The speed of light

Discussion in 'Off-Topic' started by khaos, Jul 25, 2010.

  1. khaos

    khaos DnB'addict

    Was just thinking about speed.
    Nothing can go faster then light.
    But what happens when a space shuttle is flying at lightspeed and someone fires a gun?
    The bullet SHOULD go faster then the speed of light, but physics say that's impossible...

    K.
     
  2. It's a totally messed up part of the physical world as we perceive it.. according to the laws of physics, even if you could theoretically travel at the speed of light, say set up a Pall Stool on the front end of a photon (given it's observed as a particle) and you turned on a flash light (erm, torch heh), those photons leaving the lightbulb, would be travelling @ 186,000miles/sec (ie, the speed of light) away from you.. I think some Einstein dude once said sth along the lines... It's all relative ;)

    thx for matter stirring tho hehe

    Ossi!
     
    • Like Like x 1
  3. khaos

    khaos DnB'addict

    A lot is going through my mind now.
    If it is relative like in my language, it means: compared to something.

    The speed of a bullet would be lightspeed+bulletspeed, but compared to lightspeed it's still bulletspeed.
    This is getting very complicated already....

    btw. Welcome ;)
     
  4. MindStar9

    MindStar9 Floating in Space

    Things to ponder ... I'm not a physics guru by any means, but it's all quite fascinating when my purple matter isn't busy thinking of other stuff.

    Oh, and ... welcome to EP Ossipon ... I can see you will be giving us some things to think about with your contributions. It's all good ... keeps us on our toes. Oh, but ... khaos started this didn't he :biggrin: ... you guys are gonna throw down some heavy stuff here aren't you? I'll just sit on the sidelines and learn a thing or two then. :umn:
     
  5. narfi

    narfi Lost

    Is the speed of light the same in atmosphere as it is in space?
     
  6. The math states that going in the speed of light is equal to dividing by 0.
    But going faster than speed of light isn't.

    So in essence, you can go faster, just not in the speed of light.


    Light is quite.. Weird, it has both the form of a wave, and the mass of a particle, which is very very weird. O.o
     
  7. John BD

    John BD Subwoofers rock.

    why would speed of light be a speed limmit, i can imagine that after that it becomes invisible, there are so many unknowns still maybe a black hole is nothing more then particles flying faster then light.

    keep your mind open :D
     
  8. NotAdmin

    NotAdmin Administrator

    I agree with some of the above thoughts. Just because we currently are not aware of anything that is faster than light does not mean light is the fastest thing possible.

    As Terry Pratchett stated, some things are faster. Nothing is daster than the honk of a nyc cabby behind you when the light turned green :)

    Also from pratchett: sound and light travel at the same speed. This was concluded by scientists of the unseen university who positioned a man at the end of the world and had him shout to the next guy in line as soon as he saw the sunrise. This man shouted to the next, and so on until the professors back at the university could write these findings down.
     
  9. aridash

    aridash large throbbing member

    not quite, its a little slower. the "speed of light" is the speed in a vacuum.

    quite. its because we havent seen or measured anything faster. one could focus on the "seen" part of that, its very difficult to measure somthing or the effects of somthing you cannot percieve, and we use sight (and therfore light) as our primary method of perception.

    the original question is an interesting one. i gather than at the speed of light, time for a photon becomes static or non-existant. theres an implication here that, as light doesnt observe time, it can be anywhere and every where at once. the famous dual split experiment certinly proves it can be in two places at once, so why not an infinite number of places? theres all sorts of messing with mass too, which inever really have got my head into (implications to a lay observer such as i that the photon possesses infinte mass, which is clearly false)

    i think the real answer is that at the speed of light, the torch shone does not shine anywhere as you are going the same speed. the gun shot would go *backwards* as it is slower.
     
  10. John BD

    John BD Subwoofers rock.

    ah but do u walk backwards if u walk forewards inside a flying plane at mach 1? :D
     
  11. MistressArwen

    MistressArwen Smile, makes someones day

    Here follows the best lecture on the subject I could find:

















    Antigravity and gravity is relevant to the speed of light and or how to attain the speed in a sustained bubble or a vacuum. It should also come as no surprize that secret governmental orgenizations already have the technologies to travel at the speed of Light and beyond.
     
  12. aridash

    aridash large throbbing member

    you walk forwards. you have enough energy to move at mach 1.00001 (whatever) added to that you are still in the same frame of reference as the flying plane. when the bullet (or anything) is fired from the vehicle moving at the speed of light, it moves into it own frame of refernce and has insufficient energy to maintain c, so instantly goes backwards.
     
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  13. khaos

    khaos DnB'addict

    Why does it have insufficient energy? The energy of the bullet is the thrust of the engine + the thrust of the bullet. If the vehicle is as fast as lightning this means the bullet can go faster. There also won't be much to slow it down immediately in space because it's a vacuum.

    But this only possible in theory, as nothing - except for light itself - has enough energy to get to the speed of light.

    The current theory for black holes is -I believe - that the gravity is so big it sucks all light away. This means there is no light coming from the black hole, which makes it invisible for us.

    But it can't be both at the same time.
    when you observe it for particles, there is no movement so you can't see the waves. But when there is movement you can't see the particles. (Or is it the other way around).
     
  14. MistressArwen

    MistressArwen Smile, makes someones day


    Does it not depend on the energy used? I mean is a railgun used or a plasma cannon? A plasma cannon firing particals at the speed of light or beyond would radically change the theory cos it has sufficient energy needed to do so.
     
  15. John BD

    John BD Subwoofers rock.

    :umn:aaah i get it so if i would step out of the airplane flying at mach 1 walking forewards i would infact well ehm crash? hmm lemme experiment on that :alcohol:
     
    • Like Like x 1
  16. MistressArwen

    MistressArwen Smile, makes someones day

    LOL And no-one here dares touch on Time-dialation as a factor concerning the speed of light. but it is discussed in the 8 part youtube lecture I posted.

    Where the observers see a craft making a radical 90 dgree turn at extreme high speed and seems impossible due to inertia. yet the ocupants do NOT experience it that way or as percieved due to time-dialation.
     
  17. khaos

    khaos DnB'addict

    I will watch it soon ;) Still waiting for my downloadlimit to reset.

    Btw. keep in mind i'm only 16 years old and i have never had these subjects in school. So if i say stuff that makes no sense at all, you know why ^^
     
  18. aridash

    aridash large throbbing member

    the projectile has insufficeint energy as once it is in the vacuum it is in a different frame of reference and therefore no longer maintains equilibrium with the object travelling at c. its now relying on its own energy and this is far below c.

    a photon of does have the energy to travel at c otherwise it could not do so. but it has no mass so the energy required is tiny. however a bullet is, relativly, a very large mass so would require suitably larger amount of energy to maintain the speed c. at least that is my understanding, as a non-physicists.

    the gravity of a black hole attracts everything towards it. yes this is tricky, it implies there is more energy in the black hole than the photon. i think the idea is that the gravity bends and slows the photon until it has insufficient energy to achive an escape velocity, so it falls into the black hole, its energy being converted to mass.

    that end point is about the heisenberg uncertainty principle, and the point there is that the photon can be both particle and wave simultaneuosly, its just we cannot observe both states at the same time. we can either know its position or its speed, not both.

    if you fire a projectile at the speed of light from your speed of light traveling vehicle, it would just stay forever at the end of the barrel.

    if you step out of the plane, gravity would take over and you'd fall. your velocity on the original frame of refernece would immediatly be changed to that of the next nearest and influential frame of reference, the earth. the energy required to maintain mach 1 is substantial, you lose that energy input when you leave the plane.
     
  19. aridash

    aridash large throbbing member

    i would strongly recommend NOT watching such pseudo-science until you are older and have learn physics properly, or otherwise gained the life skills to judge things beyond their face value. sure, theres some reall science in that serious of lectures, but theres lots of voodoo science that you might have to unlearn to properly understand science. I watched the last two, and its not really an explaination of anything, just fabulous ideas that for some reason 99% of science rejects (or if not reject, do not support the same conclusions).
     
  20. MistressArwen

    MistressArwen Smile, makes someones day

    O yeah! Removing the "noise level". it is explained in the first two and you totally missed it, too bad tho. BTW the guy doing the lecture is totally legit. Neither is it pseudo science in fact it is science at work. Understand most peops are conditioned to think and behave in a certain way. The school ciriculum is decided and what to reveal to the general public dictated. Have you ever seen the updated and complete periodic table? Do you know that the entire planets schools are still on the old outdated periodic tables? Only a handfull of powerfull rich elite are privey to all the facts and they themselves feel that the general populace worldwide should not know or be aware of it all. Even if you are convinced you are the smartest genius on the planet, yet some things are kept from you, still doesnt justify you to be smug and arrogant about your own high ego. You might think you know it all, but that doesnt nececarilly make it so.

    The established science you hold in high regard is incomplete and a lot is kept under control. Voodoo science is what freemasonry is all about and thats just refering to their kabalastic symbolisms in architecture that is rooted in ancient egytian and babylonian mystisism. But hey there a lot of peops who find them quite legit. Plato, Pathagoras and the rest of those Greek philosophers were all a bit loony when it comes to destinquishing between matter and the spirit world. They sure believe their mathematical quotations were a link to the spirit world and this reality. So too do they who impliment the same mathematical mystic stuff in architecture. Dont get me started on that fruitcake alistair crowley. Yet what measureable results does looney science have to show us that works?
     
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