Strange Views of Space and Time: From Einstein to String Theory

Abstract

In honour of the hundredth anniversary of Einstein\'s \'miraculous year\', I will describe the modern view of space and time. I will start with special relativity, then describe how space and time are modified in Einstein\'s general theory of relativity, and end with recent ideas coming out of string theory. In all cases, the view of space and time arising from modern physics is radically different from our everyday experience, yet many of their strange properties have already been confirmed by experiment. Einstein, space, time, general relativity, special relativity, string theory, dimension, simultaneity, gravity, black hole, singularity, big bang, space-time