- #1
epovo
- 114
- 21
Hi all,
I can't seem to find any historic account of when those two theories got their (quite strange) names. Can someone point me to a source?
One of the reasons I am interested in this is the persistent idea in popularizing texts, especially from the 1970's, that Special Relativity could only deal with uniformly moving observers and that General Relativity was needed to discuss any accelerated frames of reference (I lost count of the times I was told that you could not account for the twin paradox without studying GR!). I had to actually start studying GR in earnest (and reading this forum) to dispel such a widespread myth from my mind.
I think the names Special vs. General added to the confusion in the minds of the public (probably outside a small expert circle). So who gave it their names and why? Is it possible that Einstein started to conceive GR without a clear idea of what he was trying to achieve?
I can't seem to find any historic account of when those two theories got their (quite strange) names. Can someone point me to a source?
One of the reasons I am interested in this is the persistent idea in popularizing texts, especially from the 1970's, that Special Relativity could only deal with uniformly moving observers and that General Relativity was needed to discuss any accelerated frames of reference (I lost count of the times I was told that you could not account for the twin paradox without studying GR!). I had to actually start studying GR in earnest (and reading this forum) to dispel such a widespread myth from my mind.
I think the names Special vs. General added to the confusion in the minds of the public (probably outside a small expert circle). So who gave it their names and why? Is it possible that Einstein started to conceive GR without a clear idea of what he was trying to achieve?