Speed of Light broken

[mrhnau]

Speed of Light broken

Neat stuff! From an early reading, this might have some interesting implications in communications in space eventually... what I find neat is not that they broke the speed of light, but they really shattered it. 300X! I think thats over Warp 2, if my Trek math is right...

 

[Ray]

It will be interesting to see the results repeated and verified.

In my mind, light moving faster than normally expected doesn't mean the speed of light was "broken" or exceeded. It's still light travelling at a speed.

There have been other instances of light "apparently" travelling at speeds faster than normal. I believe Asimov wrote about it in one of his popular scientific collections..."behind the teacher's back" I think was the name of the article.

 

[tellner]

The problem is that the articles I've seen are vague about what exactly was done and demonstrated. Anyone have a subscription to Nature? It would be nice to see something a little more concrete.

 

[mrhnau]

It will be interesting to see the results repeated and verified.

In my mind, light moving faster than normally expected doesn't mean the speed of light was "broken" or exceeded. It's still light travelling at a speed.

There have been other instances of light "apparently" travelling at speeds faster than normal. I believe Asimov wrote about it in one of his popular scientific collections..."behind the teacher's back" I think was the name of the article.

Yeah, verification will be needed I'm sure. Still, light moving faster than ordinary is indeed significant. Something like a car breaking a new speed record for cars. It's still a car, just going faster than ever before observed. Since the speed of light was for a long time considered a fixed constant, that makes it all the more significant I think.

with regard to other things moving faster than the speed of light, I think its been discussed that gravity waves more faster, but I'm not up to date on that research. I seem to recall something about positrons doing something funky with time/speed, but I read about that 20 odd years ago LOL. any experts in the house?

 

[mrhnau]

The problem is that the articles I've seen are vague about what exactly was done and demonstrated. Anyone have a subscription to Nature? It would be nice to see something a little more concrete.

I've got access to the online via school. I might take a look at the PDF if I can find it... I'm not sure how quickly they update their files.

 

[crushing]

I've got access to the online via school. I might take a look at the PDF if I can find it... I'm not sure how quickly they update their files.

The article was from November 2000. Hopefully they got the update by now.

 

[Flatlander]

I'd be interested to know whether they've actually propagated a photon faster than C through space-time, or if they've simply manipulated space-time. Those are two very different circumstances. My guess is that they've manipulated space-time.

 

[Bigshadow]

I'd be interested to know whether they've actually propagated a photon faster than C through space-time, or if they've simply manipulated space-time. Those are two very different circumstances. My guess is that they've manipulated space-time.

The article hinted at that at the end. I am thinking that as well.

 

[CoryKS]

Okay, maybe I'm just picking nits. But if they caused a light pulse to move faster than the speed of light they didn't really break the speed of light, they increased the speed of light, right?

 

[mrhnau]

Okay, maybe I'm just picking nits. But if they caused a light pulse to move faster than the speed of light they didn't really break the speed of light, they increased the speed of light, right?

That's kind of the point. Light is NOT supposed to speed up. That's why its interesting

 

[Bigshadow]

Okay, maybe I'm just picking nits. But if they caused a light pulse to move faster than the speed of light they didn't really break the speed of light, they increased the speed of light, right?

Or the perception of speed (time and distance or space)?

 

[Andrew Green]

I think the answer is in here:

The scientific statement "nothing with mass can travel faster than the speed of light" is an entirely different belief, one that has yet to be proven wrong. The NEC experiment caused a pulse of light, a group of waves with no mass, to go faster than light.

They didn't send light particles, just a pulse. Still impressive, but doesn't violate Einstien's Laws, just makes them need a minor update in wording.

 

[MA-Caver]

What's faster? Thought or light? Heh.

Saying that the speed of light is "broken" is akin to saying breaking the sound barrier or something to that effect isn't it? I mean to go faster than light you're obviously breaking a universal law that was set for light to travel at such and such speed.... 640K miles per second isn't it?
Now apply this to a shuttle mission or something akin to it then we really got something. Missions to near-by planets won't take eons to make.
Actually according to legend if we just do it once we'll attract attention of all those UFO's watching this planet and they'll look at each other and sigh... "well, guess it's time to introduce ourselves huh?"

I'm still waiting for transporter technology to come to pass. I'm sure every parent would like it too... instead of yelling at the kids to come on from playing in a McDonalds play-land just push a button and the kid materializes right next to the parent, where they can grab a hand/wrist and say c'mon we're gonna be late. Or if a daughter is going to be late coming home from a date.

 

[bydand]

The scientific statement "nothing with mass can travel faster than the speed of light" is an entirely different belief, one that has yet to be proven wrong.

Oh how wrong can they be! They have never seen a credit card in my ex-sister-in-laws hands, she can swipe that bugger faster than light for sure.

 

[Ray]

They didn't send light particles, just a pulse. Still impressive, but doesn't violate Einstien's Laws, just makes them need a minor update in wording.

Light behaves sometimes as particles and sometimes as waves...you can't have "waves" without having something (empty space is not going to reverberate a wave).

It doesn't violate, nor make a minor wording in physics. Nothing with mass can be accelerated to the speed of light, nor faster. As speed increases, mass also increase. At c, mass becomes infinite there requiring infinite energy; and infinite is just too much.

My own pet theory regarding things moving fast: During the big bang, miniscule particles were hurled at very fast speeds. When observed from other vantage points, they appear to be traveling at c, therefore becoming relativistic black holes.

 

[michaeledward]

I don't think this is news at all, is it?

Wasn't there a line from the comedian Steven Wright, a few decades back that proposed this very fact.

Something like ....

In a job interview, I asked the interviewere .... if you were in a vehicle, travelling at the speed of light, and you turned on the headlights, what would happen?

When the interviewer couldn't answer, I said, never mind, I don't want to work for you anyway.

 

[zDom]

I'm still waiting for transporter technology to come to pass. ...

While this would be my favorite technological advance, I don't think this one is in the realm of possibility.

As explained in a television show I watched (a Discovery show, I think...)

What you would really be building is a machine that can construct things on a molecular level from piles of loose molecules — a replicator.

So you would end up with a duplicate copy of yourself on the other end, not the same individual. Are memories really existant in molecular structure? If so, I guess it would have the same memories instead of being a like a computer with no software loaded.

But then you get into spiritual matters: the soul isn't physical at all, is it? (Assuming it exists) So you get a soul-less creature with YOUR memories on the other end.

A molecular deconstructor on THIS end would just make you cease to exist and replace you with a soul-less copy on THAT end.

I DO see a use for this machine, however: if the duplicates have the same memory — including neuromuscular training — I sure would to make a couple copies of myself. I would enter them into vale tudo and UFC matches to see how I would do

By the way ... there is a movie released last year that kind of deals with this idea, but I don't want to spoil the movie for those who haven't seen it. To name the movie would spoil the movie.

 

[terryl965]

Man warp 2 doe sshe have enough power to egt it to that rate.

 

[Touch Of Death]

I'd be interested to know whether they've actually propagated a photon faster than C through space-time, or if they've simply manipulated space-time. Those are two very different circumstances. My guess is that they've manipulated space-time.

They have already slowed the speed of light using buffers so the fact that it is relative is interesting.
Sean

 

[Sukerkin]

Gents, we have a standard joke at work when things aren't going well ...

"Assuming the speed of light to be constant ... which it isn't!"

It's been known for quite a while that c is not a constant but that it varies (markedly in conjunction with gravity), so it's not exactly a surprise that such an experiment 'worked'.

Oh, and as to what warp factor 300c represents, well that too depends ... :

http://www.star-fleet.com/ed/warp-chart.html