3 ms·
Sure, but we can and do still routinely talk about reference frames other than those on earth. Your pedantry isn’t warranted, and rather comes across as needles
by liamwire 3y ago
Sure, but we can and do still routinely talk about reference frames other than those on earth. Your pedantry isn’t warranted, and rather comes across as needlessly condescending.
- jbotz 3y agoSorry, I don't want to sound condescending. But it's just wrong, and it's a very common error so I thought I should try to do my little part to help correct it. The physicist Carlo Rovelli belabors this point extensively in his book "The Order of Time"... there is no universal "now".
- Etherlord87 3y agoThere is no universal now, but you can translate between time frames, no? Asking as a layman inspired by your comments.
- jbotz 3y agoYou can translate, although it can be quite difficult, and isn't really useful. In the case of Betelgeuse we don't even know its exact distance (to +/- 100 ly) or proper motion relative to Sol, so it would be a very, very rough approximation. But really the more important thing here is that such translation is quite pointless... it doesn't tell us anything meaningful. Talking about relative time only becomes meaningful when you're talking about round-trip communication, and there the meaningful part is the complete round trip, and not what moment here corresponds to a moment there.