Letter to European Space Agency (ESA) Regarding Special Relativity Test That Should be Done Using Atomic and Quartz Clocks Together to See if Time Itself Dilates and if the Time Dilation Equation Holds Outside Atomic-Subatomic Realm.
This is needed because there have been Time Dilation Confirmation Problems with Clocks in Other Realms.
Further, Certain Proposals to ESA by Physics groups suggesting Testing Evade Key Problem with Logical Foundations; ESA should work to have Europe Return to Logic as the Foundation of Science.
To: ESA Management
CC: People Mentioned in Cited Science Documents
Sent: October 20, 2023
Subject: A Special Relativity Test Using Atomic and Quartz Clocks Together Should be done to see if Time Itself Dilates
Dear ESA:
This is regarding the European Space Agency (ESA) being guided away from following objective methodology in its choice of ways to test special relativity’s time dilation.
Europe has recently begun aggressively looking to fight “online disinformation and misinformation to ensure the protection of European values” and has also been examining “Disinformation and Science … gullibility of students” Unfortunately, established authorities and old media can themselves be the source of misinformation. The ESA and other agencies must become aware of misinformation that originates from these two groups. Many are becoming cognizant of who the powerful evaders of truth in our world are. “Trust in media is so low that half of Americans now believe that news organizations deliberately mislead them.” https://fortune.com/2023/02/
But since this is about physics, what about European media in the field of science?
Nature, the leading European science news publication, seemingly has a bias with a strong pro-Einstein agenda. Testing special and relativity has been part of the experimental missions that ESA has taken on, and is further considering. Let us see how objective and transparent Nature has been in its reporting on evidence of special relativity’s time dilation. If one were to look for news and papers on special relativity time dilation failure in cosmic bodies one would find these missing from Nature. (New Scientist, another European publication, has been the rare science media that has been commendably straightforward regarding time dilation, see https://www.newscientist.com/
Nature Physics reports in an article titled “Special relativity – Ticking clocks,” https://www.nature.com/
Nature has been cherry-picking by extensively reporting on the time dilation experiments using atomic clocks, all of which have successfully confirmed it to increasing precision. It should not be surprising that the ESA and others have been guided towards more and more testing using atomic clocks and confirming success; pre-WWII objective science methodology would, instead, have looked to increase testing on risky clocks and discuss those confirmation problems openly.
After years of ignoring all those papers on time dilation failures in cosmic bodies Nature found this opportunity to publish and widely disseminate a 2023 paper that suggests quasars data conforms to there being time dilation: “Detection of the cosmological time dilation of high-redshift quasars,” https://www.nature.com/
Even with the above “the empire strikes back” paper where Nature finally addressed time dilation beyond the atomic and subatomic realm, which they had for decades steadfastly refused to report on, they are not able to strike back with a paper having precision measurements of cosmic clocks. To confirm that diverse types of clocks show special relativity’s time dilation, such precision measurements need to be made for clocks outside the atomic and subatomic realm. The special relativity time dilation equation has not given high-confidence results for clocks outside this atomic-subatomic realm, with some cosmic clocks being reported to have zero time dilation. However, the power of Nature is such that its published paper on the topic is now the most widely covered by news publications and was covered even by general-news sources in foreign countries; so this news cherry-picking is now going have this one paper dominate over others that showed failure of time dilation and thus were largely ignored by science media and physics authorities. And pro-Einstein physics authorities and science media would want to move on, designating this paper as the time dilation confirmation, even though there has been no proper confirmation of time dilation outside the atomic-subatomic realm.
A simple way for ESA to test special relativity and its foundation that time itself dilates is to test whether two clocks with different mechanisms stay in sync or go out of sync at high speed. This can be done using atomic clocks together with quartz clocks in one flying craft. Atomic clocks, of course, have increasingly high precisions, but because time dilation is being repeatedly confirmed in atomic clocks does not mean it happens for all clocks. Sophisticated quartz clocks now have an accuracy of 1 second in 600 years. The other part of the experiment is speed, and speeds have been rising, and needed speeds are available today.
Is there a theoretical basis for suggesting that the time dilation value will vary with the type of clock?
Einstein has a derivation that the two postulates of special relativity can lead only to one set of equations, namely the Lorentz transformations. The time dilation equation there states that time itself dilates by a factor and thus all clocks in the same frame must have the same time dilation. But there is a counterexample to the derivation showing another set of equations can also be consistent with the two postulates. In these alternative equations, time itself does not dilate and thus all clocks need not show the same time dilation.
A counterexample to a derivation would mean that the logic of the derivation is flawed. Physics authorities across Europe religiously teach students Einstein’s wrong derivation, hiding the counterexample. This evasion of logic in European classrooms and the teaching of something incorrect would fall under “Disinformation and Science” where the “gullibility of students” is exploited. It is a decline of “European values” that logic as a foundation of science has been abandoned in European physics.
ESA could help experimentally settle the philosophical question of whether time itself dilates and also confirm (or topple) the special relativity foundation that it does, by showing that diverse types of clocks will give the same time dilation. This is a chance for ESA to earn a feather in its cap and a shining place in physics history by being the first to conclusively test that time itself dilates, with dilation factor being unaffected by the clock mechanism. This test is a simple clocks-pair experiment. That would be fundamental research by pairing an atomic with a clock outside the atomic-subatomic realm, rather than just another of many repeat confirmations using only atomic clocks.
Special relativity’s powerful supporters – the science media and physics authorities – would be against such alternative high-risk testing with diverse pair clocks, having had a bad experience with special relativity time dilation testing outside the atomic-subatomic clocks domain.
Let us address two recent proposals made to ESA, which are led by those who are experts on Time and Special Relativity. ESA would know some of these names well. However, as the quote goes: “In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual.”
The below proposals were submitted to ESA under its Space-Time Explorer (STE) and fundamental physics pursuits.
The “GrailQuest: hunting for Atoms of Space and Time hidden in the wrinkle of Space-Time” proposal comes from quantum gravity theorists, who evade the reality of a counterexample to Einstein’s derivation of the Lorentz transformations from the two postulates and heap the usual praises on the derivation, https://www.cosmos.esa.int/
Another proposal, “Space Time Explorer and …”, is led by individuals who have long been advocating more atomic clock experiments. They declare, https://arxiv.org/pdf/2211.
While purporting “to consider systematically all hypothetical violations” (including all violations of the time dilation equation), SME and other testing frameworks have been developed by those who wrongly believe that the Lorentz transformations are the only equations consistent with both postulates of special relativity. These frameworks guide towards experiments based on future physics having the Lorentz transformations as a limiting case. Thus SME and other advocated frameworks do not guide towards testing for the dramatic possibility of zero time dilation; the zero value in many published observations of cosmic bodies claim is ignored by physicists supporting testing through such frameworks.
Many in physics have acknowledged reading the counterexample which shows that Einstein did not have a valid derivation that the two postulates necessarily lead to the Lorentz transformations (and to no other equations). And they have not stated it to not be a counterexample or to be a crackpot or pseudoscience claim; they just evade the logic that a counterexample to a derivation means that the derivation is wrong. Indeed, any of the large number of expert physicists who are getting a copy of this, because their names are in the above two mentioned space and time proposals to ESA, are welcome to reply publicly regarding the counterexample (copy of paper having counterexample attached).
Since Einstein’s derivation is wrong, proposals to the ESA that assume it correct are founded on evasion of Logic. Rejection of logic as a foundation of science is an extraordinary decline of scientific methodology. Europe should work to reverse this development.
Going to misinformation beyond science, the wider European problem of media and research universities not discussing or disseminating certain truths they do not like, but joining together to evade them, comes with devastating consequences for the future of Europe. The consequences are nothing less than the fall of a civilization.
Thanks and regards,
Ashish Sirohi
(I have put a copy of this email on my churchofphysics.org website.)
Attachment: Paper – Space is Discrete for Mass and Continuous for Light
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