On the idea of time in physics-relativity

[Neddy Bate]

As a matter of fact they have, but I don't see how the differences are relavent to the issue.

Were you able to get the light from the two ends of the train to hit both observers at the same time? It is not possible.

I have read about Minkowski Diagrams but I have never actually worked any of them. Have you ever worked any Minkowski Diagrams ? Seemed like a smart guy, was just reading about him and he was Einsteins teacher.

Yes, Minkowski diagrams show all of the effects of relativity at a glance. Those effects are 1)length contraction, 2)time dilation, and 3)relativity of simultaneity. That last one is the one you are claiming is not part of relativity anymore, but it is. You can also see it in the Lorentz transformations.

 

[origin]

I still think I would rather be a real scientist and study quantum mechanics.

The chance of you becoming a scientist is roughly equivalent to the chance that the New York Mets will win the Stanley Cup - twice - in back to back years.

 

[Neddy Bate]

Only the observer O' (on the moving train) has a relative movement to the light flashes. But that only creates a frequency shift, no? It does not affect when the light is perceived.

If O' had not moved, he would have received the light rays simultaneously, just like O did. But O' moves away from O during the time the light rays are traveling toward his eyes. Therefore O' will see one light ray before the other.

 

[Aqueous Id]

I still think I would rather be a real scientist and study quantum mechanics.

Being a "real scientist" is equivalent to the phrase "being a real man". It requires genuineness, abhorrence of bias, non-reliance on hearsay, constant checks and re-checks, validation and verification to every detail (one reason I was harping on your spelling and language flaws), beaucoups of lab time and hands-on experience, and -- get this -- homework. You actually have to improve yourself to the point of being able to sit down at an exam and make a decent grade.

Until you get past your shortfall in this regard you can forget ever imagining yourself a scientist. It's virtually impossible to pick up the requisite discipline and understanding without a mentor and a well-considered curriculum to guide you. You have to grow into it; you get nowhere sitting on the sidelines screaming and hollering like a kid. Get some science cahunas. Go to school or something. Then come and try and tell us what time it is, like some of the scholars and professionals who contribute here have repeatedly told you. You not only can't lick their boots, you can't lick their shoeshine man's boots.

Your post about the moving spaceship strobing a space station is a typical thought experiment except you botched it badly, and the conclusion is utterly ridiculous. If that was offered as rebuttal to TE, you went belly up. It has no relation to MME either, and if that's your claim, you're just spouting BS again.

What's particularly dangerous about the "light sphere" type of problem for a crank such as yourself, is that you guys seem to think the leading edge of a light beam is something observable (i.e. from the space ship). It's not. It's just a another way of casting local time. So it adds nothing to the points you were trying to make, it adds no new information to the problem, it just leaves you back at square 1.

Origin has tried twice to set you straight on the light sphere issue. Here's an animation that adds to what he posted:

http://casa.colorado.edu/~ajsh/sr/paradox.html

If you were actually aspiring to be a "real scientist" as you put it, you would make an effort to explain what the inertial reference frame is, and how the frame-dragging of the the train in the TE slants the spacetime diagram as predicted by the Loretz transform, and to acknowledge that the Lorentz factor is precisely what accounts for the paradox you simply can't believe.

On the left: The spacetime diagram in the frame of the observer on the train.

On the right: The same diagram in the frame of an observer who sees the train moving to the right.

I lifted the above from the Wiki article on Relativity of Simultaneity.

The warping of spacetime is under the Lorentz transformation, identical to a coordinate rotation, rotated at an angle determined by the relative velocity of the train wrto the platform. This is the correct interpretation, not the light sphere example you mangled.

Denial of SR is not being a "real scientist". Studying it and learning what it really means is. The rest is all worthless BS.

 

[Aqueous Id]

The chance of you becoming a scientist is roughly equivalent to the chance that the New York Mets will win the Stanley Cup - twice - in back to back years.

In his world, that kind of thing happens every day - iteratively - since in his world simultaneous events get to happen over and over and over . . .

and he gets to be QM Guru and Supreme Commander of the Universe without so much as lifting a pencil to make sure he hasn't violated causality. He just sits on a throne, with a pile of *hrmph* "books" that are in a secret code that only he can correctly interpret.

After all, to get where he is, you have to suspend the laws of probability along with everything else or else all hell would break loose.

 

[Prof.Layman]

LOL, the introduction of a moving train is just to make the problem a little more difficult....:shrug:

From the interpretations I have read about the MME, the only thing the train does really is make it more difficult.

What makes it even more difficult is that it is attached to the Earth with railing. I think it is easier to think about in free space, but it seems to also make it more difficult since it changes frames.

Think it about it this way, if two ships are in relative motion in space, there is no way to know which one is actually in motion if they both travel at a constant speed relative to each other. So then the station and the train has no meaning really. They could both see two flashes of light created the same distance away from them and they will both reach them at the same time. To say ones motion is significant in one way or another creates paradoxes. The solution to that "paradox" is that they both say that the beams of light are traveling at the same speed when both of them are considered to be in motion or not.

One ships velocity will not change the speed of light coming from the other ship. The velocity is not added. They must use different measurements of space and time in order for them both to measure light traveling at the same speed when they have a relative velocity to each other.

 

[Aqueous Id]

One thing I am not clear about. The thought experiment proposes a simultaneous flash of light at two specific spacetime coordinates.
When the light flashes (simultaneously) does it make a difference if the train is in motion or if there is a train at all?

It makes a difference as to whether the folks in the train will get a different result. If the train is parked there (or gone, they're us standing trackside) they get the same result as the person on the platform, provided they are each located midway from the flashes.

IMO, the relevancy of the train is that it moves the observer (O') who is ON the train, nothing else.

That's the whole point. Since they're in motion, they have left the inertial reference frame where simultaneity was assured.

When the light flashes can this event have momentum? Seems to me a flash is
(a) stationary event at a specific spacetime coordinate.
(b) even in motion, it still occurs at a specific spacetime coordinate and is a stationary event.

Physical momentum? The product of mass of a body times its velocity? I don't see a connection.

Only the observer O' (on the moving train) has a relative movement to the light flashes. But that only creates a frequency shift, no? It does not affect when the light is perceived.

It alters the path length each ray has to travel to reach him since the train bends spacetime.

But allow me a introduce a condition which seems to be missing from all illustrations. No one has paid any attention to the distance each observer is removed from the points of the light flash.

If the train were 200' long, observer O' (in the middle of the train) would be 100' removed from both flashpoints.
However, observer O (by virtue of standing alongside the tracks) would be more than 100' removed from both flashpoints.

It seems reasonable to expect each observer to receive the light flashes at different times (even at SOL).

Keep in mind that there is a plane between the two foci (flash points) in which every point is equidistant from the flashes. Wherever the plane intersects a person's position (forming a line across the platform, down the stairs, across the tracks and cutting through the train) any such location is guaranteed to be equidistant from the flashes -- until:

LOL, the introduction of a moving train is just to make the problem a little more difficult....:shrug:

Yep - until SR kicks in and that plane just got twisted. Take a sheet of paper, hold it perpendicular to the ground and at eye level looking into the edge, now rotate until you can see some girth. The line projected by the paper onto (say a tabletop below) that was orthogonal to you is now slanted. This means that where it cuts across the tracks, the "center of simulaneity" has shifted to some other aisle farther back.

But - herein lies the paradox - it only gets twisted on the train, and only because it's moving, and to a degree that depends on the velocity relative to the platform (and especially as the speed becomes close to c).

 

[brucep]

The chance of you becoming a scientist is roughly equivalent to the chance that the New York Mets will win the Stanley Cup - twice - in back to back years.

I think the Mets have a better chance.

 

[origin]

I think the Mets have a better chance.

LOL, I think you are right...

 

[eram]

I think the Mets have a better chance.

What are the odds that we'll all ignore Prof. in the next few days?

 

[Prof.Layman]

I think the Mets have a better chance.

I think it would be far less of a chance that ignorant trolls stopped ruling what is science on the internet and people that actually knew things about science told other people about it. That is actually something I have read in books written by Ph.D's. Low and behold it was true. You guys don't even let famous Ph.D. writters on the forums, that is why you never see them.

If I ever became a real scientist I wouldn't be caught dead talking to you people. The sad part about it all is that you do not even know what you are doing, the exact opposite of what your trying to do. You guys would gang up on any real scientist saying they are wrong about everything, don't know anything about science. What is a mod to do? Go with the masses? That should be science? The popular vote?

 

[Prof.Layman]

What are the odds that we'll all ignore Prof. in the next few days?

I say that would be slim to none.

 

[eram]

I say that would be slim to none.

Good for you then. Happy trolling.

 

[Prof.Layman]

Good for you then. Happy trolling.

I am sure you all will, I already have a whole gang of troll followers. That can't wait to say something nasty about my post anytime, day or night. You guys been sleeping well?

 

[Aqueous Id]

From the interpretations I have read about the MME, the only thing the train does really is make it more difficult.

Prove MME has anything to do with this topic.

What makes it even more difficult is that it is attached to the Earth with railing. I think it is easier to think about in free space, but it seems to also make it more difficult since it changes frames.

There are two frames. One centered at the platform observer, and the other centered at the center of the train. Nothing you could conjure up is more explicitly clear than that, since the train is moving on the rails. The necessary condition is frame dragging, and the TE introduces it. There is no frame dragging in MME

Think it about it this way, if two ships are in relative motion in space, there is no way to know which one is actually in motion if they both travel at a constant speed relative to each other.

Which is irrelevant to the understanding of simultaneity, since this example is contrary to the conditions of frame dragging plus simultaneous events.

So then the station and the train has no meaning really.

It's essential to the requisite conditions for frame dragging plus simultaneity which you keep ignoring.

They could both see two flashes of light created the same distance away from them and they will both reach them at the same time.

That's an invalid construction of the problem. Frame dragging prohibits shared simultaneity. You keep ignoring this.

To say ones motion is significant in one way or another creates paradoxes.

SR / GR is all about paradoxes. No paradox, you've got the wrong answer. This is your stumbling block.

The solution to that "paradox" is that they both say that the beams of light are traveling at the same speed when both of them are considered to be in motion or not.

The solution is for you to learn what SR/GR reveals about the relativity of spacetime and the necessary paradoxes that result from it, rather than constantly arguing nonsensical unsupported BS.

One ships velocity will not change the speed of light coming from the other ship.

How many hundred times have we established that c is constant in all frames?

The velocity is not added. They must use different measurements of space and time in order for them both to measure light traveling at the same speed when they have a relative velocity to each other.

Or, you're simply stuck at square 1 repeating the same nonsense like a broken record. It's been explained to you umpteen times now that space and time are relative. The path that light must travel bends under SR/GR - space itself bends - and this is precisely why the events are not simultaneous in the center of the train as expected. I've given you the diagram twice and you've been given dozens of reference materials - so when are you going to comply with the site rules and stop trolling this thread?

 

[Prof.Layman]

Prove MME has anything to do with this topic.

Nah, I don't really feel like it. I think I would have a better chance of explaining it to a three year old. If you haven't figured that out by now there is no hope for you yet. I would just be wasting my breath.

 

[Aqueous Id]

I say that would be slim to none.

Keep bucking and you're bound to get busted for repeat posting nonsense.

 

[Aqueous Id]

Nah, I don't really feel like it. I think I would have a better chance of explaining it to a three year old. If you haven't figured that out by now there is no hope for you yet. I would just be wasting my breath.

The rules say you don't get to make that call. When you come in and disrupt a science based conversation with repeat-posting nonsense (MME relates to TE) then you're handing that decision over to the mods.

You are required to back up your bogus claims or back down. So get with the program, bub, and stop being a nuisance.

 

[Prof.Layman]

The rules say you don't get to make that call. When you come in and disrupt a science based conversation with repeat-posting nonsense (MME relates to TE) then you're handing that decision over to the mods.

You are required to back up your bogus claims or back down. So get with the program, bub, and stop being a nuisance.

You asked me what the Michelson-Morley Experiment has to do with the arrival times of beams of light. It has everything to do with it. Do that learning stuff you say you always do all the time. Maybe you should just try working harder at it.

 

[Aqueous Id]

You asked me what the Michelson-Morley Experiment has to do with the arrival times of beams of light. It has everything to do with it. Do that learning stuff you say you always do all the time. Maybe you should just try working harder at it.

No I never said that. I repeatedly asked you to show that MME has any relevance to the train experiment, which involves two reference frames. There is only one reference frame in MME, so it has no bearing whatsoever. It's not a relativisitic situation. There has to be a second observer moving with respect to the inertial frame observer to induce the relativistic conditions.

So no, you are flat wrong, MME has nothing whatsoever to do with this. What you're effectively saying is that the fact of simultaneous arrival of the MME image after splitting the path, which you are calling simultaneous events (which in itself is ludicrous) somehow overturns relativity, which is absurd. Again: You have to have a relativistic two-frame two-observer scenario (i.e. one moving relative to the inertial one) in order to even begin to address what's happening in the train experiment. How many times do I have to say this?

MME means what to you? That a beam of light when split can be brought into interference with its twin? So what? Their expectation was to be able to cause the propagation velocity to change in one of the legs in order to show that there is an aether wind, and it never happened, they got the same result no matter which angle the two legs were arranged. (That's the physical interpretation of MME which you have never been able to state, since you obviously have no clue what it was about and what this thread is about.)

And this is supposed to tell us something intelligent that we can dissect in connection with a the bending of space and time on account of one observer moving at substantial speed through the inertial reference frame?

No. It is not related in any way whatsoever. And posting a link about the MME doesn't get you off the hook. We're all familiar with it since it's been covered in school science classes at least since the Cold War era. You have to drop the moronic nonsense and give it a rest. Give it a rest here and wherever else you're filling up the threads with nonsense.

If you want to have something explained to you, just ask. But stop the parading of your unrelated bogus claims, or at some point the mods are going to put us out of your misery.

On the other hand if you want to behave responsibly, then I suggest you take the examples you were given of the rotation of space time under the Lorentz transformation and do your level best to see if you can explain back to us correctly why the folks in the middle of the train don't see the flashes simultaneously. Otherwise you have little recourse but to continue to flush yourself down the drain.