If an object moves, time for it will appear slower for an observer. How can you tell who is the observer?
Relativity states that if an object moves, time for it will appear to go slower for an outside observer. Since the object is moving in respect to the observer, the observer is doing the same in respect to the object. So what am I missing? With this logic you can’t determine if the object or the observer is slowed down.
Because theres like a millisecond where the light has to bounce of the wall into your eyes..btw not even a millisecond
Because theres like a millisecond where the light has to bounce of the wall into your eyes..btw not even a millisecond
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Which one is the observer and which one is the observed is relative (hey, it’s relativity after all). If two people are traveling at different speeds, then person A will be at rest in his rest frame and he will observe person B passing time more slowly. However, person B will at rest in her frame and she will observe person A passing time more slowly. They both observe the other passing time more slowly. And the equations work out this way and will allow for them to both observe the other passing time more slowly.
Now, if you are wondering about the twin paradox, where there are two twins and one gets on a rocket and goes real fast, then comes back and the other one aged a lot, here the thing about that. The reason one twin gets older than the other (so that there is a break in the symmetry) has to do with the fact that the rocket twin had to accelerate to be going faster. Relativity only works for inertial reference frames, where there is no acceleration. The thing that defines the rocket twin as the fast twin is the fact that he entered a non-inertial accelerating frame, which changed the way time passed during the acceleration.
But as long as there is no acceleration, which person is the observer and which is the observed is all relative.
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Physicist
Plato
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