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Time dilation and age difference

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Time dilation and age difference

kkiiji
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Posted 07/15/09 - 11:26 PM:	#11
I thought it was the other way around..where I the traveler don't age and everyone else ages.
Heard joke once: Man goes to doctor. Says he's depressed. Says life seems harsh and cruel. Says he feels all alone in a threatening world where what lies ahead is vague and uncertain. Doctor says "Treatment is simple. Great clown Pagliacci is in town tonight. Go and see him. That should pick you up." Man bursts into tears. Says "But Doctor... I am Pagliacci." Good joke, everybody laugh. Roll on snare drum... Curtains.

Kwalish Kid
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Posted 07/16/09 - 05:41 AM:	#12
It is the other way around. Given the geometry of special relativity, it is because the traveller takes a path that is longer, in space, to an event shared by friends than the friends do, in space. This distance must be "made up" by distance in time, so the stationary path to the event must take longer than the path that is in motion.
"Scientific truth is always paradox, if judged by everyday experience, which catches only the delusive nature of things." - KM, V, P and P Can you pass Religion 101?

Death Monkey
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Posted 07/16/09 - 12:44 PM:	#13
kkiji, Oh yeah I forgot about the simultaneity thing, that helps a lot, thank you. I assume that this means if Steve were to decelerate back to 0m/s, Adam's time would appear to travel super fast until Adam's time surpasses Steve's time, right? Note exactly. If the deceleration is fast enough, Steve will see the same time on Adam's clock after he stops as he did before he stopped. The only difference will be his inference of how long ago Adam's clock said that time, and from that his inference of what Adam's clock says right now. I also assume that due to the difference in simultaneity, Adam would NOT see Steve just kind of traveling real slowly in space while he decelerates, but instead see him decelerating normally? We and Steve would not agree on the amount of time spent decelerating, but Adam would percieve the deceleration time to be less that Steve does. Kwalish Kid, Given the geometry of special relativity, it is because the traveller takes a path that is longer, in space, to an event shared by friends than the friends do, in space. This distance must be "made up" by distance in time, so the stationary path to the event must take longer than the path that is in motion. Another way to see this is to observe that the time between two events will always be less for the observer for which those events occurred closer together in space. In the case of Adam and Steve, for Adam the two events (Steve crossing A and Steve crossing B) happen 8 light minutes apart. For Steve, these two events happen at the same location. So not only does Steve percieve a shorter time between the events than Adam, but the time between the events that he percieves is the minimum time between those events for any inertial frame. DM
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