Special Theory of Relativity through the Doppler Effect
Classical Physics
2009-11-11 v1
Abstract
We present the special theory of relativity taking the Doppler effect as the starting point, and derive several of its main effects, such as time dilation, length contraction, addition of velocities, and the mass-energy relation, and assuming energy and momentum conservation, we discuss how to introduce the 4-momentum in a natural way. We also use the Doppler effect to explain the "twin paradox", and its version on a cylinder. As a by-product we discuss Bell's spaceship paradox, and the Lorentz transformation for arbitrary velocities in one dimension.
Cite
@article{arxiv.physics/0605204,
title = {Special Theory of Relativity through the Doppler Effect},
author = {M. Moriconi},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:physics/0605204},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
20 pages, 1 figure