What’s it all about?
I hate to break it to you, but there is no universal clock ticking away at the same rate for every part of the universe. Instead we’ve come to learn that speed and gravity will affect the rate at which you experience time. What’s more, this is not just an abstract concept, without understanding the warping of time we would never have a functioning GPS system and many other extremely useful parts of our modern life.
Have you ever watched a movie that had some kind of relativistic time effects and wondered what it was all about? Or are you keen to build up your repertoire of interesting awkward-moment conversation starters? This is the class for you!
What will we cover?
Using the lens of some age old paradoxes we’ll explore Special Relativity and how speed changes time, we’ll then look at General Relativity and how gravity can impact time.
We’ll close by reflecting on the story of the “Einstein switch” on the GPS system and how the ranging debate between scientists was stilled.
Who will be teaching?
Ruan de Witt competed undergraduate degrees in Physics and Mechanical Engineering at the University of Melbourne. This technical background together with his passion for story telling makes for an interesting foundation to explore science. He currently works as an engineer but still likes to stare up in the sky and ponder…