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Gravitational Waves & LIGO

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New Buddha

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A big event has been made public to day with the discovery of gravitational waves.  It's beyond my pay grade, but I find it interesting.

http://motls.blogspot.com/2016/02/ligo-discovers-black-hole-merger-12.html

http://www.wired.com/2016/02/scientists-spot-the-gravity-waves-that-flex-the-universe/

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  • 3 years later...
13 minutes ago, AlexL said:

Keith Lockitch published on the ARI site a two part article explaining the gravitational waves: part 1 and part 2

<excerpt from part 1>

As a physics PhD who formerly worked in gravitational physics, my goal in this article is to guide you — in non-technical terms — toward an appreciation of the science of gravitational waves: What they are, how they were discovered, and why it’s so valuable that we can now detect them.

While not just a philosophic breakdown, this paragraph shoehorned in nicely with this article written for Aeon recently, advocating breaking philosophy down into non-technical terms for the general lay-person.
Speak to the Shoemaker.

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The article is very interesting and useful.

There is, however, a point which could be misleading - at least, but with no impact on the rest. The author writes:

[Einstein's] Special Theory of Relativity ... applies only to objects that are either at rest or are moving in a straight line at a constant speed — not accelerating or changing direction.

In fact, the Special Theory of Relativity (SR) does apply to objects moving at variable velocities and on any trajectories, as does the Newtonian mechanics, of which SR is an extension for velocities comparable with the speed of light. If it were otherwise, SR would be largely useless!

Edited by AlexL
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