Evicting Einstein

NASA ^ | 3/26/04 | Patrick L. Barry

[LiteKeeper]

BLEACHER BUMP - WV - SCIENCE / PHILOSOPHY - Nature of Reality

[chaosagent]

"This pair of mini-satellites would orbit more slowly than Earth does,..."

What am I missing here? How can the satellites be in the same orbit as Earth but traveling slower?

I don't think it works that way.

[LibWhacker]

The article says they would orbit at roughly the same distance as Earth. But the author should've made clear that they could not be in the same orbit as Earth and yet travel more slowly, as you've correctly pointed out!

[chaosagent]

And on top of that, the picture pretty much shows them in the same orbit.

[Agnes Heep]

It seems to me that you can create any model of reality you like, and so long as the math works out it will be maintained as valid, no matter whether it's true or not.

[Richard Kimball]

Some theories are proven false, others are not. The theories are put out there for people to test and challenge. The best theories, (Newton, Einstein), are generally not proven wrong, but may be proven incomplete. Einstein didn't disprove Newton, he added to Newton's theories. Some day, someone will effectively do the same to Einstein. This shows how brilliant Einstein was, as his theories have stood for a very long time, and he developed these theories without the aid of even a hand calculator.

[LibWhacker]

I don't know anything about the philosophy of science, and next to nothing about physics, but I do think that's an interesting point, AH. About all I would dare say about it is that I think it's extraordinarily difficult to come up with a model that is "false" (Statistician George Box's motto is "No model is 'true,' only useful.") and yet have the math "work out" for the model -- which of course, has to agree with observation. And I'd probably be wrong about that, lol!

[FNU LNU]

"The Global Positioning System (GPS), for instance, wouldn't be possible without the theory of relativity."

I'll bite, how did the theory of relativity make GPS possible?

Thanks

[Mean Daddy]

If you want your world rocked, do some reading on Bell's Theorem. Basically it states that you can split a molecule or an atom (can never remember) in two. Irregardless of distance, if you change the rotation of one, the second half automatically switches as well. There are superstring implications, but it trashes Einstein's theory.

[RightWingAtheist]

2005, in fact, is to be the World Year of Physics, in commemoration of the publication of "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies", the paper with which Einstein introduced the theory of relativity. Despite what this article implies, Einstein's reign will likely continue for at least another century.

[RightWingAtheist]

Ping

[RightWhale]

Relativistic effects are present at orbital speeds. Small, but for GPS accuracy, vital.

[Monty22]

Einstein did know of that entanglement, and dubbed it 'spooky action at a distance'.

[FNU LNU]

Thanks!

[SunkenCiv]

This topic is from March 2004.

---

· String Theory ping list · join · view topics · view or post blog messages · bookmark · post new topic ·

---

[Centurion2000]

bump for later

[LiteKeeper]

read later

[hosepipe]

Observation balloon ping...

[hosepipe]

Observation balloon ping...