[TheForge] YAK relativity- WAY OT, or not...

[Gladish Family]

> If I'm understanding you, then you don't understand the
> observation * it's not an assumption * that the velocity of light
> in a vacuum is a constant.
>
No (and again I hope I understand your viewpoint), what I'm saying is that
the speed of light is NOT a constant. It's only constant in a theoretical
vacuum in a theoretical void (no gravity) in a theoretically static frame of
reference.
One example I ran across today is that of two observers, one at the surface
of the earth and one some distance above, "motionless" in relation to each
other. The one on the surface shines a light of known wavelength toward the
other. The "higher" observer reports a red shift. General relativity says
that the light SLOWS DOWN due to time/space curvature (because of gravity
warping space/time- or curvature means that the light travels farther-same
dif, since there's a gravity distortion of the distance), special relativity
says that this is impossible- light has to travel at the same speed in a
static frame of reference.
I say, wouldn't Occam's razor require us to consider that the photons might
be affected by gravity in the same way that any other particle is?

In your example,

>  The SPEED of the
> sound through air is unchanged.

The speed relative to the source is unchanged, but obviously the speed
relative to the observer has changed.
Sonic booms don't spread behind the plane...

> if the light source is moving away, the speed of the light is
> unchanged, but the frequency is lowered - a phenomenon known in
> physics as the "red shift" (also the Doppler effect).

If that's what's happening in every case of red shift, that's one thing. But
since many other things slow light, why must we assume that gravity as we
know it cannot? The simplest interpretation of Einstien's pivotal eclipse
measurements is that gravity pulled the photons out of their erstwhile
straight path, for instance.

Some invalid assumptions are being made, by me or somebody else.
Help!!