Re: Is There A Physicist in the House?

From: Guy Blanchet (guyblanchet@sympatico.ca)
Date: Sat Jan 22 2000 - 14:24:34 EST

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     Mr. Murphy,

    Thanks you very much for your comments.

    George Murphy a écrit:

    > Guy Blanchet wrote:
    > >
    > > I wish to solicit the help of a person knowledgeable in the field of
    > > experimental Relativity namely on the phenomena of the variation of mass
    > > with respect to velocity as measured by an observer “at rest”. I am
    > > looking for good solid experimental data especially at the high end of
    > > the v/c spectrum i.e between 0.6 and 0.99.
    > >
    > > The reason for this is that, although Relativity conforms to actual
    > > experimental results up to about 0.6 v/c, I suspect that after this
    > > point, experimental results slowly begins to break away and reach a
    > > value 12% higher than theory prediction at v/c = 0.9. This would of
    > > course be enough of an error to cause concern.
    > >
    > > What is the source of my suspicion? Well, I believe I am well into what
    > > one would call a Christian view of fundamental physics, which looks very
    > > much like ordinary physics in that it has postulates, models and
    > > mathematical expressions of these models. The important difference
    > > however is that a biblical notion of the Creator God is at the centre of
    > > the theory which speaks of the absolute as well as the relative. A good
    > > understanding of the character of God was paramount to the development
    > > of the theory. One of the four demos included in the explanation of the
    > > theory is an expression derived for the mass vs. velocity variation.
    > >
    > > My paper is not finished and therefore I cannot send anything yet. In
    > > the meantime, it would greatly help if one of you could share credible
    > > information on the subject in question. This should ideally be in the
    > > form of a well documented experiment available in either French or
    > > English. Thank you for your help.
    >
    > 1) First a matter of terminology: Relativity theorists today generally don't
    > use the older terminology "variation of mass", M = m/(1 - v^2/c^2)^1/2 but speak
    > relativistic expressions for momentum and energy, p = Mv and E = Mc^2, where M is
    > defined as above. The older language is not wrong but for several reasons is clumsy for
    > further theoretical work.

    Agreed! I also find it easier to speak in terms of energy. I used the term "mass" for old
    times sake.

    > 2) One piece of older experimental work relevant to your question is R.A.R.
    > Tricker in Proceedings of the Royal Society A 109, 384 (1935). He used beta rays with
    > speeds up to .8c and found close agreement with the relativistic formulae.

    I came across an even older experiment by Newmann in 1914 (Annalen der Physik vol 45 p.529)
    also using beta rays. Things seem to have went real well up to 0.8c. After 0.8c the
    numbers went haywire... Thanks for the info. I'll check it out.

    > 3) Nowadays particle accelerators are designed with the assumption that the
    > relativistic relations between mass, velocity, energy, & momentum are correct, & these
    > machines would not work if those relations were wrong. The Tevatron at Fermilab, e.g.,
    > can accelerate protons to energies of 900 GeV (as in the experiments which found the top
    > quark - see, e.g., Chris Quigg, "Top-ology", Physics Today, May 1997). This energy is
    > (roughly) 1000 times the proton's rest energy, which means that v/c differs from unity
    > by only 5 x 10^-7. Thus the relativistic expressions seem to work up to such speeds.

    I have very often heard the comment that relativistic formulae "seem to work". The problem
    is that I cannot find proof of that! And when I put the question to people who no doubt
    know the answer, they clam up tighter than clams in a swamp! I mentioned that my theory
    shows that Einstein would be shy by 12% at 0.9c ...which would not exactly qualify as a
    gross error. I doubt very much if such a variance would significantly change particle
    accelerator design. I'm sure that amongst all the controls on an accelerator there must be,
    hidden away from the public's eye, a small dial labeled "Field Fudge Factor".

    > 4) There are absolutes in special relativity. The speed of light is the most
    > obvious, but electric charge and entropy are other examples.

    The constancy of the speed of light is not an absolute. The absolute is the ratio of
    distance over time after the necessary corrections have been made for relative motion. When
    Michelson and Morley did their interferometer experiment, they were looking for signs of an
    "ether", an alledged supporting medium for light. Finding such a medium would have smacked
    of the absolute. It is the inability to prove the existance of ether that kicked off
    Einstein's theory of special relativity.

    > Shalom,
    > George
    >
    > George L. Murphy
    > gmurphy@raex.com
    > http://web.raex.com/~gmurphy/



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