I watched a program the other day on Einstein's General Relativity. It was fascinating. As I understand it GR is the best model of the (large) Universe. The program stated that time literally passes slower nearer large masses than further away from them. And if I'm right in my understanding, this doesn't just mean clocks run slower, but that the "fabric" of space and everything in it moves more slowly near regions of mass. Kind of like running a game of life on my computer, and downgrading my computer when I'm near a large object, or upgrading to a supercomputer when I'm flying through space. They tested this with an atomic clock, one on the ground, and one up a mountain and after a few days there was a measurable difference. That was cool, but I started to think of more natural examples. Would, for example, a sample population of plants grow to bloom quicker in space than on the Earth's surface? This would, for me, demonstrate a kind of "time viscosity" depending on where you are in space.
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8$\begingroup$ I think if you're trying to grow plants in space, GR is the least of your worries. That said, all else being equal, the effect of GR is tiny (imperceptible fractions of a second of difference). But your intuition is correct, in general. $\endgroup$– probably_someoneCommented Jun 13, 2017 at 20:54
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$\begingroup$ Thanks. I just found it interesting and would like to know other's views. Glad my intuition was on the right track. I'm no Physicist ! $\endgroup$– user67727Commented Jun 13, 2017 at 20:58
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Well ,for the person on earth ,the answer is yes!!.But for the person on the spaceship,he will experience the same life cycle of plant as on earth.This might seem like a paradox but Einstein showed that in fact,space and time are interrelated.
There is no way to tell if you have any absolute velocity or absolute time because that would mean choosing a particular special reference frame which according to general relativity is none.Moreover,if you were in the spaceship and let's say you spend your whole life sewing sweaters.The number of sweaters you sew on the spaceship will be the same as the number of sweaters you could sew on earth but when you come back to the earth more time would have passed on earth and your twin brother(let's suppose) would have sewn more sweaters than you.
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2$\begingroup$ +1 LOL for the standard sweater knitting time as a new unit of time! I like it - it shows how time is simply a measure of the rate at which we do stuff - or how quickly physical processes happen - relative to the rates of other physical processes. Thinking about time in purely experimental terms like these takes a great deal of confusion out of relativity. You might like to mention that the effect is small though, and would probably be overwhelmed by other factors, so in practice life cycles in space may be different (but they certainly are a correct relexion of the relativistic effect alone). $\endgroup$ Commented Jun 13, 2017 at 23:56
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$\begingroup$ When you come back to earth though you would have aged less than your twin brother so you would have more lifetime to continue sewing sweaters until you made as many as your sibling, depending on who was the more adept sweater maker. $\endgroup$– WookieCommented Dec 30, 2019 at 9:33