Question

Can anyone explain me Twin paradox, a hypothetical story given by Einstein?

Answer 1

Suppose there are two twins A and B.A goes to the outer space while B remains on Earth.According to B, A always is moving away at a very high speed and so when A returns on Earth he should be younger than B. Again from the reference frame of A,he can also make the same arguments and conclude that B is younger than him.Here lies the paradox. Actually A is younger because thre is a time when the spaceship returns back,so it is not exactly uniform motion.

Answer 2

How could be this experimentally proved?

Answer 3

Hmmmm.... I'm trying to wrap my brain around this one. If I remember correctly, this is because of the time dilation that A experiences as his ship approaches the speed of light. From A's perspective, B was traveling at the speed of light away from him, and thus A believes that B was the one who was actually in motion. Who is to say? A believes that B was moving away from him at the speed of light, and B believes that A was moving away from him at the speed of light. We can solve this problem by placing both parties in intertial frames, say O and O', moving at constant speeds. We then call ourselves the observer, and place ourselves outside of the intertial frames. By watching both frames and being independent of the motions, we can determine a "proper" time. Indeed, If B was on earth, and A went into space at light speed, A would age at a rate much, much, less than B. Remember, as we approach the speed of light, time and space begin to change to keep c constant. I think I've remembered this correctly, but you may want to check with a superstar at a MIT.

Answer 4

Note: There is also a version where two twins are juggling on boats that are passing each other. Yes, I remember this one now. My answer above is a fairly solid explanation. As we approach the speed of light, we can use a Lorentz Transformation for solving the problem. At slower speeds, such as twins juggling on a boat, a Galilean Transformation can be used.

Answer 5

It has been tested experimentally with clocks (I think atomic clocks). One on a plane, traveling at high speed then returning to where the other identical clock is. They measured the small differences and found them to agree with time dilation predictions. look it up

Answer 6

The Mechanical Universe and beyond has a great explaination of the twin paradox.
http://learner.org/vod/vod_window.html?pid=613