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EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY
Every generation has its Albert Einstein and the Albert Einstein of
our generation is undoubtedly Tom Roberts: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...6f54853449465? http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...90046b3bff4c1? The Albert Einstein of our generation once informed the group sci.physics.relativity about the inherent ambiguity of Einstein's theory: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...0c6f27f1d6be1? Tom Roberts: "As I keep stressing: in an accelerated system (like a rotating disk), geometry is INHERENTLY AMBIGUOUS. You can get whatever answer you want by defining differently what you mean by "circumference of the rotating disk"." Briefly, the problem under discussion was as follows. By the end of Chapter 23 in his "Relativity" Einstein claims that measuring rods laid out along the rim of a rotating disc are Lorentz contracted whereas those laid out along the radius are not and therefore the ratio of the circumference and the diameter, as judged by a non- rotating observer, is no longer pi. The problem is usually referred to as the Ehrenfest paradox and has four solutions: 1. Ehrenfest: The ratio is smaller than pi. 2. Einstein: The ratio is greater than pi. 3. M. Strauss (Int.J.Theor.Phys. 11, 107, 1974): The ratio is equal to pi. 4. The rest of the scientific world: Who cares. Clearly Tom Roberts, the Albert Einstein of our generation, is absolutely right: there can be nothing more ambiguous than this. So my initial intention was to call this message: EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: AN AMBIGUITY Then I realized that, despite the ambiguity discovered by Tom Roberts, the final results in Chapter 23 - that the rotating clock runs slow by a factor of 1/gamma and that the ratio circumference/diameter is greater than pi - were used by Einstein in a quite unambiguous manner and proved very important for the development of relativity. So I decided to call my message EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY Of course I could also have called it EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE AMBIGUOUS UNAMBIGUITY Pentcho Valev |
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EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY
Pentcho Valev wrote: Every generation has its Albert Einstein and the Albert Einstein of our generation is undoubtedly Tom Roberts: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...6f54853449465? http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...90046b3bff4c1? The Albert Einstein of our generation once informed the group sci.physics.relativity about the inherent ambiguity of Einstein's theory: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...0c6f27f1d6be1? Tom Roberts: "As I keep stressing: in an accelerated system (like a rotating disk), geometry is INHERENTLY AMBIGUOUS. You can get whatever answer you want by defining differently what you mean by "circumference of the rotating disk"." Briefly, the problem under discussion was as follows. By the end of Chapter 23 in his "Relativity" Einstein claims that measuring rods laid out along the rim of a rotating disc are Lorentz contracted whereas those laid out along the radius are not and therefore the ratio of the circumference and the diameter, as judged by a non- rotating observer, is no longer pi. The problem is usually referred to as the Ehrenfest paradox and has four solutions: 1. Ehrenfest: The ratio is smaller than pi. 2. Einstein: The ratio is greater than pi. 3. M. Strauss (Int.J.Theor.Phys. 11, 107, 1974): The ratio is equal to pi. 4. The rest of the scientific world: Who cares. Clearly Tom Roberts, the Albert Einstein of our generation, is absolutely right: there can be nothing more ambiguous than this. So my initial intention was to call this message: EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: AN AMBIGUITY Then I realized that, despite the ambiguity discovered by Tom Roberts, the final results in Chapter 23 - that the rotating clock runs slow by a factor of 1/gamma and that the ratio circumference/diameter is greater than pi - were used by Einstein in a quite unambiguous manner and proved very important for the development of relativity. So I decided to call my message EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY Of course I could also have called it EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE AMBIGUOUS UNAMBIGUITY Nice examples of unambiguous ambiguity are the cases where a relativity hypnotist has written a text based on some hypnotic principles and then another hypnotist updates the text by using different hypnotic principles. The following patchwork created by relativity hypnotists Philip Gibbs and Steve Carlip can be regarded as a paradigm of unambiguous ambiguity: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physic..._of_light.html "Is c, the speed of light in vacuum, constant? At the 1983 Conference Generale des Poids et Mesures, the following SI (Systeme International) definition of the metre was adopted: The metre is the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second. This defines the speed of light in vacuum to be exactly 299,792,458 m/s. This provides a very short answer to the question "Is c constant": Yes, c is constant by definition!" "The SI definition makes certain assumptions about the laws of physics. For example, they assume that the particle of light, the photon, is massless. If the photon had a small rest mass, the SI definition of the metre would become meaningless because the speed of light would change as a function of its wavelength....Any such possible photon rest mass is certainly too small to have any practical significance for the definition of the metre in the foreseeable future, but it cannot be shown to be exactly zero--even though currently accepted theories indicate that it is. If it wasn't zero, the speed of light would not be constant; but from a theoretical point of view we would then take c to be the upper limit of the speed of light in vacuum so that we can continue to ask whether c is constant." "....it is nonsense to say that the speed of light is now constant just because the SI definitions of units define its numerical value to be constant." "Another assumption on the laws of physics made by the SI definition of the metre is that the theory of relativity is correct." "It is a basic postulate of the theory of relativity that the speed of light is constant. This can be broken down into two parts: The speed of light is independent of the motion of the observer. The speed of light does not vary with time or place." "Einstein then argued that those transformations should be understood as changes of space and time rather than of physical objects...." "Einstein went on to discover a more general theory of relativity which explained gravity in terms of curved spacetime, and he talked about the speed of light changing in this new theory. In the 1920 book "Relativity: the special and general theory" he wrote: . . . according to the general theory of relativity, the law of the constancy of the velocity of light in vacuo, which constitutes one of the two fundamental assumptions in the special theory of relativity [. . .] cannot claim any unlimited validity. A curvature of rays of light can only take place when the velocity of propagation of light varies with position. Since Einstein talks of velocity (a vector quantity: speed with direction) rather than speed alone, it is not clear that he meant the speed will change, but the reference to special relativity suggests that he did mean so." "This interpretation is perfectly valid and makes good physical sense, but a more modern interpretation is that the speed of light is constant in general relativity." "The problem here comes from the fact that speed is a coordinate- dependent quantity, and is therefore somewhat ambiguous. To determine speed (distance moved/time taken) you must first choose some standards of distance and time, and different choices can give different answers. This is already true in special relativity: if you measure the speed of light in an accelerating reference frame, the answer will, in general, differ from c." "In this passage, Einstein is not talking about a freely falling frame, but rather about a frame at rest relative to a source of gravity. In such a frame, the speed of light can differ from c, basically because of the effect of gravity (spacetime curvature) on clocks and rulers." "If general relativity is correct, then the constancy of the speed of light in inertial frames is a tautology from the geometry of spacetime." "Finally, we come to the conclusion that the speed of light is not only observed to be constant; in the light of well tested theories of physics, it does not even make any sense to say that it varies." Pentcho Valev |
#3
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EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY
In epsilon, a linear shift of the discrete time domain shows the inverse of
gamma as the effective value. Epsilon being the relative connection in relative states and interjections. Patrick Ashley Meuser"-Bianca" Cyberneticist "Pentcho Valev" wrote in message oups.com... Pentcho Valev wrote: Every generation has its Albert Einstein and the Albert Einstein of our generation is undoubtedly Tom Roberts: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...6f54853449465? http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...90046b3bff4c1? The Albert Einstein of our generation once informed the group sci.physics.relativity about the inherent ambiguity of Einstein's theory: http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...0c6f27f1d6be1? Tom Roberts: "As I keep stressing: in an accelerated system (like a rotating disk), geometry is INHERENTLY AMBIGUOUS. You can get whatever answer you want by defining differently what you mean by "circumference of the rotating disk"." Briefly, the problem under discussion was as follows. By the end of Chapter 23 in his "Relativity" Einstein claims that measuring rods laid out along the rim of a rotating disc are Lorentz contracted whereas those laid out along the radius are not and therefore the ratio of the circumference and the diameter, as judged by a non- rotating observer, is no longer pi. The problem is usually referred to as the Ehrenfest paradox and has four solutions: 1. Ehrenfest: The ratio is smaller than pi. 2. Einstein: The ratio is greater than pi. 3. M. Strauss (Int.J.Theor.Phys. 11, 107, 1974): The ratio is equal to pi. 4. The rest of the scientific world: Who cares. Clearly Tom Roberts, the Albert Einstein of our generation, is absolutely right: there can be nothing more ambiguous than this. So my initial intention was to call this message: EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: AN AMBIGUITY Then I realized that, despite the ambiguity discovered by Tom Roberts, the final results in Chapter 23 - that the rotating clock runs slow by a factor of 1/gamma and that the ratio circumference/diameter is greater than pi - were used by Einstein in a quite unambiguous manner and proved very important for the development of relativity. So I decided to call my message EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY Of course I could also have called it EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE AMBIGUOUS UNAMBIGUITY Nice examples of unambiguous ambiguity are the cases where a relativity hypnotist has written a text based on some hypnotic principles and then another hypnotist updates the text by using different hypnotic principles. The following patchwork created by relativity hypnotists Philip Gibbs and Steve Carlip can be regarded as a paradigm of unambiguous ambiguity: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physic..._of_light.html "Is c, the speed of light in vacuum, constant? At the 1983 Conference Generale des Poids et Mesures, the following SI (Systeme International) definition of the metre was adopted: The metre is the length of the path travelled by light in vacuum during a time interval of 1/299 792 458 of a second. This defines the speed of light in vacuum to be exactly 299,792,458 m/s. This provides a very short answer to the question "Is c constant": Yes, c is constant by definition!" "The SI definition makes certain assumptions about the laws of physics. For example, they assume that the particle of light, the photon, is massless. If the photon had a small rest mass, the SI definition of the metre would become meaningless because the speed of light would change as a function of its wavelength....Any such possible photon rest mass is certainly too small to have any practical significance for the definition of the metre in the foreseeable future, but it cannot be shown to be exactly zero--even though currently accepted theories indicate that it is. If it wasn't zero, the speed of light would not be constant; but from a theoretical point of view we would then take c to be the upper limit of the speed of light in vacuum so that we can continue to ask whether c is constant." "....it is nonsense to say that the speed of light is now constant just because the SI definitions of units define its numerical value to be constant." "Another assumption on the laws of physics made by the SI definition of the metre is that the theory of relativity is correct." "It is a basic postulate of the theory of relativity that the speed of light is constant. This can be broken down into two parts: The speed of light is independent of the motion of the observer. The speed of light does not vary with time or place." "Einstein then argued that those transformations should be understood as changes of space and time rather than of physical objects...." "Einstein went on to discover a more general theory of relativity which explained gravity in terms of curved spacetime, and he talked about the speed of light changing in this new theory. In the 1920 book "Relativity: the special and general theory" he wrote: . . . according to the general theory of relativity, the law of the constancy of the velocity of light in vacuo, which constitutes one of the two fundamental assumptions in the special theory of relativity [. . .] cannot claim any unlimited validity. A curvature of rays of light can only take place when the velocity of propagation of light varies with position. Since Einstein talks of velocity (a vector quantity: speed with direction) rather than speed alone, it is not clear that he meant the speed will change, but the reference to special relativity suggests that he did mean so." "This interpretation is perfectly valid and makes good physical sense, but a more modern interpretation is that the speed of light is constant in general relativity." "The problem here comes from the fact that speed is a coordinate- dependent quantity, and is therefore somewhat ambiguous. To determine speed (distance moved/time taken) you must first choose some standards of distance and time, and different choices can give different answers. This is already true in special relativity: if you measure the speed of light in an accelerating reference frame, the answer will, in general, differ from c." "In this passage, Einstein is not talking about a freely falling frame, but rather about a frame at rest relative to a source of gravity. In such a frame, the speed of light can differ from c, basically because of the effect of gravity (spacetime curvature) on clocks and rulers." "If general relativity is correct, then the constancy of the speed of light in inertial frames is a tautology from the geometry of spacetime." "Finally, we come to the conclusion that the speed of light is not only observed to be constant; in the light of well tested theories of physics, it does not even make any sense to say that it varies." Pentcho Valev |
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EINSTEIN RELATIVITY: THE UNAMBIGUOUS AMBIGUITY
A few more examples of unambiguous ambiguity:
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.p...d7baf4ffcae461 On February 23, 1994, Hartmut Frommert wrote in sci.physics: Though the natural constant "c" which is usually called the vacuum light velocity (or speed) can only be changed by re-definition of units (as any conversion factor), the (actual) speed of (the propagation of) light (photons !) is NOT constant, e.g. in a gravitational field (see any textbook on elementary General Relativity). JOHN BAEZ replied: "This is darn misleading. THE SPEED OF LIGHT IS CONSTANT IN GR, it's just that the spacetime the light is moving around in is a bit wiggly. Of course, one *could* think of it the way you suggest, but one would have to say, not just that the speed of light was different in a "gravitational field," but that all other laws of physics were different too, in a fairly complicated manner." http://www.pitt.edu/~jdnorton/papers...UP_TimesNR.pdf "What Can We Learn about the Ontology of Space and Time from the Theory of Relativity?", John D. Norton: "IN GENERAL RELATIVITY THERE IS NO COMPARABLE SENSE OF THE CONSTANCY OF THE SPEED OF LIGHT. The constancy of the speed of light is a consequence of the perfect homogeneity of spacetime presumed in special relativity. There is a special velocity at each event; homogeneity forces it to be the same velocity everywhere. We lose that homogeneity in the transition to general relativity and with it we lose the constancy of the speed of light. Such was Einstein's conclusion at the earliest moments of his preparation for general relativity. ALREADY IN 1907, A MERE TWO YEARS AFTER THE COMPLETION OF THE SPECIAL THEORY, HE HAD CONCLUDED THAT THE SPEED OF LIGHT IS VARIABLE IN THE PRESENCE OF A GRAVITATIONAL FIELD; indeed, he concluded, the variable speed of light can be used as a gravitational potential." http://www.ias.ac.in/jarch/jaa/20/91-101%20.pdf John Stachel: "At first Einstein looked for a scalar generalization of Newtons theory, based on the gravitational potential. By the middle of 1912, he had worked out what he regarded as a satisfactory theory for the case of a static gravitational field. He developed a field equation for the gravitational potential, which he identified in this case with a VARIABLE SPEED OF LIGHT c(x,y,z) INSTEAD OF THE CONSTANT SPEED OF THE SPECIAL THEORY..." In Oceania (where we all live) it makes no sense to ask "Is the speed of light REALLY variable?" for the same reason for which it makes no sense to ask "Do two and two REALLY make four?". It only makes sense to ask: "What do Einstein's criminal cult (the Party) say about the speed of light?": http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/1984/ George Orwell "1984": "In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The heresy of heresies was common sense. And what was terrifying was not that they would kill you for thinking otherwise, but that they might be right. For, after all, how do we know that two and two make four? Or that the force of gravity works? Or that the past is unchangeable? If both the past and the external world exist only in the mind, and if the mind itself is controllable what then?" Pentcho Valev |
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