Faster Than Light
 

Out of curiosity, assuming that we can travel faster than light, what would be the effect on your relative time. As you get closer and closer to the speed of light, time slows down, and if you could approach it, it would stop altogether, correct? Does this mean that if you could travel faster than light, you would move backwards in time. I'm just curious what would happen, no real reason that I'm asking except a conversation I had with a friend.

Yes, you would move backwards in time.

I hate theoretical physics discussions though, since 99% of the people arguing think they're experts on the subject after watching a 30 minute documentary on the Science Channel.

Most of then are an hour long.

You'd go back in time, but it doesn't matter since nothing can travel faster than the speed of light.

The correct answer is, "Theoretically, yes."

Considering that I'm Black Jesus, and I made physics, I would say I'm an expert.

I saw it on Science channel last night too..

Aparently we gotta harness the wormholes.. which are fractions of the width of an atom...

... And I hear that can be pretty hard.

I don't assume we would ever be able to approach anything even remotely near the speed of light. Maybe a superior race after we die out.

Just get D3V on the case. That's about how big his penis is.

Someone has sent information faster than light, he sent music information.

I heard about that. It was only centimeters though....and dunno if it was true.

According to a show I saw on The Science Channel last night it's true. And If I remember correctly 50x the speed of light was no prob with his little.... system thing thing thang.

Impossible.

What type of information, and by what means?

If Adrenachrome is talking about the same guy as I think he is, it was a symphony (Beethoven I believe).

I was just thinking. Maybe it's impossible, because mayve you just cant go past light speed. Maybe it would cause you to "go back in time" as to go back to the speed just before light speed... as in, you just oculdnt break light speed. I have no backing for anything i say, I'm just shooting out ideas.

I meant what type of information as in... electricity, vibrations, etc?

The place where I first read about it is here: http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physic...Light/FTL.html

It doesn't really say, and I don't understand some of what they're talking about anyway. Whatever I tell you about the experiment would be my interpretation of that site, and a couple of others, so I guess it's best you look yourself, because I would probably garble some stuff up. It's under section 11 if you want to see. Not much on it, so you can see my knowledge of the experiment is quite limited, and probably distorted.

It looked like some sort of green light.. laser thing...
(I know the issue is to make matter move faster than light but htis is a start eh?)

Last paragraph:

The likely conclusion is that there is no real FTL communication taking place and that the effect is another manifestation of the Heisenberg uncertainty principle.

Simply, you couldn't ever go faster than the speed of light since once you reached the speed of light you would be stuck in time. Once time stops so do you and you obviously can't move through space.

Well, you're right but for the wrong reasons.

It has nothing to do with time stopping for you (though it would). If that was the only barrier, then why couldn't you just be on a vehicle going 1mph under the speed of light and throw a 90mph fastball forward?

What actually stops you from exceeding the speed of light is a sort of implied barrier. It's like our speedometers don't go any higher than that. Theoretically, if you were to do something like what I just suggested with the baseball, the ball would effectively teleport.

The ball wouldn't teleport, it would disappear. It would be stuck in time and would therefore no longer exist in the future, so basically what you would see is this:

1. You throw ball.
2. Ball disappears.
3. You continue traveling at your speed.

Let's say that you throw the ball at 5:00PM EST on the dot on June 1, 2010, at 5:01 you would not see it because it would still be at 5:00, stuck.

Completely false.

Time, relative to the ball, would freeze. It would not disappear.

Time is all relative. Those outside such extreme speeds observing the things experiencing time dilation still see them. The objects do not cease to exist.

Well it wouldn't disappear at 5:00, but you would no longer see it because it would still be at 5:00, therefore to you it would no longer exist.

I understand that. I wasn't implying that I think it's possible, just pointing you to what (I think) Adrena was talking about.

I'm a little confused on the baseball example. I know just about nothing about relativity, but doesn't light always move at the same velocity relative to you no matter what speed you're going? So if you're going .99999C, wouldn't light still appear to you to be going 300,000 KM/S relative to you? Then how would a baseball reach that speed if you through it at 90 MPH? God, I understand nothing about this. Could anyone point me to a site that explains this stuff that I might be able to comprehend?

What he was saying is you could go very close to the speed of light, and throw a baseball really hard(meaning it would continue traveling at your speed+however fast you threw it) making it go at the speed of light or faster.

The speed of light isn't relative to anything. It's concrete. It's the speed of light.

You don't seem to understand how time works. Time is our perception of the passing of events. If time stops for a baseball, that's what it perceives. It's still there. It doesn't cease to exist or continue to exist in one particular time.

If I put you in a freezer and dropped the temperature to 0K, time would literally freeze for you. The passing of time would stop for you. It wouldn't for everyone else, though.

When the baseball hit the speed of light, it would experience that same situation. However, due to the acceleration that the thrower put on it, it would continue to increase in speed. When its velocity reached a speed greater than that of light, it would, effectively, teleport to its implied destination. It wouldn't do it instantaneously, but it would go faster than mass is capable of.

kthxbye

But doesn't light always travel 300,000 m/s (approx. of course) relative to you, no matter what velocity you may be traveling at? Don't know if that's right, just thought I heard that somewhere.

I'm not going to argue physics with you or anyone else again, it's bothersome. Simply, I am right and you are not.

funny how you brought this up... just recently i was explaining this to my friend's sister. i beleive its true because as we see stars as they were billions of years ago

im going to tap that shit when he isnt looking lol

Bob is right, K_A. You're dead to me.

According to the documentaries on the Science Channel, the only way an object would disappear is if it traveled faster than light, since it would go back in time.

Nuh-ahh! If you had a flux-capacitor and went at 88 MPH it would disappear too!

Your argument is that I'm wrong and you're not arguing anymore? That's so fucking convincing.

The speed of light is not relative to anything. It always goes the speed of light.

Electrons can travel faster than the speed of light in some media.

Yet only in some media. They usually travel around 99.9...% of light.


Wow...it's amazing what a simple google search for "speed of elctrons" comes up with...quite a lot of Einstein references...and some weird experiments to do with electrons in electrical fields and the like...

And then a search for "speed of light"...wow...I could spend days reading all this stuff...

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MJ, read this: http://www.zamandayolculuk.com/cetin...travelvill.htm

It talks all about wormholoes, and contians the thing I think you're talking about with the baseball (two people hold a sheet and place a baseball in the middle which causes the sheet to curve at that point??).

Interesting reading.

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Anyone ever heard of Kerr holes (rotating black holes)?? http://www.zamandayolculuk.com/cetin...travelvill.htm Mentioned on the same site.

Okay, so let me ask another question: If you're traveling at 299,999 km/s, how fast does light seem to be traveling behind you? (assuming that light travels at 300,000 km/s)

Thanks, Lenny. Intresting read.

If you're travelling at just under the speed of light, then light travels past you like a slow moving vehicle. You won't notice a change however, because almost all light sources are constant, so it'll still be a solid beam of light. You would see head or the tail the beam of light moving slowly if it were switched on or off respectively (like with a flashlight).