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Do you really think matter can become infinitely long or thin? If you continue provide acceleration, your speed has to increase.

2007-04-03 16:32:04 · 8 answers · asked by Anonymous in Science & Mathematics Astronomy & Space

8 answers

Kind of, but not exactly. But it isn't matter that gets thin, it is space. To the person in the space ship traveling at 99% the speed of light, everything seems normal. He seems just as fat as ever to himself, but all the things in the universe appear squished and the distance to that star thousands of light years ahead seems like less than one light year. Also, time slows down and mass increases. To the guy in the space ship, a gram is still a gram and a year is still a year, but to the person sitting still, seeing him zoom by at 99+% the speed of light he appears squished flat, thousands of time heavier and his clocks are all running so slow that it takes years to tick over one hour. All these bizarre observations, and many more, are mathematically predicted by relativity and many of them have been confirmed by experiment. You cannot experience any of these effects in normal life because we have no way to move at such high speeds. But particle accelerators can and do accelerate subatomic particles to these kinds of speeds and the effects can be measured. It is very hard to get an intuitive feel for this stuff, you really have to do the math. Unfortunately the math is EXTREMELY complex and advanced, so for the average person it doesn't help either. The source has some simple math to explain some of this, but if you follow some of the links to find more detail, you will quickly get lost in really messy math. At least I do.

2007-04-03 17:39:49 · answer #1 · answered by campbelp2002 7 · 0 0

You're overlooking something. As the velocity of some thing increases so does its mass. That means that you've got to pump more energy into it than before to get it moving faster, which in turn increases the mass, which requires more energy to go faster, and so on and so on...... To get this thing up to the speed of light would require almost infinite energy (..infinite energy meaning all the energy in the universe..) Even if you could somehow come up with that much energy and the thing got up to light speed it would have infinite mass (..all the mass in the universe..) Any rational person can see that such is impossible. Nor is mass increase versus velocity just a theory; that this is truly how the universe works is seen over and over again in high-energy particle accelerators.

You speak of "infinitely long or thin." This too can't happen. How would you describe "infinitely long or thin?"

2007-04-03 16:43:40 · answer #2 · answered by Chug-a-Lug 7 · 4 0

Hi. You are correct. The problem is that as the matter approaches c the mass increases to infinity, so you need infinite energy to accelerate it any faster. Got power?

2007-04-03 16:44:19 · answer #3 · answered by Cirric 7 · 1 0

The faster you move at, the more your mass begins to stretch itself. So, naturally, going at the speed of light, all your atoms would be stretched out for an incredible lenght. You would not be infinitely long though.

2007-04-03 21:22:51 · answer #4 · answered by Anonymous · 0 0

Take your spaceship with the helpful engine. It truthfully does not "income mass" because it speeds up; it fairly is a fiction promulgated with the help of shitty extreme college textual content fabric books. You and the different passengers experience precisely the comparable quantity of acceleration for as long as that engine is working; you could improve up like that for an afternoon, a twelve months, a century, invariably, for as long as you have gas. And certainly, the extra you improve up, the fewer time it is going to take to attain distant places. The extra you improve up, the extra desirable your rapidity and celerity, and the speedier you will get to the place you're going. What you could not do is return and forth speedier than c relative to the different physique. the reason being easy, and it has no longer something to do with mass or forces. It has to do with the way that spacetime is popular. particularly, the fee of each and every gentle ray is c, as measured with the help of every physique. So no remember how long you improve up, a mild beam consistently passes your deliver at c. you could under no circumstances seize as much as that gentle ray, via fact no remember how briskly you pass relative to Earth, that gentle ray nevertheless passes you at c. considering the fact which you could under no circumstances seize as much as that gentle ray, no you possibly can see you seize as much because it, and so everybody will consistently agree that your speed is below its.

2016-12-15 15:33:10 · answer #5 · answered by ? 4 · 0 0

General and special relativity have both been successfully tested and applied. The math isn't all that hard to understand either. I suggest you look into it a bit before suggesting that no physicist is rational. If you start by insulting us, don't expect us to help too much.

2007-04-03 17:01:01 · answer #6 · answered by eri 7 · 0 0

Complexed matter cannot travel at the speed of light, because space dust is in the way...Nothing can propel it anyway.

2007-04-03 16:38:56 · answer #7 · answered by spir_i_tual 6 · 0 1

Yes. And if you were travelling with spaghetti, you would have to infinitely wind a noodle with your fork.

2007-04-03 16:41:01 · answer #8 · answered by dvari 3 · 0 1

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