- Title Pages
- Preface
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Observers and time
- 3 Subjective images of time
- 4 Cultural images of time
- 5 Literary images of time
- 6 Objective images of time
- 7 Mathematical images of time
- 8 Illusionary images of time
- 9 Causal images of time
- 10 Physics and time
- 11 Biological time
- 12 The dimensions of time
- 13 The architecture of time
- 14 Absolute time
- 15 The reparametrization of time
- 16 Origins of relativity
- 17 Special relativity
- 18 Generalized transformations
- 19 General relativistic time
- 20 Time travel
- 21 Imaginary time
- 22 Irreversible time
- 23 Discrete time
- 24 Time and quanta
- 25 Temporal correlations
- 26 Time reversal
- 27 Quantized spacetime
- 28 Epilogue
- Appendix
- Bibliography
- Index
Special relativity
Special relativity
- Chapter:
- (p.171) 17 Special relativity
- Source:
- Images of Time
- Author(s):
George Jaroszkiewicz
- Publisher:
- Oxford University Press
This chapter discusses special features of Lorentz transformations, such as the loss of absolute simultaneity, relativistic time dilation, the clock hypothesis, and the Twin Paradox. The light cone structure of Minkowski spacetime is explored, followed by an analysis of the causal structure of solutions to the Klein-Gordon equation (the relativistic quantum wave equation that describes massive spinless particles). The chapter shows how the classical causality structure of these solutions can be encoded into a single object known as the Schwinger function, a generalized function that can be used to set up unequal time commutation relations in relativistic quantum field theory. The chapter applies Kemmer’s memory field notation to Fock’s wave-front analysis of the Klein-Gordon equation, using it to find the equation that has to be satisfied by wave front discontinuities propagating throughout spacetime.
Keywords: Lorentz transformations, time dilation, clock hypothesis, Twin Paradox, light cone structure, Klein–Gordon equation, Schwinger function, Kemmer memory field, Fock wave-front analysis
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- Title Pages
- Preface
- 1 Introduction
- 2 Observers and time
- 3 Subjective images of time
- 4 Cultural images of time
- 5 Literary images of time
- 6 Objective images of time
- 7 Mathematical images of time
- 8 Illusionary images of time
- 9 Causal images of time
- 10 Physics and time
- 11 Biological time
- 12 The dimensions of time
- 13 The architecture of time
- 14 Absolute time
- 15 The reparametrization of time
- 16 Origins of relativity
- 17 Special relativity
- 18 Generalized transformations
- 19 General relativistic time
- 20 Time travel
- 21 Imaginary time
- 22 Irreversible time
- 23 Discrete time
- 24 Time and quanta
- 25 Temporal correlations
- 26 Time reversal
- 27 Quantized spacetime
- 28 Epilogue
- Appendix
- Bibliography
- Index
