TheUnknown said:
so to an outside observer it would be happening in slow motion?
No, an outside observer also sees the light beam move at 186282.397 miles/sec in
his frame. He would see clocks aboard the ship running slow, if that's what you mean.
TheUnknown said:
so light IS time... and time is light?
No, or at least I can't think of any way that statement would make sense.
TheUnknown said:
and the speed of light controls time and the way we percieve it? is this true?
In a way I guess this is true. The way spacetime works in relativity can be derived uniquely from two postulates--the first says that the laws of physics should look the same in every reference frame, the second says light should be measured to move the same speed in every reference frame. If these are true, then each frame
must see other frame's rulers shrink and clocks slowed down in the way relativity predicts.
TheUnknown said:
and is there anywhere where i can read more about this.
Well, you probably want to start with learning about the "Lorentz transformation" which tells you how, if you know the coordinates of an event in one frame, you can figure out the coordinates of the same event in a different frame. You can play around with the Lorentz transformation equations and see for yourself that if the distance/time between two events is c in one frame, it will also be c in another frame. Once you are familiar with the Lorentz transformation then you can try to understand how it can be derived from Einstein's two postulates which I mentioned above. I'm not sure what good sites for these things would be, maybe someone else can offer a recommendation, or you can try looking around on google.
This page is pretty good for learning the concepts of relativity, but it doesn't seem to talk about the details of the Lorentz transformation or how it is derived.
I can give you the equations of the Lorentz transform right now, though. Suppose you have two reference frames A and A', with A' moving at velocity v along the x-axis of A, and with the origins of each coordinate system matching at time zero in both frames (ie when t=0 in A and t'=0 in A', the point in space x=0, y=0, z=0 in A matches the point x'=0, y'=0, z'=0 in A'). In that case, if you know the space and time coordinates of some event x,y,z,t in A, and you want to know the coordinates x',y',z',t' of that same event in A', you'd use the Lorentz transformation:
[tex]x' = \gamma (x - vt)[/tex]
[tex]y' = y[/tex]
[tex]z' = z[/tex]
[tex]t' = \gamma (t - vx/c^2)[/tex]
where [tex]\gamma = 1/\sqrt{1 - v^2/c^2}[/tex]
That's all there is to it, from this you can prove that each frame sees the other's clocks slowed down, that each sees the other's rulers shrunk, that if something is moving at velocity u along the x'-axis of A' then it will be moving at [tex](u + v)/(1 + uv/c^2)[/tex] along the x-axis of A, and so on.
TheUnknown said:
I'm still very interested now... in why inside the ship the observer sees the rocket traveling at 7,000 mph, but outside it is not
If the outside observer is at rest relative to the ship, then he will see the rocket moving at 7,000 mph, but even in Newtonian physics, if the outside observer saw the ship moving at 3,000 mph in his frame, then he wouldn't see the rocket moving at 7,000 mph, he'd see it moving at 10,000 mph. But like I've said, velocities don't add in this simple way in relativity. If you like we could analyze this problem in terms of the Lorentz transformation, finding the coordinates that the rocket is launced and the coordinates it reaches the front end, as well as the coordinates a light beam is emitted from the back and the coordinates it hits the front end, in both the rocket's frame and another frame where the rocket is moving.
