A Logical Analysis of Albert Einstein\'s Mirror-Light-Clock Gedankin by Robt Curtis Youngs

Hi Robt,

I first just noticed you writing Gedankin instead of Gedanken. Then I was bewildered by the 'Voight-Einstein "Galilean Transform" diagram' not just because you also misspelled Voigt. When Einstein suggested to explain the photoelectric effect by photons, he at best reinvented Newton's corpuscular theory of light, etc. I am certainly not the first one to tell you such striking imperfections in what you are uttering.

You might check to what extent your "cogent ideas" agree with what I found out. I got the opportunity to use English when I was already fifty years old. That's why I had to look into my dictionary what cogent means: almost the same as convincing. Admittedly, your final questions are not yet convincing to me.

May I tell you that length contraction and time dilution were not fabricated by Einstein himself but by FitzGerald, Lorentz and others who aimed to rescue the idea of an aether after the experiment by Michelson and Morley (MMX) seemed to disprove it. Some authors argue that the MMX did not disprove the aether. I maintain that Fig. 5 of my essay for the first time cogently explains why.

Eckard

It looks to me as if you can have Voigt either way. See Wikipedia: Voigt.

Your criticism: "When Einstein suggested to explain the photoelectric effect by photons, he at best reinvented Newton's corpuscular theory of light, etc" is just what I said in your own words. Albert named them "photons." I get the sense that you are quite adversarial. Imperfections? Gnats!

I have found "gedanken" spelled either way also. I thought I had my "speller" trained to your "approved" spelling; I just can't depend upon my tail gunner!

I am proud that you "got" the opportunity to use your English! I too, am aware that cogent is a synonym for "convincing."

My questions are questions. I am looking for cogent answers as to why my method is faulty. You have not provided any convincing answers.

Your figure 5 is fine for a medium that moves the path of waves. Where is your evidence that the aether can blow the rectilinear path of light around? BTW, the method I propose works with a medium that can affect the path of radiation, if such exists.

Yes, Albert's predecessors sensed that things seem "compressed" in a "moving frame." Nether they nor Voight and Einstein saw the expansion factor revealed in my diagrams WRT the oncoming, or decreasing distance detector/emitter situation.

In his "Measuring the Moving Train from the Platform" Gedankin, (paraphrased) Albert postulates why the train should be shorter (contracted) than the same train measured at rest with the platform.: As the train approaches the platform, a technician marks the platform exactly when the front of the train reaches him, and simultaneously signals another technician at the the receding end of the platform to mark the back end of the train. Since the train keeps moving while the signal propagates to the rear, the train has moved forward by the time the rear technician makes the mark on the platform, making the measurement contracted.

Now, by measuring the train from back to front, and having the rear technician send the signal forward, the same basic experiment measures the moving train longer than at rest! So the length of the moving train depends upon whether the initial measurement is at the back or the front. His "Measure the train Gedanken" is slight of hand, IMHO.

Good luck with your essay, and I stand corrected to the Eckard Method!

You state: "Then I was bewildered by the 'Voight-Einstein 'Galilean Transform' diagram . . ."

So am I! The diagram is not "mine." It is a representative example of how consensus Physicists draw the "Galilean Transform!" Everyone seems confused as to where and to which reference frame the point "p" is to be associated. In fact at Wiki, they leave the point entirely out of the diagram! This is the whole idea as to why I incorporated it in the essay.

Incidentally, they are transforming the emitter, rather than the finite traveling radiation. The emitter must really be elastic to be both moving and at rest with the at rest coordinate system!

Thanks, your comment helps make my point.

That resource list should be very long, but the length of the essay prevented inclusion of everyone. Your experiments confirm my understanding that light has the nature of waves. If your experiments were to be replicated by a university or such, millions of dollars would undoubtedly be spent! True genius there, my friend.

Curt,

"Where is your evidence that the aether ... ?" My explanation of the experiment by Feist seems to be the only reasonable. Calling Feist a crank, as did Bruhn, is pointless. The same reasoning which I used in case of Feist's experiment turns out correct for electromagnetic waves too while Potier's calculation was based on wrong assumptions. This concerns a pillar of modern physics.

Eckard

Nowhere in my article or posts did I call anyone a crank. Please do not put words into my mouth. It is distasteful. In the "at rest with the source reference frame," radiation leaves the emitter at the recognized speed of light for the medium, (in vacuo being the fastest.) in all directions unless focused or produced as a beam, as a laser produces. The beam still diverges. This makes the radiation pattern spherical in the "at rest with the source frame of reference."

The late Brian Wallace, In his book, "The Farce of Physics," re-analyzed the returns from radar ranging of the planets done by JPL. He found that the evidence points to the return's light speed needing to be "c plus or minus the speed of the detectors; in the relativistic sense," for the returns to make sense. He, like you and your friends, believe this forces the evidence to be particulate. Microwave energy is just borderline particulate in nature, so be careful in making adamant pronouncements in that respect. My analysis shows that whether radiation is thought to be waves or particles doesn't matter, the graphs work out the same (though the positions of the "moving frame" detectors would be different.)

The MM experiment was not about "light speed." It was about whether the aether causes this spherical radiation pattern to distort. The source for the interferometer was mounted right on the interferometer, for crying out loud. Dayton Miller, along with others did find distortion in the interferometer interference pattern. His findings would distort the spherical form of the radiated pattern. It does not affect my analysis.

The physicists from ancient to the present think it is the light waves, particles, and/or "space/time," that bunch up, contract, or compress when "motion" enters the picture. It is not. It is merely the position of the detectors in the "moving reference frame" that bunch up, with respect to their own reference frame, as compared to the positions of the "at rest with the source" reference frame's detectors in their own frame. Furthermore, no one has analyzed the approaching detector's positions in the same "moving reference frame.," the positions of which actually expand; as compared to those in the "at rest with the source" reference frame.

In the "Mirror Light Clock Gedanken," the same set of "source reference frame" detectors get to detect the light pulse each time the pulse bounces back and forth between the mirrors. In any "moving reference frame," each detector only gets one fleeting chance to detect the pulse, and only if it coincides with the position of an "at rest with the source" detector that is momentarily detecting the same pulse.

If the medium's motion affects the shape of the radiated pattern of the radiation, that happens in the "at rest with the source" reference frame. It has no effect upon where the "moving frame" detectors find the pulse and the coincident "source frame detectors."

See Eric Reiter's essay posted here on FQXI, as to the wave nature of EMR . . .

Eckard, my friend, for all the criticism you laid on me, (which I take to be constructive criticism, BTW) how come you missed calling me out on the misuse of the word "antecedent" at the end of the third paragraph of my essay?

The word(s) should have been "post emission." You remember when Einstein, or was it Voigt? proposed the Galilean Transform, the two coordinate systems coincided, right when the event took place? Rather than "transform" the event (at point p) into the opposite reference frame, I placed an observer in the opposite frame from where the event took place, (the event being the firing of a light pulse.) Now, since the two coordinate systems are separating, after the event, the observer/detector and the source/laser emitter have been separating. The point in the opposite reference frame from the laser, which coincided with the laser when the two coordinate system origins coincided, just marks the place in the "moving coordinate system" where the laser and the initial observer/detector were simultaneously existing when the laser pulse came into existence. That particular observer/detector will never have another chance to see the laser pulse again. (unless the event was recorded)

All the best to you,

Curt

Curt,

We have spent a full century now, arguing over the observations given to us by an imaginary space traveler, who moves at relativist speeds, and much like a crooked politician running for re-election, will tell you virtually any far-fetched tale - truthful or not; but most often not.

Personally, I've become increasingly skeptical of all "hypothetical observations" made by imaginary observers. In his book, Science at the Crossroads, Herbert Dingle wrote the following:

"All science is based on observation, and whatever we say about the world studied in science must justify itself ultimately in terms of what we actually observe, not of what we infer that hypothetical observers would experience in circumstances impossible yet to attain. Now effectively, in all matters with which special relativity is concerned, there is only one observer - a terrestrial one - for the relative motions possible to terrestrial observers are so small as to be negligible in this connection. Hence the theory must be wholly expressible in terms of the experiences of that one observer alone."

If nothing else your essay and theory restores some much needed sanity to the topic of time dilation and twins that age at different rates. It's a good essay, and I am delighted to see a new, well thought out theory that is at odds with Einstein's incredulous, outlandish ideas. Well done!

Evans

Dear Robt Curtis Youngs,

I would like to see relativists debate some of the content of your essay. I have not found any use for Einstein's, or his supporter's, visual aids. They are not needed to explain or account for relativity type effects nor for deriving the correct equations necessary for properly modeling those effects. Now, that is my opinion. I think though that your approach has more opportunity to draw serious debate. I hope it happens. Your arguments deserve to be evaluated.

James

Thank you "Evans" for your favorable comment, and confidence in my efforts. Herbert Dingle is one of my heroes. He did get caught up in Einstein's clocks and latex space assumptions. I had been working on what shape the expanding light sphere, that forms isotropically around the emitter of a light pulse in the primary "at rest with the source" reference frame, becomes in various "moving" reference frames. At some point, I realized that the light pulse can only be detected when it gets to the detector. This realization necessitates multiple detectors in every reference frame, enabling their distances from the origins of their respective frames to be plotted. This is something Dingle had overlooked with his "one observer" idea.

I have constructed how the spherically expanding wave front of the light pulse appears in various moving frames (yes they appear spherical in the moving frames too) but the inspiration for using Einstein's "Light Clock Gedankin" to demonstrate the patterns of detectors approaching and receding from the emitter, while traveling at various speeds and angles of approach, came from "Siggy_G." He insisted that the location of the pulse be determined.

I had visualized the zigzag pattern they take in the transversely moving frame, but was surprised at the pattern in the rectilinearly moving frame. I had expected the "compressed" locations of detectors to be in the approaching the emitter side of the moving frame, and the "expanded" locations to be on the receding side. I have never found mention of the expanded part of the diagram. Why would that be?

Curt,

I have four entries in each of the four essay contests here. Each one disputes relativity theory. The beginning of my approach is presented in my current essay. It is completely different. I have been working on this project since 1988. On the Internet since 2001. My website is and has been, since 2001, number one on search engines for 'New Physics Theory'. There is extensive work presented there.

Now back to your essay which is my main point in posting my message. I don't think that your essay belongs so near the bottom without successful refutation by relativists. I don't have a role to play in evaluating relativity's visual aids. As I sort of mentioned here I have found no point to them. For me relativity theory has always been clearly wrong.

I am not discounting relativity type effects. Empirical facts are the beauty. Theory is the beast. I remove theory as much as possible from the equations of physics that would otherwise accurately represent the patterns and meanings offerred to us by empirical evidence. I do not ask that you go along with my view. It is your view that is the subject of your forum and I found it interesting and worthy of serious discussion by relativists. I would like to see how well your view holds up.

James

As your diagrams clearly demonstrate, nothing out of the ordinary is happening. Both sets of detectors (straight and diagonal) are essentially recording the same exact thing. If you turned your diagram into an animation it would show that the diagonal detectors are one-after-another moving into the same location, at the same time, as the stationary detectors. Nothing unusual occurs.

The confusion sets in when we ignore what the detectors are telling us, and try to predict what a moving observer will actually see; the former is actual data, the latter imaginary data.

Many years ago I read a book by Paul Davies titled 'Superforce'. I no longer have it, but, I feel certain that it was the one in which he referred to Herbert Dingle in a disdainful manner. Taking into consideration what Dingle was reported to have said and Davies' book allong with its revelations that 'nothing is unstable' or that we were possibly 'glimpsing' the superforce nonsense, my opinion of Davies dropped hard. My point is that Davies used the same artificially superiorly projected 'rational' attitude of relativists that continues to this day. Relativity theory is not rational. It is theory. It is interpretation. It includes dependence upon invented and empirically unjustifiable properties. An example is space-time.

James

Evans replied on Sep. 20, 2012 @ 02:50 GMT

As your diagrams clearly demonstrate, nothing out of the ordinary is happening. Both sets of detectors (straight and diagonal) are essentially recording the same exact thing. If you turned your diagram into an animation it would show that the diagonal detectors are one-after-another moving into the same location, at the same time, as the stationary detectors. Nothing unusual occurs.

The confusion sets in when we ignore what the detectors are telling us, and try to predict what a moving observer will actually see; the former is actual data, the latter imaginary data.

>>>>

Yes, exactly! I had been putting off "publishing" this revelation of mine until I had learned how to use Gimp or Blender, or such animation software. I just haven't become adept with any of them. An animation would cinch the understand for many. It's just near impossible to put a three dimension dynamic situation onto a piece of paper. My essay seems to be opening people's minds, though.

Do you agree with me that once this idea sinks into your mind, Einstein's space-time becomes sophomoric? Can you go back to thinking space-time becomes skewed by moving real fast, if you ever did?

Curt,

As one reviewer noted, relativists are nowhere to be found on this thread. You appear to be drawing a strictly anti-Special Relativity audience. So how do you defend an essay that has yet to be attacked? You need a foil in order to argue the merits of your theory. With that said let me assume the role of Devil's advocate and posit this glaring flaw in your theory, from a typical relativist point of view (but not my own personal viewpoint).

The diagonal arranged detectors will not coincide with the stationary detectors, as depicted in the diagram. The light pulse will only hit the stationary detectors, and miss the diagonal detectors entirely. The diagram shown is a strictly Newtonian depiction of the situation. The diagonal detectors must be pre-arranged into an array that takes into account the Lorentz factor, which is mysteriously absent. You need to redraw the diagrams to reflect the anticipated length contraction and time dilation. Otherwise, you will only receive one set of data -- the data from the stationary array.

Evans

Ha! God Bless you, my "relativist" friend! Exactly the argument I have faced all along!

In the Voigt transform, no skewing and no foreshortening take place. The reference frames separate without Einstein's prevarications. Initially, "x" is the position of the emitter in both frames when three things are true. Both frame origins are coincident, "x" appears at the exact same place in both frames, and thirdly the emitter at "x" emits the laser pulse. His very next step is (x-vt). I have shown that (x-vt) is the new, supposed location of the emitter in the "stationary frame." This is impossible. The emitter cannot be in two places at once. (x-vt) is merely the new position in the stationary frame where the phantom of the emitter would momentarily appear after the moving frame traveled the distance "vt". In short, (x-vt) is not the position of the pulse of light, it is the position of the emitter after releasing the pulse to light at "t" (in the stationary reference frame.)

So, my Consensus Relativist friend, why is the post emission position of the emitter in the frame opposite the emitter frame important? I thought the "Theory of Special Relativity" was about the finite speed of light. The "at rest with the emitter" reference frame" (the ARWTERF) is usually depicted as the "moving frame" in most drawings of the Voigt Transform. Where in the ARWTERF is the finite speed of light considered? Before assuming what happens in a relativistically moving reference frame, as viewed from a different reference frame, shouldn't the finite speed of light be analyzed directly from the source in the source reference frame?

Then, my Consensus Relativist friend, does Einstein's "relativity of simultaneity" say that a detector in motion with another detector cannot be momentarily at the same place as the other detector? No!

Does the "relativity of simultaneity" say that a third object, in motion with both aforementioned objects cannot be momentarily at the same place as the other two? No! (the third "object" being the light pulse)

My Consensus Relativist friend, your demand that the "moving frame" (which ever one you choose the be the "moving frame," since Einstein insists there is no difference which is "moving,") be skewed or foreshortened, before determining where the detectors in said reference frame will be located, is circular reasoning. Circular reasoning is one of the famous Logical Fallacies. Einstein and you are not immune to said Logical Fallacy.

Thank you, Evan, for being the straight man! Do you think a "Consensus Relativist" would be convinced?

Why would this essay gain high points from the rest of the entrants, when, if my reasoning is sound, it makes those entrant's whose essays discuss anything to do with Einstein's theories moot?

I and my essay are double damned to obscurity!

Hi Curt.

It seems to me you have confused the two frames of reference in Einsteins gedanken light clock and made it more complicated than it really is. A very strong argument for Einsteins light clock is that it works in real life. For example when an atom clock looses i few microseconds after going around the world in a jet aircraft.

The thing that you have got right is that no one has ever seen a photonic particle. Only the effects of its absorption. That fact seems to be overlooked by many physiscists.

Have ze najs day!

Andreas Bøe,

Thanks for taking the time to respond. Now, I need for you to supply the details of which two reference frames I have confused! Since I think I have it right, I have no idea what you think is wrong. Please let me know, otherwise I'll remain ignorant. That is a condition that I wish to avoid!

Curt

Andreas wrote: "It seems to me you have confused the two frames of reference in Einsteins gedanken light clock and made it more complicated than it really is. A very strong argument for Einsteins light clock is that it works in real life. For example when an atom clock looses i few microseconds after going around the world in a jet aircraft.

The thing that you have got right is that no one has ever seen a photonic particle. Only the effects of its absorption. That fact seems to be overlooked by many physiscists.

Have ze najs day!"

>>>>>>>>>>>>

Andreas,

Please explain to me how not needing a fourth axis (that has to duplicate one of the existing three axes in the Cartesian coordinate system) "is more complicated?" My charts demonstrate that the zigzag and expansion compression appearance is not physical shape-shifting of matter or space, just where actual positions of detectors that have detected the pulse end up in relation to the origins of their respective coordinate systems

I'm sorry Andreas, but Einstein is not here to defend "the two frames of reference" to which you refer so I have no idea what you are thinking on this account. You have to defend for him. Reference frames are merely a system of keeping track of all the objects that are going the same speed, in the same direction. The objects within inertial reference frames are not subject to acceleration. In other words, all the objects within an inertial reference frame are at rest with each other. (the whole reference frame, and all the objects therein, move as one unit; with respect to some other reference frame.)

The emission of the light pulse is the primary event, the one indicated by "point p" in the Voigt Transform diagram. That "event" happens at the emission end of the laser. From there the light pulse moves rectilinearly away from the laser, along its extended axis. After the emission, the whole story is just about detection. Once the pulse is emitted, everything is about detection, and where the detectors are when they detect the pulse. What prevents a moving detector from being momentarily very close to the position of a "stationary with the source" detector when both detect the light pulse?

Einstein's "relativity of simultaneity" is contrived because he imagined the diagonal going "photon" before determining where detectors would find the light pulse.

No detector can detect the pulse, unless the detector is in the line of the beam, and the right distance from the source at the time the pulse reaches the detector. Stationary detectors can detect the pulse as many times as it passes each one of them in bouncing back and forth.

Moving detectors, all moving as a fleet, like airplanes flying along "in formation," will only have one chance to detect the pulse, and that is when the "lucky" detectors that happen to be in the line of the pulse for a moment, also happen to be there when the pulse is there too.

For Einstein's diagonal going "photon" to defy physics and travel diagonally, in a nonphysical "reference frame," he (and you) need to explain how an infinite number of them must exist for all the reference frames full of detectors that maybe moving at who knows how many speeds, and at what ever angles to the light pulse and its emitter, simultaneously.

I show that he is mistaken.

H &K tests prove nothing:

The Hafele Keating experiment to which you refer was just a bunch of cherry picked "data." The noise in the variability of the atomic clocks far exceeded any useful readings of "time" that could be used to show the conclusions they published.

Quote from article:

"The H & K tests prove nothing. The accuracy of the clocks would need to be two orders of magnitude better to give confidence in the results. The actual test results, which were not published, were changed by H & K, [and] give the impression that they confirm the theory. Only one clock (447) had a fairly steady performance over the whole test period; taking its results gives no difference for the Eastward and the Westward tests."

So, you see, the The Hafele Keating experiment does not live up to the advertising!

Looking forward to your answer, have a nice day,

Curt