Questioning Einstein: Is Relativity Necessary?

by Tom Bethell

Questioning Is Relativity Necessary? by Tom Bethell is a serious scholarly work that is very well written, absorbing the reader in a tale of long-neglected experimental results that plays out to a deep satisfaction in finally answering the question, "Why can't I understand relativity?" This is a fresh, unique review of both special and general relativity. It takes for granted that Einstein s mathematics is properly done. It does not quarrel with the numerous experimental results that support Einstein's general relativity theory. Then what is the quarrel with Einstein? Bethell argues that special relativity theory is wrong and general relativity theory is not necessary. For example, Einstein himself derived E = mc2 without relativity theory, and he also argued in a lecture in 1920 at Leiden that space without ether is unthinkable, only 15 years after having said that the ether was superfluous. Bethell's book is not mathematical; after all, he does not quarrel with Einstein s mathematics. Importantly, it is strongly based on experimental foundations. Time dilation, for example, is supported by but not proved by moving muons and clocks carried around the globe. In particular, Bethell promotes Petr Beckmann s case that the medium of propagation of light is the dominant gravitational field. That idea is actually part and parcel of Einstein s general theory of relativity, save that the latter hides the simplicity behind tensors in curved space-time.

205 pages, Perfect Paperback

First published June 8, 2010

About the author

Tom Bethell is a senior editor at the American Spectator. He has contributed to many publications, including the New York Times magazine, Atlantic Monthly, Harper’s, Crisis, and National Review. He writes often on science. Tom Wolfe has called Bethell “one of our most brilliant essayists.”

Bethell was born and raised in England and graduated from Oxford University in 1962 with a degree in philosophy, physiology, and psychology. He lives in Washington, D.C.

Reviews

[Lee W. · Rating 5 out of 5]

A fascinating volume which suggests that there is no necessity for relativity theory, that this theory faces contradictions within itself and with classical physics, and that every supposed proof for relativity has a simpler solution in classical physics.

[Garret Seinen · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very readable and understandable book showing that the accepted view, that Dr Einstein's theory of relativity is unchallenged is noise make by acolytes.