Re: Experimental verification of the relativity theory

[Jack Uretsky <jlu@HEP.ANL.GOV>]

        Actually, SR is tested daily at such places as Fermilab.  For
example the creation of the proton-anti-proton beams in the Tevatron is an
exercise in relativistic dynamics.  Steering those beams so that they
collide in a region measured in millimeters, or fractions of a millimeter,
is another such exercise.
        The pion has a lifetime (at lest) of about 10^{-8} secs, yet
practical pion beams have been in use since the '50's.  Why?  Because at
energies of hundreds of MeV the time dilation effect makes the apparent
lifetime long enough to transport and direct the beam over long distances.
        As a practical matter it is not possible to create, or analyze, a
high-energy physics experiment without taking relativistic effects into
account.  This is not just a "scientific curiosity", it is an engineering
reality.
                                        Regards,
                                                Jack




On Mon, 5 May 2003, Jon Bell wrote:

> On Tue, 29 Apr 2003, Pentcho Valev wrote:
>
> > John Mallinckrodt wrote:
> >
> > > It is the spectacular agreement of the many seemingly bizarre
> > > predictions of this theory with every experiment that has been
> > > performed that give us such enormous confidence in the primary
> > > postulate.
> >
> > Here I am really incompetent - I don't know of those spectacular
> > agreements -
>
> I'm coming in late on this discussion because I've had to deal with the
> usual end-of-semester activities (I turned in my final grades this
> morning, hurrah!).  In case nobody else has mentioned this yet, here's a
> useful summary of the experimental situation with respect to special
> relativity, part of the Usenet Physics FAQ:
>
> <http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/experiments.html>
>
> --
> Jon Bell <jbell@presby.edu>                         Presbyterian College
> Dept. of Physics and Computer Science        Clinton, South Carolina USA

--
        "What did Barrow's lectures contain?  Bourbaki writes with some
scorn that in his book in a hundred pages of the text there are about 180
drawings.  (Concerning Bourbaki's books it can be said that in a thousand
pages there is not one drawing, and it is not at all clear which is
worse.)"
                                        V. I. Arnol'd in
                                Huygens & Barrow, Newton & Hooke