Einstein Light Clock Conundrum

[Bufofrog]

9 hours ago, Otto Nomicus said:

What if we take the viewpoint of the ball in the video? Was the ball launcher traveling on a longer parabolic path? What if we take the viewpoint of the ball on the train? Was the train traveling on a longer parabolic path?

Yes

9 hours ago, Otto Nomicus said:

What if we take the viewpoint of the photon? Was the clock traveling on a longer zig-zag path?

No, since a photon has no valid rest frame.

9 hours ago, Otto Nomicus said:

Now did the ball launcher, the train or the clock travel different and longer paths REALLY or did we just imagine that they did?

What do you mean by 'REALLY'? 

From the frame of the ball the launcher had a parabolic motion and from the frame of the launcher the ball went straight up and down and from the frame watching the ball and the launcher move the ball makes a parabolic motion.  Each of these statements are correct.

Your difficulty in seeing this is your problem but with a bit of effort you could understand it. 

[Genady]

14 minutes ago, Bufofrog said:

with a bit of effort you could understand it

Unfortunately, it is not necessarily so. I've met people who cannot see a motion in different frames. They just don't get it.  

[Otto Nomicus]

4 hours ago, Eise said:

Then how do you explain that for the train frame the photons go vertical, but for you from the ground frame, according to you, the photons arrive back at the laser when the train is at the railway crossing? If you think a slant is needed, i.e. the observer/experimenter on the train must point the laser a bit forward, from the train frame it would miss the small mirror. Your viewpoint is logically inconsistent. There is no way the light clock would work for different inertial frames at the same time, including the rest frame of the light clock (the train).

I suppose it works because uniform motion is the same as no motion, and the fact that it does work is proof of that. Obviously photons don't possess mass and therefore are no subject to inertia, yet they appear to move along with the clock and the train. You can't explain that using relativity any more I can explain it not using relativity, it's a mystery. I invite you to explain how photons move sideways with the train and clock, we both know you can't.

And I am shocked you are so sure about your viewpoint, where you obviously have no idea what vectors are, and how one adds them. But obviously you are not here to learn anything.

Vector, a quantity or phenomenon that has two independent properties, magnitude and direction. You know, like the photons in the clock having the velocity vector of c and the direction of vertical I didn't think I would have to tell you the velocity of light, but apparently I did. But why don't you tell me what term you would have considered acceptable. And I don't care how you think vectors are added. I just care that you can't refute the logic of what I posted, which you can't. But actually I'm tired of explaining reality to you and the others, so after I'm done with these replies I'm not going to bother with this forum anymore, it's boring me.

I won't, because I am an 'amateur physicist'. But I am pretty sure the example of the wire and the length contraction is very simplified. I think it does nothing more than give a some intuition how special relativity, electricity and magnetism are related. E.g. from the example of the wire, I do not see how the magnetic field would be circular around the wire.

Maybe some of the real physicists here can give a short comment on that?

I have some notion of where the limits of my knowledge are. You obviously don't. You are saying that a theory that is already accepted and used for a century, and is basic to nearly all of fundamental physics, is wrong. Here is a list of empirical tests, that all confirm special relativity is correct. 

About the wire example, ChatGPT says the following:

@swansont: is ChatGPT right?

Considering it didn't actually answer the question, just gave some lame excuses, I would say GPT was right, about not knowing the answer, just like you.

 

2 hours ago, Bufofrog said:

Yes

No, since a photon has no valid rest frame.

What do you mean by 'REALLY'? 

From the frame of the ball the launcher had a parabolic motion and from the frame of the launcher the ball went straight up and down and from the frame watching the ball and the launcher move the ball makes a parabolic motion.  Each of these statements are correct.

Your difficulty in seeing this is your problem but with a bit of effort you could understand it. 

All I will say is that you appear to me to have very poor powers of logic. Thanks for participating in my thread, it's been a slightly interesting pastime but I grow weary of it so bye.

[Bufofrog]

1 hour ago, Otto Nomicus said:

but I grow weary of it so bye.

Bye, hope you get some rest.

[swansont]

14 hours ago, Otto Nomicus said:

What if we take the viewpoint of the ball in the video?

Why would we do this? It’s an analog to the light clock, and the photon does not have an inertial frame of reference.

14 hours ago, Otto Nomicus said:

I know we weren't moving with the launcher, the train or the clock in the thought experiments but the same logic would apply. We could consider the clock to be taking the zig-zag path, could we not? The most ridiculous scenario is the one involving a speeding locomotive taking a parabolic path, did that really happen? In our imagination it happened, but in reality, pretty sure not. Isn't that the whole idea of "relativity", that we can take either view and everything works the same reciprocally? That's the principle of reciprocity between inertial frames and it mustn't be ignored.

The light clock is used to show the difference between someone at rest with respect to the photon launcher and an inertial frame where there is relative motion. Anything else is a distraction.

The ball itself is not in an inertial frame, so this is pointless..

[studiot]

6 hours ago, Otto Nomicus said:

ll I will say is that you appear to me to have very poor powers of logic. Thanks for participating in my thread, it's been a slightly interesting pastime but I grow weary of it so bye.

Since your reply to me was so disrespectful I will simply say here is a good animation of the correct logical thinking I have been promoting and leave you to figure the rest out for yourself.

 

https://www.einstein-online.info/en/spotlight/light-clocks-time-dilation/