Wht exactly is the THEORY OF RELATIVITY??

Question

Plse tel it in a simpl eway if possible..but tis ok if it's complicated!

Answer 1

MOTION is the underlying subject of relativity.

all things are in motion (including me sitting here at my desk) but relative to other objects, they may appear not to be.

since i am sitting here and so is my desk, we both seem not to be moving at all.  the fact is, that we are moving at the SAME speed (the earth turns, don't you know) so no motion is detected.

think of it this way:  if you drop two baseballs off of the empire state building i think you'd agree that by the time both balls fell for a few seconds, they'd be moving FAST.  but the balls, relative to one another, are not moving at all (ignoring the slight differences in their movement due to air friction and wind)

so really it's a relationship between TIME and SPACE (how velocity, or speed, is described in scientific terms).  since light travels at a certain velocity (about 186,000 miles per second, depending on external factors), einstein not only theorized that time is not a constant but proved it.  i'm not sure of the details but i know that an experiment with synchronized clocks, one on the surface of the earth and one traveling for hours in an airplane, were no longer synchronized upon the plane's return (a matter of tens of thousandths of a second off, not much, but different.)

Answer 2

When we look to moving system with speed almost equal to the speed of light then some physical propriety (mass,length,time duration,etc) does not remain invariant and depends on time. Theory that tells the explain the propriety at that limit is called THEORY OF RELATIVITY.

Answer 3

The theory is that something happens (or moves) only when it's compared with something else. When you are standing, and someone else is standing in front of you, you are both still, right? Wrong, you are still when compared to what is around you, but in reality the earth is spinning at thousands of miles per hour, so you are moving. The theory says that there's always a comparison to be made. So compared to someone else, you are still, compared to the sun you are moving.

Answer 4

In simple words it means when you are sitting with your bf times fly by and when you are sitting on burning stove than time stops...this is the gist of theory of relativity...actually when you compare two things and how it feels that is what einstein mean by theory of relativity..one more example is you see a plane flying in the air though it is moving at faster rate but you see it moving very slowly..it happnes cuz we are relating it with sky..hope it may help you...

Answer 5

Special relativity is a theory of the structure of spacetime. It was introduced in Albert Einstein's 1905 paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies". Special relativity is based on two postulates which are contradictory in classical mechanics:

1.The laws of physics are the same for all observers in uniform motion relative to one another (Galileo's principle of relativity),

2.The speed of light in a vacuum is the same for all observers, regardless of their relative motion or of the motion of the source of the light.

The resultant theory has many surprising consequences. Some of these are:

1. Time dilation: Moving clocks are measured to tick more slowly than an observer's "stationary" clock.

2. Length contraction: Objects are measured to be shortened in the direction that they are moving with respect to the observer.

3. Relativity of simultaneity: two events that appear simultaneous to an observer A will not be simultaneous to an observer B if B is moving with respect to A.

4. Mass-energy equivalence: E = mc2, energy and mass are equivalent and transmutable.

The defining feature of special relativity is the replacement of the Galilean transformations of classical mechanics by the Lorentz transformations. (See Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism and introduction to special relativity).

Answer 6

The German Jewish theoretical physicist Albert Einstein formulated the special theory of relativity in 1905. Relativity is that area of physics that has to do with how observers in motion with respect to the phenomenon observed can account for their observations given that two different frames of reference (that of the observer and that of what is observed) are involved. Einstein labeled his 1905 theory "special" because it dealt with a limited range of phenomena, namely uniform linear motion at constant but high velocities. The consequences of special relativity became cornerstones of twentieth-century physics and displaced some of the central tenets of Newtonian physics that had been pillars of scientific thought for two centuries.

First, Einstein showed that time, space, and matter are interdependent, as expressed in the famous formula e - mc2 , where e is energy, m is mass, and c is the speed of light. The mass of material objects is determined by their energy; if they give off energy, their mass decreases. Mass increases with velocity and since the velocity of light is so great, a small mass traveling at the speed of light is equivalent to a vast amount of energy. (Atomic energy is an example of the special theory but was not based on it.) Second, time is not absolute: it depends on the circumstances of the ob-servers. Third, there are no privileged observers: what one person sees or measures may not be what another person measures, even if both think they are measuring the same phenomenon, especially if one is moving faster than the other. For example, according to the special theory, a person on a moving train and another on an adjacent embankment do not see the same light signal on the railroad station at the same time and thus cannot say that the two observations were simultaneous. Fourth, space is not absolute; it is only a conventional way of describing the relationships of objects. Fifth, as American physicist Albert Michelson had already demonstrated, the ether, an invisible substance that supposedly filled the entire universe and through which light waves were propagated, does not exist.

The theory gave rise to all kinds of widely discussed paradoxes that delighted Einstein and his supporters and enraged physicists opposed to the theory. The most famous was the "twin paradox" of the space traveler. An astronaut travels through space at speeds approaching that of light for many years. When he returns to Earth, he finds his twin brother to be an old man while he has hardly aged at all. Einstein's theory explained that at very high speeds time slows down.

find more on

http://archive.ncsa.uiuc.edu/Cyberia/Num...

Answer 7

The Special Theory of Relativity was published in 1905 and deals with (frames of reference) objects separating with constant high velocities (close to the speed of light). In this first theory, Einstein stated that the speed of light was the absolute limit for all velocities and furthermore all observers, what ever their motion, must measure the speed of light to be exactly the same. Finally, only mass-less objects may attain the speed of light. However, massive objects contract in their direction of motion, their clocks slow down relative to observer's clocks and they gain mass and thus inertia as they accelerate towards the speed of light.

Einstein's theory of General Relativity (1915) is a cause and effect theory. The theory describes the fabric of space-time as a medium that may be distorted by the presence of mass and energy. From his earlier relativity theory, Einstein had related mass and energy in the famous equation: -

E = mc²

From this concept, he described the curvature or distortion of space-time as due to the total sum of mass-energy present within the region of distorted space. It is the curvature of space-time we call gravity. Thus, our planet follows the 'straightest' path or path of least action whilst it orbits the mutually curved space around the Sun. An object falling to earth, under the pull of gravity, is following the curvature of space in the region around the surface of the Earth. Einstein described the relationship between space-time curvature and the mass-energy causing it, in the tensor field equation: -

G = 8πT

Where 'G' is the Einstein tensor representing the 'gravity' or curvature of space-time and 'T' is the total energy tensor representing the mass-energy creating the gravitational curvature of the space-time.

The theory, accurately predicts many features of the solar system, such as the peculiar motion of Mercury’s perihelion, and may be used to account for the gravitational physics of black holes and neutron stars. The extreme high pressure physics at the core of a star may be described using this theory. General relativity also predicted the Big Bang origin of the universe, although Einstein refused to accept the conclusion. He later claimed that this erroneous conclusion was his biggest blunder. Overall, after ninety-three years, General Relativity is still the best theory of gravity that we have!

Answer 8

I think how I would describe it is that there is no overall "measuring stick" that the universe is measured off. what I mean is that in Newtonian mechanics you say that some car is traveling 60 kph, and so it has say 200,000J of energy. what you actually mean is that the car is moving at 60 kph in comparison to the ground, which is the earth. in this case the earth is the measuring stick. but what if your on a bike riding in the same direction as the car at 20 kph, that means you see the car moving at 40 kph, and this would only have say 100,000J of energy, but this observation cant be correct(under Newtonian mechanics) because where did the energy go?

relativity in simple terms takes away the earth measuring stick, and allows the car to be considered correctly ( in other words follow the laws of nature) in any frame of reference whether your riding on the bike or standing on the earth or flying in a rocket ship. so whether you see the car going 60kph from earth 40kph from the bike, or 1000 kph from some random space ship, your calculated values that the car has for velocity, energy, ect are all right, for the frame of reference from which they're observed.

relativity also states that the speed of light is the universal constant. one of the effects this has is that anything traveling in the range of the speed of light will behave differently to the way they would behave if Newtonian mechanics held true. for example time slows down and the lengths observed change. while in a slow moving world there is minimal significance in astrophysics there are a number of phenomenon that are only correctly described by relativity. for example the correct orbits of the solar system are only described with relativity because of the high velocities of the planets.

another thing to note that this is the first part of relativity called special relativity, the theory of general relativity came later and describes how gravity works in the relativity framework.

a short description is that masses bend space(and time) and this bending causes the object to experience a force, which is quite different to the old description of two masses attracting each other.

Answer 9

In simple,

1. Theory of motion and energy developed by Albert Einstein in the 20th century.

2. The theory that says that, space and time are relative concepts rather than absolute concepts. (special relativity and general relativity)

3. A set of mathematical relations showing that mass and energy come from equivalent space, that can appear differently in different observational situations.!

4.Several important results such as the equivalence of matter and energy, Einstein field equations are derived from it only!

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Answer 10

search it in wikipedia

Answer 11

This example will help to make your concept:

Suppose there are twin brothers.Henry and Jack.Both are 25 years old on 1 september 2008.NASA selects Henry for one special space mission. On 1 september 2008 Henry goes into the space by a spaceship. Spaceshuttle travelles for 20 years in the space by the speed of light i.e. 300000 km/second. He comes on the earth on 1 september 2028. Jack goes to welcome his brother on Kenedi space station.Then Henry observes that Jack has 45 years old but he (Henry) is still 25 years old.

This is because Henry travelled by the speed of light but Jack didn't.

Answer 12

When you are in a car during rain, you see the rain drops falling inclined, but actually those are falling straight. This is basically relativity. Now the theory behind this is theory of relativity.

In details...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory_of_r...