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Length contraction is the phenomenon that a moving object's length is measured to be shorter than its proper length, which is the length as measured in the object's own rest frame. [1] It is also known as Lorentz contraction or Lorentz–FitzGerald contraction (after Hendrik Lorentz and George Francis FitzGerald ) and is usually only noticeable ...
Below: In S′ the distance between the spaceships increases, while the string length stays the same. Bell's spaceship paradox is a thought experiment in special relativity. It was first described by E. Dewan and M. Beran in 1959 [1] but became more widely known after John Stewart Bell elaborated the idea further in 1976. [2]
The proper length of an object is the length of the object in the frame in which the object is at rest. Also, this contraction only affects the dimensions of the object which are parallel to the relative velocity between the object and observer. Thus, lengths perpendicular to the direction of motion are unaffected by length contraction.
In physics, the special theory of relativity, or special relativity for short, is a scientific theory of the relationship between space and time. In Albert Einstein 's 1905 paper, On the Electrodynamics of Moving Bodies , the theory is presented as being based on just two postulates : [ p 1 ] [ 1 ] [ 2 ]
The failure of any experiment to detect motion through the aether led Hendrik Lorentz, starting in 1892, to develop a theory of electrodynamics based on an immobile luminiferous aether (about whose material constitution Lorentz did not speculate), physical length contraction, and a "local time" in which Maxwell's equations retain their form in ...
The so-called Length contraction without expansion perpendicularly to the line of motion and by the precise value = / (where l 0 is the length at rest in the aether) was given by Larmor in 1897 and by Lorentz in 1904. In the same year, Lorentz also argued that electrons themselves are also affected by this contraction.
1902 – Lord Rayleigh writes that Lorentz’s hypothesis of length contraction predicts a form of birefringence and tries to observe it. [14] The null result questions Lorentz’s model, but it would be later explained by a combination of length contraction and time dilation. 1902 – Max Abraham develops his classical model of the electron.
1. First postulate (principle of relativity) The laws of physics take the same form in all inertial frames of reference.. 2. Second postulate (invariance of c) . As measured in any inertial frame of reference, light is always propagated in empty space with a definite velocity c that is independent of the state of motion of the emitting body.