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Man-Made Atomic Clocks the Best In the Universe
An anonymous reader writes "The widespread belief by astrophysicists that pulsars and white dwarfs are the best clocks in the universe is wrong, say two Australian physicists. John Hartnett and Andre Luiten from the University of Western Australia have recently shown that man-made terrestrial atomic clocks take the crown, contrary to numerous claims in astrophysical literature that the natural timing provided by pulsars and white dwarfs is the most precise. The preprint of their paper, available on the arXiv, shows that terrestrial clocks exceed the accuracy and stability of the astrophysical 'clocks' by all sensible measures, in some cases by several orders of magnitude."
Man > Nature... Take that religion!
Isn't the best clock going to be one in your frame of reference?
Give me Classic Slashdot or give me death!
The summary seems to use precision and accuracy interchangeably, they are in fact quite different.
Well, maybe your atom clock is more accurate, but my pulsar timepiece has way brighter display.
How does gravity affect light?
Strictly speaking it does not - it bends space-time and light travels on a straight line which looks bent. Think of it this way - you took off and flew in a straight line from Edmonton, Alberta to London, UK someone in orbit would see that you had actually flown a curved path on the surface of the Earth. Light is the same - it thinks it is following a straight line but when looked at from a different frame it appears as a curve.
How much matter is in space?
Strictly speaking, all of it.
Ignorance is the root of all evil.