Einstiens Theory of Relativity?

Ain't no way I got time to read this entire thread, but this is a cool subject that interests me, so here goes, forgive me if I repeat any points made so far...

As was pointed out, there is no "absolute" frame of reference, it's all relative, a "frame of reference" is merely a means by which we apply a yardstick to our surrounding world. Just as we can define light as particles (photons) or waves, and both models have proven valid for studying the properties of light, so can we define other physical properties, like positions or velocities of various bodies relative to one another. Mass and energy are interchangeable, one form can be transformed into the other. Since the Big Bang, our Universe has been expanding at a rapid rate, and everything in this world is expanding, but you don't notice it because your yardstick is expanding as well. I look at the back of my hand, and it could be a million times bigger than it was a second ago, but I wouldn't know it 'cause my eyeball is a million times bigger as well, as are the other objects in the room, all of which are expanding at the same rate. My question is this: if a physical body travelling at the speed of light acquires infinite mass, that speed is relative to what? I mean we're hauling ass around the Sun, and our solar system is trucking through the galaxy, and our galaxy is motoring through space, so surely we're moving at the speed of light relative to something, why don't we become infinite in mass?

On a slightly different related note, another thing I find cool is the study of black holes. When a star gets old and burns out, it collapses on itself, resulting in a huge gravitational attraction, and sometimes the sheer force of the particles crashing together is so powerful that the matter becomes anti-matter, resulting in a black hole. A black hole will suck in anything near it, and has infinite gravitational force at it's entrance. A black hole connects one part of the Universe to another via a worm hole, and dumps all the stuff out at the other end through a white hole. Matter travels through a worm hole at the speed of light (relative to what?), so time and space are effectively warped within the worm hole. I gotta get one of those bad boys for my commute every morning. I'd put my black hole in the garage, and my white hole in the office, what a time saver that would be!

 

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I tried to understand this theory once, I think I got the gist of it, I also think that one day people will look at it as 'quaint' . it did get people seriously thinking along lines that led to the A bomb. but the theory wasnt exactly new. the biggest thing that bothered me about it was we dont realy have no way of knowing if velocity has any effect on mater at all.(aside from friction) it sure dosnt seem to. and then theres the whole time thing. I dont think Shoelinger would agree at all, or the phylosphy of Karma that(as near as I can understand it) purposes that everything happened at once and it is only our limeted perseption that makes us think diferently. just no way of knowing,

 

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the mass increase can also be explained by the fact that electrons are being added

 

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I see what you meen here and i am aware of work done at stanford, however I still believe it is a mater of perseption

 

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What do you mean by perception, the way you percieve something refers to the way that it appears but not necessarily the way it is. So when you say 'it is a matter of perception' you are implying that we are seeing the visible effect of something but we are not sure of the underlying cause. This, of course, is teh case with much of physics relativity could be a symptom, appearing under certain conditions (high velocity or high gravitational field) of a deeper theory, infact id go as far as to say it almost certainly is. Just as quantum mechanics is how we see this deeper theory in the regieme where interatomic forces reign and masses are small. Our best theory comes from the combination of special relativity and quantum mechanics to describe the behaviour of entities such as electrons, here we have a theory that describes the world of charges in atoms and sub-atomic particles with incredible accuracy.

This however is still a model based on our perception of the sitation and we must continue to devise tests to test our current perception and refine it, relativity has so far stood up to rigorous testing however on truely immense distances (the intergalactic scale) it appears that it could be floundering perhaps we are seeing more evidence of the deeper theory that will allow us to refine relativity to better fit our refined perception and take us one step closer to this deeper theory.

The best example of this process is the development of the atomic theory of matter. As far back as the Greeks it has been postulated that matter is ultimately made up of identical indivisible units in various combinations. This theory was not improved upon until the renassance when it was suggested the light maybe a stream of partices with Newtons corpuscular theory of light. In the nineteenth century the Greek perception was put to the test and found to be basically correct different elements appears to be made up of fundamental units of different mass each with a neutral net charge. When the electron was discovered atoms where thought to be made of a ball of positive matter with electrons embedded within them. This was how they perceived the atom but we now know that to be incorrect. When Rutherford performed his famous scattering experiment he found that the atom consisted of a tiny dense, positive core with electrons round the outside. Indeed this model is still used by some chemists today where quantum properties of atoms are not important. But again our perception had imporved but it was still wrong. If the nucleus was positive and the electrons were negative why didnt electrons spiral into the nucleus? Bohr found the solution by saying that angular momentum was quantised and that electrons could only occupy certain orbits, this was the birth of quantum mechanics. Within a few years the schrodinger equation had been formulated and a full quantum description of the atom was found. However it still couldnt explain the phenomenon of spin and some of its predictions disagreed slightly with observation. When Dirac combined SR and QM the phenomenon of spin appeard naturally and it predictions are accurate to the most sensitive equipment availbale. This is our current perception of an atom. Since then the neutron and proton have been found to consist of 3 quarks and a host of other particles have been found. This is where thepoint baout perception is important, we do not know that a neuttron is made of 3 quarks. We have made equations the predict the existance of quarks and their combining to make different particles. Maybe quarks do not exist as we percieve them but what we do know is that the world behaves as though they do. Perception is important and relativity describes how we perceive the universe under certain conditions, and its doing it quite well, however it is only an apporximation of something greater.

 

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The thing about the theory of relativity, is not to prove it, that is aposed to the scientific method, we can hold up examples all day and say they "prove" all sorts of things, but if we cant disprove it, we can just go with it for now. Both maxwell and einstien were working under asumtions, daydreams even, if the forces of gravity is a seperate thing, existing on its own, and if the reason the light cant travel faster than it does, is because of gravity, than it might be true. But we always seem to get down to things being the same thing, like mater is realy made up of the same thing as energy. so its realy also pretty easy to assume that the forces of gravity, the force assosiated with all movement and what we see as nuetrons and protons are also the same thing, and that a mass would carry its own gravity with it beyound the speed of the light we can percieve., maybe, to were vilocity is infinet.

 

Exactly, nature behaves like a neutron is made of 3 quarks, but we cant see them, we can never see them. We dont know what a quark 'looks' like all we can do is model it with the most appropriate maths. Is light a particle or a wave? Its neither in certain situations our mathematical models for a particle or a wave will allow us to describe light.

Sorry Steffan im not following you. Why is the speed of light restriced by gravity?

 

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To learn more about this subject I'd suggest reading Cosmology : The Science of the Universe. It's an awesome book. I never got to finish reading it but I skimmed over these parts. I don't know to much about this so I'm not really going to try and explain it... but get that book. It's one hell of a read. Oh, and it's not hard to understand.

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/t...103-4119588-1839804?v=glance&s=books&n=507846