STRENGTHS and WEAKNESSES of the THEORY OF RELATIVITY

Discussion in 'Alternative Theories' started by Asexperia, Aug 3, 2012.

  1. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    WHY WEAKNESSES?

    1 - All reference frames are equally valid.

    Relativity is based on observable facts and not in real facts.

    2 - Time is a dimension of space.

    Time is flowing, space is static, the bodies move in it.

    3 - It is possible the time travel.

    Time has only one dimension: from past to future. Never from future to past.

    4 - Gravity is not a force.

    Gravity is one of the fundamental forces.

    5 - The cosmological constant.

    Einstein couldn't prove it.
     
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  3. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    Then the concept of space-time is just that, something abstract with no correlation with reality.

    No, probably not, but it involves that.
    The high speed and gravity affect the motion of clocks, the rhythm of time in those systems of reference.
     
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  5. OnlyMe Valued Senior Member

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    Sibilia,

    I keep getting the impression that you are attempting to argue the merit of the science of physics, from the perspective of the psychology of the human mind. Both subjects I have been interested in over time. And there are situations in the past, even within these forums, where I am sure others would say the same of me.

    It is a mistake!

    While we must certainly always keep in mind the limitations of thought and mind we come to understand, the fact that within the context of psychology, the world we observe is a reconstruction, though for all intents and purposes it "looks" like it is out there before us, while in truth, it is all within our heads so to speak, does not diminish the fact that there is an out there that it is reconstructed from... IOW While our experience of the world could be reduced to an internal holographic recreation of the mind, it still is a recreation of that which lies outside of ourselves.

    Setting aside delusions, halucinations and other disfunctional states of mind, the holographic illusion of the world, we each create from experience and sensory perception, does accurately describe the world around us and in doing so can be trusted as an experience of reality beyond ourselves. If it did not, we would not have survived the real world...

    It seems to me you are mixing disciplines, you seem to be attempting to use the psychology of mind to explain or criticize physics and the physical world. While I do agree, that it is important to remain aware of the psychology of mind that imprisons us all, it is also a mistake to assume, that other than where psychological disfunction is involved, that psychology of mind does lead to an accurate description of reality.

    You began this thread with a title that places the discussion within the context of physics and yet it seems to me your real argument may be one of the psychology of mind. The two are really separate discussions.



    While it is true that there is a certain subjectivity to all of "our" observations, setting aside delusional personalities, what "we" observe must be a close approximation, of the reality of the world, or "we" would not have survived to discuss it. And yes there always remains the potential that there is some part or aspect of what is real, that we cannot observe.

    This is a subjective assessment and one that does not appear to agree with experience. Space cannot be thought of as static. It is a dynamic counter part to the material objects, that we observe within it.

    The geodetic and frame-dragging effects, which have been confirmed, both support the dynamic nature of space. See information of the Gravity Probe B experiment as the latest confirmation, of GR and the dynamic nature of space/space-time.[/quote]

    While we experience gravity as a force, there are some who would agree with you, on this.

    However, all who pose an opinion on the subject overstep the underlying truth, that even within the context of GR, we do not know how space and matter, or even matter and matter interact such that we experience that interaction as a force.

    We feel and measure the effect and call it a force, gravity. But in the end we cannot say how or why.., we can only describe the effect and experience.

    Einstein could not prove most of what was predicted, by his theories of both SR and GR. However, in the years since much of what his theories suggest of the world, has been proven or confirmed. The cosmological constant, is a part of a mathematical model, that functions as a close approximation of experience, within the scope of GR.., and cosmology.



    The universe is out there. Science and physics does a good job of describing it, or at least in describing our experience of it. It is a mistake to believe that, again setting aside aberrant psycholological conditions and disfunctional sensory perception, what we "see" is not the real world.
     
    Last edited: Aug 12, 2012
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  7. OnlyMe Valued Senior Member

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    This is a mistaken interpretation, of what space + time and spacetime, or 3D and 4D geometric models of reality are. They are both descriptions of reality. They just both describe reality from different perspectives. Each has it's advantages.

    The old Newtonian fixed 3D space + time, is far easier for most lay persons to grasp and connect with, it is a natural extension of everyday experience. That said, whether you use a modern relativistic version of 3D space + time or 4D space-time, both are more accurate descriptions of the world than the old Newtonian view.., as soon as you step out of your front door and begin to observe the universe.

    Einstein's space-time, and it is and was not his alone, is a more accurate description of our experience than the Newtonian perspective you seem fixated on. Then again, as long as your actions remain within the confines of your local environment, Newton most certainly provides a functional description, of reality.

    Actually I am not really certain if you are fixated on Newton or just fixated on the concept that all of our experience is an illusion. Either way, it does not reflect accurately a description of the world the rest of us live in.
     
  8. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    No, it's the opposite, spacetime quintessentially defines reality. It just happens to be relative to the inertial reference frame of the observer.

    The word "rhythm" has no meaning in this context. You would do better to use common language. Otherwise you lose clarity. Time is relative. That's about all there is to it. GPS involves fast-moving satellites. 1 ns of error equates to about 1 m of location error in each of the intersecting hyperbolas. The time dilation due to relative velocity of a given satellite can be thousands of ns per day. Therefore, the network calculates for this - using the principles discovered by Einstein and Lorentz. And it works - the system locates you very close to your actual position. Gravity Probe B is another great example. Therefore, relativity is proven beyond a shadow of a doubt. (For non-technical skeptics, of course. Other proofs are sufficient for technically minded folks.) This alone leaves us without any need to worry about "strengths and weaknesses". To search for such would seem to equate to denial of a proven fact of nature.
     
  9. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    Yes, you're right. I use two methods to get my conclusions: intuition and analogical reasoning. Considering the distance, Einstein used the intuition and the method of equations.

    That's correct. We know the effects of gravity, but we don't know its nature. Someone talks about gravitons.
     
  10. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    We think in four dimensions, even representing them mathematically, but space and time are independent (3D + 1D).

    The rhythm is the necessary or casual ordination in the occurrence of events. For thousands of years man had understood that there is a rhythm of time. The man followed the rhythm of time thanks to the Sun (the day always follows night) and the rhythm of the seasons. Another sense of the word rhythm is the speed at which something develops.
     
  11. Aqueous Id flat Earth skeptic Valued Senior Member

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    You seem to be leaning toward explaining the relationship between physical reality and perception. You might want to address this as a topic in biology. Obviously spatial processing was highly evolved before humans emerged.

    I have no idea what this sentence means.

    OK, so seasonal and diurnal variation gave ancient people a way to measure time. And...?

    A better word is tempo, but neither term has anything to do with the passage of time, or of relativity.
     
  12. rpenner Fully Wired Valued Senior Member

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    Einstein used the language of equations to talk about the geometry of space-time. Ultimately, what General Relativity says is that there is a geometric object at every point of space and time that describes aspects of the curvature of space and time at that point, and that this geometric object is proportional to a separate geometric object that describes the density of matter, energy and momentum at that point. But curvature of space-time leads to the self-consistent appearance of forces.

    Tension between your objections 1 and 4 exists because if physics is "limited" by what we can observe, then the theory that describes the "appearance of force" is indistinguishable from theory that describes an identical "actual force". But if they aren't identical, actual physics requires us to prefer the one that more closely matches observation and experiment. Thus it is your claim that the "fictitious force" of terrestrial gravity contradicts some authoritarian dogma of "four fundamental forces" that is not properly part of physics. Physics does not rely on authoritarian statements -- rather its authority flows from its comprehensive agreement with the totality of human observation. If some pop physics writer wants to enumerate gravity as a fundamental force, he probably not writing for an audience versed in differential geometry and Bianchi identities and it has zero impact on whether General Relativity is the best model of gravity known to mankind.
     
  13. AlphaNumeric Fully ionized Registered Senior Member

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    6,702
    Observable facts ARE real facts. Reality is real. Observations of reality therefore are facts. Relativity has more agreement with facts than any other known model of gravity.

    Relativity doesn't say time is a dimension of space. I've already corrected you on this. If you're unwilling or unable to accept correction then you just demonstrate no one should give a damn what you think.

    Unjustified assertion.

    Gravity is a force in relativity, it just takes on a different formulation than people familiar with Newtonian mechanics might typically use.

    You can never prove something about the real world using a model, at all. Besides, if Einstein had stuck to his guns and said "I really think there's a cosmological constant, according to my work" he'd have predicted it decades before it was observed. It was only the lack of experimental data which astronomers were working with which lead him to retract his initial hypothesis about the cosmological constant. .

    Experiments suggest otherwise. Motion through one affects motion through the other.

    And for thousands of years Man thought thunderstorms were the gods being angry or that slavery was okay. Science moves on, develops new understanding as new evidence and data is gathered. Saying "In the past....." isn't a good way to argue a scientific position.

    All concepts are abstract, since by definition they are conceptual. However, the structure within the concept of general relativity's space-time leads to statements about the structure of the observable universe which are accurate and reliable. Clearly viewing gravity in terms of space-time is a useful point of view.

    Speak for yourself. Mathematicians regularly work in all kinds of dimensions. Mathematicians and physicists regularly work with systems which have hundreds of dimensions. These dimensions aren't space-time dimensions but their formalisation is very similar. For example, in string theory 6 dimensional spaces are regularly considered. A given 6 dimensional space might have a moduli space (space of parametrisations of deformations preserving particular structures) with more than 100 dimensions. Anyone who has ever done a Fourier series is actually working with an infinite dimensional space which they are truncating at some finite dimension. The ability to consider all sorts of weird and wonderful constructs is what makes mathematics such a powerful tool for physics.

    Whereas you're just using your intuition. Einstein kept up to date with the latest models and experiments, working closely with many of the people doing such things. As such even his intuition was developed in a way a layperson's would not. You have no experience with gravitational phenomena, you've never looked at any observation data nor examined the models developed to describe such things. So why are you allowed to make blanket assertions on things you have zero knowledge/experience of while Einstein taking more than a decade, working along side the great mathematicians and physicists of the day, to carefully develop a mathematically sound descriptive and predictive tool for gravitational phenomena not allowed?
     
  14. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    It's broken the pencil?
    NO, that's an observable fact. It's not real, but perceptible.

    Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!



    OK, I rectify what I wrote.

    Interesting everything else, I've updated a lot.
     
  15. Crunchy Cat F-in' *meow* baby!!! Valued Senior Member

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    I don't know anyone whom would interpret that as a broken pencil. An observable fact is there something that looks like a pencil in a glass with water. Another observable fact is that water refracts light.
     
  16. rpenner Fully Wired Valued Senior Member

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    The fact is you have an image made from light arriving nearly at the same time at recording device.

    Interpreting the facts isn't being done in a vacuum -- interpretation should be made in consideration of all the information and all human knowledge. Just because someone's untutored intuition interprets the photo in a manner inconsistent with reality doesn't mean that observation doesn't reflect reality -- it means that someone needs more education about the nature of reality.

    Visible in the image are a meniscus of a boundary and a caustic network of some (diffuse) light source in the shadow to the left of the glass. This strongly and independently supports the working hypothesis that there are three transparent substances of different refractive indices in this image. Also visible are two breaks (one at the menicus and one at the edge of the glass) in the straight lines of the brown object which may be some sort of wooden object, perhaps a pencil. In light of the obvious refraction effects, the informed observer will strongly favor the hypothesis that there is exactly one convex brown object in the image.
     
  17. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    THE ORIGIN OF THE CONCEPT SPACE-TIME

    I don't want to sound pretentious, I just want to show my humble opinion.

    The general relativity (1916) states that gravity and space are equivalent, that is, Einstein reduces the space to gravity. This is like saying that a liquid in a container is the container itself. But first, in special relativity (1905), Einstein had equated time as a dimension. Hence the concept of space-time. If time is a dimension, and space is gravity, the gravity modifies both time and distance.

    ABOUT THE IMAGE
    I express with the image is that an illusory fact may be perceptible, but not for this is real. You've explained an observable fact, it can be said relative.
    Another example is the illusory sensation that everything revolves around us when we take many turns. This is perceptible, but not real.
    Senses deceive us sometimes.
     
  18. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    COMMON RELATIVITY

    Common relativity is intrinsic or characteristic to clocks and rhythmic phenomena. It's common because it doesn't require high-speed or gravity to manifest.

    1 - The types of becoming are: natural and artificial. Both types can be: uniform or regular rhythm and variable or irregular rhythm.

    2 - Cycles are periodic phenomena that repeat continuously (day and night, seasons).

    3 - For measuring time it requires a high precision clock. Currently, atomic clocks are the most precision.

    4 - The calculation of elapsed time is an application of common relativity.

    [video=youtube;LafAMJ4TTJw]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LafAMJ4TTJw[/video]
     
  19. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    An observer with two watches (R1 and R2) takes a journey from place X (leaves at 9:00 AM) to place Y in 6 hours. If R1 goes to one sec per sec and R2 goes to 1.1 sec per second, what time will mark the clocks?

    Solution:
    1 - As the journey takes 6 hours and leaves at 9:00, and 9 + 6 = 15, which is 3:00 PM. This time is R1.

    2 - As 6 hours = 21600 sec and 21600 x 1.1 = 23760 sec. Subtract from 23760 to 21600 = 2160 sec. 2160 / 60 = 36 min. R2 will mark R1 + 36min, which is 3:36 PM.
     
  20. origin Heading towards oblivion Valued Senior Member

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    Sure, or 1.1 X 6 = 6.6 hours or 6 hours and 36 min. What is your point?
     
  21. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    My point is that common relativity refers to the difference in the rhythm of the processes. We can obtain different times (time) according to the rhythm of the clocks.
     
  22. origin Heading towards oblivion Valued Senior Member

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    Gee that is really amazing, if one clock runs faster than another clock the times won't match. A broken clock will read the same as a working clock 2 times a day - astounding isn't it?
     
  23. Asexperia Valued Senior Member

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    Mr origin:
    An advice, don't write for writing, analyze well what you're going to put in the forums first.
    Not too wise.
     

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