Light is fascinating with it particle/wave character, possibly no mass and speed. But if applying energy can speed matter up and can change light's frequency, why can light not be made to go faster?
2007-09-20 07:54:15 · 13 answers · asked by BAL 5 in Science & Mathematics ➔ Physics
Photons have no rest mass. The speed of light is a fundamental speed limit imposed by the universe. The equations show that time comes to a stop at the speed of light - some people say this means that if something went faster it would go back in time but this is meaningless - nothing can go faster. If you wanted to talk about time travel you'd have to forget about the speed of light and talk about wormholes or exotically curved spacetime.
Light can't be made to go faster because there is no way you could speed it up. If you imagine something going at half the speed of light - then firing a beam of light from it. Then that logically will be travelling at 1.5times the speed of light right?
Wrong! Special relativity shows that whenever the speed of light is measured it is always the same. Its time and space that become relative. The speed of light is fixed and cannot be altered. As for photons they have mass - but no rest mass.
2007-09-20 08:25:29 · answer #1 · answered by Leviathan 6 · 1⤊ 1⤋
it goes back to the famous michaelson-morley experiment in 1897 or so.
before that, they thought that all waves travel through things, like sound has to travel through air or water. the magical thing that light was supposed to travel through was called the ether.
but if a wave travels through a medium, the speed of the medium effects the speed of the wave, which partially explains why sound travels at different speeds in air and water.
scientists tried to measure the speed of the ether relative to the earth.
they thought this way: the earth travels through space. the ether doesn't move but the earth moves through it, so when the earth travels one way, the speed of the either should be different when the earth circles around and travels the other way.
anyway they set up mirrors on mountains and measured the speed of light and found, to their great surprise, that the speed of light is the same no matter what direction the earth travels.
this caused scientists to scrap the whole idea of the ether, and caused einstein to ponder a universe where the speed of light does not change based on the speed of the observer. because SOMETHING had to change, einstein realized that time is relative, not the speed of light. everything followed from that, including the fact that light has a speed limit. (time slows down with speed, so the speed limit of light is when time would appear to stop for an observer. mass also increases, and the limit is when the mass climbs to infinity. 2 sides of the same coin, time and mass.)
2007-09-20 08:57:01 · answer #2 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
The speed of light is determined by the interaction of the magnetic and electric properties of space. These properties are fixed for a vacuum (they are different in matter, which is why light slows down in water or air). The frequency and energy are not relevant for the speed. We say that light is non-dispersive in a vacuum. On the other hand, there are very slight differences in the speed of light in, say, water depending on the frequency. This is why it is possible to separate the different wavelengths into a rainbow with water droplets.
2007-09-20 09:06:41 · answer #3 · answered by mathematician 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The "speed of light" (c) is not really about light per se. Think of it as a mathematical relationship between time and space. In the olden days, we thought that "time" and "space" were two separate things. Now we know that they are related in such a way that, if you travel 186,000 miles through space, you MUST also travel AT LEAST 1 second forward in time.
It so happens that things that don't have any mass, ALWAYS travel forward by 1 second when they travel forward by 186,000 miles. Light particles have no mass, so they fall into this category.
Conceivably, there could be universes where the relationship between time and space is different than it is "here," and in such universes the "speed of light" would have a different value.
2007-09-20 08:29:46 · answer #4 · answered by RickB 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I think, I don't realy know is this right, that the photon are made in reaction for example in oxidation, this reaction can give energy outside. This energy is giving acceleration to photon and if photon is running with no obstacles it goes with the speed of light in the vacuum but it can't be forever there is always something to reflect or change the speed. We need to remember that in the air or in the water this speed is different.
I'm sorry for my english (I'm from Poland), I hope that I didn't write very stupid things. :-)
2007-09-20 08:19:15 · answer #5 · answered by pati.smerf 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Photons are not considered matter. They are very different. if something went faster than the speed of light, it would be traveling through time faster than it should be. Sure you can slow light down, hence black holes, but I really don't think you can speed it up.
2007-09-20 08:01:20 · answer #6 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
It has been proven that as a particle approaches the speed of light its mass increases. At the speed of light, its mass would be infinite. At this time it does not appear to be possible. As usual, not the whole explanation. String theory and hyperspace may one day explain more.
2007-09-20 08:02:30 · answer #7 · answered by gzlakewood@sbcglobal.net 4 · 0⤊ 1⤋
but what is the force that limits a photon from travelling faster than the speed of light there must be a barrier akin to the speed of sound when aeroplanes had to breech this in the 50's
2014-07-20 00:01:41 · answer #8 · answered by Judi 1 · 0⤊ 0⤋
The regulation of Physics have been made via Physicists. those regulations carry on with as referred to interior the actual Universe. however we don't rather precisely understand the composistion of the Universe. So those regulations have been made without precisely understanding what makes the Universe tick. whilst a Human dies his soul is going to Heaven. And traveling on the cost of sunshine, pondering the enormous length of the Universe,is merely too sluggish. to realize the Heaven exterior the Universe.
2016-11-05 23:25:07 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
The speed of light is a constant 186,282 mps or 2.98 * 10^10 cmps
2007-09-20 08:00:23 · answer #10 · answered by Sid B 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋