I’m fairly familiar with the standard twin paradox, but I’ve never seen the paradox adequately resolved for a closed universe. Closed in the sense that if you travel in a fixed direction long enough, you’ll end up where you started; like if space were the surface of a hyper-sphere.
Anyone know how to resolve it? What would happen if two twins set out in opposite directions and (assuming the universe is closed) they ran into each other again? Calculations made by either of them would yield that the other should be older and they could ask each other who was the younger via radio transmissions without necessarily stopping.
I’ve seen one person resolve it (in “American Mathematical Monthly”) by saying that there IS a preferred reference frame in the universe, but that kind of flies in the face of one of the basic postulates of Relativity.
(Just FYI this stumped my physics professor, but he specializes in Particle Physics not Cosmology)
2006-07-23 08:39:42 · 3 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
I do not know, maybe that's why it is a paradox.
Good Luck finding an answer
2006-07-24 14:23:05 · answer #1 · answered by az 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Where is the paradox?
A paradox simply means there are conflicting assumptions made. Here the assumption one age different than the other is not valid. There is no proof it happens. This is refrence frame issue. How to correlate 2 refrence frames. Theory of relativity has lots of assumtions and statements. Aging also one among them and doesnt have any vality.
2006-07-23 15:48:36 · answer #2 · answered by Dr M 5 · 0⤊ 0⤋
isnt it amazing
2006-07-23 15:42:55 · answer #3 · answered by ast5792 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋