Is the Speed of Light Contingent on the properties of spacetime?

[Touch The Universe]

Hypothesis: The speed of light is infinite, or at least unbounded and contingent upon the properties of spacetime. The "speed of light" is the maximum speed at which energy or matter can move through spacetime and not an intrinsic property of light but is incidental to the properties of spacetime. The vacuum is a substance which has atleast two dimensions. One dimension describes the way energy and matter propagate through it.  The other dimension is that space itself can propagate, increasing irrespective to the contents within it. These two are related.

Experiment: Measure the speed of light in regions which have a suspect high amount of dark energy and see if the speed of light is different around these regions. Perhaps see if the cosmic inflation was a time where there was less dark energy and thus the speed of light was different. This suggests as the speed of the vacuum of space expands, light will behave differently in how fast it can travel. There may be a quantum component to this aspect of vacuum where it expands in discrete steps and not a linear or even exponential curve, but similar to the orbits electrons can take around a nucleus. For instance, any increase in the speed of light may require the speed space accelerates by a factor of 10. In essence, it can resonant with this new stable level the same way an electron is bumped to a higher orbit when it absorbs a photon, so it can increase in discrete steps. 

Just a funny idea, let me know why it's not unique or not based on reality. 

Edited November 26, 2018 by Touch The Universe

[beecee]

6 minutes ago, Touch The Universe said:

Hypothesis: The speed of light is infinite, or atleast unbounded and contingent upon the properties of spacetime. 

The speed of light is "c" or 299,792,458 kms/sec. It is not contingent on spacetime but follows geodesics in spacetime.

 

 

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The vacuum is a substance which has atleast two dimensions. One dimension is the way energy and matter propogate through it. The other dimension is the space itself can propagate. These two are related.

Three spatial dimensions in reality, length, breadth  and height, and the fourth time

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Experiment: Measure the speed of light in regions which have a suspect high amount of dark energy and see if the speed of light is different around these regions.

DE affects all of space uniformally, and we have no reason to suspect that "c" is any different here then over there.

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Perhaps see if the cosmic inflation was a time where there was less dark energy and thus the speed of light was different. 

DE in effect acts against the gravity of the mass energy in space...5 billion years ago, that was at a density that saw the expansion slowing down...as that density lessened with expansion, the expansion started accelerating which is now what we observe. 

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This suggests as the speed of the vacuum of space expands, light will behave differently in how fast it can travel.

No, not really.

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Just a funny idea, let me know why it's not unique or not based on reality.

It doesn't stand up to observational scrutiny at all. 

[Touch The Universe]

Thanks. your reply is helpful.

I know reality is 4D but was trying to describe the two ways space accepts movement. Stuff can move in space, space can move/expand in space. Dimensions might not be an apt word, apologize, but I degress.

You pretty much nailed the hypothesis shut, which is fun. Except for one possibility.

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DE in effect acts against the gravity of the mass energy in space...5 billion years ago, that was at a density that saw the expansion slowing down...as that density lessened with expansion, the expansion started accelerating which is now what we observe. 

This doesn't actually discount the idea of possible discrete steps in the speed of light though, does it? If space moves faster and faster, is it at all conceivable it can effect the speed of light?

On the same thought, wouldn't that mean space is expanding at different rates, at a faster rate where there is more mass, like a galaxy cluster, and wouldn't that be easy to test?

What do you mean the geodesics of space?

The speed of light could be infinite but there are some properties within the geodesics of spacetime which limit it to 300M ksp?  Is that possible?

 

Edited November 26, 2018 by Touch The Universe

[beecee]

15 minutes ago, Touch The Universe said:

Thanks. your reply is helpful.

I know reality is 4D but was trying to describe the two ways space accepts movement. Stuff can move in space, space can move/expand in space. Dimensions might not be an apt word, apologize, but I degress.

You pretty much nailed the hypothesis shut, which is fun. Except for one possibility.

Not sure about nailing it shut, I'm only an amateur, and in time one of our professionals could give a more astute answer.

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This doesn't actually discount the idea of possible discrete steps in the speed of light though, does it? If space moves faster and faster, is it at all conceivable it can effect the speed of light?

 

Simply, we have no reason to believe it isn't constant and plenty of reasons to accept that it is constant. It is the maximum speed at which any energy or mass is able to achieve. Light having no rest mass, therefor must always travel at "c" in a vacuum, and again we also have no reason to believe that has or will change depending on the age of the universe.

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On the same thought, wouldn't that mean space is expanding at different rates, at a faster rate where there is more mass, like a galaxy cluster, and wouldn't that be easy to test?

Bingo!!!Spot on! Our Milky Way galaxy for example, the local group of galaxies and even beyond, has mass energy densities so that effectively the space in those regions is decoupled from the overall large scale expansion that we do see.eg: M31 or Andromeda is moving towards us, and us towards them, as is the case with all members of the local group.

23 minutes ago, Touch The Universe said:

On the same thought, wouldn't that mean space is expanding at different rates, at a faster rate where there is more mass, like a galaxy cluster, and wouldn't that be easy to test?

At a slower rate where there is more mass energy and faster rate where there is less. 

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What do you mean the geodesics of space?

Mass warps, curves twists spacetime: Light follows the exact path of the curvature, warping or twisting. This is why we see gravitational lensing of distant objects.

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The speed of light could be infinite but there are some properties within the geodesics of spacetime which limit it to 300M ksp?  Is that possible?

We can only model what we observe...the rest is speculation.

Edited November 26, 2018 by beecee

[Touch The Universe]

Synopsis of another answer I got from a different source (youtube). For the laws of electricity and magnetism to work, we need a finite speed of light. Mass less objects must travel at the speed of light. Mass is an impediment to motion. No mass means no impediment so they go as fast as they can go. The very existence of mass and space time means that the speed of light is finite. If speed of light was infinite, there would be no mass because it would take infinite energy to create matter.

There is a finite maximum speed of light, but, before it is the maximum speed of light, it is the maximum speed of casualty. This casualty is what I was referring to when I was talking about the properties which could limit the speed of light, like some property of the vacuum. It is the maximum rate at which two points in space can talk to each other. The speed of light happens to share this same finite number because photons are mass less. This casualty seems to be the more interesting thing than the speed of light, which is a component of this first.

A better question would be what properties dictate these laws of casualty, which could theoretically be some property embedded in plank space/time or the vacuum.

On the same thought, wouldn't that mean space is expanding at different rates, at a faster rate where there is more mass, like a galaxy cluster, and wouldn't that be easy to test?

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Bingo!!!Spot on! Our Milky Way galaxy for example, the local group of galaxies and even beyond, has mass energy densities so that effectively the space in those regions is decoupled from the overall large scale expansion that we do see.eg: M31 or Andromeda is moving towards us, and us towards them, as is the case with all members of the local group.

Wow, so that is really cool, and rather mysterious.

Edited November 26, 2018 by Touch The Universe

[studiot]

11 hours ago, Touch The Universe said:

Hypothesis: The speed of light is infinite, or at least unbounded and contingent upon the properties of spacetime

The speed of light is neither infinite, nor  unbounded.

But it is contingent upon the properties of spacetime.

Someone recently asked speed a similar question "why is the speed that particular number ?"

https://www.scienceforums.net/topic/116678-why-light-speed/

Here is my reply there which demonstrates exactly the contingency you refer to.

I apologise in advance if this daft forum cannot display the quote correctly.

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This is a fine place for your equally fine question.

The speed of light is related to two very fundamental constants of free (empty) space.

The electrical permittivity   ε0  of 8.85 x 10^-12 farads per metre  (capacitance per unit length)

and

The magnetic permeability  μ0   of   4πx10−7  Henries per metre (inductance per unit length)

 

When these two constants are substituted into solutions of Maxwell's equations of Electromagnetism EM waves of characteristic speed in free space have this value.

c=1ε0μ0−−−√

This is the speed of light.

I suggest you read through this thread and then come back with any further questions.

Edited November 26, 2018 by studiot

[Touch The Universe]

Thanks studiot, came to the same conclusion. See my post above yours

[studiot]

1 hour ago, Touch The Universe said:

Thanks studiot, came to the same conclusion. See my post above yours

Thanks

No further questions?

I must have done something right.

 

[Strange]

This is an interesting paper: http://physics.princeton.edu/~mcdonald/examples/stiffness.pdf

It is mainly about calculating the "stiffness" of space that gravitational waves experience. It derives a value for the Young's modulus of space.

He then goes on to consider light and derive an "Young's modulus, Y_QED, of elasticity of (quantum) electromagnetism"

16 hours ago, Touch The Universe said:

On the same thought, wouldn't that mean space is expanding at different rates, at a faster rate where there is more mass, like a galaxy cluster, and wouldn't that be easy to test?

Expansion is less in the presence of concentrations of mass; because they are held together by gravity.

[Rajiv Naik]

On 27/11/2018 at 12:28 AM, studiot said:

Thanks

No further questions?

I must have done something right.

 

But what is this news...  even though its laser it talks about photons and speeds in  vacume:

sent a pulse of laser light through cesium vapor so quickly that it left the chamber before it had even finished entering.

The pulse traveled 310 times the distance it would have covered if the chamber had contained a vacuum.

Researchers say it is the most convincing demonstration yet that the speed of light — supposedly an ironclad rule of nature — can be pushed beyond known boundaries, at least under certain laboratory circumstances.

“This effect cannot be used to send information back in time,” said Lijun Wang, a researcher with the private NEC Institute. “However, our experiment does show that the generally held misconception that ‘nothing can travel faster than the speed of light’ is wrong.”

The results were published in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature.

 

 

[Carrock]

36 minutes ago, Rajiv Naik said:

“This effect cannot be used to send information back in time,” said Lijun Wang, a researcher with the private NEC Institute. “However, our experiment does show that the generally held misconception that ‘nothing can travel faster than the speed of light’ is wrong.”

The results were published in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature.

A reference would help; I couldn't find anything about publishing in nature.

'the generally held misconception that ‘nothing can travel faster than the speed of light’ is wrong.”' is certainly not held by (m)any physicists.

 

This sounds similar to quantum tunnelling; e.g. a particle with uncertain position has its .0001% 'leading edge' tunnel through a barrier and the particle gets detected; this can seem superluminal simply because the position of calculated maximum probability has changed FTL.

[studiot]

You could look into "The Catt Anomaly"

I don't know that has been satisfactorilly resolved yet.

https://www.google.co.uk/search?ei=H1ICXKj_M8a_gQajtZfIBg&q=catt+anomaly&oq=catt+anomaly&gs_l=psy-ab.3..0j0i22i30.62502.65526..65950...0.0..0.114.1076.9j3......0....1..gws-wiz.......0i67j0i131j0i131i67j0i10.AZd5yR9VUSs

[Strange]

33 minutes ago, Carrock said:

A reference would help; I couldn't find anything about publishing in nature.

Searching for some of the text, just seems to bring up conspiracy and crackpot websites (I went to look at one of them but my ISP issued a security warning, so I didn't bother.)

[Rajiv Naik]

1 hour ago, Strange said:

Searching for some of the text, just seems to bring up conspiracy and crackpot websites (I went to look at one of them but my ISP issued a security warning, so I didn't bother.)

I am citing this as there genuine  research going on regarding speed of light.

 

.https://www.nature.com/articles/133759b0

velocity of light by Frank K Edmondson.

J. GHEURY DE BRAY has directed attention to an apparent decrease in the velocity of light¹. I have recently tried to explain this on the basis of the theory of the expanding universe. If the speed of light is a true constant, independent of any variation in our unit of length, then a doubling of the radius of the universe should cause the measured velocity of light to diminish by half. If the radius of the universe doubles every Kyears, then the velocity of light will be proportional to (1/2)^t where K is the unit of time. Thus, the logarithm of the measured velocity of light must be a linear function of the time. I determined the two constants of such a function from de Bray's data and found that it represented the observations in a satisfactory manner. I then solved this equation for the length of time it would take the velocity to diminish by half. The time is of the order of 60,000 years, which is considerably shorter than the value derived from a study of the recession of the external galaxies². Consequently, this observed variation cannot be explained by the expanding universe theory unless we assume that the rate of expansion is much more rapid in the vicinity of the earth than it is at the distance of the spirals.

[Strange]

3 minutes ago, Rajiv Naik said:

I am citing this as there genuine  research going on regarding speed of light

Did you notice that is from 1934 and is a response to an article published in 1927. I think we have moved on a bit since then.

[Rajiv Naik]

6 hours ago, Strange said:

Did you notice that is from 1934 and is a response to an article published in 1927. I think we have moved on a bit since then.

not much  ahead of 1934. ,just kidding.

I have referred to other research also. Ill post more.

[studiot]

12 hours ago, Rajiv Naik said:

On 26/11/2018 at 6:58 PM, studiot said:

Thanks

No further questions?

I must have done something right.

 

But what is this news...  even though its laser it talks about photons and speeds in  vacume:

sent a pulse of laser light through cesium vapor so quickly that it left the chamber before it had even finished entering.

The pulse traveled 310 times the distance it would have covered if the chamber had contained a vacuum.

Researchers say it is the most convincing demonstration yet that the speed of light — supposedly an ironclad rule of nature — can be pushed beyond known boundaries, at least under certain laboratory circumstances.

“This effect cannot be used to send information back in time,” said Lijun Wang, a researcher with the private NEC Institute. “However, our experiment does show that the generally held misconception that ‘nothing can travel faster than the speed of light’ is wrong.”

The results were published in Thursday’s issue of the journal Nature.

 

What does this have to do with my post that you quoted?

Nothing as far as I can see.

 

 

@Strange.

I wonder if this fixation with Pi is to do with the fact that 4Pi appears in many formulae where a volume integral is taken ?

Yes I often take advantage of the fact that Pi is very nearly the square root of 10 when knocking out quick back of envelope estimates of something.

Phi is often used as the golden ratio symbol by numerologists and other mystics from La La Land.