RE: The past
June 9, 2011 at 11:59 am
(This post was last modified: June 9, 2011 at 12:00 pm by lilphil1989.)
(June 8, 2011 at 11:55 am)Darwinian Wrote: For example, you can 'slow' time down the faster you travel so that a clock on a space ship travelling at say, .5 the speed of light would be running a lot slower than a clock on Earth.
I think you're mixing up Galilean relativity and SR. If I were on the spaceship, I would see the ship clock running normally and the Earth clock running slow. Remember, there is no priveleged reference frame with respect to which motion should be defined.
(June 8, 2011 at 11:55 am)Darwinian Wrote: If you could somehow be on that spaceship but surround yourself with a field of some sort that would allow your mass to remain stable no matter how fast the ship travelled, would you still experience the same rate of time passing as your shipmates?
Yes. Relativistic mass is a superfluous concept, and in my experience of explaining relativity, it tends to be more of a hindrance than a help. Mass doesn't change in motion, only the apparent mass as measured by an observer in motion with respect to the massive object.
To go back to our spaceship idea, if I were to measure my mass on the spaceship travelling at 0.5c (w.r.t Earth), it would be exactly the same as it would be if I were to measure it on Earth.
(June 8, 2011 at 11:55 am)Darwinian Wrote: But is this really time itself that has slowed down or . . . . slowing down cause and effect itself?
Empirically, what is the difference?
Galileo was a man of science oppressed by the irrational and superstitious. Today, he is used by the irrational and superstitious who claim they are being oppressed by science - Mark Crislip
