papers in which he corrected it. I’m not so audacious to go up against any Einstein theory this vigorously, if Einstein himself had not altered, changed, and corrected the theory himself.

I even went a little further and tracked down the original source material for the 1905 theory, which is Lorentz’s 1895 book. I happened to find a reference to it in one of Einstein’s own papers, and I searched for a copy for about 4-5 years, and I finally found one.

You should be complementing me for my diligent investigative work.

This is something that you are going to have to face sooner or later, now that the “Collected Papers” have been published in English. As his more obscure and rare papers get distributed around the world, other people will begin to realize that he actually did change the SR theory as time went by, to correct its errors.

[swansont]

According to Dr. Su, the earth-based gravity-related “ether” does not rotate with the earth.

Which is it Sam? Are moving through an ether or aren't we? Earth rotation through an ether should give a fringe shift in the M-M experiment. Gotta pick one here. Does it rotate with the earth or not?

MM’s interferometer wasn’t sensitive enough to notice a 700 or so mph motion. It was set up to detect an 18.6 mps motion. More sensitive interferometers have detected the shift due to the movement of the apparatus caused by the earth’s rotation.

See this:

“Using a neutron interferometer of the type first developed by Bonse and Hart for x rays, we have observed the effect of Earth's rotation on the phase of the neutron wave function. This experiment is the quantum mechanical analog of the optical interferometry observations of Michelson, Gale, and Pearson.”


Wow Sam, you're firing on all cylinders! It just so happens I am familiar with the Bonse-Hart interferometer, since my graduate work involved atom interferometry, and we used that design. And the reason for the fringes has nothing at all to do with ether, and everything to do with the Sagnac effect. The interferometer (similar to a Mach-Zender interferometer) encloses an area, and the sensitivity is related to that area. If the device rotates, one path will be longer and the opposite path shorter, and that gives you fringes.

However, even though I don't think the M-M interferometer was set up to measure a specific speed, you have given an upper limit for some ether effect. 700 mph will not give you fringes. That's something to work with.

[SeanF]

I took the time to track down his changes and his corrections. When I first read the 1905 paper, I saw some of the errors, so I figured that he surely must have corrected them, so I conducted a long search for some of his rare papers in which he did correct them.
You didn't see any errors in his 1905 paper. By your own admission, you don't even understand the 1905 paper.

But I would not be sitting here saying that the original SR theory is “wrong”, if I had not found Einstein’s own papers in which he corrected it. I’m not so audacious to go up against any Einstein theory this vigorously, if Einstein himself had not altered, changed, and corrected the theory himself.
One of the supposed changes you've claimed Einstein made was removing relative motion as a cause for time dilation. But you just posted in this very thread an Einstein quote from 1918 using it.

You should be complementing me for my diligent investigative work.

This is something that you are going to have to face sooner or later, now that the “Collected Papers” have been published in English. As his more obscure and rare papers get distributed around the world, other people will begin to realize that he actually did change the SR theory as time went by, to correct its errors.

With all due respect to your investigative reporting abilities, you have to understand the papers before you can claim that you understand the modifications and additions made in later papers. You don't understand the math, so you don't know what you're reading.

[Tensor]

He's not going to have anything left to argue, pretty soon!

Welcome back to the fray Sean. :wink:

[Sam5]

Now, in light of this (NPI), can you please explain how they could possibly see my clock ticking slowly, when they will see my clock go from 2000 to 2010 in only five years?

That’s what I thought when I first read the 1905 SR theory. That’s why I said to myself, “Hey, this is a bunch of baloney!”

But ask Tensor, and he will tell you. The 1905 theory says that both relative moving observers will see each other’s clock run slow. But only one clock will "lag behind" the other when they are united. This is the famous "clock paradox" of the SR theory.

This is why so many physicists in Europe laughed at the theory, and this is why Einstein had to change it.

After 13 years of being harassed and kidded all over Europe about it, he finally had to change it. That’s why he added the atomic clocks, the acceleration effects, and the gravity fields in his 1918 paper. That’s why he had to take out the “relative motion” and add some real physical effect that would slow down some kind of clock, such as an atomic clock.

I wouldn’t make such a big deal about it, except that the wrong version of the theory is being taught in universities in America today, the original version, the one with the mechanical clocks, no acceleration effects, and no gravity.

When I mention the 1918 correction paper, some professors get really mad at me for bringing it up.

(paragraphs added)

[Normandy6644]

you only pick out what you want to see.


You only say what you want people to think. You don’t care if it is scientifically or historically accurate or not.

You said, “SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space,”

But in the actual paper, Einstein specifically said, ”light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c”.

So you told something about the theory that is untrue, only in an attempt to try to salvage the theory’s public image.

Dude, go back and READ my post. Then return and tell us all what you have found.

[Sam5]

Dude, go back and READ my post. Then return and tell us all what you have found.

I read it already. You said, “SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space”.

But Einstein said in the paper, “light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c”.

We’ve discussed this already.

[Normandy6644]

SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space, only that all observers will see light as c regardless of motion in a locally flat reference frame. Gravity isn't involved!! He did not know about gravity slowing down light until he worked on GR, and this did not cause him to go back and "change" SR because GR, as we have said many times, is an extension of SR to cover curved manifolds.


Ok, I can see where this is a bit confusing. My point is that SR deals with locally flat planes, and that gravity is not involved. You were saying that Einstein changed SR, whereas I'm saying he extended it. I know what he said about light propagating into empty space, but the keyword is empty. This it can be considered locally flat, gravity ignored, and SR correct.

[Tensor]

Einstein’s original theory, which was copied and modified from Lorentz’s book, contained many errors, and he corrected several of them in 1907,

snip...

will begin to realize that he actually did change the SR theory as time went by, to correct its errors.

Well, that was a nice fairy tale. Now lets get to some facts.

Show us the equations that were wrong in SR and the GR equations that corrected those wrong equations.

Explain why, if SR is wrong and GR corrected it, SR and GR give the same answers when considering non-accelerated relative motion.

If you still believe that Lorentz is correct and SR is wrong, explain why magnetic field line are cut when in motion using Lorentz's theory, but not cut using SR. And SR matches our observations.

We keep asking and you don't provide us with these answers. Is it becasue you don't understand enough to answer or do you know that if you answer these questions your whole house of cards will collapse?

[Andreas]

If “time itself” actually slows down 50% on the space ship, then the rms velocities and vibration rates of the molecules in and on board the space ship will slow down 50%. When this happens, all the water on the ship will freeze, and the water inside all living things on the space ship will freeze, so no living thing will come back alive.
If you take into account other relativistic effects (like the increase of mass), you'll see that the freezing point of water will have decreased by the same amount. When they are at a comfy 8% above freezing from their own viewpoint, they'll be 8% above freezing in 50% slower time. It's just the absolute temperatures that are different, not the relative ones.

Otherwise the people in the space ship would be quite comfortable while the observers on earth would see them freezing to death, which is clearly wrong.

[Sam5]

SR doesn't say that the speed of light is constant in space, only that all observers will see light as c regardless of motion in a locally flat reference frame. Gravity isn't involved!! He did not know about gravity slowing down light until he worked on GR, and this did not cause him to go back and "change" SR because GR, as we have said many times, is an extension of SR to cover curved manifolds.


Ok, I can see where this is a bit confusing. My point is that SR deals with locally flat planes, and that gravity is not involved. You were saying that Einstein changed SR, whereas I'm saying he extended it.

You are trying to change it too, because he DID say in the SR theory, “light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c”. And he DID NOT say in the theory, “all observers will see light as c regardless of motion in a locally flat reference frame.”

He didn’t get the idea of “flat and curved space” until several years later. Once he got that idea, and some others, he began to realize that the SR theory as written in “On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies” was NOT correct, and that’s why he began to change it.

The first thing he changed was removing geometric “length contraction” due only to “relative motion”, which he changed in his 1907 paper. He changed more of the SR theory in 1911 and 1916, and more of it in 1918 and 1920, and even more of it in 1952. In 1952 is when he finally admitted that as far as light and light speed is concerned, space is NOT “empty”.

When he made all the changes that he made in the SR theory, the original SR theory no longer existed. What he wound up with was a “special case” of the GR theory, which he tried to retroactively call the “SR” theory, and he pretended in some of his book chapters and some of his other papers that the original SR theory was not flawed. But I tracked down some of his papers in which he made the changes. These papers have been translated into English only recently, so not many people know about them.

He didn’t “extend” the 1905 SR theory, he changed it and eradicated it, and he extended part of the GR theory backwards, retroactively, and he called this backwards extension the “SR” theory.

When he said “empty” in 1905, he meant void of all objects, because he kept discussing light traveling in a vacuum. In 1905, “empty” space meant space with no physical objects in it, i.e. a vacuum. He did not know at that time that gravity fields had anything to do with light speed. Only later did he realize that gravity fields affect light speed, and this is why he added the comments in 1952 (to the 5th Appendix to his 1916 book) about space NOT being “empty”. He said in 1952, “There is no such thing as an empty space, i.e. a space without field.”

Don’t you get it? He was politicking all those years. He changed his opinion about the 1905 theory, his point of view, because his knowledge changed and he realized that the 1905 SR theory was wrong, because he finally figured out a lot more stuff during the next several years. But he didn’t want to admit that the 1905 version of the theory was flat out wrong, because he didn’t want to admit that his most vocal critics were right about it being wrong. So he modified it during the next several years, and he gradually corrected some of its errors, but without ever coming right out and saying “I was wrong in 1905”.

Politicians do this all the time. I’ve seen this type of stuff all my life. It is somewhat rare in physics, but this is a “worst case scenario” of it in physics.

You need to understand that he did not know his entire “relativity” theory right from the beginning. He worked different parts of it out as he went along. He worked on the ideas in that first paper for nearly 10 years, and he based many of those ideas on the 1895 Lorentz book. But he changed some of Lorentz's stuff, and he wound up publishing a basically silly theory, which attracted a lot of criticism then and now, and he finally realized he had to change and modify a lot of stuff he had said in the 1905 theory, to make it match his newer and more accurate GR theory.

When he started getting feedback right after that first relativity paper was published, he began to consider his errors, and he began to think of ways to correct them. He also began to develop his own ideas about gravity, thermodynamics, and quantum mechanics. Of these three topics, only his gravity theory became famous. He also tried to develop what he called his “Unitary Field Theory”. This was supposed to be the next great new “third stage” of his overall “relativity” theory, but it never worked out. Neither did his refrigerator.

What I object to the most, is guys today reading the 1905 paper and thinking that all of it still applies. I especially object to physics professors telling students that all of it still applies and that it is flawless. I especially object to these professors brow-beating the students who notice the errors in the 1905 theory and trying to intimidate them into thinking they are “weird” or outcasts or “crackpots”, when, in reality, the professors are flat out wrong about the 1905 theory being flawless.

[freddo]

in reality, the professors are flat out wrong about the 1905 theory being flawless.
I don't think anyone's been bold enough to claim this. However, you should be brow-beaten for claiming the 1905 paper is outright wrong (or just the kinematical part - whatever)... It has been demonstrated that the math of this theory conforms to observations. Complete? Possibly not - probably not. Incorrect? Certainly not as far as its predictions go.

[Sam5]

SR correct.

Did you notice that TheAtomium has found a flaw in the 1905 theory? The flaw that led to the clock paradox. Einstein worked the theory out and published it with the clock paradox error in it, and he apparently didn’t notice the error until after the paper was published. In the 1905 theory, both of two relatively moving observers would see each other’s clocks slow down during the relative motion. TheAtomium said, “Now, in light of this (NPI), can you please explain how they could possibly see my clock ticking slowly, when they will see my clock go from 2000 to 2010 in only five years?”

So he sees this flaw in the 1905 theory, just as I saw it nearly 14 years ago.

I didn’t stop my investigation until I tracked down the 1918 paper in which Einstein corrected that flaw by adding acceleration effects and gravity fields to the thought experiments of the 1905 theory.

Look all over the internet for the all the “twins paradox” resolution pages. Many other people see exactly the same flaw, and they try to make excuses for it, with every “resolution” being completely different and just as invalid as the original “peculiar consequence” thought experiments of the 1905 paper.

[SeanF]

After 13 years of being harassed and kidded all over Europe about it, he finally had to change it. That’s why he added the atomic clocks, the acceleration effects, and the gravity fields in his 1918 paper. That’s why he had to take out the “relative motion” and add some real physical effect that would slow down some kind of clock, such as an atomic clock.

How can you still claim that he "took out the 'relative motion'" when you've already quoted Einstein's 1918 paper as using relative motion?!

Einstein's 1918 resolution:

"According to both descriptions, it is the clock U2 which lags by a certain amount behind clock U1 at the end of the process considered. With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest. But the time lag gets overcompensated by the faster rate of U1 during procedural step 3. Because, according to the general theory of relativity, a clock has a more accelerated rate the higher the gravitational potential is at the clock’s location; and during procedural step 3, U2 is indeed at a location of higher gravitational potential than U1. Calculation shows that this running-ahead amounts to precisely twice as much as the lag-behind during the procedural steps 2 and 4. This analysis clarifies completely the paradox you referred to."

At least try to be consistent, Sam!

[freddo]

Lesson:

Don't quote Einstein when trying to claim he didn't say something. Sooner or later you're going to quote the bit where he said what you said he didn't say.

[Sam5]

How can you still claim that he "took out the 'relative motion'" when you've already quoted Einstein's 1918 paper as using relative motion?!


LOL, you need to read the whole paper. He removed relative motion as being the cause of the “time dilation” and the “slow down” in the clock. There is no "time dilation" due to "relative motion" in the 1918 paper. He uses acceleration and gravity fields to slow down an atomic clock, like in his 1911 paper, but he does it in a very peculiar and bizarre way that is even more ridiculous than the original 1905 paper. He turns the gravity fields on and off when he needs to, as if he had a gravity switch in his hand. He has his clocks fall and get accelerated, then he has the gravity come on and then suddenly it "vanishes" when he needs to get rid of it.

[freddo]

[twang!]

Where the heck did that watermelon seed go?!?!?

[Taibak]

Now, in light of this (NPI), can you please explain how they could possibly see my clock ticking slowly, when they will see my clock go from 2000 to 2010 in only five years?

That’s what I thought when I first read the 1905 SR theory. That’s why I said to myself, “Hey, this is a bunch of baloney!”

But ask Tensor, and he will tell you. The 1905 theory says that both relative moving observers will see each other’s clock run slow. But only one clock will "lag behind" the other when they are united. This is the famous "clock paradox" of the SR theory.

And it's not as terminal a problem as you seem to think it is. Like we've pointed out (repeatedly) the resolution to the paradox is built into special relativity.

This is why so many physicists in Europe laughed at the theory, and this is why Einstein had to change it.

After 13 years of being harassed and kidded all over Europe about it, he finally had to change it. That’s why he added the atomic clocks, the acceleration effects, and the gravity fields in his 1918 paper. That’s why he had to take out the “relative motion” and add some real physical effect that would slow down some kind of clock, such as an atomic clock.

Based on this argument alone, I see no reason whatsoever to congratulate you on your investigative skills. Your version of events is demonstrably wrong. The three papers Einstein published in 1905 - including relativity - established his reputation as one of the top theoretical physicists in Europe. No less a physicist than Max Planck himself was seeking out Einstein to talk physics. Relativity wasn't immediately universally accepted, but it certainly wasn't ridiculed. Heck, why would it have been when it solved some burning theoretical problems - the very problems that Michaelson, Morely, and Lorentz tried and failed to adequately explain.

As others have pointed out, general relativity is an extension of special relativity, and not the other way around. What you fail to understand is that under general relativity, gravity, acceleration, *AND* relative motion can all cause time dilation. It's trivial to show that the GR equations reduce to the Lorentz equations when gravity is not present and no object is accelerating. Heck, you yourself have quoted a passage from the 1918 paper that USES relative motion to explain some effects.

I wouldn’t make such a big deal about it, except that the wrong version of the theory is being taught in universities in America today, the original version, the one with the mechanical clocks, no acceleration effects, and no gravity.

Bull. The 1905 paper has been experimentally shown to be correct. From a scientific point of view, that's all that matters. Similarly, the 1918 paper has been experimentally shown to be correct AND to be in agreement with the 1905 paper. Consequentially, anything Einstein published between those two papers that disagrees with those two papers is wrong. It has historical value, but the physics is meaningless junk and is rightly ignored.

When I mention the 1918 correction paper, some professors get really mad at me for bringing it up.

Considering that you're challenging them based on really poor evidence, I can't say I blame them. So far, you've done nothing but dodge questions, ignore evidence, quote papers out of context, disregard the math and contradict yourself and if that's any indication of how you approach them they have every right to disregard your arguments.

Heck, you STILL haven't answered the questions I asked back on page seven. You still haven't answered Andreas's question on page 13 about taking the increased mass into account when computing a relativistic temperature. You still haven't answered Swansot's question on page 11 on whether or not the Earth rotates relative to its local ether field. If you're going to push a theory, you need to come prepared to answer any and all objections that are raised. You need to either account for everything we've raised by answering ALL our questions OR explain why the objections we raise are unimportant. If you don't - either through refusal or ignorance - there's no reason why anyone should believe you.

Page Seven (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=150)

Page Eleven (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=250)[/url]

[milli360]

If “time itself” actually slows down 50% on the space ship, then the rms velocities and vibration rates of the molecules in and on board the space ship will slow down 50%. When this happens, all the water on the ship will freeze, and the water inside all living things on the space ship will freeze, so no living thing will come back alive.
That's a serious misinterpretation on your part. Just as we would observe their clock to slow, whereas they would have a normal experience of time, the same is true of temperature.
When I mention the 1918 correction paper, some professors get really mad at me for bringing it up.
Do you also try to insist on relativity freezing objects? I could see why they might get mad. :)

[AstroSmurf]

Ignoring Sam5 for the moment, is it just me or is the change of the temperature scale blindingly obvious? Thermodynamically, it can be defined as the inverse of the rate of change of entropy with internal energy. Since the entropy remains constant when you switch reference frame while the energy changes, of course the temperature changes. It has to!

Secondly, I think relativistic Doppler shift is best studied using an object travelling in a straight line offset from the observer's position, as the object passes the point closest to the observer. That way, all the direction-dependant effects ("normal" Doppler shift) vanish, while the relativistic time dilation remains and can be seen directly.

[milli360]

Ignoring Sam5 for the moment, is it just me or is the change of the temperature scale blindingly obvious?
Are you thinking that there are others saying that the temperature does not change?

I thought even Sam5 was saying that relativity has the temperature change--it's just that he then interprets that, and insists that that would mean that objects would actually have to freeze, water turn into ice.

[SeanF]

How can you still claim that he "took out the 'relative motion'" when you've already quoted Einstein's 1918 paper as using relative motion?!


LOL, you need to read the whole paper. He removed relative motion as being the cause of the “time dilation” and the “slow down” in the clock. There is no "time dilation" due to "relative motion" in the 1918 paper.

Baloney. Your own provided quote:

With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest.

Where's the "acceleration" or "gravity field" that causes U1 to tick at a slower rate than U2 (with respect to the coordinate system K') during procedural steps 2 and 4? There isn't one. Nothing but relative motion. And with respect to the other coordinate system, it's U2 that is ticking slow during those procedural steps, isn't it?

He uses acceleration and gravity fields to slow down an atomic clock, like in his 1911 paper, but he does it in a very peculiar and bizarre way that is even more ridiculous than the original 1905 paper. He turns the gravity fields on and off when he needs to, as if he had a gravity switch in his hand. He has his clocks fall and get accelerated, then he has the gravity come on and then suddenly it "vanishes" when he needs to get rid of it.

Wow! You've always argued that it was the 1905 paper that was "magic" and that he fixed everything in the later papers. You've claimed to accept GR. Now you're arguing that even GR is magical?

(And he doesn't turn gravity on and off. He turns acceleration on and off during the experiment, and there's nothing wrong with that. But since the Theory of General Relativity posits the equivalence of an accelerating frame and a gravitational field, it's the same thing)

[Sam5]

And it's not as terminal a problem as you seem to think it is. Like we've pointed out (repeatedly) the resolution to the paradox is built into special relativity.


No it’s not built into SR. If it was built into SR he wouldn’t have changed the conditions and the thought experiments in 1918. He finally saw the paradox himself and had to add acceleration and gravity to the thought experiments in order to give the clocks a real reason to slow down.

SR is a fable that you believe in, and you have been trained to think that it contains no flaws or paradoxes, so that’s what you believe.

[Sam5]

is it just me or is the change of the temperature scale blindingly obvious? Thermodynamically, it can be defined as the inverse of the rate of change of entropy with internal energy. Since the entropy remains constant when you switch reference frame while the energy changes, of course the temperature changes. It has to!

Read Einstein’s 1907 paper about it. He said the “absolute temperature” of the moving object goes down.

Even if you just use common sense and say that all actual motion rates, vibration rates, oscillation rates inside the spacecraft really slow down, then you must say that the molecular vibration rate actually and really slows down too, and if this happens, then water and the astronauts on the spacecraft would freeze.

But if the slowdown is not real and actual, but only some kind of illusion as “seen” from your vantage point, such as with the classical Doppler effect illusions, then the water and the astronauts would not freeze, but, also, none of the motion rates, vibration rates, or oscillation rates would really slow down on the spaceship either, thus, there would be no real time dilation on the spaceship.

It would really help you to study the classical Doppler effects. When objects separate, the light signals going between the two are stretched out, and both of two relatively moving observers see an illusion in each others “clocks” that looks like a “time dilation”. However, when they turn around and move toward each other, they see an illusion that looks like a “time speedup”. And when they unite, there is no lost time.

In SR time dilation, both of two moving observers would see the other’s clock slow down both when they separate and when they approach one another, but, magically, at the end of the trip, one of the clocks is supposed to “lag behind” the other. Which one? Well, which ever one you are not traveling with.

So, if you travel with clock A, then clock B is supposed to “lag behind” when you unite with it. But if you travel with clock B, then clock A is supposed to lag behind when you unite with it. So this is an impossibility. You can’t really slow down a clock by not traveling with it or by traveling with the other clock. This is why the SR theory was laughed at by physicists all over Europe when it was first published. Einstein said so many goofy things in it, it seemed as if it was written as a joke or by a confused high school student.

He could have passed it off as high-tech science, if he had not united the two clocks in Section 4, but when he united the two clocks and only one lagged behind, while both sets of observers had seen each other’s clocks run slow, that’s what made the theory so obviously ridiculous.

Many physics students see this paradox today, when they read the 1905 paper, but their professors just imply to them that they are wrong and too stupid to understand the theory. But it is the professors who are wrong and stupid about this particular theory.

[Sam5]

Baloney. Your own provided quote:

With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest.

Where's the "acceleration" or "gravity field" that causes U1 to tick at a slower rate than U2 (with respect to the coordinate system K') during procedural steps 2 and 4? There isn't one.

That’s on page 69 of the English translation. I’ll quote a little from that page:

“There arises a homogeneous gravitational field in the direction of the positive x-axis, in which the clock U1 gets accelerated in this direction of the positive x-axis until it has attained the velocity v, whereupon the gravitational field again vanishes. An external force along the negative x-axis prevents the clock U2 from making any movement in this gravitational field.”

Yes, this is Einstein’s own “resolution” of the “twins paradox”. He had to add acceleration and gravity fields to try to “resolve” the paradox, since he knew that the original version of SR theory was wrong.

[AstroSmurf]

Even if you just use common sense and say that all actual motion rates, vibration rates, oscillation rates inside the spacecraft really slow down, then you must say that the molecular vibration rate actually and really slows down too
Correct - that's exactly what I'm saying.

, and if this happens, then water and the astronauts on the spacecraft would freeze.
Incorrect! Sam5, the water, the astronauts, thermometers and whatnot on the spacecraft are also slowed down - they'll be measuring and interacting with the temperature of other objects on the spacecraft as it appears to them, i.e, perfectly normal.

Now, Sam5, have you actually studied theoretical thermodynamics? Unless you have a fairly thorough understanding of this topic, I regret to say that you're very ill equipped to discuss this situation - you need a fairly extensive toolbox of mathematics and theory to get a grip on this subject, and this forum is not the best place to acquire this.

It would really help you to study the classical Doppler effects. When objects separate, the light signals going between the two are stretched out, and both of two relatively moving observers see an illusion in each others “clocks” that looks like a “time dilation”. However, when they turn around and move toward each other, they see an illusion that looks like a “time speedup”. And when they unite, there is no lost time. That accounts for the direction-dependant part of relativistic Doppler shift. Yet there remains an additional part which is independant on the direction the ship is travelling, and which always slows it down.

In SR time dilation, both of two moving observers would see the other’s clock slow down both when they separate and when they approach one another, but, magically, at the end of the trip, one of the clocks is supposed to “lag behind” the other. Which one? Well, which ever one you are not traveling with.
This is an incorrect formulation of the so-called paradox - one of the clocks has turned around, and the other has not. The one that has turned around will be lagged behind the other. The situation is not symmetrical!

[Ricimer]

Sam, Einstien's "turning gravity on and off" is part of an approach to physics called though experiments. In these you can have inertialess pulleys, frictionless surfaces, control over gravity.

You basically address only the issues you want to incoporate.

Say you want to model a star, and figure out what increasing fusion is going to do to it. You'll probably ignore convection, magnetic fields, solar rotation, gravity gradients and such and just say: If fusion increases, we lose heavier elements, and the sun will heat up.

Then you need to ask: Will it head up enough to matter? So then you look down that line of inquiry.

When Einstien talks about empty space he's basically saying: Okay, I know matter can complicate things, so lets just look at the situation without matter, for now, and see where we can go with it. So, if we have no matter, it's "empty space" and that's what I'll call it (you know, its called being brief and concise).

The problem you're having is you are taking each phrase and word Einstien uses as a fundamental statement of his position, instead of just a phrase he picked to describe a situation in the vague language of english (math is much more precise).

I.e. if he had written in a letter, "Its raining cats and dogs" you take that as an absolute statement of his, instead of just an idiom.

I.e. lighten up, don't take things quite so literally!

[swansont]

Sam-

If the ether moves with the earth, then it must be rotating about the sun at our orbital velocity. Why would it do that? Does that mean that other planets are moving through it, as they don't have the same angular velocity that we do? Or is there some transition point where it changes speed?

[Taibak]

And it's not as terminal a problem as you seem to think it is. Like we've pointed out (repeatedly) the resolution to the paradox is built into special relativity.


No it’s not built into SR. If it was built into SR he wouldn’t have changed the conditions and the thought experiments in 1918. He finally saw the paradox himself and had to add acceleration and gravity to the thought experiments in order to give the clocks a real reason to slow down.

Again, this is outright bull. You're overlooking the simple fact that he was talking about different thought experiments.

SR is a fable that you believe in, and you have been trained to think that it contains no flaws or paradoxes, so that’s what you believe.

Bull. I was trained from day one to believe that relativity contains paradoxes. They're one of my favorite parts of the theory. However, I also understand the theory well enough to know why they arise and how to resolve them. As for flaws, I was also trained from day one to recognize the limitations of the theory - its determinism and that it deals with neither acceleration nor gravity. I also know that the theory has been experimentally verified and therefore IS a perfectly valid theory and not a fable. [-X

And you STILL haven't answered everybody's questions. Please do so! :evil:

[SeanF]

Baloney. Your own provided quote:

With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest.

Where's the "acceleration" or "gravity field" that causes U1 to tick at a slower rate than U2 (with respect to the coordinate system K') during procedural steps 2 and 4? There isn't one.

That’s on page 69 of the English translation. I’ll quote a little from that page:

“There arises a homogeneous gravitational field in the direction of the positive x-axis, in which the clock U1 gets accelerated in this direction of the positive x-axis until it has attained the velocity v, whereupon the gravitational field again vanishes. An external force along the negative x-axis prevents the clock U2 from making any movement in this gravitational field.”

Yes, this is Einstein’s own “resolution” of the “twins paradox”. He had to add acceleration and gravity fields to try to “resolve” the paradox, since he knew that the original version of SR theory was wrong.

This latest quote says, "the clock U1 gets accelerated . . . until it has attained the velocity v". I asked about procedural steps 2 and 4, during which, "clock U1 moving at velocity [i]v." Your first quote says that U1 is running slower while it's moving, not while it's accelerating. This latest quote, talking about acceleration and homogenous gravitational fields, does not deal with procedural steps 2 and 4.

BTW, I've noticed that you are now subtly moving away from your acceptance of GR. You're saying things like "to try to 'resolve' the paradox" when before you said that GR did resolve the paradox. I warned you a long time ago that that was going to happen if you ever really started to look at GR, didn't I?

[Sam5]

The problem you're having is you are taking each phrase and word Einstien uses as a fundamental statement of his position, instead of just a phrase he picked to describe a situation in the vague language of english (math is much more precise).


No, I’m not having that problem. I see others having that problem, such as insisting that “c is constant”, “c is invariable”, all based on what he erroneously said in the 1905 theory. He clearly altered the “constancy” postulate in 1911 and incorporated the alteration into his 1916 theory, and he clearly said that light speed slows down in a gravity field, but others still swear that he made no mistakes in the 1905 theory and that “c” is always “constant”.

This Einstein cultism is a religion, a “belief system”, not a science.

[Sam5]

BTW, I've noticed that

I don’t really have the time to point out all your errors.

[Tensor]

Anybody here recognize David (http://www.metaresearch.org/msgboard/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=403&whichpage=3)

[Sam5]

Incorrect! Sam5, the water, the astronauts, thermometers and whatnot on the spacecraft are also slowed down - they'll be measuring and interacting with the temperature of other objects on the spacecraft as it appears to them, i.e, perfectly normal.

If everything is “perfectly normal”, then there is no “time dilation” on the spacecraft. If there is “time dilation” on the space craft, the molecular vibration rates will slow down and the water will freeze.


This is an incorrect formulation of the so-called paradox - one of the clocks has turned around, and the other has not. The one that has turned around will be lagged behind the other. The situation is not symmetrical!

There is no “turn around” in the “peculiar consequence” thought experiment of Section 4 that started the whole “twins paradox” debate.

[Normandy6644]

Anybody here recognize David (http://www.metaresearch.org/msgboard/topic.asp?TOPIC_ID=403&whichpage=3)

Actually yeah. He's not only there, but seems to be on a number of science boards. Interesting...

This Einstein cultism is a religion, a “belief system”, not a science

I think you've lost it Sam. Not only do you fail to support any of your points with credible scientific evidence, you now accuse all of us who adhere to the scientific methods as being part of a "cult" or a "religion." We can (and do) provide evidence that counters every point you make, and despite all of this, you cannot seem to provide legitimate answers, but rather try to turn the tables and call the majority of the scientific community part of a cult. I urge no one else to respond to this charge, as it without basis and a terribly low debating tactic.

[SeanF]

BTW, I've noticed that

I don’t really have the time to point out all your errors.

LOL! In other words, I got you, and you don't want to talk about it.

You don't understand GR any better than you understand SR, and you just proved it.

[Ricimer]

The problem you're having is you are taking each phrase and word Einstien uses as a fundamental statement of his position, instead of just a phrase he picked to describe a situation in the vague language of english (math is much more precise).


No, I’m not having that problem. I see others having that problem, such as insisting that “c is constant”, “c is invariable”, all based on what he erroneously said in the 1905 theory. He clearly altered the “constancy” postulate in 1911 and incorporated the alteration into his 1916 theory, and he clearly said that light speed slows down in a gravity field, but others still swear that he made no mistakes in the 1905 theory and that “c” is always “constant”.

This Einstein cultism is a religion, a “belief system”, not a science.


He did say, in the later discussions (i.e. your papers), that C is not constant, but that is in a gravitational field or when dealing with accleration. When the velocity is constant, and the gravitational effects non-existant (or insignificant), you still have the effects of special relativity. You're missing the qualifying statements.

[SeanF]

There is no “turn around” in the “peculiar consequence” thought experiment of Section 4 that started the whole “twins paradox” debate.

Sure there is:

It is at once apparent that this result still holds good if the clock moves from A to B in any polygonal line, and also when the points A and B coincide.

"[I]n any polygonal line" allows for the clock changing direction, and "when the points A and B coincide" allow for it returning to its starting point.

[Tensor]

BTW, I've noticed that

I don’t really have the time to point out all your errors.

It's also very obvious that you can't or won't answer our questions or give experimental evidence for your wild ideas.. Why is that Sam5, why won't you give us the answers to the questions below? Is it because you don't fully understand and know you will get it wrong or don't dare provide the answers because you know it will refute you own ideas?
Either way, your continued refusal to answer becomes more and more apparent and leads me to believe you either don't know what you are talking about or are simply pulling our chain.

Please answer the following questions or give proper examples. If you can't provide the answers or examples, your claims have no validity.


Show us the equations that were wrong in SR and the GR equations that corrected those wrong equations.

Explain why, if SR is wrong and GR corrected it, SR and GR give the same answers when considering non-accelerated relative motion.

If you still believe that Lorentz is correct and SR is wrong, explain why magnetic field line are cut when in motion using Lorentz's theory, but not cut using SR. And SR matches our observations.




We keep asking and you don't provide us with these answers. Is it becasue you don't understand enough to answer or do you know that if you answer these questions your whole house of cards will collapse?

If Lorentz is right, the magnetic field lines of a moving object are finite. The Earth is moving relative to the Sun and there is no evidence of its magnetic field being broken as a result. According to Einstein's theories, magnetic field lines are always closed loops - and this has been observed (repeatedly) in nature. Explain.

If massive objects produce a 'local ether,' what causes it? Taken a step further, because the Earth is in motion, it should leave behind some sort of wake. It doesn't. Explain.

If the local ether exists, what are its properties? What is its permeability and permittivity? What is its density? How does it interact with other forces? Does it interact with other local ethers (that is, does the Earth's local ether field interact with the Moon's local ether field?)? If so, how? What is its index of refraction?

Both the special and general theories of relativity have been shown to agree with every experimental test to which they've yet been subjected. Why should we scrap theories that work so well? Similarly, Dirac's relativistic quantum mechanics are also in strong agreement with experiment and that's based on Einstein's 1905 paper.

If Dr. Su's theory is right, the error in the Bragg diffraction angles should be approximately one degree. By his own admission, the error is over 40 degrees. Explain this discrepency and explain why we should believe a theory that predicts a result 40 times smaller than what's observed, espescially when relativity, as outlined in the 1905 and 1916 papers, produces the correct results?

Taken the last point a step further, you make a big deal about Einstein making and correcting mistakes en route to developing the definitive version of his theories and see this as evidence that relativity as a whole is wrong. On the other hand, Dr. Su's theories contain a glaring, uncorrected error and you insist on the theory's validity. Both made mistakes and admitted them.- Why is this a problem for Einstein and not for Su? Are the rules of evidence different for them?

Your expertise with clocks - does that extend to clocks moving at greater than roughly half the speed of light relative to a stationary observer? If not, how can you claim to have first hand experience with observing time dilation when the effects can be mathematically shown to be negligible at low speeds?

Is it possible that the 'wristwatches' and 'balance-wheel clocks' Einstein refers to in the 1905 paper were idealisations and not actual clocks? If so, can those timepieces be assumed to function as perfect clocks that keep time with 100% precision regardless of whatever mechanical effects they may experience?

[Andreas]

Read Einstein’s 1907 paper about it. He said the “absolute temperature” of the moving object goes down.

Even if you just use common sense and say that all actual motion rates, vibration rates, oscillation rates inside the spacecraft really slow down, then you must say that the molecular vibration rate actually and really slows down too, and if this happens, then water and the astronauts on the spacecraft would freeze.
Again: While time slows down and with it all motion and therefore absolute temperature, the inertia of all matter increases. I'm no expert in physical chemistry, but there is an easily conceivable way in which the higher mass of molecules interacts with the freezing point: In order to solidify, the temperature has to be low enough so that stable bonds between molecules can be built. If the inertia is higher, molecules will break out of bonds more easily than lower mass molecules at the same velocity (= same temperature). Therefore the freezing point should decrease by the same amount that time dilates.

Different temperatures, but no freezing.

[TheAtomium]

Incorrect! Sam5, the water, the astronauts, thermometers and whatnot on the spacecraft are also slowed down - they'll be measuring and interacting with the temperature of other objects on the spacecraft as it appears to them, i.e, perfectly normal.

If everything is “perfectly normal”, then there is no “time dilation” on the spacecraft. If there is “time dilation” on the space craft, the molecular vibration rates will slow down and the water will freeze.

Really? Do you mean frozen water, as in ice? If you do, could you please explain where all the thermal energy has gone?

[daver]

Incorrect! Sam5, the water, the astronauts, thermometers and whatnot on the spacecraft are also slowed down - they'll be measuring and interacting with the temperature of other objects on the spacecraft as it appears to them, i.e, perfectly normal.

If everything is ?perfectly normal?, then there is no ?time dilation? on the spacecraft. If there is ?time dilation? on the space craft, the molecular vibration rates will slow down and the water will freeze.

Really? Do you mean frozen water, as in ice? If you do, could you please explain where all the thermal energy has gone?

Einstein says that an observer will measure a lower temperature on a moving object. Sam5 thinks that this means that observer A will think passenger B's hot tub is filled with ice cubes if B is moving quickly enough.

If you're really interested, this was discussed in one of the locked relativity threads (relatively early on, i think--maybe around page 40. I don't feel like going through the thread again to find out for sure).

[swansont]

Sam-

If the ether moves with the earth, how do you explain the presence of stellar aberration (http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/relativ/star.html#c2)? Shouldn't a fixed ether not give aberration?

[Sam5]

Different temperatures, but no freezing.

Would you care to cite some scientific papers that describe how water has been frozen to near absolute zero, but it didn’t freeze?

[Sam5]

Einstein says that an observer will measure a lower temperature on a moving object.

In his 1907 paper he said that the “absolute temperature” of the moving object would be lower.

When you correct his errors by changing what he actually said into something you just made up, such as, “Einstein says that an observer will measure a lower temperature on a moving object,” you are not doing science a favor.

[Sam5]

Really? Do you mean frozen water, as in ice? If you do, could you please explain where all the thermal energy has gone?

I don’t know, ask Einstein. Ask Tensor. The dilation of “time itself” and “absolute temperature” decreases due to “relative motion” is not my theory, it’s Einstein’s.

[Sam5]

Really?

And while you’re at it, see if you can figure out this 1907 Einstein statement:

“Thus, the temperature of a moving system is always lower with respect to a reference system that is in motion relative to it than with respect to a reference system that is at rest relative to it.”

[daver]

Einstein says that an observer will measure a lower temperature on a moving object.

In his 1907 paper he said that the ?absolute temperature? of the moving object would be lower.

Could you expand on this a bit? I'm surprised that Einstein would say anything about an "absolute temperature".

[daver]

Really?

And while you?re at it, see if you can figure out this 1907 Einstein statement:

?Thus, the temperature of a moving system is always lower with respect to a reference system that is in motion relative to it than with respect to a reference system that is at rest relative to it.?

Was this the bit you were referring to, when you were talking about "absolute temperature", or is there another reference? This of course is talking about relative temperatures.

[Sam5]

Could you expand on this a bit? I'm surprised that Einstein would say anything about an "absolute temperature".

In 1907 he expanded his Special Relativity theory. He apparently became aware of the problem of the reduced molecular vibration rate if “time itself” slowed down in a relatively moving body, as per his 1905 theory. For example, we can’t have all of time, except for molecular vibration rates, slowing down in the SR theory. So in 1907 he attempted to add a thermodynamic section to the SR theory, but, in my opinion, this ideas about that produced paradoxes like the original SR theory and they turned out to be so bad and illogical he later just dropped the subject.

This paper is in Volume 2 (paperback, English translation) of “The Collected Papers of Albert Einstein.”

The sentence I quoted above is one of his conclusions near the end of that section of the paper. You probably will recognize the statement to contain a paradox, with both relatively moving systems being colder than the other. He’s not talking about illusions here. Earlier in the section he called the temperature change in the “moving” system the “absolute temperature”. Of course, this is relative motion, so both of two systems are the “moving” system.

Some of these more absurd papers and early claims of his have not been reproduced in American books for the good reason that they contain a lot of nonsense and paradoxes.

This reminds me of when Newton tried to get involved in alchemy, and never came up with much of anything that was new and creative. So today, his alchemy papers are not reproduced. He understood a lot about gravity and optics, but not too much about early chemistry. I guess the time was not right for a good early understanding of chemistry. The 1905 SR theory was very premature and filled with errors for a similar reason. The time was just not right and Einstein just did not know enough yet.

After the 1905 paper was published and heavily critiqued, he began to consider relativity in a more realistic way, and I think that’s why his GR papers were so much better. Also, by the time he was working on GR, he had Lorentz and other great minds helping him. The original SR theory actually descended from things he had been thinking about and trying to work out since his high school years, and it was based a lot on the reading of other people’s papers, such as the 1895 Lorentz book. But after the 1905 paper was published and created a lot of controversy, he actually began to get some feedback from men like Lorentz, and this helped him quite a lot.

You might recall that some years back Stephen Hawking developed a theory about time flowing backwards? Then later he realized the theory was ridiculous and he recalled it. Well, this is what happened to SR, except that, due to the political climate in German in the WW I era, and Einstein’s own pacifism against the war, Einstein did not want to come right out and admit that his most vocal enemies among the physicists in Germany were right about the SR theory being wrong and filled with errors. This is my opinion of why he did not make his changes and corrections very obvious. He made the corrections, but it took more than 12 years of diligent research for me to be able to find them.

What bugs me the most about this, is that people today are taking the unmodified and uncorrected 1905 theory, by reading it in the 1952 version as published in “The Principle of Relativity”, and they claiming that it is real and flawless, and they claim that they fully “understand it”, even though Einstein himself changed it many times over the years. They believe in an antiquated first-draft theory that he himself changed and altered, because he realized it contained so many errors, and yet they call me the "crackpot" for pointing out that he changed it, and they claim that they "fully understand" the original 1905 paper that contains so many errors that he later corrected.

[Andreas]

Different temperatures, but no freezing.

Would you care to cite some scientific papers that describe how water has been frozen to near absolute zero, but it didn’t freeze?

As in an actual experiment? Do you really think we can accelerate significant amounts of water (enough to distinguish liquid/frozen phases) to relativistic speeds? Besides, what would the point of such an experiment be? The result follows from the time dilation and mass increase, which can be ascertained separately and easier.

Of course the real question is: What would be wrong with my reasoning? Given your debating history, I'm not even starting to hope to get a straight answer out of you.

[Sam5]

Different temperatures, but no freezing.

Would you care to cite some scientific papers that describe how water has been frozen to near absolute zero, but it didn’t freeze?

As in an actual experiment? Do you really think we can accelerate significant amounts of water (enough to distinguish liquid/frozen phases) to relativistic speeds? Besides, what would the point of such an experiment be?

Any experiment at all that shows water at near absolute zero but not freezing.

Surely you’re not just making this stuff up about water being able to go down to near absolute zero without freezing, so give us some citations from some real scientific papers that say this can happen.

This is another big problem with the SR theory. Guys make stuff like this up about it all the time. You just pull things out of thin air and you say “such and such will happen”, and you’ve got nothing at all scientific to back up your claims.

That’s why I call belief in the original SR theory more of a “religion” than a “science”. Perhaps I should call it more of a “superstitious belief system”.

[Tensor]

That’s why I call belief in the original SR theory more of a “religion” than a “science”. Perhaps I should call it more of a “superstitious belief system”.

That would be your belief system Sam5. You've been asked to provide answers to to questions about your claims and can't do it. You believe that SR is wrong because relative motion can't cause dilation in time, length or mass. Then why, using GR and the same circumstances, can you have relative motion cause dilation at the same amount as SR? You believe in an aether, something the is no evidence for (because if there was an aether, the effects would be visible and measureable.) Again, you have not provided any sort of reference that shows there is a measurable aether. Claiming things without any proof (as you do in just the above two examples) is a belief. Why haven't you answered the questions Sam5? Don't you have any facts to back up your claims?

[Sam5]

You've been asked to provide answers to to questions about your claims and can't do it.


I’ve answered all the questions I’ve had time to answer, and I’ve said “I don’t know” when I didn’t know, and I’ve given many citations to papers and books that you are fully capable of finding and reading yourself.

I don’t know the answer to every science question that you guys invent. I’ve given you hundreds of answers so far, but you don’t seem to understand most of them. Why don’t you guys ask each other some questions for a while. I don’t have time to sit here all day and answer hundreds of questions from 6-8 guys. You can go out and buy the books and papers I cite and find some of the answers in them.

I’ve asked you what you think about TheAtomium’s opinion that the other relativity moving guy would see our clocks “speed up” under SR theory, instead of slow down, so what is your opinion about that?


You believe that SR is wrong because relative motion can't cause dilation in time, length or mass. Then why, using GR and the same circumstances, can you have relative motion cause dilation at the same amount as SR?


It’s not “relative motion” that causes atomic clocks to slow down in GR. Lorentz invented the atomic oscillation rate “dilation” due to motion idea, but it’s not “relative motion” that causes it, it’s a motion though fields that causes it. I’ve answered that question dozens of times already. You keep asking the same questions over and over again. Some of my answers I just keep on file so I can re-post them when you ask them again.


You believe in an aether,

Einstein believed in an ether. He wrote about it in 1918 and 1920. Go read his papers and see if you can figure it out for yourself.

[Taibak]

You've been asked to provide answers to to questions about your claims and can't do it.


I’ve answered all the questions I’ve had time to answer, and I’ve said “I don’t know” when I didn’t know, and I’ve given many citations to papers and books that you are fully capable of finding and reading yourself.

I don’t know the answer to every science question that you guys invent. I’ve given you hundreds of answers so far, but you don’t seem to understand most of them. Why don’t you guys ask each other some questions for a while. I don’t have time to sit here all day and answer hundreds of questions from 6-8 guys. You can go out and buy the books and papers I cite and find some of the answers in them.

Nothing doing. You're pushing the theory so you do the research and present the evidence. I'm certainly not going to do your homework for you. Moreover, it's not a simple matter of you answering some of the questions but not others. If you have any realistic dreams of convincing us that you're right, you need to answer *ALL* of them. Otherwise, you've made your theory look incomplete and make yourself look, at best, like you don't know what you're talking about and, at worst, dishonest. We're not talking 'hundreds' of questions here. We're talking about the fourteen questions that Tensor, swansont, Andreas, and I have asked. You shold be able to answer those - any good researcher, regardless of his field, should be able to anticipate and address challenges to his thesis. It's also not a simple matter of just providing citations. You need to provide the evidence yourself - be it showing us the equations or quoting your sources - because we're not going out of our way to prove your theory for you.

I’ve asked you what you think about TheAtomium’s opinion that the other relativity moving guy would see our clocks “speed up” under SR theory, instead of slow down, so what is your opinion about that?

Looks to me like he misunderstood the questoin he was answering, but he would be wrong, regardless. Each observer would see the other's clocks run slow.


You believe that SR is wrong because relative motion can't cause dilation in time, length or mass. Then why, using GR and the same circumstances, can you have relative motion cause dilation at the same amount as SR?


It’s not “relative motion” that causes atomic clocks to slow down in GR. Lorentz invented the atomic oscillation rate “dilation” due to motion idea, but it’s not “relative motion” that causes it, it’s a motion though fields that causes it.

Only in Lorentz's theory which, as we've explained, contains serious flaws. Einstein's theory explains it solely with relative motion.

I’ve answered that question dozens of times already. You keep asking the same questions over and over again. Some of my answers I just keep on file so I can re-post them when you ask them again.

That should tell you something, to be honest. If your explanation keeps begging the same questions over and over, then it's not a very good explanation. For instance, what 'fields' are you talking about? There is no evidence for the ether, so that's out, and I can't think of any other fields except gravity that would cause those effects. Even then, a gravitational field wouldn't explain why two small objects in interstellar space would experience time dilation, whereas Einstein's theory of relative motion does.


You believe in an aether,

Einstein believed in an ether. He wrote about it in 1918 and 1920. Go read his papers and see if you can figure it out for yourself.

Irrelevant. If Einstein believed that, he was wrong (and the quotes you've provided don't convince me that he did). To date, there is no evidence of the ether and general relativity works just fine without one. The problem isn't whether or not Einstein believed in the ether, it's whether there's any physical evidence for us to believe in the ether. So far, we haven't seen any.


And we're still waiting for answers to our questions.

[Normandy6644]

Irrelevant. If Einstein believed that, he was wrong (and the quotes you've provided don't convince me that he did). To date, there is no evidence of the ether and general relativity works just fine without one. The problem isn't whether or not Einstein believed in the ether, it's whether there's any physical evidence for us to believe in the ether. So far, we haven't seen any.

Exactly. We've asked you how many times to show us any experimental evidence of an ether, and you have yet to do so. This does not mean that the ether does not exist, only that it has not been verified experimentally and hence, wrong, at least as of now. Until it's proven experimentally IT IS WRONG. That's all there is to it.

[Tensor]

You've been asked to provide answers to to questions about your claims and can't do it.


I’ve answered all the questions I’ve had time to answer, and I’ve said “I don’t know” when I didn’t know, and I’ve given many citations to papers and books that you are fully capable of finding and reading yourself.

Yes, like the citation to the US Navy paper you said supported your position, and the paper was about an experiment that an used SR corrections. Since that doesn't support your position (after all, you claim SR doesn't work), we asked the question again. After all, you didn't answer the question, because that citation doesn't support your position.

I don’t know the answer to every science question that you guys invent.

And there is no problem with that. But, if you make a claim, you better have a experimentally valid answer to questions about that claim, or your claim is false and you should stop making that claim.

I’ve given you hundreds of answers so far, but you don’t seem to understand most of them.

Thats because you don't answer directly. You make a long post that really doesn't answer the question. You post on something else, that is only tangential to what we asked. Is there a problem with sticking just to the question we ask?


You can go out and buy the books and papers I cite and find some of the answers in them.

Well, see, that's why we ask. You claim one thing from a paper based on quotes from the paper(like say SR is wrong and GR is correct). We ask for a clarification (like what equations are wrong in SR and what equations corrected it in GR). But, you don't provide us with what equations are wrong in SR, just more quotes which proves nothing about the math. And, after all, if the SR predictions match observations, why should we believe you that there is something wrong with SR, when you can't show us wher the math is wrong and should give a wrong answer. And you haven't posted any equations from GR. So how can you say that GR is correct if you can' t provide the equations that make the correction you say is there?

I’ve asked you what you think about TheAtomium’s opinion that the other relativity moving guy would see our clocks “speed up” under SR theory, instead of slow down, so what is your opinion about that?

I think he/she is misunderstanding relativity. (See, nice, short, and sticking to the point)


You believe that SR is wrong because relative motion can't cause dilation in time, length or mass. Then why, using GR and the same circumstances, can you have relative motion cause dilation at the same amount as SR?


It’s not “relative motion” that causes atomic clocks to slow down in GR. Lorentz invented the atomic oscillation rate “dilation” due to motion idea, but it’s not “relative motion” that causes it, it’s a motion though fields that causes it.

See, that is the kind of answer we would like. However, it is wrong, because no where in GR does it say that motion through a field causes dilation. And besides, where the gravitational potential is zero, there is no field, so how can you have motion through a field with no field. And according to the equations of GR, there is still dilation based on relative motion and the answers to the equations in GR match those in SR. So you really didn't answer the question. You just posted something that is easy to show is wrong. So we need another answer.

Even if you claim that it's motion through a field that causes dilation, you still have the problem of SR and GR giving the same answer, even though you claim SR is wrong. Well, if SR is wrong, why does it match the answer in GR and why does it match our experimental observations? If you disagree with this, please point me to the GR equations that predict something different from SR in GR, when there is non-accelerated relative motion. If you can't support your contention(and again, you haven't posted any GR equations to show a correction) then your claim is false, you know it to be false (because you can't support it), and you shouldn't make a false claim.

I’ve answered that question dozens of times already. You keep asking the same questions over and over again. Some of my answers I just keep on file so I can re-post them when you ask them again.

Oh, then it should be easy to repost your answers to the questions and request for examples that I posted. Some are mine, some are Taibak's.
Do you think you can keep them short? Almost every question you have asked me hasn't taken more than a paragraph or two to answer.


You believe in an aether,

Einstein believed in an ether. He wrote about it in 1918 and 1920. Go read his papers and see if you can figure it out for yourself.

This is another non answer, and has nothing to do with what I asked you. I was asking you to show us a experiment that shows an aether and the properties of the aether. As you've already pointed out, no one has measured an aether, but you still claim there is one and there is support for it. Well, which is it? If there is an aether, as you have claimed, what are the properties of that aether, if there isn't, again, as you claim, why do you, in latter posts, claim there is?

[Chip]

Einstein believed in an ether. He wrote about it in 1918 and 1920. Go read his papers and see if you can figure it out for yourself.

Defining and applying the word "ether" as Einstein does in his 1920 address to the University of Leyden, is not quite the same application as the "ether" which Michelson and Morley attempted to detect. The absence of which proved that the speed of light did not depend on the motion of the source. SR successfully reconciled the results of Michelson-Morley's experiment with physics. "Ether" remained a common term used by scientists in other applications.

From his 1920 address Einstein said (translated)
"...according to the general theory of relativity space is endowed with physical qualities; in this sense, therefore, there exists an ether."

And Einstein also stated:
"Newton might no less well have called his absolute space "ether;" what is essential is merely that besides observable objects, another thing, which is not perceptible, must be looked upon as real, to enable acceleration or rotation to be looked upon as something real."

In this context, Einstein's redefined uses of the term do not seem contractive of his past theories, such as GR, which he also discussed on the same occasion in 1920.

[Normandy6644]

In this context, Einstein's redefined uses of the term do not seem contractive of his past theories, such as GR, which he also discussed on the same occasion in 1920.

We can also point out that Einstein believed in a static universe (as did everyone else) until 1929 when Hubble first experimentally verified new galaxies. Einstein certainly did believe in some kind of "ether," long after the publication of his theories, and no one denies that. But at the same time, it does not appear (by context) to be the same ether that was disproved by the MM experiment.

[Andreas]

Any experiment at all that shows water at near absolute zero but not freezing.

Surely you’re not just making this stuff up about water being able to go down to near absolute zero without freezing, so give us some citations from some real scientific papers that say this can happen.

Do you really need a scientific paper telling you that water is liquid above its melting point?

I presented a way how relativistic mass increase should decrease the melting point. Unless you can find a problem in that, your point about time dilation "freezing astronauts" is refuted.

[Sam5]

Einstein certainly did believe in some kind of "ether," long after the publication of his theories, and no one denies that. But at the same time, it does not appear (by context) to be the same ether that was disproved by the MM experiment.

Of course not. The 19th Century speculation was that the universe was static and there was a universal ether that the earth moved through at 18.6 mps. The MM experiment proved there wasn’t a universe-stationary ether. Dr. Su’s theory proposes an ether at rest with the earth in his “local ether” theory. This would be a local ether, most likely based somehow on “fields” that are at rest locally at and near all astronomical bodies that generate the local fields.

Einstein, 1952:

“Concerning the experiment of Michelson and Morley, H.A. Lorentz showed that the result obtained at least does not contradict the theory of an aether at rest.”

[Sam5]

I presented a way how relativistic mass increase should decrease the melting point.


Well then show me any substance with a high mass that doesn’t freeze at near absolute zero.

[captain swoop]

I presented a way how relativistic mass increase should decrease the melting point.


Well then show me any substance with a high mass that doesn’t freeze at near absolute zero.

It woulddepend on how fast it was moving.

[SeanF]

I presented a way how relativistic mass increase should decrease the melting point.


Well then show me any substance with a high mass that doesn’t freeze at near absolute zero.

If you want to claim that moving at .5c won't do what SR says it will do, then it's up to you to figure out how to get something moving that fast and measure it's temperature without moving with it.

Demonstrating that water freezes solid at extremely low temperatures when it's not moving at relativistic velocities does not prove that it will do so when it is moving at relativistic velocities.

And the fact that you don't understand how that could work doesn't prove anything, either.

BTW, I'm still waiting for you to tell me what force is affecting Clock U1 during procedural steps 2 and 4 (when it's not accelerating and there's no homogenous gravitational field).

[Ricimer]

Einstein certainly did believe in some kind of "ether," long after the publication of his theories, and no one denies that. But at the same time, it does not appear (by context) to be the same ether that was disproved by the MM experiment.

Of course not. The 19th Century speculation was that the universe was static and there was a universal ether that the earth moved through at 18.6 mps. The MM experiment proved there wasn’t a universe-stationary ether. Dr. Su’s theory proposes an ether at rest with the earth in his “local ether” theory. This would be a local ether, most likely based somehow on “fields” that are at rest locally at and near all astronomical bodies that generate the local fields.

Einstein, 1952:

“Concerning the experiment of Michelson and Morley, H.A. Lorentz showed that the result obtained at least does not contradict the theory of an aether at rest.”


geh! Its back! If there is a locally stationary Aether (I.e. it follows the earth) the Aether theory predicts (i.e the following is a required side-effect of the presence of aether) a significant stellar abberation, as the light shifts from the "non-moving" universal aether, to the "co-moving" local aether.

WE SEE NO SUCH SHIFT!

But we've gone over that before.

[Sam5]

I presented a way how relativistic mass increase should decrease the melting point.


Well then show me any substance with a high mass that doesn’t freeze at near absolute zero.

It woulddepend on how fast it was moving.

Moving relative to what?

Show me some scientific experiments that back up your claim.

The earth is moving a very high speeds relative to the distant high-z galaxies, but I don’t see our mass increasing or our temperatures going down to near absolute zero or our clocks coming to a stop.

And I don’t see the distant galaxies’ temperatures going down either. Even the most remote ones are bright and hot and they continue to glow. You can’t have all of their “time itself” slowed down to nothing but still allow their molecular vibration rates to continue to be very fast and the galaxies to continue to be very hot. If time stops in the galaxies that are moving away from us as fast as light speed, then their molecular vibration rates would stop too, and they would be very cold and dark.

Just face it, the 1905 SR theory was wrong.

[Sam5]

If you want to claim that moving at .5c won't do what SR says it will do, then it's up to you to figure out how to get something moving that fast and measure it's temperature without moving with it.


No, it's up to you to prove the crazy theory that you believe in.

Lol, the distant galaxies are moving that fast, but they still look hot to me.

Many are moving at faster than “c” relative to us, but I don’t see the Hubble pictures showing them “frozen”. They are neither “really” frozen, nor are they visually or “apparently” frozen, from our point of view.

You need to remember that in 1905, Einstein didn’t know that these fast moving galaxies existed. He thought all the galaxies and stars were “fixed”.

[Ricimer]

Moving relative to what?

Show me some scientific experiments that back up your claim.

The earth is moving a very high speeds relative to the distant high-z galaxies, but I don’t see our mass increasing or our temperatures going down to near absolute zero or our clocks coming to a stop.

And I don’t see the distant galaxies’ temperatures going down either. Even the most remote ones are bright and hot and they continue to glow. You can’t have all of their “time itself” slowed down to nothing but still allow their molecular vibration rates to continue to be very fast and the galaxies to continue to be very hot. If time stops in the galaxies that are moving away from us as fast as light speed, then their molecular vibration rates would stop too, and they would be very cold and dark.

Just face it, the 1905 SR theory was wrong.

Actually, they do look pretty cold considering the spectral lines they give off. Only by using SR to "correct" for their very high recession speeds do we get the temperatures required for them to emit the lines they are emitting.

Thus, the emmission lines say their hot, and SR calculations confirm it by another means. But they look redder, and peak in a lower wavelength thus, from that measure, have a lower temperature (refering to blackbody temperature determination and redshift).

[SeanF]

The earth is moving a very high speeds relative to the distant high-z galaxies, but I don’t see our mass increasing or our temperatures going down to near absolute zero or our clocks coming to a stop.

Is the Earth moving at very high speeds relative to you? No? Then SR predicts that you won't see any of those effects!

And I don’t see the distant galaxies’ temperatures going down either. Even the most remote ones are bright and hot and they continue to glow. You can’t have all of their “time itself” slowed down to nothing but still allow their molecular vibration rates to continue to be very fast and the galaxies to continue to be very hot. If time stops in the galaxies that are moving away from us as fast as light speed, then their molecular vibration rates would stop too, and they would be very cold and dark.

There are no galaxies that are moving through space at c (or greater) relative to us. It's only the expansion of space that gives them a recessional velocity greater than c. And those that are moving at relativistic velocities relative to us still have their molecules vibrating at the same rate per their second, so I don't know why you'd expect them to be dark.

Just face it, the 1905 SR theory was wrong.

Just face it, you don't understand the 1905 SR theory. Not one bit of it. In light of which, I guess I do know why you'd expect those distant galaxies to be dark.

[SeanF]

No, it's up to you to prove the crazy theory that you believe in.

On the contrary. No theory is ever "proven." Theories can only be disproven. And since it is you who claim to be able to disprove SR, it is incumbent upon you to do it.

And as I said before:

And the fact that you don't understand how that could work doesn't prove anything, either.

[daver]

I?ve asked you what you think about TheAtomium?s opinion that the other relativity moving guy would see our clocks ?speed up? under SR theory, instead of slow down, so what is your opinion about that?

I think he's way wrong; under SR you only see another reference frame's clock as moving slower.

[Sam5]

On the contrary. No theory is ever "proven."

No? So the theory that the earth revolves around the sun has never been “proven”? The theory that there is a Western Hemisphere was never “proven”? The theory that the earth is round and not flat was never “proven”? LOL.

So you are making up Sean’s Laws as you go along?

I already know the SR theory has not been “proven”. That’s what I’ve been telling you. It says that “c” is a universal speed limit, but the redshifts show the distant galaxies moving faster than “c”. It says any object approaching “c” will freeze, but the distant galaxies obviously aren’t frozen, nor are we.

The SR theory was not only never “proven”, it was disproved, and it was changed by its author, in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, 1920, and 1952.

If you say that you saw a “white rabbit with a watch who was saying ‘I’m late, I’m late, I’m late’,” then it is up to you to prove it. I don’t have to prove there is no talking white rabbit with a watch.

[Sam5]

I've asked you what you think about TheAtomium's opinion that the other relativity moving guy would see our clocks "speed up" under SR theory, instead of slow down, so what is your opinion about that?

I think he's way wrong; under SR you only see another reference frame's clock as moving slower.

Ticking slower.

So, during the relative motion, if the other guy sees our clock as ticking slower, and if we see his clock as ticking slower, then which clock “lags behind” the other when they unite, after the relative motion is over?

[Sam5]

Thus, the emmission lines say their hot, and SR calculations confirm it by another means.

The visual redshift of their light at the earth is due to the classical Doppler effect.

SR requires them to freeze to absolute zero at a speed of “c” relative to the earth. The Doppler theory does not. Their classical Doppler shifts reveal that they are moving faster than “c” relative to the earth and that their light is appropriately Doppler redshifted. The ones that are moving toward us are appropriately Doppler blueshifted. In SR theory, they should get colder in both directions of travel, but M31 is blueshifted, not redshifted, and it is moving toward us.

[Ricimer]

On the contrary. No theory is ever "proven."

No? So the theory that the earth revolves around the sun has never been “proven”? The theory that there is a Western Hemisphere was never “proven”? The theory that the earth is round and not flat was never “proven”? LOL.

So you are making up Sean’s Laws as you go along?

I already know the SR theory has not been “proven”. That’s what I’ve been telling you. It says that “c” is a universal speed limit, but the redshifts show the distant galaxies moving faster than “c”. It says any object approaching “c” will freeze, but the distant galaxies obviously aren’t frozen, nor are we.

The SR theory was not only never “proven”, it was disproved, and it was changed by its author, in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, 1920, and 1952.

If you say that you saw a “white rabbit with a watch who was saying ‘I’m late, I’m late, I’m late’,” then it is up to you to prove it. I don’t have to prove there is no talking white rabbit with a watch.

Actually, those haven't been proven. The other theories though (i.e the earth is flat, and center of the universe) have been so thouroughly disproven, and the ideas of a round earth and heliocentric solar system are so successful, they seem to most, to be "proven".

Science works with some efforts to defend an idea (providing evidence or proof) but mostly on the concept of disproof. You can definetly disprove something, but you cannot completely prove it, not when you're dealing with reality. The correct answer, while it may be true, may only be part of the answer, and so cannot be proven. The "truest" answer is the one that is the most accurate, that is the biggest part of the picture.

Basically, in order for something to be true, it has to hold in all cases, and stand under all circumstances.

For something to be false, it has to be shown to be false under only a sinlge set of conditions.

So which do you think is focused on more? Because last I checked, you couldn't check for every single condition.

So you pose an idea, and some reasoning as to why you whipped it up. We then try to find cases where it is false. If we find any, your idea (as you posed it) is invalid. You must either throw it away and make a new theory, modify it so it still works (thus creating theory mark II), or explain to us (satisfactorily) why it does actually hold.


Now, as for those faster than light galaxies of yours.

I have already told you that those Z values >1 are determined using a relativistic formula for doppler shift, based on SR. If you plug those values into the SR doppler shift formula, you get a velocity slower than C.

Also, SR says C is the maximum speed something can move through space. In Expansionary terms, the galaxies arean't moving through space, but space is growing in between. SPACE can move and expand as fast as it likes (it doesn't behave the same as matter!)

But we've already gone over that.

Gee, I'm detecting a trend. You don't answer our questions, or listen to our answers.

[daver]

I already know the SR theory has not been ?proven?. That?s what I?ve been telling you. It says that ?c? is a universal speed limit, but the redshifts show the distant galaxies moving faster than ?c?.

No. We can't see redshifts from galaxies moving faster than c.

It says any object approaching ?c? will freeze

No it doesn't. You have a fundamental misunderstanding of just what relativity means; you are so convinced that it is wrong that you won't go through the high-school algebra necessary to demonstrate that it is indeed consistent.


The SR theory was not only never ?proven?, it was disproved.

No. It has been expanded upon, but not disproven or even discredited..

There are some fundamental incompatibilities between SR (and GR, for that matter) and quantum mechanics; possibly when these are resolved we'll see a new theory (maybe one in which there is a preferred reference frame and the possibility of superluminal communications). However, that new theory won't invalidate most of SR (time dilation, length contraction, mass increase)--these effects have been measured over and over again.

Your best bet would be to find a good primer on SR and read it and understand it and work through the examples. It has been explained to you why Einstein's papers are NOT a good primer.

[Tensor]

On the contrary. No theory is ever "proven."


I already know the SR theory has not been “proven”. That’s what I’ve been telling you. It says that “c” is a universal speed limit, but the redshifts show the distant galaxies moving faster than “c”. [/quote]

SR says c is a universal limit in an inertial frame, this is something you continually ignore.

It says any object approaching “c” will freeze, but the distant galaxies obviously aren’t frozen, nor are we.

That is your interpratation of the explanation of the math. The math itself doesn't show this. Care to show us where the math claims this?

The SR theory was not only never “proven”, it was disproved, and it was changed by its author, in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, 1920, and 1952.

If is has been disproved, why do SR predictions match our observations?
And where are your examples of wrong SR equations and the GR equations that correct them? We have asked , but you haven't provided any equations. Why do you continue to claim SR is wrong. without providing us any mathematical examples where it is wrong.

If you say that you saw a “white rabbit with a watch who was saying ‘I’m late, I’m late, I’m late’,” then it is up to you to prove it. I don’t have to prove there is no talking white rabbit with a watch.

You are one claiming SR is wrong. It is up to you to show where and we have asked you show us what equations are wrong. But, you haven't given one mathematical example of it being wrong, within it's realm of validity. You haven't explained why, if it is wrong, its predictions match our observations. This has been pointed out to you repeatedly. You are simply being intellectually dishonest by continuing to claim it is wrong, without any providing any proof, after having been refuted.

[daver]

So, during the relative motion, if the other guy sees our clock as ticking slower, and if we see his clock as ticking slower, then which clock ?lags behind? the other when they unite, after the relative motion is over?

They don't unite--if they did then one of them would have to change reference frames.

Spaceship A pases Spaceship B. Spaceship A think's Spaceship B's clock is running slow, Spaceship B thinks Spaceship A's clock is running slow. After they pass, Spaceship A launches Shuttle A' to catch up to Spaceship B. Similarly, Spaceship B launches Shuttle B' to catch up with Spaceship A. When Shuttle A' meets Spaceship B, Shuttle A' notices that their clocks lag behind Spaceship B's clocks. Similarly, Shuttle B' notices that their clocks lag behind Spaceship A's clocks.

NOBODY IS SURPRISED AT THIS.

There are four different reference frames involved; each of the reference frames sees clocks in the other reference frames as moving slower. If you'd exert a modicum of effort, you could work out from each reference frame's point of view how much time had passed for each clock at each of the various events (Spaceship A passing Spaceship B, Spaceship A launching Shuttle A', Spaceship B launching Shuttle B', Shuttle A' docking with Spaceship B, Shuttle B' docking with Spaceship A).

Similar situations have been described to you dozens of times in the locked thread (sometimes with errors, which is why you should get a real book on the subject).

[Ut]

On the contrary. No theory is ever "proven."

No? So the theory that the earth revolves around the sun has never been “proven”? The theory that there is a Western Hemisphere was never “proven”? The theory that the earth is round and not flat was never “proven”? LOL.

Since you're such a fan of reading, read some philosophy of science. The nature of a theory is that it can only ever be proven wrong.

Has it ever been proven that the Earth revolves around the Sun? No. Rather, an overwhelming body of evidence suggets that it does. The theory is instantly proven wrong if some massive body enters the system and flings us out.

Has it ever been proven that the earth is not flat? Yes. Like I said, you can prove something wrong. Has it ever been proven that the Earth is round? No. We simply have a lot of evidence that it is.

They was little in the way of thought of there being a "New World" before it was discovered. Remember, people expected to sail straight through to China.



I already know the SR theory has not been “proven”. That’s what I’ve been telling you.

No, you've been trying to say that SR is wrong, was a fatal mistake made by Einstein, and that he denounced it at a later date. SR has never been proven because you can't prove something right. A billion insidences of confirming data is outweighed by a thousand insidences of condeming data.

It says that “c” is a universal speed limit, but the redshifts show the distant galaxies moving faster than “c”.

Distant galaxies are not "moving" faster than c. The distance between us and them is changing at a rate greater than c. They're conceptually different. More importantly, they were not distancing themselves from us at a rate greater than c at the time when the light we currently see was emitted.

It says any object approaching “c” will freeze, but the distant galaxies obviously aren’t frozen, nor are we.

Have you seen these distant galaxies spinning about? I haven't. One still image every 5 years or so doesn't show that they're not "frozen". Moreover, why would you expect us to be frozen? You're not moving at c relative to us...

The SR theory was not only never “proven”, it was disproved, and it was changed by its author, in 1907, 1911-16, 1918, 1920, and 1952.

You're right. It is invalid in a non-inertial frame, and non-inertial frames don't exist in our universe. Thus, it's an approximation in a limiting case. And a very good one. It can be derived from GR. Does that mean GR is proven wrong, too?

If you say that you saw a “white rabbit with a watch who was saying ‘I’m late, I’m late, I’m late’,” then it is up to you to prove it. I don’t have to prove there is no talking white rabbit with a watch.

This is always an interesting direction to go in...

Let me make a controvercial statement. There's no such thing as "scientific fact". It's a myth. It is NOT a fact that the sun will rize tomorrow. It is only a fact that we witnessed the sun rise TODAY, YESTERDAY, and for a million years prior to today. It will not be a fact that the sun will rise tomorrow until it already has. Thus, there IS such a thing as "historical fact". If I saw a talking white bunny, then I saw it. It doesn't even have to have been there for it to be true that I saw it.

Now, it comes down to whether this thing I saw was real or not. You say it isn't, and that there's no such thing as a talking bunny. You also say that there's no reason for you to prove that there's no such thing as a talking bunny. You're absolutely correct. In fact, I couldn't prove that if I wanted to. I could grab every rabbit I saw for the rest of my life, and tried to hold a conversation with it, and find that none of them speak. It still wouldn't prove you right. All I would have proven is that I never got a rabbit to speak to me. It only takes one rabbit to prove you wrong, but there is no number of rabbits that will prove you right.

But let me guess. We're not talking about rabbits. We're talking about relativity theory. My bad.

[Ut]

Your best bet would be to find a good primer on SR and read it and understand it and work through the examples. It has been explained to you why Einstein's papers are NOT a good primer.

What? Are you honestly trying to suggest that the best way to learn something isn't to read 100 year old papers on the subject published by a very small number of individuals who did the initial work on the theory? But why? What could a more modern, introductory text on the subject possibly teach someone? I mean, they probably don't even include any vague quotes which can be spun into saying whatever I wish them to.


Here's an interesting question (though, it's at least only tangentially on topic -- it comes back around, though). I asked it once before, and got a good scoffing at. I'm sure others have asked it, too. But I'll throw it out again.

The aether supposedly exists (says Sam, and some of the great minds of the 19th century) because waves need a medium to propagate through. Of course, light is a wave, just like sound, or water waves. Hence the Doppler shift discussion. So, how does one (specifically Sam) address the photo-electron effect? How about Compton scattering?

[SeanF]

I already know the SR theory has not been “proven”. That’s what I’ve been telling you. It says that “c” is a universal speed limit, but the redshifts show the distant galaxies moving faster than “c”. It says any object approaching “c” will freeze, but the distant galaxies obviously aren’t frozen, nor are we.

Special Relativity predicts that nothing can move through space at a velocity greater than c, not that the expansion of intervening space cannot give a recessional velocity greater than c. It predicts that objects moving at near-c will have a lower temperature, not that they will freeze.

But you don't understand that, of course, because you don't understand Special Relativity.

[Flaney]

Even if you claim that it's motion through a field that causes dilation, you still have the problem of SR and GR giving the same answer, even though you claim SR is wrong. Well, if SR is wrong, why does it match the answer in GR and why does it match our experimental observations?

The results are similar although the mechansms are different. GR is relative to the field. The field affects clock rates and light speed (directly related).
SR is relative to the 'apparent' data rates of the carrier wrt to every target. The rates (clocks) and light speed are unchanged, but are distorted because of self-measurement, videre licet, light-clock measuring rates (and because of adherence that c'=c).

If you disagree with this, please point me to the GR equations that predict something different from SR in GR, when there is non-accelerated relative motion. If you can't support your contention(and again, you haven't posted any GR equations to show a correction) then your claim is false, you know it to be false (because you can't support it), and you shouldn't make a false claim.

SR paradox needs to bring the clocks in question together, id est, into the same frame. This requires accelerating in a zero gradiant potential. Is this not equivalent to moving uniformly in a grav gradient (the real relativity)? Thus, SR aquires the GR conditions; and the relative acceleration belongs to the one doing the acceleration. The GR equation will apply to SR.

SR is apparent differences, GR affects actual clock and light properties via field forces.

Both subsist on the field potental, one without a gradient, and one with. In any inertial reference frame, this potential is scalar by definition, the gradient is zero.

The equations should produce the same answers in specific situations; they are closely coupled. The underlying mechanisms are not the same. It is important not to attribute one's equations to the other's mechanism.

It is not really fair to Sam5 to demand an equation discrepency when it's a matter of mechnism difference. Besides, it should be a 'covering theory' anyway, just the interpretation is modified.

[Taibak]

Einstein certainly did believe in some kind of "ether," long after the publication of his theories, and no one denies that. But at the same time, it does not appear (by context) to be the same ether that was disproved by the MM experiment.

Of course not. The 19th Century speculation was that the universe was static and there was a universal ether that the earth moved through at 18.6 mps. The MM experiment proved there wasn’t a universe-stationary ether. Dr. Su’s theory proposes an ether at rest with the earth in his “local ether” theory. This would be a local ether, most likely based somehow on “fields” that are at rest locally at and near all astronomical bodies that generate the local fields.

Einstein, 1952:

“Concerning the experiment of Michelson and Morley, H.A. Lorentz showed that the result obtained at least does not contradict the theory of an aether at rest.”

Dr. Su's theory also makes a prediction for Bragg diffraction that's inaccurate by 4000%. That convincingly disproves his theory. Why should we believe a theory that predicts such grossly inaccurate results when general relativity makes successful predictions for the same phenomena?


And TheAtomium, Andreas, swansont, Tensor, and I are still waiting for answers to our questions (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=325) on page 14.

Edited to fix a math error. The percent error based on Dr. Su's local ether theory should be 4000%, not 400%. [(40 degrees - 1 degree)(100%)/1 degree = 4000%]

[SeanF]

SR is relative to the 'apparent' data rates of the carrier wrt to every target. The rates (clocks) and light speed are unchanged, but are distorted because of self-measurement, videre licet, light-clock measuring rates (and because of adherence that c'=c).

. . .

SR paradox needs to bring the clocks in question together, id est, into the same frame. This requires accelerating in a zero gradiant potential. Is this not equivalent to moving uniformly in a grav gradient (the real relativity)? Thus, SR aquires the GR conditions; and the relative acceleration belongs to the one doing the acceleration. The GR equation will apply to SR.

SR is apparent differences, GR affects actual clock and light properties via field forces.

Clocks A and B are located some distance apart, motionless relative to each other. They are synchronized with each other in their own motionless reference frame.

Clock C is in relative constant motion (non-accelerating) to A and B, such that it passes A first and B later. At the exact moment that C passes A (zero distance), C and A verify that they are displaying the same time. At the exact moment C passes B, C will be lagging behind B. This is not an "apparent" difference - the clocks' rates are absolutely different - but there is no acceleration involved.

[Taibak]

Even if you claim that it's motion through a field that causes dilation, you still have the problem of SR and GR giving the same answer, even though you claim SR is wrong. Well, if SR is wrong, why does it match the answer in GR and why does it match our experimental observations?

The results are similar although the mechansms are different. GR is relative to the field. The field affects clock rates and light speed (directly related).

What field are you talking about? That makes a huge difference.

SR is relative to the 'apparent' data rates of the carrier wrt to every target. The rates (clocks) and light speed are unchanged, but are distorted because of self-measurement, videre licet, light-clock measuring rates (and because of adherence that c'=c).

If you disagree with this, please point me to the GR equations that predict something different from SR in GR, when there is non-accelerated relative motion. If you can't support your contention(and again, you haven't posted any GR equations to show a correction) then your claim is false, you know it to be false (because you can't support it), and you shouldn't make a false claim.

SR paradox needs to bring the clocks in question together, id est, into the same frame. This requires accelerating in a zero gradiant potential. Is this not equivalent to moving uniformly in a grav gradient (the real relativity)? Thus, SR aquires the GR conditions; and the relative acceleration belongs to the one doing the acceleration. The GR equation will apply to SR.

SR is apparent differences, GR affects actual clock and light properties via field forces.

Not necessarily. According to general relativity, gravity is not a force, so you can't attribute gravitational time dilation to field forces. Moreover, general relativity still accepts time dilation due to relative motion in the absence of a strong gravitational field and any accelerations.

Both subsist on the field potental, one without a gradient, and one with. In any inertial reference frame, this potential is scalar by definition, the gradient is zero.

Again, what is this 'field?' A gravitational field? A tensor field? An ether field? An electromagnetic field?

The equations should produce the same answers in specific situations; they are closely coupled. The underlying mechanisms are not the same. It is important not to attribute one's equations to the other's mechanism.

It is not really fair to Sam5 to demand an equation discrepency when it's a matter of mechnism difference. Besides, it should be a 'covering theory' anyway, just the interpretation is modified.

It's more accurate to say that the mechanisms aren't necessarily the same. According to general relativity, time dilation can be caused by relative motion (which special relativity covers) OR by gravitation (which SR doesn't). When either theory deals strictly with relative motion without any accelerations and without gravitation they predict the same result from the same mechanism. When there is an acceleration and/or gravity, special relativity doesn't even apply, although you will get a similar effect (time dilation) through a different mechanism (spacetime curvature).

And what's a 'covering theory?' Don't all theories attempt to cover their subjects?

[Lunatik]

Your best bet would be to find a good primer on SR and read it and understand it and work through the examples. It has been explained to you why Einstein's papers are NOT a good primer.

What? Are you honestly trying to suggest that the best way to learn something isn't to read 100 year old papers on the subject published by a very small number of individuals who did the initial work on the theory? But why? What could a more modern, introductory text on the subject possibly teach someone?...
Here is a quote from the original paper:

Einstein's 1905 Special Relativity (http://www.fourmilab.ch/etexts/einstein/specrel/specrel.pdf) paper says, pp. 10-11:
From this there ensues the following peculiar consequence. If at the points A
and B of K there are stationary clocks which, viewed in the stationary system,
are synchronous; and if the clock at A is moved with the velocity v along the
line AB to B, then on its arrival at B the two clocks no longer synchronize,
but the clock moved from A to B lags behind the other which has remained at
B by 1/2 tv2/c2 (up to magnitudes of fourth and higher order), t being the time
occupied in the journey from A to B.

It is at once apparent that this result still holds good if the clock moves from
A to B in any polygonal line, and also when the points A and B coincide.
If we assume that the result proved for a polygonal line is also valid for a
continuously curved line, we arrive at this result: If one of two synchronous
clocks at A is moved in a closed curve with constant velocity until it returns to
A, the journey lasting t seconds, then by the clock which has remained at rest
the travelled clock on its arrival at A will be 1/2 tv2/c2 second slow. Thence we
conclude that a balance-clock at the equator must go more slowly, by a very
small amount, than a precisely similar clock situated at one of the poles under
otherwise identical conditions. (italics mine)
We can see from this statement that Einstein consciously 'transfers' what is observed from a stationary observer's reference frame to the moving reference frame of the observed. This, at least to me, represents a 'transference' that is not justified, since what is observed cannot be transferred to the 'actuality' frame of the observed, the clock moving away, is not what is observed from the reference frame of the observer. Observationally, the moving away clock will 'appear' to slow for the stationary observer, but will not 'experience' this time difference within itself, unless this is caused for other reasons, like redshift of oscilating atoms accelerating through a gravity field, etc. 8-[

I hope this makes sense, since it is a subtle distinction, but it may also be the weakest point of Einstein's Theory of Relativity. Subsequent papers may have corrected some of the particulars of this theory, but the fundamental 'transference' from observer to observed remained, which not only complicated physics for the past 100 years, but may have unecessarily encumbered it as well. The fact that physicists had succeeded in making it work for our obersvational interpretation of the universe is a success that rests on this 'weak link', which may in the end be its undoing. [-X

[Flaney]

Clocks A and B are located some distance apart, motionless relative to each other. They are synchronized with each other in their own motionless reference frame.

Clock C is in relative constant motion (non-accelerating) to A and B, such that it passes A first and B later. At the exact moment that C passes A (zero distance), C and A verify that they are displaying the same time. At the exact moment C passes B, C will be lagging behind B. This is not an "apparent" difference - the clocks' rates are absolutely different - but there is no acceleration involved.

C's position is never 'seen' by either A or B. They see C's apparent position. If A looks at C's clock when C is closest, C has already passed A on its way to B. That clock reading cannot be assiged to distance = 0. If B makes a reading when it 'sees' C cross A, C is really even farther past A.

A and C will not display the same time when they cross! If either adjusts their clock, B will register a discrepancy with with one or the other.

[SeanF]

Clocks A and B are located some distance apart, motionless relative to each other. They are synchronized with each other in their own motionless reference frame.

Clock C is in relative constant motion (non-accelerating) to A and B, such that it passes A first and B later. At the exact moment that C passes A (zero distance), C and A verify that they are displaying the same time. At the exact moment C passes B, C will be lagging behind B. This is not an "apparent" difference - the clocks' rates are absolutely different - but there is no acceleration involved.

C's position is never 'seen' by either A or B. They see C's apparent position. If A looks at C's clock when C is closest, C has already passed A on its way to B. That clock reading cannot be assiged to distance = 0. If B makes a reading when it 'sees' C cross A, C is really even farther past A.

??

I don't understand your criticism here. Are you talking about light travel delay? This is an idealized thought experiment, and we can consider A and C (and B and C, for that matter) to pass infinitely close to each other and observer each other "instantaneously."

A and C will not display the same time when they cross! If either adjusts their clock, B will register a discrepancy with with one or the other.

Again, what?! If the experiment is set up so that A and C will be showing the same time when they pass each other, then A and C will be showing the same time when they pass each other. Why in Pete's sake would you suggest that two moving clocks couldn't possibly both say "12:00:00" at the moment they pass? :-?

[daver]

C's position is never 'seen' by either A or B. They see C's apparent position. If A looks at C's clock when C is closest, C has already passed A on its way to B. That clock reading cannot be assiged to distance = 0. If B makes a reading when it 'sees' C cross A, C is really even farther past A.

I'm not sure that I'm understanding you properly. C can pass arbitrarily close to A and B, so the distance between them can be made arbitrarily small.

At the moment of passing, A can get an instantaneous reading on how fast C's clocks are ticking, and can get a well defined reading of C's clock. A can radio this time to B. After C passes B, B can similarly get a fix on C's clock rate, note the time on C's clock, and compare this with A's data. B would see C's clock as running slow, would know that A also saw C's clock as running slow by the same amount, and would see that the amount of time that passed for C during the journey from A to B was consistent with this slower clock rate.

[Ut]

C's position is never 'seen' by either A or B. They see C's apparent position. If A looks at C's clock when C is closest, C has already passed A on its way to B. That clock reading cannot be assiged to distance = 0.

Sure it can. What observer A is reading from clock C is the time on clock C when C was at d=0. C may be at y = vx/c when A sees C at d=0, but A sees C as C was at y=0.

C
|y=vt
|
|
|_______x=cT A

r=sqrt((vt)^2 + (cT)^2)

If B makes a reading when it 'sees' C cross A, C is really even farther past A.

But B doesn't make that reading. B's only purpose is to read the time on C when it observs C to be at its minimum distance from B, i.e. r=x. All you're really saying here is that light travels with finite speed, which is why we see these effects to begin with.

A and C will not display the same time when they cross! If either adjusts their clock, B will register a discrepancy with with one or the other.

Why do they need to adjust their clocks? Just pretend it's some amazing cosmic coincidence. Amazingly, when r=x, C observes A's clock to read what it reads its own clock to say, and vice versa. This is ONLY true for A and C, and only at that time. If you're zooming by in some other inertial frame, you won't observe this to be true. This is the relativity of simultaniuity.

[Flaney]

I don't understand your criticism here. Are you talking about light travel delay? This is an idealized thought experiment, and we can consider A and C (and B and C, for that matter) to pass infinitely close to each other and observer each other "instantaneously."

A and C will not display the same time when they cross! If either adjusts their clock, B will register a discrepancy with with one or the other.


Again, what?! If the experiment is set up so that A and C will be showing the same time when they pass each other, then A and C will be showing the same time when they pass each other. Why in Pete's sake would you suggest that two moving clocks couldn't possibly both say "12:00:00" at the moment they pass? :-?

C had never been sync'd to A or B. If they had, there would be an offset ascribed to GR when accelerated to its speed.

As A observes C approach, the apparent clock reading it sees in C is 'old' but the rate of the reading speeds up until C's apparent clock shows a bias equal to the slowdown induced by GR acceleration for its change in velocity. So A or C needs to adjust their clock when they pass. B notes the discrepancy with C equal to the GR effect, or differences its clock with A's (including the light delay) to record the same GR effect.

[SeanF]

We can see from this statement that Einstein consciously 'transfers' what is observed from a stationary observer's reference frame to the moving reference frame of the observed. This, at least to me, represents a 'transference' that is not justified, since what is observed cannot be transferred to the 'actuality' frame of the observed, the clock moving away, is not what is observed from the reference frame of the observer. Observationally, the moving away clock will 'appear' to slow for the stationary observer, but will not 'experience' this time difference within itself, unless this is caused for other reasons, like redshift of oscilating atoms accelerating through a gravity field, etc. 8-[

Lunatik, with all due respect, you don't understand what Einstein is doing any better than Sam5 does. Let's take that first paragraph:

From this there ensues the following peculiar consequence. If at the points A and B of K there are stationary clocks which, viewed in the stationary system, are synchronous; and if the clock at A is moved with the velocity v along the line AB to B, then on its arrival at B the two clocks no longer synchronize, but the clock moved from A to B lags behind the other which has remained at B by 1/2 tv2/c2 (up to magnitudes of fourth and higher order), t being the time occupied in the journey from A to B.

First of all, let's put some real numbers on here so we can more easily see what's going on. We start out with A and B synchronized (in K), and then put A in motion relative to K. So let's say the two clocks are a distance of three light-minutes apart, the relative motion starts when the clock at A says "12:00:00," and the velocity is 0.6c. Now, when Einstein mentions "points A and B of K," he's talking about points in space. To really understand what's going on, though, we need to look at points in space-time. So, let's call A1 the point where and when the "clock at A" says "12:00:00", B1 the point where and when the "clock at B" says "12:00:00," and B2 the point at which the two clocks meet.

Now, the Theory of Special Relativity is a theory of coordinate transformations. What that means is that the distance between two points (in space and in time) is relative. Now, it is in the K frame that we've measured our clocks as being three light-minutes apart, and the clocks as synchronized. Therefore, in K, points A1 and B1 are separated in space by three light-minutes and in time by zero time (they are simultaneous). Also, in K, points B1 and B2 are separated in space by zero distance (they are colocated) and in time by five minutes. A1 and B2 are separated in space by three light-minutes and in time by five minutes.

Now, what are the distances between those points in K', the reference frame in which the clock that moves from A to B finds itself during its journey? Firstly, we find that points A1 and B1 are separated in space by 3.75 light-minutes(!) and in time by 2.25 minutes(!) - specifically, point B1 occurs 2.25 minutes before A1! (Lord, I hope my math is right . . . 8-[ )

Next, we find that B1 and B2 are separated by in space by 3.75 light-minutes and in time by 6.25 minutes, and that A1 and B2 are separted in space by zero distance (they are colocated) and in time by 4 minutes.

Now, look what this tells us. B1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in the K frame but 6.25 minutes in the K' frame. The clock that remains at B is in the K frame, so it ticks off 5 minutes. An observer in the K frame sees 5 minutes in 5 minutes, which is normal. An observer in the K' frame sees 5 minutes in 6.25 minutes, so the clock is running slow.

A1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in the K frame but 4 minutes apart in the K' frame. The clock that moves from A to B is in the K' frame, so it ticks off 4 minutes. An observer in the K frame sees 4 minutes in 5 minutes, so the clock is running slow. An observer in the K' frame sees 4 minutes in 4 minutes, which is normal.

Thus, both observers agree that at B2, the clock that moved from A to B is showing "12:04:00" and that the clock that remained at B is showing "12:05:00," but they both say the other clock was running slow.

There is no paradox here, there is no problem. Doing it in a "polygonal line" or with "A and B being the same point in space" complicates the math a little, but there is still no paradox, and no problem.

Both observers say the other clock was running slow while they move together, but there is no disagreement as to what they say when they finally meet.

[Edited to Add]
Sam5 doesn't understand the math, and he will not even read this post. He will probably make some dismissive comment about me just trying to confuse him, though. If you, Lunatik (or anybody else, for that matter), have any questions or need clarification about what I've done here, please ask. :)

[SeanF]

C had never been sync'd to A or B. If they had, there would be an offset ascribed to GR when accelerated to its speed.

As A observes C approach, the apparent clock reading it sees in C is 'old' but the rate of the reading speeds up until C's apparent clock shows a bias equal to the slowdown induced by GR acceleration for its change in velocity. So A or C needs to adjust their clock when they pass. B notes the discrepancy with C equal to the GR effect, or differences its clock with A's (including the light delay) to record the same GR effect.

Fine, so let's not worry about C being synched to either A or B. It's not important. When A passes C, the two clocks merely look at each other and determine how far off they are. For the simplicity of argument, let's say at the moment they pass, C is exactly 5 minutes behind A. Fair enough?

When C passes B, it will be more than 5 minutes behind B, even though A and B still see each other as synchronized. There was no acceleration while C was travelling from A to B, but it will still be farther behind.

[SeanF]

Why do they need to adjust their clocks? Just pretend it's some amazing cosmic coincidence. Amazingly, when r=x, C observes A's clock to read what it reads its own clock to say, and vice versa. This is ONLY true for A and C, and only at that time. If you're zooming by in some other inertial frame, you won't observe this to be true. This is the relativity of simultaniuity.

Careful, Ut . . . that is, if you're saying what I think you're saying. :)

If A and C observe themselves to "match" when they pass each other, then every observer will agree that A and C match when they pass each other. They are, effectively, in the same place, and relative differences in simultaneity require distances.

A and B, for example, consider themselves to "match" throughout the experiment. A relatively moving observer (like C), will not consider them to match. The measured difference between them will depend on 1) the distance between A and B; and 2) the relative velocity (including, believe it or not, the direction)

[Ut]

If A and C observe themselves to "match" when they pass each other, then every observer will agree that A and C match when they pass each other. They are, effectively, in the same place, and relative differences in simultaneity require distances.

No, no. I took up Flaney's issue with the propagation delay. Note the carefully crafted ASCII diagram. ;) My A and B aren't on top of each other.

[SeanF]

If A and C observe themselves to "match" when they pass each other, then every observer will agree that A and C match when they pass each other. They are, effectively, in the same place, and relative differences in simultaneity require distances.

No, no. I took up Flaney's issue with the propagation delay. Note the carefully crafted ASCII diagram. ;) My A and B aren't on top of each other.

OIC. Glad I put "if you're saying what I think you're saying" in my post. You weren't.
:D

[Ut]

Since this is the duscussion at hand currently, I thought I'd ask...

A and B, for example, consider themselves to "match" throughout the experiment. A relatively moving observer (like C), will not consider them to match. The measured difference between them will depend on 1) the distance between A and B; and 2) the relative velocity (including, believe it or not, the direction)

The difference is due to the +/- in the equations, right? Or, I guess if one's following cause and effect, the difference is the cause of the +/-, but... That's really only a radial thing, right? If Receiver Y moves away from Emitter X at speed v in the -x direction, and Receiver Z moves away from X at speed v in the +x direction, they both read the same delay in X, right? I guess it comes down to: v=dR/dt=d|x|/dt ?

[SeanF]

Since this is the duscussion at hand currently, I thought I'd ask...

A and B, for example, consider themselves to "match" throughout the experiment. A relatively moving observer (like C), will not consider them to match. The measured difference between them will depend on 1) the distance between A and B; and 2) the relative velocity (including, believe it or not, the direction)

The difference is due to the +/- in the equations, right? Or, I guess if one's following cause and effect, the difference is the cause of the +/-, but... That's really only a radial thing, right? If Receiver Y moves away from Emitter X at speed v in the -x direction, and Receiver Z moves away from X at speed v in the +x direction, they both read the same delay in X, right? I guess it comes down to: v=dR/dt=d|x|/dt ?

The difference is definitely due to the sign, but let me clarify; I'm talking about two clocks motionless relative to each other and synchronized with each other in their own reference frame. An observer moving relative to those two clocks will consider them to be non-synchronized (they will both be ticking at the same rate, but not showing the same time at the same time). The question is, which of the two clocks does the observer see to be "ahead"? If the motion is such that the observer passes A first, B will be ahead of A. If the motion is in the opposite direction such that B is passed first, A will be ahead of B.

[Ut]

Right, but that's just the symmetry of the system. If A and B are synchronized wrt each other, and I'm travelling from A to B, and see a difference between them, I'd expect to see the exact same (but opposite) difference when travelling from B to A. Otherwise, A and B wouldn't agree on the time. Since A and B do agree, we should be able to switch the lables and move backwards, and see an identical system.

[daver]

Since this is the duscussion at hand currently, I thought I'd ask...

A and B, for example, consider themselves to "match" throughout the experiment. A relatively moving observer (like C), will not consider them to match. The measured difference between them will depend on 1) the distance between A and B; and 2) the relative velocity (including, believe it or not, the direction)

The difference is due to the +/- in the equations, right?

Let's say A and B are one light year apart; A and B think they are synchronized if a light pulse sent from A at Jan 1 2001 arrives at B when B thinks it is Jan 1 2002. Now, we have pairs C and D fly past, where C and D share the same reference frame, and in C and D's reference frame, they each pass their respective A or B at the same time (say, when A sent the pulse). At that time, C would read a different value on A's calendar than D would on B's (maybe I should note that, in C-D's reference frame they passed A and B "simultaneously", while in A-B's reference frame the passing was staggered--one of C or D passed first).

[d 2022]

The claims of the author after a mathematical demonstration are:
http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-5.html

Looking at the assumption in (Eq. 19)...(ve) was the term used in the beginning to represent the ether wind velocity... This means Einstein used fluid space as a basis for Special Relativity. His failing was in declaring the velocity of light an observable limit to the velocity of any mass when it should only have been the limit to any observable electromagnetic wave velocity in the ether. The velocity of light is only a limit velocity in the fluid of space where it is being observed. If the energy-density of space is greater or less in another part of space, then the relativistic velocity of light will pass up and down through the reference light wave velocity limit - if such exists.
Do not fall into the trap of assuming that this fluid space cannot have varying energy-density. Perhaps, the reader is this very moment saying, an incompressible fluid space does not allow concentrations of energy - but he is wrong - dead wrong!

http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-5.html

Comments?
After reading most of the debate and revise the mathematical demonstration made by the author it is clear than Einstien as include ether in his calculations.(See the mathematical demonstration below)
So when the author talk about Enstein Relativity Error he is not saying than this is the Equation who is in the error but "His failing was in declaring the velocity of light an observable limit to the velocity of any mass when it should only have been the limit to any observable electromagnetic wave velocity in the ether."

The author`s mathematical demonstration.
http://au.geocities.com/psyberplasmic/ccX-5.html

THE DISCIPLINE DETAILS
Einstein was faced with an apparent paradox as to the nature of space. It behaved like a fluid in many ways - yet in others it behaved like an abstract, ten-component Ricci Tensor from the Reimannian model of the Universe. The failure of the M-M test to detect an ether was the final straw. Yet, hard as he tried, Einstein failed to remove the "ether" from E = mc2 The following discussion should illustrate this point:

Diagram 1 is a schematic of the M-M test. It was conducted on the basis that if an ether existed, the earth would by moving through it. Hence, there would be a relative velocity between earth and the fluid of space.



It was reasoned that by splitting a beam of light (F) into two parts; sending one out and back in-line with the direction of earth's orbital path, (to mirror (A) from half-silvered mirror (G)); sending the other at right angles to the direction of earth's orbital path (to mirror (B) through half-silvered mirror (G) and glass plate (D)); and recombining the two beams in the interferometer (E) one should be able to detect a shift in the phases of the two beams relative to one another.

This shift could be accurately predicted by knowing the velocity of light (c) and the velocity (ve) of earth through orbital space. Their reasoning was as follows (refer diag.1, diag.2a, diag.2b):



Assuming:
ve = velocity of ether wind or drift
c = velocity of light
= velocity from G to B by fixed extra-terrestrial observer
s = distance GA = GB
t1 = go-return time in-line (GA-AG)
t2 = go-return time at right angles (GB-BG)
t = .5t2
v1 = apparent velocity from G to B by earth observer

Then the time (t1) is determined by: [s/(c-ve)]+[s/(c+ve)] = t1 which reduces to:
(Eq.1) 2sc/(c2-ve2) = t1

Also, the time (t2) is determined by first solving for (v1) in terms of (c) and (ve) using the Pythagorean Theorum (c2=a2+b2)... or, in this instance: (G to B)2=(G to M)2+(M to B)2.

by substitution, c2 = ve2+v12

hence:
(Eq.2) v1 = (c2-ve2).5

Now, solving for the time (t) - which is the same over GM, GB, MB - of the GB trip by substituting s/t = v1 in (Eq.2) , one obtains:
(Eq.3) s/t = (c2-ve2).5

rearranging:
(Eq.3) t = s/(c2-ve2).5

substituting: t=.5t2

gives: t2/2 = s/(c2-ve2).5

or:
(Eq.4) t2 = 2s/(c2-ve2).5

by comparing the ratio of the in-line go-return time (t1) to the right angle go-return time (t2) one obtains:
(Eq.5) t1/t2 = [2sc/(c2-ve2)][(c2-ve2).5/2s]

which reduces to:
(Eq.5) t1/t2 = (1-ve2/c2)-.5

Now then, if the light source is at rest with respect to the ether, one sees:
(Eq.6) ve = 0

hence:
(Eq.7) t1/t2 = 1/(1-0).5 = 1/1 = 1

Such a ratio as (Eq.7) shows is exactly what every successive try of the linear M-M test has obtained...(notice: linear not angular). Lorentz and Fitzgerald knew there had to be an ether; so they developed their well-known transforms - an act which was in essence a way of saying, there has to be an ether... we'll adjust our observed results by a factor which will bring our hypothetical expectations and our test results into accord... Their whole transform was based on the existence of ether space! Their transform, in essence, said that length shortened, mass flattened, and time dilated as a body moved through the ether; hence it was possible to detect the ether.

Einstein came along in 1905 saying the Michelson-Morley test showed the velocity of light to be a universal constant to the observer. Seizing upon this and the Lorentz-Fitzgerald transforms, Einstein was able to formulate his Special Relativity which resulted in the now famous E=Mc2 ... the derivation of which follows:

Starting with (Eq.5): t1/t2=(1-ve2/c2)-.5

The Lorentz-Fitzgerald transform factor for (Eq.5) becomes (1-ve2/c2).5 (to bring t2=t1) giving t1/t2 an observed value of (1).

Assuming Lorentz and Fitzgerald's supposition to be correct, one should look at mass-in-motion as the observer on the mass sees it versus mass-in-motion as the universal observer sees it....
let m1 = mass as it appears to riding observer
let v1 = velocity as detected by rider
let m2 = mass as universal observer sees it
let v2 = velocity as universal observer sees it

then it follows (from Lorentz and Fitzgerald) that:
(Eq.9) m1v1 not= m2v2 (to either observer)

So, to equate the two products, Lorentz and Fitzgerald devised their transform factor (1-ve2/c2).5 which would bring m1v1=m2v2 to either observer,... yielding the following extension:

since,... v1 = s1/t1 and v2 = s2/t2 (assuming time is reference)
(Eq.10) m1s1/t1 not =m2s2/t1

or,...
(Eq.10) m1s1 not= m2s2

then, by substitution of the transform factor s2=s1(l-ve2/c2).5 (assuming time is reference) into (Eq. 10) one obtains: m1s1 = m2s1(1-ve2/c2).5 which reduces to:
(Eq.11) m1=m2(1-ve2/c2).5

To re-evaluate this relative change in mass, one should investigate the expanded form of the transform factor: (1 - ve2/c2)-.5 (which transforms t1=t2) .It is of the general binomial type:
(Eq.12) (1-b)-a

Hence, it can be expressed as the sum of an infinite series:
(Eq.13) 1+ab+a(a+1)b2/2!+a(a+1)(a+2)b3/3!+... etc

where: b2 is less than 1

So, setting... a=.5 and b=ve2/c2

one obtains:
(Eq.14) 1+(ve2/2c2)+(3ve4/8c4)+(5ve6/16c6)+... etc

For low velocities in the order of .25c and less the evaluation of (1-ve2/c2).5 is closely approximated by, the first two elements of (Eq. 14):
(Eq.15) (1-ve2/c2)-.5=1+ve2/2c2

so, (Eq.ll) becomes:
(Eq.16) m2=m1(1+ve2/c2) (where ve less than .25c)

developing further,... m2=m1+m1ve2/2c2
(Eq.17) m2-m1=.5m1ve2/c2

Remembering energy (E) is represented by:
(*Eq.18*) E=.5mv2(where ve less than .25c)

One can substitute (*Eq.18*) into (Eq.17) giving...
(Eq.19) m2-m1=E/c2 (assuming ve = v)

Representing the change in mass (m2-m1)by M gives:
(Eq.20) M=E/c2

or, in the more familiar form using the general (m) for (M):
(Eq.21) E=mc2

(Note, however, that equation (14) should be used for the greatest accuracy - especially where ve is greater than .25c)

Looking at the assumption in (Eq. 19)...(ve) was the term used in the beginning to represent the ether wind velocity... This means Einstein used fluid space as a basis for Special Relativity. His failing was in declaring the velocity of light an observable limit to the velocity of any mass when it should only have been the limit to any observable electromagnetic wave velocity in the ether. The velocity of light is only a limit velocity in the fluid of space where it is being observed. If the energy-density of space is greater or less in another part of space, then the relativistic velocity of light will pass up and down through the reference light wave velocity limit - if such exists.

Do not fall into the trap of assuming that this fluid space cannot have varying energy-density. Perhaps, the reader is this very moment saying, an incompressible fluid space does not allow concentrations of energy - but he is wrong - dead wrong!

When a fixed-density fluid is set in harmonic motion about a point or centre, the number of masses passing a fixed reference point per unit time can be observed as increased mass (or concentrated energy). Although the density (mass per volume) is constant, the mass-velocity product yields the illusion of more mass per volume per time. Space is an incompressible fluid of varying energy density...in this author's opinion.

The apparent absurdity of infinitely-increasing-mass and infinitely-decresing-length as a mass approaches the light-wave velocity is rationalized by realizing that space has inertia and as such offers inertial resistance to the moving mass. The energy of the moving mass is transmitted in front of it into the medium of space. The resulting curl of inertial resistance increases as negative momentum to the extent the mass is converted to radiant energy as it meets its own reflected mass in resistance. However, to the Star Trek fans, take heart... just as man broke the sound-velocity limit (sound barrier) he can also break the light-velocity limit (light barrier). By projecting a high-density, polarized field of resonating electrons to spoil or warp the pressure wave of the inertial curl, the hyperlight-craft can slip through the warp opening before it closes - emitting the characteristic shock wave. Such a spoiler would be formed by using the electro-dynamic, high-energy-density electron waves which would normally proceed before the hyperlight craft, as a primary function of propulsion. When a similar function is executed by hypersonic aircraft, a sonic boom is formed as the inertial curl collapses on itself. In space, the light-velocity equivalent to this sonic boom would be in the form of Cherenkov radiation which is emitted as a mass crosses the light-velocity threshold sending tangential light to the direction of travel.

[Sam5]

No. We can't see redshifts from galaxies moving faster than c.

Sure we can. See the Davis-Lineweaver paper “Superluminal Recessional Velocities” and this quote from their paper:

“Here we show that galaxies with recession velocities faster than the speed
of light are observable and that in all viable cosmological models, galaxies above a
redshift of three are receding superluminally.”




You have a fundamental misunderstanding of just what relativity means

No I don’t. I have his 1907 paper in which he says the absolute temperature of a moving body will go down, and you don’t. He didn’t say that in the 1905 paper. You base all your belief system about SR on that one paper that he added to and eventually changed. You need to read his updates published after 1905.

[Sam5]

So, during the relative motion, if the other guy sees our clock as ticking slower, and if we see his clock as ticking slower, then which clock ?lags behind? the other when they unite, after the relative motion is over?

They don't unite--if they did then one of them would have to change reference frames.

In the first thought experiment in Section 4 of “On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies”, the two clocks unite, and one of them “lags behind” the other, although the motion between them is only relative and both were synchronized and synchronous before the relative motion began. This is what started the twins paradox argument 99 years ago. So which one “lags behind”, if both are synchronized and synchronous at the beginning, and both systems are equal, and the motion between them is relative? And how did Einstein resolve the paradox in his 1918 paper? And what did Pauli say about Einstein’s resolution in his own 1921 book? A good relativist would have read all this important stuff.

[Lunatik]

We can see from this statement that Einstein consciously 'transfers' what is observed from a stationary observer's reference frame to the moving reference frame of the observed. This, at least to me, represents a 'transference' that is not justified, since what is observed cannot be transferred to the 'actuality' frame of the observed, the clock moving away, is not what is observed from the reference frame of the observer. Observationally, the moving away clock will 'appear' to slow for the stationary observer, but will not 'experience' this time difference within itself, unless this is caused for other reasons, like redshift of oscilating atoms accelerating through a gravity field, etc. 8-[

Lunatik, with all due respect, you don't understand what Einstein is doing any better than Sam5 does. Let's take that first paragraph:

From this there ensues the following peculiar consequence. If at the points A and B of K there are stationary clocks which, viewed in the stationary system, are synchronous; and if the clock at A is moved with the velocity v along the line AB to B, then on its arrival at B the two clocks no longer synchronize, but the clock moved from A to B lags behind the other which has remained at B by 1/2 tv2/c2 (up to magnitudes of fourth and higher order), t being the time occupied in the journey from A to B.

First of all, let's put some real numbers on here so we can more easily see what's going on. We start out with A and B synchronized (in K), and then put A in motion relative to K. So let's say the two clocks are a distance of three light-minutes apart, the relative motion starts when the clock at A says "12:00:00," and the velocity is 0.6c. Now, when Einstein mentions "points A and B of K," he's talking about points in space. To really understand what's going on, though, we need to look at points in space-time. So, let's call A1 the point where and when the "clock at A" says "12:00:00", B1 the point where and when the "clock at B" says "12:00:00," and B2 the point at which the two clocks meet.

Now, the Theory of Special Relativity is a theory of coordinate transformations. What that means is that the distance between two points (in space and in time) is relative. Now, it is in the K frame that we've measured our clocks as being three light-minutes apart, and the clocks as synchronized. Therefore, in K, points A1 and B1 are separated in space by three light-minutes and in time by zero time (they are simultaneous). Also, in K, points B1 and B2 are separated in space by zero distance (they are colocated) and in time by five minutes. A1 and B2 are separated in space by three light-minutes and in time by five minutes.

Now, what are the distances between those points in K', the reference frame in which the clock that moves from A to B finds itself during its journey? Firstly, we find that points A1 and B1 are separated in space by 3.75 light-minutes(!) and in time by 2.25 minutes(!) - specifically, point B1 occurs 2.25 minutes before A1! (Lord, I hope my math is right . . . 8-[ )

Next, we find that B1 and B2 are separated by in space by 3.75 light-minutes and in time by 6.25 minutes, and that A1 and B2 are separted in space by zero distance (they are colocated) and in time by 4 minutes.

Now, look what this tells us. B1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in the K frame but 6.25 minutes in the K' frame. The clock that remains at B is in the K frame, so it ticks off 5 minutes. An observer in the K frame sees 5 minutes in 5 minutes, which is normal. An observer in the K' frame sees 5 minutes in 6.25 minutes, so the clock is running slow.

A1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in the K frame but 4 minutes apart in the K' frame. The clock that moves from A to B is in the K' frame, so it ticks off 4 minutes. An observer in the K frame sees 4 minutes in 5 minutes, so the clock is running slow. An observer in the K' frame sees 4 minutes in 4 minutes, which is normal.

Thus, both observers agree that at B2, the clock that moved from A to B is showing "12:04:00" and that the clock that remained at B is showing "12:05:00," but they both say the other clock was running slow.

There is no paradox here, there is no problem. Doing it in a "polygonal line" or with "A and B being the same point in space" complicates the math a little, but there is still no paradox, and no problem.

Both observers say the other clock was running slow while they move together, but there is no disagreement as to what they say when they finally meet...
Thanks Sean for the thorough illustration showing how the theory of coordinate transformation works. I am not totally clear on it, so will use another illustration to see if it can make sense to me, using your example above with mine below.

I'll use the example of kids playing Gorilla tag (what we played as kids on the streets of New York long ago), where kid A runs up and tags kid A1, who's now 'you're it!' Kid A1 must now run over to kid B1, at v=0.6c (New York kids are fast, man!), to tag him. Because kid B1 is 3*c minutes away, it takes kid A1 5 minutes to get there. He tags B1, who now becomes B2, who's now 'you're it!'. Kid B2 now runs back to kid A, who gets tagged, so he now becomes A1 again. B2 tagging A1 happens in more than 5 minutes, so their distance now seems further apart, both in space and time, 3.75 minutes in space, and 6.25 minutes in time. Kid K is the referee, so from his point of view he can see both A1 and B2 kids, so he knows what's going on for both of them.

Now step over to kid K and see what he saw. "Well, duhh (he's a real New Yorker), duh kid A1 ran to duh kid B1/B2 in 5 minutes, who ran back to kid A1 in 5 minutes... I think?"

But that's not how A1 saw it, since for him (standing at B1) the return trip from B2 to A1 was further and longer, since he saw the distance now as 3.75*c minutes, and time as 6.25 minutes. But for kid B2, who is running at 0.6c, the trip was exactly 5 minutes, over a distance of 3*c minutes. Kid B2 is now at kid A1, "tag!", and his distance is zero. Kid K saw what both A1 and B2 saw in their own reference frames, and not from the perspective of either. So for him, or so he thought, nothing had changed for either one. Because Kid K was kinda slow, he couldn't make the 'transference' he needed to assign A1's perspective over to B2's perspective, to jump over to K'. For him, it all happened in a 'New York minute', fast, but not faster or slower.

Einstein was no doubt brilliant, so for him to make the 'transference' from A1's reference frame over to B2's was easy. However, this is where we get tripped up, because as a prudent and reasonable man (I moved to sunny California!), I can see no justification for doing this jump from one observational reference frame to the other, carrying over the result from the original, without questioning it. And yet, every Relativist out there has to make that 'transference jump' in his or her mind, either consciously or not, to make it work, otherwise it doesn't work. This is the 'voodoo' magic that has to be accepted, to me counterintuitively on 'faith', to make Einstein's Relativity work, otherwise it becomes nonsense. The fact that several generations have accepted this puzzles me much more than the puzzle of Relativity itself.

So in my original above, when I spoke of 'transference', this is what I was referring to. Anyone who cannot, or refuses to, make that jump is left out of Relativity, which I dare say is a lot of people who don't accept it, even if they don't understand why they don't accept it. I think Relativity is a brilliant 'observational' technique for understanding what appears to be happening at another reference frame moving in relation to us, and for that it is perfect. But to then take that observational technique and transfer it onto the observed, as if it were happening for the observed's moving frame from his own perspective, is a counterintuitive and unjustifiable jump, one no reasonable or critically thinking individual dare make, except to accept it on faith. Still, it obviously has not stopped others from doing so for nearly a century.

Gorilla tag, anyone? :cool:

[daver]

In the first thought experiment in Section 4 of ?On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies?, the two clocks unite

Then you are no longer talking about two inertial reference frames, but three. Again, go through the math, at least for an intellectual exercise. It's not hard, and you'll see that there's no inconsistency.

[daver]

I have his 1907 paper in which he says the absolute temperature of a moving body will go down, and you don?t.
OK, then could you quote for me the relative bits, where he talks about absolute temperatures? The quote you provided before involved relative temperatures.

[Sam5]

No, you've been trying to say that SR is wrong, was a fatal mistake made by Einstein, and that he denounced it at a later date.


No, he didn’t “denounce” it. He changed it but pretended he didn’t change it. He removed geometric “length contraction” due to relative motion in 1907. He changed the “constancy” postulate in 1911-1916, he added acceleration and gravity fields to it in 1918, he acknowledged an “ether” in 1918 and 1920, and he finally admitted that as far as light is concerned, space is not “empty”, since it contains fields. He had already shown in 1911-1916 that gravity fields slow down the speed of light.

Over the years he sort of tore down the original SR theory and erected a new improved one and called the new one the “SR” theory. Essentially, there was no more original SR theory after he added acceleration and gravity fields to it in 1918. He did that, so don’t blame me for it.

[daver]

Sure we can. See the Davis-Lineweaver paper ?Superluminal Recessional Velocities? and this quote from their paper:

?Here we show that galaxies with recession velocities faster than the speed
of light are observable and that in all viable cosmological models, galaxies above a
redshift of three are receding superluminally.?

Anyone have access to this paper? I can see three alternatives:

1. Galaxies which we see having a redshift of greater than three "now" have a recessional velocity of greater than c; hence at no time in the distant future will we be able to see the light that leaves these galaxies "now".

2. Their interpretation of the results differs from the normally accepted one.

3. I don't understand the currently accepted view.

Sam5, I don't need your opinion on which of the alternatives is correct.

[Sam5]

In the first thought experiment in Section 4 of ?On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies?, the two clocks unite

Then you are no longer talking about two inertial reference frames, but three.

In the 1905 paper, all his relatively moving bodies are in non-accelerated “systems”. When you start counting the “inertial reference frames”, then I know you’ve been getting a lot of bad information off the internet. Try sticking to his own 1905 theory, then see how he changed it over the years. Also see that he had to add acceleration and gravity to it in 1918 in an attempt to resolve the clock paradox. Also, he had to have the clocks fall and accelerate in a gravity field, and he had to turn the fields on and off, as if with a “gravity switch”.

[SeanF]

Thanks Sean for the thorough illustration showing how the theory of coordinate transformation works. I am not totally clear on it, so will use another illustration to see if it can make sense to me, using your example above with mine below.

[Snip]

I'm afraid I don't understand how your example relates to Relativity. It seems to have nothing to do with it, and is only related to my example in the usage of terms like A1 and B2. :-?

Einstein was no doubt brilliant, so for him to make the 'transference' from A1's reference frame over to B2's was easy. However, this is where we get tripped up, because as a prudent and reasonable man (I moved to sunny California!), I can see no justification for doing this jump from one observational reference frame to the other, carrying over the result from the original, without questioning it.

What "result" do you think is "carr[ied] over . . . from the original?" The fact that A1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in K and 4 minutes apart in K' is not an observation that only K makes. It is an absolute measurement of space and time. Saying that the "moving" clock only ticks off 4 minutes has nothing to with what the "stationary" clock is observing. It is because of what the "moving" clock is doing.

[Ricimer]

No, you've been trying to say that SR is wrong, was a fatal mistake made by Einstein, and that he denounced it at a later date.


No, he didn’t “denounce” it. He changed it but pretended he didn’t change it. He removed geometric “length contraction” due to relative motion in 1907. He changed the “constancy” postulate in 1911-1916, he added acceleration and gravity fields to it in 1918, he acknowledged an “ether” in 1918 and 1920, and he finally admitted that as far as light is concerned, space is not “empty”, since it contains fields. He had already shown in 1911-1916 that gravity fields slow down the speed of light.

Over the years he sort of tore down the original SR theory and erected a new improved one and called the new one the “SR” theory. Essentially, there was no more original SR theory after he added acceleration and gravity fields to it in 1918. He did that, so don’t blame me for it.

1) I think you're mistaking his expanding SR into GR (i.e. taking the special case and making it into a general case, thus the names) for him saying SR is wrong.

2) I think you're also saying he's taken stuff out that he hasn't. Its still there, he just had to alter them a little to make them more general.

[SeanF]

In the 1905 paper, all his relatively moving bodies are in non-accelerated “systems”. When you start counting the “inertial reference frames”, then I know you’ve been getting a lot of bad information off the internet. Try sticking to his own 1905 theory . . .

It is at once apparent that this result still holds good if the clock moves from A to B in any polygonal line, and also when the points A and B coincide.

The 1905 theory, and nothing else.

[Sam5]

Have you seen these distant galaxies spinning about? I haven't. One still image every 5 years or so doesn't show that they're not "frozen".

Uhh, if they were “frozen”, they wouldn’t glow.

[Ricimer]

In the first thought experiment in Section 4 of ?On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies?, the two clocks unite

Then you are no longer talking about two inertial reference frames, but three.

In the 1905 paper, all his relatively moving bodies are in non-accelerated “systems”. When you start counting the “inertial reference frames”, then I know you’ve been getting a lot of bad information off the internet. Try sticking to his own 1905 theory, then see how he changed it over the years. Also see that he had to add acceleration and gravity to it in 1918 in an attempt to resolve the clock paradox. Also, he had to have the clocks fall and accelerate in a gravity field, and he had to turn the fields on and off, as if with a “gravity switch”.


Ugh! Do you not read the material. A "non-accelerated system" is called, in short, an inertial frame. You are carried only by your own inertia, you aren't accelerating at all, you're coasting, because of inertia, thus the shorter name.

Now, of course he added gravity and acceleration! SR is a "special case" theory, it works only under very specific conditions. Like the equations for free fall (v=vot+1/2*at^2) only work when drag is ignored. In order to get the complete picture, that applies in general you have to figure out what terms to apply.

This is no saying the old one was wrong, just incomplete. All the stuff the old one did, must be preserved in the modified version. A similar example is Maxwell altering Ampere's law to better describe electrodynamics. Doesn't mean the original, unmodified law was wrong, just incomplete.

So Einstien, by building and expanding upon SR described a more general case using GR. This is not "hiding" or scrapping, or dismanteling SR. Because both GR and SR give the SAME answers when applied to the simple situations in which SR is valid. Just like the free-fall equations agree with the more complicated ones when drag=0 or Ampere's law holds (and Maxwell's extra term disappears) when considering an electro-static condition.

[Lunatik]

SeanF: What "result" do you think is "carr over . . . from the original?" The fact that A1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in K and 4 minutes apart in K' is not an observation that only K makes. It is an [i]absolute measurement of space and time. Saying that the "moving" clock only ticks off 4 minutes has nothing to with what the "stationary" clock is observing. It is because of what the "moving" clock is doing. (italics mine)
No, with all due respect, I think 'absolute' is the wrong term here. It should be 'relative' only. That is the whole point, that relative for the observer, yes, absolute for the observerd, no. Otherwise, it becomes what I'm talking about, transference.

[Sam5]

Sure we can. See the Davis-Lineweaver paper "Superluminal Recessional Velocities"


Anyone have access to this paper? I can see three alternatives:

Here, see if this link works for the first paper, click the pdf file

LINK (http://216.239.53.104/search?q=cache:ZaBcH7f9Fp0J:arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0011070+davis+lineweaver+superluminal&hl=en&ie=UTF-8)

Here is their newer paper:

LINK (http://216.239.53.104/search?q=cache:AVLn4ErE1OkJ:arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0310808+davis+lineweaver+expanding+confusion&hl=en &ie=UTF-8)

Remember what someone here said about the light we are now receiving from a galaxy that astronomers say is supposed to be 13 billion light years away? He said that the light actually left the galaxy when it was only about 2 billion light years away, but it has taken about 11 billion years for that light to reach us.

So, what does that mean? If you study the first Davis Lineweaver paper, you’ll see that the light emitted by the high-c galaxies at first moves away from the earth. It is moving at about “c” inside and relative to the galaxy that emits it, but the “comoving space” (the “ether”) of that galaxy is moving away from our galaxy at faster than “c”, so the light photons move a long time away from us. They are aimed in our direction, but they are moving away from us since the galaxy is moving so fast relative to us.

Ok, then, as the photons gradually leave the galaxy in which they are emitted, and move into the “comoving space” (“ether”) of galaxies that are a little closer to the earth, and that aren’t moving as fast away from the earth, their speed away from the earth gradually slows down. As this process keeps happening, for billions of years, eventually the photons enter our local group traveling almost at “c” relative to us. When they finally arrive here on earth and travel through our own local “comoving space” (our local “ether”), then they are finally traveling at “c” relative to us. That’s why it takes so long for the light from the distant galaxies to reach us, even though the galaxies were only 2 or 3 billion light years away from us when that light was first emitted.

Einstein didn’t think of all of this stuff way back in 1905, because he thought all the stars and galaxies were “fixed” back in those days.

A lot of this stuff is new. For example, superluminal galaxies weren’t discovered until about the 1980s, so there was no need to think about this stuff before then. Certainly not in 1905.

[Sam5]

Ugh! Do you not read the material. A "non-accelerated system" is called, in short, an inertial frame. You are carried only by your own inertia, you aren't accelerating at all, you're coasting, because of inertia, thus the shorter name.


I know that. But I also know that Einstein used the word “system”, while the modern websites use the term “inertial frame”, so that tells me where you are getting most of your information from. Not from Einstein’s own work, but from the modern websites.

[Ricimer]

So what, is Einstien's words on relativity the only valid ones?

Frame and system are synonymous in this context by the way.

[Normandy6644]

So what exatly are we talking about now? :o

[Sam5]

1) I think you're mistaking his expanding SR into GR (i.e. taking the special case and making it into a general case, thus the names) for him saying SR is wrong.

No. What actually happened was that Lorentz invented the first modern “electrodynamics” relativity theory in the 1890s. Einstein got most of his ideas for the 1905 paper out of Lorentz’s 1895 book, which I have a copy of. For example, it was Lorentz who first developed the concept of atomic clock slowdowns (atomic oscillation rate slow-downs) in the 1890s. He spoke of oscillating atoms as if they were nearly perfect “clocks”, just as Maxwell had suggested in his own 1873 book.

As far as I can tell, Lorentz was the first person to predict that atomic oscillation rates (atomic clocks) would slow down if the atoms moved through fields or experienced acceleration. He referred to the new oscillation rates of his atoms moving through a field as “local time”. Later Einstein mistook this for “true time” and “time itself”. Lorentz’s book was published when Einstein was only 16 years old and still in high school.

Einstein worked on his own version of the new Lorentz electrodynamics theory, and he introduced it in 1905, and he called it “the theory of relativity”. He didn’t begin to call it the “Special Theory” until around 1916.

Once his first “theory of relativity” paper was published in 1905, he began to receive a lot of criticism for it, since it contained serious errors and paradoxes. Turns out that Einstein left out too many of Lorentz’s ideas. His 1905 paper contained no physical “forces” for example. It contained no acceleration effects or gravity effects or fields that could actually cause atomic clocks to slow down their rates. Lorentz’s clocks in his 1895 theory slowed down for real physical reasons, but Einstein’s clocks in his 1905 theory did not.

Einstein mistook Lorentz’s atom oscillation rate slow-down for a “time itself” slowdown, and that’s why he used common mechanical clocks in his 1905 theory. He thought all clocks would slow down and just due to “relative motion”. This he called a “kinematical” effect.

So, Lorentz’s atoms slowed down because of real physical effects, but in Einstein’s new “relativity theory” of 1905, he had all kinds of clocks slow down due to relative motion only, and that was basically a really stupid idea.

Later, especially in 1911, as Einstein began to develop his more accurate theory that did involve physical forces, fields, and acceleration, then he finally began to realize that the critics of his original 1905 paper had been right, and that the paper did contain a lot of errors. This is why he said in his 1911 gravitational redshift paper:

”To avoid unnecessary complications, let us for the present disregard the theory of relativity, and regard both systems from the customary point of view of kinematics, and the movements occurring in them from that of ordinary mechanics.”

He had to leave out considerations of his original 1905 “relativity theory” in order to develop this new and more accurate theory that involved real physical forces, acceleration effects, and field effects. And also in this 1911 paper he switched over to using atomic clocks, just as Lorentz had originally done in his 1895 book. In this paper, Einstein designated ideal clocks that followed changing atomic oscillation rates (due to accelerative and gravity forces) as “U” clocks.

It was also in this paper that he contained his “constancy” postulate, because he had finally deduced that light speed would slow down inside a gravity field.

In the meantime, he finally got in touch with Lorentz himself, and they worked on some of these ideas together.

By 1916 he realized that the original “relativity theory” of 1905 had serious errors in it and that it did not match or conform to his new discoveries, so that was when he split the two theories into the “Special Theory” (1905) and the General Theory (1916). One of his main advancements toward the more accurate General Theory came with his 1911 gravitational redshift theory.

By 1918 he had acquired so many critics in Europe, he did not want the errors of his 1905 theory to destroy his reputation, so that is when he wrote his main correction paper, in which he resolved the famous 1905 “clock paradox” by adding atomic clocks (“U” clocks), acceleration effects, and gravity fields to the 1905 theory’s thought experiments. That gave the clocks (specifically atomic clocks) a real physical reason to slow down their rates, and this slow-down was due to real forces placed on the clocks, just as Lorentz had predicted in his own book 23 years earlier. So, as of 1918, the clock rate slowdown of the 1905 theory was no longer due just to the “kinematical” effects of “relative motion”, but due to real physical effects and real forces acting on the clocks. And this is when the original 1905 theory literally disappeared. All we have now is the basic 1895-1904 Lorentz theory (atomic clock slow-downs due to a motion through fields) and the GR theory (atomic clock slow-downs due to accelerative effects and gravity effects).

In 1916 and thereafter, Einstein always pretended that the 1905 theory was a “special case” of the 1916 GR theory, but that was not true. He knew by 1916 that the 1905 theory was wrong and that clocks do not slow down just for “kinematical” reasons due only to “relative motion”. In 1918, when he changed the reasons for the clock slowdown in the 1905 theory, what he was doing was “retrofitting” the 1905 theory, retroactively, and upgrading it to conform to the 1911-1916 GR theory as a “special case”, and, actually, the clocks in the 1918 upgrade were no longer in what are now called “inertial frames”, since they slowed down because of accelerative and gravity effects. Only Lorentz clocks, moving steadily through fields, slow down their rates while they are not accelerating.

So, the 1905 theory is not and never was a “special case” of the General Theory, even though Einstein pretended that it was. What is often mistaken for a “special case” of the General Theory is the Lorentz theory.

Needless to say, it took many years of research for me to find out all this information and to track down his rare papers that contain his several changes to the original 1905 theory, and it was not easy to find a copy of the rare 1895 Lorentz book. And I had to do a lot of reading to find the 1873 origin of Maxwell’s remarks about atomic clocks.

[freddo]

This is a form of revisionist history I'm not familiar with... #-o

[Tensor]

Ugh! Do you not read the material. A "non-accelerated system" is called, in short, an inertial frame. You are carried only by your own inertia, you aren't accelerating at all, you're coasting, because of inertia, thus the shorter name.


I know that. But I also know that Einstein used the word “system”, while the modern websites use the term “inertial frame”, so that tells me where you are getting most of your information from. Not from Einstein’s own work, but from the modern websites.

Modern textbooks also use the term inertial frame.

[JohnOwens]

Ugh! Do you not read the material. A "non-accelerated system" is called, in short, an inertial frame. You are carried only by your own inertia, you aren't accelerating at all, you're coasting, because of inertia, thus the shorter name.
I know that. But I also know that Einstein used the word “system”, while the modern websites use the term “inertial frame”, so that tells me where you are getting most of your information from. Not from Einstein’s own work, but from the modern websites.
Modern textbooks also use the term inertial frame.
Actually, I think Sam5 finally got something right here; that was his point.
On the other hand, I wouldn't agree that the original works are the best place from which to be gaining an understanding of relativity, as he seems to imply, especially if you seem to have been having trouble grasping a lot of the salient points.

[Tensor]

Even if you claim that it's motion through a field that causes dilation, you still have the problem of SR and GR giving the same answer, even though you claim SR is wrong. Well, if SR is wrong, why does it match the answer in GR and why does it match our experimental observations?

The results are similar although the mechansms are different. GR is relative to the field. The field affects clock rates and light speed (directly related).

SR is relative to the 'apparent' data rates of the carrier wrt to every target. The rates (clocks) and light speed are unchanged, but are distorted because of self-measurement, videre licet, light-clock measuring rates (and because of adherence that c'=c).

I am aware of all that. It is Sam5 who has claimed that SR is wrong and the dilation is described by Lorentz by some vague motion through fields (he never explains exactly what fields or how they interact), not the relative motion. My point in asking this is to get an explanation from Sam5 what is exactly happening, According to him, relative motion only(whatever the mechanism) cannot cause dilation.

If you disagree with this, please point me to the GR equations that predict something different from SR in GR, when there is non-accelerated relative motion. If you can't support your contention (and again, you haven't posted any GR equations to show a correction) then your claim is false, you know it to be false (because you can't support it), and you shouldn't make a false claim.

SR paradox needs to bring the clocks in question together, id est, into the same frame. This requires accelerating in a zero gradiant potential. Is this not equivalent to moving uniformly in a grav gradient (the real relativity)?

I said nothing about the paradox or about accelerated motion. I asked why SR and GR agree when there is non-accelerated relative motion. If, as Sam5 claims, SR is wrong and GR is correct, why do they give the same answer?

SR is apparent differences, GR affects actual clock and light properties via field forces.

Both subsist on the field potental, one without a gradient, and one with. In any inertial reference frame, this potential is scalar by definition, the gradient is zero.

The equations should produce the same answers in specific situations; they are closely coupled. The underlying mechanisms are not the same. It is important not to attribute one's equations to the other's mechanism.

I am aware of that. It is Sam5 who has claimed that SR is wrong (period, even without a gradient) and that GR fixed SR. I keep asking for him to show us how SR is wrong and how GR fixed it. By his claim, they should not give the same answers in cases of zero gradients, since he claims SR is wrong and GR fixed it.

It is not really fair to Sam5 to demand an equation discrepency when it's a matter of mechnism difference. Besides, it should be a 'covering theory' anyway, just the interpretation is modified.

Oh but that is the whole point. If, as he claims, SR is wrong and GR fixed it, then he should be able to point to exactly which equation or equations in SR gives us the wrong answer. And how exactly does GR change that wrong answer into the correct answer.

[Tensor]

Ugh! Do you not read the material. A "non-accelerated system" is called, in short, an inertial frame. You are carried only by your own inertia, you aren't accelerating at all, you're coasting, because of inertia, thus the shorter name.
I know that. But I also know that Einstein used the word “system”, while the modern websites use the term “inertial frame”, so that tells me where you are getting most of your information from. Not from Einstein’s own work, but from the modern websites.
Modern textbooks also use the term inertial frame.

Actually, I think Sam5 finally got something right here; that was his point.
On the other hand, I wouldn't agree that the original works are the best place from which to be gaining an understanding of relativity, as he seems to imply, especially if you seem to have been having trouble grasping a lot of the salient points.

Actually, he claims that we get our information from websites and those websites hide all the information about how Einstein knew SR didn't work, was laughed at in Europe, and changed his mind about an aether. That was the reason I mentioned that textbooks also call it an intertial frame. Now, if he wants to start claiming modern relativity textbooks are wrong, that is a whole 'nother story.

[Tensor]

1) I think you're mistaking his expanding SR into GR (i.e. taking the special case and making it into a general case, thus the names) for him saying SR is wrong.

No. What actually happened was that Lorentz invented the first modern “electrodynamics” relativity theory in the 1890s. Einstein got

Snip....

changes to the original 1905 theory, and it was not easy to find a copy of the rare 1895 Lorentz book. And I had to do a lot of reading to find the 1873 origin of Maxwell’s remarks about atomic clocks.

I simply don't have time to go through this mostly incorrect post tonight (it's 12:30 AM, I just got home from the show, and I have to be up in five hours for work). I will go through it tomorrow though. If anyone else want to start in on it, feel free.

[Sam5]

Actually, I think Sam5 finally got something right here; that was his point.
On the other hand, I wouldn't agree that the original works are the best place from which to be gaining an understanding of relativity, as he seems to imply, especially if you seem to have been having trouble grasping a lot of the salient points.

Original works are where you can find out what was originally said by whom and when. And in them you can find out who invented what, who stole who’s ideas, and who modified their earlier theories because they turned out to be wrong.

So far, I seem to be the only guy on this board who learned the original source of the “atomic clocks” concept, and I wouldn’t have learned that if I had not waded through about 900 pages of Maxwell’s 19th Century work.

Nor would I have learned that it was Newton who first proposed the big bang theory when he proposed his “projectile impulse” idea to Bentley, nor would I have learned that Einstein actually thought the universe was static and all the stars were “fixed” when he developed the GR theory.

And of course wouldn’t have learned that it was Lorentz who first proposed the “relativistic Doppler effect” in his 1895 book, nor would I have learned that it was he who was the first to propose a slowdown in the oscillation rates of atomic clocks due to motion-related effects, also he was the first to propose length contraction in moving bodies, mass increase in moving bodies, and the speed limit of “c”.

If you get all your science information off the internet, you might be misled into believing that Einstein invented all this stuff.

What I usually do in an investigation is compare the modern stuff with the original stuff and that way I can tell which modern writer is lying or mistaken or purposely trying to mislead his readers.

“Relativity” is not difficult to understand, once you remove all the rumors, the errors, and the myths about it.

I find it a little odd that anyone would type up a “clock paradox” resolution page on the internet without first consulting and studying Einstein’s own clock paradox resolution solution. Do all these guys think they are smarter than Einstein, or what?

I had one guy on this board argue that Lorentz and Einstein couldn’t have ever been talking about “atomic clocks” back at the turn of the 20th Century, since he said atomic clocks weren’t invented until around 1952. And this guys is a kind of “relativity monitor” on another science board. He tries to get guys banned if they don’t support Einstein 100%, yet he did not know that it was Maxwell who first proposed oscillating atoms as clocks, way back in 1873. How can I have any respect for guys like that who don’t know the history of science or what the basic principle of an atomic clock is?

[Sam5]

If, as Sam5 claims, SR is wrong and GR is correct, why do they give the same answer?

.

Show us where they give the same answer. Be specific.

[Taibak]

1) I think you're mistaking his expanding SR into GR (i.e. taking the special case and making it into a general case, thus the names) for him saying SR is wrong.

No. What actually happened was that Lorentz invented the first modern “electrodynamics” relativity theory in the 1890s. Einstein got most of his ideas for the 1905 paper out of Lorentz’s 1895 book, which I have a copy of. For example, it was Lorentz who first developed the concept of atomic clock slowdowns (atomic oscillation rate slow-downs) in the 1890s. He spoke of oscillating atoms as if they were nearly perfect “clocks”, just as Maxwell had suggested in his own 1873 book.

As far as I can tell, Lorentz was the first person to predict that atomic oscillation rates (atomic clocks) would slow down if the atoms moved through fields or experienced acceleration. He referred to the new oscillation rates of his atoms moving through a field as “local time”. Later Einstein mistook this for “true time” and “time itself”. Lorentz’s book was published when Einstein was only 16 years old and still in high school.

True, but you're talking history - not science. The physics of Lorentz's theory were wrong.

Einstein worked on his own version of the new Lorentz electrodynamics theory, and he introduced it in 1905, and he called it “the theory of relativity”. He didn’t begin to call it the “Special Theory” until around 1916.

That's because there was nothing to compare it to. You don't need to refer to a theory as a special case until you need to distinguish it from a more general theory.

Once his first “theory of relativity” paper was published in 1905, he began to receive a lot of criticism for it, since it contained serious errors and paradoxes.

Perhaps, but all of those paradoxes can be reconciled within the context of special relativity. More importantly, special relativity has yet to predict something not verified through an experiment. Therefore, there is no reason to claim that the theory contains serious errors.

Turns out that Einstein left out too many of Lorentz’s ideas. His 1905 paper contained no physical “forces” for example.

He did that for two reasons. First, because Einstein was only concerned with objects moving at a constant speed, meaning that he was only interested in objects that weren't being acted upon by forces. He basically started with the simplest possible form of motion and built from there. Second, Einstein realised that time dilation and Lorentz contraction were direct consequences of relative motion and that no force was requried to explain their effects.

It contained no acceleration effects or gravity effects or fields that could actually cause atomic clocks to slow down their rates.

Why do you think a force or a field is needed? As has been shown in countless experiments, you don't need a force to alter the rate at which time passes.

Lorentz’s clocks in his 1895 theory slowed down for real physical reasons, but Einstein’s clocks in his 1905 theory did not.

Einstein provides a real physical reason - relative motion. Are you saying motion isn't a real physical phenomenon?

Einstein mistook Lorentz’s atom oscillation rate slow-down for a “time itself” slowdown, and that’s why he used common mechanical clocks in his 1905 theory. He thought all clocks would slow down and just due to “relative motion”. This he called a “kinematical” effect.

It is time slowing down. This has also been verfied in repeated experiments involving Cs 133 clocks, muon decay, pion decay, satellite tracking, etc.

So, Lorentz’s atoms slowed down because of real physical effects, but in Einstein’s new “relativity theory” of 1905, he had all kinds of clocks slow down due to relative motion only, and that was basically a really stupid idea.

Actually, rejecting a theory in the face of overwhelming evidence is a stupid idea. Relativity was a stroke of brilliance that has yet to be proven wrong.

Later, especially in 1911, as Einstein began to develop his more accurate theory that did involve physical forces, fields, and acceleration, then he finally began to realize that the critics of his original 1905 paper had been right, and that the paper did contain a lot of errors.

What errors? Every prediction special relativity makes has been experimentally verified. It doesn't deal with acceleration and gravity because the special theory deals only with inertial reference frames without gravitation. Faulting the special theory for not predicting something beyond its scope is like criticising Kepler's first law as incomplete because it doesn't predict the hyperfine structure of a Chlorine atom!

And, incidentally, Einstein realised special relativity was a special case when he was developing it. He knew that sooner or later if he didn't extend it to deal with acceleration and gravity someone else would.
This is why he said in his 1911 gravitational redshift paper:

”To avoid unnecessary complications, let us for the present disregard the theory of relativity, and regard both systems from the customary point of view of kinematics, and the movements occurring in them from that of ordinary mechanics.”

He had to leave out considerations of his original 1905 “relativity theory” in order to develop this new and more accurate theory that involved real physical forces, acceleration effects, and field effects. And also in this 1911 paper he switched over to using atomic clocks, just as Lorentz had originally done in his 1895 book. In this paper, Einstein designated ideal clocks that followed changing atomic oscillation rates (due to accelerative and gravity forces) as “U” clocks.

From a scientific point of view, the 1911 paper is completely worthless. It is doodoo. It is a historical curiosity and nothing more. You're also leaving out the parts of the quote that don't say what you want them to. Einstein says that he was setting special relativity aside 'to avoid unnecessary complications.' In other words, he wanted to make a stronger argument by starting from scratch. You've also clipped one sentence out of a longer paper. It would be nice to know the context that goes with that sentence since you're obviously leaving a LOT out.

It was also in this paper that he contained his “constancy” postulate, because he had finally deduced that light speed would slow down inside a gravity field.

In the meantime, he finally got in touch with Lorentz himself, and they worked on some of these ideas together.

I fail to see how this is even relevant. Both were brilliant physicists who were working on the same problem and shared ideas. That still doesn't change the fact that Einstein produced a successful theory of relativity and Lorentz did not.

By 1916 he realized that the original “relativity theory” of 1905 had serious errors in it and that it did not match or conform to his new discoveries, so that was when he split the two theories into the “Special Theory” (1905) and the General Theory (1916). One of his main advancements toward the more accurate General Theory came with his 1911 gravitational redshift theory.

Again, special relativity has yet to make an incorrect prediction. The general theory is also indistinguishable from special relativity in situations where accelerations and gravitation are not present.

By 1918 he had acquired so many critics in Europe, he did not want the errors of his 1905 theory to destroy his reputation so that is when he wrote his main correction paper, in which he resolved the famous 1905 “clock paradox” by adding atomic clocks (“U” clocks), acceleration effects, and gravity fields to the 1905 theory’s thought experiments.,

Bull. In 1908 he became a lecturer at the University of Berlin. In 1909 he became a professor in Zurich. In 1911 he was appointed a full professor at the University of Prague and in 1912 he was awarded another professorship in Zurich. In 1914 he was not only awarded a fulf professorship at the University of Berlin, he was also appointed the director of the Kaiser Wilhelm Physical Institute, which he held until 1933. If his critics were legion, as you claim they were, he would have been regarded as a fringe scientist and, in the open, highly competitive academic world, he not only would have had a much harder climb to the top of the academic world, he would have been stripped of the posts he held by 1918.

Moreover, the scientific literature would be full of papers pointing out that general and special relativity are incompatible. None exist.

That gave the clocks (specifically atomic clocks) a real physical reason to slow down their rates, and this slow-down was due to real forces placed on the clocks, just as Lorentz had predicted in his own book 23 years earlier. So, as of 1918, the clock rate slowdown of the 1905 theory was no longer due just to the “kinematical” effects of “relative motion”, but due to real physical effects and real forces acting on the clocks. And this is when the original 1905 theory literally disappeared. All we have now is the basic 1895-1904 Lorentz theory (atomic clock slow-downs due to a motion through fields) and the GR theory (atomic clock slow-downs due to accelerative effects and gravity effects).

You're right that he introduced gravity as a cause of time dilation. However, YOU YOURSELF HAVE QUOTED PASSAGES FROM THE 1918 PAPER THAT ATTRIBUTE TIME DILATION STRICTLY TO RELATIVE MOTION.

In 1916 and thereafter, Einstein always pretended that the 1905 theory was a “special case” of the 1916 GR theory, but that was not true. He knew by 1916 that the 1905 theory was wrong and that clocks do not slow down just for “kinematical” reasons due only to “relative motion”. In 1918, when he changed the reasons for the clock slowdown in the 1905 theory, what he was doing was “retrofitting” the 1905 theory, retroactively, and upgrading it to conform to the 1911-1916 GR theory as a “special case”, and, actually, the clocks in the 1918 upgrade were no longer in what are now called “inertial frames”, since they slowed down because of accelerative and gravity effects. Only Lorentz clocks, moving steadily through fields, slow down their rates while they are not accelerating.

Bull. He knew that special relativity only applied to a particular set of circumstances when he was writing it. That's why he explicitly stated in the 1905 paper that the theory only dealt with objects moving at a constant speed and in the absence of gravity. Heck, that's why he started working on a more generalised theory in the first place!

So, the 1905 theory is not and never was a “special case” of the General Theory, even though Einstein pretended that it was. What is often mistaken for a “special case” of the General Theory is the Lorentz theory.

The only mistake is taking the Lorentz theory seriously. It predicts several effects that have never been shown in nature, like cut magnetic field lines.

Needless to say, it took many years of research for me to find out all this information and to track down his rare papers that contain his several changes to the original 1905 theory, and it was not easy to find a copy of the rare 1895 Lorentz book. And I had to do a lot of reading to find the 1873 origin of Maxwell’s remarks about atomic clocks.

I hate to say it, but your research is sorely lacking. Your track record of lifting quotes out of context, failing to understand the math, mistaking history for science, ignoring counterarguments, and disregarding bits of quotes that don't fit your hypothesis shows that your work has all the hallmarks of bad historical writing.


Original works are where you can find out what was originally said by whom and when. And in them you can find out who invented what, who stole who’s ideas, and who modified their earlier theories because they turned out to be wrong.

So far, I seem to be the only guy on this board who learned the original source of the “atomic clocks” concept, and I wouldn’t have learned that if I had not waded through about 900 pages of Maxwell’s 19th Century work.

Nor would I have learned that it was Newton who first proposed the big bang theory when he proposed his “projectile impulse” idea to Bentley, nor would I have learned that Einstein actually thought the universe was static and all the stars were “fixed” when he developed the GR theory.

And of course wouldn’t have learned that it was Lorentz who first proposed the “relativistic Doppler effect” in his 1895 book, nor would I have learned that it was he who was the first to propose a slowdown in the oscillation rates of atomic clocks due to motion-related effects, also he was the first to propose length contraction in moving bodies, mass increase in moving bodies, and the speed limit of “c”.

I fail to see how any of this is relevant to the science. Yeah, Lorentz proposed a theory of relativity in 1895. Unfortunately for him, his theory failed when put to the test. Einstein's didn't, so Einstein gets the credit for the successful theory while Lorentz gets an historical footnote for being a step along the way.

And incidentally, you're not the only person who's aware of the contributions Lorentz and Maxwell made to Einstein's research. You are, however, the only one here who thinks that, somehow, Einstein learning from Lorentz's mistakes somehow invalidates his work.

If you get all your science information off the internet, you might be misled into believing that Einstein invented all this stuff.

I think you underestimate us here. Like you, I've read Einstein's papers and have studied relativity extensively. Unlike you, I understand the math involved. Most people here seem to be even more qualified than I am. Like you, we understand that Einstein built upon the work of other scientists. Unlike you, we reject the idea that this somehow invalidates Einstein's work since nobody else managed to produce a successful theory.

What I usually do in an investigation is compare the modern stuff with the original stuff and that way I can tell which modern writer is lying or mistaken or purposely trying to mislead his readers.

So... you never compare the theoretical predictions of a theory with the experimental evidence then? If you did, the glaring problems with your hypothesis should be obvious.

I find it a little odd that anyone would type up a “clock paradox” resolution page on the internet without first consulting and studying Einstein’s own clock paradox resolution solution. Do all these guys think they are smarter than Einstein, or what?

Two questions: How do you know that they haven't studied Einstein? Why should Einstein's work preclude anyone else from trying to find other ways to resolve the problem?


And we're still waiting for answers to the questions we posted back on page 14. (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=325)

[darkdev]

Wow! Sam5 and Taibak are both going to need fingertip replacements by the end of the week.

[JohnOwens]

I know that. But I also know that Einstein used the word “system”, while the modern websites use the term “inertial frame”, so that tells me where you are getting most of your information from. Not from Einstein’s own work, but from the modern websites. Modern textbooks also use the term inertial frame. Actually, I think Sam5 finally got something right here; that was his point.
On the other hand, I wouldn't agree that the original works are the best place from which to be gaining an understanding of relativity, as he seems to imply, especially if you seem to have been having trouble grasping a lot of the salient points. Actually, he claims that we get our information from websites and those websites hide all the information about how Einstein knew SR didn't work, was laughed at in Europe, and changed his mind about an aether. That was the reason I mentioned that textbooks also call it an intertial frame. Now, if he wants to start claiming modern relativity textbooks are wrong, that is a whole 'nother story.
OK, I was half right. I caught the modern/original distinction, but overlooked the textbook/website distinction. Half wrong, too. :-?
Meanwhile, I'm still trying to dig my way though the rest of the thread and its enormous posts... starting in on page 16 about now. :o http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/images/smiles/eusa_sick.gif
Added: Great, and I just kicked off page 18 in pointing that out. :roll:

[swansont]

A good relativist would have read all this important stuff.

Anyone else reminded of dialogue from "A Fish Called Wanda" ?


Otto: Apes don't read philosophy.
Wanda: Yes they do, Otto. They just don't understand it! Now let me correct you on a couple of things here. Aristotle was not Belgian. The central message of Buddhism is not 'every man for himself,' and the London Underground is not a political movement.

:roll:

[swansont]

I had one guy on this board argue that Lorentz and Einstein couldn’t have ever been talking about “atomic clocks” back at the turn of the 20th Century, since he said atomic clocks weren’t invented until around 1952. And this guys is a kind of “relativity monitor” on another science board. He tries to get guys banned if they don’t support Einstein 100%, yet he did not know that it was Maxwell who first proposed oscillating atoms as clocks, way back in 1873. How can I have any respect for guys like that who don’t know the history of science or what the basic principle of an atomic clock is?

Can you have as much respect as one has for a person that doesn't know the difference between an oscillator and a clock?

[SeanF]

SeanF: What "result" do you think is "carr over . . . from the original?" The fact that A1 and B2 are 5 minutes apart in K and 4 minutes apart in K' is not an observation that only K makes. It is an [i]absolute measurement of space and time. Saying that the "moving" clock only ticks off 4 minutes has nothing to with what the "stationary" clock is observing. It is because of what the "moving" clock is doing. (italics mine)
No, with all due respect, I think 'absolute' is the wrong term here. It should be 'relative' only. That is the whole point, that relative for the observer, yes, absolute for the observerd, no. Otherwise, it becomes what I'm talking about, transference.

Okay, let me try a different tack. You seem to be under the impression that Einstein figured the difference between those two points was 5 minutes, but that the K observer would "observe" the K' clock only ticking off 4 minutes. Then, when he switched over to the K' observer, he "transferred" that 4 minutes observence into the K' observer's reality.

That's not what he did. He determined that those two points are 5 minutes apart when measured in the K frame, but only 4 minutes apart when measured in the K' frame. Therefore, a clock in the K frame ticks off 5 minutes between them, but a clock in the K' frame only ticks off 4 minutes.

It was never, "this is what K observes, so this must be what actually happens in K'." It's always been "this is what actually happens for K'."

The two clocks are not simply "observed" by the other observer to run slower. They both actually do run slower than the other.

[swansont]

If, as Sam5 claims, SR is wrong and GR is correct, why do they give the same answer?

.

Show us where they give the same answer. Be specific.

Sam, you've been challenged a number of times to show that the GR equations don't reduce to the SR result when in an inertial frame. (and asked to show your work) It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to turn around and request that someone else now do the work to prove their point. You made the claim first. The burden of proof remains yours.

[SeanF]

If, as Sam5 claims, SR is wrong and GR is correct, why do they give the same answer?

.

Show us where they give the same answer. Be specific.

Sam, you've been challenged a number of times to show that the GR equations don't reduce to the SR result when in an inertial frame. (and asked to show your work) It takes a certain amount of chutzpah to turn around and request that someone else now do the work to prove their point. You made the claim first. The burden of proof remains yours.
Actually, Sam5 has already done what he asked Tensor to do. Sam5 himself has shown us where GR and SR predict the same thing:

Einstein's 1918 resolution:

"According to both descriptions, it is the clock U2 which lags by a certain amount behind clock U1 at the end of the process considered. With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest. But the time lag gets overcompensated by the faster rate of U1 during procedural step 3. Because, according to the general theory of relativity, a clock has a more accelerated rate the higher the gravitational potential is at the clock’s location; and during procedural step 3, U2 is indeed at a location of higher gravitational potential than U1. Calculation shows that this running-ahead amounts to precisely twice as much as the lag-behind during the procedural steps 2 and 4. This analysis clarifies completely the paradox you referred to." (Emphasis mine)

In his 1918 GR papers, Einstein was still saying that relative motion alone causes clocks to tick at different rates, and Sam5 has verified that for us.

(BTW, I'm going to be out of town for the better part of today, so this will probably be my last post until late this afternoon. See ya folks!) :)

[russ_watters]

This is a form of revisionist history I'm not familiar with... #-o Perhaps de-visionist history is a better word? Its the version of history written before the events were completed, so better to attempt to confuse the situation.

[Sam5]

The physics of Lorentz's theory were wrong.

That’s not true. It was Lorentz who proposed the “resistive” force put up by fields when ponderable bodies try to move through them. This is the principle that NASA used in the tether experiment. This is the basis of the “c” speed limit. The earth’s magnetic field put up a resistance force to the tether’s motion through it.

Back in 1895 Lorentz predicted a slowdown in atomic clocks moving near the surface of the earth, and that turned out to be true, although Einstein cultists credit Einstein with the prediction today.

But I don’t have time to respond to all your false statements.

[Sam5]

Perhaps


You’re the guy who claimed that Einstein and Lorentz couldn’t have been talking about atomic clocks, since you said they weren’t invented until the 1950s.

[Sam5]

In his 1918 GR papers, Einstein was still saying that relative motion alone causes clocks to tick at different rates,

You are just making stuff up again. On page 69 he said:

“There arises a homogeneous gravitational field in the direction of the positive x-axis, in which the clock U1 gets accelerated in the direction of the positive x-axis until it has attained the velocity v, hereupon the gravitational field again vanishes. An external force along the negative x-axis prevents the clock if from making any movement in this gravitational field.”

The clocks are moving in the 1918 paper but it is gravity and acceleration that change the clocks rates. In the 1905 version, it was just the relative motion that did it. He finally realized that just relative motion places no force on a clock and without a force the clock can’t change rates. So in 1918, he added the forces caused by acceleration and gravity fields.

Einstein cultists just make stuff up and hope nobody will notice.

[Sam5]

Can you have as much respect as one has for a person that doesn't know the difference between an oscillator and a clock?

Every oscillator is a “clock”. Everything that hums, vibrates, oscillates is a “clock”, whether its rate is steady or not.

[Sam5]

The 1918 paper and the Einstein shuffle:

“Kritikus (SR critic): But isn’t this gravitational field only fictitious? Its existence is, I should say, only simulated by the choice of coordinates. After all, real gravitational fields are always generated by masses and can not be made to vanish by a suitable choice of coordinates. How should one believe that a merely fictitious field could influence the rate of clocks?

Relativist (Einstein): First I have to point out that the distinction of real versus non-real is not very productive.”

[Normandy6644]

The 1918 paper and the Einstein shuffle:

“Kritikus (SR critic): But isn’t this gravitational field only fictitious? Its existence is, I should say, only simulated by the choice of coordinates. After all, real gravitational fields are always generated by masses and can not be made to vanish by a suitable choice of coordinates. How should one believe that a merely fictitious field could influence the rate of clocks?

Relativist (Einstein): First I have to point out that the distinction of real versus non-real is not very productive.”

Sam, go take a course in tensor analysis and differential geometry. Then go back to Einstein's 1916 paper "The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity." Then go to equation 46, which says (after a bit of rearraning, since I can't find the original equation on another site):

http://nedwww.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/March01/Carroll3/Equations/eq_four9.gif

The following paragraph is

We now make the assumption, which readily suggests itself, that this covariant system of equations also defines the motion of the point in the gravitational field in the case when there is no system of reference Ko, with respect to which the special theory of relativity holds good in a finite region....If the {Christoffel symbols} vanish, then the point moves uniformly in a straight line. These quantities therefore condition the deviation of the motion from uniformity, They are the components of the gravitational field.

And there you have Einstein himself showing where (in the first of many instances) the equations of GR will reduce to those of SR in the absence of a gravitational field.

[Taibak]

The physics of Lorentz's theory were wrong.

That’s not true. It was Lorentz who proposed the “resistive” force put up by fields when ponderable bodies try to move through them. This is the principle that NASA used in the tether experiment. This is the basis of the “c” speed limit. The earth’s magnetic field put up a resistance force to the tether’s motion through it.

Lorentz's also predicted that the magnetic field lines of a moving object are cut. No experiment ever conducted has found any evidence that this is the case. Since Lorentz's theory makes an incorrect prediction, Lorentz's theory is wrong.

Back in 1895 Lorentz predicted a slowdown in atomic clocks moving near the surface of the earth, and that turned out to be true, although Einstein cultists credit Einstein with the prediction today.

Then why are they still called the Lorentz equations if Einstein is given the sole credit for them? Yes, Lorentz predicted time dilation ten years before Einstein did, but like I just said the theory that made those predictions made other predictions that have been shown time and again not to happen, proving that Lorentz's theory is wrong. Einstein's theory of relativity has a 100% success rate so far, so Einstein gets credit for creating a successful theory.

As for the resistive properties of fields, I don't even see how they enter into the discussion. Under Lorentz, a small object that has a magnetic field and is moving through otherwise empty space will have its magnetic field cut. It's at rest relative to its own magnetic field and no other fields are present. You also haven't explain just what these 'fields' are supposed to be. Are they gravitational fields? Electromagnetic fields? Ether fields? What are they?

But I don’t have time to respond to all your false statements.

Then why should we belive you? If you don't respond to their objections, are you're doing is giving your critics a free ride and making yourself look either unable to answer their questions and provide the evidence needed to convince your critics or unwilling to participate in the sort of debate science requires. Either way, it doesn't look good.

“There arises a homogeneous gravitational field in the direction of the positive x-axis, in which the clock U1 gets accelerated in the direction of the positive x-axis until it has attained the velocity v, hereupon the gravitational field again vanishes. An external force along the negative x-axis prevents the clock if from making any movement in this gravitational field.”

The clocks are moving in the 1918 paper but it is gravity and acceleration that change the clocks rates. In the 1905 version, it was just the relative motion that did it. He finally realized that just relative motion places no force on a clock and without a force the clock can’t change rates. So in 1918, he added the forces caused by acceleration and gravity fields.

You're cherry picking quotes again. That's two paragraphs out of a very extensive paper (and, BTW, page numbers are useless if you don't specify the edition). In the same paper, Einstein also writes:

According to both descriptions, it is the clock U2 which lags by a certain amount behind clock U1 at the end of the process considered. With respect to the coordinate system K’ the phenomenon is explained in the following manner: During procedural steps 2 and 4, clock U1, moving at velocity v, has indeed a slower rate than clock U2 which is at rest. But the time lag gets overcompensated by the faster rate of U1 during procedural step 3. Because, according to the general theory of relativity, a clock has a more accelerated rate the higher the gravitational potential is at the clock’s location; and during procedural step 3, U2 is indeed at a location of higher gravitational potential than U1. Calculation shows that this running-ahead amounts to precisely twice as much as the lag-behind during the procedural steps 2 and 4. This analysis clarifies completely the paradox you referred to.

Which contains an instance of time dilation due to relative motion, in addition to time dilation caused by gravity. If you want to show that Einstein had abandoned the concept completely by 1918, you need to show that the 1918 paper attributes absolutely nothing to relative motion. So far, you haven't done that.


And we're still waiting for answers to our questions. Frankly, I don't care if you think you have time or not - if you want to convince us of anything, you need to be willing to put in the work necessary to do so.

If Lorentz is right, the magnetic field lines of a moving object are finite. The Earth is moving relative to the Sun and there is no evidence of its magnetic field being broken as a result. According to Einstein's theories, magnetic field lines are always closed loops - and this has been observed (repeatedly) in nature. Explain.

If massive objects produce a 'local ether,' what causes it? Taken a step further, because the Earth is in motion, it should leave behind some sort of wake. It doesn't. Explain.

If the local ether exists, what are its properties? What is its permeability and permittivity? What is its density? How does it interact with other forces? Does it interact with other local ethers (that is, does the Earth's local ether field interact with the Moon's local ether field?)? If so, how? What is its index of refraction?

Both the special and general theories of relativity have been shown to agree with every experimental test to which they've yet been subjected. Why should we scrap theories that work so well? Similarly, Dirac's relativistic quantum mechanics are also in strong agreement with experiment and that's based on Einstein's 1905 paper.

If Dr. Su's theory is right, the error in the Bragg diffraction angles should be approximately one degree. By his own admission, the error is over 40 degrees. Explain this discrepency and explain why we should believe a theory that predicts a result 40 times smaller than what's observed, espescially when relativity, as outlined in the 1905 and 1916 papers, produces the correct results?

Taken the last point a step further, you make a big deal about Einstein making and correcting mistakes en route to developing the definitive version of his theories and see this as evidence that relativity as a whole is wrong. On the other hand, Dr. Su's theories contain a glaring, uncorrected error and you insist on the theory's validity. Both made mistakes and admitted them. Why is this a problem for Einstein and not for Su? Are the rules of evidence different for them?

Your expertise with clocks - does that extend to clocks moving at greater than roughly half the speed of light relative to a stationary observer? If not, how can you claim to have first hand experience with observing time dilation when the effects can be mathematically shown to be negligible at low speeds?

Is it possible that the 'wristwatches' and 'balance-wheel clocks' Einstein refers to in the 1905 paper were idealisations and not actual clocks? If so, can those timepieces be assumed to function as perfect clocks that keep time with 100% precision regardless of whatever mechanical effects they may experience?

Show us the equations that were wrong in SR and the GR equations that corrected those wrong equations.

Explain why, if SR is wrong and GR corrected it, SR and GR give the same answers when considering non-accelerated relative motion.

If you still believe that Lorentz is correct and SR is wrong, explain why magnetic field line are cut when in motion using Lorentz's theory, but not cut using SR. And SR matches our observations.

Really? Do you mean frozen water, as in ice? If you do, could you please explain where all the thermal energy has gone?

If the ether moves with the earth, how do you explain the presence of stellar aberration? Shouldn't a fixed ether not give aberration?

[Ut]

Can you have as much respect as one has for a person that doesn't know the difference between an oscillator and a clock?

Every oscillator is a “clock”. Everything that hums, vibrates, oscillates is a “clock”, whether its rate is steady or not.

Strange, didn't you spend nearly a full page of this thread arguing that the SR "light clock" isn't a valid clock? I believe your argument went something like:

"Different clocks measure different kinds of time.
But what's time? The definition you people give of time is not a good one. I refuse to offer one of my own, though.
You make up this light clock balony, Relativist slime. There's no such thing. It's not a real clock."

And now you're saying that anything and everything that oscillates is a clock. Sounds like that should include a light beam reflecting back and forth between two mirrors...

[Lunatik]

SeanF writes:
That's not what he did. He determined that those two points are 5 minutes apart when measured in the K frame, but only 4 minutes apart when measured in the K' frame. Therefore, a clock in the K frame ticks off 5 minutes between them, but a clock in the K' frame only ticks off 4 minutes.
Maybe this will help explain mine better:

1. A1 moving to B1, so from A's perspective (who is stationary in his inertial frame while A1 is moving) he see's A1's clock slow down as he moves to B1.

2. B1 tags B2 who now returns back to A, so from B1's perspective (inertial frame), B2's clock slows as he moves back to starting point.

3. The apparent 'slowing' clocks are from the perspective of the inertial frame from which it is being observed, so the resuts of this observatiion, per Einstein's Relativity, is what is 'actually' happening in the reference frame in motion. THIS is the transference I'm refering to. It is this item alone I had called a 'weak link' in Einstein's theory, since it forces us to accept results based on this implied transference.

I hope this explains it better, since in my original Gorilla tag explanation, I might have not made this point very clear. No harm in believing in Einstein's Relativity, as long as it is understood to be an 'observational' phenomenon, and not transfer it onto the observed as if it were real. In fact, from the moving reference frame's perspective, nothing happens at all.

Tag! :)

[swansont]

Can you have as much respect as one has for a person that doesn't know the difference between an oscillator and a clock?

Every oscillator is a “clock”. Everything that hums, vibrates, oscillates is a “clock”, whether its rate is steady or not.

An oscillator is a part of a clock, i.e. all clocks have oscillators of some sort. But you have to actually count the oscillations in order to make a clock.

[Ut]

SeanF writes:
That's not what he did. He determined that those two points are 5 minutes apart when measured in the K frame, but only 4 minutes apart when measured in the K' frame. Therefore, a clock in the K frame ticks off 5 minutes between them, but a clock in the K' frame only ticks off 4 minutes.
Maybe this will help explain mine better:

1. A1 moving to B1, so from A's perspective (who is stationary in his inertial frame while A1 is moving) he see's A1's clock slow down as he moves to B1.

2. B1 tags B2 who now returns back to A, so from B1's perspective (inertial frame), B2's clock slows as he moves back to starting point.

3. The apparent 'slowing' clocks are from the perspective of the inertial frame from which it is being observed, so the resuts of this observatiion, per Einstein's Relativity, is what is 'actually' happening in the reference frame in motion. THIS is the transference I'm refering to. It is this item alone I had called a 'weak link' in Einstein's theory, since it forces us to accept results based on this implied transference.

I hope this explains it better, since in my original Gorilla tag explanation, I might have not made this point very clear. No harm in believing in Einstein's Relativity, as long as it is understood to be an 'observational' phenomenon, and not transfer it onto the observed as if it were real. In fact, from the moving reference frame's perspective, nothing happens at all.

Tag! :)

Well, each observer will observe the "moving" frame as being slow.

In all honesty, though, if time were to slow down, you wouldn't notice it, as everything would slow down with it. The slowing is relative to the observer, though, because each observer sees the others as slowing. If it were absolute, those in the "slow" frame would see everyone else as being faster. It's a physical phenomenon, though, as it causes red-shifts and the like.

This is the reason my professor seemed to pretencious. It's a sometimes confusing thing. He kept telling us that he didn't expect us to understand relativity, but rather we should just be able to do the math. Felt like a cop out at the time, but as time goes on, and I actually do come to understand SR more and more, I'm beginning to see his point. If you just jump right into it all, your head would explode...

[Lunatik]

Ut wrote:In all honesty, though, if time were to slow down, you wouldn't notice it, as everything would slow down with it. The slowing is relative to the observer, though, because each observer sees the others as slowing. If it were absolute, those in the "slow" frame would see everyone else as being faster. It's a physical phenomenon, though, as it causes red-shifts and the like.
This reminds me of that old chestnut "The Twins Paradox", where one twin stays behind on Earth while the other goes off into space, only to come back and finding his Earthbound twin much aged in comparison to himself. Of course, the only way this could be understood (without being Relativity pretentious) is if the Earthbound twin's observation of his spacetraveling twin's relativistic time slowing down... and then... 'transferring' that observation over to the spacebound twin, as if it were happening to him. This is the much debated Paradox, which shows how ludicrous that 'transference' really is, if it is not understood for what it really is, an 'observational theory' only. I'd bet the ranch that someday, when we could actually travel at near lightspeed and do this Twins experiment for real, we'll discover that their biological clocks were not affected at all, once they are reunited on Earth. Then, and not until then, the illusion of Relativistic transference, supported by redshifted atomic clocks, will be locked in debate between those who can make the relativistic-transference-jump and those who will not.

[Ricimer]

but....

we've done the "twin paradox" experiment! Instead of "biological" clocks we used atomic clocks (since they are highly accurate) and ran things around pretty fast, and for a long time (to make up for the non-relativistic effects).

When we compared clocks, that are accurate to nanosecnds per century or so, we found a considerable difference (much more than a nano-second).

Isn't that enough man!

[swansont]

but....

we've done the "twin paradox" experiment! Instead of "biological" clocks we used atomic clocks (since they are highly accurate) and ran things around pretty fast, and for a long time (to make up for the non-relativistic effects).

When we compared clocks, that are accurate to nanosecnds per century or so, we found a considerable difference (much more than a nano-second).

Isn't that enough man!

Not for Sam - he has his own interpretation of the Hafele-Keating experiment. And because he can't or won't use relativity properly, he claims it shows relativity to be wrong.

As far as clocks losing ns/century - we aren't there yet. Still a few orders of magnitude away. And the relevant property is the precision, or stability, rather than the accuracy.

[Ut]

I thought the Twin Paradox was an accleration thing, and thus is in the realm of GR. Otherwise, the paradox would not be that one has aged more slowly than the other, but rather that the twin on the space craft managed to return home without changing its velocity.

[SeanF]

In his 1918 GR papers, Einstein was still saying that relative motion alone causes clocks to tick at different rates,

You are just making stuff up again. On page 69 he said:

“There arises a homogeneous gravitational field in the direction of the positive x-axis, in which the clock U1 gets accelerated in the direction of the positive x-axis until it has attained the velocity v, hereupon the gravitational field again vanishes. An external force along the negative x-axis prevents the clock if from making any movement in this gravitational field.”

The clocks are moving in the 1918 paper but it is gravity and acceleration that change the clocks rates. In the 1905 version, it was just the relative motion that did it. He finally realized that just relative motion places no force on a clock and without a force the clock can’t change rates. So in 1918, he added the forces caused by acceleration and gravity fields.

Einstein cultists just make stuff up and hope nobody will notice.

No, you're trying to ignore stuff. The 1918 paper says that clock U1 runs slow while it's being accelerated (procedural step 1) and it also says it runs slow while it's only moving relatively (procedural steps 2 and 4).

BTW, it also says that clock U1 runs fast while it's being accelerated (procedural step 3) - did you know that GR's predictions of clock rate during acceleration depend on the direction of acceleration?

[Ricimer]

I thought the Twin Paradox was an accleration thing, and thus is in the realm of GR. Otherwise, the paradox would not be that one has aged more slowly than the other, but rather that the twin on the space craft managed to return home without changing its velocity.


The twin paradox is posed to SR as well, though SR treats it with a heavier hand than GR.

SR relies on the breaking of symetry, the twin that turns around is the twin that "moved" since the earth didn't turn around.

SR I have been told, can, if treated in a very specific (and not necessarily elegant) manner, can deal with uniform accelerations to a certain extent. I think the gentleman said it dealt with an approximation of some sort. But I don't put to much weight in that tidbit.


Edited to remove a misquote by Sam5....my bad.

[Donnie B.]

Later, especially in 1911, as Einstein began to develop his more accurate theory that did involve physical forces, fields, and acceleration, then he finally began to realize that the critics of his original 1905 paper had been right, and that the paper did contain a lot of errors.

What errors? Every prediction special relativity makes has been experimentally verified. It doesn't deal with acceleration and gravity because the special theory deals only with inertial reference frames without gravitation. Faulting the special theory for not predicting something beyond its scope is like criticising Kepler's first law as incomplete because it doesn't predict the hyperfine structure of a Chlorine atom!
Actually, it's more like Sam5 is claiming that Kepler's laws are incorrect because they don't predict the behavior of an object falling into a black hole.

[SeanF]

SeanF writes:
That's not what he did. He determined that those two points are 5 minutes apart when measured in the K frame, but only 4 minutes apart when measured in the K' frame. Therefore, a clock in the K frame ticks off 5 minutes between them, but a clock in the K' frame only ticks off 4 minutes.
Maybe this will help explain mine better:

1. A1 moving to B1, so from A's perspective (who is stationary in his inertial frame while A1 is moving) he see's A1's clock slow down as he moves to B1.

2. B1 tags B2 who now returns back to A, so from B1's perspective (inertial frame), B2's clock slows as he moves back to starting point.

Okay, wait a second. Are A1 and A different people, or what? A1 runs to B1, but then B1 tags B2? Note that in my original experiment, A1, B1, and B2 are merely points in space-time. They are simple instantaneous events. The clocks themselves are only identified as "the clock that moves from A to B" and "the clock that remains at B."

3. The apparent 'slowing' clocks are from the perspective of the inertial frame from which it is being observed, so the resuts of this observatiion, per Einstein's Relativity, is what is 'actually' happening in the reference frame in motion. THIS is the transference I'm refering to. It is this item alone I had called a 'weak link' in Einstein's theory, since it forces us to accept results based on this implied transference.

There is no transference. It is not that the moving clock "appears" to run slow. The idea is that the amount of time between two points in space-time is different in one reference frame than the other. The amount of time a clock ticks off between two events is the duration between those two events in whatever reference frame the particular clock is in.

I hope this explains it better, since in my original Gorilla tag explanation, I might have not made this point very clear. No harm in believing in Einstein's Relativity, as long as it is understood to be an 'observational' phenomenon, and not transfer it onto the observed as if it were real. In fact, from the moving reference frame's perspective, nothing happens at all.

Tag! :)

Special Relativity's time dilation is not an "observational" phenomenon, it is a real phenomenon.

Look at the way I described Einstein's "peculiar consequence," where A1, B1, and B2 are the different points in space-time. A1 and B2 are separated by 5 minutes in K but 4 minutes in K'. However, B1 and B2 are separated by 5 minutes in K but 6.25 minutes in K'. Notice that in one case the time is less in K' and in the other it's more in K'?

That's because A1 and B2 are colocated in K' but not in K. B1 and B2, conversely, are colocated in K but not in K'.

This is not what one observer "sees" in the other reference frame. This is what actually happens in each reference frame.

[Sam5]

it also says it runs slow while it's only moving relatively

Exactly! Relative motion also causes time dilation! Both acceleration and relative motion cause it, GR handles both, while SR handles only the relative motion.

I can’t find the post that your alleged “quote” comes from. Where is it?

Anyway, relative motion can't slow down any clock.

Acceleration and gravity can slow down atomic clocks. Also, a motion through fields can slow them down. This is why Einstein had to add the acceleration and gravity fields to the SR theory in his 1918 paper.

You need to read more books. You believe in the theory which he later changed. You probably got it out of that $3 1952 book, “The Principle of Relativity”,

[Sam5]

No

LOL, he’s trying to explain away the paradox in the Special Theory. He manipulates the clocks with gravity fields and acceleration in the 1918 paper. But there are no gravity fields in the Special Theory and there are no accelerative effects in the theory.

[russ_watters]

Perhaps
You’re the guy who claimed that Einstein and Lorentz couldn’t have been talking about atomic clocks, since you said they weren’t invented until the 1950s. And you're the guy who keeps saying Einstein's Relativity only works for one specific type of clock, though you have yet to show which one.

You use two different definitions of "clock" in a way that is convenient for you to confuse the issue. We can all see right through it.

[darkdev]

I thought it wouldn't matter what type of clock you use, since the time dilation occurs at the sub-atomic level, so everything from the sub-atomic up is effected (the same).

[Sam5]

Perhaps
You’re the guy who claimed that Einstein and Lorentz couldn’t have been talking about atomic clocks, since you said they weren’t invented until the 1950s. And you're the guy who keeps saying Einstein's Relativity only works for one specific type of clock, though you have yet to show which one.

In 1905, he misunderstood Lorentz’s theory, and he thought all kinds of mechanic clocks (such as his wristwatch) would slow down due only to “relative motion”. This is what made him famous in the European and American newspapers, since science editors liked this idea, even thought they didn’t understand it. Anyway, it helped sell newspapers to the gullible public.

But by 1911 he learned that Lorentz theory applied specifically to atomic clocks (fundamental atomic oscillation rates). By 1918 he had to use atomic clocks and the 1911 theory to resolve his 1905 “clock paradox”.

[SeanF]

No

LOL, he’s trying to explain away the paradox in the Special Theory. He manipulates the clocks with gravity fields and acceleration in the 1918 paper. But there are no gravity fields in the Special Theory and there are no accelerative effects in the theory.

It's funny watching you scramble, Sam5. You've always claimed (up until now) that SR was flawed because it had time dilation caused by relative motion only and you've always claimed that GR fixed it. Now, when your own quoting of Einstein's papers shows that relative motion is still a cause in GR, you've decided that Einstein was still wrong with GR.

Like I said, funny.

[Sam5]

I thought it wouldn't matter what type of clock you use, since the time dilation occurs at the sub-atomic level, so everything from the sub-atomic up is effected (the same).
No, not true. This was a mistake that Einstein made in his 1905 paper and that he corrected in his 1911 and 1918 papers.

Different kinds of clocks (that use different laws of physics to determine their tick rates) slow down and speed up for different reasons. For example, a pendulum clock will speed up in a strong gravity field where an atomic clock will slow down. Heat sensitive clocks will speed up when more heat energy is applied to them, and they will do this in places where atomic clocks will slow down.

Einstein got the idea for his 1905 theory clock slow-down from Lorentz’s 1895 book, but Lorentz was speaking specifically about atomic oscillation rates.

One problem with all of this is that his 1905 paper has been reproduced and published millions of times since it was published in a Dover book in English in 1952. However, his 1918 paper, which corrects the 1905 error, was never translated into English until 2002, and very few people have read that 1918 paper.

This modern Einstein cultism has come about only since about the 1980s. Some guys pay a few bucks for the Dover book, they read the 1905 paper, they read a few websites about it, then they claim they “understand” it and they support it so they can pretend they “as smart as Einstein”. Generally, all they think they need to learn about the SR theory is that “time slows down in a moving inertial frame”. But in the meantime, they don’t realize Einstein finally saw some of the mistakes in his own 1905 paper and published various corrections of it in 1907, 1911-1916, 1918, 1920, and 1952.

[Ricimer]

it also says it runs slow while it's only moving relatively

Exactly! Relative motion also causes time dilation! Both acceleration and relative motion cause it, GR handles both, while SR handles only the relative motion.

I can’t find the post that your alleged “quote” comes from. Where is it?

Anyway, relative motion can't slow down any clock.

Acceleration and gravity can slow down atomic clocks. Also, a motion through fields can slow them down. This is why Einstein had to add the acceleration and gravity fields to the SR theory in his 1918 paper.

You need to read more books. You believe in the theory which he later changed. You probably got it out of that $3 1952 book, “The Principle of Relativity”,


My bad, it was a misquote. I've corrected teh post.

1) SR correctly predicts and explains the longer half-life of Muons created by cosmic ray impacts via invoking "relative motion". I've done the bloody calculations myself!

2) It correctly predicts almost every single aspect of motion within a linear particle accelerator (including increased half-lifes, that do not depend on atom oscillations)

3) All clocks, even the pendulum clock, will run slower. Lorentz was WRONG when he said only atomic oscillations would do it.

4) THe pendulum problem you posed, would deal with gravity and acceleration, thus be a problem with GR, not SR.

5) The Pendulum clock will run faster in stronger gravity, yes, but it will not do so "correctly" If you double the gravity it won't run sqrt(2) times faster, because the stronger gravity has a time dilation effect that will make it something like sqrt(1.99999) x faster.


Also, you seem to be assuming we're basing everything off of einstiens work himself, when we, at least I, am not. I'm basing it off of the modern interpretations and applications of SR and GR.

You seem to be caught up in what Einstein said. Since he said (in your mind anyway) that SR was wrong, then it must be! Regardless of what anybody else says.

[Taibak]

I thought it wouldn't matter what type of clock you use, since the time dilation occurs at the sub-atomic level, so everything from the sub-atomic up is effected (the same).
No, not true. This was a mistake that Einstein made in his 1905 paper and that he corrected in his 1911 and 1918 papers.

Different kinds of clocks (that use different laws of physics to determine their tick rates) slow down and speed up for different reasons. For example, a pendulum clock will speed up in a strong gravity field where an atomic clock will slow down. Heat sensitive clocks will speed up when more heat energy is applied to them, and they will do this in places where atomic clocks will slow down.

Except the flaw in this argument is that the behavior of any clock is dependent on time, independent of any other type of clock. If you change the rate at which time passes, you change the behavior of any clock.

And I still don't see why Einstein was necessarily referring to literal watches in the 1905 paper. Seems to me like he was talking about idealised clocks.

Einstein got the idea for his 1905 theory clock slow-down from Lorentz’s 1895 book, but Lorentz was speaking specifically about atomic oscillation rates.

Atomic oscillation rates as a method of timekeeping. Either way, that doesn't change the fact that Einstein took time dilation and integrated it into a new theory that not only explains things that Lorentz's could not, it also has been verified repeatedly throughout the last century - something Lorentz's theory can't claim.

One problem with all of this is that his 1905 paper has been reproduced and published millions of times since it was published in a Dover book in English in 1952. However, his 1918 paper, which corrects the 1905 error, was never translated into English until 2002, and very few people have read that 1918 paper.

The historical record doesn't bear that out, unfortunately. Even if the 1918 paper was never translated into English, there should still be attacks on the paper from German-speaking physicists. Since German physicists were the leading theorists at the time and since Einstein was very quickly making a name for himself, silence would be the last thing you'd expect. In your investigations, Sam5, have you encountered any such paper?

Also, your argument implies that the English-speaking world was completely oblivious to general relativity until fairly recently. How then do you explain that it was an Englishman, Sir Arthur Eddington, whose observations of gravitational lensing were generally agreed to *confirm* Einstein's predictions and were made in 1919? If the language barrier was and is as insurmountable as you claim, he shouldn't have been able to mount an expedition for the express purpose of testing general relativity.

This modern Einstein cultism has come about only since about the 1980s. Some guys pay a few bucks for the Dover book, they read the 1905 paper, they read a few websites about it, then they claim they “understand” it and they support it so they can pretend they “as smart as Einstein”. Generally, all they think they need to learn about the SR theory is that “time slows down in a moving inertial frame”. But in the meantime, they don’t realize Einstein finally saw some of the mistakes in his own 1905 paper and published various corrections of it in 1907, 1911-1916, 1918, 1920, and 1952.

Actually, Einstein's celebrity far predates the 80's. I mean, in 1952 he was offered the presidency of Israel because of his celebrity!

Besides, you still need to establish that what Einstein wrote in 1918, 1920, and 1952 differs significantly from what Einstein wrote in 1916, which is generally held to be the definitive version of Einstein's theory. You also still need to explain why we should take the 1907 and 1911 papers as being equal to the 1905 paper, which contains the definitive version of the special theory of relativity, and the 1916 paper. The 1907 and 1911 papers are generally held to be works in progress and you have yet to offer any compelling evidence to challenge that.


And I'm still waiting for answers to these questions (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=425). They're midway down the page I linked to.

[Sam5]

it also says it runs slow while it's only moving relatively

Exactly! Relative motion also causes time dilation! Both acceleration and relative motion cause it, GR handles both, while SR handles only the relative motion.

I can’t find the post that your alleged “quote” comes from. Where is it?




My bad, it was a misquote. I've corrected teh post.

Ok, no problem.



1) SR correctly predicts and explains the longer half-life of Muons created by cosmic ray impacts via invoking "relative motion". I've done the bloody calculations myself!

2) It correctly predicts almost every single aspect of motion within a linear particle accelerator (including increased half-lifes, that do not depend on atom oscillations)

3) All clocks, even the pendulum clock, will run slower. Lorentz was WRONG when he said only atomic oscillations would do it.

4) THe pendulum problem you posed, would deal with gravity and acceleration, thus be a problem with GR, not SR.

5) The Pendulum clock will run faster in stronger gravity, yes, but it will not do so "correctly" If you double the gravity it won't run sqrt(2) times faster, because the stronger gravity has a time dilation effect that will make it something like sqrt(1.99999) x faster.


Also, you seem to be assuming we're basing everything off of einstiens work himself, when we, at least I, am not. I'm basing it off of the modern interpretations and applications of SR and GR.

You seem to be caught up in what Einstein said. Since he said (in your mind anyway) that SR was wrong, then it must be! Regardless of what anybody else says.


As I mentioned, different kinds of clocks operate by different laws of physics. They all don’t have the same reason for slowing down or speeding up, or the same causes, or the same reaction rate to the various causes. Individual types of clocks don’t represent all of “time itself”. Different kinds of things happen in nature at different rates, and for different physics reasons. Some kinds of things can happen slower in the same place that other kinds of things can happen faster in, depending on the forces applied to or taken away from the various kinds of clocks, depending on the kinetic energy involved, depending on the gravity or other reasons.

Lorentz, in is book and theory was responding to the new fad of the late 19th Century of thinking that atomic clocks (oscillating atoms) represented “perfect” clocks that never changed their rates. He showed that they could change their rates. Young Einstein mistook that idea for a “true change” in “time itself” at the places where the specific atoms in question were located, and he also mistook Lorentz’s motion of atoms though fields as just being due to “relative motion” alone.

The muons are accelerating and moving through the earth’s fields.

The particles in accelerators are accelerating and moving through fields.

The pendulum clock runs faster in a strong gravity field, where an atomic clock runs slower, so atomic clock tick rates don’t represent all of “true time” or “time itself”.

What I am “caught up” with is so many people attributing so many new theories (and old ones too) to “Einstein”. This name has just become a fad word today. A few days ago I saw a giant Einstein balloon used to advertise used cars at a car lot. “Smart Deals” the sign under the balloon read. Geepers, this has grown bigger than the Great Elvis Fad of the 1950s and 1970s.

[SeanF]

1) SR

2) It

Sam5, why do you do this? If you're not going to quote specific passages from previous quotes, then just say, "Ricimir, as I mentioned..." If you're going to quote them, leave the quotes in. It's like you get a kick out of feeling like you're interrupting.

As I mentioned, different kinds of clocks operate by different laws of physics. They all don’t have the same reason for slowing down or speeding up, or the same causes, or the same reaction rate to the various causes. Individual types of clocks don’t represent all of “time itself”.

Obviously. However, a change in "time itself" will affect all types of clocks equally, regardless of how other changes affect them. And Relativity (Special and General) is about changes in "time itself," not changes in clocks.

Relativity didn't come about because Einstein noticed a change in clocks and concocted this theory to explain it, you know.

What I am “caught up” with is so many people attributing so many new theories (and old ones too) to “Einstein”. This name has just become a fad word today. A few days ago I saw a giant Einstein balloon used to advertise used cars at a car lot. “Smart Deals” the sign under the balloon read. Geepers, this has grown bigger than the Great Elvis Fad of the 1950s and 1970s.

Oh, brother. Sounds like you're just jealous. You accuse others of supporting Einstein so they can feel "as smart as Einstein." Seems like you're only criticizing him so you can feel "smarter than Einstein" (not to mention everybody else).

[JohnOwens]

1) SR

2) It

As

Lorentz,

The

The

The

What
While I don't want you to turn into one of those people who leaves all of nine levels of quotes in a reply that become five screens long, just to spite me for pointing this out, could you leave a bit more context in your quotes? You've been leaving out an awful lot of context in quotes lately, even of the ones from this bulletin board. It makes it look even more like you're just trying to confuse issues than the rest of your selective quoting and taking things out of context already does.

[Sam5]

You've been leaving out an awful lot of context in quotes lately, .


I changed that one other post. I thought everyone could scroll up and read his statements. I’m trying to respond to about 6 guys at the same time, all the time, and I don’t have the time to format detailed posts of all of their quotes with all my responses in perfect order. If I don’t respond to every post of everyone here, they start yelling at me like a bunch of kids in a sandbox for not responding to their posts and everything they say. So take your choice. I can answer as many of the posts as I have time to answer, but I don’t have time to answer them all and format them all.

[Ricimer]

1) You still haven't mentioned which fields your talking about.

2) Einstien said that it applies to all clocks. If he saw what lorentz did (unlikely, he didn't cite it at all) he showed that it holds for all clocks, regardless of the mechanisms by which they keep time. All the clocks have mechanisms that are time dependent. If time itself alters (leaving all, other conditions teh same) then the clocks will differ too.

You have a moving pendulum clock with constant gravity.

Or an atom at a constant temperature, in a faraday cage,

A piezolectric quartz regulated watch. constant temperature.

A spring driven watch, constant temperature.

A water clock, constant gravity.

They will all slow down, the same amount, due to relative motion.

That said,

I'm willing to put a moritorium on my responses until you answer, in full, the ones outlined by Taibak.

So don't worry about me for a while, I can bide my time.

[Sam5]

A water clock, constant gravity.

They will all slow down, the same amount, due to relative motion.


This is very interesting news.

Please post some quotes from some of the more famous papers about moving water clocks slowing down when they move relatively.

[Normandy6644]

The 1918 paper and the Einstein shuffle:

“Kritikus (SR critic): But isn’t this gravitational field only fictitious? Its existence is, I should say, only simulated by the choice of coordinates. After all, real gravitational fields are always generated by masses and can not be made to vanish by a suitable choice of coordinates. How should one believe that a merely fictitious field could influence the rate of clocks?

Relativist (Einstein): First I have to point out that the distinction of real versus non-real is not very productive.”

Sam, go take a course in tensor analysis and differential geometry. Then go back to Einstein's 1916 paper "The Foundation of the General Theory of Relativity." Then go to equation 46, which says (after a bit of rearraning, since I can't find the original equation on another site):

http://nedwww.ipac.caltech.edu/level5/March01/Carroll3/Equations/eq_four9.gif

The following paragraph is

We now make the assumption, which readily suggests itself, that this covariant system of equations also defines the motion of the point in the gravitational field in the case when there is no system of reference Ko, with respect to which the special theory of relativity holds good in a finite region....If the {Christoffel symbols} vanish, then the point moves uniformly in a straight line. These quantities therefore condition the deviation of the motion from uniformity, They are the components of the gravitational field.

And there you have Einstein himself showing where (in the first of many instances) the equations of GR will reduce to those of SR in the absence of a gravitational field.

We seem to be ignoring this...you asked a question of Tensor (show where GR and SR agree), I provided an answer and you have given no acknowledgement of this fact. I understand you are a busy man, but I just wanted to poiint this instance out so that when you say no one answers your questions, it's fresh in your mind that someone did.

[Sam5]

2) Einstien said that it applies to all clocks. If he saw what lorentz did (unlikely, he didn't cite it at all) he showed that it holds for all clocks, regardless of the mechanisms by which they keep time.


Where did he “show” that?

If so, then why did he have to change the SR theory thought experiments in his 1918 paper in order to resolve the clock paradox of the SR theory?



All the clocks have mechanisms that are time dependent. If time itself alters (leaving all, other conditions teh same) then the clocks will differ too.
.

What is your definition of “time itself”?

[Sam5]

you asked a question of Tensor (show where GR and SR agree), I provided an answer

Why is it when I ask someone a question, someone else answers it? Are you divided up into teams?

Why does it take so many of you to debate me? If I'm wrong, why don't you just ignore me?

I mean, if all of you are experts on relativity, and I’m just a “crackpot”, then why does it take so many of you to work in 24 hour relay teams to answer my simple questions? Why couldn’t just one of you do it? Why does it take 7 or 8 guys?

(paragraph added)

[Normandy6644]

you asked a question of Tensor (show where GR and SR agree), I provided an answer

Why is it when I ask someone a question, someone else answers it? Are you divided up into teams?

Because, like you, we are all busy and since Tensor and I (among others) think the same thing, I see no harm in answering questions for the other person, so long as the answer is right.

Why does it take so many of you to debate me? If I'm wrong, why don't you just ignore me?

We've tried that, and you just keep coming back, hijacking others' threads and spreading your bad science. Besides, it ups our post counts. :lol:

Note: You still didn't acknowledge my answer as being correct.

[Musashi]

you asked a question of Tensor (show where GR and SR agree), I provided an answer

Why is it when I ask someone a question, someone else answers it? Are you divided up into teams?

Why does it take so many of you to debate me? If I'm wrong, why don't you just ignore me?

I mean, if all of you are experts on relativity, and I’m just a “crackpot”, then why does it take so many of you to work in 24 hour relay teams to answer my simple questions? Why couldn’t just one of you do it? Why does it take 7 or 8 guys?

(paragraph added)

So which is it Sam? No time to post or so much time you can post junk like that? Why is it that whenever people ask you to acknowledge their questions you act like you are backed into a corner?

[Sam5]

you asked a question of Tensor (show where GR and SR agree), I provided an answer

Why is it when I ask someone a question, someone else answers it? Are you divided up into teams?

Because, like you, we are all busy and since Tensor and I (among others) think the same thing, I see no harm in answering questions for the other person, so long as the answer is right.



Yes, but you’ve got the advantage of 8 researchers, 8 questioners, some who have different science specialties. Your group can go for 24 hours in relays, but I can't.



Why does it take so many of you to debate me? If I'm wrong, why don't you just ignore me?

We've tried that, and you just keep coming back, hijacking others' threads and spreading your bad science. Besides, it ups our post counts. :lol:


I don’t hijack threads.

I make one little post on one little thread, in response to some other guys’ post, and your X-Team sounds the alarm and goes into action. You work sort of like a big-city police Swat Team. Each of you has a specialty. You encircle me. Then you post hundreds of questions, and when I try to answer them, you accuse me of “hijacking” the thread. If I try to save time by cutting out the fancy formatting, you chew me out for leaving out the formatting. I’m just one guy, and I’ve got to sleep sometime, and I’ve got to eat and do some work around the house, but you are 8, and sometimes more, who work on a 24 hour schedule.

I’ll tell you what.... why don’t you elect just one of you to debate me, then all the rest of you can read his answers. Uhh, I suggest you elect Russ. Yes, Russ would be a good debate partner.

Now tell me the truth. Don't you enjoy this?

[Ricimer]

Sam5: Since you asked, I'll answer. Though feel free to leave it all hanging. I'd like to see you answer Tiabak's questions.

Here's (http://www.drphysics.com/syllabus/time/time.html) a derivation of time dilation. Find a flaw if you'd like.


My definition of time: The stuff the clocks measure. You know, the span between now and then, today and yesterday.

Just like distance is the stuff a ruler measures, the distance between me and you.

one of the four coordinates needed to uniquely determine an event.

Now as for the clocks:

A clock, calibrated in a set of conditions, and left in those same conditions (but sent moving in say, a train, at constant velocity) will all slow the same amount, just so long as you don't tweak with the calibration settings (and that includes the conditions under which you set it). Heck, calibrate it on the move even!


Anyway, if the rest of you want to elect a single debator to face Sam, I'm game (not as the debator, Tiabak seems a good choice).

Sam, Russ isn't a good choice, he's barely contributing (no offense russ).

And of course, I won't agree to letting the outcome of that debate be definitive. Its just to eliminate one of your complaints.

[Normandy6644]

Now tell me the truth. Don't you enjoy this?

Actually yes. It has enabled me to learn much about a subject I truly love, while at the same time taught me much about how people debate. It is kind of fun, but that doesn't change you avoiding questions and then accusing us of not answering them. I understand that you're at a disadvantage since it is only you and not a group of people, but it's not like we haven't given you time to answer what we think are the important questions. What do you want from us? What is your purpose of being here and debating?

[swansont]

The muons are accelerating and moving through the earth’s fields.

The particles in accelerators are accelerating and moving through fields.

The pendulum clock runs faster in a strong gravity field, where an atomic clock runs slower, so atomic clock tick rates don’t represent all of “true time” or “time itself”.

Why would the decay rate of atoms mediated by the strong and weak nuclear forces (which were not known to Lorentz), have the same response to moving through gravity fields as an atomic oscillation, which is electromagnetic in nature? The relative size of the interactions is different, and yet the fractional change in time as measured by the interaction is given by the same equation.

What I am “caught up” with is so many people attributing so many new theories (and old ones too) to “Einstein”.


We don't necessarily attribute everything to Einstein, Sam. I learned about Lorentz contraction as a prelude to relativity. And the equations are still called Lorentz transformations. But the theory behind them was wrong, and demonstrated to be so, so the theory was discarded. SR, even though it uses the same equations, is a different theory, and was proposed by Einstein.

[Sam5]

Note: You still didn't acknowledge my answer as being correct.

See? Every one of you pesters me with questions, then you demand an instantaneous answer. In the meantime, the rest of you are out trying to think up new questions. Your routine is quite obvious by now. I ask Tensor a question that he doesn’t know the answer to. You make excuses for him and you try your hand at an answer. Then while I’m typing out an answer, Musashi comes along and posts a sarcastic comment just to irritate me.

This is modern American science?

This is “the scientific method”?

LOL.

It should be pretty evident to you that the “clock paradox” issue has gone on for 99 years for a good reason.

You can’t rule out all the professional physicists who have said over the years that the 1905 SR theory is not accurate.

It should be obvious to you that if he originally said that acceleration is not considered in the SR theory and the effects of gravity fields are not considered, and a lot of professional physicists say that his theory is wrong about relative motion causing “time dilation” in his “wristwatch” and a “balance-wheel clock”, and when he finally decides to try to “resolve” the paradox himself, to refute their criticism, and then he suddenly adds acceleration effects and gravity effects and the atomic “U” clocks of his 1911 theory, and he has to accelerate the “U” clocks and drop them in a gravity field and then switch the gravity field on and off when necessary, so he can get the “U” clocks to do what he wants, then that indicates that he realizes the critics were right about the original SR theory being wrong? I mean, that's not obvious to you?

What he is basically saying in the section you quoted is that if the gravity field disappears, then the SR theory is supposed to apply, but he is still stuck with no “force” in the SR theory that could cause any kind of clock to slow down its tick rate under the conditions of a steady unaccelerated straight-line motion and the standard “no force” situation as is described in Newton’s First Law of Motion, as published in the Principia in 1687. If there is no different force or unusual force or chance in force on the timing mechanism of the clock, then the clock is not going to change rates, no matter what kind of clock it is, and no matter how many other clocks are moving relative to it.

[swansont]

Why does it take so many of you to debate me? If I'm wrong, why don't you just ignore me?

I mean, if all of you are experts on relativity, and I’m just a “crackpot”, then why does it take so many of you to work in 24 hour relay teams to answer my simple questions? Why couldn’t just one of you do it? Why does it take 7 or 8 guys?


It's a science board, and you are posting here. That's why we don't ignore you. It's a public place, so anybody can chime in. 24 hour relays are a consequence of time zones and personal schedules.

I'm not a relativity expert. I do have some expertise in (mostly atomic) physics and precise time. It's fun tearing your arguments down, because they're wrong, and there may be other people reading who gain an understanding of science by following these discussions. A big difference is that a lot of people are here to both teach and learn, but you seem to be here just to preach.

[Ricimer]

okay, I've gotta say 1 more thing before I let the others at it.

The clock paradox has persisted because it is a common question about SR. It has been answered, and to such an extent it is often used as a teaching tool. This is much the same way Olber's paradox is used to demonstrate why the universe isn't Infinite or Eternal.

You can’t rule out all the professional physicists who have said over the years that the 1905 SR theory is not accurate.

No, I can't, but they can be outweighed by the 1000x more that agree.

You, of course, seem to be able to discount all of those.

Now, that's my take, and I'm not asking any more questions for a while. Once again, feel free to ignore me, I can wait.

[Sam5]

So which is it Sam? No time to post or so much time you can post junk like that? Why is it that whenever people ask you to acknowledge their questions you act like you are backed into a corner?


I think it would help matters if you would stick to the physics issues. For example, do you not see a relationship between the straight-line unaccelerated motion of Newton’s First Law in the Principia, and the lack of a deviation from that straight-line unaccelerated motion when a “force” is not applied to the body, and a clock that ticks at a fairly steady rate when its timing mechanism is reacting normally to normal forces that cause it to tick at a steady rate and when no other outside forces are applied to it or taken away from it? And for example, would you expect Newton’s First Law to not apply to the body if some other body is moving relative to it? Should the first body then changes its direction or rate of motion because of only the relative motion of another body, no matter how far away that other body is? I’d like for you to answer these questions yourself, so that I can evaluate the depth of your understanding of forces and motions, and I will be waiting right here for your reply, which I will expect forthwith.

[Normandy6644]

Note: You still didn't acknowledge my answer as being correct.

See? Every one of you pesters me with questions, then you demand an instantaneous answer. In the meantime, the rest of you are out trying to think up new questions. Your routine is quite obvious by now. I ask Tensor a question that he doesn’t know the answer to. You make excuses for him and you try your hand at an answer. Then while I’m typing out an answer, Musashi comes along and posts a sarcastic comment just to irritate me.

I am 100% confident that Tensor could have posted exactly what I did. I just happened to do it first.

What he is basically saying in the section you quoted is that if the gravity field disappears, then the SR theory is supposed to apply, but he is still stuck with no “force” in the SR theory that could cause any kind of clock to slow down its tick rate under the conditions of a steady unaccelerated straight-line motion and the standard “no force” situation as is described in Newton’s First Law of Motion, as published in the Principia in 1687. If there is no different force or unusual force or chance in force on the timing mechanism of the clock, then the clock is not going to change rates, no matter what kind of clock it is, and no matter how many other clocks are moving relative to it.

Not "supposed to," Sam, does. That section says nothing about clocks, only what happens to a point in a gravitational field and what happens when the Christoffel symbols vanish, i.e., locally flat coordinates. No clocks.

[swansont]

This is “the scientific method”?

LOL.


Who said anything about this board being an example of the scientific method?


You can’t rule out all the professional physicists who have said over the years that the 1905 SR theory is not accurate.

It should be obvious to you that if he originally said that acceleration is not considered in the SR theory and the effects of gravity fields are not considered, and a lot of professional physicists say that his theory is wrong about relative motion causing “time dilation”

Define what you mean by "a lot of professional physicists." There should be a lot pf papers in peer-reviewed journals criticizing SR if this is so. And yet you see a lot of papers confirming SR, written by these professional physicists. How did SR ever get established, if all of these physicists think it's wrong? Ultimately it's about the evidence. Relativity has experimental evidence to back it up. The ether required by Lorentz was discarded because the evidence was not there.

[Sam5]

okay, I've gotta say 1 more thing before I let the others at it.


Are you all sharing just one computer?

The clock paradox has persisted because it is a common question about SR. It has been answered, and to such an extent it is often used as a teaching tool.

Oh?

You mean we’ve been arguing about this all this time, and the issue has already been “answered”??

Geepers, then what is the answer?

I’ve got Einstein’s “answer” in his 1918 paper, so what is your “answer”? Have you seen his “answer”?

Why didn’t you just give me his answer when this subject first came up?

[Sam5]

So which is it

Well, so, what is your response to my questions? They were very simple questions.

[Musashi]

I think it would help matters if you would stick to the physics issues.

I think it would help if you also stuck to the physics issues, but you don't.

[swansont]

I’d like for you to answer these questions yourself, so that I can evaluate the depth of your understanding of forces and motions, and I will be waiting right here for your reply, which I will expect forthwith.


How do we evaluate the depth of your understanding of physics, Sam?

[Musashi]

So which is it

Well, so, what is your response to my questions? They were very simple questions.

Classic. You avoid my question, throw some remarks in my direction, and then ask me questions. I will make it very simple for you.

You say you don't have the time to answer all the questions people ask you. Then you take time from your (supposedly) busy schedule to answer my off topic questions and begin posing questions to me. I am not an important player in these debates. My questions usually have nothing to do with the matter at hand, only your strange evasions. Yet you choose to elevate my questions above those of all the others. The others are asking relevant physics questions, I am asking style questions. Why then do you choose to allocate your valuable time answering questions that aren't important? You are either lying about not having engough time, or you are intentionally evading the real questions posed by others here. Which is it, lying or evading?

[Sam5]

What do you want from us? What is your purpose of being here and debating?

To discuss the physics issues in a calm intellectual atmosphere of a one on one exchange of ideas, sort of like the way science has always been discussed among intelligent learned people in an old-fashioned coffee house located near a major university. I don’t have a big university or coffee house nearby, so I thought maybe this would be the next best thing. But instead, I sometimes feel like I’m being trampled to death by a herd of wild steers.

[Sam5]

So which is it

Well, so, what is your response to my questions? They were very simple questions.

Classic. You avoid my question, throw some remarks in my direction, and then ask me questions. I will make it very simple for you.

You say you don't have the time to answer all the questions people ask you. Then you take time from your (supposedly) busy schedule to answer my off topic questions and begin posing questions to me. I am not an important player in these debates. My questions usually have nothing to do with the matter at hand, only your strange evasions. Yet you choose to elevate my questions above those of all the others. The others are asking relevant physics questions, I am asking style questions. Why then do you choose to allocate your valuable time answering questions that aren't important? You are either lying about not having engough time, or you are intentionally evading the real questions posed by others here. Which is it, lying or evading?


I take that to mean that you don’t have any idea of how to answer my simple questions about Newton’s First Law of Motion and how it relates to the tick rates of clocks?

[Sam5]

I am asking style questions.

You are just posting insults to me. I notice them every now and then. Why do you not want to discuss the physics issues involved with this discussion? If you don’t understand the physics, then why do you continue to post insults to me? I’m responding directly to your remarks and I’m talking about your “style”.

I'd like to hear your thoughts about Newton's First Law of motion and how it might apply to clocks.

[JohnOwens]

I take that to mean that you don’t have any idea of how to answer my simple questions about Newton’s First Law of Motion and how it relates to the tick rates of clocks?
I took it to mean that that question was so blatantly misstated it wasn't worth the trouble. It's a bogus question, invoking vague similarities of concepts and then drawing the conclusion that because they're similar, they must both be true if either is true. Does that sound like a question worth answering to you? If so, I've got a few more questions lined up you'll love answering.

[Sam5]

JohnOwens,
You’ll have to take a number. I’m having a discussion with Musashi about “style” and Newton’s First Law. I'll try to get back to you later.

[JohnOwens]

JohnOwens,
You’ll have to take a number. I’m having a discussion with Musashi about “style” and Newton’s First Law. I'll try to get back to you later.
At least try to look like you're paying attention. Assuming you're referring to my last post before this, I didn't even ask a (non-rhetorical) question, I attempted to answer a question of yours.

[Musashi]

Don't worry John, Sam seizes any chance to spend gobs of his non-existant time having meaningless conversations with me. It is just another way he can avoid have a serious discussions with anyone else.

Why do you not want to discuss the physics issues involved with this discussion?

Sam, why do you not want to discuss the physics issues involved with this discussion? Why do you instead choose to focus on my so-called attacks? Is it because you can't google up answers for the questions that have been asked? Is it becuase you have run out of passages to quote out of context? Are you just buying some time to do some more internet mining, hoping to come up with some kind of translation error you can pin all of your hopes on? Either quit whining about how you don't have the time to address the questions or learn how to spend your time more efficiently. I can guarantee that answering the questions posed in this thread would be a lot more useful than bickering with me, but I predict you will keep milking this opportunity to dodge the issues.

[Sam5]

My definition of time: The stuff the clocks measure. You know, the span between now and then, today and yesterday.


Today and yesterday are determined by the rotation of the earth, and that rate varies, and it’s slowing down gradually. So if this is “time itself”, why isn’t everything else slowing down?


Just like distance is the stuff a ruler measures, the distance between me and you.

The distance between you and me can vary, but that doesn’t change all distances. The distance between you and me isn’t all of “distance itself”. It is just one distance that changes, and it changes for a specific reason, without any other distance having to change as a result. How can the relative motion between my clock and a clock on another planet in another galaxy cause either of our clocks to change rates?

So where are the papers about all the water clocks changing drip rates due to relative motion with other water clocks in other galaxies?


Now as for the clocks:

A clock, calibrated in a set of conditions, and left in those same conditions (but sent moving in say, a train, at constant velocity) will all slow the same amount, just so long as you don't tweak with the calibration settings (and that includes the conditions under which you set it). Heck, calibrate it on the move even!


Everything is already moving. All things are born and created moving. So if you have a clock and I have a clock and we move relative to each other, then how can the velocity of the relative motion between us slow down either clock, and how do you determine which clock slows down? Which clock “lags behind” at the end of the experiment, if, as in SR theory, neither of the clocks experience accelerative or gravity effects?

Do you not realize that when Einstein moved his clocks in the SR theory, he left out all forces, all fields, and all accelerative effects, yet he had the relatively moving clock in the system that the main observer was NOT in, physically slow down? And if he had moved that observer to the other system, then the system the observer just left would have the clock that slowed down, while the new system the observer just changed over to would no longer have the clock that slowed down? And that this is just nonsense? And that he realized it later and changed the thought experiments so they wouldn’t be so stupid, and that’s when he added the real physical forces and the acceleration effects and the gravity fields, and then the thought experiments no longer represented SR but GR and Lorentz theory?

[Sam5]

Sam, why do you not want to discuss the physics issues involved with this discussion?

I’m ready any time. You are the one who flagged me. I didn’t go to some thread you were on and post a message to you. I was talking to someone else, and you specifically flagged me and posted a message to me, and so here I am, and I’m responding to your post, so let’s chat about the physics issues we are discussing on this thread. So what do you think about the implications of Newton’s First Law concerning the alteration or non-alteration of steady clock rates?

[Sam5]

Musashi,

Or you can decide the topic. Would you like to talk about Maxwell’s references to atomic clocks? Or how about Lorentz’s theory of ponderable bodies moving through fields? Or maybe we could chat about Poincaré’s comments about relative and absolute motion? Or how about Steinmetz’s comments about atomic clocks? Or maybe Pauli’s comments about Einstein’s 1918 change in the reason for the clock slowdown in “On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies”? Maybe you know what kind of “force” was used to impart the motion to the k frame in that paper? Whatever you want to talk about in regard to SR, well, here I am. You attracted my attention, so let's talk about the physics of the SR theory.

[Musashi]

I predict you will keep milking this opportunity to dodge the issues.

[Taibak]

My definition of time: The stuff the clocks measure. You know, the span between now and then, today and yesterday.


Today and yesterday are determined by the rotation of the earth, and that rate varies, and it’s slowing down gradually. So if this is “time itself”, why isn’t everything else slowing down?

Except the rotation of the Earth isn't an accurate clock because, as you mentioned, it's slowing down. The day is merely a convenient unit of measuring time for everyday purposes. However, time exists independent of your ability to measure it. It doesn't matter if you divide time into hours, minutes, days, years, or seconds, any more than it matters if you divide space into meters, feet, or cubits


Just like distance is the stuff a ruler measures, the distance between me and you.

The distance between you and me can vary, but that doesn’t change all distances. The distance between you and me isn’t all of “distance itself”. It is just one distance that changes, and it changes for a specific reason, without any other distance having to change as a result. How can the relative motion between my clock and a clock on another planet in another galaxy cause either of our clocks to change rates?

You're right, the distance between two observers can vary, a phenomenon that's analogous to the passage of time. However, you're overlooking the fact that spacial dimensions are just as variable as time in relativity. If you have two observers moving at high enough speeds relative to each other - in the absence of gravitation or any other forces - not only will each observer say that time is slowing down for the other, each will also say that the other looks compressed.

So where are the papers about all the water clocks changing drip rates due to relative motion with other water clocks in other galaxies?

There doesn't need to be one. You can test time dilation with any clock and atomic clocks are used for their precision. In fact, you couldn't do this experiment with a water clock - they're too imprecise.

However, experiments have been done with atomic clocks. After correcting for graitational effects and any sources of experimental error, the clock that was in motion still found to run slow when compared with the one that remained at rest. The Hafele-Keating experiment proved this. Muon and pion decay measurements have shown this.

[quote=Ricimer]
Now as for the clocks:

A clock, calibrated in a set of conditions, and left in those same conditions (but sent moving in say, a train, at constant velocity) will all slow the same amount, just so long as you don't tweak with the calibration settings (and that includes the conditions under which you set it). Heck, calibrate it on the move even!

Everything is already moving. All things are born and created moving. So if you have a clock and I have a clock and we move relative to each other, then how can the velocity of the relative motion between us slow down either clock, and how do you determine which clock slows down?

That's where the 'relativity' kicks in. All reference frames are equally valid so it doesn't make any sense to ask which clock is right and which is wrong. Or, put another way, any observer will decide he's at rest and is keeping the proper time. However, it's then equally valid for any other observer to decide that he's at rest, that he's keeping the proper time, and that the other observer is in motion.

Which clock “lags behind” at the end of the experiment, if, as in SR theory, neither of the clocks experience accelerative or gravity effects?

Both and neither. It's a weird concept, I'll admit, but each observer says that the other's clock has run slow.

Do you not realize that when Einstein moved his clocks in the SR theory, he left out all forces, all fields, and all accelerative effects, yet he had the relatively moving clock in the system that the main observer was NOT in, physically slow down?

Yup. That's a pretty good summary of the SR theory, actually.

And if he had moved that observer to the other system, then the system the observer just left would have the clock that slowed down, while the new system the observer just changed over to would no longer have the clock that slowed down?

Yup. To move one clock to the other's reference frame you break the system's symmetry and/or cause it to experience an acceleration. Either way, it changes its velocity and can therefore no longer claim to be at rest.

And that this is just nonsense?

Then how come no experiment has ever found a case where special relativity fails?

And that he realized it later and changed the thought experiments so they wouldn’t be so stupid, and that’s when he added the real physical forces and the acceleration effects and the gravity fields, and then the thought experiments no longer represented SR but GR and Lorentz theory?

Again, why do you think that a force is necessary to alter the passage of time?

Anyway, referring to the original thought experiments as 'stupid' isn't really helpful. It's a subjective label that, at best, disagrees with the evidence supporting the theory that grew out of those thought experiments.

As for general relativity, Normandy444 provided the theoretical argument about how GR reduces to SR in either zero- or micro-gravity. Lorentz theory, on the other hand, makes predictions that have been shown to be false. I'm going to keep harping on those magnetic field lines that Lorentz says should be cut because it's damming evidence. If Lorentz was right, we should see breaks in the magnetic fields of fast-moving particles or in the magnetic field of the Sun as it moves relative to the Earth. No such breaks have ever been found. Einstein's theory, on the other hand, agrees with Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism and, consequently, with experiment.


Questions that need answering. (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=425)

[Taibak]

Sam, why do you not want to discuss the physics issues involved with this discussion?

I’m ready any time.

If that's the case, why have you continued to avoid the questions I asked you back on page seven, back on April 18th? Or the questions that others have asked since then and that I've been linking to?

Questions for Sam5. (http://www.badastronomy.com/phpBB/viewtopic.php?t=12739&postdays=0&postorder=asc&sta rt=425)


As for your first law question, while I don't see how that's relevant to the issue at hand, I'll see what I can come up with. There might be more to that question than meets the eye, so I want to make sure I've got a handle on it before I say anything.

[Sam5]

I predict you will keep milking this opportunity to dodge the issues.

I think you are dodging the issues. You flagged me. You posted a message to me. So let's talk about relativity.