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| Image Source: MIT Open Course Ware - General Relativity |
Topics: Black Holes, Einstein, Special Relativity, GPS, Gravity, General Relativity, Spacetime, Wormholes
The 100th anniversary of the General Theory of Relativity also happens to have coincided with Einstein's birthday and the American Nerd-inspired Pi Day last Saturday (I say American, because it works when you use the dating sequence 3-14-15, and breaks down if you use military or European dating formats: e.g. 14 March 15; 14.3.15). Star Trek abused the word "warp" ad nauseum to get their astronauts from one side of the galaxy to the other in record time to solve galactic issues before the ending credits. Space is still vast, and getting to even our own solar system's planets in a human lifetime will take something more than conventional chemical rockets and Newtonian momentum, hence NASA's concentration on breakthrough propulsion technologies up to and inclusive of warp drive. Quoting one of the articles whose link I give below:
In 1905, Albert Einstein determined that the laws of physics are the same for all non-accelerating observers, and that the speed of light in a vacuum was independent of the motion of all observers. This was the theory of special relativity. It introduced a new framework for all of physics and proposed new concepts of space and time.
Einstein then spent ten years trying to include acceleration in the theory and published his theory of general relativity in 1915. In it, he determined that massive objects cause a distortion in space-time, which is felt as gravity. [1]
It is our current, best description in modern physics of gravity, and along with its effects, our Global Positioning Systems in our cars and smart phones; the evolution of stars into Brown Dwarfs; White Dwarfs, Black Holes and the theoretical possibility of Wormholes. It has outlived Einstein and proven its usefulness time and again.
1. Space.com: Einstein's Theory of General Relativity, Nola Taylor Redd
2. Einstein-Online: General Relativity
3. Princeton University Press: Relativity: The Special and the General Theory
100th Anniversary edition, Edited by Hanoch Gutfreund & Jürgen Renn
4. Physics Central: Einstein's Relativity and Everyday Life, Clifford M. Will (think GPS)
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