The Relativity of Simultaneity

Discussion in 'Physics & Math' started by Motor Daddy, May 12, 2010.

  1. Emil Valued Senior Member

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    Please do not depreciation at person.
    So you explain again and argues with SR?
    You are able to focus on assumptions?
    If it turns out that SR is wrong, how you interpret the experiment "Muon Velocity" ?
    Are you able to take also into account this alternative?
     
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  3. AlphaNumeric Fully ionized Registered Senior Member

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    How am I arguing with SR?

    Yes, I am able to 'focus on assumptions', that is why I discussed how the experiment you link to could be viewed in two different ways and thus why it is important to do a different experiment where we explicitly track the velocity of the muons. When we do that the interpretation they are moving faster than light failed to be a viable explanation.

    In particle accelerators when we push muons to 0.989c relative to the Earth their decay rates slow down in precisely the way observed in the experiment you link to. The collider experiments refute the proposition the muons are moving 6 times faster than light.

    You ask me to consider alternatives but you seem incapable of considering you might be wrong. I've discussed the need for more data to remove other alternatives, you've just asked the same questions again and again, ignoring replies.

    Sorry but that's how you're coming across. I answer your question, addressing your points, and you ask it again. Tach. Funk and I have all answered your questions multiple times and yet you continue to ask. You ask a yes/no question, I answer with a huge size 10 bold italic capitalised 'no' and then you ask again. Why?

    Please explain precisely how we have failed to answer your question.
     
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  5. Emil Valued Senior Member

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    And if it turns out that SR is untrue?
    So the laboratory testing contradict the experiment.
    If you can you give a link for fast muons decay time and slow muons decay time.
    Because the experiment stipulate clear the dates if there would not be SR.
    After that they take into account time dilation, according SR.
    I understand that you are denying the experiment data which are stipulated, if would not be SR.

    Please put the dates of the experiment if would not be SR.
     
    Last edited: Oct 2, 2011
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  7. AlphaNumeric Fully ionized Registered Senior Member

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    It still wouldn't mean the muons move at 6 times the speed of light since we're able to recreate the conditions which produce the muons in controlled conditions.

    No, they are consistent. If they weren't consistent in the eyes of relativity they'd be a disproof of relativity.

    How are you not getting this?

    Your link! I've had to ask you this before, did you read your link? There's stuff after the bit about 6 times the speed of light, there's a discussion about relativity's point of view and how muons decay slower if they move faster.

    Do you know how to scroll down?

    Firstly that isn't coherent. Secondly it isn't a case that if relativity is not exactly true then the muons move at 6 times the speed of light. Relativity, if not exactly true, is very very very close to right in these conditions. A change of at most \(10^{-5}\) is allowed by the neutrino experiments and a change of \(10^{-5}\) in 0.989c is still less than 1c.

    The muon experiment doesn't measure speeds directly, how many times do you need to be told?

    Trust me, you don't understand. I don't deny the experimental data. The experimental data is the muon counts. The implications of the data is model dependent. In SR it means the muons move slower than light. In Galilean mechanics it means they move faster than light. Even if SR is not exact that doesn't make Galilean mechanics true, as we know Galilean mechanics is also not exact. The truth would lie somewhere in the middle (actually much closer to SR).

    Your sentence is not coherent enough for me to be able to answer.
     
  8. Emil Valued Senior Member

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    2,801
    So are just assumptions the different decay time? There is no determination in the laboratory?
    The dates which lead to t=0.596 microseconds and speed V = 2.0x10 ^ 9 m / s.
    Which are these dates, without SR and to which t and V lead us?
     
  9. AlphaNumeric Fully ionized Registered Senior Member

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    6,702
    Yes, the results are dependent on the assumption of how fast the particles decays as a function of their velocities.

    The 'assumption' of different decay rates in special relativity is validated by other experiments. We can produce muons in controlled conditions and watch them decay. They decay faster if they are sitting still.

    The \(v=2\times 10^{9}\)m/s is dependent upon the assumption the decay rates don't change. The v is not directly measured, it is inferred.

    The experiment measures the distance between counters and the muon counts at each counter. To work out t and v then requires you make an assumption about the behaviour of muons. This is why I'm not saying the experiment is faked or anything like that. The distance and the muon counts are valid. The interpretation which leads to t=0.596 microseconds and \(v=2\times 10^{9}\)m/s is not valid.
     
  10. Janus58 Valued Senior Member

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    2,394
    Okay, we can play that game. Let's, just for the sake of argument, assume that the 2e9 meter/sec velocity for the muons is correct and SR does not hold.

    Then we would use KE= mv²/2 to find the kinetic energy of these muons. A muon has a mass of 1.88e-28 kg, so this gives an energy of

    3.76e-10 joules.


    Now let's see what their energy would be if SR holds, and the actually velocity is 0.989c

    The formula for this is

    \(KE = mc^2 \left ( \frac{1}{\sqrt{1- \frac{v^2}{c^2}}} -1 \right )\)

    This works out to being

    9.75e-11 joules or about 1/4 the energy arrived at above.

    This is not something that could have been overlooked or ignored by the experimenters.

    Now if one group of scientists were perplexed by some neutrinos arriving a few nanoseconds early, what do you think would have happened if another group had measured muons having 4 times the kinetic energy predicted?
     
  11. OnlyMe Valued Senior Member

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    Emil, the statement above is one that makes me think that there is some translation issue still involved.

    If we were talking about how fast a car can stop without brakes, that would not be the same as saying the car does not have brakes.

    The muon experiment you are talking about never says SR is not real, it just says if we don't apply SR to the situation this is what it looks like..., then it says and when we do apply SR this is what we discover. That part of the discussion of the experiment is for comparison only not intended as a conclusion or proof. The conclusion and proof is that SR explains the experimental results properly.

    When you translate some of these technical papers some of the subtle differences between languages are not alway easy to see.

    At least I hope that it is an issue of translation, because otherwise your understanding is not in anyway reasonable.
     
  12. Emil Valued Senior Member

    Messages:
    2,801
    So it is an assumption.
    Please give a link.
    I asked from you to give the dates with which we can calculate the speed, disregarding SR.
    What are you doing? You try to prove the assumptions of SR?
     
  13. Tach Banned Banned

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    5,265
    He's being charitable to you in trying to teach you basic physics. Not that anyone will ever succeed.
     
  14. funkstar ratsknuf Valued Senior Member

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    You understand that it's a worked example of how to use special relativity?
    I would hazard a guess that Emil is a native German speaker, judging from the grammar. Also, 'data' (plural) is 'daten' in German, which might be why he keeps asking for 'dates'...
     
  15. AlphaNumeric Fully ionized Registered Senior Member

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    6,702
    What 'it'? Every way of converting the measurements about muon count in that experiment involves making an assumption to do with how muons decay. The speed is model dependent.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Time_dilation_of_moving_particles

    It took 5 seconds on Google. Accelerators include things like muon storage rings, where the muons have to be kept moving very quickly else they decay before the experiment can be done. This is standard equipment and well understood physics. The muons are produced in similar conditions to the atmospheric experiment but they are never seen to move faster than light. Instead they live longer.

    Why are you asking questions you already have the answer to? It's in the link you provided!

    Seriously, is there something going on with the anti-relativity people this week? Both you and Chinglu seem to have some problem where you can't do anything other than repeatedly ask questions you've already had answered.

    He's demonstrating the nonsensical nature of claiming the muons don't experience any time dilation effect.
     
  16. Emil Valued Senior Member

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    2,801
  17. rpenner Fully Wired Valued Senior Member

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    Emil, by proposing abandonment of special relativity, you demonstrate that you have been in a time out since at least 1859.
    By asking for source material for a worked out demonstration of physics, you have been in a time out since at least 1687.

    The success of special relativity does not stand or fall on any one experiment. It's an approximate law of physics that has been very reliable in millions of observations, including some which predate Einstein's birth. It's known to be wrong when gravity is a factor, which is why general relativity which works if gravity is or isn't important has replaced special relativity. The success of special relativity to explain observation in favor of Galilean relativity or Newton's absolute space and time does not allow ever to return to these older ideas, because science doesn't move backwards. Science is progressive because we add to human knowledge and our best theories are the theories that correctly predict the widest range of experimental results -- a target which is necessarily growing.

    Since September, we have a comparison between a predicted time of arrival and a measurement of time of arrival which disagree by some amount. No theory of the past lets this experiment say neutrinos are faster than light and explain all the observations since 1859. So at this point we need to either go down the path of (1) saying the predicted time of arrival was wrong because an important input was neglected, measured wrong or put into the calculation in the wrong way; (2) saying that the measurement of time of arrival was wrong due to statistics which are weaker than advertised or a mistake in synchronization; or (3) creating a radically new physical theory where neutrinos are potentially superluminal and localizable and capable of traveling such distances and at such energies without decay and consistent with every other physical experiment observed.

    But even if choice number three is correct, special relativity remains an excellent approximate law of nature and much better than the ideas that came before it. Science is progressive and understanding special relativity was a step in the direction of progress.
     
  18. Tach Banned Banned

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    5,265
    You are probably right. Nevertheless, his problems are not due to language, they are, as in the case of chinglu, MD, Farsight, Green Destiny,Reiku, Masterov, victorespinoza and a few others, due to basic inability to understand science combined with a deeply rooted hatred for what they cannot understand. They all act as polluting agents for the forum.
     
    Last edited: Oct 3, 2011
  19. billvon Valued Senior Member

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    21,634
    You keep saying this but you are making false assumptions. You can prove easily that the speed of the stream is less than the speed of light.
     
  20. Janus58 Valued Senior Member

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    2,394
    I'm demonstrating that the results of the experiment is not consistent with the conclusion that muons travel faster than light.

    1. If we assume that SR is wrong and the muon travel faster than c, then the energy of those Muon will be 4 time greater than if we assume that SR is correct.
    2. The energy measured for the Muons was the value predicted by SR.( we know that their energy was measured because that is one of the factors used to make sure that its is muons that are being detected.)

    3. Given the above, we have two possible explanations:

    The first, and most likely is, that SR is correct. Not only is the measured energy correct, but the number count is right for the predicted time dilation and corresponds with accelerator experiments done with muons.

    The second, assuming that SR is wrong, means that it cannot be muons that are being detected. The problem is that everything else about the particles point to them being muons( charge, byproducts etc.). There is no other known particle that fits the bill. That would leave us with an unknown particle. However, if its an unknown particle, we don't know what its half-life is.

    Since its the half-life of the particle that determines how fast the particle must travel in order to reach the base of mountain, not knowing the half-life means that we can't calculate its speed either, so we cannot conclude that it travels faster than light.

    So they are either Muons which travel slower than light or unknown particles traveling at an unknown speed. The second case being inconclusive.

    But in no case can we conclude that muons travel faster than light.
     
  21. AlexG Like nailing Jello to a tree Valued Senior Member

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    Emil assumes his conclusions are correct, and ignores anything which says otherwise.
     
  22. Emil Valued Senior Member

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    2,801
    I needed this break. This subforum is exhausting for me. But I came back, you tramps.
    rpenner,Janus58,AlphaNumeric (for the others I haven't bothered to respond),
    I had time and I have prepared a response for each one. With accurate data, criticism addressed to your's circular reasoning, irony and criticism addressed to your's inability to get out of relativistic thinking. (Your mind is so screwed around relativity as a religious.)
    I gave up and put only the conclusion.

    SR was born dead and was kept alive artificially. It will be disconnected from the device.
    Maybe you live in a society with a cult for SR.
    I learned something in university faculty (Polytechnic University, Faculty of Automation) about GR under quantum physics. ( Considered as not worth to learn SR.) I know SR because I was curious.

    Will be set up the absolute reference system, where the light propagates.
    We will find the speed and direction of Earth and other celestial bodies.
    It will opens a new path for astronomy.(Where the directions converge and if there are more points of convergence?)
    What is where the light propagates?
    All these things were held back by the SR and considered as blasphemy.

    If you do not separate SR from GR then GR will suffer.
    But GR will remain. GR is a model, a "tool", an "abstract tool."
    If you feel that this "tool" will be useful in understanding, studying, researching quantum phenomena, nobody can have something against this "tool". This is your business.
    But you can not present the outcome of research the GR.
    You will need to bring concrete results that will be the basis for a new technologies.
    If you will not be able then everything was in vain.
    We will discuss in a year, maximum two.

    p.s. I withdraw and apologize for tramps.
     
  23. AlexG Like nailing Jello to a tree Valued Senior Member

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    4,304
    Assertions with nothing to back them up.

    Worthless.
     

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