Relativity: The Special and General Theory

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   Time does not flow the same for everyone — a clock moving very fast or sitting near a huge mass runs slightly slower.

   Relativity: The Special and General Theory · 1916

   Time is not universal: every reference frame has its own time, and mass and speed stretch it.

   Picture space and time as a stretched elastic sheet. A heavy planet bends it, just like a heavy ball bends a stretched blanket. Other objects passing by slide along that curve, which we call gravity. The heavier the mass, the stronger the curve — and the stronger the effect on time.

   “Events which are simultaneous with reference to the embankment are not simultaneous with respect to the train, and vice versa (reference-frame of the train). Every reference-body has its own particular time; unless we are told the reference-body to which the statement of time refers, there is no meaning in a statement of the time of an event.”

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