Page:The theory of relativity and its influence on scientific thought.djvu/10

6 the force of gravity will be the same there as here. If there were no experimental evidence in support of Einstein's theory, it would nevertheless have made a notable advance by exposing a fallacy underlying the older mode of thought—the fallacy of attributing unquestioningly a more than local significance to our terrestrial reckoning of space and time. But there is abundant experimental evidence for detecting and determining the difference between the frames of differently circumstanced observers. Much of the evidence is too technical to be discussed here, and I can only refer to the Michelson-Morley experiment. I fear that some of you must be getting rather tired of the Michelson-Morley experiment; but those who go to a performance of Hamlet have to put up with the Prince of Denmark.

This famous experiment is a simple test whether light travels at the same speed in two different directions. For this purpose an apparatus is constructed with two equal arms at right angles, providing two equal tracks for the light. A beam of light is divided into two parts so that one part travels along one arm and back, and the other along the other arm and back. The two rays then re-unite, and by delicate interference tests it is possible to tell if one has been delayed more than the other; a delay of less than a thousand-billionth of a second could be detected. The experiment is simply a race between two light-rays with equal tracks, but pointing in different directions; the result turns out to be a dead-heat. At first sight this is just what would be expected; and one almost wonders why it should have been thought worth while to try the experiment. But Michelson, like a good Copernican, had stationed himself on the sun to watch the race; accordingly he realized that the apparatus was being borne along by the earth's orbital motion with a speed of 20 miles a second. Consequently the