On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 12:26:58 PM UTC-7 Quentin Anciaux wrote:
AG, your attempt to brush off the apparent paradox as a "false expectation" is nothing more than intellectual laziness dressed up as insight. Of course, we don’t expect the frames to agree on fitting—that’s the whole point of the apparent paradox. The paradox exists because the frames reach different conclusions, and understanding why they disagree is the actual problem to be addressed. Pretending it’s just a "false expectation" is a cheap cop-out. Just assume the opposite, that the frames AGREE, and you'll see the clarity of my analysis (so to speak, a proof via contradiction). AG Length contraction sets up the conditions for the disagreement, but it doesn’t explain it. The relativity of simultaneity is what resolves it by showing how the frames define "fitting" differently. In the garage frame, simultaneity aligns the back and front of the car with the entrance and exit, so the car fits. In the car frame, simultaneity shifts, and the same events don’t happen at the same time, so the car doesn’t fit. Without simultaneity, there’s no way to explain why both frames are correct within their own contexts. Your claim that resolving the paradox would "imply length contraction is false" is pure nonsense. The disagreement between frames doesn’t undermine length contraction— I wrote that if the frames AGREED on fitting, that would imply length contraction using the LT is a false prediction. AG it’s a direct consequence of it. The Lorentz transformations don’t give "false predictions"; they provide the framework that explains both length contraction and simultaneity. If you’re failing to see this, it’s not because the theory is flawed—it’s because your understanding of it is. Your refusal to engage with simultaneity shows that you’re not interested in understanding the physics. I understand that your commitment to simultaneity is so intense, that you are unable to admit I was able to determine in which frame the car fitted, without simultaneity; AND that there's no paradox to resolve unless you want to claim a false expectation equates to a paradox. AG You’re more interested in dismissing the actual resolution because it doesn’t fit your overly simplistic narrative. Stop pretending that ignoring a core concept like simultaneity makes you insightful. It doesn’t. It makes you wrong, and transparently so. Le jeu. 9 janv. 2025, 20:25, Alan Grayson <agrays...@gmail.com> a écrit : On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 12:16:52 PM UTC-7 Alan Grayson wrote: On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 12:10:58 PM UTC-7 Quentin Anciaux wrote: AG, length contraction is what sets up the apparent paradox, but it doesn’t resolve it. Length contraction tells us that in the garage frame, the car is shorter and can fit, while in the car frame, the garage is shorter and the car cannot fit. This sets the conditions for disagreement but does nothing to explain why the two frames reach different conclusions. The relativity of simultaneity is what resolves the paradox. In the garage frame, simultaneity ensures that the back of the car passes the entrance and the front is at or within the exit at the same time, meaning the car fits. In the car frame, these same events are not simultaneous, and the back of the car passes the entrance before the front reaches the exit, meaning the car doesn’t fit. This difference in simultaneity explains why both frames disagree while remaining consistent with relativity. Your claim that you can determine whether the car fits without simultaneity is nonsense. Length contraction alone doesn’t tell you when events align—it only gives you the contracted lengths in a given frame. Without simultaneity, you have no way to compare the positions of the car and garage endpoints in time, which is essential to define fitting. Referencing Einstein and the Lorentz transformations won’t save your argument. Simultaneity is built into the framework of special relativity. Ignoring it doesn’t simplify the problem; it leaves it unresolved. You’re not demonstrating insight, AG. You’re just showing how deeply you misunderstand relativity. I asked the question to Clark. The fact is, I was able to know in which frame the car fitted, and didn't need any reference to simultaneity. It was real easy. Try my method. You might like it. AG There is no paradox to be resolved. What is interpreted as a paradox is the false expectation that the frames should agree on fitting. But, as I pointed out previously, that would be a worse situation than someone's false expectation; it would imply that length contraction, and therefore the LT, was giving us a false prediction. AG Le jeu. 9 janv. 2025, 20:05, Alan Grayson <agrays...@gmail.com> a écrit : On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 8:58:03 AM UTC-7 Alan Grayson wrote: On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 5:40:16 AM UTC-7 Alan Grayson wrote: On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 5:33:25 AM UTC-7 Alan Grayson wrote: On Thursday, January 9, 2025 at 5:13:15 AM UTC-7 John Clark wrote: On Thu, Jan 9, 2025 at 1:02 AM Alan Grayson <agrays...@gmail.com> wrote: *> I think I've mostly resolved this issue. * *Being confused is bad but there's something worse, convincing yourself that you're not confused when you're still dead wrong, because then you believe you no longer need to learn. * > * Length contraction is sufficient to define and resolve the problem* *You can't understand length contraction without understanding time dilation because the speed of light can't be the same for all observers unless you have BOTH, and if you have both then you must give up simultaneity. And until you stop thinking about things happening in space and remember that they happen in SPACETIME you're never going to understand Special Relativity, and General Relativity would be hopelessly out of your reach. * *> despite the unanimity of our resident experts, the importance of simultaneity for solving this problem is way overblown.* *As I've said before, nobody on this list has ever been able to convince you that you're wrong about anything and I don't believe anybody ever will. And the tragedy of that is if you think you know everything then you will never learn anything.* Amusing coming from a guy who believes that radioactive decays in the human body produces many worlds. Carroll never justified his claim, and sycophants like you presumably go along with this nonsense. AG The LT is derived with the understanding that SR is dealing with SPACETIME, so I can use it for length contraction as it is stated. AG Apparently you forgot that Einstein assumes x' = f (x, t) and t' = g (x, t) to derive the LT, where the primed coordinates are the transformed coordinates. AG Here's a puzzle for one of the resident experts in relativity: how was I able to determine whether the car fits, or not, in the garage and car frames respectively, without using the disagreement on simultaneity? AG -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-li...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/2ccd706d-7fc1-4887-bac9-2fd4ec861d39n%40googlegroups.com <https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/2ccd706d-7fc1-4887-bac9-2fd4ec861d39n%40googlegroups.com?utm_medium=email&utm_source=footer> . -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. 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