case_against_absolute

The problem with Absolute Speed is that no experiment to date has been able to detect Earth’s motion through space. The most famous experiment by Michelson–Morley and repeated by many others did not yield any results consistent with the concept of Earth moving through space as it orbits the sun, or the sun’s orbital motion within the galaxy. The experiment is based on a light interferometer; light was expected to travel at different speed depending of the direction of motion when Earth orbital velocity is taken into account. When light is traveling in the same direction as Earth, the speed would be different than when moving in another direction as measured by an Earth observer. The interferometer was supposed to detect changes in light speed from two beams of light previously split from a common source as Earth’s rotation changes the angle of motion with respect to Earth orbital velocity. All experiments have failed to measure a speed of motion anywhere close to the known value. For all practical purposes is as if Earth were not moving and the rest of the Universe is revolving around us. The Theory of Special Relativity is based on the assumption that all motion is relative (a shared concept with Newton.) This makes it possible, for instance, for GPS constellation of satellites to remains synchronized for all Earth observers, while for an observer outside Earth’s frame of reference, these satellites will experience different time dilation effects as their respective orbits take them in the same direction or opposite to Earth’s motions around the sun, and fall out of synchronicity with each other. The complexity of the motion and synchronization is more sophisticated when the sun’s orbital motion around the galaxy is taken into account, but that can also be accounted for, and satisfactorily explained, by SR.

This presents a serious conflict with the previous section, as they cannot be both true. These two different concepts and their respective experimental evidence will be reconciled in later sections.

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2.2 The case against Absolute Speed. The problem with Absolute Speed is that no experiment to date has been able to detect Earth’s motion through space. The most famous experiment by Michelson–Morley and repeated by many others did not yield any results consistent with the concept of Earth moving through space as it orbits the sun, or the sun’s orbital motion within the galaxy. The experiment is based on a light interferometer; light was expected to travel at different speed depending of the direction of motion when Earth orbital velocity is taken into account. When light is traveling in the same direction as Earth, the speed would be different than when moving in another direction as measured by an Earth observer. The interferometer was supposed to detect changes in light speed from two beams of light previously split from a common source as Earth’s rotation changes the angle of motion with respect to Earth orbital velocity. All experiments have failed to measure a speed of motion anywhere close to the known value. For all practical purposes is as if Earth were not moving and the rest of the Universe is revolving around us. The Theory of Special Relativity is based on the assumption that all motion is relative (a shared concept with Newton.) This makes it possible, for instance, for GPS constellation of satellites to remains synchronized for all Earth observers, while for an observer outside Earth’s frame of reference, these satellites will experience different time dilation effects as their respective orbits take them in the same direction or opposite to Earth’s motions around the sun, and fall out of synchronicity with each other. The complexity of the motion and synchronization is more sophisticated when the sun’s orbital motion around the galaxy is taken into account, but that can also be accounted for, and satisfactorily explained, by SR. This presents a serious conflict with the previous section, as they cannot be both true. These two different concepts and their respective experimental evidence will be reconciled in later sections. .