Everyone has heard about SR: Lorentz contraction, time dilation, etc. But not many people have stopped to think what would you actually see (as opposed to what you would measure) if you were travelling at relativistic speeds. The answer is more complex than one would think: you wouldn't see contracted objects, but rotated/deformed ones and there are additional effects (Doppler shift, aberration, changes in light intensity...)
Oddly enough, no one had thought of this until the 50s and even now the topic is much misunderstood. So, what better than a simulation? Here are several links (follow the third one if you are only going to visit one):
Most of these are quite old, I'm afraid (they talk about 1MB videos as if they were huge), but they are very nice and useful.
Oddly enough, no one had thought of this until the 50s and even now the topic is much misunderstood. So, what better than a simulation? Here are several links (follow the third one if you are only going to visit one):
- Physics FAQ about the Penrose Teller rotation
- A very good and simple, if somewhat primitive page:C-ship by John Walker. It is very well organised and the easiest way to learn the ideas behind all this.
- Which takes us to: Seeing relativity by A. Searle. Impressive. You can see the commentary of the videos (don't panic: no math) here.
- http://www.tat.physik.uni-tuebingen.de/~weiskopf/sr/index.html
- Trip to black holes and neutron stars
- Relativistic flight through Stonehenge
- Relativistic starflight
- Andrew Hamilton's homepage
Most of these are quite old, I'm afraid (they talk about 1MB videos as if they were huge), but they are very nice and useful.