Absoluteness of Velocity Produced by Accelerating Process and Absolute Space-time Theory with Variable Scales

Mei Xiaochun

REVIEW

Absoluteness of Velocity Produced by Accelerating Process and Absolute Space-time Theory with Variable Scales

Mei Xiaochun

General Physics · Submitted 3 Mar 2006 · 5 references

Pith's verdict: The paper's central proof is circular—the rope-breaking experiment presumes the preferred frame it claims to establish—so the absoluteness claim is unsupported, though the paper does usefully remind us that acceleration leaves physical traces.

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arXiv IDphysics/0603017 (version 1)

Pith ID27MKMAQV, Pith's permanent record of this paper and its review

CitationMei Xiaochun. "Absoluteness of Velocity Produced by Accelerating Process and Absolute Space-time Theory with Variable Scales." arXiv:physics/0603017 (2006). https://pith.science/paper/27MKMAQV

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Claim paper

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Editor's note

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Dear Colleague,

The short version: this paper's core claim is unsupported. The "proof" that accelerated velocity is absolute runs in a circle. In Section 2, the second acceleration is prescribed as "a constant acceleration a" without specifying the frame. If that means coordinate acceleration in K0—the frame in which both boxes were initially at rest—then K2 starts the burn already moving at V, so its proper acceleration is γ(V)^3 a, larger than K1's. The rope breaks because of that difference, not because K2 carries an absolute velocity. If instead the boxes undergo equal proper accelerations, the rapidity difference is constant and the rope need not break. The "absolute event" (rope breaks or not) does not select an absolutely moving frame; it selects the frame relative to which the burn was defined. That is the very frame the paper aims to derive.

The paper earns credit where it is due. It correctly notes that acceleration leaves observable traces—ropes stretch, masses increase—and it puts its finger on a real pedagogical divide in how SR is usually presented, where kinematics is treated without dynamics. It also honestly credits Lorentz for the contraction idea, and the suggestion that the CMB frame is a natural rest frame is not crazy; many cosmologists use it as a comoving frame.

But none of this supports the conclusion. Section 3 re-derives the standard Lorentz transformation from a slightly reworded light postulate and then declares the contractions "real and absolute" without any new dynamical input. The symmetry argument for an absolutely resting frame assumes that rulers, clocks, and masses have an extremum in some frame; that is the claim at issue, not a consequence. There are no quantitative predictions that distinguish this theory from SR, and the paper does not engage with well-established precision tests—Ives–Stilwell, muon lifetimes, GPS—that are perfectly consistent with relativity without a privileged frame. The superluminal tangent-velocity examples confuse apparent angular velocity with physical velocity, and the rotating-disc argument glosses over the fact that a disc is non-inertial.

This is a Lorentzian reinterpretation of SR with the novelty left out and a flawed thought experiment added. A reader interested in historical absolute-frame interpretations might skim Section 3, but the paper does not advance that program. I would not send it to peer review; the load-bearing flaw is visible on first reading, and a single competent referee would do no more than write back the exact circle I described above.

Referee report

Significance

If the central claim were correct, it would overturn a foundational assumption of special relativity and would have profound implications for cosmology and for a wide range of experiments. However, the proof is not valid: the thought experiment is circular because it prescribes the second acceleration relative to K0 and then interprets the outcome as revealing an absolute state, and the Lorentz-transformation derivation in Section 3 is identical to the standard one, with the absolute interpretation imposed by fiat rather than derived. The paper does contain some useful observations, such as the operational concern that inertial frames compared in experiments must have a common rest state at some earlier time, and the criticism of some textbook treatments of the twin paradox is not without merit. Those points, however, are not developed into a coherent theory, and the paper offers neither a mathematical derivation from dynamical principles nor a concrete, falsifiable prediction that distinguishes its framework from special relativity.

Major objections (4)

[Section 2, Eq. (1) and Fig. 2] The central thought experiment is circular. The author prescribes that both K1 and K2 are accelerated 'simultaneously' with the same acceleration a, but no frame is specified in which this acceleration is defined. If a is the coordinate acceleration measured in K0, then K2 starts the second burn already moving at speed V relative to K0, so its proper acceleration is m0 gamma(V)^3 a, which exceeds the rope's breaking threshold; K1's rope does not break. This only tells observers that K2 was already moving relative to K0 at the start of the burn, which is the very frame the paper is trying to establish. If, instead, both boxes undergo equal proper accelerations, the relative velocity between K1 and K2 remains unchanged and the rope in K2 need not break. Thus the 'absolute' conclusion is built into the choice of K0 as the frame that defines the second acceleration, and the rope-breaking event does not prove that velocity is absolute.
[Section 3, Eqs. (3)-(4)] The derivation of the Lorentz transformation in Section 3 is the standard derivation from the light-postulate, and the absolute interpretation is added after the fact. The postulates in Section 3, namely that non-inertial motion affects space-time natures and that light speed is invariant among arbitrary non-inertial frames, are simply asserted; the derivation then yields the same Lorentz formulas that appear in Einstein's theory. No step in Eqs. (2)-(4) shows that the accelerated frame's rulers and clocks 'really' contract or dilate. The claim that the transformation now has 'absolute significance' because the velocity was produced by an accelerating process is a separate assumption, not a result of the calculation. Without an independent definition of what 'real change' means and without a dynamical model of how acceleration alters space-time scales, the absoluteness claim is unfalsifiable within the manuscript itself.
[Section 4, 'The discussion above would lead to a result...'] The existence of an absolutely resting frame is not proved. The paper argues that if one accelerates a frame in different directions, the frame in which rulers are longest, clocks are quickest, and masses are smallest is the absolutely resting one. This presumes that there is a unique maximum ruler length and minimum mass across all possible accelerations, which is exactly what needs to be demonstrated. In the context of the author's own scenario, K0 is simply the frame in which the initial accelerations were defined; calling it 'absolutely resting' adds a metaphysical label but provides no new physical content. The identification of the CMB frame as the absolutely resting frame is an empirical coordinate choice, not a consequence of the claimed proof.
[Section 5, 'Equivalent inertial frames...'] The paper's treatment of equivalent inertial frames and superluminal motion contradicts its own postulates. In Section 5 it asserts that frames whose relative velocity 'exists primordially, not caused by accelerating processes' are completely equivalent, are not restricted by the invariability of light speed, and may move faster than c. But postulate 2 of Section 3 states that the speed of light is invariant among arbitrary non-inertial reference frames, and the author does not explain why frames with primordial relative velocity are exempt. Furthermore, the claim that the sun's diameter is 'almost unchanged' when viewed from a rapidly rotating disk because the sun 'has not ever been accelerated' is not derived from the Lorentz formalism of Sections 3-4, which was developed for linearly accelerated frames; the rotating-disk scenario requires a separate treatment that the paper does not provide.

Minor objections (5)

[Abstract and Section 1] The English contains many typographical errors that impede readability: for example, 'specied' for 'specified', 'declaimed' for 'claimed', and 'eached' for 'reached'.
[References] The references are incomplete and imprecise: Ref. [4] gives 'S. Weiberge' (spelling), Ref. [5] is only 'Nature, 3, (2002)' with no author or article title, and Ref. [6] omits the article title and page numbers; standard protocol requires full citations.
[Section 4, last paragraph] The text says 'as shown in Fig. 1.1' when it should say 'Fig. 1' or 'Fig. 4'; the figures are not numbered consistently.
[Section 2, paragraph after Eq. (1)] The phrase 'whether elastic ropes are pulled apart or not are absolute events' is imprecise: what is invariant is whether the rope breaks, not the event itself; the issue is that under the standard relativity the same breaking event is described differently in different frames, so the author needs to argue that the invariant description requires one frame to be absolutely moving, which is the circular step flagged above.
[Section 5, rotating disk example] The paper states that if the angular speed of a disk reaches omega >= 1/480, the tangent speed of the sun reaches light speed; this numerical factor is introduced without derivation and the units are unclear, making the example impossible to check.

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The paper

The paper claims

This paper argues that acceleration-produced velocity is absolute and that an absolutely resting frame exists.

The reading

The paper sets out to prove that velocity produced by an accelerating process is absolute, not relative, using the dynamical effects of special relativity rather than its kinematics. It argues that the customary split of special relativity into kinematics and dynamics is artificial, and that acceleration really changes an object's rulers, clocks, and mass. If the proof holds, Lorentz contraction and time dilation become real physical changes in the accelerated frame, and an absolutely resting reference frame exists, currently identifiable with the cosmic microwave background frame. The author presents this as a third space-time theory, absolute space-time with variable scales, alongside Newton's absolute theory and Einstein's relative theory.

What carries the argument

The load-bearing mechanism is the relativistic inertial force on an accelerated object. For a body of rest mass $m_0$ under constant acceleration $a$, the paper uses $F = m_0 a (1 - V^2/c^2)^{-3/2}$, which grows without bound as the speed approaches $c$. In the thought experiment, this force stretches the elastic rope behind the object; exceeding the rope's breaking strength gives an observable, frame-independent event. The second operational concept is the nonequivalent inertial frame: two frames initially at rest with identical rulers and clocks, one of which is later accelerated to a relative speed. The paper keeps the Lorentz transformation formulas but interprets them as describing real changes of scale in the accelerated frame, so the formulas acquire absolute significance.

Extended reading notes

Core claim

The central discovery is that the dynamical effects of special relativity, mass increase and the accompanying inertial force on a tethered object, make the velocity caused by acceleration an absolute quantity. In the paper's central thought experiment, two closed chambers $K_1$ and $K_2$ each hold identical masses tethered by identical elastic ropes. $K_2$ is accelerated to speed $V$; later both chambers receive a short identical acceleration. $K_2$'s rope breaks, because the added speed pushes its already enlarged relativistic mass past the rope's limit, while $K_1$'s rope does not break. Since observers in all frames agree about which rope broke, the accelerated frame is identifiable without prior knowledge of its history. From this the author concludes that Lorentz contraction, time dilation, and mass increase are real and absolute changes tied to the accelerating process, and that an absolutely resting frame exists.

Load-bearing premise

The argument rests on the premise that whether a rope breaks is an absolute event on which all observers must agree, so the broken rope uniquely identifies which chamber was accelerated even for observers who slept through the acceleration.

Editorial extensions

If this is right

Lorentz contraction and time dilation become real changes in the accelerated frame, so the twin paradox is resolved asymmetrically without appeal to general relativity.
An absolutely resting frame exists, and the paper's spring-length search procedure gives a practical route to locating it; the cosmic microwave background frame is the current candidate.
The speed-of-light barrier applies only to velocities manufactured by acceleration; velocities that arise without such a process, such as the apparent tangential velocities of fixed stars, may exceed light speed.
The Lorentz transformation is retained but reinterpreted: its formulas describe actual changes of rulers and clocks in accelerated frames, not merely coordinate conventions.

Reading between the lines

Editorial extensions of the paper, not claims the author makes directly.

Extending the paper's logic, precision experiments on stored or centrifuged particles could be reexamined as searches for an absolute frame, since every acceleration history would imprint a real mass, length, or clock change.
A modern implementation of the paper's absolute-frame test is possible with atomic clocks or atom interferometry, looking for the direction in which a spring or equivalent probe stretches least.
The theory's allowance of superluminal relative motion for objects never co-accelerated suggests a cosmological search for proper motions relative to the cosmic microwave background frame that exceed light speed; the paper itself does not propose such a search.

Original abstract

It is proved by means of the dynamical effects of special relativity that velocity caused by accelerating process is not a relative concept. The influence of accelerating process should be considered in space-time theory. Besides the Newtonian absolute space-time theory with invariable space-time scales and the Einstein relative space-time theory with variable space-time scales, there exists the third space-time theory, i.e., the absolute space-time theory with variable space-time scales. At present, special relativity is divided into two parts, kinematics and dynamics. In kinematics, force and acceleration are not considered so that space and time becomes relative concepts. This division is completely artificial and irrational. The rational space-time theory should be established on the foundation of dynamics consistently. The changing rules of space, time and mass with speed should be dependent of accelerating processes and with absolute significance. The real meaning of invariability principle of high speed should be that we can not make the speed of an object speed with rest mass reach and exceed the speed of light in vacuum by the method of accelerating object. It is proved that the absolutely resting reference frame exists. In order to eliminate multifarious space-time paradoxes in special relativity, and coincide with Big-bang cosmology, the absolutely resting frame is necessary. A method is put forward to look for the absolutely resting reference frame. The isotropy reference frame of cosmic microwave background radiation can be regarded as the absolutely resting reference frame actually at present.

The compiled record

The paper's own sentences, arranged, kept beside the review and separate from it. Each label is drawn from a closed vocabulary; the number beside it is the probability the classifier gave that label. Numbers in the tables are the authors', checked by code. No sentence in this record was written by a model.

Compiled by classifier-1.13.0 via TypeSafe API, question bank abstract-p1-20260923, 2026-09-23: 1 request, 9,324 input tokens.

What the abstract itself states, as probabilities: claims first 0.11 · states limitation 0.08 · human participants 0.02 · controlled comparison 0.03 · randomized assignment 0.01 · states quantitative result 0.15 · compares with prior results 0.49 · mentions code or data availability 0.01.

The abstract, sentence by sentence

arXiv listing abstract v1. Results and the main claim are underlined; show every role.

It is proved by means of the dynamical effects of special relativity that velocity caused by accelerating process is not a relative concept. The influence of accelerating process should be considered in space-time theory. Besides the Newtonian absolute space-time theory with invariable space-time scales and the Einstein relative space-time theory with variable space-time scales, there exists the third space-time theory, i.e., the absolute space-time theory with variable space-time scales. At present, special relativity is divided into two parts, kinematics and dynamics. In kinematics, force and acceleration are not considered so that space and time becomes relative concepts. This division is completely artificial and irrational. The rational space-time theory should be established on the foundation of dynamics consistently. The changing rules of space, time and mass with speed should be dependent of accelerating processes and with absolute significance. The real meaning of invariability principle of high speed should be that we can not make the speed of an object speed with rest mass reach and exceed the speed of light in vacuum by the method of accelerating object. It is proved that the absolutely resting reference frame exists. In order to eliminate multifarious space-time paradoxes in special relativity, and coincide with Big-bang cosmology, the absolutely resting frame is necessary. A method is put forward to look for the absolutely resting reference frame. The isotropy reference frame of cosmic microwave background radiation can be regarded as the absolutely resting reference frame actually at present.

background contribution method result interpretation main claim

What the classifier reports for each sentence. The number is the probability it gave the label.
#	sentence	role	the authors' own work	states the main conclusion	strength
s0	It is proved by means of the dynamical effects of special relativity that velocity caused by accelerating process is not a relative concept.	result 0.97	0.82	0.72	asserted 1.00
s1	The influence of accelerating process should be considered in space-time theory.	interpretation 0.39	0.18	0.10	asserted 0.90
s2	Besides the Newtonian absolute space-time theory with invariable space-time scales and the Einstein relative space-time theory with variable space-time scales, there exists the third space-time theory, i.e., the absolute space-time theory with variable space-time scales.	contribution 0.73	0.36	0.24	asserted 1.00
s3	At present, special relativity is divided into two parts, kinematics and dynamics.	background 1.00	0.05	0.02	asserted 1.00
s4	In kinematics, force and acceleration are not considered so that space and time becomes relative concepts.	background 0.98	0.05	0.03	asserted 1.00
s5	This division is completely artificial and irrational.	background 0.54	0.09	0.04	asserted 1.00
s6	The rational space-time theory should be established on the foundation of dynamics consistently.	future work 0.34	0.14	0.11	asserted 0.97
s7	The changing rules of space, time and mass with speed should be dependent of accelerating processes and with absolute significance.	interpretation 0.46	0.33	0.25	asserted 0.88
s8	The real meaning of invariability principle of high speed should be that we can not make the speed of an object speed with rest mass reach and exceed the speed of light in vacuum by the method of accelerating object.	interpretation 0.91	0.41	0.19	asserted 0.99
s9	It is proved that the absolutely resting reference frame exists.	result 0.97	0.80	0.34	asserted 1.00
s10	In order to eliminate multifarious space-time paradoxes in special relativity, and coincide with Big-bang cosmology, the absolutely resting frame is necessary.	interpretation 0.75	0.15	0.09	asserted 0.99
s11	A method is put forward to look for the absolutely resting reference frame.	method 0.60	0.73	0.06	asserted 0.90
s12	The isotropy reference frame of cosmic microwave background radiation can be regarded as the absolutely resting reference frame actually at present.	interpretation 0.44	0.17	0.13	hedged possibility 0.62

What kind of paper the classifier reports this is: theoretical result 0.68 · evidence from proof or derivation 0.60.

What was examined, and what was not

sources read

arXiv listing abstract v1

not examined

full text
figures and tables
references and citing sentences
relations to other papers

levels run

P abstract

not run

S sections
T body sentences
C citations
R cross-paper relations

Every quoted sentence on this record is the authors'. Every label is from Pith's closed vocabulary, with the probability shown beside it. Every number in the measurements table is the authors', checked by code. Record as JSON

References

Works cited (5)

[1]

Sastry G., Am. J. phys., 55, 943, (1987). Varica V. Zum, Z. Phys , 12, 169 (1911). Ai H B., Phys Essays, 11, 1 (1998)

View on Pith 1987
[2]

W. Rindler, Essential Relativity, Second Edition, (1977)

View on Pith 1977
[3]

Zhang Yongli, Introduce to Relativity, 286(1980)

View on Pith 1980
[4]

S. Weiberge, Gravitation and Cosmology, 608(1984)

View on Pith 1984
[6]

Wang, Lijun, et al, Nature, 406, (2000). 8 9 This figure "Fig.1.jpg" is available in "jpg" format from: http://arxiv.org/ps/physics/0603017v1 This figure "Fig.2.jpg" is available in "jpg" format from: http://arxiv.org/ps/physics/0603017v1 This figure "Fig.3.jpg" is available in "jpg" format from: http://arxiv.org/ps/physics/0603017v1 This figure "Fig.4.jp...

View on Pith Pith review arXiv 2000

Discussion

Disagree with the review, or know something it missed? Leave a comment, highlight any passage above to comment on it, or challenge this review formally.

[1] [1]

Sastry G., Am. J. phys., 55, 943, (1987). Varica V. Zum, Z. Phys , 12, 169 (1911). Ai H B., Phys Essays, 11, 1 (1998)

View on Pith 1987

[2] [2]

W. Rindler, Essential Relativity, Second Edition, (1977)

View on Pith 1977

[3] [3]

Zhang Yongli, Introduce to Relativity, 286(1980)

View on Pith 1980

[4] [4]

S. Weiberge, Gravitation and Cosmology, 608(1984)

View on Pith 1984

[5] [6]

Wang, Lijun, et al, Nature, 406, (2000). 8 9 This figure "Fig.1.jpg" is available in "jpg" format from: http://arxiv.org/ps/physics/0603017v1 This figure "Fig.2.jpg" is available in "jpg" format from: http://arxiv.org/ps/physics/0603017v1 This figure "Fig.3.jpg" is available in "jpg" format from: http://arxiv.org/ps/physics/0603017v1 This figure "Fig.4.jp...

View on Pith Pith review arXiv 2000