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real life is there as a reference. But what if we go beyond the Afraid of Vertigo premises of our concepts and, for argument's sake only, add As Einstein's theories gained a foothold with the younger another dimension, another measurable yardstick to our three generation of believers in the "new physics", Einstein's fame dimensions, and make it 4D: length, breadth, height plus increased steadily and the stature of the aether scientists seemed "something else". This something else can be measured with the to die out accordingly. same yardstick as the three others, but what is it? In real life, there But in 1913, French scientist Georges Sagnac (1869-1926) took is nothing compared to it: it is a mental construct. But we can Einstein's second postulate to the slaughter-house by mounting an apply the same rules to 4D as to 3D, and play with ideas in 3D. interferometer on a spinning disc and proving that there is a To make things easy on mathematics, one us system of definite difference between light going with or against the measurement of speeds where the speed of light is equal to unity direction of rotation. This difference could be easily explained by (c = 1) and all other speeds are presented as a percentage of c using old-time Newtonian arguments that the speed of light (v'=v/c). Miraculously, it seems one has created "space-time" by changes according to the direction of rotation." This not only forgetting that "c", just a few minutes ago, was measured in killed the second postulate, it killed the whole of STR. kilometres per second and now appears as unity: one (1). So Again, Einstein ran short of arguments and was once more beware: it is not space-time after all: it is space-light-distance and unable to defend himself. Instead of dissecting Sagnac's nothing but a simple paper-world suited for easy calculations.'*” mathematical analysis, he just sent a "short note" stating that the It is in such a paper-world that all movements appear to spread out. ~~ whole phenomenon was due to a "Doppler effect" (a change of nicely as time-space paths, and one can backtrack to gain frequency due to movement of the source)!” knowledge of the "past". For the moment, Einstein thought he had saved his reputation Few scientists were happy about this and still fewer understood but all he had done was to prove his own incompetence. When, the use for it. Michelson admitted openly that he did not grasp the as late as 1925, Michelson and Gale repeated the Sagnac meaning of the new ideas—but a experiment using the spinning Earth as young Swiss scientist, Walter Ritz, their laboratory, their results once more did! confirmed rotation as an absolute type Being a specialist in optics and of movement. Einstein, who was by interferometry, Walter Ritz ichi H then a Nobel laureate, did not do (1878-1909) offered to restore some After publishing his anything to save the sacredness of his sanity.'*" He claimed that if we General Theory of Relativity postulates.” assume that all radiation loses some in 191 6, Einstein still refused But Sagnac and, later, Michelson energy as it traverses space, this could and Gale had actually proved nothing account for a vast majority of to accept that galaxies spin. new that Einstein ought to have been phenomena, explain the Michelson— confused about! They had just proved Morley zero-result experiment, save what Galileo and Copernicus had Newton from embarrassment and bury claimed 300 years earlier: that rotation Einstein's theoretical fundament. is not relative movement: it is Because Einstein's two postulates absolute. were insufficient to support his STR, as he admitted in later years, By simple means, any man on a spinning planet can realise that one had to assume two other postulates not presented in 1905: his world is going round, utilising simple means such as those that all information transmitted by radiation must be reversible, used in 1854 by the French physicist Jean Bernard Léon Foucault paving the way for backward time, and that space must bear no (1819-1868). Using a pendulum suspended from the ceiling of impression of what is going on—i.e., the world must be without the Panthéon, anyone living in Paris could observe how the memory! rotation of the Earth made the pendulum perform strange patterns However, if radiations are an irreversible process, as Ritz in sand on the floor. Thus, claiming that the Earth is spinning and argued in 1908-09, time becomes irreversible and knowledge of __ the heavens are still is by no means identical to holding on to the real space depends on direction. Thus, if some history of events is belief that the heavens spin and the Earth is at rest. lost forever and our world becomes inhomogeneous (anisotropic), Unknowingly, as incredible as it may seem, Einstein had the rug is pulled from under the Einsteinian thought-world. claimed exactly this, reviving the cosmology of Ptolemy from the Einstein, who was regarded as a genius by his admirers, could first century AD.* Maybe he had been in a rush creating his find no good counter-arguments to defend his theory against these theory? arguments and somewhat lamely accepted Ritz's criticism but After publishing his General Theory of Relativity in 1916, without changing his own theories. Einstein still refused to accept that galaxies spin. He claimed that In 1909, Walter Ritz died, and Einstein and the believers in the this counteracted his second postulate in the STR. Sadly for "new physics" were all too eager to forget his name and the common sense, all astronomers by 1916 knew that galaxies spin.” embarrassment he had created. Years after Einstein's death, opinion is still in favour of Sagnac Many years later, as quantum physics came of age, proponents and the absolute nature of rotation. When satellite clocks are of this new atomic theory admitted that Ritz's ideas were 100 per synchronised, corrections are made using a speed of light either ne cent in accord with quantum physics; Einstein's were not: time is greater or less than "c irreversible and tomorrow will forever be different from today. And today, spaceships, satellites and aeroplanes all carry laser- But in the paper-world of Einstein, these facts were only regarded ring gyroscopes that use the non-relativistic Sagnac effect to tell as "ugly trees" in the garden of "pure marble".” the speed between the aeroplane and the rotating Earth, with And moreover, if Einsteinians were to have been believed, they accuracies down to nanoseconds.” could have found the "holy grail": perpetual creation out of a limited amount of matter! Continued on page 78 After publishing his General Theory of Relativity in 1916, Einstein still refused to accept that galaxies spin. 46 = NEXUS Continued on page 78 www.nexusmagazine.com AUGUST - SEPTEMBER 2007