English Explanatory Dictionary

twin paradox

English dictionary entry

Meanings

noun
  1. The clock paradox.

Word forms

twin paradox twin paradoxes twins paradox

Etymology

From the thought experiment conducted by Albert Einstein, in which one of a pair of twins sets off in a spaceship on a trip at high speed, and due to the effects of relativity, his effective clock ticks slower than the twin who remains at home, not encountering relativistic effects, so that when the spacetraveller twin returns home to compare clocks, the spacetraveller will have experienced less elapsed time than the homebody, thus having aged less than the homebody twin and being younger.

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