Old Physics for New: a worldview alternative to Einstein's relativity theory, by Thomas E. Phipps Jr.
Book Review
Book Review
Old Physics for New: a worldview alternative to Einstein's relativity theory
by Thomas E. Phipps Jr.
http://www.amazon.com/Old-Physics-New-alternative-relativity/dp/098649268X
I went into this book reluctantly because it clearly would require a lot of thinking to keep up with, and because I am tired of claims that "Einstein was wrong!"
I am now on my second read through the book. I cannot remember the last book I finished and then went right back to the beginning to read again. Mr Phipps also has a very entertaining writing style. I might be branching out to read more of his works. Does he know physics? Yes, he clearly knows physics as well as any professor or textbook you will find. He is "bucking the system" completely from within the system.
This book starts with fundamental critiques of Maxwell's equations: they do not take into account the detector; they are covariant not invariant; and they do not remain the same through Galilean Transformations. It takes about 200 pages to flush out what all that means. And he is asking us to think about things we don't usually think about - like why shouldn't ones mathematical formalism be allowed to take into account the motion of the detector? I now understand that Maxwell's equations are a surprisingly inadequate formalism for Electromagnetism. Mr Phipps provides a much better formalism by re-introducing us to Hertz's equations, which were a contender back in the day.
The other half of the book is devoted to opening holes in Special Relativity Theory, then widening those holes, then pretty much tearing down the SRT structure. As Mr. Phipps is aware, I, like many of his well educated, PhD physics readers was never taught this darker side of SRT. The degree to which the theory is both illogical and not supported by observation is not for the faint of heart. Time dilation is not symmetric, and GPS satellites and CERN muon data prove it. We must say that again: time dilation is not symmetric between frames. The whammy #2, length contraction has never been observed. Really, never observed? Yes, really. I certainly never knew that. Using the more physically flexible Hertzian form of the E&M equations yields the prediction that time dilation be not symmetric and there should be no length contraction.
Heavy stuff. Not for the faint of heart.
Mr. Phipps supplies a suitably clear experimental challenge to the physics community by asking someone to use the Very Long Baseline Arrays to measure for stellar aberration. The experiment would take very little time or resources, and would either prove him right, or prove SRT right. After reading this book, I would place my money with Mr. Phipps.