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Old October 15th 13, 10:15 AM posted to sci.astro
Pentcho Valev
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Default SPECIAL RELATIVITY AND SANE SCIENCE

Insofar as the speed of light is concerned, Maxwell's 19th century electromagnetic theory was wrong but still sane science. It was sane, although wrong, to assume that the speed of light (relative to the observer) was independent of the speed of the emitter but it would have been totally insane to assume that this speed was independent of the speed of the observer as well. Maxwell was not "totally insane" of course:

http://www.pitt.edu/~jdnorton/papers/Chasing.pdf
JOHN NORTON: "That [Maxwell's] theory allows light to slow and be frozen in the frame of reference of a sufficiently rapidly moving observer."

http://culturesciencesphysique.ens-l..._CSP_relat.xml
Gabrielle Bonnet, École Normale Supérieure de Lyon: "Les équations de Maxwell font en particulier intervenir une constante, c, qui est la vitesse de la lumière dans le vide. Par un changement de référentiel classique, si c est la vitesse de la lumière dans le vide dans un premier référentiel, et si on se place désormais dans un nouveau référentiel en translation par rapport au premier à la vitesse constante v, la lumière devrait désormais aller à la vitesse c-v si elle se déplace dans la direction et le sens de v, et à la vitesse c+v si elle se déplace dans le sens contraire."

http://www.amazon.com/Brief-History-.../dp/0553380168
Stephen Hawking: "Maxwell's theory predicted that radio or light waves should travel at a certain fixed speed. But Newton's theory had got rid of the idea of absolute rest, so if light was supposed to travel at a fixed speed, one would have to say what that fixed speed was to be measured relative to. It was therefore suggested that there was a substance called the "ether" that was present everywhere, even in "empty" space. Light waves should travel through the ether as sound waves travel through air, and their speed should therefore be relative to the ether. Different observers, moving relative to the ether, would see light coming toward them at different speeds, but light's speed relative to the ether would remain fixed."

Einstein knew that the speed-of-light-independent-of-speed-of-observer concept was totally insane but still found it profitable to introduce it, after some wrestling:

http://www.aip.org/history/einstein/...relativity.htm
John Stachel: "But here he ran into the most blatant-seeming contradiction, which I mentioned earlier when first discussing the two principles. As noted then, the Maxwell-Lorentz equations imply that there exists (at least) one inertial frame in which the speed of light is a constant regardless of the motion of the light source. Einstein's version of the relativity principle (minus the ether) requires that, if this is true for one inertial frame, it must be true for all inertial frames. But this seems to be nonsense. How can it happen that the speed of light relative to an observer cannot be increased or decreased if that observer moves towards or away from a light beam? Einstein states that he wrestled with this problem over a lengthy period of time, to the point of despair."

So Maxwell said the speed of light (relative to the observer) did depend on the speed of the observer, Einstein said it didn't. How are such problems solved in Divine Albert's world? By changing the past, as in Big Brother's world: nowadays 99% of the Einsteinians teach that Maxwell also said the speed of light didn't depend on the speed of the observer, Divine Einstein, yes we all believe in relativity, relativity, relativity:

http://www.physics.fsu.edu/courses/S...15-ch27__2.pdf
"He [Maxwell] also showed the speed of light is independent of the motion of both the source and the observer."

http://www.planetastronomy.com/speci...20mars2005.htm
Françoise Balibar: "Maxwell rentre en scène : il pense que la lumière se propage dans un milieu matériel baptisé éther, ce qui est une erreur, mais il pense aussi que la lumière est un champ électromagnétique, ça c'est révolutionnaire. Il met au point ses célèbres équations dans lesquelles la vitesse de la lumière est la même dans l'éther (référentiel absolu) et dans tout autre référentiel en translation uniforme."

http://sfloccari.lycee-berthelot.fr/...relativit_.pdf
Françoise Balibar: "En effet, lors d'un changement de référentiel à un autre en translation uniforme par rapport à lui, la vitesse de la lumière (appelée ici c) ne devient pas c+V; elle reste c. Cette circonstance, résultat obligé de la théorie de la lumière développée au milieu du XIXè siècle par Maxwell...."

http://www.physics.usyd.edu.au/~gfl/...5/Lecture1.pdf
"As Maxwell's equations provide a single wave solution, with a velocity c, Einstein proposed the postulate of the constancy of the speed of light: The velocity of light in free space is the same for all inertial observers."

http://www.lecture-notes.co.uk/sussk...al-relativity/
Leonard Susskind: "One of the predictions of Maxwell's equations is that the velocity of electromagnetic waves, or light, is always measured to have the same value, regardless of the frame in which it is measured."

http://www.amazon.com/Why-Does-mc2-S.../dp/0306817586
Why Does E=mc2?: (And Why Should We Care?), Brian Cox, Jeff Forshaw, p. 91: "...Maxwell's brilliant synthesis of the experimental results of Faraday and others strongly suggested that the speed of light should be the same for all observers."

Pentcho Valev