the instant t + a, by laws as precise as that of Newton, though more complicated. Then why not regard one of these aggregates as the cause of the other, which would lead to considering as simultaneous the instant t of Jupiter and the instant t + a of Saturn?
In answer there can only be reasons, very strong, it is true, of convenience and simplicity.
XII
But let us pass to examples less artificial; to understand the definition implicitly supposed by the savants, let us watch them at work and look for the rules by which they investigate simultaneity.
I will take two simple examples, the measurement of the velocity of light and the determination of longitude.
When an astronomer tells me that some stellar phenomenon, which his telescope reveals to him at this moment, happened, nevertheless, fifty years ago, I seek his meaning, and to that end I shall ask him first how he knows it, that is, how he has measured the velocity of light.
He has begun by supposing that light has a constant velocity, and in particular that its velocity is the same in all directions. That is a postulate without which no measurement of this velocity could be attempted. This postulate could never be verified directly by experiment; it might be contradicted by it if the results of different measurements were not concordant. We should think ourselves fortunate that this contradiction has not happened and that the slight discordances which may happen can be readily explained.
The postulate, at all events, resembling the principle of sufficient reason, has been accepted by everybody; what I wish to emphasize is that it furnishes us with a new rule for the investigation of simultaneity, entirely different from that which we have enunciated above.
This postulate assumed, let us see how the velocity of light has been measured. You know that Roemer used eclipses of the satellites