Re: Experimental Evidence for Special Relativity

On Sep 11, 3:57 pm, Sean2008 <mac.offic...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Dear Mr. Smith,

First of all, I am going to hate going back to work next week - I
won't be able to follow these posts so attentively! Hate when that
happens!

I am hesitant about offering my ideas for public consumption yet. I
don't mind if someone tells me they amount to nothing more than
"thought-goo" so long as I can wrap my hands around the specific
reasons for the flaws. Does that make sense? It's not too useful to be
on the wrong end of a public whipping, if you see my meaning.

Anyway... having offered all the above disclaimers... for the sake of
discussion....

I read the following in Max Born's book ("Einstein's Theory of
Relativity", Dover, 1965):
____________
In precisely the same way we must now admit that a definite position
in the

[gravito-inertial_ether fits better in a more modern paradigm]

ether is nothing real in the physical sense, and for this
reason the ether itself entirely loses the character of substance.
Indeed, we may say: If each of two observers who are moving relative
to each other can assert with equal right that he is at rest in the
ether, there can be no ether (Born, 223)
____________

So, I got to thinking (quite some time ago, actually... just don't
really have anybody to discuss it with now that my father has passed
on). Is there any evidence that says that the ether or the EM medium
could not be a real physical entity that has no "particles" of mass in
it? This entity, as I was pondering it, would be completely specified
by the permeability and permittivity of space. These would be the two
physical qualities which, by themselves, completely specify the medium
- at least insofar as electromagnetic propagation is concerned.

Light would propagate through this medium by virtue of the fact that
these qualities of space would transfer the energy of the propagating
wave just as water transfers a water wave except that there is no
"material" like water and only these two qualities of space. The would
be analgous to the differential capacitive and inductive elements in a
transmission line that transfer energy along the line, except that
these "differential elements" are instrinsic to space itself rather
than just to a transmission line.

Because there are no "particles" of any type associated with the
medium, there is no motion with respect to the medium, yet light would
propagate through it. Now, naturally, I guess I am assuming a
completely wave-nature to the propagating wave and I realize, in doing
so, I am ignoring the particle-nature in such things as the
photoelectric effect. I have a half-formed notion of how that might be
explained but I have not explored it fully.

The Nobel committee ~ignores~ it as well.

http://nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/articles/ekspong/


I think, in answer to your question of, "Light moves in / through this
medium then, differently than matter?" I would say, yes. Other objects
simply move through space, unaffected by the medium since it has no
mechanical qualities. Light, on the other hand, depends upon these
electrical characteristics of space in order to propagate.

I think a medium envisioned in this way does not violate the
requirements imposed so far by PD, Harald and so on, and is in keeping
with Einstien's own thoughts. Two (or more) bodies can each have any
relative motion they wish with respect to one another but, because
there is no motion between any one of them and the medium (or, more
specifically, with respect to permeability and permittivity), none of
the conditions I have read so far seem to be violated, including the
argument I quoted by Born.

By virtue of the fact that one could measure the permeability and
permittivity of space (including space that has objects in it, where
the values would be different), it is detectable in that sense.

Ok, so that was what I was pondering. So, when all the laughter dies
down... go ahead... take it apart for me. I'll do my best to defend my
notion until I run out of ideas that make sense to me.

(I told you I was just beginning... sorry if this has already been
covered elsewhere in other posts.)

Thanks for whatever input you have.

It all looks quiet thoughtful and not at all far from
a modern mainstream discription of an electrodynamic
~ether~.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_space

Sue...


.

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