Einstein's Thought Experiment.

If I remember correctly F=MA, which is how things are weighed on earth with a spring scale, or a balance for that matter. A calibrated spring is used to support an unknown mass at the surface of the earth. The spring compresses until the mass is motionless. The compression is measured and as the acceleration at the surface of the earth is known to be about 9.8 meters/ss the mass/earth weight is determined. All the the thought experiment illustrated was that gravitational acceleration and acceleration experienced in an accelerating reference frame are identical. If the reference frame acceleration is 9.8 meters/ss then the scale attached to the frame reads the same weight as when it is on the earth surface. Also an object released from a height of 4.9 meters from the earth surface or the floor of the box will take 1 second to hit the surface or floor. Strangely even in 1900 gravitational fields were described as acceleration fields, ie the gravitational attraction at the surface of the earth is 9.8 meters/ss. also acceleration due to gravity is easly calculated as : a = (ml*c^2)/R^2, where a= acceleration, ml= length of the gravitational mass, c= speed of light and R= the distance from the center of ml.
Tidal effects for a six foot person at the surface of the earth are at the feet 9.8000000 meters/ss and at the top of the head 9.7999944 meters/ss and may be ignored as we normally do when jaunting around this globe.

con morton

>>The star's light beam that was supposedly deflected by the Sun’s gravity to add credibility to Einstein’s theory, was probably optically deflected by the Sun’s atmosphere as it passed through its extended corona.

No way. GR predicted the exact location of where the light would be perceived based on the measured location of the star behind the sun...repeatedly. FURTHERMORE, if the corona gases modified the path of light coming from something behind it, they would more likely cause the light from the distant star to reflect/refract away from the Earth entirely.

>>Secondary force exerts its force in succession, one body pushes against the next body which pushes against the next etc. etc.. A molecule pushes against the next molecule, an atom pushes against the next atom (even though, at this level they may not actually touching each other), the floor of a rocket pushes against the feet of an astronaut which pushes against his/her ankles which push against his/her legs etc. etc. It does not matter whether you are standing on the surface of earth or if you are accelerating in a rocket. The effect is the same - weight is created. Gravity, a Primary Force, exerts its force on all the atoms of a body simultaneously, not in succession

This is misleading as well. The "transference of force from one molecule to another" occurs whether the acceleration is caused by gravity or by rocket. Prime example: the "spaghetti-string" effect caused by black holes. (For those less knowledged, consider this example. Joe Schmoe is falling into a black hole feet-first. There is a point, very close to the center of the black hole at which gravity will pull harder on Mr. Schmoe's feet than it will on his head, thereby elongating his whole body. This force will elongate Mr. Schmoe until he is merely a long "spaghetti-string" of atoms/particles. That is, until he physically strikes the surface of the object at the center.)

Gravity is indeed acting on all particles of a human subject but not equally. It just seems so because Earth's gravity is so weak. If we were able to build many (seriously, I mean a LOT of) hypothetical atomic rockets that could propel each individual atom of a human subject, we could witness a secondary force with the same validity as (indeed, indistinguishable from) a primary gravitational force, simply because the force they would exert would be so weak.

Exemplifying that idea a bit further, let's take the idea of Mr. Schmoe in completely empty space, with little/no gravity to accelerate him, but equipped with atomic rockets to push all of his atoms in one direction. The tiny rockets would be his PRIMARY source of acceleration. If he were to approach, say, Earth, gravity would be the SECONDARY source of acceleration, and would affect him in exactly the same way as if the roles of the rockets and gravity were reversed.

>>Albert Einstein used his famous thought experiment to justify his "Principle of Eqivalence" postulate that asserts; Inertia (acceleration) and Gravity are equivalent.

Again, misleading. The above statement presumes that inertia and acceleration are the same thing. They are not. Inertia = the RESISTANCE to acceleration of an object due to its mass. Acceleration = Gravity. However, inertia != acceleration, ergo inertia != gravity. Basic Newtonian stuff.

Any questions?

So, I must be a fool, because I will try one last time myself...

Mr. Hamilton,

So, one day Donald Hamilton wakes up and realizes the tens of thousands of physicists and astronomers don't know about atmospheric light bending and got fooled by Einstein nearly a century ago... and gave him way too much credit? As though astronomers don't know *exactly* how much an intervening gas may bend light?

Yes, an atmosphere can bend light. We see this effect twice a day, at sunrise and sunset. But has one ever noticed that it isn't perfect? That changes in density in the atmosphere cause the sun to appear lumpy instead of perfectly squashed into perfect oval? Further, even the oval isn't the amount of bending that would one would expect if the bending were from space-time being stretched by gravity. And the same would be true for starlight through the sun's corona.

Oh... and speaking of the corona, if the corona were dense enough to bend the light by that *exact amount* predicted by General Relativity, the amount of Rayleigh scattering of the sun's light, would washout any starlight coming from behind, just as it does in the earth's atmosphere. (only more so, given that the corona is right next to the ^%$#@! sun!)

But back to the *exact amount* predicted by GR, the observation has been repeated many times... but the corona is never the same twice... yet... funny that it always seems to be bending the light by the *exact amount* predicted by GR?

Oh yeah... and about those distant galaxies that are imaged by intervening galaxies, whose light has bent bent by the *exact amount* as predicted by GR? The light must have been bent by the sun's corona then too huh?

Dr. Bortz has already patiently explained most of the errors in your logic. Mr. Hamilton, your continued argumentation brings to mind two words, "crank" and "crackpot".