It's Sarah's question of the day!
2007-03-23 08:10:31 · 4 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
My guess is that the answer they are looking for is c - the speed of light. However, this isn't techically accurate.
Since light is a tangeable thing made up of photons, it can be said to have a speed. Dark, on the other hand, is the absense of a tangeable thing. It is an abstract concept that exists only in the brain. While you can study the unit of light, a photon, you can't study a unit of dark.
What that means is that dark must be percieved to exist. Light can exist outside of human perception. It has meaning and we can see the eventual effects of its presence even if we don't see it. Dark is not like this though. Dark only exists so long as we observe it (like the tree falling in the forest that no one hears).
So the answer would depend on how far away you were from the dark - the receding photons. How long does it take that information to reach the observer, without whom the darkness has no meaning and doesn't exist.
Therefore, the speed of light could be described roughly as:
c + (d/c)
where c is the speed of light and d is the distance from the darkness.
In layman's terms, therefore, this means that the light is receding at the speed of light, but that information has to travel to the viewer over a certain distance (the information also travels at the speed of light). That darkness doesn't mean anything until it is observed means that you have to calculate the time it takes to reach an observation point.
Of course, that's probably much more philosophical than you wanted...
2007-03-23 08:26:43 · answer #1 · answered by USC MissingLink 3 · 0⤊ 1⤋
Is so much the last of any photons that previously existed in a space is speeding away from that space at c (the speed of light), the the speed of the dark replacing that light is traveling at that speed as well.
2007-03-23 15:16:12 · answer #2 · answered by Gargoil 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
dark is a lack a light, so it does not have a speed.you cant say "what is the speed of the absents of water as i pour out the water.on the other hand,the speed of light leaving the room is,of course,the speed of light
2007-03-23 18:38:13 · answer #3 · answered by the professor 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Awsome question of the day! The speed of Dark is Inversely proportional to the speed of light. Darkness taketh away at the same speed that light giveth. In otherwords, its traveling at the seed of dark (or light), have I confused you yet?. Cheers! âº
2007-03-23 15:25:10 · answer #4 · answered by krodgibami 5 · 0⤊ 1⤋