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Author | Topic: Relativity - In Words of Four Letters or Less | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||
Ragged Member (Idle past 3869 days) Posts: 47 From: Purgatory Joined: |
I was looking around the internet to learn about the theory of relativity and I fould this little explanation which might be more accessible to the non-scientific community.
Short Words to Explain Relativity I'm am not sure whether its accurate or not because the source is questionable, so if any of the people in the profession out there (i.e. cavedivier) can take a look at it and make corrections or clarifications that would be real cool. Edited by Ragged, : spelling mistake
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Admin Director Posts: 13136 From: EvC Forum Joined: |
Thread copied here from the Relativity - In Words of Four Letters or Less thread in the Proposed New Topics forum.
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fearandloathing Member (Idle past 4461 days) Posts: 990 From: Burlington, NC, USA Joined: |
The way it is told is confusing to me, Dr. Seuss could ve done better..lol.
I like this one, its not over simplistic but is very clear. I am a plumber who's college is minimal compared to many on here. Machinist, welding, some business, Bio-tech repair is where I started...lol... check this one perkel.com/nerd/relativity.htm Also if you enjoy reading try Stephen Hawking's ' A Brief History Of Time...I read it in high school so its rather old ..1988.. I haven't got his new one but I read a few others of his..wiki him and there is a list of books ..even a kids book him and his daughter wrote. His religious views are interesting as well. Good luck....I was hoping someone elese woulve responded as I am interested in another take on the one you posted about.
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Percy Member Posts: 23135 From: New Hampshire Joined: Member Rating: 5.8 |
I couldn't get through it myself, I didn't have the patience for wading through paragraphs of analogy about something I thought I already knew (can never be certain about that
![]() --Percy
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NoNukes Inactive Member |
I'd label the exercise of using tiny words "cute".
The most off putting part about the explanation was the need to call people things like Ari, Izzy, Herb etc. just to avoid using longer words. If the people were important to understanding the explanation, then using unfamiliar names for those people was at least an impediment to understanding. I didn't see anything obviously wrong, but I found the whole thing quite tedious to read, so I did only skimmed the special relativity stuff, and completely blew off the general relatively stuff. Surely an attempt using ordinary, if somewhat longer words would have been more effective and probably a good deal shorter.
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fearandloathing Member (Idle past 4461 days) Posts: 990 From: Burlington, NC, USA Joined: |
I already posted stuff on here I think dealing with relativity prior to this topic. I Spoke of how traveling at near speed of light affects perceived time of traveler in relation to how time passes for people back on Earth.
I did think the link I posted was easy to understand compared to the other one. I don't think I would try to teach it to anyone without using some reference material though, I feel I have a fair grip on it, but others have done a better job than I could.
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Buzsaw Inactive Member |
I read the whole thing thoughtfully. When I came to the bent straight line episode, it brought to mind some past debates about the properties of space, linking up space to time, ( abe: geometric dimensional to non-geometric) dimensional, so as to render the 3 geometric dimensional universe , as 4 dimensions, 3 geometric and one time.
Edited by Buzsaw, : No reason given. Edited by Buzsaw, : delete off topic phrase BUZSAW B 4 U 2 C Y BUZ SAW. The Immeasurable Present Eternally Extends the Infinite Past And Infinitely Consumes The Eternal Future. |
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Ragged Member (Idle past 3869 days) Posts: 47 From: Purgatory Joined: |
NoNukes writes: I'd label the exercise of using tiny words "cute". The most off putting part about the explanation was the need to call people things like Ari, Izzy, Herb etc. just to avoid using longer words. If the people were important to understanding the explanation, then using unfamiliar names for those people was at least an impediment to understanding. I didn't see anything obviously wrong, but I found the whole thing quite tedious to read, so I did only skimmed the special relativity stuff, and completely blew off the general relatively stuff. Surely an attempt using ordinary, if somewhat longer words would have been more effective and probably a good deal shorter. Thanks for your input as to the "correctness" of it. I actually kinda liked the "cute" aspect of it (which is also the word I'd use to describe it). And the whole Ari and Izzy thing made me chuckle alittle. I think that making it into a 4-word-or-shorter game made it easier to keep up the focus and interest. Not that I'm not interested in it anyway but it was a nice change up from some of the other stuff I read.
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Ragged Member (Idle past 3869 days) Posts: 47 From: Purgatory Joined: |
Percy writes: I couldn't get through it myself, I didn't have the patience for wading through paragraphs of analogy about something I thought I already knew (can never be certain about that ![]() --Percy I do feel like I understand it somewhat better, but there are some parts of it I still don't really understand. If we can't tell who is really "at rest" how would that affect our perception of time? If light always travels at c why would Bert see one rock land before the other? In reference to this paragraph: (once the fact that there is no true "at rest" has been established)
We have Bert and Dana. Take a bus, and put Bert on the bus. The bus goes down the road. Dana, she sits here, on the side of the road. He's in the bus and she's on her ass. And now take a rock off of the moon, and let it fall at them. It hits the air and cuts in two. The two bits burn, and then land just as Bert and Dana are side by side. One hits the dirt up the road a ways, and one hits down the road a ways. Dana sees each rock at the same time, but Bert sees one rock and then sees the next rock. Now: if Bert and Dana both see Dana as the one who is "at rest", they both will say that the two bits came down at the same time. Dana will say, "I am 'at rest', and I saw them both land at the same time, so they both did, in fact, land at the same time." And Bert will say, "I move away from the rock down the road, so when I add that fact in, I can see that if I were 'at rest', I'd have seen both land at the same time. So it must be the case that they did land at the same time." Okay, but what if Bert and Dana now see Bert as the one who is "at rest"? Eh? You get to pick who is "at rest" and who isn't, no? So make Bert be "at rest". Now Bert will say, "I am 'at rest', so the one up the road beat the one down the road, on the way to the dirt, just the way I saw it." And Dana will say, "I saw them land at the same time, but I move away from the rock up the road, so when I add that fact in, I can see that the rock up the road must have beat the one down the road."
And then it goes on to say that if we can't tell if there is one "true" time then we can't know about "true" size and mass. I don't really see how that follows. I'm yet to read fear's link about this too.
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cavediver Member (Idle past 3960 days) Posts: 4129 From: UK Joined: |
I'm am not sure whether its accurate or not... Hmm, neither am I but only because it is too hideous to read ![]() If light always travels at c why would Bert see one rock land before the other? Bert will see the rock in front of the train land first, because he will be nearer that landing spot when the light reaches him. He will see the rock behind him land last as that light has much further to travel to reach him, as he moving away from that landing spot.
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Ragged Member (Idle past 3869 days) Posts: 47 From: Purgatory Joined: |
I'm surprised I am the only one who seems to have liked the four letter word style though....
Also, thanks cavediver. I see why rocks are observed the way the are.
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NoNukes Inactive Member |
Ragged writes: I'm surprised I am the only one who seems to have liked the four letter word style though.... You are looking at a rather small sample.
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slevesque Member (Idle past 4957 days) Posts: 1456 Joined: |
I think it's more that the basic idea is rather flawed.
There's a reason we invented words longer then four letters, and it wasn't to complicate our lifes
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luluxiu ![]() Suspended Member (Idle past 4632 days) Posts: 3 Joined:
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He will be close to the light when he reached the landing point. Behind him the land, the light end, he will see the rock, there are many travel further to reach him, as he moved away from the landing point.
Edited by Adminnemooseus, : Reset signature to reprocessed version.Charming Ladies black leather Platform Shoes and that's really beautiful. |
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