You might have heard that this guy named Albert Einstein came up with some crazy ideas back in 1915, and they actually turned out to be pretty accurate when it comes to describing how gravity works.
But let’s not get too technical here. Instead, let’s focus on one of the most famous examples of general relativity: Mercury’s eccentric orbit around the sun. Yep, that little planetoid that we all learned about in elementary school has a pretty weird path around our star and Einstein was able to explain why!
So what’s going on here? Well, according to Newtonian physics (which is still pretty accurate for most purposes), Mercury should have an elliptical orbit just like the other planets. But when scientists started measuring its position more precisely in the early 20th century, they noticed that something was off the planet’s orbit seemed to be slightly elongated and tilted compared to what we would expect based on Newtonian calculations.
This discrepancy became known as the “anomalous perihelion advance” of Mercury (which is just a fancy way of saying that it gets closer to the sun than expected), and for years scientists were stumped about how to explain it. But then Einstein came along with his theory of general relativity, which basically says that gravity isn’t actually a force like we thought instead, it’s caused by spacetime being curved around massive objects (like planets or stars).
And when you apply this idea to Mercury’s orbit, things start to make sense. According to Einstein’s theory, the planet should experience a slight “pull” towards the sun as it gets closer but because of the way that spacetime is curved around massive objects, this pull actually causes the planet to speed up and move faster than expected (which in turn makes its orbit appear more elongated).
Einstein’s theory of general relativity not only explains why Mercury has an eccentric orbit it also helps us understand how gravity works on a much deeper level. And who knows? Maybe someday we’ll be able to use this knowledge to build better spacecraft or even travel through time (although that part is still pretty sci-fi). But for now, let’s just enjoy the fact that science can help us understand some of the most mysterious and awe-inspiring phenomena in our universe!