Related papers: Chukchi Myths perspective on Special Relativity
Though Einstein and other physicists recognized the importance of an observer being at rest in an inertial reference frame for the special theory of relativity, the supporting psychological structures were not discussed much by physicists.…
Five topics: A rigid body does not exist in the special theory of relativity; distant simultaneity defined with respect to a given frame of reference without any reference to synchronized clocks; challenges on Einstein's connection of…
The Principle of Relativity has so far been understood as the {\it covariance} of laws of Physics with respect to a general class of reference frame transformations. That relativity, however, has only been expressed with the help of {\it…
The Einstein-First project aims to change the paradigm of school science teaching through the introduction of modern Einsteinian concepts of space and time, gravity and quanta at an early age. These concepts are rarely taught to school…
It will be shown that, in comparison with the pre-relativistic Galileo-invariant conceptions, special relativity tells us nothing new about the geometry of spacetime. It simply calls something else "spacetime", and this something else has…
This paper aims to provide teachers with a tool to teach the essential features of special relativity, considering the students' difficulties highlighted by numerous studies. Our proposal presents special relativity as the solution to the…
Galilean Relativity and Einstein's Special and General Relativity showed that the Laws of Physics go deeper than their representations in any given reference frame. Thus covariance, or independence of Laws of Physics with respect to changes…
The conceptual evolution of principle of relativity in the theory of special relativity is discussed in detail. It is intimately related to a series of difficulties in quantum mechanics,relativistic quantum mechanics and quantum field…
Following an approach proposed by Rosser for deriving the transformation equations of volume charge density and current density we derive the transformation equations for the space-time coordinates of the same event, for the mass and the…
Minkowski famously introduced the concept of a space-time continuum in 1908, merging the three dimensions of space with an imaginary time dimension $ i c t $, with the unit imaginary producing the correct spacetime distance $ x^2 - c^2 t^2…
The importance of a teaching a clear definition of the ``observer'' in special relativity is highlighted using a simple astrophysical example from the exciting current research area of ``Gamma-Ray Burst'' astrophysics. The example shows…
We show that alternative relativity theories that are essentially based on varied distant clock synchronization procedures can be recovered by using the standard Lorentz-Einstein transformations for the space-time coordinates of the same…
Many authors noted that the principle of relativity, together with space-time symmetries, suffices to derive Lorentz-like coordinate transformations between inertial frames. These contain a free parameter, $k$, (equal to $c^{-2}$ in special…
This note examines an apparently unpublished manuscript on special relativity written by Conrad Habicht in 1914 and made available online by the ETH-Bibliothek Z\"urich in December 2024. To the best of my knowledge, no study of its content…
A challenge in teaching about special relativity is that a number of the theory's effects are at odds with the intuition of classical physics, as well as student's everyday experience. The relativity of simultaneity, time dilation and…
A phenomenological explanation is presented for the physics of aberration, which is in contrast with special relativity physics. The effect of relativity is identified with an effect due to the velocity of observation being affected by the…
Special Relativity is taught to physics sophomores at Johns Hopkins University in a series of eight lectures. Lecture 1 covers the principle of relativity and the derivation of the Lorentz transform. Lecture 2 covers length contraction and…
We discuss the twin paradox or the clock paradox under the small velocity approximation of special relativity. In this paper the traveller twin of the standard twin parable sets out with a non-relativistic speed for the trip leaving behind…
In this paper we bring to light an hitherto undisclosed richness of this Theory, namely its admitting a consistent reformulation which is able to provide a unified scenario for all kinds of particles, be they lightlike or not. This result…
Some of the assumptions of cosmology, as based on the simplest version of General Relativity, are discussed. It is argued that by slight modifications of standard gravitation theory, our notion of the sources of gravity {the right hand side…