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Unread 16 May 2010, 19:44   #157
Sun_Tzu
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Re: Alliance player limit

Quote:
Originally Posted by BigGayAl View Post
Ahhh Einstein lovers

Ok, lets drop QM and look at relativity. Einstein's theory was shunned, both at the theoretical level and because NOTHING backed it up in experiment. Or very nearly nothing if something did - I'm not a fan of relativity, bores me to death - so not 100% sure on my history here.

Einstein was totally ignored, and I dare say ridiculed about his hypothesis. I'll be amazed if he wasn't - as nice as the maths & hypothesis was, it was a little weird at the time.

Then was it 1919? or sometime, there was a solar eclipse - Einstein proven right, relativity replaces (or supersedes) the existing laws of physics.

Better analogy for you?

If there was never an experiment done to confirm relativity (nothing that had been observed uptil then suggested the current laws of physics were flawed), then relativity would be nothing more than an obscure theory - probably in a few textbooks here and there because of the nice maths used.
Well, I'll have to disagree with you on this again, and refer you to kuro5hin for the history of it: Introduction to the Theory of Relativity

There were issues with the nature and speed of light, which was actually where Einstein got his start, resolving the question of why light acts as it does.

History of general relativity

Now with actual relativity, we're stepping on the toes of Newton, but this is not actually a problem, as this quote shows:

Quote:
Originally Posted by Wikipedia
Within a century of Newton's formulation, careful astronomical observation revealed unexplainable variations between the theory and the observations. Under Newton's model, gravity was the result of an attractive force between massive objects. Although even Newton was bothered by the unknown nature of that force, the basic framework was extremely successful at describing motion.
So there were problems known even during Newtons day with his theory. In reality, Einstein attempted to resolve these problems, not by ignoring Newton, but by standing on his shoulders. Special and General relativity are therefor natural results of the further refinement of Newtons laws.

Quote:
Originally Posted by Wikipedia
In the early years after Einstein's theory was published, Sir Arthur Eddington lent his considerable prestige in the British scientific establishment in an effort to champion the work of this German scientist. Because the theory was so complex and abstruse (even today it is popularly considered the pinnacle of scientific thinking; in the early years it was even more so), it was rumored that only three people in the world understood it. There was an illuminating, though probably apocryphal, anecdote about this. As related by Ludwik Silberstein,[4] during one of Eddington's lectures he asked "Professor Eddington, you must be one of three persons in the world who understands general relativity." Eddington paused, unable to answer. Silberstein continued "Don't be modest, Eddington!" Finally, Eddington replied "On the contrary, I'm trying to think who the third person is."
This quote further shows how few quite understood the theory, however this is not the same as stating that he was ignored or ridiculed. In fact I seem to remember there being held competitions during the early years for who could best explain the theory of relativity.

Naturally, before it was proven it was simply that, an elegant theory. And indeed had it not been proven, it would have stayed an elegant theory. However, the 1919 experiment you allude to concerning the bending of light was in fact based on the classical tests laid out by Einstein during 1916:
Tests of general relativity

As the article on the testing of general relativity states in the opening paragraph, special relativity was already held to be true at this point, and general relativity was seen as a good philosophical explanation unifying Newtons laws and special relativity:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Wikipedia
At its introduction in 1915, the general theory of relativity did not have a solid empirical foundation. It was known that it correctly accounted for the "anomalous" precession of the perihelion of Mercury and on philosophical grounds it was considered satisfying that it was able to unify Newton's law of universal gravitation with special relativity. That light appeared to bend in gravitational fields in line with the predictions of general relativity was found in 1919 but it was not until a program of precision tests was started in 1959 that the various predictions of general relativity were tested to any further degree of accuracy in the weak gravitational field limit, severely limiting possible deviations from the theory.
I hope this was at least somewhat interesting to someone reading this, which I suppose is the only real point of this thread at this point
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Last edited by Sun_Tzu; 16 May 2010 at 19:54.
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