Why Can't we travel faster than the speed of light?

Just looking through, I thought I would post a couple things. I saw where it says light is part particle and part wave. That is not correct. Light takes on the properties of both a particle and a wave, depending on the situation.

Lots of talk about Einsteins relativity. Special relativity is still a theory, but as theories go, it is going under testing to see if it is a law or not. While it cannot be considered a law, it is still a theory that has not been proved wrong yet, and has predicted many things that we have found to be true.

Another quick note about relativity. Explaining relativity to someone who does not understand physics, is like trying to explain music to someone who is deaf.

Light has mass. Particles that have even less mass than photons can travel faster. Also, I think when speaking of the speed of light, it is important to state, the speed of light in a vacuum. Light travels at different speeds depending on the medium it is traveling in. (It travels VERY slowly within the Sun itself)

The original posters topic is "Why can't we travel faster than the speed of light?". I will try to answer this with 2 answers.

1. As many people have said, it is a mass issue. To much energy is required to accelerate us to that speed. Let alone the logistics of what engine could be used to form thrust.

2. Define travel. A fly can travel over 400 MPH, while flying at his normal speed. He broke no laws, and can be done quite easily. (Put a fly in a jet airliner). We have propulsion concepts for faster than light travel. Think of it as warp speed. Take a bus. (lets make it safe for space too ) Now this space bus we can take up to 1/10th speed of light. Not bad at all. Now, take the area around the space bus, and have that travel 1/10th the speed of light also. This area is being "warped" constantly. The bus is only going 1/10th speed of light, the warped area only going the speed of light.

Relativity deals with faster than light. Relativity speaking, the space bus is only going 1/10th the speed of light (important to know when dealing with that whole time dilation thing) but clearly traveling much faster.

Electrical pulses break light speed record

Some crazy Canucks near me have already done it. I am unsure if anyone has already stated this but I thought I would throw it out there.

Full article here:physicsworld.com...

Originally posted by foremanator
Have you guys heard of the "Hutchinson effect"?
He was this cazy Canadian inventor dude, anyway he was playing around with electro magnatism and started to notice weird effects happening to various items around this feild he was creating, metal was turning to liquid without heat being involved, levitation of objects, stuff like that.
There is still video of his experiments just google search him.
Anyway this guy takes off on a vacation and when he came back he finds all of his stuff has been confisacated by the Canadian govererment, with an American attachment, he took the goverment to court and won his case, but to this day they have not honoured the courts findings and have not returned the confiscated items
What does this have to do with faster than light travel???
The atom has a shell of electrons orbiting the nulei at about 75% the speed of light, this is wht gives things "mass" the denser the atom lets say lead (pb82) lots of electrons gives you really good sheilding thats why they use it for protection against radiation, as oppoed to hydrogen which has one electron and basically offers no resistence.
So the speculation starts there that if you could stall the orbit of electrons using a method similar to that of Hutchison would you negate its mass?
this tottally reminds me of all those reports on abductions and how the aliens go through walls and windows and such, makes sense to me, esepecially when the U.S goverment gets involved, makes a lot of sense to me

[edit on 25-3-2008 by foremanator]

Gene Roddenberry's creation Star trek series introduced some novel ideas about space travel. People worldwide, among them scientists, loved the concepts and many expressed that some serious thinking was done behind the scenes for the models of propulsion Star Trek series were introducing. Some scientists even concluded that if we indeed reach some type of levels of technology enabling us to effortlesly fly among the stars, the resemblance with what Star trek proposed might be enormous.

here is the concept of subspace as presented in Star Trek series:

Subspace medium

It is primarily another continuum in which we can submerge matter and have both some physical qualities presenting at same time from both worlds, from normal space (vision, limited interaction) and subspace (exceed sublight speed, access hypothetical parallel realities, interact etc.).

Even if subspace does not exist, the very idea is by itself very attractive.
We could be creating ands exploring the subspace concept in theory, and later enabling technologies to fool the universe around us, pretending there is a subspace, thus separating our target matter from obstacles like Einstein's light speed barriers.

If we can generate a relative reality around our target matter and then apply sublight propulsion concepts within the created medium in theory we could depart/arrive anywhere in a given space while fooling the Einstenian light barrier.
The problem is that we are not even sure that barrier Einstein proposed, exists in the first place!

[edit on 25-3-2008 by spacebot]

[edit on 25-3-2008 by spacebot]

Th only time we even come close to FTL travel is when we smack a bug biting us on the arm, and such.

But, in all reality we might already be doing FTL travel. Who knows what is going on out in space (with our secret fleet?) with all the stuff hackers find before they get busted by NAS.

I often wonder myself what is really going on. I mean time travel an such would be FTL speed and the things people claim that are done in secret who knows?

[edit on 25-3-2008 by RUFFREADY]

Ok,I thought I saw someone on here post that they had their own theroies on ftl travel,if that person reads this,pleas u2u me,I also have my own theroies and would like to talk w/ you.

Do you theorize that 'we' might be able to break the light barrier if 'we' could produce a "force field" that would mask or mitagate (sp) our mass? then wouldn't it just be a matter of accelerating 'us' to the speed of light and through it?

Just letting my brain wander for a while, off the leash.

When einstein first published his theory, dark matter and dark energy hadn't even been theorised about. I feel that, during this century, we will learn much more about these mysterious things, and who knows what such information may lead to. Also, I do believe scientists have found a way round the limit of light speed. There was an experiment where a speed above that of light was achieved, but it did not prove einstein wrong. I think someone posted a thread about it on here, but I really cant be bothered to find it now. There is also of course, worm holes, black holes etc. A worm hole may permit faster than light travel from one place to another, again without breaking einsteins theorised laws, but alas, as usual its all just theory.

reply to post by Warlon


If you ask me, I find it to be an attractive idea. It is not something we haven't done before.. well sort of.

There is a concept called supercavitation, it is about exceeding speeds greater than ordinary propulsion systems capabilities inside liquid mediums. In reality an envelope is formed around a vehicle (torpedo) separating it from the sea water and uses gas to form this envelope or bubble and then this bubble has the effect of reducing the drag of the vehicle enabling it to go faster.
If this concept has any chances to be applied to space propulsion, then we could use or slightly modified propulsion concepts to propel a craft through space with FTL.

here is the wiki for it: Supercavitation

Here it is applied to torpedoes: The Skhval.

A sci-fi site dealing with supercavitation: Empire

[edit on 25-3-2008 by spacebot]

reply to post by Warlon


Yes, people would be incapable to travelling at the speed of light, there's no way around that

On the other hand, when a vehicle was encapsuled in a Transverse Magnetic Wave during gravitational distortion, it protects those inside from anomalies such as the Hutchison Effect which was documented in the Philidelphia Experiement, where crew members where fused to the deck, and some experienced time travel.. a whole disarray of problems.

With the TMW barrier, it creates a bubble making the environment within shielded from the gravitational disturbance outside, except for vibration and shaking of the craft; much like the vessel is being funneled from one location of space to a distant location in a brief span of time.

Some people seem to e getting upset with the "Einstein is a fake" link. In fact it was a question. "WAS Einstein a fake?"
I am not saying he is a fake (not in context of this thread anyway) but I am saying his SoL theory can and should be questioned.
It is as though as soon as he announced the theory walls went up for everyone. "Einstein said therefore is must be true, so lets stop looking any further"

Originally posted by Shadow_Lord
Just looking through, I thought I would post a couple things. I saw where it says light is part particle and part wave. That is not correct. Light takes on the properties of both a particle and a wave, depending on the situation.

Lots of talk about Einsteins relativity. Special relativity is still a theory, but as theories go, it is going under testing to see if it is a law or not. While it cannot be considered a law, it is still a theory that has not been proved wrong yet, and has predicted many things that we have found to be true.

Another quick note about relativity. Explaining relativity to someone who does not understand physics, is like trying to explain music to someone who is deaf.

Light has mass. Particles that have even less mass than photons can travel faster. ....

Good going until this point. Light is an EM wave, electric and magnetic fields. Photons are massless particles.

To add, the orbit of mercury has also vindicated special relativity.

Originally posted by VIKINGANT
Some people seem to e getting upset with the "Einstein is a fake" link. In fact it was a question. "WAS Einstein a fake?"
I am not saying he is a fake (not in context of this thread anyway) but I am saying his SoL theory can and should be questioned.
It is as though as soon as he announced the theory walls went up for everyone. "Einstein said therefore is must be true, so lets stop looking any further"

That's only true for people who don't have the mind to pursue his work any furthur. I say, forget about the outspoken few who get this attention, instead, look into the work of John Dering, Gabriel Kron, and Dr James Corum who are some of the other great minds of our time, trying to unravel the mysteries of Einstein's Unified Field Theory.

AFAIK, which is not much, the postulate that nothing can move faster than light is simply an assumption that holds for special relativity. Any frame of reference will always experience light traveling at C0 (speed of light in vacuum), therefore it will always have to contend with this barrier. The problem is that Maxwell's equations require the constant to hold no matter what speed the frame of reference is moving at or accelerating.

And since this has held the theory together which in turn has been experimentally been proven, until Mr. Spock comes along and rips through subspace, we will just have to believe the limit applies.

However, as someone else stated before, that if an existing frame of reference is already travelling above C0, the upper barrier to speed limit will not apply. However, such an environment will have a lower limit, i.e. cannot travel slower than C0.

Corrections are always welcome.

Why do scientists think that if you break the SOL barrier that you will go back in time? How are time and light related.

To me it seems that if you took off from a spot next to a stationary light source and broke the SOL then all you would do is pass the photons/ waves from the light source and it would "Seem" like you left before the light was turned on but in all actuality you wouldn't have gone back in time you just passed the photons/ waves that left at the same time you did.

Kind of like breaking the sound barrier (which at one time everyone said couldn't be broken, but Chuck proved them wrong) you just pass the sound that you make and it sounds like it did before you left, as long as you stay ahead of the pressure wave.

As long as you stay ahead of the particles/ waves of light it would look like the light never got turned on. I'm just rambling, sorry.

I just don't understand. Guess I have a long way to go to deny ignorance. But I will try

[edit on 3/25/2008 by Warlon]

No dude you are right on ...at least I think so. That is proper thinking. I like how these sceneros really open up the mind.

If something moves faster then the speed of light I think its just that, faster and thats it.

Object at point A gets to object at ponit B and C faster then the speed of which light travels and or for this matter is traveling at (SOL alternating..etc) The object should get to points B and C before the light (traveling wave) from the light source gets to the object. In essance it would be literal....invisible...as in not visible..as in the object got to and left point B before the light wave could shine on it and reflect back in our eyes.

Light is just like any other wave. Makes sense. I not sure how matter ACTUALY REALLY does play a REAL role. I understand the theorys but I think there is an added unnecesary componet or there is something missing.
Concerning acceleration and G's I think we are forgetting basic theory that if all objects move relatively together at the same rate then there should be no prob.

In fact G's occur only when other parts of the componets resist movement. If all componets can tie in....zip.

This might sound crazy but experienced these physics through skateboarding. There is a way where you can gain control over your mass where the existing force from your movement and mass get dis-placed and things that would normally have a hold on you are now energy for your liking. I know.

[edit on 25-3-2008 by Stella Lotus]

reply to post by Warlon


Thats a good question about time and light(I gave it a star).You are correct in that you would esentially be somewhere before you left-but like you said I think that is just a mathmatical(ie-non real world)scnerio.Also someone on here said photons have no mass that is incorrect-they have to have mass to produce energy-which is all photons are,neutrinos do not have mass(so it is postulated)although new research is thinking they alternate w/ and w/o mass.So as far as ftl I believe the main plausable ways to achieve it are one of two ways.
1.Artificial worm hole.
2.Warping of local space.
There is alot of sites you can go to that talk about all these theories from credibal physic sources.

Originally posted by jkrog08
reply to post by Warlon

 

You are correct in that you would esentially be somewhere before you left-

I disagree. I think you would be at your destination before light arrives or faster than that speed of which "light" travels at. You wouldn't arrive before you left. After you left before the light.

[edit on 25-3-2008 by Stella Lotus]

Originally posted by jkrog08
reply to post by Warlon

 

Thats a good question about time and light(I gave it a star).You are correct in that you would esentially be somewhere before you left-but like you said I think that is just a mathmatical(ie-non real world)scnerio. I believe the main plausable ways to achieve it are one of two ways.
1.Artificial worm hole.
2.Warping of local space.
There is alot of sites you can go to that talk about all these theories from credibal physic sources.

I believe that worm holes are a myth, while warping the space-time ether is possible, and experiments have had side-effects which proved it. (Although nearly impossibly to replicate).

Everyone knows the direction of light can be bent by gravity. Theoritically, gravitational wave is induced by emitting grav A pulses (at 7.46Hz) against an existing grav B field. When the pulsing stops, the wavefront created by the grav A distortion pushes the object from its current position to an extended distance until the ether has returned to its normal state (similar to a slingshot.. a grav A wave carries the vessel through space until it reaches the grav B field of a celestial body)

Kind of abstract, but that's my take on it.

reply to post by Kinesis


So far ive got, when you move from point A - B faster than the speed of light, you will be invisible? I may be wrong, but if you've just beat light to your,'it's destination', then nothing will be visible? no light to reflect off objects, so the light wouldn't be picke up by the eye?

I still believe light is bent by EM and not gravity (well it is gravity, but they have named the force and not the cause, sort of like naming the blast after the nuclear explosion 'the reaction')

Originally posted by ElectroMagnetic Multivers
reply to post by Kinesis

 

So far ive got, when you move from point A - B faster than the speed of light, you will be invisible? I may be wrong, but if you've just beat light to your,'it's destination', then nothing will be visible? no light to reflect off objects, so the light wouldn't be picke up by the eye?

I still believe light is bent by EM and not gravity (well it is gravity, but they have named the force and not the cause, sort of like naming the blast after the nuclear explosion 'the reaction')

The way I see it, regardless of the velocity something travels at, it does not become invisible, unless you consider disintegration a form of invisibility. The brain only processes visual images at about 30-40 frames per second, so an object travelling at a high velocity may appear as a quick flash. The Transverse Magnetic Wave barrier around the vessel maintains a gravitational and atmospheric constant from within, separate from the external forces acting upon it. It may feel you're ascending in an elevator at most.