I just put this on BAUT and thought I might as well put it here as well...

Einstein's Special Relativity (SR) was/is/has been supposedly*Unified* with General Relativity (GR).

SO, here is a very simple question that should have been the first question ALL physicists/astronomers asked themselves way back in 1915 (If not even 1905 when SR first came out, accept that SR was then only configured in an *Empty Universe*).

There is ONLY one possible "Real"/Honest answer to this question!

I am going to state the question in the positive so the one and only correct answer is "yes".

I understand this well enough now to show those that answer "Yes" where the problems are and can explain it well enough to show how and where, for lack of a better term, the *Illusion(s)* take place.

For those that insist on using all the normal mainstream *Tactics*, you are the ones that will need to put on your "Thick Skins"!

So, here it goes, and it's sooooooo simple you won't even be able to fathum how this has been "Ignored" for 100+ years. In other words...you don't even realize how "Brainwashed", for lack of a better term, everyone is!

Question: If a spaceship takes off from Earth, flyng directly at the Sun, at very, very, very near lightspeed (I don't care whether it is instantaneously at 'constant' speed/velocity or not), will Earth's orbit remain at the ~93 million miles it has orbitted at for the last ~4.6 billion years?

Hi, Russ...

Why go to all the bother of asking the question if you have already assumed the answer?  Why not just state it rhetorically and then go into your explanation?  The hyperbole you are unnecessarily tossing in advances neither your argument nor your credibility.

So, having said my "little criticism" :-) I am most curious to hear what you have to say about your subject.

Regards,
Mike Petersen

Cosmic rays leave the Sun and travel to earth at very very nearly the speed of light. How is this relatively different to Russ's Rocket going the other way?

Hi Russ,
I think you are on a loser here.
I am a very mainstream physicist. This surprised many at the CCC2 conference. People think that if one doesn't believe in this little tiny bit of physics ie the Big bang, then then one is supposed to disagree with everything.
Well I for one don't.
I am mainstream. All my theoiries are mainstream and supported with mainstream references.
I checked out the BAUTFORUM responses to your thread (no i am not banned! - yet)
As I see it, you are not taking time dilation into account. Yes as the rockets speed approaches 'c' distances shorten. but time lengthens. ergo no problem with your rocket.
If speed of light is a universal constant then time MUST change.
This is the basis of tired light.
If photons lose energy then they cannot slow down, the frequency has to change.

Well, Russ...how goes it at BAUT on this subject?  Is Nereid giving you a hard time?

Nereid is no problem as far as theories go. IMO she never really says anything other than playing the rules and clogging up a thread with endless, meaningless questions.
However, that said, i don't understand why people have a problem with distances changing.
If I take a copper rod and transfer energy to it in my lab, in my reference frame the bar gets longer. But to a copper lyndon (inside the bar) , the rod stays the same and the lab gets shorter. Its called expansion
In Russ's rocket, transfer energy to it and the rocket sees thedistance from earth to Sun to reduce but we see it as the rocket getting shorter.
Its all a case of what you are used to.
Cheers.
happy new year to all.
Lyndon

First, I have been through many very heavy SR threads over the last four years on BAUT and over that time I have finally figured out ALL the 'double speak' and true inconsistencies that make SR "Not Real"
IE: not even wrong.

The whole set up is all fatally flawed, especially the initial part of 'swapping' motions where one observer can be considered at rest and the other in opposite motion.

Einstein set all that up in an "Empty Universe" with NO consideration for distance what-so-ever...A and B can be 1000^1000 light years apart or 10 feet or inches apart...so the "d" in all the equations is meaningless!!!

I suggested that you guys follow this....http://www.bautforum.com/space-astronomy-questions-answers/88698-distances-then-now.html

But got no responses...anyway KenG made a huge point of saying this...

There's no such thing as the distance the light travels. There isn't even such a thing as the time the light travels.

And all I did was to stick to what our "Earth Rest Frame" observer 'sees', and figured out that if I used Super Nova "First Light", say from Andromeda...NONE of the SR stuff he was trying to say worked.

In other words, there were 2 completely "Opposed" 'truths' being portrayed as "Both True"

When we see, from "Earths Rest Frame" the moon at 240 thousand miles, @1.25 seconds light travel time, the Sun at 93 million miles @~8.32 seconds light travel time, Alpha Centauri ~ 4 light years, and Andromeda @ ~ 2.4 million light years........that's ALL that is "Real" and from our rest frame, light DOES have a travel time and distance, And, there is NO 'second observer' to switch off to and compare anything to.

The second observer is the entire problem with SR... period...using hypothetical spaceship observers traveling at Relavistic speeds to determine how our universe is working is more ridiculous than you even know, and now everyone is SOOOOOO brainwashed it isn't even funny.

And now that I have figured this out, ALL of the analogies that are used to try and 'justify SR' are hilarious...

They ALL "Ignore" Gravity or more correctly, the Magnetic Field that holds the Stars in their orbits and the planets in theirs............and guess what....I am NOT an EU or PU advocate, although the EU/Alfven camp is a little correct....they just don't know how to get there.

Lyndon....why would you say this...As I see it, you are not taking time dilation into account. Yes as the rockets speed approaches 'c' distances shorten. but time lengthens. ergo no problem with your rocket.

Especially after using the term...time dilation ??? that's not mainstream.

And this...If speed of light is a universal constant then time MUST change.

is most defintely NOT true...in fact above I just showed you....in "Earth's Rest Frame" light is 186,282.397 miles ps and those times are Constant....that IS the only thing that is "Real"

The speed of light IS Constant, BUT not all observers 'see' light at "c"...

IF, a spaceship is coming straight at us at say .99c, with it's light shining forward, it is right behind the first light you will see from it...........AND who in the hell even as an inkling of what the observers in that ship will 'see'!!!   That is NOT science as it is most certainly NOT testable!

SO quite simply...Velocity, no matter how you define it, is NOT a "Force" and does NOT cause space to shrink or length to contract........I don't know what Poinecare/Lorentz/Einstein were smoking, but it must have been some pretty good stuff...;)

This guy got it exactly right...

Originally Posted by RussT 
-Why would you think that the Earth orbit would be modified by the rocket launch? Please answer the direct question.

I don't think Earth's orbit would be affected/effected by any rocket launched at any speed/velocity up to and including 'infinitely fast'....BUT you do....don't you?

I know earth's orbit would not be affected because I simpy understand that you or anyone else cannot *Ignore Gravity* and think that that rocket is either...

1. pulling earth towards the sun faster and faster the faster it travels....OR
2. causing 'space' in front of the rocket to *Disappear* the faster and faster it travels.

Knowing (and this word has even become nearly impossible to use!!!) that the earth's orbit, has remained the same for nearly 4.6 Billion years, whether it is held in place by a Magnetic Field or a gravitational field, is as close to fact as you can get.

If an alien landed on earth, saying he had just traveled nearly "Instantanesously" to the Sun, would you believe him when he said...

Therefore the distance to the Sun MUST be nearly Zero distance?

Aastrotech said...
I doubt that an alien with the technology to be able to travel "nearly "Instantanesously"" would be foolish enough to claim that the distance would be nearly zero.

and finally, you don't really think your expanding metal analogy is 'real' justification for SR...Do You?

BTW, I have absolutely NO doubt that our Universe(s) is working as an Open Steady State System, with New Galaxies being born on a regualr basis...;) Mini Bangs....there is a T=0 for each and every Galaxy...and that is NOT a 'singularity'!!!

First we 'see' the High Energy Gamma Radiation Event....then that makes the hydrogen/helium that we see as "Your" evenly spaced HI clouds.
http://kencroswell.com/FirstDarkGalaxy.html

Then those turn into BCD's, with first star light in the core....and look...the Nuclear "Bar" hasn't even formed yet!!!...:)
http://www.narrabri.atnf.csiro.au/public/images/ngc2915/

There was NO T=0 for the Universe and SR has "TIme" messed up 9 ways to Sunday......there is NO "Frozen Time" anywhere in our Universe, and Light CANNOT travel from point A to Point B instantaneously....that's a "Singularity" and they don't exist....period

Hi Russ,
Sorry, but can you get to the point?
I don't see yet how Russ's rocket proves the distance between ......
You know what i mean.
In my understanding it is an observational fact that the speed of light is a universal constant independent of velocity of source or observer.
are you disputing this?

If so please tell us why.

If you are not disputing this then please explain how it can happen in Russ's universe - ie that we all measure c the same no matter where we are

Hi Russ,
Sorry, but can you get to the point?
I don't see yet how Russ's rocket proves the distance between ......
You know what i mean.

The question I posed IS the point.

If....you say/think/believe that Earth's orbit will remain the same ~93 million miles radius when a spaceship travels at very near light speed from or close by Earth toward the Sun (Or any other relavistic speed), Then............SR and indeed ALL of Relativity is "Falsified"

IF, you think/believe that a tiny little rocket, traveling at any speed, even including infinite speed, can affect/effect the distance between the Earth and Sun, then you are.............?...smok'in something powerful...in the land of Sci-Fy...crazy/looney OR length contraction/time dilation is just simply not "Real"...;)

It is a very complicated Maths game/illusion...all based on a "Singularity"...Yes, SR IS a 'singularity'....division by zero that they philosophize away.

In my understanding it is an observational fact that the speed of light is a universal constant independent of velocity of source or observer.
are you disputing this?

Yes, most heartily....I just did...;)

Here are a couple of quotes from this thread...
http://www.bautforum.com/astronomy-cast/49011-einsteins-theory-special-relativity-4.html
sorry, I didn't keep the post #'s

Grey said
Tensor's pretty bright. I'd assume that he's aware that it's not really possible to accelerate instantaneously to the speed of light. But his statement gets most of the idea across. A more precise wording might be that if you travel from here to Alpha Centauri, moving at arbitrarily close to the speed of light, the trip will take roughly four years for outside observers, but will be arbitrarily short for the person traveling. Depending on how fast you go, the trip could take a year as measured by the traveler, or a day, or a second, or a nanosecond. Essentially no time as measured by an outside observer, if the traveler is moving quickly enough. And it still scales. If you're traveling fast enough that time dilation means you measure a nanosecond .to go four light years, then it will take you a whole second to travel four billion light years

So, first I never bought into/believed that a ship traveling at 186,282.397 mps could travel 4 Billion light years in 1 second OR, that traveling really fast (Velocity) would cause 'space to disappear' in the direction of travel...and btw, that is not 'time exanding'.

Here are two other quotes from that thread, and I hope you know that Grey is one of the most knowledgable posters on BAUT.

I will show the defining "inconstency" and then show what it means...

Quote:
Originally Posted by RussT
SO, how do they/you justify that light from differing distant sources, even in the frame of the light paths taken, straight line if no massive body curves it, goes from the source to us "Instantaneously"?In other words, the light that is emitted from say Alpha Centauri gets here instantaneously just like the light from a Quasar 13 billion light Yr's away?
So Grey, how have you been able to justify or ignore this?

Grey said
Because it's not true. There is no valid relativistic reference frame in which light gets from any point to any other point instantaneously. In every valid reference frame, light (when traveling through a vacuum) travels at the same finite speed, and so there will be a measurable amount of time between its emission and absorption.

Quote:
Originally Posted by EvilEye
But NOT measurable by the photon's perspective. It is instantaneous for the photon.. not for the person measuring it.I still can't get pastthe fact that time stops at the speed of light. And if c is c, then c is c, and for the photon the trip is instant. It has not aged.

Grey said
I'd disagree, and simply state that the question of how much time passes in the "rest frame of the photon" is not a meaningful one within relativity. In any valid relativistic reference frame, light moves at c, so there's no such thing as the rest frame of a photon. Now, as I said, one can bend relativity a bit, and try to use it to answer the question, "well, what if it were a valid reference frame, how much time would pass?" And it's true that a certain reading of the equations would tell you that no time had passed. But you'd also find that some of the relativistic equations would now include division by zero, so that should be a big clue that you shouldn't take your results too seriously.  It's certainly true that there's no way to measure how much time elapses between emission and absorption for a photon, but that's at least as much because there's no way for a clock of any sort to travel along with a photon as because "no time passes".

It simply cannot be BOTH!

And in the Distance Now VS distance Then Thread, KenG hammered this home umpteen times...

KenG
I will say it one final time: the only "proper time" or "proper distance" that connect the emission and absorption of light are zero. This is an invariant result, which means it is not coordinate dependent, and is true for all observers, including us.

IFFFFFFFFFFFF, the Earth's orbit does NOT change because a tiny spaceship flys from the earth to the sun.....Then.......emmission and absorption of light can NEVER be 0.

I can't make it much simpler than that!

Although that does mean a whole lotta things have to be relearned/retaught...;)

I don't know how meaningful it is to discuss the 'subjective time' (what the quote was calling 'proper time') from the point of view of a photon. The state of a photon obviously changes in less than an infinite amount of observer time, so it would be an infinitesimal proportion of the photon's subjective time. There's nothing well-defined for combining infinities and infinitesimals (∞ × 0) - that doesn't invalidate anything - that just means that you can't use such trickery to claim invalidation.

It's hard to suss out the subjective time as it is, though. Accelerating any mass to light speed would, by the equations, end up with infinite mass. Photons do not have infinite mass, so having them in the same realm with the same meaning is questionable. Would they be zero-mass if they were going less than light speed for reasons other than transmission medium? Would such a particle undergo subjective time dilation when accelerated? Does such a question even make sense?

Besides, without special relativity, you end up being a little stuck for explanations for longer-lived intermediate particles in cosmic ray showers.

General relativity is where I'm personally more willing to entertain alternatives, because it's one of the major sticking points when trying to use quantum principles (quantum is bumpy but general relativity geometry is perfectly smooth), it relegates gravity to geometry when all other forces are fields and the equivalence principle (acceleration is actually the same as gravity instead of being of the same relation) seems more assumed than proven.

Look Russ,
A spaceship going from earth to the sun doesn't change the distance. Its just that we all measure it differently, thats all.
We think it is this much, the spaceship captain thinks it is that much.
Its relative.
You meet a woman. you measure yourself as big she measures you as small.
You think you are young she thinks you are old.
Distances/ time are relative - thats ALL
Who needs a spaceship?
Cosmic rays travel from sun to earth all the time at the speed of light (almost). It doesn't change our distance it changes theirs so either they think the distance is less or time changes for them.
Speed of light is a universal constant - obsrvational fact.
if you don't like einsteins explanation come up with something else.

Look Lyndon...evidently, everyone agrees with you, as no one is jumping in to show that you are simply relying on "Blind Faith" to justify Relativity.

We think it is this much, the spaceship captain thinks it is that much.
Its relative.

Einstein formultaed SR in "Empty Space" and he did so with no consideration of "Gravtiy" OR "Distance"...ie; observer A can be "Infinitely Far" from observer B and they 'supposedly' can still 'sync clocks' (Impossible) and "Flip Flop"/swap motion from one to the other...even IF that motion is horizontal to perpendicular...again "Impossible". OR...simply "Meaningless"!!!

IE: two planes flying in the sky are each flying 'relative to the earth', AND you CANNOT "swap" either Planes motion for that of the Earth/observer!!! BUT have NO relativity to one another in a SR/GR relationship!!!

BUT, let's just stick with Gravity.

That spaceship captain is absolutely "Ignoring Gravity" IF he thinks that the distance from the sun to the the Earth is changing At All because of "His Velocity".

AND, this needs more explanation, BUT the spaceship captain CANNOT measure "Distance" as he cannot 'see' "Time" and "Distance" together...A light Year means NOTHING to him....therefore a "Light Second" is also meaningless to him....SR uses "c" BUT that is not the same "c" at 186,282.397 miles per second that our "Eath Rest Frame" observer uses, that sees the sun sending it's light to us in ~8.32 seconds.

"c" in SR is 0 to near infinity. A Singularity!!!

SO, the "Earth Rest Frame" Observer is NOT equal to the "SR" "Rest frame Observer"!!!

You meet a woman. you measure yourself as big she measures you as small.
You think you are young she thinks you are old.

And, then you even go to "None Moving" analogies to show your "Blind Faith"

And And And, THEN your next post is "Tired Light" "Nullifying" "Time Dilation"...........hummmmmmmmmmmmmmm

Ritchie...this is a pretty good assessment and I will try to respond in more detail later....but, right now I will respond to one part.

Besides, without special relativity, you end up being a little stuck for explanations for longer-lived intermediate particles in cosmic ray showers.

The ONLY "Real" observations that we have are from the "Earth Rest Frame" observers...ie; the ones that 'see'...

When we see, from "Earths Rest Frame" the moon at 240 thousand miles, @1.25 seconds light travel time, the Sun at 93 million miles @~8.32 seconds light travel time, Alpha Centauri ~ 4 light years, and Andromeda @ ~ 2.4 million light years........that's ALL that is "Real" and from our rest frame, light DOES have a travel time and distance...

So, When it comes to "Cosmic Rays" (Which do NOT come from the Sun) hitting earths atmosphere, what does the "Earth Rest Frame" observer 'see/detect'???

The "First" thing detected is...the 'energy' 'seems' to disappear nearly instantly!

That IS Non-Conservation of Energy in an "Open Steady State System"!!!

They then 'switch' to a "SR" rest frame observer, where they can 'swap' one motion for another, they do the SR Maths, and violla...

They have a 'SR Rest Frame Muon' at 'sea level' OR the "Earth has accelerated" up to where the Cosmic Ray lost it's "Energy".

SO, what does that mean? It simply means that Muons DO NOT exist!!!

Same thing with the LHC...colliding protons together just shows that "Energy is NOT Conserved"...they have "Made UP" Quarks...Quarks and all their 'flavors' and 'coulors' do NOT even exist!

The "First" thing detected is...the 'energy' 'seems' to disappear nearly instantly!

Apart from the insane number of quote marks around things, where do your conclusions on this come from? What energy disappearing how?

SO, what does that mean? It simply means that Muons DO NOT exist!!!

Eh? We can produce muons indirectly from hadron collisions, and you can use good old-fashioned cloud chambers to determine that they precipitate clouds and have a distinct set of stable decay products a large part of the time.

Same thing with the LHC...colliding protons together just shows that "Energy is NOT Conserved"...they have "Made UP" Quarks...Quarks and all their 'flavors' and 'coulors' do NOT even exist!

How so? We're accelerating things to high percentages of the speed of light in accelerators, and the MeV of the decay products does increase. We wouldn't bother with the new CERN ring if that were not the case, and people would have noticed it a while before now.

Now, if you want to talk about quarks and flavours and colours, that's a different issue altogether. QED and QCD have their troubles, and even what they produce mathematically could be explained by other means. I liked Brian DuPraw's analogies to regular atomic nuclei for how well it explained what sort of decay products showed up, but I haven't the means to verify that. Personally, I fantasize that neutrinos are at the bottom of it all and particles happen from them absorbing energy near charge centers as opposed to virtual particles, which seemed to me to come from a weird interpretation of Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle - which to me is about measurement, not actual particle existence limitations. I wouldn't place my bets on that either, though :)

It's been a good while since I've seen a good book on particle physics, though - the field seems to have stagnated since the earlier successes of the Standard Model, which did pretty well except on explaining masses.

So what are you on about, anyhow? :)

Here is a new thread on BAUT about muon 'time dilation'...

http://www.bautforum.com/space-astronomy-questions-answers/99000-some-kind-twin-paradox-muons.html

Curantil 
Newbie........Even though he is a newbie obviously knows his Maths, and has the same basic problem I do...

BUT, he has not figured out that "Swapping" one observers motion for another's "Ignores Gravity"/

The Earth simply cannot and does NOT accelerate "UP" to the location of the Cosmic Ray colliding with particles in the upper atmosphere!

And it has nothing to do with KenG's...the muon 'sees' the atmosphere as "Thinner"!!!

Now, if you want to talk about quarks and flavours and colours, that's a different issue altogether.

Yes, I am simply saying that Quarks do NOT even exist....why?

Because you are right when you say this...

Personally, I fantasize that neutrinos are at the bottom of it all

Neutrino's are ALL of Space traveling in ALL directions at "c" and carry all the microwave to Gamma Ray Photon energies.

BUT, let's just stick with Gravity.

That spaceship captain is absolutely "Ignoring Gravity" IF he thinks that the distance from the sun to the the Earth is changing At All because of "His Velocity".

He doesn't think it is 'changing'. His value for the measured distance is different than ours, that's all.

AND, this needs more explanation, BUT the spaceship captain CANNOT measure "Distance" as he cannot 'see' "Time" and "Distance" together...A light Year means NOTHING to him....therefore a "Light Second" is also meaningless to him....SR uses "c" BUT that is not the same "c" at 186,282.397 miles per second that our "Eath Rest Frame" observer uses, that sees the sun sending it's light to us in ~8.32 seconds.

"c" in SR is 0 to near infinity. A Singularity!!!

SO, the "Earth Rest Frame" Observer is NOT equal to the "SR" "Rest frame Observer"!!!

So accepting that 'c' is the same for all observers as per experiment/observation, If i drive my car at the speed of light in the dark and switch my headlights on, will i see anything?

And, then you even go to "None Moving" analogies to show your "Blind Faith"

And And And, THEN your next post is "Tired Light" "Nullifying" "Time Dilation"...........hummmmmmmmmmmmmmm

No. Not true. What i am saying is that there is no evidence for "time dilation" in supernova light curves. What is measured is that the curves are broader AND dimmer.
In the BB these two dependent results are treated independently.
Broader is interpreted as "time dilation" and "dimmer" as acceleration.
In Tired Light I treat them as one effect.
The curves are multicoloured. Some colours travel through a medium faster than others. So, if they all set off at the same time, some wavelengths will arrive before others - the curves are broader.
However, since there are the same number of photons, if the curves are broader the maximum height must be reduced so that the area under them must be the same.
This is known in fibre optics. Send a muticolour pulse down a fibre optic and it broadens and dims so that the area under the curve is constant. It is known as 'pulse broadening and why they use pulses of one wavelength only for commmunication.

It is reproducible in the lab, happens in space.
Tired Light

wow!
Someone from BAUT must read this board.
The universities in the UAE are now able to read the Baut threads.!
Remember in another thread i said i was never banned but the universities where? well they are all back on!!
As per the thread on time dilation, won't last.
One of the ways to measure pace of life (other than counting the number of words per minute people speak) is to get people to close their eyes and open them when they think a minute has passed.
Country folk open their eyes long after the minute has passed, city folk think a minute has gone by after 30 secs.
We do not all measure time equally. It depends on your reference frame. new york or the blue ridge mountains of virginia, we measure it all differently.

re the post on supernova light curves, here is an example.

http://www.iop.org/EJ/article/1538-4357/466/1/L21/5107.pdf?request-id=79b0ae3e-4529-4321-bf37-d8f6ead6a98b

Sounds good

The photometry of SN 1995K extending over about 50 days
provides sufficient data to probe the effect of time dilation on
a clock running at a cosmological distance. We find that
including the time dilation expected from universal expansion
makes SN 1995K comparable to local SN Ia’s and a fair
representative of its class.

So it represents local SIa's

On the other hand, assuming a static universe, SN 1995K
had the slowest photometric evolution of all known SN Ia’s
despite appearing spectroscopically indistinguishable from local events

Spectroscopically indistinguishable. WOW must be true.

BUT....................

It is even less luminous than the mean of local supernovae and would
constitute a unique and peculiar SN Ia

Pulse broadening. tired Light. Area under the curves is constant. Pulse gets wider height gets less
Lyndon

He doesn't think it is 'changing'. His value for the measured distance is different than ours, that's all.

And it doesn't change........at all...because the Sun is keeping it in it's orbit.

When that spaceship, traveling at 186,282.397 mps, get's halfway from the Earth to the Sun the distance from the Sun to the spaceship will be 46.5 million miles and the distance from the spaceship to Earth will be 46.5 million miles.

Even IFFFFFFFFF that captain could fly that spaceship at infinite speed, the Distance would still be 93 million miles from the Earth to the Sun, because that tiny little ship CANNOT affect the Sun/Earth distance relationship!!!

So accepting that 'c' is the same for all observers as per experiment/observation, If i drive my car at the speed of light in the dark and switch my headlights on, will i see anything?

NO. I only accept that light is traveling everywhere at 186,282.397 mps. at a Constant "c".

NOT that all observers will see light traveling at "c"

as per experiment/observation is sheer balony. There is NO experiment that has ever proved this!!!

If i drive my car at the speed of light in the dark and switch my headlights on, will i see anything?

IFFF a car/spaceship is coming straight at you from say 100 light seconds away, and that car/spaceship is traveling at or very nearly at the speed of light, and it turns it's light on at the 100 light second mark, that car/spaceship is "Traveling With That Light" and will hit you right when or very nearly right after that light hits you.

SO, the observer in that ship CANNOT 'see' it's light traveling at "c"!!!

Let me leave you with what I now consider the best example...Super Novae...

Super Nova 1987A from the LMC took ~160,000 years to reach us here on Earth, since the Large Magelanic Cloud is approximately 160 thousand Light Years from Earth, and that is what our Earth Rest Frame observers "Observe".

Now in order for SR to work, it says that light in it's own frame has 0 time and can travel from point A to Point B with 0 time and 0 distance involved, which they then say is "an Invalid Frame"...then they actually "lie" and say they don't use it because it is an invalid frame.....but they really do use it vecause that is the frame that their spaceship is always flying in.......BUT, when you try to pin them down on that they just "Deny Deny DenY".

Anyway...........can you, or anyone else in this forum, honestly say that you believe, that the light from SN 1987A could get from there to here "Instantaneously" under any circumstances what-so-ever???

One of the more interesting aspects of "thought experiments" like this one (travelling along a light beam) is the quantum connection.  You see, we all know that quantum theory has this "spooky action at a distance" thing going on, right?  Well, if indeed a photon of light experiences zero time on its journey, then there really would be no such thing as "spooky action at a distance" because, as far as the photon is concerned (or any other object travelling at 'c'), no time has passed, and so to the photon, the "spooky" action isn't spooky at all, 'cause it all happens all at once.  In other words, the photon is emitted and simultaneously does its "spooky action".  But it's not at a distance.  To the photon, as a result of there being no time, there cannot therefore be any distance.  Yes, we see the photon cross space, but the photon doesn't. 

So, zero time for a photon (or anything else) to travel obviates the "spooky action at  a distance" problem.

Thoughts on this?

Regards,
Mike Petersen

That doesn't help us out all that much on the spooky-action-at-a-distance problem unless we're all traveling on that photon ;)

Photons experience that 'spooky action' at a set point in our own reference frames. Someone might have attempted some relativistic versions by now (quickly-moving apparatus? detectors?) and that may modify things a bit.

There is also the point that the 'spooky action' also affects much slower-moving electrons, which can 'interfere with themselves' going through slits.

It all behaves almost as through there were "possibility waves" that are in constant, instantaneous communication. Bohm's pilot wave theory (why do they never call them hypotheses?!) is like that. There are other possibilities, but they all have to be "non-local" as per Bell's Theorem - hidden variables never panned out.

Wow..........I really don't get it!!!

I tell you guys, or say...The "Only" thing that is "Real" is the "Earth Rest Frame" observers 'seeing' the 'real' time and distance for photons traveling at "c" to the Moon, Sun, Alpha Centauri, LMC, M31...

And then ask you........if you "Honestly" believe that the photons from SN 1987A could have arrived at earth "Instantaneously". which they MUST IF SR is correct, and you...

1. Don't answer the question, and
2. Go on tangents of more "Wild Hypothosizing"

Please....just answer the question yes or no, and then I'll explain what has happened.

RussT -

This is not BAUT, and I don't put up with electronic bullying, so knock it off.  I will "wildly speculate" if I want to, and quite frankly, there is nothing you can do about.  Now stop whining about what YOU want to say.  Relax, and we can have a reasoned discussion, which may or may not include more wild specultations on my part.  It already has some of yours.

Now, having said that, I will answer your question about relativity.  IMO, relativity is a theory that is successful in many of its predictions.  Until someone comes along with a better theory that fits facts more completely than relativity, I will accept it.  Which means, of course, that individual photons do not experience time as we understand it.  My opinion is one of an educated layman.  I cannot defend the point mathematically, only pragmatically, so don't ask.

So, my answer is "Yes."

- Mike Petersen

The "proper time" increments decrease as matter gets accelerated towards c. Taking the limit gives zero.

That said, I'm not sure what the thought experiment of riding on a beam of light would prove, since the equivalent matter taken to the mathematical limit would also have infinite mass.

The photons are obviously not proceeding at an infinite pace from our POV, and "instantaneously" is supposed to be "from the POV of matter moving at c", not from our POV, so I don't know why the manner in which people try to interpret time "from a photon's point of view" given its non-infinite mass is supposed to be any particular basis for falsification of the math or theory of Special Relativity, Russ.

If you have an alternate explanation, then by all means present that, but it should cover all the bases, and I'm going to ask "How do you know that?" :)

Mike, you may relax here in my electronic abode :)

***relaxing***

Ahhh......

well... here's a reply that would surely get me banned from any respectable scientific forum. In my silly view, distance is an expression of the amount and density of stuff between point a and point b (mind you most "stuff" is much smaller than we can perceive and is thus determined not to exist). Time dilation then, is just a contraction of stuff caused by intense velocity of something traveling within it. So, no the distance would not remain the same, but as soon as your vehicle slowed down, the stuff would go back to a more comfortable density and we'd be back at the standard distance.

Of course that suggests that the "standard" distance of the Earth from the Sun is in part determined by the density and net trajectory of photons traveling between them. If the Sun were to suddenly stop emitting photons, would the distance between Earth and Sun increase?

Ed said:

Time dilation then, is just a contraction of stuff caused by intense velocity of something traveling within it. So, no the distance would not remain the same, but as soon as your vehicle slowed down, the stuff would go back to a more comfortable density and we'd be back at the standard distance.

That's not what Special Relativity says, though. It says that there is no privileged frame, and means it. You should be able to run experiments between two objects that are at rest to each other, but going some incredible velocity away from two other objects, and come up with exactly the same results that your 'stationary' objects do.

It could be disproved somehow some day, but it is not trivially false :)

Ed said:

If the Sun were to suddenly stop emitting photons, would the distance between Earth and Sun increase?

How very Zen :)

No, though. Things do not change their distance simply because the ruler has gone away, be it a "zero-time geodesic" or whatever else it is that you are using for measurement.

It would make a fun premise for a novel, though. Imagine how fast you could go underground with the lights out!

..and you could get closer to things by turning on your flashlight, the more powerful, the faster.