If light travels very very fast how fast does darkness travel?

Question

Say you have a star and you put something in its way like a planet. How fast would its shadow travel? The only reason I ask this is because it has nothing to do with anything. Also a sub question do you think its possible that all these stars are filling the universe with light so that there is never really any darkness at all but it just looks like it because some parts are less bright then others? I'm probably wrong on this but I would love to see your thoughts on this.

Answer 1

Shadow is just the lack of light, so it doesn't travel. But, for the purpose of this answer, assume that it does. It would, logically, travel at the same speed. The light would travel at the same speed, but only when the light ends does the darkness appear. Hard to explain.

Say you have a lamp. When you turn the light off, the light will finish traveling to your eyes, and the darkness will follow.

Probably made this more confusing, but I tried. I don't make the best teacher.

Answer 2

Well as you know, darkness doesn't travel, but you are right on about some parts of space being brighter than others giving the appearance of darkness. This is exactly what we see. Here is something else you should consider, some light is even invisible to our eyes so no, there is no darkness at all. Wherever there is matter, there will be energy and some form of light. Scientists were able to create a near perfect recreation of "absolute darkness" in a controlled environment, but as I have mentioned it was not perfect. I do believe, however, that if the "big bang" is ever proven, then it is possible that absolute darkness does indeed exist beyond the outer edges of our universe where matter has yet to reach. Unless of course the outer edge has already reached another universe full of matter, but that is another subject I'll save for later.

Answer 3

Darkness one must assume must mean the lack of light. Light being made of "particles" or "waves". (Light behaves as both particles and waves by the way.) Therefore darkness does not have a speed.
Now what you are saying about putting a planet in the way of a star would not affect the speed of light itself. It would however effect how the light traveled around that planet. It may take longer for the light to travel from point "A" to point "B" due to a lensing effect but the speed of the light would remain constant, just the distances traveled would be affected.
As to how long the light was blocked by the planet while you are in the "shadow" of the planet would be dependant on the size of the planet, it's speed of travel and it's distance from the star.

Answer 4

Its totally dark inside a sealed container or deep inside a cave. However, yes, in space darkness is relative. Darkness isn't actually a thing, its just the absence of light. If a planet moved in front of a star you would still see the star until the light that was already on its way to earth had completed the journey. The light from stars originated from them many years ago so what you actually see is how the star looked like years ago when the light left it on its way to earth. All of the stars in the universe could suddenly go out and we would still see them for tens, hundreds thousands or even millions of years to come depending upon how far away the were from us. If the sun went out it would be 8 minutes before we knew it. During a solar eclipse the moon has already stopped blocking the suns light seconds before we actually see it happening.

Answer 5

Here is another thought for you. You can try this safely at home.

1. Have someone hold a flashlight (steadily)on one side of a darkened room, shining on the opposite wall.
2. Move their finger slowly across the flashlight beam, say a foot or so in front of the flashlight.
3. Watch how quickly the shadow of their finger will move across the wall. It's much faster than their finger moved.

A real example of this happens every time there is a total solar eclipse. The shadow of the moon moves across the earth's surface much more quickly than the moon is moving.

The speed of the shadow moving on a surface can be faster than the speed of light, theoretically, even though the light doesn't move nearly that fast.

A similar effect appears when you play with your cat using a flashlight or a laser pointer -- the spot can move VERY fast with only a slow motion of the laser, depending on the relative distances and such.

Now, how fast does darkness travel... very slowly, especially here at Yahoo Answers where nothing seems to be able to dispell it!

Answer 6

You just ask a question that is easy to grasp but most people are looking at in the wrong way. Reverse your thoughts.

Darkness is already there and it is interrupted by light. So Darkness does not move at all.

You seem to want to confuse the speed of site or the speed of light.with something that is not related. Light is one thing and darkness is another. To give you something to think about. Site is slower than light because in order to see something, the light has to be there first. Which means you only think you could see at the speed of light, But you can't because your eye sees it and transforms what it seen into electric which follows a nerve to the brain which converts it into something that you understand. This creates a time lag.

Keep in mind that darkness is already there. So with that in mind should answer your second part of your question. The stars will all go out one day and there will be nothing but darkness and cold and vacuum and clumps of frozen matter in the universe.

Darkness, Cold, Vacuum are the constants of the universe. The frozen clumps of matter are what we need to find out where came from. And if we could get all of these frozen clumps to crash in to each other they will start a spark and guess what it all starts over. I wonder how many times this has already happened?

Answer 7

Your question is just the same as "Which is faster, a car or the road?" They are two different things, darkness is just the same as an open space that anytime a light is welcome to pass. A travelling light also has a front and a tail. Darkness will immediately follow as soon as the light goes off, otherwise, you will see a line of light when an airplane pass through the night sky.

Answer 8

This may not be as much "fun" an answer but...
As "darkness" is actually the absence of light, it is, essentially, nothing. (Although that statement in itself can be the basis of a long and theoretical debate!) Therefore, darkness cannot travel.
Arguments exist that there is no such thing as true darkness as some light is so dim that the human eye simply can not distinguish the difference between low light and no light.
Neat question, thanks!
Enjoy!

Answer 9

Darkness doesn't travel. Darkness is simply the absence of light. So I guess if there were a speed to it, it would travel at the speed of light. Because the light goes away just as fast as it arrives.

Answer 10

Darkness travel at -1 x the speed of light ;-)