Physics ppl

[chriso20]

lol here we go;

I have an idea for light speed :naughty:

1) Make a huuuuuuuuuuuuuuuuge 'tunnel' in space.
2) Put another 'tunnel' in that one that's a 1/5 as long.
3) repeat 150,000 times til you have a train sized 'tunnel' (i told you it was huuuge! ^)

So if each of these tunnels can travel at let say 2,000mph in relation to its parent tunnel, the inner most tunnel travels at (in this case) 300,000,000mph.... the speed of light! (i think lol)

Sooooo my point...
CAN IT BE DONE!? i mean, no air resistance, the distance for the outer most tunnel to get up to speed is v.v.small compared to space and inner tunnels take less time (less inertia) and ignore the construction and quantity of materials.

Is there anything that says this couldn't work?

(hehe i love these maaad theories :E)

 

[Ames]

It won't. How are you going to get the energy to do all that?

It would require an infinite amount of energy.....:|

 

[SLH]

wtf do you mean by tunnel?? Some wierd wormhole type thing, or do you just litterally mean a tunnel?

If it's the latter then Einstein (pretty sure it was Einstein) says it wouldn't work.

Regardless of the fact that the inner tunnel is only going 2000km's faster than it's parent it's still going fast, and the faster it gets (or the it's inner ones go) the more energy is needed (i.e. infinate when approching LS).

 

[Neutrino]

Doesn't work.

Anything with mass cannot reach light speed.

Also, light speed is a constant. It is not relative to anything. So the tunnels' relative speeds have nothing to do with it.

 

[Wraith]

it wouldnt be as important as feeding all the children of the world, and you could feed all the children of the world with like 1/9999th the amount of money, time, and resources.

 

[mayfer]

i love ideas like this.
i hate how they never work.

 

[chriso20]

well **** dudes, its a "THEORY".

While inner tunnels are traveling 2000mph in relation to the one surrounding it, its traveling 4000mph in relation to the next one. see? so the inner most one is moving 3x10^8mph (light speed).

Oh and by tunnel i mean like an empty tube (but fecking huuuuuuuge!)


So what about now? (or do you still not get it?)

 

[SLH]

well **** dudes, its a "THEORY".

While inner tunnels are traveling 2000mph in relation to the one surrounding it, its traveling 4000mph in relation to the next one. see? so the inner most one is moving 3x10^8mph (light speed).

Oh and by tunnel i mean like an empty tube (but fecking huuuuuuuge!)


So what about now? (or do you still not get it?)

We do understand it - we also understand that it wouldn't work, in theory or practice.

 

[Neutrino]

well **** dudes, its a "THEORY".

While inner tunnels are traveling 2000mph in relation to the one surrounding it, its traveling 4000mph in relation to the next one. see? so the inner most one is moving 3x10^8mph (light speed).

Oh and by tunnel i mean like an empty tube (but fecking huuuuuuuge!)


So what about now? (or do you still not get it?)

Ya, I got it.

That's why I said light speed is a constant in space. It's not relative to anything. So it doesn't matter what the relative speeds of the tunnels are. They can still never come close to light speed.

 

[chriso20]

We do understand it - we also understand that it wouldn't work, in theory or practice.

Can you tell me why it wouldnt work in theory?

 

[Neutrino]

Can you tell me why it wouldnt work in theory or practice?

I just did.

 

[chriso20]

Ya, I got it.

That's why I said light speed is a constant in space. It's not relative to anything. So it doesn't matter what the relative speeds of the tunnels are. They can still never come close to light speed.

I can see that a laser pen on the inner most tunnel would still emit light at the speed of light, but i dont get why the inner tunnel isnt travelling the speed of light?

 

[marksmanHL2 :)]

If you have mass you can't reach the spead of light. Read some physics text books

 

[Letters]

Yeah, and trains are dangerous because when you go over 35 miles/hour your blood will start to boil!

 

[Ames]

Yeah, and trains are dangerous because when you go over 35 miles/hour your blood will start to boil!

/me runs over Letters

Trains are happy and friendly. Ride them, even if they go a gajillion miles per hour.

 

[chriso20]

If you have mass you can't reach the spead of light. Read some physics text books

Well mass can travel any speed, its just that its v.hard t get it up to these speeds. surely?

So back to my theory ^ if there's a laser pen at the very outer tunnel and its on, light will travel along side the inner most tunnel, right ? (if the tunnel leaves the end of the other tunnels)

 

[Ames]

Well mass can travel any speed, its just that its v.hard t get it up to these speeds. surely?

So back to my theory ^ if there's a laser pen at the very outer tunnel and its on, light will travel along side the inner most tunnel, right ? (if the tunnel leaves the end of the other tunnels)

Not just very hard, infinitely hard.

 

[chriso20]

Not just very hard, infinitely hard.

Infinitely.. just because we dont have a way of doing it. But are we happy that anything can travel at the same speed as light?

 

[marksmanHL2 :)]

Infinitely.. just because we dont have a way of doing it. But are we happy that anything can travel at the same speed as light?

Oooh! Just noticed. You're from nottingham!! I used to live there!


WestBridgford to be more precise.





Neeeeway! Yeah, If you look at some stuff on the web it will show theorectical graphs and stuff showing that the speed just goes towards an asympytote (sp) and therefore doesnt get there.



Its basically not possible. ;(

 

[Neutrino]

I can see that a laser pen on the inner most tunnel would still emit light at the speed of light, but i dont get why the inner tunnel isnt travelling the speed of light?

Light speed is a constant with respect to space. Having tunnels within each other is completely irrelavent.

Basically your idea is the same as the following though experiment:

No object can travel at light speed. But an object can travel at half light speed. Thus if two objects traveled toward each other both at half of light speed, wouldn't the velocity of one object be equal to light speed from the reference frame of the other?

This would seem to mean that FTL speed is possible. However in in this case Newtonian physics do not apply and instead you have to use relativistic equations.

Here's a quote explaining it:

Relative speeds

If an observer A measures two objects B and C to be travelling at velocities u = (ux, uy, uz) and v = (vx, vy, vz) respectively, one may ask the question of what the relative speed between B and C are, or in other words at what speed w B would measure C to be travelling at, or vice versa. In Gallilean relativity the relative speed would be given by

w2 = (u-v).(u-v) = (ux - vx)2 + (uy - vy)2 + (uz - vz)2.

However, in special relativity the relative speed is instead given by the formula


(u-v).(u-v) - (uXv)2/c2
w2 = ----------------------
(1 - (u.v)/c2)2

where u-v = (ux - vx, uy - vy, uz - vz) is the vector difference of u and v, u.v = ux vx + uy vy + uz vz is the inner product of u and v and uXv is the vector product for which (uXv)2 = (u.u)(v.v) - (u.v)2.

When uy = uz = vy = vz = 0 the formula reduces to the more familiar


w = |ux - vx| / (1 - ux vx/c2).

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/velocity.html

You see, the speed of light in a constant in the universe. Thus the physics which apply to speeds close to the speed of light are not the same physics we use commonly on Earth. But basically you can think of it that the speed of light is constant from any frame of reference and no object with mass can achieve that speed.

Well mass can travel any speed, its just that its v.hard t get it up to these speeds. surely?

So back to my theory ^ if there's a laser pen at the very outer tunnel and its on, light will travel along side the inner most tunnel, right ? (if the tunnel leaves the end of the other tunnels)

It is not just dificult to travel at that speed. It is impossible. As a mass approaches light speed it's intertia increases exponentially. At the point at which it would hit light speed it's intertia reaches infinity. Thus it can never reach that point as it would take an infinite amount of energy to get there.

About the laser pen idea. Actually though your idea seems intuitive it is incorrect. The light from the laser pen would actually be seen traveling at light speed from both frames of reference.

 

[chriso20]

lol fiiiiiiiiiiiiiine thanks for that lesson

 

[Bad^Hat]

This thread makes my penis hurt.

 

[HunterSeeker]

It might not be possible to travel at light speed but what about 99.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% of the speed of light?

 

[Bad^Hat]

If I'm in a car travelling at the speed of light, and I turn the lights on, would they do anything?

 

[Ames]

It might not be possible to travel at light speed but what about 99.999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999999% of the speed of light?

Yes, but it would take a whole crapload of energy.

 

[dream431ca]

Actually it is VERY VERY hard to reach those speeds.. here's an example: Lets say you have a train going 20km/h and you have someone inside the train run in the direction of travel at 20km/h.

So how fast would the guy be going relative to you standing outside watching him?? 40km/h right??

Well...now lets say the train is going 200,000km/s and the guy is running down the train in the direction of travel at also 200,000km/s. If you could see this happen..you would expect to see the guy run at 400,000km/s right?? WRONG! He would actually be running at 221,000km/s. Here's why:

Your idea of cylinders ( I am thinking about magnetic fields combing inside the cylinders to create a HUGE magnetic field that will push the vessel forward right??), could not be done.

When something goes that fast...basically the energy is not propelling the vessel anymore, it's giving the object more mass and not acceleration. So there is a point where energy is converted to mass and it becomes alot more hard to accelerate the object because at the same time energy is building more mass on the object, so you get to a point where mass and energy cancel and the object will not accelerate anymore. If you try and go faster..you will just build up more mass and the object will slow down. In theory..to go the speed of light the object will have the mass of the entire universe before it even gets to the speed of light.

Hope this helps

 

[hasan]

hmm ..

well basically, form what I know, when something goes at the speed of light, it turns to energy.
so, at the speed of light mass turns to energy, therfore you can't "push" it to give it more speed.

this is the first time I hear that energy turns to mass as you approach light speed but then again, I don't know.

but I think there was an experiment when light speed was exceeded.
they made light go faster than light speed, but I don't know how legit it is.
google it, I don't have a link.
edit:
most journalists talking about it have absolutley no idea what they are talking about. so don't take thier word forgranted.
just like BBC says too many wrong things about steam.

 

[dream431ca]

hmm ..

well basically, form what I know, when something goes at the speed of light, it turns to energy.
so, at the speed of light mass turns to energy, therfore you can't "push" it to give it more speed.

this is the first time I hear that energy turns to mass as you approach light speed but then again, I don't know.

but I think there was an experiment when light speed was exceeded.
they made light go faster than light speed, but I don't know how legit it is.
google it, I don't have a link.
edit:
most journalists talking about it have absolutley no idea what they are talking about. so don't take thier word forgranted.
just like BBC says too many wrong things about steam.

In theory...light has no mass so I guess you could make it go a little faster but not much faster probably around 0.0000000001km/s faster...but still it's faster.

 

[hasan]

well, if that experiment is true, they made light go faster somehow, and it went back in time. aka the results of the experiment happened before the experiment.

 

[Vigilante]

It won't. How are you going to get the energy to do all that?

It would require an infinite amount of energy.....:|

No it doesn't. If there is no air resistance, and just like a 1N force is applied to an object, it will continue to accelerate unless an equal force comes in the opposite direction (then the object will be in equilibrium, traveling at a constant velocity). It may take a while, but you will eventually acclerate to and past the speed of light.

I may be wrong on this, but I'm pretty confident..took me a while to come up with that answer, makes perfect sense to me! :cheers:

 

[dream431ca]

I don't think time has anything to do with it...remember, scientists have labeled that the speed of light is time.

Example: If you look at a star 400 light years away it means you are seeing the star 400 years in the past.

Don't forget that the star is moving and so are we. So time or (rate of change) doesn't really matter to much when you are talking about speed of light.

I know that the faster you go the slower time goes but is there really a speed where time stops??

Think about this for a while:

take 1 and divide it by a number then divide it by a larger number and a larger number:

1/1000=0.001, 1/10000000=0.00000001, 1/1E99=1E-99

As you can see, the larger the number we pick, the more closer to zero we get..but do we ever reach zero...no.

That is the same as time with speed...the faster you go the slower time goes or the smaller the rate of change is...but it never reaches zero.

Think about it.

Also going back in time is very mythical...it's not even a scientific endavor it's just a myth. To go back in time..some people say you have to go faster than light...but as we saw earlier..no matter how fast we go time never stops so we will never go back in time....unless they find an "Anti-time" as with Anti-matter.

 

[hasan]

no, that's not true.

when you approach the speed of light, the newton laws you learn in highschool don't apply anymore.

edit:
that was in reply to Vigilante

edit2:

I know that the faster you go the slower time goes but is there really a speed where time stops??

Think about this for a while:

take 1 and divide it by a number then divide it by a larger number and a larger number:

1/1000=0.001, 1/10000000=0.00000001, 1/1E99=1E-99

As you can see, the larger the number we pick, the more closer to zero we get..but do we ever reach zero...no.

That is the same as time with speed...the faster you go the slower time goes or the smaller the rate of change is...but it never reaches zero.

Think about it.

yes, according to the theory of relativity (AFAIK), time completly stops at the speed of light.

in your numerical example, you never reach zero, because no matter what number youpick, there is a number bigger than it, there is no number which there is no number after.
"infinity" is not a number.

but in the speed of light thing, C is the infinity, so to speak.
if infinity was a number, then 1/infinity = 0

 

[Vigilante]

I still think my answer makes sense =).

 

[dream431ca]

no, that's not true.

when you approach the speed of light, the newton laws you learn in highschool don't apply anymore.

edit:
that was in reply to Vigilante

Your right..that involves a whole new form of physics called relatavistic motion of matter and energy..something Einsitne made up.

 

[dream431ca]

no, that's not true.

when you approach the speed of light, the newton laws you learn in highschool don't apply anymore.

edit:
that was in reply to Vigilante

edit2:

yes, according to the theory of relativity (AFAIK), time completly stops at the speed of light.

in your numerical example, you never reach zero, because no matter what number youpick, there is a number bigger than it, there is no number which there is no number after.
"infinity" is not a number.

but in the speed of light thing, C is the infinity, so to speak.
if infinity was a number, then 1/infinity = 0

If infinite was a number..yes. But unfortunatly it is not therefore we cannot do anything with infinite...until someone discovers it and I know that someone will discover it in nature.

Also some people have tried to say that 1/0 equals infinite...it doesn't. 0 is a defined number that can be used as a quantity. Since infinite is not a number it cannot be used as a quantity. But I do still believe that infinite can be shown with mathematics..just not now.

 

[Vigilante]

Damn...well I guess it makes sense becuase I'm still in high school.

 

[dream431ca]

Damn...well I guess it makes sense becuase I'm still in high school.

I find this stuff interesting...if I could make a mod for Half-life 2 I would try to incorporate this stuff into it..see what the source engine does...maybe it already has this stuff in it...But because the source engine uses math and physics of density and mass and momentum I don't think it would work.

 

[hasan]

If infinite was a number..yes. But unfortunatly it is not therefore we cannot do anything with infinite

what I was saying, in physics, C is the limit, nothing can exceed it.
the closer you get to it, the slower time moves.
if you actually move at C, time will stop.

 

[Neutrino]

No it doesn't. If there is no air resistance, and just like a 1N force is applied to an object, it will continue to accelerate unless an equal force comes in the opposite direction (then the object will be in equilibrium, traveling at a constant velocity). It may take a while, but you will eventually acclerate to and past the speed of light.

I may be wrong on this, but I'm pretty confident..took me a while to come up with that answer, makes perfect sense to me! :cheers:

It's already been said, but ya your idea would work using Newtonian physics. But those physics no longer hold true at relativistic speeds.

 

[Vigilante]

I really dont understand what you mean by light speed not being relative..can you explain it?