M_Broz

Fellow Scientists, I have a perplexing thought for you. This is truly intellectual and most likely cannot be tested, but an interesting idea to think about to say the least. So, I was watching an episode of Into the Universe with Stephen Hawking, and I got caught up in some thoughts. I love to think about paradoxes, and this almost seems fitting, so I'll get on with it. Light speed (3.00x10^8 m/s) is the fastest known speed, and nothing can ever match it. However, it does allow for things to get extremely close, about 99.99999% (maybe even infinitely close). Light is interesting in that a single photon doesn't have mass, yet it is there, but can still travel. Anyway, you can send an object (let's say a spaceship with people on board) very close to the speed of light and those people would "travel in time." So, since it cannot reach the speed of light things have to get slower to simply prevent it from reaching the speed of light. Which is a good question in the fact that if you were to graph such a thing, the closer you get to the speed of light, the slower time travels...right? I mean it takes light from the Sun 8 minutes to reach Earth. On such a graph, it would be a decrease in time as the speed increases and reaches closer to light speed. Alright get ready, because this takes some thinking. What about light itself? If you were to plot the graph, it should follow the ever so decreasing time, right? So light itself would slow down. The graph shouldn't jump back to normal time? You at least think it would based upon what I just said, but that cannot be true, or could it? I mean it's not going to (at least based on evidence) go off the graph, It could be either two situations: one, is purely perception vs reality, and the other is that light isn't an object (without any mass) so it mustn't follow the laws of physics. One, our perception of light could be way different that what it is in reality.Let me explain, because in reality this could be true, where light is actually slowed down, but it is the way we perceive it to be that it's instantaneous. The other situation could be that [a photon of] light is a massless "thing" that we can't count as any normal object, and thus, it follows physics differently? So, as I wrap this up, if you're still with me, the question is: What happens to light itself because of the fact it is traveling at the speed of light? Is it slowed down or not? With that, I suggest taking a look at the graph attached to this forum and give it a look because it is interesting to see what happens at the end of the graph, because for now it's a mystery. Matt P.S. Please enlighten me on what you have to say about this.