E=Mc2? Not On Conservapedia

[Michaelangelica]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn19303-emc2-not-on-conservapedia.html

 

Religious believers have quite the love/hate relationship with Albert Einstein. Some quote the physicist's comments about God not playing dice with the universe to support their own views – despite the fact that Einstein himself said, "I do not believe in a personal God." One young-Earth creationist site even uses an Einstein quote in a diatribe against evolution. Now the pendulum is swinging over to hate as Einstein goes the way of Darwin, becoming an unlikely enemy of some on the religious right.

 

It seems that the folks at Conservapedia – a sort of conservative alternative to the more familar online encyclopedia Wikipedia – are not fans of Einstein's most famous theory, general relativity. In fact, they view it as a far-reaching liberal conspiracy.

 

 

[HydrogenBond]

I think the concern has to do with relativism, which is a social behavior version of relative reference. Relative reference implies there is no absolute reference, but rather all references are relative, with any reference as good as the other. This is not connected to general relativity GR, since space-time contraction in GR is a direct function of mass/gravity. This is absolute. You will not see a larger mass have less space-time contraction than a smaller mass.

 

Relative reference is more connected to special relativity SR, which is all about velocity and relative motion. The relative reference illusion was not created by Albert Einstein. The relative reference illusion makes use of only space and time references, while avoiding an energy balance. Albert Einstein originally added a third variable to SR, he called relativistic mass, which implies an energy balance was also needed. This third variable was dropped, because nobody could prove the existence of relativistic mass as a material. This loss of the third variable and the implied energy balance, allowed the illusion to work; due to two variables instead of three.

 

Relative reference is useful for some things, but reduces to absolute, when you introduce an energy balance.

 

For example, If we have someone on a train moving at velocity=V and someone standing at the station, stationary, each will see the other moving. From either point of view we can calculate the same velocity. This application of relativism has some useful applications since for calculating velocity either reference is useful.

 

However, if we introduce an energy balance (add variable number three) each observer will see different energy requirements, that allows up to infer an absolute order to the references. The stationary person at the station only sees the train moving. This will take X energy. While the person on the train, looking out the window, sees the entire earth and universe moving, if he assumes himself to be stationary. This will take much more energy, implying these references are not the same. We can infer that the station has to be the zero reference since the other scenario implies an impossible amount of energy in the experiment.

 

Relative to social behavior, relativism would imply all behavior is the same. Maybe at some level this is true (if we use only 2 of 3 variables). However, an energy balance might be connected to the social costs of two relative behavior, If they were the same, social costs should be exactly the same, but one costs much more (uses more energy). They are different not relative.

 

With relativistic mass removed from SR, we are essentially taught to avoid the energy/resource balance, and to rely only on the aspect that is relative. In the short term, an energy balance is not clear, between behavior, so the illusion works. But over time, the social energy balance (social costs) adds up differently but it is often too late to change bad policy. This perpetuates the illusion, since even then the energy balance is ignored and the consensus thinks the references are relative. It is a clever trick but I prefer reality.

 

It was not Albert Einstein, but the consensus that took over his theories.

Edited April 8, 2012 by HydrogenBond