Sunday, February 21, 2010

What's the difference between Absolute and relative ? Most of us will say, its very easy to explain with some example. Let say as on 21.02.2010 my height is 175cms that's an absolute statement. My brother is 180 cms. I am shorter than him by 5cms that's a relative statement. So the summary is, an absolute statement is actually a fact and relative statement is a comparison .

But hold on. My height on 21.02.1987 was 90cms. Which is a fact, so this absolute. Now there cannot be two absolute statement i,e my height is 90 cms and 185 cms . But they are facts, but they are dependent on another variable in this case time. So every absolute fact is actually a relative fact when it comes to time.

Lets extend this fact. Sun is at the centre of the universe this is an absolute statement. But just go back 500 years and most of the world believed in the opposite fact that earth is at the centre of the universe, until Nicolaus Copernicus showed us light. So when we compare the fact of 2010 with a fact of 1450, the earlier fact is correct relatively.
So the summary is a thing is absolute only when we compare it to another parameter.

Just observe things around you and you will start thinking all absolute things are relative in the long run.