A speed beyond light question ^^

@akaMechsmith,

akaMechsmith wrote:

re. Particularly for Brandon and Mr.Bobs posts.

As long as light is a "wave" there will be some continuity and we can call it light or an X-ray or a radiowave as the case may be. But at some velocity the wave will be broken and then the characteristics will change.

If I am out in my sailboat in a hurricane I will observe that at some point the wind driven waves will diminish as the tops will be blown off destroying the wave function. A water wave will build as long as it can absorb wind energies. If the bottom of the wave "stumbles" on the seabed it also destroys the wave. We call those "breakers" and it signifies the end of the wave.

I suspect that what will happens with light is that at some velocity the light waves will become discontinuous thus destroying the wave function. Then it becomes something not light. I know that electromagnetic waves (submarine ELF radio) can be many miles long but eventually the wave function of light also must be lost in the background. Somehow I doubt that there are a bunch of photons hanging around in outer space waiting for something to collapse onto but there may be.

The math became too much for me when I tried to figure out exactly when this point occurs but occur it must. The speed of time also enters into it.

Mr. Bob,
The "red shift" theory of the expanding universe has a few too many anomalies for me to take as "gospel". Also keep in mind that "c" is a constant is not the same as saying that the speed of light is constant. "c" also defines the speed of time which is not the same for everybody.

This speed being a limit has nothing to do with light. It just so happens that light moves at that speed. So do neutrinos, which are massless. We could call it the speed of neutrinos instead. The limit applies any time one tries to accelerate matter. It's mass approaches infinity, and ultimately one runs out of energy to accelerate it further.

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@akaMechsmith,

akaMechsmith wrote:

The speed of time

WTF?

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Hi Drew Dad,

It's an interesting fact that time itself is percieved differently from differing vantage points. Ie. runs at different speeds for different observers.

For instance a pendulum will swing faster on some points of the Earth than others. So will a cesium clock.

If you are interested look up the "Harvard Tower Experiments"for one.
Also there were some done in the "Empire State Building" in the thirties or forties. During the experiment there was a difference in clock times of about three parts per trillion between a clock on the first floor and an identical clock up near the top floor. These experiments were done as a check on the theory of relativity.

So back to light! If the emission point of light was a place where time runs slower or faster than ours we would see the light as red shifted or blue shifted as the case may be.

Our notion of time basically derives from the observation that a light wave propagates at 186,000 miles per second. This actually defines the duration of a second in our part of the universe. There are reputed to be parts of the universe (or Cosmos) where a speed of light is is zero if described in miles and seconds. However it is still "c" in relativity theory.

If you want to learn a little more check out Steven Hawkings "A Brief History of Time". He shows how time could have begun, and how time mayend.

Another thing to search is "Gravitational Isobars" on Earths surfaces. There is a map of them someplace!

1 Reply

@Brandon9000,

Brandon,

Seen and noted and found agreeable! The only difficulty is that neutrinos are hard to see. I suspect that any energetic massless particle would move at that speed. If it quit moving then it would lose whatever energies it may have. Its also hard to get a second look at a photon.

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@akaMechsmith,

I'm actually familiar with that, but I've never heard it referred to as "the speed of time". It sounds a little ridiculous, frankly.

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Drew Dad,

What would you call that phenomenen? I've never run across a more aptly descriptive term.

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@akaMechsmith,

Well- the mysteriousness of the expression is complimentary to the mysteriousness of the objects. Naming the objects does not necessarily make them any clearer.

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@akaMechsmith,

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

Since "speed" is "distance over time", then I'd say "speed of time" is not an apt description.

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this is a hard discussion in that there are indeed too many differences t deal with that we as yet do not understand ..

it has always been accepted that speed of light ( c ) is constant ..
It is also been accepted that time itself is also constant ..

for what has been observed and known to exist shows that indeed either time and or C is not constant ..

we are already reasonably sure that entering a black hole speeds what enters through it beyond the speed of light ( well sort of .. by creating a short cut through time and space) ..

However there are other possible ways to go beyond the speed of light ..
It seems likely that our recently realized dark matter and dark energy may have a influence in these abilities ( we have not been able to reasonably assume the amounts and influences of either to use a formula to create a theory for us to test ) ..

Now regarding Black holes and hawkings and even the big bang theory itself
well is no surprise that he has it wrong ( or at very least incomplete)

The Big bang is not persay the creation of the universe but rather simply the bubble or the plane or reality we know as our universe ( one among many universes)
regarding black holes the finding of hawking radiation is indeed present and works as he states ( well mostly to in part) but the greater information lost that eventually causes even the death of the black hole is not solely from hawkins radiation but information taken through the black hole and taken to the other side of the black hole that ends in a white hole ( be it within our known universe or some other plain or alternate universe )

The math to prove and or dis prove these theory's is of course great and would take a lot of time .. but until we have a proper understanding of what is truly in our pocket of universe that we live in , then we surely can not hazard to guess about the rest of the universe and or universes

it may well be possible to go beyond the speed of light within our known universe (sort of) by standing outside of it or within it but while within a bubble created as a buffer between a traveling ship and our known universe and then within this bubble we could collapse what lies in front of the bubble that would draw the bubble forward while behind such a bubble known space would collapse in on the void caused by our traveling bubble and further pushing the bubble along

such a bubble would travel sort of in and out of our known universe and as such create a manor in which one can over come the constant both of C and of time without breaking what we currently know ( rather accept as the constant of both C and time )

food for thought at the very least

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@Mr BOB,

Drew Dad, Nice link. I have been there several times with mostly less than complete understanding! Since speed must always be related to two other factors, distance and time, any change in our perception of time or distance must necessarily effect what we can see.

With at least four different mechanical circumstances working on any light that we can see, Doppler, Gravitational, Obscuring, and Time Dilation it does make observations a bit chancy.

The Doppler effect is due to actual relative motion in our spacetime. Beloved by the Highway Patrol.

The time dilation effect is due to an object travelling through a space time that is probably different than ours.

The gravitational effect is due to space time falling towards mass (Earth +solar system+Milky way+local group etc. Or climbing out of a similar gravity well.

The obscurational effect is due to the loss of energy as the light encounters intergalactic hydrogen etc.

Mr Bob, The speed of light is not constant, it is "a constant". If it was constant then there would be no "Black Holes" nor Schwartzchild Radiuses. These are just the most dramatic examples but they are pretty well accepted.

So since light apparently cannot climb out of a black hole due to gravity its actual motion to an outside observer will be zero or less. However it will still be travelling at "c".

This effect is reportedly also seen in quasars in which their light is"red shifted" out of any proportion to their distance due to their mass.

Since the light is either red shifted towards infinity or actually stopped with respect to an observer then if the speed of light is constant then it seems to me that time or distance itself must change. Basically this is Hawkings position as I understand it. Time stops when and where light does. Thats why I chose "Speed of Time" as a description.

Definitely food for thought. Kind of fun! Best

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@akaMechsmith,

There is a LOWER limit to the speed of propagation of gravity - about 6 orders of magnitude FASTER than "c", the speed of light. We don't know the upper limit. Wheeler expressed it well:

Quote:

There is no spacetime, there is no time, there is no before,
there is no after. The question what happens “next” is without
meaning.

Quantum Gravity (Second edition, Oxford 2007)
http://www.uni-koeln.de/minkowski/contributions/Concepts_of_space_a_time_in_quantum_gravity_Kiefer_C.pdf

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@High Seas,

High Seas,

If I read you correctly then some massive objects should be falling at 6 times"c" given enough time. So far they haven't been noticed!

Frankly I prefer a classical state of the universe with localized quantum state universes more or less enclosed. This agrees with observation pretty well.

Where we live is within a classical universe. It can be described pretty well by density. But a "Black Hole" could be either another universe or a portion of the universe that is dense enough so that light doesn't escape to our particular portion of space time.

According to most "Big Bang" theories at some density and temperature gravity disappears. Without gravity to hold things together then you will get an "expansion". Time as defined by Hawkings also disappears.

You see as a mechanist my hobby is building mechanical devices called universes by reverse engineering. I take things off the shelf (observable at least in theory) and attempt to make a place to live with what we have to work with. My universe will also have a five day weekend with a two day work week!

Wheeler is not describing our universe as there are preconditions and effects in this one.
Minkowski space may not exist in a classical portion of the universe. If there exists a universe without any preconditions IMO it's probably a matter for religion!

I'm enjoying the conversation. Thanks.

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@akaMechsmith,

The speed of propagation is not the same as the speed of individual particles.

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@High Seas,

High Seas wrote:

There is a LOWER limit to the speed of propagation of gravity - about 6 orders of magnitude FASTER than "c", the speed of light. We don't know the upper limit....

False. Gravity propagates at the speed of light, exactly.

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@Brandon9000,

Brandon - you have already been proven wrong on the speed of propagation of gravity, which is several orders of magnitude greater than "c", speed of light. If you read the link I posted on the previous page you'll find out the following:

Quote:

The evidence from all six experiments that bear on the question of the speed of gravity is unambiguous in excluding answers as slow as lightspeed. A similar remark applies to the propagation speed of electrodynamic forces.

The strongest of these experiments sets a lower limit to the speed of gravity of 2x(10**10) c.

All objections and questions about this conclusion raised during the last two years have now been addressed and answered. In particular, claims (championed by Steve Carlip) that such a result is inconsistent with general relativity are now shown to be false. Moreover, no serious claim of experimental support for gravity propagating at lightspeed has been advanced in modern times.

Perhaps you're the one making the "serious claim" mentioned by the authors?! Let them know.

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@akaMechsmith,

You're not reading this correctly, Mechsmith. It was "orders of magnitude", not multiplication!

Specifically the lower limit to the speed of gravity is 2x(10^10)c, that's 10 raised to the 10th power times 2 times c, the speed of light - a helluvalot faster than "multiplying by 6".

All observations of supernovas made by Hubble and Chandra confirm this number is the lower limit - perhaps you have other sources?

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@High Seas,

High Seas wrote:

Brandon - you have already been proven wrong on the speed of propagation of gravity, which is several orders of magnitude greater than "c", speed of light. If you read the link I posted on the previous page you'll find out the following:

Quote:
The evidence from all six experiments that bear on the question of the speed of gravity is unambiguous in excluding answers as slow as lightspeed. A similar remark applies to the propagation speed of electrodynamic forces.

The strongest of these experiments sets a lower limit to the speed of gravity of 2x(10**10) c.

All objections and questions about this conclusion raised during the last two years have now been addressed and answered. In particular, claims (championed by Steve Carlip) that such a result is inconsistent with general relativity are now shown to be false. Moreover, no serious claim of experimental support for gravity propagating at lightspeed has been advanced in modern times.

Perhaps you're the one making the "serious claim" mentioned by the authors?! Let them know.

The Metaresearch organization, is hardly the last word on Physics. In fact, it's a foundation dedicated to exploring unpopular theories. The accepted view, the result of most measurements, and the prediction of General Relativity is that gravity propagates at the speed of light. Here is a reference:

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

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@High Seas,

You are correct as to my reading you incorrectly. The difficult seems to be in a shortage of observations. Perhaps observations are not possible?

So, since light seems to propagate at "c" why do we suspect that gravity propagates at a speed so much greater than than the accelerations of gravity which seem mostly determined by proximity to mass? Have you found an upper limit to the accelerations provided by gravity? If so how?

There seems to be some evidence that some structures in space are gravitationally bound that are larger than gravity at "c" could account for, assuming a Big Bang scenario. But these would work if space was at some time smaller.(BB-EU theories) It would also work if the universe was much older.(various solid state theories) It would also work if gravity was a good bit quicker than "c". It would also work if the locations were only there by happenstance or faulty observations.

If you haven't been there yet "Google" LISA and LIGO. I have not heard of them matching any of the observations that you mentioned. Kind of seems like they should've.

A good cook only uses one cookbook. I am not much of a cook!

1 Reply

@Brandon9000,

Quote:

The Metaresearch organization, is hardly the last word on Physics. In fact, it's a foundation dedicated to exploring unpopular theories. The accepted view, the result of most measurements, and the prediction of General Relativity is that gravity propagates at the speed of light. Here is a reference:

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

Wikipedia is a known quantity. It is generally useful for topics for which no controversy of any sort could plausibly exist: 'how does a steam engine work?', 'how does a two-stroke diesel engine work?', 'where is the city of Gdansk and when was it founded?'

Wikipedia is worthless for topics for which controversies exist and the speed of gravity should not be such a topic, but apparently is due to the religious approach which some take towards Albert Einstein's pronouncements.

Gravity propagates instantaneously to within our ability to measure it and that is a FACT, and not a theory. If that were not true our own solar system would have long since flown apart.

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@gungasnake,

gungasnake wrote:

Quote:
The Metaresearch organization, is hardly the last word on Physics. In fact, it's a foundation dedicated to exploring unpopular theories. The accepted view, the result of most measurements, and the prediction of General Relativity is that gravity propagates at the speed of light. Here is a reference:

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

Wikipedia is a known quantity. It is generally useful for topics for which no controversy of any sort could plausibly exist: 'how does a steam engine work?', 'how does a two-stroke diesel engine work?', 'where is the city of Gdansk and when was it founded?'

Wikipedia is worthless for topics for which controversies exist and the speed of gravity should not be such a topic, but apparently is due to the religious approach which some take towards Albert Einstein's pronouncements.

Gravity propagates instantaneously to within our ability to measure it and that is a FACT, and not a theory. If that were not true our own solar system would have long since flown apart.

Well, according to virtually every physicist, neither light, nor gravity, nor any other force propagates instantaneously. Generally Relativity, accepted by the scientific community for almost a century, predicts a propagation speed of c, and the experiments, such as that by Kopeikin measuring the deflection of radio waves by the planet Jupiter, show a speed of light propagation.

You say, that if gravity didn't propagate instantaneously, our solar system would fly apart. Please show your calculations for me to check.

1 Reply

A speed beyond light question ^^

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