this post was submitted on 04 Sep 2023
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Science Memes

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submitted 1 year ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[–] Phlogiston 13 points 1 year ago (2 children)

I’m a little amused that in the comic both viewers are correct relative to their frame of reference. An extremely powerful concept that significantly advanced physics and about which famous people are household names.

[–] [email protected] 11 points 1 year ago (1 children)

I’m a little amused that in the comic both viewers are correct relative to their frame of reference. An extremely powerful concept that significantly advanced physics and about which famous people are household names.

You accidentally made the wrong point, because Einstein's breakthrough of special relativity was that the speed of light is constant regardless of reference frame.

So if two people with different frames of reference are measuring the speed of light differently, at least one of them is objectively wrong.

[–] [email protected] 3 points 1 year ago (1 children)

But if they measure the order of events differently, they may both be correct. That is because light is always perceived as being the same speed regardless of the observer.

[–] [email protected] 6 points 1 year ago

And yet, causality is preserved, and there is a clear specific mathematical relationship between the two frames of reference.

So you will measure differently, but as soon as you do the math to account for your different frames of reference, you will again have the same measurements. Of course, we know there is an objective mathematical relationship between the two frames of reference, because the speed of light is constant.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago)

If you assume this is the entirety of the universe of the comic (perhaps encased in a spherical cow), sure.