Robert Daniel Carmichael

“ In the very nature of things speculation must often outrun experiment. The philosopher vaguely and boldly conceives a truth which it requires years of patient labor to establish on a firm and satisfactory foundation.
It is one of the glories of modern science that things hitherto of a speculative nature are being brought under the domain of experimental fact. ”

“ Now, since our only reason for attempting to measure time is in a matter of convenience, the way in which we measure it will be determined by the dictates of that convenience. The system of time measurement which we shall adopt is just that system by means of which the laws of nature may be stated in the simplest form for our comprehension. ”

“ These and many other considerations suggest the desirability of a fresh analysis of the foundations of physical science. Now it is a ground of gratulation for all those interested in this matter that there has arisen within modern physics itself a new movement capable of contributing most effectively to the construction of a more satisfactory foundation for its superstructure of theory. I refer to the recent widespread interest in the principle of relativity and the rapid developments to which it has led. ”

“ Whether in the present state of science experimental facts demand such a radical procedure is a question which will be answered differently by different minds. To one who accepts the postulates of relativity there is indeed no other recourse; one who refuses to accept them must find some other satisfactory way to account for experimental facts. The Lorentz theory of electrons gives striking evidence in favor of supposing that matter is subject to some such deformations as those mentioned above ”

“ In the indirect method some auxiliary law, as for instance the law of conservation of electricity, must usually be employed in deducing the relativity postulates or essential conclusions from the new assumption which one attempts to justify by experiment. There is always the possibility that the auxiliary law is itself wrong; and consequently one's confidence in the accuracy of the relativity postulates as thus deduced can be no stronger than that in the truth of the auxiliary law. ”

“ We have an immediate perception of what it is for two conscious phenomena to coexist in our mind; and consequently we perceive immediately the simultaneity of events in our minds. Further, we have a perfectly clear sense of the order of succession of events in our own consciousness. ”

“ We would first enquire earnestly if there fa not some more convenient way by which we can reconcile all experimental facts; and only in the event of a failure to find such a way would we be willing to so profoundly modify our views of the material world. ”

“ This is equivalent to saying that the longitudinal mass of any material body becomes infinite as the velocity of that body approaches c. Therefore it would require an infinite force to give to a material body the velocity c; that is, c is a maximum velocity which the velocity of a material body may approach but can never reach.
We may obtain the same result in a different way, and thus arrive at a deeper understanding of the matter. From the first formula of transformation given in the preceding section we have ”