Faster than the speed of light?

Question

I overheard a discussion the other day posing this question.
If you were traveling at the speed of light while holding a flashlight, would the light from the flashlight be traveling double the speed of light? What do you think?

Answer 1

General relativity says that the speed of light is a constant, but time and space are not. It is all your frame of reference.

You are travelling very close to light speed. You shine a flashlight ahead of you. An observer would perceive the light travelling just a bit faster than you.

You perceive the light heading out at lightspeed away from you - because you are slowed down in time. The exact amount depends on how fast you go, but can be found in the Lorenz equation.

Answer 2

No. You and the light would be moving at the exact same speed. I'll try to make it simple. You are moving the speed of light. This means the handle of the flashlight is also moving the speed of light. The light coming out of the flashlight obviously also is traveling at the speed of light. What this means is you are keeping up with the light coming out of the flashlight. If there was a wall in front of you also moving the speed of light, you would not see the light from the flashlight on the wall because it is going the same speed of the light. Think of the wall as one runner and the light as another runner. If they were running at the exact same speed, one runner would not be able to reach the other. This is the case of the flashlight, the light is not going any faster, its just that the flashlight handle is keeping up with the light. Hope this helps and i hope i wasn't confusing.

Answer 3

The speed of light is always the same relative to all observers .So if you observed someone holding a flashlight moving near the speed of light (cant go the speed of light ) the light coming out of the flash light would only go the speed of light .But from the persons view holding the flashlight its light would also shine away at the speed of light Its not logical but that's relativity for you .

Answer 4

Here's a much more interesting one.

Supposing the speed of light is going one way - what would happen if you went at the same speed the OTHER WAY?

With your flashlight if you like.

Answer 5

No the Speed of light is faster than any and every thing. just becasue of the flashlight you would not go any faster. a flashlight doesnt give enough light to be faster than the speed of light.

Answer 6

No, you'd both be going the same speed, assuming you turned the flashlight on as you started going the speed of light.

Answer 7

with travelling exact C you won't see a light anymore, cause light needs time to propagate, and if your own inertial frame is at C theres no more time for your frame passing.

if you are a little bit slower than C you would see the light from your flashlight travelling with C cause its within your own inertial frame.

just a distant observer would see that your inertial frame (lets say your spaceships cabin) getting much shorter due to lorentz contraction. he would really see the light slower in relation to your moving ship, but the ship itself shortened too, so actually the more you get to C the shorter the ship is, for the distant observer, and both speeds add to C.

as i said, for yourself its C with normal speed, except you ARE at C

Answer 8

The speed of light is indeed a constant, so the beam is travelling at light speed. However, you would stop aging as time theoretically stops progressing for objects moving at light speed as time is relative to motion.

Answer 9

It is not possible. Light couldn't travel twice as fast. However, it is still possible to go faster than the speed of light. I read something about it somewhere. The addition thing doesn't work.

Answer 10

There are things faster than light. But not the light itself.

I know that modern scientists do not know anything faster than light. But I can prove you immediately, if you wonder what is faster than the light.

Best,