Relative Velocity - Special Relativity Theory

Special Relativity Theory

According to SR, the vacuum speed of light is isotropically equal to a universal constant c in any coordinate systems. Inter alia, it leads to the fact that

  • apart from Newtonian limit, velocities are not additive quantities, and
  • the difference velocity between A and B is not equal to their relative velocity and particularly has a smaller absolute value. Whereas the maximum difference speed between two objects is 2c, the maximum absolute value of a relative velocity is equal to c.

To get from and in an arbitrary reference frame, it's necessary to Lorentz transformation the latter into the rest frame of A. If and are collinear, the formula

holds.

Read more about this topic:  Relative Velocity

Famous quotes containing the words special, relativity and/or theory:

    Nature is a setting that fits equally well a comic or a mourning piece. In good health, the air is a cordial of incredible virtue. Crossing a bare common, in snow puddles, at twilight, under a clouded sky, without having in my thoughts any occurrence of special good fortune, I have enjoyed a perfect exhilaration. I am glad to the brink of fear.
    Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)

    By an application of the theory of relativity to the taste of readers, to-day in Germany I am called a German man of science, and in England I am represented as a Swiss Jew. If I come to be regarded as a bĂȘte noire the descriptions will be reversed, and I shall become a Swiss Jew for the Germans and a German man of science for the English!
    Albert Einstein (1879–1955)

    There never comes a point where a theory can be said to be true. The most that one can claim for any theory is that it has shared the successes of all its rivals and that it has passed at least one test which they have failed.
    —A.J. (Alfred Jules)