Einstein Avenged: Neutrinos Bow to Light Speed Laws ("E=MC2, Dammit!")

TechNewsWorld ^ | 06/08/12 | Richard Adhikari

[MHGinTN]

I use French Vanilla creamer in my tea ... I like cream tea.

[UCANSEE2]

But it doesn’t apply to the rate of expansion of the universe itself.

If the Universe is made of empty space, and expanding, what do we call the part the Universe is expanding into?

And how big is it?

[UCANSEE2]

But it doesn’t apply to the rate of expansion of the universe itself.

Wow. I don't have any answer to that.

IF you were in a spaceship, way out in interstellar space, how would you know how fast you were going?

What immovable point would you measure from?

If you left the Earth at , say, 100,000mph and exited our galaxy, would you still be going 100,000 mph?

[UCANSEE2]

(oops) I meant to quote your comment from post 40.

It must be late. Or, I’ve gone past the edge of the known universe.

[Lancey Howard]

The only question I have, is there some massless particle (or a particle with a negative mass) that can travel faster than the speed of light?

(shrug) There must be, or there wouldn't be any energy. Because, after all, energy is equal to mass times the speed of light squared.

[UCANSEE2]

Light Squared.

[The Cajun]

That's the weird old theory the photon's reference frame is not our 3 spacial dimensions and one temporal dimension reference frame.
No time or distance involved.
It explains "spooky action at a distance" for me.

[Errant]

Gravity or links between entangled particles, to name a few, are other “things” to consider, that may/do travel faster than C; but then these “things”, among others, are likely neither E nor M. :)

[TexasTransplant]

“Did he ever consider that the speed of light was not an historical constant?”

Actually that is the exact exit that he chose

TT

[Mycroft Holmes]

The only question I have, is there some massless particle (or a particle with a negative mass) that can travel faster than the speed of light?

The math of relativity tells us that in order to move faster than C you must have an imaginary (square root of -1) rest mass, whatever that means.

[presidio9]

The sad thing is, if you recognize the group in the photo, you’re an old man. If they just look like a bunch of hippies to you, you’re a REALLY old man.

[BigCinBigD]

There are ways around everything.

[presidio9]

What you are both getting at is the principle of comoving distance. The universe DID expand at faster that the speed of light for the first exponentially small fraction of the first second. After that, every single point in the universe continued to move away from every single other point in the universe. Relativity's light speed limit does not apply, because in relativity velocity assumes one fixed coordinate. That's the woefully incomplete short answer. The layman's answer is that physics assumes that the force of gravity should have started to slow the expansion at some point after the big bang. Instead, the expansion is speeding up. To explain this, they have created a mysterious force called "dark energy," and the equally mysterious "dark matter." They have not been able to prove the existence of either, but its one of the reasons they built the large hadron collider.

[PastorBooks]

“Cut to the chase. Does this mean humans will never get star travel?”

We’ll get there. We just don’t understand even the basic concepts yet.

In the most recent Star Trek movie, the elder Spock showed the younger Scotty the equation to achieve transport through hyperspace. Scotty took one look at the numbers and said, “Huh, I didn’t realize that space was the thing moving.” That’s science fiction, but it does illustrate one point: Our ideas of physics are vastly limited.

One hundred years ago the Sopwith Camel biplane was still a few years away. Think of where we’ll be in another hundred.

[presidio9]

One hundred years ago the Sopwith Camel biplane was still a few years away. Think of where we’ll be in another hundred.

Slaving in the rice paddies for our Chinese overlords...

[PastorBooks]

“Slaving in the rice paddies for our Chinese overlords...”

...and speaking Spanish.

[patton]

Wait, what?

[The Cajun]

Wait, what?

Believe it's called the *Go Splat* theory of photons, LOL.
Strictly the from the photon's point of view.
Since zero time runs for it (traveling at 186,000 miles per second), distance traveled is also zero (length contraction is infinite).
To us it may have traveled a billion light years for a billion years, but to it no time or distance was traveled.
With no time running for it (speed of light, time stopped thing), when it finally hits something, you can say from its' point of view it was both created and destroyed in the same instant.
I probably botched up the explanation from what I remembered, but it makes sense to me a little.

[patton]

“you can say from its’ point of view it was both created and destroyed in the same instant.”

Well, that explains religion.

[The Cajun]

Don't know about that, but to me it does explain how entangled photons can exchange spin information at great distances instantaneously if in there *reality* time and distance doesn't exist.