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3.3
 
Einstein’s mistake
3. Relativity
The following lines are part of 
Logic in the universe
When I heard of the twin paradox for the first time, I thought: How can arelative movement raise an absolute time contraction? That was in 1957, Iwas 18. I forgot all about it until recently.I want to demonstrate that absolute time contraction is absurd. Relativemovement can only produce relative time contraction.Since the idea of absolute time contraction is generally accepted byeveryone, I am going to have a hard time demonstrating its’ absurdity. Let usstart from the very beginning.
vorsini@gmail.com 
 
On page 11 of the English translation of his famous article
“
ON THE ELECTRODYNAMICS OF MOVING BODIES 
”,
Einstein states:
 
If one of two synchronous clocks at A is moved in a closed curve with constant velocity until it returns to A, the journey lasting t seconds, then by the clock which has remained at rest the travelled clock on its arrival at A will be (1/2) tv 
2 
 /c 
2 
seconds slow.
Paul Langevin, made more clear the idea with his known twin paradox. One of the twinstravels at fast speed to a star. When he returns to Earth he will be younger that the onethat stayed on our planet.We are going to go through the following small steps:1. Every movement is relative2. Details of absolute contraction3. Contraction is not a property of the moving body4. Contraction is relative5. Where is the mathematical mistake?Let’s go.
1. Every movement is relative
 Newton’s words are the shortest and best way to enunciate Galileo’s relativity:There is no absolute movement, space doesn’t have any marks. Every movement isrelative to another object that is taken as stationary.
2. Details of absolute contraction
In Einstein’s version, he doesn’t speak of acceleration and deceleration. In fact, the highspeed is only used to underline that contraction is visible. So we are going to forgetcompletely about acceleration.Let’s say that when the traveling twin returns, after 
t 
seconds, he is younger than theearthly twin
n
seconds. He will stay younger 
n
seconds for the rest of their lives, becausecontraction is absolute.Time contraction didn’t jump from nothing to
n
. It accumulated second by second,millisecond by millisecond. So, when
t/2
seconds went through, the traveling twin was
n/2
seconds younger. Given that the speed was constant, the contraction depends only onthe time it lasted.
3. Contraction is not a property of the moving body.
 
 
Let’s continue with the paradox, but at
t/2
seconds, a comet strikes Earth, and Earthdisappears with the earthly twin and his clock.The traveling twin was moving inertial with constant speed, without using brakes or accelerator. He didn’t know about the crash. He just continues traveling as he was.Let’s answer the following questions:-
 
Will absolute contraction continue to grow at the same pace, but now relative towhom or what?-
 
Will absolute contraction vanish at the exact moment of the strike?-
 
Will absolute contraction stay as
n/2
for the rest of his life?There is not a good answer. This is because time contraction, absolute or not is not a property of the moving body.
4. Contraction is relative
Let’s think about another experiment. Instead of twins, now we have quintuplets. Theystart moving at some place in space with different speed. We measure contraction of Quintuplet 1 relative to all the other four quintuplets. After 
t 
seconds, contraction relativeto quintuplet 2 is
n
2
, relative to quintuplet 3 is
n
3
,
 
relative to quintuplet 4 is
n
4 
 
and relativeto quintuplet 5 is
n
5 
.Quintuplet 1 could not have four different ages at the same time. It implies thatcontraction can only be relative.
5. Where is the mathematical mistake?
 No matter how convincing the logic I used can be, some people will need mathematicalformulae as a demonstration.Einstein starts the second subsection “On the relativity of lengths and times” saying:
Thefollowing reflections
 
are based on the principle of relativity and on the principle of theconstancy of the velocity of light.
 
Then he specifies that:
velocity = light path / time interval 
either when light is emitted by a moving or stationary body. This equation could bewritten as
c = l / t or 
of 00

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