On Einstein's explanation of the invariance of c

:soapbox:

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

If I defined a rutgruf to be the distance light travels in space in 1 second, the speed of light is 1 r/s, period. You don't need to measure it because I defined a rutgruf by light travel time. You simply need to know the time light travels and you then know the distance light traveled. Are you that thick you can't understand that???

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

When it's nighttime and you can't see anything, how do you land on an aircraft carrier? What if it's moving, like most aircraft carriers are?

But today, distance and time are defined by atomic clocks. These "measure" time at a constant frequency (in fact, that's exactly what a clock is, a constant frequency device of some kind). They also measure distance because clocks have faces with marks on them, all at a constant distance from each other.

If you disagree with this, like you did before with the "clocks measure time, not distance" objection a while back, then you're saying clocks don't have markings on them at a constant distance from each other, and also saying atomic clocks don't have a fixed frequency (equivalent to marks on a clock face at a constant distance from each other).

You're saying the only way to make a clock that has equally spaced marks on its face is to use "light travel time", but that's what atomic clocks do. Your logic is circular, like a clock face with no marks on it--it tells us nothing except "there is this thing called time".

How "simply" do you need to know this? What do you use to measure the time? Wait, it wouldn't be "a clock" would it?

 

Log in or Sign up to hide all adverts.

So a 12" clock's second hand travels 0.62832" per second. A 6" clock's second hand travels 0.31416" per second. Which one measures distance properly?

BTW, they both travel at the rotational velocity of 1 RPM.

 

The marks on the face are a way to measure the distance the second hand travels. The rate is completely irrelevant, the distance between the marks is what's relevant. Distance is independent of the time it takes to "travel". But you know that, right?

 

Oh, wait, I think I have the answer to my own question. You need a 5725600802.1390374331550802139037 meter clock so that the second hand travels 299,792,458 m/s.

Please Register or Log in to view the hidden image!

 

So goddam what? What does that have to do with the distance between 12 o'clock and 3 o'clock on a clock face?

 

You're clueless. Clocks measure time, not distance. How much distance does a digital clock measure?

 

What's the distance between 12:00 and 15:00 on a digital clock? What if I adjust the digital clock to 12:01?

Is 15:00 - 12:01 a constant, independent of the time it takes the digital clock to change the digits?

 

Do you understand what a duration of time is? If you started a stop watch and then stopped it, it would take a duration of time to do that. Do you understand that concept?

 

Do you understand what distance is? If you start to move in one direction, you travel in that direction. If you travel one mile (or to the local newsstand) you can take as long as you like?

Do you understand that concept?

 

Yeah, it's called motion, and every object can be in motion. Motion is measured relative to light travel, do you understand that? Evidently not!

 

When a clock's hands are in motion, do they travel?
Does this motion occur at a fixed rate?

Does an analog clock have marks on it and is the distance between the marks defined relative to light travel?
Does a digital clock have a timebase which is fixed by a crystal oscillator, and does the timebase have a frequency? Is a frequency, of a square or sine wave, composed of wavelengths which all have a constant length?

Are you a moron?

 

If you honestly believe clocks measure distance I have nothing to say to you anymore.

Clocks measure time!

We define the meter by the distance light travels in a specific time. It is moronic to think you take a meter stick and measure the time it takes light to travel the length of the stick. How the heck do you know it's a meter in the first place??? You are talking in circles and you don't even realize it! Get a clue!

 

Yes they do.
But how do they measure time? Apart from having a device that generates a constant timebase, they have to have a constant distance between the marks on their face. Or, they have to have a constant frequency which gives a constant wavelength.

How does anyone "know" the distance or the wavelength is constant?

Is the frequency of light equivalent to a timing mechanism, and is there a constant distance between the wavefronts? If you want to know the frequency do you also need to know the velocity of light--what you keep referring to as "light travel time"?
If you want to know the time it takes for light of a given frequency to travel one metre, do you need to know what the frequency is?

I know these are probably difficult questions for someone with your limited grasp of reality, and you probably can't answer them.

 

Wavelength measured in what units, meters? What is a meter?

A specific duration is just that! Too bad if you have a cheap watch and can't consistently measure the duration accurately! Too bad!!

What is a meter? How is it defined? You are talking in circles again!

Your brain must be spinning because you keep talking in circles. You keep mentioning the meter but you haven't defined it yet. Did you grab a stick and declare that is a meter?

 

MD: you keep rabbiting on about the meter. I don't see anywhere I mentioned that word in my last post.

And like I also mentioned, you probably can't answer the questions. You just aren't all that smart.

Did you grab the idea from somewhere that the speed of light is defined? Aren't you intelligent enough to realise that the word "defined" means "in terms of something"? Are you just too used to going in the same circles, over and over, to understand that the speed of light is defined by distance and time? And so is frequency. You seem desperately unwilling to confront this: a definition requires that what is being defined uses something other than itself.

Just repeating, over and over, "the speed of light is defined" is you going in circles. You can't even discuss what speed is or how it's defined, let alone understand what the phrase you keep repeating like a mantra actually means.

Did you finish high school? Do you seriously believe that anyone else is going to believe you about "Einstein got it wrong"? Are you NUTS?

 

You need to ask yourself how you can measure wavelength in units of meters when you haven't defined the meter yet.

My numbers prove Einstein got it wrong!

When you understand the concept that light always travels in space the same distance in the same time then maybe you will start to understand why we use light to define a meter. Until then, you don't have a clue what I'm talking about.

 

James R, Will you be responding to me about your ship? What do you think the length of the ship is? What do you think the velocity of the ship is? Do you agree with my numbers?

 

You need to understand that you can measure wavelength in terms of wavelength.

Your numbers are just numbers. They don't "prove" anything, except that you don't understand Einstein.

When you understand that nobody can see light traveling in space, you might wake up to your ignorance, but I really doubt it.

No, YOU don't have a clue what you're talking about.