Move Beyond the Realm of Human Experience With New Relativity Software

Physics Academic Software Releases RELLAB

This low-speed example illustrates relative motion in the Newtonian world
of trucks, baseballs, and trees. The two baseballs were launched with
equal speeds with respect to the trucks.

April 18, 1995--RELLAB is a computer-based relativity laboratory for
creating and exploring thought experiments about motion--both low-speed
motion described by Newton's mechanics and high-speed motion described by
Einstein's special relativity. The program puts you in charge and will
carry out almost any "thought experiment" imaginable, providing it does
not violate the presently known laws of nature. In RELLAB, you start with
the everyday world around you and then move on to explore the rich
paradoxes of relativity, developing your intuition about the world of the
very fast.

Developed by Paul Horwitz, Edwin F. Taylor, and Kerry Shetline, RELLAB lets
you create and model your own physical systems in two space dimensions
while time is frozen, and then start the clock and observe the system's
motion from the rest frame of any object. Objects can change speed and
direction and emit other objects (including light flashes) in particular
directions, as well as three kinds of emissions that spread out in all
directions: sound, light, and explosion fragments.

RELLAB can be used to enrich and empower student learning. At the high
school level, students can use the program to investigate paradoxes of
special relativity. "Paradoxes reflect the cutting edge of special
relativity and stimulate student enthusiasm and involvement," say the
software's developers. "RELLAB allows students to engage in the paradoxes
from the beginning, before they have the mathematical background to solve
them analytically." In college classes, where there is a greater
obligation to teach the subject of relativity than in high school, RELLAB
can be used as a tool for visualizing and analyzing physical phenomena.

Reviewer response to the software has been enthusiastic. "RELLAB is a very
powerful program for exploring special relativity," says Peter Cramer,
Case Western Reserve University. "It is a superb piece of software." Ron
Stoner, Bowling Green University, says that the program provides a "more
intuitive treatment of special relativity than I have seen in any other
simulations of this type." And David Winch, Kalamazoo College, calls
RELLAB "an excellent resource for modem physics or relativity courses."

RELLAB is published and distributed by Physics Academic Software, which is
a project of the American Institute of Physics in cooperation with the
American Physical Society and the American Association of Physics
Teachers, as part of a continuing series of educational software from
PAS.

RELLAB operates on any Apple Macintosh Plus computer or later with system
software version 6.0 or higher and at least 1 MB of RAM. RelLabFaster, an
enhanced application included in the software that runs faster than
RELLAB, requires a math coprocessor.
RELLAB may be purchased from Physics Academic Software for $64.95 plus
$3.50 shipping and handling for the first package ($12.50 foreign airmail)
and $.75 ($4.00 foreign) for each additional package. Lab Packs, which
include ten copies of the software and one User's Manual, are available
for $194.95.

Physics Academic Software offers a no-risk guarantee by providing a full
refund for packages returned within 30 days. Orders and requests for the
Physics Academic Software 1994-1995 Catalog of Programs should be directed
to The Academic Software Library, Campus Box 8202, North Carolina State
University, Raleigh, NC 27695-8202. By telephone, call (800) 955-TASL or
(919) 515-7447; Fax (919) 515-2682; E-mail PAS@aip.org.

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