On Sun, Sep 25, 2011 at 11:34 AM, Electron wrote: > > By the way, could anybody explain this (IMHO) Relativity paradox? > > first of all: > "Ether doesn't exist" =3D TRUE, relativity says. OK. > > now, I am in a spaceship, I orbit around the Earth at very high > speed for a certain time, when I'm back home all other people > (which resided on the Earth) look older than I am. Thus time in > my spaceship was slowed, or on the Earth it was quickened. > But relativity says that it could have been the Earth to orbit > very quickly around my spaceship, or my spaceship around it.. > as all is relative and NO ETHER (fixed space coordinates) EXISTS! > > To me this sounds very contraddictory! > > Is there any convincing explanation for that, that doesn't break > neither relativity theory nor asks me to have faith in something? > > Cheers, > Mario > > This is also know as the Twins Paradox. Wikipedia < http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_paradox> has a good explanation that includes the interesting phrase "according to a naive application of time dilation , each should paradoxically find the other to have aged more slowly." It then goes on to explain in pedantic detail, the resolution of the paradox. Carey Fisher --=20 http://www.piclist.com PIC/SX FAQ & list archive View/change your membership options at http://mailman.mit.edu/mailman/listinfo/piclist .