Speed of light may have changed recently

New Scientist ^ | 6/30/04 | Eugenie Samuel Reich

[U S Army EOD]

There may be some merit to this story, through careful observations, I noticed my electric meter runs much faster when I turn on the lights and the air conditioner in the house.

[Shryke]

Lower? Wasn't it supposed to have been faster 6000 years ago?

Ahem. Nothing existed 6000 years ago, Mr. Beelzebub. Where do you get these crazy questions from? Sheesh!

[monday]

"may have been lower as recently as two billion years ago"

lol...we I guess recent is objective when discussing the life of the universe. It would help explain a lot of things though.

[mattdono]

Well, I guess! I'll just go along with this whole change in the speed of life...after all, I don't wanna cause no trouble. If it will make life go smoother....I guess (hehe)

[VadeRetro]

There may be some merit to this story, through careful observations, I noticed my electric meter runs much faster when I turn on the lights and the air conditioner in the house.

Light has speeded up. I used to be able to turn out the light and be in bed before the room got dark. Now I can't.

[null and void]

Ummmm, that was 6008 years ago...

[mcg1969]

Yeah, but I usually skip a couple versions before upgrading. So I'll wait for one or two more adjustments to relativity theory before I upgrade.

[nuconvert]

Q: What would happen if the speed of light were only sixty miles per hour?

A: As we approach the speed of light, the aging process slows down. So, if the speed of light were sixty miles per hour, we would have even more people speeding, especially older people trying to stay young. As a matter of fact, physics would demand that we go faster than the speed of light. The safest thing is to drive at a steady sixty to keep time and the highway patrol off our necks. Airplanes would become obsolete in this slow light world, because you would be going so fast, relatively speaking, that you'd be back before you even left. This would make business trips unnecessary and lead to economic collapse.
So, to answer your question, life, if the speed of light were sixty miles per hour, would be youthful, fast, and dark.

[tx_eggman]

The flashing 12:00 symbol on my VCR seems to have slowed down a bit

[Shryke]

No, no nononononnono. Your book is wrong (by eight years). Mine is RIGHT.

I win. Don't you love logical debate?

[tortoise]

Speed of light may have changed recently

My bad! Won't happen again.

[U S Army EOD]

Enstein was correct, light has a constant speed, you are getting older and slowing down.

[Poohbah]

The speed of light, one of the most sacrosanct of the universal physical constants, may have been lower as recently as two billion years ago - and not in some far corner of the universe, but right here on Earth.

Two billion years ago, the interstellar highway patrol were a lot more strict.

[VRWCmember]

Speed of light may have changed recently

It's Bush's fault.

[djreece]

marking

[Dahoser]

There may be some merit to this story, through careful observations, I noticed my electric meter runs much faster when I turn on the lights and the air conditioner in the house.

Try having your stepdaughter use a hair straightener and a hair dryer. I could rent my meter out as a centrifuge.

[Rockitz]

Oh crap! Now I'm going to have to readjust the warp drive on my Toyota.

There goes my holiday weekend.

[<1/1,000,000th%]

Now they've done it. I have to go back and review all this Sommerfeld stuff...

And didn't Einstein originally just assume the speed of light as a constant?

[Lijahsbubbe]

Yeah, but I usually skip a couple versions before upgrading

Funny! I was thinking the same thing!

[RightWhale]

The speed of light and the color of light are related. If the speed of light has increased, would the old light from galaxies long ago and far away appear to be redshifted?