What is the theory of relativity and how does it work?

Answer 1

I'll do my best to introduce you to the Theory of Relativity.

To grab your interest I will tell you that it is the scientific reasoning that gave us the atomic bomb and all the rest of that stuff.

The 'General Theory of Relativity' and 'The Special Theory of Relativity' by Albert Einstein form the theory.

Matter and energy cannot be created or destroyed, but it can be converted from one form to the other .... with a great deal of power ( energy ) being consumed or released .... I think it takes a long time of calming down for Quantum ( another theory ) particles to combine and absorb so much energy to become real matter, but when they do they have atomic amounts of energy:

E=MC squared ... means Energy equals Mass times the speed of Light squared. Boom, hydrogen bombs.

If you could convert a pound of matter into its total energy you would destroy the earth and effect planets from here to, at least, Saturn ! ( Which would be affected by Earths disappearance anyway )

Einstein was not out to find weapons, but to find and understand scientific truth ... the nature of our universe ... who we really are
That's cool huh!

Relativity also gives us an understanding of time, it is the fourth dimension in our " 3-D world " ... and gravity which light bends with , proven a few years ago, when light from a known star actually bent around the suns gravity during a solar eclipes and was witnessed by scientists around the world..

Relativity also involves all the things that a lot of other answerers
mentioned, and Einstein was thinking about the the relative motion of trains ... that's how the theory came about, but it has nothing to do with trains and a lot to do with understanding how our universe works.

To big a subject to cover in one answer, but feel free to contact me through Yahoo A. and I'll be glad to continue the discussion.

Yours truly;
Jonnie

Answer 2

Let me give you a very practical example. Have you ever been in a train at the station, and one of you started to move but couldn't tell if you were moving or the other train was moving? Essentially the theory of relativity is saying when 2 things are moving in relation to one another, you can't really tell which one is moving. All you can say is that one is moving in respect to the other. Here is another example. If a plane is flying above you, you would say the plane is moving. You say that because the plane is moving in relation to the Earth, but the Earth is rotating at about 1,000 miles an hour. So both the Earth and the plane are moving, but since you are moving just as fast as the Earth, the plane looks like it is the one moving. One more example. If a pitcher for a baseball team throws a fastball at 95 mph, he would throw it at 105 mph at the batter if he could get a 10 mph running start and then threw it, but to the pitcher it would still only be 95 mph if he kept running at 10 mph after he threw it. Two different frames of reference, two different speeds. The amazing discovery we found was that the speed of light, no matter how fast you could run always appears as the speed of light. It can never go slower or faster. That is essentially the theory of relativity in laymen's terms.

Answer 3

Try reading the book on String Theory called "The Elegant Universe" . The first couple of chapters walk you slowly through the meaning of relativity. It was co-written by Michael B. Green who made a mini-series on the same subject. It's a very exciting read.:)

What I found interesting and I suppose most people find interesting is that no matter what light always always travels at the same speed. No matter if you're on a moving train or bus, light always travels at the speed c= 299 792 458 m / s, that is, relative to whatever is not on the train or bus:)

Answer 4

Albert Einstein's 1905 paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" introduced the special theory of relativity. Special relativity considers that observers in inertial reference frames, which are in uniform motion relative to one another, cannot perform any experiment to determine which one of them is "stationary". This is actually Galileo's principle of relativity; Einstein's contribution was to explicitly include electromagnetism within this principle, which required that the Galilean transformations be replaced by the Lorentz transformations. The resultant theory has many surprising consequences. In particular, it requires that the speed of light in a vacuum be the same for all these observers, regardless of their motion, or the motion of the source of the light, since the invariance of the speed of light is a consequence of Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism.

General relativity
General relativity was developed by Einstein in the years 1907 - 1915. General relativity replaces the global Lorentz symmetry of special relativity with a local Lorentz symmetry in the presence of matter. The presence of matter "curves" spacetime, and this curvature affects the path of free particles (and even the path of light). General relativity uses the mathematics of differential geometry and tensors in order to describe gravitation as an effect of the geometry of spacetime. This theory is based on the general principle of relativity, which requires all observers to experience the same laws of physics, not just those moving with uniform speed, hence its name.

Answer 5

Albert Einstein's 1905 paper "On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies" introduced the special theory of relativity. Special relativity considers that observers in inertial reference frames, which are in uniform motion relative to one another, cannot perform any experiment to determine which one of them is "stationary". This is actually Galileo's principle of relativity; Einstein's contribution was to explicitly include electromagnetism within this principle, which required that the Galilean transformations be replaced by the Lorentz transformations. The resultant theory has many surprising consequences. In particular, it requires that the speed of light in a vacuum be the same for all these observers, regardless of their motion, or the motion of the source of the light, since the invariance of the speed of light is a consequence of Maxwell's equations of electromagnetism.


[edit] General relativity
Main article: General relativity
General relativity was developed by Einstein in the years 1907 - 1915. General relativity replaces the global Lorentz symmetry of special relativity with a local Lorentz symmetry in the presence of matter. The presence of matter "curves" spacetime, and this curvature affects the path of free particles (and even the path of light). General relativity uses the mathematics of differential geometry and tensors in order to describe gravitation as an effect of the geometry of spacetime. This theory is based on the general principle of relativity, which requires all observers to experience the same laws of physics, not just those moving with uniform speed, hence its name.

Answer 6

Nothing is universal not even time, except for the speed of light. This is the same no matter how fast or slow or in which direction you travel. Everything is relative including how fast time goes by but NOT the speed of light.
Combine this with other responses and you should be starting to understand.

Answer 7

The theory of relativity says that the speed of light is the cornerstone, not any place in the cosmos... ie, there is no ultimate reference point.

No matter your velocity, you will always see that the speed of light will be travelling at that ultimate velocity. If you and I were looking at a photon speeding by, but you were going 1/2 the speed of light in reference to me, we would both see the photon, and relative to each of us, the speed of the photon would remain constant.

In order for this to happen, our distances and our time must change relative to each of us (yours will be different from mine) so the speed of light can remain constant.

Answer 8

basically it is a theory of space and time. it unifies space and time in a single entity called space-time. this theory helps to explain the time dilatation, length contraction and mass increased of an object that is moving. it is based in postulates such as the postulate that i loved is that all observers will always measure the speed of light to be the same no matter what their state of uniform linear motion is. and of course it has a consequence the so called E=mc2 equation.


good luck... i hope you get it

Answer 9

well , i would like to explain the way einstein explained it. if a boy is made to sit with a pretty girl,an hour just seems like a minute but if the same boy is made to sit on a hot stove a minute passed seems to be an hour .Thats theory of relativity

Answer 10

well its like this if u think time is moving slow and time for someone else is moving fast but the same amount of time has occured for both of you then its like they say on stargate sg-1 its all relative. :) that should prove as an example and help to explain how it works i hope