Recent content by emd

Of course. The strikes don't have to be equidistant from the embankment. Einstein uses the example of simultaneity within one frame and its absence in a different frame to illustrate the lack of simultaneity across frames. My claim is that simultaneity does indeed apply across frames...

Because they are at rest in that frame. The lightning bolts are at rest in the embankment frame and in motion in the train frame (because the train is moving relative to the lightning bolts).

Thank you all for your responses. My impression is that the equal validity of all frames of reference applies only in the abstract. In practice, one frame is always privileged, specifically the frame in which the events in question are at rest. In the lightning scenario, because the...

Okay, let's take a scenario in which the train frame is at rest. If a light flashes in the center of the train, in the train frame the light reaches the front and back of the train simultaneously. In the embankment frame, the motion of the train causes the light to reach the back slightly...

In Einstein's thought experiment of the train passing the embankment, the lightning bolts take place within the frame of the embankment, not the train. Does this privilege the embankment frame when measuring the timing of lightning strikes? And if not, why not?

As I understand it, Einstein's dismissal of the "luminiferous aether" was based on his discovery that there is no universal frame of reference, i.e. that no frame of reference is privileged in relation to all other frames. My question is whether this principle can also be stated in the inverse...