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American Journal of Physics -- September 1989 -- Volume 57, Issue 9, pp. 791

The case of the identically accelerated twins

S. P. Boughn

Haverford College, Haverford, Pennsylvania 19041

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A variation on the ‘‘twin paradox’’ of special relativity is presented wherein twins undergo the same acceleration for the same length of time, yet they age differently. Although this problem is simple to solve, it gets to the heart of the behavior of clocks in special relativity and, hopefully, will help to dispel the notion students develop that the acceleration experienced by a relativistic traveler is directly related to the rate at which that traveler ages.

EDITORIALLY RELATED

  1. Comment on ``The case of the identically accelerated twins,'' by S. P. Boughn [Am. J. Phys. 57, 791–793 (1989)]
    Edward A. Desloge et al.
    Am. J. Phys. 59, 280 (1991)AJPIAS000059000003000280000001

KEYWORDS and PACS

Keywords

RELATIVITY THEORY, ACCELERATION, TIME MEASUREMENT, SYNCHRONIZATION, REFERENCE SYSTEMS, LORENTZ TRANSFORMATIONS

PACS

History
Received Oct 1988
Accepted Nov 1988

PUBLICATION DATA

ISSN

0002-9505 (print)  

ARTICLE DATA

Digital Object Identifier
http://dx.doi.org/10.1119/1.15894

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