[davidgow77]

I've just read thePicking on Einstein article on the TOEQuest Homepage, and found it very interesting. However, I would like to try and dispell one of the myths that it presents as fact. Newton did not believe that space and time were absolute, and in fact states very clearly ion Principia that time and motion are "relative".

"For from the positions and disatances of things from any body [object] considered as immovable, we define all places; and then with respect to places we estimate all motions considering bodies as transferred from some of those places into others. And so instead of absolute places and motions, we use relative ones; ... for it may be that there is no body really at rest, to which the places and motions of others may be referred."

(pg 8, Defintions, Principia, Isaac Newton)

In light of this, it must be realised that although Einstein may have come up with the notion of relativity by himself, it was by no means an original thought. Newton was very aware of the philosophical problems of absolute space, motion and time, and it has been the subsequent arguements of lesser physicist s that have landed the term "Newtonian Space-time" as meaning absolute motion, space and time. Nweton was probably only prevented from researching this field further by the limitations of technology of his time, although it must be said that he found the question (is space and time absolute or relative) a largely incosequential notion.

DG