Recent content by bengoodspeed

there's a "trainload" of problems with it. For one, it starts off with the focus and question on whether the light flashes would be simultaneous with each other alone, not whether they would be simultaneous with the simultaneous positions of the observers. It then goes on to specifically state...

very nice animations, this works better than the text too, thank you

minkowski diagram is beautiful once i understand how it slides. And I have become accustomed to picturing time as a sort of 'spatial' dimension that moves through the 3rd dimension even before I picked up this book, and yet this book still confused me

that's a good way of putting it. with the scorch marks especially. yes, a good way, much better than the text hah

good stuff

I still think it's a terribly written book, but maybe it's just that I consider everything too much. If the man on the embankment sees the light rays hit train man at two different points, then I was just supposed to accept that as the infallible truth for all observers and not even question...

I think this makes sense now. I'll have to mull it over a little I suppose but I think it's consistent. Thanks guys

Not sure how you can say that unless we're already taking time dilation or length contraction or anything else apart from the constancy of light as a proven concept into account, (which can't be since this is the first chapter that's really even beginning to create a thought experiment to form...

I have read what I just wrote a few times and pondered it. Yes they were in the same spot when the text states that lightning struck. But they weren't in the same places THAT the lightning struck. So those could be different instants for them, from far away, since they are not in the same...

thanks much:smile:

Ok, I can kinda see where this is going. Inferring from the reference frame of the embankment, watching how the light hits the train guy, and extrapolating backwards to infer that his 'now' at that moment must be different from the 'now' of the embankment fellow. The issue of how the man on the...

It's funny, considering the 1920 book is lauded as being meant for the layperson and easy to grasp without confusing math. All it's done is make me frustrated with Einstein for explaining everything in the most haggard and extraneous way hahaha Thanks, feynman is an enjoyable speaker so maybe I...

Thanks for the thoughts. Although this still isn't clear to me. For simplicity, let's first just talk about the light that the observers actually visually receive, without back-calculating: So you say: Well, yes, from the perspective of the embankment observer. But from the train observer in...

Hi, I have been reading and watching a lot of physics lately but I have come across this problem. I have the basics of special relativity down, and it all seems clear to me. This is not in question to me. For example, I am reading a book on string theory by Brain Greene, and in it he covers...