The ‘Independent’ Confirmation
Einstein’s famous 1905 paper “On The Electrodynamics Of Moving Bodies” was quite remarkable [1]. He started his reasoning with two postulates:
1) The “Principle of Relativity” rejects an absolute rest frame and requires that “the same laws of electrodynamics and optics will be valid for all frames of reference”
2) The speed of light c in a vacuum will always be the same regardless of “the state of motion of the emitting body”. This is referred to today as the invariance of the speed of light.
From these two postulates came a thought experiment, and from that thought experiment came forth math. It is math which Lorentz also happened to have come up with years prior, but using a more conventional approach. “Clearly Einstein just had a special kind of mind”, popular science tells us, “he was so far above his peers that he didn’t need to arrive at conclusions the conventional way”.
Generally speaking, scientific discovery starts with observations that beg an explanation. We might see an experimentally determined fact that leads us to ask questions and form or modify a physical model. This model is the basis for our hypothesis which we can then test against further observations. This is exactly how Lorentz and Poincaré came to their conclusions before Einstein.
H. A. Lorentz’s relativistic work started with the challenging conclusions of the Michelson-Morely experiment. Their experiment was a stumbling block for existing physical models of light propagation, leading Lorentz to hypothesize length contraction as an extension of his aether model. As shown in my previous paper this length contraction hypothesis later necessitated the creation of “time dilation” or what Lorentz referred to as “local time” or t′ [2] . This modification was needed to satisfy the requirements of Maxwell’s equations with respect to its second order terms. After this was established, Poincaré, who was intimately involved in the critique and extension of Lorentz’s work, showed that Lorentz’s work lead to what he called the “principal of relativity”. Does that sound familiar?
To be fair, Poincaré first referred to this concept as “the principal of relative motion” but I can find lectures as early as 1904 where he names it the “principal of relativity” verbatim. In 1902 Poincaré wrote “The movement of any system whatever ought to obey the same laws, whether it is referred to fixed axes or to the movable axes which are implied in uniform motion in a straight line. This is the principle of relative motion” [3]. In 1904 Poincaré stated in his lectures, “The principle of relativity, according to which the laws of physical phenomena must be the same for a stationary observer as for an observer carried along in a uniform motion of translation ; so that we have not and can not have any means of discerning whether or not we are carried along in such a motion.” [4]. Poincaré even used a thought experiment in which observers synchronized their watches using light beams as Einstein did. One admirer of Einstein even admitted “the similarity between Poincaré’s and Einstein’s thought experiment is striking” [5].
Einstein then came out with the 1905 paper outlining Special Relativity, a completely new theory that independently confirmed Lorentz & Poincaré’s work, we are told. This illusion of independence stemmed from the fact that not a single paper was cited in Einstein’s writing. In the first pages, he makes a general reference to Maxwell’s electrodynamics and to the “unsuccessful attempts to discover any motion of the earth relatively to the ‘light medium’ ” to justify his postulate of relativity, but not much else. There was no specific citation which could be used to pin down what or who exactly he had been reading at the time.
Lorentz embraced Einstein’s Relativity Theory as a body of work independent from his own. With conscious motives that I assume are genuine, Lorentz stated, “there can be no doubt that [Einstein] would have conceived it even if the work of all his predecessors in the theory of this field had not been done at all. His work is in this respect independent of the previous theories.” [6]. That confirmation seems to have satisfied most historians, while Poincaré’s silence on the matter is largely ignored.
Reverse Engineering
The most logical explanation for Einstein’s mysterious 1905 paper is that, rather than conjuring up useful postulates to work from in a stroke of prophetic genius, Einstein reverse engineered Lorentz and Poincaré’s existing work.
Lorentz started with length contraction as a postulate, and Einstein’s reasoning ended with length contraction as a conclusion. Einstein’s work began with the principle of relativity and invariance of c as postulates, but Lorentz and Poincaré’s work contains them as conclusions. Using both of those conclusions as guiding principles, Einstein worked backwards to get time dilation and finally length contraction, whereas Lorentz’s length contraction is what led him to discover time dilation (local time, t’). Despite a relativity concept being clearly inspired by experiments like Michelson-Morley, Einstein claimed in an interview to have no knowledge of Michelson-Morley prior to 1905: “When I asked him [Einstein] how he had learned of the Michelson-Morley experiment, he told me that he had become aware of it through the writings of H. A. Lorentz, but only after 1905 had it come to his attention! ‘Otherwise,’ he said, ‘I would have mentioned it in my paper’ ”[7].
It’s hard to overstate how suspicious a lack of citation is in this context. Given that these two postulates of Einstein were not widely accepted truths, omitting citation is very unnatural. If someone is making an argument based on hitherto little known postulates, any responsible scientist would cite the specific experiments leading to these assertions. Even if not Michelson-Morley or Lorentz, some other citation would be warranted. In fact we even see Lorentz’s name mentioned, but only with respect to certain equations later on in the paper. So he is using Lorentz’s math but is not familiar with his important work regarding Michelson-Morley? And why would a man familiar with Lorentz’s work just happened to chose a starting principle derived from that same work?
I believe Poincaré noticed this early on, leading to his notorious silence on the matter [8]. Put yourself in his shoes and imagine what he witnessed. Imagine someone writes a paper years after you, using postulates you wrote about, yet without a single citation to you or your co-workers’ writings. He even uses the same name for the principle (relativity) and an almost identical thought experiment for the reasoning in his work. Nevertheless, this is still circumstantial evidence presented thus far, and perhaps that isn’t strong enough of a case for some. It turns out, however, we have more explicit evidence that Einstein was deceiving the world.
Proven Liar
Einstein’s lies are fully exposed when we compare his public interviews with his private letters. As mentioned earlier, Einstein publicly denied having any knowledge of Michelson-Morley or Lorentz’s work regarding that experiment. If he had, he would have “mentioned it”, he said. Unfortunately, letters to his wife later surfaced proving the exact opposite. Einstein wrote to his wife Mileva in Decemeber 1901: “I want to get down to business now and read what Lorentz and Drude have written about electrodynamics of moving bodies” [9]. Hector Munera explains the importance of this admission as follows: “these books were the 1895 theory of Lorentz, and the 1900 optics book by Drude. The empirical basis for Lorentz’ work was the “negative” interpretation of the MM experiment. Indeed, Lorentz was closely following Michelson’s work right from the beginning and send him a correction to the 1881 experiment” [ibid]. Drude was summarizing and interpreting work from Lorentz and Poincaré including one of Einstein’s famous postulates. Munera explains, “from Drude’s work Einstein learnt about the constancy of the two-way velocity of light in January 1902” [ibid].
These letters show that not only was Einstein aware of MMX and Lorentz / Poincaré’s work on the subject years prior to 1905, but he was studying them intensely for the purpose of his own future writings. There can be no other reason for lying so blatantly other than to cover up what we’ve alluded to so far.
The reasoning behind this deception seems clear. If the source material he built his conjecture on were to be admitted, Einstein’s paper would have had much less impact. To merely reverse engineer a chain of scientific discoveries, is not a discovery at all and far from an independent confirmation. Worse yet, as shown in my previous writings, the logic and conclusions that Special Relativity brings to the table don’t hold up to scrutiny and are inferior to Lorentz and Poincaré’s original work [10]. One such example is the fact that time dilation calculations for GPS use Lorentz and not Special Relativity since they have a preferred frame that Special Relativity, if properly applied, forbids.
Lost in Heuristics
“But Einstein’s math is useful, isn’t it? Therefore Relativity Theory must be right!”.
Einstein’s work marked the beginning of physics getting lost in heuristics detached from reality. To be fair, it’s not only Einstein to blame for this, but he was the vanguard of a larger shift away from understanding fundamentals into the mindset that has been referred to as “shut up and calculate”.
As physicist Alexandr Unzicker points out, there has been a “transition from philosophy-based physics to the technical, math-recipe form that had become fashionable in the late 1920s” [11, pg75]. Mainstream physics has long since discarded the pursuit of fundamental mechanisms in exchange for useful heuristics that keep failed models alive indefinitely. This can solve problems in the short term, but fails us in the long run. Interestingly, Unzicker himself is an admirer of Einstein and argues that by starting with the postulates in his 1905 paper, Einstein was not part of the problem in modern day physics. I couldn’t disagree more, given that adherents of Relativity Theory (relativists) exemplify the problem.
Being a relativist requires using math without understanding what the math physically means. I can’t count the number of times that relativists, when pressed on the contradictions and lack of clear mechanism within Relativity Theory, have justified the soundness of it with “well the math works” (even though it doesn’t always) as if this were some sort of final and conclusive argument. I’ve even heard it argued that space-time itself is the math of the coordinate system. They are unknowingly admitting that all they have is a heuristic in place of a true physical model or even a tentative mechanism for producing an effect. In other words, they have built up an idol and are sacrificing truth at the metaphorical feet of Baal or perhaps more accurately Mammon for some (keeping the grant money flowing). In any sane world, such heuristics would be placeholders for later examination and revision of the underlying theory from whence they came, not the gospel truth itself.
And why must we deal with this current mess in physics? Why much we accept quasi-mystical dogma instead of questioning models that don’t make sense? Perhaps because a bad tree always bears bad fruit, and Relativity is at the heart of that bad tree. Perhaps because the world embraced a dazzling new theory shrouded in lies and omissions by a self serving participant. Because the world wanted a good story rather than reality. It’s seems like a new rendition of The Emperor’s New Clothes and science is still swimming naked.
References
[1] Einstein A. On the electrodynamics of moving bodies. Annalen der physik. 1905 Jun 30;17(10):891-921.
[2] Babaoye R. “Lorentzian time dilation and the electromagnetic future”. Better Science Substack. Available at: https://betterscience.substack.com/p/lorentzian-time-dilation-and-the. (Accessed: Feb 24th 2026)
[3] Poincaré H. 1905. Science and Hypothesis. New York: The Walter Scott Publishing Co., LTD. The Project Gutenberg EBook release.
[4] Poincaré H. The Current State and Future of Mathematical Physics. Bulletin des Sciences Mathématiques. 1904 Dec;28(2):302-24. Original lecture given on September 24, 1904, at the Congress of Art and Science in Saint Louis.
[5] Granek G. Poincaré’s light signaling and clock synchronization thought experiment and its possible inspiration to Einstein. In AIP Conference Proceedings 2006 Nov 3 (Vol. 861, No. 1, pp. 1095-1102). American Institute of Physics.
[6] Lorentz, H. A.; Miller, D. C.; Kennedy, R. J.; Hedrick, E. R.; Epstein, P. S. (1928), “Conference on the Michelson–Morley Experiment”, The Astrophysical Journal, 68: 345–351, Bibcode:1928ApJ....68..341M, doi:10.1086/143148
[7] Shankland R.S. . “Conversations with Albert Einstein”, Am. J. Phys. 31 (1) 47-57 (1963). Quoted in Munera, H. “Observation During 2004 of Periodic Fringe-Shifts in an Adialeiptometric Stationary Michelson-Morley Experiment”. Electromagnetic Phenomena. 2006;6(1):70-92.
[8] Goldberg S. Poincaré’s Silence and Einstein’s Relativity: the role of theory and experiment in Poincaré’s physics. The British Journal for the History of Science. 1970 Jun;5(1):73-84.
[9] J. Renn and R. Schulmann (editors), S. Smith (translator), Albert Einstein-Mileva Maric, The Love Letters, Princeton University Press, Princeton (1992) 107 pp. Quoted in Munera, H. “Observation During 2004 of Periodic Fringe-Shifts in an Adialeiptometric Stationary Michelson-Morley Experiment”. Electromagnetic Phenomena. 2006;6(1):70-92.
[10] Babaoye R. “How Lorentz Beat Einstein”. Better Science Substack. Available at: https://betterscience.substack.com/p/how-lorentz-beat-einstein. (Accessed: Dec 17th 2025)
[11] Unzicker A. 2013. “The Higgs Fake: How Particle Physicists Fooled the Nobel Committee”. CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform. Quoted in Smith, W. “Pondering the Brave New Particle Physics”. Philos Sofia Initiative. Available at: https://philos-sophia.org/unzicker-particle-physics. (Accessed: Aug 21 2026)