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Abstract:
The geometry of hyperbolas is the key to understanding special
relativity. The Lorentz transformations of special relativity are
just hyperbolic rotations, yet this point of view has all but
disappeared from the standard physics textbooks. This approach
replaces the ubiquitous gamma symbol of most standard treatments by
the appropriate hyperbolic trigonometric functions. In most cases,
this simplifies the resulting formulas, while emphasizing their
geometric content.
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