kotake

Maybe, but perhaps the brief disappearance is so brief that it actually happens in no time, ergo, causes no delay. So the explanation might be a different one.

Why Not? (Not doubting' date=' just interested)[/quote']As far as I know, all experiments give the results that light travels at c, but I don't know how many decimals they have. I also assume that experiments with addition of relativistic velocities give positive results, something that supports special relativity. I think it would depend on the manner of c not being a constant for us to determine whether relativity would work. For instance, if c were changing over the period of time past big bang, we could use relativistic calculations within a given period. c would still be constant, in a way, but it would continually change over time. I cannot see any other way in which c would not be a constant.

He just doesn't understand it himself, and makes a public worriment out of it. He says so himself:

I think that the energy that the photons were carrying gets absorbed into the glass atoms, so for a moment there is no photon, but an excited atom. Then the energy gets emitted in the form of a new photon. So the delay is caused by the brief disappearance of the photons.

So you are saying that the speed if light isn't constant, yet that the formulas say that it is constant, ergo there is something fishy about them? An object cannot obtain a velocity of c if it has a mass, isn't that so? Therefore, photons (if we consider them to be mass-less) are the only ones that can reach c and the only ones that have a relative velocity of c whatever the reference frame. Thus your new theory states that c is the theoretical maximum velocity for all matter? But isn't that what Special Relativity says? Or is the difference that according to this new theory light can have any velocity, and a maximum of c? You mean, when light is transmitted through a medium such as glass, it has a velocity slightly below c, and thus cannot be said to have a constant speed? This is a good point. I have been wondering about it too. But I think that light doesn't really slow down, it only gets delayed, because the photons (all travelling at c) are absorbed into the atoms in the glass and then re-emitted. When the beam leaves the medium and proceeds in vacuum, its speed is again c. Sorry if I ask so much, but I want to be reassured about whether I am following along. I am little slow.

G'day, I am kotake [ko-ta-keh] and come from Poland. I attend the Norwegian equivalent of high school. I like physics, science and stuff, and I like long and aesthetic words. And that's about it. Good night. Edit: Yey! I'm a lepton!

Some experiments indicate that the speed of light is not constant. I recently read that accordring to the physicist João Magueijo, the speed of light was several trillions that of c in the moment of Big Bang, and has drastically been decreasing for some 10 billion years. Some two billion years ago, it has slowly been increasing again.