Light speed...

[insane_alien]

your right, nobody has travelled at the speed of light but we've fired particles at damn close to the speed of light and they don't increase in velocity much no matter how much energy we pump into them. einsteins equations hold true so we can infer that to reach light speed would require infinite energy for a massive particle. since theres is a good deal less energy than infinite in the universe we can conclude that it is impossible to reach it and therefore a very real barrier.

 

no more ad hom attacks or somebody'll ban you.

[Pangloss]

I removed Cooper's last comment, which unfortunately happened just as Insane_Alien posted above, so that may look a little odd.

[Royston]

...

(quotation removed by Pangloss)

 

Again. read up on relativity and while you're at it, read up on the scientific method because both of these you seem to have no incling about whatsoever...and there's no need for insults.

 

just another hocus pocus religon of science there's no such things as beariers..............{they are made to be broken}

 

Oh dear...but you're correct on one thing, there's no such thing as 'beariers.'

[Pangloss]

(coff) Boy I really didn't quite get to cooper267's post in time, did I? (grin) I hope you don't mind, Snail, but I've deleted part of your post where you quoted the post that I deleted for inappropriate content.

 

(He cussed somebody out, for those wondering, but it's been handled so let's move on.)

[jackson33]

your right, nobody has travelled at the speed of light but we've fired particles at damn close to the speed of light and they don't increase in velocity much no matter how much energy we pump into them. einsteins equations hold true so we can infer that to reach light speed would require infinite energy for a massive particle. since theres is a good deal less energy than infinite in the universe we can conclude that it is impossible to reach it and therefore a very real barrier.

 

no more ad hom attacks or somebody'll ban you.

 

of what we understand as mass and what is understood as energy do hold to the 186k mps theory. you mentioned barrier, which is the key word...what is that barrier and isn't it possible to breech this barrier, may require or involve some items not totally or correctly understood.

 

it may be there are things that travel faster, even much faster. if possible or true, we could not see to begin with, even with equipment, since everything is based on this certain or accepted speed limits and these things would be non responsive to reflection or receptive to current equipment.

 

sound is a bad example since with out something to travel on or in, does not exist.

 

just a thought...

[insane_alien]

yeah, but according to the theory this 3*10^8 m/s is a barrier both ways.

 

If you are all ready travelling faster (a whole lot of funky stuff would probably be happening but lets focus on velocity) then it would work the opposite way with energy increasing as you go towards c. this is because if you travelled faster than c, your energy would be complex(look up complex numbers if you don't understand).

 

either way you can't accelerate too, or past, c in either direction. In effect, it is a barrier. There may be ways to side step this barrier however with sub-space, hyper-space or some similar concept if they exist outside science fiction and we can safely traverse them.

[cooper267]

And lets say the barier can't be broken , well ever herd of a loop hole , or how about somewhere time and space don't matter , a worm hole , there's always a way its just a matter of finding it................

[cooper267]

kinda like the quickest way to point a and b is a straight line , not , fold it in half and the points become one or from point a and b without leaving the ponit at all.....

[cooper267]

I totally agree , and disagree i think we all will just have to wait until that point comes along....

[Phi for All]

I totally agree , and disagree i think we all will just have to wait until that point comes along....

And when that point comes along remember you are being given a second chance. Respect is one of the few courtesies an online community has. We're willing to give you a break but not if this is the way you will continue posting. I don't waste the infraction system on rude newbies; I just ban them immediately.

[cooper267]

respect is earned not given , i spent four years as a sniper in the marine corps , and re enlisting for a second term , so don't tell me about respect , until you walk the line that respect is fought for..................

[cooper267]

rude i think it is the other way around , im simply stating my opion your being the rude ones can't handle the heat get out......

[cooper267]

My URL

http://www.myspace.com/cooper_27

[swansont]

respect is earned not given , i spent four years as a sniper in the marine corps , and re enlisting for a second term , so don't tell me about respect , until you walk the line that respect is fought for..................

 

And this applies to your knowledge of physics in what way? And what, exactly, have you done on these boards to earn my respect?

 

Try this: Consider the "expert" stars, and, even more so, the bolded usernames (like Pangloss and Phi for All's) to be rank insignia above yours. Then look up article 91 in the UCMJ and make the connection.

[spikerz66]

hey actually i asked my teacher this exact same question last week.

Bad News he didnt know why-

So, i turned to my old firend Carl Sagan. well not actually. i watched his segment in the COSMOS mini series on light travel and to my amazement he brought up a WONDERFULL analogy about light travel and why you cant add your veloxcity to the speed of light.

 

basically to sum it up into layman's terms it has to do with the fact that if your going at the speed of light then time will actually of slowed down

i cant exactly remember why but its this speeding up of time, in this case you traveling at light speed, your speed up in time will be negated by the slowing of time, in the light waves that are around you.

i believe this is called "time dilation?" correct me if im wrong

 

 

i highly suggest you watching the segment about time travel in the COSMOS series, i believe its disc 5 if you have the DVD collection

[spikerz66]

sry i shoulf of posted this in my above post but i just rembered something that i find partially relevant to this post.

i was wondering why doesent light have a mass? doesent everything have a mass even though it might be irmesuable?

[swansont]

Time dilation is the name an effect one will observe/experience when moving relative to something else, though it will be exceedingly small at speeds we're used to. It's a consequence of light travelling at c in all inertial frames (is time dilation causing constant c or is it the other way around is a separate argument)

 

Photons do not have mass, where the mass is being defined in the way most physicists use it, so that the term is invariant between reference frames. That property mandates that they move at c. Objects with mass cannot move at c.

[spikerz66]

thanks swansont! that helped me understand it better i have been confused about this for the longest time.

 

hmmmmm.... how then can light not escape from a black hole?

what is the gravity of the black hole pulling on that prevents light from escaping it then?

[insane_alien]

gravity can act on a photon even though they have no mass. and the escape velocity of a black hole is greater than c so the photon will not ba able to escape.

[spikerz66]

gravity can act on a photon even though they have no mass.

but i dont understand how this could happen.

ill set up a really bad analogy.

 

you are a little kid ridind a tricycle (you in this analogy is the speed of light) your dad for some reason ties a long rope around you while your riding the bike and starts pulling you in (the gravity pulling in the light)

 

i dont understand how if you have no mass, lets just say you and the bike disapear suddenly (understanding that light is a photon) and "you" being the photon are gone, your mass is gone therefore to your dads amazement he pulls just an empty rope

 

how can gravity pull on something that has no mass? something that is atomiclly "not there"

[swansont]

Gravity changes the geometry of space — it is no longer flat. Light follows a particular path (locally it looks straight), called a geodesic, but the large mass of a black hole curves space so much that there is no path the light can follow to get out.

[Royston]

how can gravity pull on something that has no mass? something that is atomiclly "not there"

 

Think of gravity this way. Take a large object, such as a star and imagine the space around it curving towards that large object, because this is the effect mass has on gravity.

 

Now imagine shining an incredibly powerful torch on the star (a great distance away),..now because the space in which you're shining the torch towards is curved, then the light will curve with the space in which it's travelling through. Light only has that path to follow, because the space in which the light is travelling is curved.

 

Sorry if that came across a little simplistic, but it should give you an idea of gravity according to GR.

[cooper467]

has nothing to with physics , so if you were a marine you would understand, I don't want your respect , you are not worth it , if people want to ? me about respect , then at least have a background to stand on , I simply asked comon sense ? , don't like , i don't really care..........

[cooper467]

So if at the speed of light time slow's down , then does that mean time really doesn't exsits......... , what is time ? , the revoulotoion of earth around the sun , or the rotation of the earth in a 24 hour period , if there is no sun where is time ? , unless time is measured in changes and evnets , but then how can anyone say what the frist event was ? , even the starting of the universe is not an absolute , and in that case nothing has an absolute , everyone still trying to come up with more qeustions , and answers that makes more qeustions , so in the on going pull and tug , i say there's no such thing as a boundery , oh and just a thought that craweld up my ass , what if we are a germ just floating and a bigger being in a bigger universe , and just hasn't been disinfected yet , lol.........

 

 

so many ? , hard to uput your finger on anything........

[cooper467]

sorry about typeing , very big hands , and type fast hard to cope with both........