speed of light?

Question

why is it not possible to travel faster then light

Answer 1

According to Einstein's Theory of Relativity, mass increases as velocity increases. At the speed of light, mass would be infinite. It's impossible at this time to accelerate something with infinite mass.

Answer 2

Woah there.

How much detail do you want? The short answer is that it's because the world doesn't work like you think it does - at all.

We live in a realm that represents only a small fraction of how the world really works - the so-called realm of so-called Newtonian physics. In our world, you add some energy to something that's moving, and its speed goes up, in a fairly linear fashion. The heavier a thing is, the more energy you have to add to it to make it move a certain speed. Pretty simple. But as you speed up beyond a walk, beyond a car, beyond a jet or a rocket... toward the speed of light, you find that things work differently.

The function that represents energy input as a function of speed, whether you're talking about a particle or a vehicle, is actually highly nonlinear, and it would require an infinite amount of energy to make something move faster than light. This is because - believe it or not - as a thing's velocity increases, so does its mass. So we actually get heavier as we go faster. At the speeds we normally move, even in jets and race cars, the change in mass is not measurable. But at so called "relativistic speeds", it's quite significant, to the point where the change in mass with a change in velocity approaches infinity at - you guessed it - the speed of light.

The problem with this question is that it's tied to so many current and historical questions in Physics. I've cited a source below that will get you started if you're interested in a more detailed answer, but even that is only a starting point.

A couple of the answers above this one seem to imply that people are learning their science from TV and movies. That's not surprising. Hollywood has its own ideas about how things work, but "G-forces" associated with high rates of speed, and the supposed breaking apart of atoms aren't really known effects, and in any case, aren't the actual reason why we can't go past the speed of light.

"186,282 miles per second. It's not just a good idea, it's the law"

Answer 3

The main thing is that if any particle having mass reaches the speed of light,then its "mass" increases and at speed=3 lakh Km/s its mass becomes equal to infinity...

and the energy thus required to even approach light speeds becomes great according to the equation: K.E=(1/2) m v^2
where m is infinity so energy required is infinity so its IMPOSSIBLE TO PROVIDE SUch a large energy so no particle having definite mass can reach light speed...



CAN WE BREAK THE LIGHT BARRIER? ACC. TO EINSTIEN ITS NOT POSSIBLE, BUT RECENT STUDIES SHOW ITS POSSIBLE FOR "subatomic particles" BY A PROCCESS CALLED ---"QUANTUM TUNNELLING"
where even before the light wave entered a Cs vapour filled glass chamber,THE LIGHT WAVE EXITS FROM OTHER END.THUS TRAVELLING AT ALMOST 300 TIMES THE SPEED OF LIGHT!!!
-but note that photons have almost no mass so there is no chance of paradoxes like grandfather paradox..!!!

Answer 4

The Equation to determine the Veolcity of a moving mass is as follows;
V^2 = Space pressure on the moving mass divided by its Density.
There fore if a moving mass moves in the medium of space where pressure is very large and the density of the moving mass is smaller than that of light ,it follows that V^2 will exceed C^2.

The only Observation by Cosmologist is the Recession velocities, of the moving Galaxies in the Universe,which have been seen to exceed the Speed of Light.

Answer 5

The source has a very good description of the question. The last sentence is: For physicists the interesting question is "why is it impossible and what can we learn from it?"

One answer might be is that it would allow you to travel backwards in time and change history. A famous example is going back and killing your grandfather. If you did this you would not exist and therefore could not go back in time and kill him. What would happen if you could do this and did? Anyway, read the source. Very good discussion.

Answer 6

its possible, just not now. Space shuttles travel at the speed of sound, and thats pretty damn fast. It might be hundreds or thousands of years before we come up with the technology to travel that fast.

Answer 7

It is, we just haven't got the technology to boost anything that fast. Matter, such as our own, will seperate at the atomic level because of the G-force that speed requires.

Answer 8

Because matter breaks down after that and atoms can't stay together.

Answer 9

Cause it travels at 299,792,458 metres per second. Thats pretty damn fast.