Does travel at relativistic speed slow proton decay?

Question

The empiricist turn in modern science has subverted the semantics of "time" to refer to measurable phænomena and relativity in particular holds it to be a progression of electromagnetic mutations but do the arguments for the reality of The Twin Paradox have any traction for sub-nuclear interactions? If so, what is the proof? All the lines of reasoning I’ve encountered speak only electromagnetic stasis for preserving the twin who’s in motion (or else epistemic illusions in obtaining information). If not, there would be a physical exception to demonstrate that the way Einstein uses “time” is not what we mean by the word in English. It's not. Modern science also abuses the way we use words like "space" and "universe," too, but society has ceded the power to fix their definitions to that field. Were there a natural clock that’s immune to “time-dilation” then there’d be an observable counter-example which would beat ‘em at their own game.

Answer 1

The short answer is, "Yes."

Relativistic speed absolutely does slow proton decay. This has been directly observed in particle accelerators, and provides strong evidence that Einstein was right. We've also directly observed time dilation in other objects such as GPS satellites.

> ...the way Einstein uses “time” is not what we mean by the word in English.

I disagree. Our perceptions and measurements of time have always been made relative to some local reference frame, and Einstein's usage doesn't differ with that. The only thing that's changed is our old conception that our local measurements must match everybody else's local measurements. In other words, what's changed is the old idea that there is an absolute time standard that holds in all reference frames.

Answer 2

Yes, because relativistic speeds slow all physical processes. This is easily demonstrated in a particle accelerator where particle decay is observed to take longer than usual when the particles are travelling close to the speed of light by exactly the amount predicted by Einstein.

Answer 3

Only to an outside observer. Time is relative (hence, relativity). An object moving at close to the speed of light *relative* to an observer, experiences time more slowly. To the object, the speed of light is still 300,000 km/s, and time is exactly as normal.

Only objects with no rest mass can move at the speed of light. They MUST move at the speed of light, because if they stop moving (i.e. come to rest), they have no mass/energy, and hence don't exist. But since they move at the speed of light, time stops, so their existence can continue.

Readers of the HitchHiker's Guide to the Galaxy will remember that with the Infinite Improbability Drive the spaceship passed through every point in the universe simultaneously. That is exactly what happens at the speed of light. Light-speed particles experience no time, so they also experience no distance, and to themselves are everywhere at once.

Such is the odd world of relativistic speed.

So, to us, it would appear to slow the proton decay. To the proton, time passes as normally, and it decays when it will.

Answer 4

If one tiny particle goes 0.95 of C near a major amount of material, then the tiny particle probably is affected, but the major material is not.
Just a guess. 3 x 10 ^ 8 m/s is C.
Also binding energy in atom's nuclei or center may reduce the mass and the binding energy may differ for different elements and maybe isotopes, don't really know. That's why you can't get a good reading for the mass of a neutron, 'cause it's always bound up with other things.

Answer 5

short answer, yes. A proton might, more often mesons though ( quark pairs eg in cosmic rays) can extend their decay life times by travelling close to the speed of light. except that protons are very stable and so don't tend to decay much at all.

evidence for meson decay is at
http://www2.slac.stanford.edu/vvc/cosmicrays/cratmos.html