On Feb 8, 5:19 pm, Rodney <rodneyjke...@[EMAIL PROTECTED]
> wrote:
> First off, it's not handwaving, it's technobabble. Every reference
> source I have access to states that as a body with mass accelerates,
> it gains in mass.
This concept is misleading. In relativity, many of our intuitive
ideas about physical properties no longer apply. It is convenient to
take certain mathematical relations between quantities of the motion
that turn out to be invariant no matter how fast the object is
moving. One of these is the so called "invariant mass" or "rest
mass", which I will denote by the letter m, and is equal to
m = E^2/c^4 - p.p/c^2
where E is the objects total energy, p is the (vector) momentum, and I
use the period to represent the vector dot product in three spatial
dimensions. It so happens that at rest, the momentum p=0, so that the
minimum possible energy is E_min = m c^2. Note that the invariant
mass does not increase when the object goes faster - that's the whole
point. It is equal to the normal concept of mass that we use in every
day life. The energy of a moving object does increase. The extra
energy above and beyond the minimum energy is typically called kinetic
energy. This has led some sloppy thinking to the effect that there is
a mass (m', say)directly proportional to the energy, m' = E/c^2.
However, this "mass" has little use or predictive power, being simply
a rescaled unit of energy and introducing no conceptual value above
and beyond what is contained in the energy.
> Now I grant you that my information is a bit old,
> but all of them agree that the mechanism for this is unknown. More
> current sources talk of Higgs partials, but I am skeptical of a
> partial whose only job is to support an obscure part of a theory.
Bah. You don't need the Higgs field to describe any aspect of special
(or general) relativity.
> My
> theory is based on what I see as an alternative explanation of the
> affect.
There is no need for an alternative explanation. Special relativity
is a perfectly adequate and self consistent description of motion
which comes about solely by demanding self-consistency in the rules of
classical physics. Trying to introduce photons or any other quantum
phenomena to explain a purely classical effect is not only needless,
but indicates a misunderstanding of the problem by bringing in
something quite unrelated. While the field of relativistic quantum
effects is perfectly legitimate and useful, it is unneeded for any
classical effect (such as special relativity).
Luke
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