Re: [Phys-l] mass or rest mass?

[chuck britton <cvbritton@mac.com>]

The neat thing about wikipedia articles is that adventurous and 
knowledgeable folks can CORRECT stuff that others just complain 
about! ! ! !

I doubt that many physics articles are being moderated.


At 4:34 PM -0400 3/25/11, James McLean wrote:
> Hello,
>
> It was recently brought to my attention that numerous pages on wikipedia
> are espousing "mass conservation."  See for example "Mass conservation",
> "E=mc2", and "Mass and energy in special relativity".
>
> I wonder what everyone's reactions to these articles is.
>
> My impression is that the physics is essentially accurate, but that the
> use of nomenclature is not so good.  It was my understanding that modern
> usage in relativity is that "mass" means "rest mass", and thus that
> "mass" and "energy" are not two names for the same thing (as one of
> those articles claims).  It is true that the (rest) mass and the
> non-mass-energy of one component of a system contribute equally and
> indistinguishably to the total (rest) mass of the whole system.  But
> that isn't quite the same thing.
>
> Cheers,
> -- James
> --
> Dr. James McLean                     phone: (585) 245-5897
> Dept. of Physics and Astronomy       FAX:   (585) 245-5116
> SUNY Geneseo                         email: mclean@geneseo.edu
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