Science a GoGo's Home Page Forums General Discussion General Science Discussion Forum light speed

dehammer, maybe you understand what you are saying, but you say it in such a way that it is confusing. Just agree on the following:

1. both observers will measure the same light speed c relative to their reference frames respectively; even though they move relative to each other.

2. Each observer will see a Doppler shift when looking at the other observer and the light moving from that observer, but this does not mean that any of the observers are actually catching up with light within their respective reference frames.

your 1. assumes that in the process of getting to that speed we dont learn to over come time dialation. in my original statement i stated what you are saying. prior to being insulted and told i know less than nothing.

2. i dont know if doppler shift is the proper term. they do see each other being forshorten in the direction of the movement. doppler is more related to frequency.

i am assuming that you are talking about a large differnce in speed, rather that them having a difference of a few feet a minute.

dehammer wrote:
"your 1. assumes that in the process of getting to that speed we dont learn to over come time dialation."


dehammer wrote:
"2. i dont know if doppler shift is the proper term."

It is. And if you don't know that then you have absolutely no business pontificating on the subject. You should be asking people who do understand it to explain it to you.

dehammer wrote:
"i am assuming that you are talking about a large differnce in speed, rather that them having a difference of a few feet a minute."

The amount of the difference in speed is irrelevant.

dehammer should take a look here.

Point 12:

Hi dehammer,

DA Morgan answered you correctly so I will not expand on it.

You must stop thinking that when you observe time dilation it is really happening within the framework moving relative to you. Neither does the increase in mass you see of a body moving relative to you manifest within the framework moving with that body. Similar for length contraction.

This argument is even applicable in Galileo's relativity. The kinetic energy you measure for a body moving relative to you is NOT present within the reference frame moving with that body.

two objects or ppl moving at the same speed and directions in relationship to each other will have the same time dialation effected on themselfs as the other. therefore they will not see a difference. to use da analagy, two ppl moving in an aircraft in the same direction will see the same distance between them at the front of the aircraft as at the back of the aircraft. someone setting in a seat will see them both move, but to the eyes of the ppl moving there is no change bewteen them.

simularly a person that was at a point in space that was stationary to light would see both of the ppl move extreamly slowly. but the two of them would see each other move at normal speed, due to the fact that they were affected the exact same way.

lets me move alittle out of known science for a sec to explain this a little bit.

according to einstein and others its impossible for something in our universe to move faster than light. the corrolary is that if something could excape some how from our universe momentary, it would have the potensial to go beyound light. NOT necissarily the capacity, just the potensial.

for this theory (its not mine by the way, i wish i was this smart) to be understandable you have to keep in mind the punt boat. its a boat that the pusher using a pole to push against the bottom of a river. to a passanger in the boat. the boat itself is motionless, while the water and the shore moves past. to the shover, the punt is moving underneath him, and the river and shore are moving past him. to the person on the shore the punt and the shover are both moving.

as this theory goes if you were to create a field around a ship, that acted as an interferance interface, something that seperated you from the rest of the universe, all the rule of the universe would apply inside the field and outside the field. only at the interface would their be a change and that would be the field would seperate the two from each other. according to this theory the engines would have their own seperate fields that in effect created a tunnel though them. it has been proven that mass can bend light and in this theory its used to turn photons into the engine. at this point a shover of some sort would attempt to accelerate the photo. since it cant change its speed, the ship moves instead. the interface would creat the effect of movement on ice, allowing the field to accelerate beyound light. since its neither energy or mass its not affected by the restriction of objects moveing faster than light. basically it would simply be twising the universe around it. the ppl inside the ship would be motionless in relation to the universe they were in contact with so they would not be vialating the restrictions against moving faster than light. thats the theory at least

now if this ship was moving at the exact speed of light, light moving forward of the field would not be moving at all, in relation ship to them. light moving in the opposite direction would seem to be moving at twice the speed of light since they were moving 1x light and the light would be moving 1x light. they would not be affected by the time dialation due to the fact that in relation to the unverse they were in contact with they were motionless.

now if they were moving at .99 light and were moving next to a ship that was doing the same in the same direction without the field, (according to what i was reading recently on the net) the ppl in the second ship would be 1/7 as deep measureing front to back (accounding to the direction of movement) and would be moving at 1/7 as fast. two ppl in the second ship would see each other moving at 1/7 of normal, but their preception would be slowed to 1/7th so they would see it as normal. to them the ship in the field would be 7 times longer than it should be and the ppl in it would be moving at 7 times normal speed.

its possible that we are saying the same thing in different ways.

dehammer wrote:
"simularly a person that was at a point in space that was stationary to light would see both of the ppl move extreamly slowly. but the two of them would see each other move at normal speed, due to the fact that they were affected the exact same way.

lets me move alittle out of known science for a sec to explain this a little bit."

Why don't you not move outside of known science and try just fixing what you wrote above. Wrong again! Why are you writing this stuff? Where did you get the idea any of it is valid?

where did you get the idea that its not. as i pointed out its theory. i also read the stuff that was on the net about relativity.


think about this. if your correct then if something ever goes near the speed of light, the atoms are not going to be able to funtion together because each will be distanced to the other by the relativity. if im correct the atoms will be able to be the same in relation ship to the near by atoms and the components in relationship to the components of the same atom.

no, everything moving the same has to be affect the exact same, therefore in relation to the things around it moving the exact same speed everthing will be appear to be normal. otherwise, its a mute question becuase nothing will be able to approach even a small portion of light without the atoms tearing each other apart.

Dear dehammer,

Maybe you have your own way of saying things; but I cannot follow you. Either I am stupid, or else as Mark Twain purportedly said: "Today I have met a man who knows more things that are not so than any other man I have met".

dehammer wrote:
"as i pointed out its theory"

No it isn't. Theory does not equate with any wild-eyed concept that can be written down in a sentence using nouns ad verbs.

Learn what a "theory" is.

Johnny Boy ... I think you have as clear an understanding of dehammer as anyone. He can't tell a theory from a fiction. Can't tell the difference between a meteorologist or climatologist and a geologist or botanist. And seemingly is incapable of demonstrating integrity by acknowledging when not just wrong but REALLY wrong.

theory is something that is projected from what is known, has some facts that are pr oven, and some things that are not yet proven. once they are tested, either the theory is discarded, corrected or proven.

leonardo de vinci had a theory of flight. if you look at his diagrams many of them have been proven wrong. does that mean that it was useless. no. it was advanced by other ppl. today as a result we have the capacity to fly to the moon or even other planets. the method of getting to the stars is still theoretical. had you asked many of the ppl of da vinci's time, they would have told you that flight was a "wild-eyed concept that can be written down in a sentence using nouns ad verbs."

relativity is still considered a theory even though there has been some proof, because as extensive as it is, there are still some areas that have not been tested.


really, i am the one that cant tell. i quote a well known source, that tells you that meteorologist are interested in the short term weather conditions, while you maintain that they are the ones that are interested in long term. these are called climatologist, which you don't acknowledge. so far i have not discussed botanist, so how would you know if i knew who they were or not.

before you claim ppl are wrong, why don't you find out the reality of this world.

you cant even quote your own sources right.

Johnny Boy, i understand what I'm trying to say, and logically i cant see how it can be other wise. some of what i understand is also being said to tell me I'm wrong. again if its what I'm saying and your saying, how can i be wrong and you be right. due to what was said here i have been reading up on this, and there is a lot i don't understand and stay away from. perhaps i do understand it and am saying it in a way that confuses everyone. perhaps my image of what I've learned is in err. perhaps what you are saying is comfusing me. i just cant see it happening logically.

either way its obvious that I'm not going to be able to convince you and da is getting to the point that hes not worth discussing. he getting to insulting. since he even argues with dictionary definition and claims that anyone that follows those definitions is wrong, ill not be responding to his insults here anymore.

its been enjoyable discussing this subject with you, Johnny Boy, and with a few others. good day to you.

dehammer wrote:
"theory is something that is projected from what is known, has some facts that are pr oven, and some things that are not yet proven. once they are tested, either the theory is discarded, corrected or proven."

NO! And not just NO but damned NO!

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory

Please try educating yourself just once before posting.

Can you guys please stop this idiot slanging? If you have science stuff then post it, otherwise don't.

[attempt to get thread back on topic]

Faster Than Light Effect Baffles Boffins
Physicists are scratching their heads after seeing light travel through a doped optical fiber almost instantaneously. The researchers plan on taking the experiment further and putting one of Einstein's key tenets to the test...

http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/20060411212755data_trunc_sys.shtml

[/attempt to get thread back on topic]

i have.


from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theory

there are ppl that are working on faster than light theory and this is one of them. in order to prove or disprove whether or not ppl can go faster than light, the must first speculate, then theorise, then look for ways of disproving or proving the theories.

i understand how this works. its been theorized that things can go faster than light if they can seperate themselfs from the things in this universe. its possible that we might never go to .99 light, if we can learn to go around that restriction first. from what ive read the speed of light restriction is only a theory, albet one that has had some test that support it.

i wonder if they could create an energy field that would use what ever it is that cause the second pulse to be created, and project it in front of the ship. then the data from the ship would hit the field long before the ship, creating two copies. then if the second hit the original they would cansil out leaving only the version of the ship created in by the field, which would repeat it causing the ship to effectively skip though space. it would arrive at its destination long before the light from its launch arrived.

Hey this is my first post here and I'm just a sophomore in highschool. I'm obviously very interested in science and I came across this site when I was reading an article about elecrtron entanglement.

Anyway I'm trying to understand more about this topic now. I know light, even from a stationary object, can go faster than the measurment of the speed in a vaccum. "Scientists have seen a pulse of light emerge from a cloud of gas before it even entered."

So if you could explain this example that I am going to put together after reading all posts thus far.

So imagine the experiment to measure the speed of light using one stationary mirror and one rotating. Imagine all of that equipment was on a desk along with observer 1. Observer 2 is stationary.

Now assume the whole desk (and observer 1) is moving 99.99% of the speed of light. I imagine that observer 1 would see the same thing as if the desk were stationary.

Heres my real question. Would observer 2 see the light as moving 1.9999 times the speed of light? From what I've read it seems not, but why?

You are correct to conclude that observer 1 will still see the same result; because observer 1 and the equipment remains stationary relative to each other no matter how fast the desk is moving.
The point you have to realise is that observer 2 will always (also) measure the speed of light as c relative to his/her "stationary" position, no matter how fast the desk moves relative to him/her. According to observer 2, the second mirror will move away from the light reflected from the first mirror. So the light will have to travel a further distance to reach the second mirror. I hope it helps.

welcome. sorry but my understanding of this pheonomon has been question to much for me to give you a good answer.

please do keep the question coming. curiosity has its own rewards.

Thanks for the posts but I still have some questions.

Imagine a spacecraft moving close to the speed of light. Observer 1 is in the spacecraft and observer 2 is outside. I am trying to keep in mind that speed is distance/time and the person is aging slower traveling near the speed of light.

They both are holding a flashlight in the same direction and turn them on exactly when they are next to eachother.

Will observer 1 see the 2nd flashlight moving across space in slow motion? In relation to observer 2's stationary position will the 1st flashlight be moving faster? Will it apear to observer 2 that the 1st flashlight is affected by a dopler effect because the source of the light is moving close the the speed of the light? Thanks in advance.

Both observers see the light moving at c.

Empire,
It's called relativity.
There is no such thing as 'stationary` except as
compared to a selected observer.
There is no absolute frame of reference.
To restate your question: Two observers are
traveling with respect to each-other at a
substantial fraction of C, each emitting light.
What do they observe?
Each will see a blue shift on approach.
Each will see a red shift on departure.
Each will observe time dilation and flattening
in the other.
Each will see the same relative velocity
in the other.
Each will measure C as the same.
Pragmatist