Can anybody explain Einstein's theory of Relativity to me?

Question

His theory of relativity is:
D=R * T
Distance= Rate (times) Time

Answer 1

Einstein's Theory of Relativity has nothing to do with Distance = velocity * time. That's classical Newtonian Physics.

The others have done a good job of explaining portions of the Theory of Relativity, especially starwarsfan 's extract from the pbs website.

One of the most important aspects of Einstein's theory is that the observations you make about things happening depends implicitly and explicitly on your frame of reference -- exactly where the observer "stands". An observer in motion with respect to an event sees that event differently than an observer at rest with respect to the same event.

Answer 2

Instead of thinking that Gravity is a force as Newton may have you believe, think of Gravity as more of a bending of space and time. It's easier if you look at the fabric of the universe (space time) like a big blanket being held flat by 2 people standing and holding it a both ends. Now, put a cannon ball in the middle of the blanket. The cannon ball represents Earth. Notice the blanket sinks a little around where the cannon ball is placed, simulating Earths mass bending space time. If you were to put a marble a few inches from where the cannonball rests. It would move down the sinking area towards to cannonball. Viola, gravity! Hence gravity is not a force but it is objects moving through a curved/warped space-time path. There is a lot more to it but, that's the essence of Einstien's theory of relativity

Answer 3

you choose for answering, in below 10 words, a concept that has exercised the final minds over the final ninety years!! Oh that existence substitute into that easy! There are, extremely, 2 theories of relativity: the specific and the final. to locate their define, study Einstein's extensive-unfold e book, "Relativity" revealed by utilising Methuen & Co Ltd. I doubt that your learn little from the solutions given right here. one element i could warning you approximately: the belief of relativity isn't e=m^2

Answer 4

In November of 1919, at the age of 40, Albert Einstein became an overnight celebrity, thanks to a solar eclipse. An experiment had confirmed that light rays from distant stars were deflected by the gravity of the sun in just the amount he had predicted in his theory of gravity, general relativity. General relativity was the first major new theory of gravity since Isaac Newton's more than 250 years earlier.

Einstein became a hero, and the myth-building began. Headlines appeared in newspapers all over the world. On November 8, 1919, for example, the London Times had an article headlined: "The Revolution In Science/Einstein Versus Newton." Two days later, The New York Times' headlines read: "Lights All Askew In The Heavens/Men Of Science More Or Less Agog Over Results Of Eclipse Observations/Einstein Theory Triumphs." The planet was exhausted from World War I, eager for some sign of humankind's nobility, and suddenly here was a modest scientific genius, seemingly interested only in pure intellectual pursuits.

The essence of gravity
What was general relativity? Einstein's earlier theory of time and space, special relativity, proposed that distance and time are not absolute. The ticking rate of a clock depends on the motion of the observer of that clock; likewise for the length of a "yardstick." Published in 1915, general relativity proposed that gravity, as well as motion, can affect the intervals of time and of space. The key idea of general relativity, called the equivalence principle, is that gravity pulling in one direction is completely equivalent to an acceleration in the opposite direction. A car accelerating forwards feels just like sideways gravity pushing you back against your seat. An elevator accelerating upwards feels just like gravity pushing you into the floor.

If gravity is equivalent to acceleration, and if motion affects measurements of time and space (as shown in special relativity), then it follows that gravity does so as well. In particular, the gravity of any mass, such as our sun, has the effect of warping the space and time around it. For example, the angles of a triangle no longer add up to 180 degrees, and clocks tick more slowly the closer they are to a gravitational mass like the sun.

Many of the predictions of general relativity, such as the bending of starlight by gravity and a tiny shift in the orbit of the planet Mercury, have been quantitatively confirmed by experiment. Two of the strangest predictions, impossible ever to completely confirm, are the existence of black holes and the effect of gravity on the universe as a whole (cosmology).