Jacques Posted March 11, 2005 Posted March 11, 2005 From http://homepage.mac.com/ardeshir/EssayOnGeometry.pdf according tothe Theory of Relativity, an object which is accelerating — i.e., gradually moving faster and faster — should be increasing in mass as time goes by, while an object which is decelerating — i.e., gradually moving slower and slower — should be decreasing in mass as time goes by. But, and this is a really big “BUT”, the Theory of Relativity also insists that acceleration and deceleration are equivalent to one another in every way: or in other words, that there is no way to tell of an object whose velocity is changing, whether it is changing in the direction of an increase in velocity or a decrease in velocity! Indeed according to Relativity, any particular object can be both accelerating and decelerating at the same time — that is to say, accelerating relative to a second object, and decelerating relative to a third.12 So if an object’s velocity is at all changing, according to the Theory of Relativity its mass could be both increasing and decreasing simultaneously … which is of course quite impossible. Is what is told in this quote, conform to Relativity ?
swansont Posted March 11, 2005 Posted March 11, 2005 I think the quoted part is confusing reference frames, as well as the standard "which mass do we use" problem. The observer whose mass you are measuring never "sees" a change in mass in his own frame, just as he thinks his own clock is ticking properly.
J.C.MacSwell Posted March 12, 2005 Posted March 12, 2005 the Theory of Relativity also insists that acceleration and decelerationare equivalent to one another in every way: or in other words, that there is no way to tell of an object whose velocity is changing, whether it is changing in the direction of an increase in velocity or a decrease in velocity! This part is wrong. Pick a reference frame and SR insists that (wrt the chosen frame) this is wrong.
luc Posted March 15, 2005 Posted March 15, 2005 Is this why physicists prefer the formulation of SR in which there's no relativisitic mass. The notion of rest mass makes easier the calculations
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