Saint

How about this for starters - authors are responsible for writing papers, responses, etc... in terms that can be understood by their target audience. Period. This is a skill that many people, not just physicists, are lacking. It's one of the reasons that skilled teachers are so few a far between. It's tough to do.

What?? On what is your curiosity based? Is it based on your research? I have a brain and an opinion. Pretty much the same as everyone else here. What level of study do you require to have an opinion, Tom?

Easy there killer - all I'm saying is that someone can, in fact, understand a given physical phenomena without ever using mathematics as his/her modelling tool. The problem that person might encounter when talking to someone who uses mathematics as his/her basis for understanding reality is that they would expect to get mathematically-based answers to questions. That bias toward mathematics does not discount the ability of someone to understand physical phenomena without mathematics. Does the physics world as a whole use mathematics - yes. Is it difficult to separate mathematics from physical reality once you've learned to look at it through a mathematical lense - yes. Is it possible to understand the physical world without mathematics - yes. The experiment used to validate a mathematical model can just as easliy be used as the basis for understanding. Trial, error and inspection, while time consuming, is a valid method for developing an understanding of a given phenomena.

What do physicists normally do to validate mathematical models?

On a related note, since we are talking about time dilation (Lorentz factor), does length contraction (Lorentz) work for the entire distance along the direction of travel? I mean, as you approach the speed of light, does the distance to an object you are leaving shrink as well? If you left Earth and accelerated to .9c, would the Earth appear to get closer? That's one that's always puzzled me.

Tom and Locrian, I should appologize for that one. I didn't mean to imply that physicists are incompetent. They're a whole lot smarter than I am, and I know they're doing their best to understand what's going on. I just don't buy relativity. I shouldn't make broad accusations like that.