- #1
Buckethead
Gold Member
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It seems that time dilation does not occur due to acceleration alone. It surprised me to learn this due to the equivalence principle as I was under the impression that one could not experimentally know the difference between being accelerated in space and being at rest in a gravitational field (other than tidal forces). The only experiment I'm aware of to verify this was done with muons in a centrifuge with a force of 10^18 g being applied (lots of g). My question: Is this definitive proof? Does the fact that a muon is a particle make this experiment any less valid than say putting a quartz watch inside a centrifuge? Isn't acceleration a form of space warping due to the differential time dilation between one part of an accelerated object and another? Thanks (no math in the answer please).