How did special relativity challenge Isaac Newton’s laws of motion?

Albert Einstein’s special relativity challenged Isaac Newton’s laws of motion by abandoning the classical assumption that space and time are absolute, universal, and independent of an observer’s motion.12

In the Newtonian universe, space was viewed as a flat, three-dimensional continuum, and time was a separate, homogeneous dimension that flowed at the same rate for everyone. Newton’s mechanics relied on Galilean transformations, which assumed that if two observers were moving at different constant velocities, they would agree on the timing of events and the length of objects.234

Einstein challenged this by insisting that the speed of light is constant for all observers, regardless of their motion. To maintain this constancy, he demonstrated that:52

• Relativity of Simultaneity: Events that appear simultaneous to one observer may not be simultaneous to another moving at a different velocity.34
• Time Dilation: Time intervals are not absolute; clocks in a moving frame run slower relative to a stationary observer.14
• Length Contraction: Objects moving at high speeds appear shorter in the direction of motion to a stationary observer.64

Consequently, Einstein replaced Galilean transformations with Lorentz transformations, uniting space and time into a single four-dimensional space-time continuum.32