On simplified axiomatic foundations of special relativity

Year 2010 marks the 100-th anniversary since the paper by Ignatowsky was published that was devoted to the axiomatic analysis of the special theory of relativity. Despite such a long history, the ideas put forward by Ignatowsky, and later developed by Franck and Rothe, still have not earned a proper place in the physical curriculum. As a celebration of this jubilee, we would like to draw the attention of the community to logical foundations of the relativity theory. In this paper we consider the history of the field, analyse the main postulates underlying the special relativity theory, and discuss the causes that lead to fundamental physical constants arising from within the mathematical structure of the theory.