About Einstein's theory../?

Question

This is one of my home work questions but I really don't get it..

Discuss the properties of mass that concernted Einstein and what theory resulted. How does this explain the discrepancy between clocks in New York and Denver?

Answer 1

Relativity does not explain the "discrepancy between clocks in New York and Denver". The reason why they've adopted different times is because when it's high noon in New York, it's still morning in Denver, the sun isn't at the highest point. That's because the Earth is round, and it's revolving.

After assuming that the speed of light was constant for all moving observers, Einstein was able to deduce that mass was interconvertible with energy, the formula being E=mc^2. But the "theory that resulted from mass" has to do with its connection with curved spacetime, which is part of general relativity. The equation between mass-energy and spacetime curvature is 8 pi T = G,
where T is the stress-energy tensor, and G is the curvature tensor. I'm sure your teacher will be happy to explain the details to you. But in fact, Einstein's special relativity did NOT come as a consequence from his understanding of mass, but the other way around.

Addendum: redwind64 did bring up a good point, even though it takes extremely sophisicated lab equipment to detect the difference.

Answer 2

Denver is at a higher altitude than New York, so I think you will find that, because the gravity field is weaker, that clocks in Denver will run a little faster.

Einstein was concerned about the effect of strong gravitational fields on time. Gravity is caused by the presence of mass/matter.

Answer 3

What does the disdrepancy involve? Like what are the clocks? Are they wall clocks? Or cessium?