The use of words in special relativity
From
Richard Hachel@21:1/5 to
All on Tue Dec 12 18:13:12 2023
It is not superfluous that the use of words reserved for science be as beautiful and precise as possible.
“Writing well has never been synonymous with writing badly”
Doctor Richard Hachel. Kyoto speech
November 2023
In common use, physicists speak of the relativistic transverse Doppler
effect.
The term is not very pretty, and above all it is very semantically false
and physically imprecise.
This effect is not "transversal", it is pangeometric, that is to say that
it exists and diffuses whatever the direction of the mobile, and only
depends on its speed and not at all on its direction or its sense.
Conversely, the classic longitudinal effect depends on the direction of movement, in addition to the speed.
So why talk about a “transverse” Doppler effect?
While the term is improper (there is no transverse Doppler effect in
nature: it is an antinomy).
Answer: because this effect is as pure as possible when we observe a
body moving transversely, since there no longer exists any superimposed longitudinal Doppler effect.
It's true ; nonetheless it is improper.
The most correct term, I think (after forty years of reflection on the
theory of special relativity), is that of the internal Doppler effect.
It's more beautiful, more precise, more intuitive.
There are therefore, in special relativity, two physical effects to take
into account:
- the longitudinal, classic, external Doppler effect, resulting from the science of Nexton and Galileo, due to the speed and direction of movement.
- the internal, relativistic, second-degree Doppler effect, coming from Poincaré physics, and due to the speed whatever the direction of
movement.
Thank you for your attention.
R.H.
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