Can something move faster than light?

[Pyrotex]

Possibly...If light exists in other universes it's probably slower, and faster in some....

I have three things to say:

1. What is Racoon doing up at 4:30 in the f*king morning???

2. Why does Racoon's avatar show a dog being humped by a pointy headed metal robot with a fuse sticking out its ***?

3. Orby, you may very well be right.

 

I have often wondered why the heck a "universe" needs to go through an "inflation" period. Is it just to get large? Some writers spoke of it as a "state transition", like when water turns to ice. What if they are literally correct? What if a Big Bang is kind of like "universe vapor". It's not a REAL universe--it's not REAL matter. It's superduperhyperhot stuff that begins to "cool" an instant after the Bang itself.

 

As it cools, it goes through a water-to-ice transition. It freezes and leaves behind the frozen propterties that we call "laws of nature". It cools by expanding into a void of no-space, no-time, leaving space-time in its wake. Whatever the first speck of space-time...whatever its properties...the rest of the "universe vapor" touching that speck also freezes...and has the SAME properties.

 

That first speck froze out having a random "speed of light". That property spread uniformly out in all directions along with "space-time". And all the other random properties of that first speck. Electron charge, force of gravity, magnetic inductance, the strong force, the electro-weak force--all froze out like the tiny bubbles in a slab of ice, never to change thereafter.

[Qfwfq]

Remember that c = 1.

That first speck froze out having a random "speed of light". That property spread uniformly out in all directions along with "space-time".

Apart from how we insignificant apes choose to measure timelike intervals, with whopping huge units such as seconds, and spacelike intervals, with puny little units such as km or miles, the real, true value of c is exactly 1.00000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000000

and if you can send information faster than that you can also tell someone what to do the day before yesterday.

 

When you've figured out how, tell me which numbers to play.........

[Pyrotex]

Remember that c = 1........

I see what you're saying.

Yes. Okay. I accept.

C = 1 metron per chronon. "faster" is not even conceivable in principle.

 

However, in the creation of a new universe, the sizes (whatever that may mean) of the initial metron and the initial chronon may be essentially random (perhaps a gaussian distribution?).

 

IF (!!) there are other universes piled around hereabouts, and IF it were possible to shift from one to the other, then one might conjure an hypothesis of a speculation of a theory that one could shift to a universe where the local c' was much larger than OUR c -- make your long distance moves -- then shift back into the vicinity of, say, Vindemiatrix.

[CraigD]

Isn't Warp speed in "Deep Hyper Space" faster than light? …

Yes. It’s also, with the exception of a small literature of very speculative Physics, entirely fictional

… or is Star Wars and Star Trek deceiving me?

Only if you somehow failed to note that they’re fiction :cool:

 

Personally, I consider the near ubiquitous presence of faster-than-light travel in science fiction to reveal, with a few exceptions, both an ignorance of Physics and a failure of imagination on the part its writers. FTL travel allows the telling of conventional stories on an interstellar scale, with extraterrestrial planets equivalent to distant earthly cities and spacecraft equivalent to ocean-going ships. To tell a scientifically reasonable story on an interstellar scale requires a rethinking of many fictional givens, and results in a decidedly strange story. Such stories, though rare, are often excellent.

[Qfwfq]

I'm not 100% sure Racoon was being serious Craig. :confused:

 

However, in the creation of a new universe, the sizes (whatever that may mean) of the initial metron and the initial chronon may be essentially random (perhaps a gaussian distribution?).

What difference would it make? Even assuming consider them to be distinct, independent things. A second is slightly less than three hundred million metres.

 

In speculating of "shifting" from one universe to another, we'd have to define more clearly how the shift would occur, including as to our notion of distance and time...

[Pyrotex]

...What difference would it make? ...

Yes, you are correct again. If I "shifted" into a parallel 'verse, I couldn't expect to keep my old identity (notions) of distance and time. I would "scale" up or down to match the new metrics so that c=1 becomes a panuniversal constant.

 

[sighhh] So, I guess we have to build Heinleinesque "generation ships".

[ldsoftwaresteve]

Pyrotex:

have often wondered why the heck a "universe" needs to go through an "inflation" period. Is it just to get large? Some writers spoke of it as a "state transition", like when water turns to ice.

:friday: I can't resist pushing McCutcheon here because that could be close to what might've actually happened. According to his expansion theory, the physical laws which currently operate in our universe had an actual beginning, a time when they kicked in.

His cause for that beginning was the slowdown of the rate of expansion of all particles in the universe. That would eliminate the need for a big bang....material was already spreading out in the universe but it didn't have the properties that it does today. And how 'long' did it spread out or just wander? Probably can't tell. Once the epansion rate slowed enough to trigger today's 'matter', i.e. its configurations as atoms, molecules, etc. that would be the point in time that it all 'started'.

Also, he doesn't think we actually have a speed of light limitation.

By the way Pyro, I read that you've written but haven't had published SCI Fi. May I peek?

[Pyrotex]

...Also, he doesn't think we actually have a speed of light limitation. By the way Pyro, I read that you've written but haven't had published SCI Fi. May I peek?

Hi, Steve!

thanks for the info. Others have also suggested that this "freezing" of the laws into place makes plausible sense, but only if one assumes that the nature of space itself came about this way. Inflation did not exceed the speed of light, because there was no space and there was no light, until the metric of space-time "froze" out.

 

Sure, you can peak at my stuff. But don't copy, use or pass it on. You want the far-out stuff or the more hard-core stuff?

[ldsoftwaresteve]

Pyrotex:

Inflation did not exceed the speed of light, because there was no space and there was no light, until the metric of space-time "froze" out.

You might find grist for your mill by reading McCutcheon's stuff. In his view, the smallest particle that exists is the basic component of all things. It is this particle that is expanding and it is that expansion that is behind 'now', all of the physical laws and all things that exist. If I read him correctly, he believes that the rate of expansion is slowing down.

Not knowing what inflation in a cosmological sense means, I don't know how McCutcheon's expansion relates to it.

Send me your favorite story.

[TheFaithfulStone]

If I read him correctly, he believes that the rate of expansion is slowing down.

 

I think he's wrong on that point at least.

 

TFS

[jpittelo]

Yes, because to be picky (childish ?) it is not specified in vacuum...so that for example, you can get a Cerenkov Radiation (blue light...particles flying faster that light in a medium...)

[HydrogenBond]

The only thing that I am aware of that can go faster than the speed of light is human imagination. Imagination is not contrained by the laws of nature and can do anything it wants. I can look through a telescope and visualize what it going on in the ends of the universe in a split second. I can go back in time to the BB in the blink of an eye. I would like to see light do that. It may be totally bull, but the imagination is not contrained by space/time/ mass, the laws of physics, logic or even common sense.

[Four Dogs]

I said no. But I take it back. In the case of entangled photon particles, they APPEAR to have inter-realted properties which remain consistent at any distance. If an entagled photon is measured, it will produce a seemingly random result. Its entangled brother will instantly display the same (random) result. Therefore, information is being swapped between the particles faster (possibly) than the speed of light. Albert Einstein called this "Spooky action at a distance". It is a little creepy.

[jpittelo]

The only thing that I am aware of that can go faster than the speed of light is human imagination. Imagination is not contrained by the laws of nature and can do anything it wants. I can look through a telescope and visualize what it going on in the ends of the universe in a split second. I can go back in time to the BB in the blink of an eye. I would like to see light do that. It may be totally bull, but the imagination is not contrained by space/time/ mass, the laws of physics, logic or even common sense.

 

So do you use this reasoning :

 

If i put my pen on a map of the earth on my desk and move, I got teleported...I^m not sure about the real physical displacement due to human imagination...it would make a stoxx market of oil companies crash....maybe...

[hallenrm]

Yes, Thought can move faster than light, and by thought i do not mean imagination alone.

 

I do believe in the move ment of thoughts, if you have not, please do read the thread intiated by me Phones tommorow or a scfi posted by myself on bloogers.com.:naughty:

[adam_rockstar]

are we talkin about matter here... because any matter wanting to get to the speed of light would require and infinite amount of force. as you approach the speed of light you require more and more thrust to push the object (spacecraft for example)... i guess we'll always have to be happy with "less than speed of light" travel :)

[hallenrm]

Hehe Hallen...:hihi:

 

Nice try, Are you going to Reinvent E=MC^2 ??

 

I LOVE IT AND YOU! :love: :eek2:

 

Ah Ha!:D ;)

 

I would love to! I am trying to imagine what would be the mass "m" in that new equation;)