[BLANK_AUDIO].

We've reached Week 5 now, so let's do a,

a preview of the, the major topics of the
week, where we've labeled it Spacetime
Switches.
there are actually a number of different
topics we're covering but the, the idea
of Spacetime Switches comes from the
Lorentz Transformation, which we'll be
talking about, enables us to switch
between different frames of reference
very easily.
But before that we'll have, we'll have
the quotations of the week.
We'll do that in a minute.
we'll talk just briefly about convenient
units for the speed of light.
The concept of a lightyear.
And the fact that if we measure distances
in lightyears, a lightyear is a distance,
the distance light travels in a year, as
some of you may, may know.
if we measure velocities in lightyears
per year, then c, the speed of light, is
simply one.
By definition, it's one lightyear per
year.
It's the distance it travels in, in one
year.
And so, that and a couple of other tips
that will make it a little easier for us
calculationally when we do things.
And then we're going to spend a little
time looking at a case of time dilation
and length contraction to build on the
ideas we were working with.
Last week we introduced and, and derived
last week, you get some more familiarity
with them, just struggle with them a
little bit.
Try to get a deeper understanding of it
and we're calling this Star Tours part 1.
That is we're going to send, in this
case, Bob will go on a trip to a nearby
star, five light, lightyears away.
The nearest star to earth is actually
about 4.2 light years away.
We mentioned that in one of the one of
the early problem sets.
But I think we mentioned, mentioned in
terms of the distance not in lightyears,
but just in how long light would take to,
to get there, it's about 4.2, 4.1, 4.2
years.
Anyways, so, we're just going to imagine
Bob taking a trip there.
And we're going to analyze it from
Alice's perspective as she watches Bob
take the trip to the nearby store, and
she's on Earth.

So analyze it from her perspective, and

Bob's perspective, we'll try to make
sense of both their perspectives.
And then we'll, we'll sort of hit a wall,
hit a puzzle in that there will be
something that really doesn't make sense,
we'll get to.
And so, we'll have to hold that aside for
a minute.
And because we won't be able to answer it
yet and that's really what the next part
here is.
In order to answer it, we're going to
derive the Lorentz transformation.
Lorentz Transformation just like the
Galilean Transformation allowed us to
switch between different frames of
reference.
in a non-relativistic manner, the Lorentz
transformation also derived by, by
Einstein.
But typically called the Lorentz
transformation now.
allows us to switch between different
frames of reference when relativistic
speeds are involved.
And it actually is equivalent to the
Galilean Transformation for slow speeds.
So it, it subsumes the Galilean
Tranformation.
So, this will probably be the most
algebra we do in the entire course.
It will take us a while to get through
it.
Several video lectures, but we'll work
our way through it and, and then get
these transformation equations.
Then we'll spend a little time exploring
those transformation equations.
Trying to understand them, seeing what
they are telling us, see if they make
sense from what we know so far.
And then we're going to use those
transformation equations.
The, they're very general.
They're useful in all kinds of ways but
we're going to use them but we're going
to use them to revisit this whole idea of
leading clocks lag because this will turn
out to be the key to understanding our
Star Tours conundrum that we end up with,
with there.
so we're going to revisit leading clocks
lag and do it quantitatively, find out
exactly how much do leading clocks lag
when you have, remember when you have a
series of clocks moving by you, you're in
one frame of reference.
You see two or more clocks moving in
another frame of reference past you, then

the leading clock as it's moving past you

in in that series of clocks, or two
clocks, lags behind the rear clock.
And we did that qualitatively before, now
we'd like to figure out exactly how much
does it lag behind that clock.
And that's going to be the key as we
discover to to figure out this, this
problem we run into, that Star Tours part
2 here.
And then we'll say a few words about the
ultimate speed limit speed of light being
an ultimate speed limit and why that
might be so, what would happen if you
could travel at the, the speed of light.
And then finally talk about combining
velocities, we did a little bit of this
with sort of the Galilean Transformation
idea where if you know, if you have a car
and you have a basketball shooting
machine that, that we talked about, and
then a tennis ball out, out of the
basketball that type of thing.
In our every day experience, those types
of things just add, you add the
velocities, or if the velocities are
opposite each other you subtract the
velocities.
Well, a similar idea in terms of the
special theory of relativity, but it's a
little more complicated.
Because if the speed of light is an
ultimate speed limit, what if you have
something travelling at 0.9c, say Bob on
his spaceship travelling at 0.9c.
And then he shoots out maybe an escape
pod or something, travelling at 0.5c away
from him.
So, he's travelling at 0.9c.
9 10th the speed of light.
He shoots out of the escape pod at 0.5c,
so that's 0.5c with respect to him
travelling away.
in classical physics we'd say oh, you
just add the velocities.
It's 0.9c plus 0.5c, Alice watching it
over here.
As Bob goes by and shoots off the, the
escape pod, Alice would say presumably
0.9C plus 0.5C, 1.4C is the velocity of
the escape pod as she sees it.
But actually in fact you will never see
anything go past the speed of light.
And so, combining velocities here, and
show us the new form for doing that, such
that no matter you know, how fast Bob
shoots out that, that space pod or
whatever Alice will never see it go
faster than the speed of light.
Actually, it will never get up to the

speed of light, but will never exceed the

speed of light there.
Okay.
So that's sort of a rundown of where
we're heading this week.
Let's do the, the quotations of the week.
Two short ones this time.
First one, Einstein.
It's not that I'm so smart, it's just
that I stay with problems longer.
It's not that I'm so smart, it's just
that I stay with problems longer.
Now I, I said Einstein quotation-wise, in
actual fact, Einstein probably did not
say this.
It's one of those things that somebody
invented at some point and it sounds
good, it sounds like Einstein could have
said it, it's certainly inspirational
and, therefore, you see it all over the
place.
In actual fact, it's something he could
have said because he certainly did stay
with [UNKNOWN].
He certainly was very, very smart you
know, hard to measure those types of
things at a certain level.
But great scientists also have this
tenacity about them, and he was tenacious
when he got onto a problem.
We saw that in the special theory of
relativity.
It was about ten years of thinking about
that, other things as well, but ten years
from, about 1995, 1996, when he started
in the university to year 1905, or
[INAUDIBLE] 1896, if I said 1996, to
1905, ten years.
And then, actually, the next ten years
after that he spent a large part of time
working on his general theory of
relativity.
It took about 10 years to work on that,
as well as a number of other things as,
as well.
So that, that tenacity, that idea that
I'm going to stay with this problem.
Now, it's not always a benefit because if
you, you know, go off in the wrong
direction, you may be going off in the
wrong direction for a long time.
In fact many physicists or contemporaries
of Einstein during the second half of his
life felt that he had gone off in the
wrong direction in terms of the physics
of the day, which had gone in, in much
more quantum mechanical direction and
Einstein had some real problems with,
with that.
And, and so really for the last half of

his life, from about 1925 on or so, he

was out of the mainstream of, of physics.
He's certainly revered by many people and
physicists but just did not really
contribute anything major at the time
from about 1925 to he died in 19, 1950.
So again, it is a good quality to have.
No matter how smart you are, or however
you want to measure that, but that just
staying with the problem longer, that
struggle for understanding we talked
about before.
so even though Einstein probably didn't
say it, it certainly captures one aspect
of his scientific personality.
and the second quotation, similar to the
first.
And this one is something he said.
One should not pursue goals that are
easily achieved.
One must develop an instinct for what can
just, what one can just barely achieve
through one's greatest efforts.
And so there's, there's that insight into
you know, you want to tackle problems
that are challenging for you, but you
also have to have some insights.
Sometimes it is just to hard a problem.
Scientists have to have that as well.
They have to understand, you know, given
our current capabilities, our current
understanding, my current abilities
maybe.
That's just something its, its not good
for me to tackle.
Leave it for somebody else or leave,
leave it for, you know, 20 years from now
when maybe when we'll be able to come
back and tackle that, that problem again.
On the other hand, sometimes the, the
really hard problems like that, the only
way you really do crack those nuts as it
were is for someone to, to take it on a
group of people really to, to take it on
and to stay with that problem until it
gets, gets solved.
Okay, so that's overview of the week
where we're heading, quotations of the
week and again, we're going to be
building on the things we've been doing
the last couple weeks now with the key
concepts of the special theory of
relativity and see what some of those
implications are for are situations not
only with traveling to stars maybe, but
also combining velocities and ultimate
speed limits and the like.