can light go faster than the speed of its self

[swansont]

unfortunatly' date=' to be at lightspeed you must have either zero mass (like photon) or infinite mass.

[/quote']

 

Note, however, that former solution is valid and the latter (if you use energy) diverges.

[Gasparri]

. I don't like the idea of saying "it's not the same photon" or not.

 

Well, that as it may, you are both fundamentally correct

and incorrect. It's the perspective of the observer don't' you think?

After all, no phenomena is a phenomena unless it is an observed phenomena.

That more or less sums up as; If it tastes like chicken it's not chicken unless

it *IS* chicken.

 

You can quote me on that.

[hobz]

Despite what 5614 said, you are correct. It is most probably absorbed and re-emitted. How you define 'the same' is a but subjective though....

 

If that is the case, what causes the re-emitted photon to have a certain direction based on its frequency?

[J.C.MacSwell]

Wouldn't light-speed and a light particle be two different things? If so, couldn't you then somehow accelerate the light particle to such a point that it is faster then the speed of light?

 

With what? What would you suggest using to apply the force?

[swansont]

If that is the case, what causes the re-emitted photon to have a certain direction based on its frequency?

 

Conservation of energy and momentum

[hobz]

Conservation of energy and momentum

I guess energy is conserved since the frequency of the photon doesn't change.

So the incident momentum gets mapped, so to speak, to a new momentum (direction) depending on the materials properties?

 

If the absorption/re-emission is true, then isn't that contradicting that only photon of specific wavelengths can be absorbed in a given material?

 

I read somewhere that the absorption is virtual; the photon is not absorbed per say. Instead it interacts with the atom of the material that tries to absorb it, and depending on how different the wavelength of the photon and the energy required for absorption is, there is a time delay explaining the slowing of the photon as it goes through the material. Is this true?

[swansont]

I guess energy is conserved since the frequency of the photon doesn't change.

So the incident momentum gets mapped, so to speak, to a new momentum (direction) depending on the materials properties?

 

If the absorption/re-emission is true, then isn't that contradicting that only photon of specific wavelengths can be absorbed in a given material?

 

I read somewhere that the absorption is virtual; the photon is not absorbed per say. Instead it interacts with the atom of the material that tries to absorb it, and depending on how different the wavelength of the photon and the energy required for absorption is, there is a time delay explaining the slowing of the photon as it goes through the material. Is this true?

 

AFAIK the virtual-state absorption precludes a recoil from the atom, which would allow the change in momentum and energy you see in real absorptions or Raman scattering, where the atom ends up in a different state. In a virtual absorption it does not need to be near a resonance.

[VickFury]

Heisenberg uncertainty principle is interesting

[elas]

can light go faster than the speed of its self

 

Perhaps the answer is not in the same frame.

 

A muon in a cyclotron travels just a little slower than a photon in the same magnetic field;

1) at what speed would an observer on the muon observe the movement of the photon?

2) is it possible for the observer on the muon to observe a particle in the same frame, as travelling at 'c'?

If so the particle would not be observed by an observer in a different frame such as the external observer of the cyclotron experiment. However, it should be possible to detect the particle by trapping it in a counter rotating magnetic ring where the particle's speed relative to an external observer would be '0' making it observable by an external observer.

[Banshii]

Light does not accelerate, at all.

Light is either full speed, or not at all.

From the moment each photon is created, it's traveling at the max speed allowable by it's environment.

There's no acceleration involved with light.

To say light accelerates is the same thing as saying light takes 'time' to get to it's maximum speed. Which is false, because as far as we know, light does not take any time what so ever to reach its max speed.

 

Best way I can explain it without writing more.