Computer clocks and Relativity

[Philip Miller Tate]

On 28 Feb 2010, at 03:27, Richard Barth wrote:

> At 07:15 PM 2/27/2010, andre kesteloot wrote:
>> Gang,
>>
>> An acquaintance of mine owns a laptop running Windows XP.
>> He lives in Maryland, hence within same time-zone as mine in  
>> Virginia.
>> The little icon located at bottom right of his screen indicates  
>> the actual real current time.
>>
>> If he sends out an e-mail message, however, the msg will be dated  
>> differently.
>>
>> A msg that I send him at 1600H is marked, when he receives it, as  
>> being dated earlier in time, i.e., at 15:34H, about 1/2 hour  
>> earlier than real time
>> If he writes to me at 16:00H, it will be marked on my computer as  
>> having been sent at 16:37H, or about 1/2 later than real time
>>
>> Is this a   --so far unexplained--  effect of special relativity ?
>>
>
> No, it means that Maryland is at least a half hour ahead of  
> Virginia.  :-)
>


No, it means that one or both of them has a processor running at a  
significant fraction of the velocity of light. And a USB tachyon drive.

Phil M1GWZ