Einstein was wrong, the speed of light cannot be constant because it's immeasurable by his own theo

reply to post by CLPrime


Wow... you REALLY did your homework on this one... I'm impressed.

So, what was that about 200 milliseconds?

My apologies on that one.... I *DID* write down milliseconds... but the actual Shapiro delay was 200 *MICROSECONDS*

en.wikipedia.org...

Mea Culpa.

The reduced speed of light through Earth's atmosphere is

Not actually necessary for the calculation, actually.... the measurements were preformed from an orbiting satellite.... so the refractive index of the Earth's atmosphere would have no effect on wave propagation.

Originally posted by ErtaiNaGia

Wow... you REALLY did your homework on this one... I'm impressed.

I always do my homework. (Just don't talk to any of my university professors.)

... the actual Shapiro delay was 200 *MICROSECONDS*

Which is still more than the predicted 8.5 microseconds.

Not actually necessary for the calculation, actually.... the measurements were preformed from an orbiting satellite.... so the refractive index of the Earth's atmosphere would have no effect on wave propagation.

Which means the reduction in the speed of light by the Venusian atmosphere can account even less for the Shapiro Effect.

Mea Culpa.

Bene Habet.

reply to post by CLPrime

I always do my homework.

I have no doubt of that... that's why I believe you will be EXCEEDINGLY useful for this next part!

Which is still more than the predicted 8.5 microseconds.

Indeed....

Which means the reduction in the speed of light by the Venusian atmosphere can account even less for the Shapiro Effect.

Agreed.... now comes the Mind Melter.


I noticed that your calculations for the intervening distance between earth and Venus at closest approach were conducted using "c", as opposed to the actual speed of light in THAT MEDIUM.

(And this is precisely my point of contention)

Because the space between the two planets is not actually a vacuum, it is filled with electrons, and ionized hydrogen (Hydrogen plasma), which, although Diffuse, has an actual effect on the propagation speed of photons passing through the intervening distance.

(part 2.2: Refractive index of plasmas)
articles.adsabs.harvard.edu...

The refractive index of the stellar medium is a function of Electron Density, and thus, a function of solar radii (denser closer to the sun)

So, in order to gain a more thorough estimate of the delay, one would have to factor in the refractive index of that medium for the entire length of the journey, and then compare that to the speed through vacuum.





P.S. it looks like the refractive index that close is something like 1.0000007701, I'm still looking for more information though...

It's fun watching two obviously intelligent people argue or disagree on matters that are full on textbook half truths.

Originally posted by ErtaiNaGia

P.S. it looks like the refractive index that close is something like 1.0000007701, I'm still looking for more information though...

So am I. And, in fact, it appears that the refractive index of a plasma is typically less than one. This means that the luminal phase velocity is actually greater than c.

However, let's assume an index of 1.0000007701.
The original time to travel between Earth and Venus was 127.42148436569408293787030492942 seconds.
Taking the index of refraction into accounts gives a time of 127.42158249297919295888357538332 seconds.
That's a difference of 0.000098127285110021013270453921826131 seconds, or 98 microseconds.
Accounting for a round-trip, that's 196 microseconds.

Did you pick the index value because you knew it would give close to 200 microseconds?

reply to post by CLPrime

So am I. And, in fact, it appears that the refractive index of a plasma is typically less than one. This means that the luminal phase velocity is actually greater than c.

LOL!!! TIME TRAVEL!!! HERP DERP!!!

Did you pick the index value because you knew it would give close to 200 microseconds?

Nope... *I* didn't, but the source I picked it up from???? I don't know...

www.extinctionshift.com...

Some REAL interesting stuff on there... I don't know enough about plasma physics to actually do the calculations myself, unfortunately...

It's a Mind Melter!

Take a glance at it... some great info there.... I'm still trying to corroberate his findings, but finding the refractive index of a plasma by electron density, or merely distance from the sun is a TRYING task...


All in all.... thanks for playing the game with me!

reply to post by ErtaiNaGia


I was actually just reading that site. It's why it took me so long to reply...there was a lot of reading (and deciphering) to do.

And, I'm always willing to play these "games" ...this being the second you and I have played.

reply to post by CLPrime

I was actually just reading that site. It's why it took me so long to reply...there was a lot of reading (and deciphering) to do.

Ya, there's alot there...

And, I'm always willing to play these "games" If you'll recall, this would be the second you and I have played.

Indeed! You have a keen mind, and I enjoy debating you!

Keep me posted on anything you find, eh?

reply to post by CLPrime

I'm not sure what your initial statement (about superluminal invisibility, as it were) was about.

Objects (if any) beyond the boundary of the observable universe are receding superluminally.

reply to post by Astyanax


Yes, but they're "invisible" for another reason; and you mentioned a paper which states that even some objects within the observable universe are receding at superluminal velocities, yet they're not "invisible" at all.

reply to post by CLPrime

Yes, but they're "invisible" for another reason.

They’re invisible because they’re so far away that light would take longer than the age of the universe to reach us from their location, or because they’re moving away so fast the light from them is redshifted down to a wavelength that is undetectable. Either way, they acquired that velocity relative to us because of the expansion of space, didn’t they? Enlighten, if you’ll pardon the expression, me. This is not intended to be an argument.

reply to post by Astyanax


I'm just confused...trying to figure out what you meant by your initial statement:

I understand that the metric expansion of space is superluminal at intergalactic distances. However, information can’t be exchanged, as far as we can tell, between objects being carried apart at speeds above c

The first part is fine. It's the second part that, in this instance, is incorrect. And yet you seem to understand that cosmological recession is not proper velocity, and, so, is not subject to the limits of Special Relativity. That's what's confusing me.

reply to post by CLPrime

Aha! I see now. That is just a practical observation. Apart from some kind of ansible of the kind we were discussing earlier, there is no way to communicate between them. I guess I shouldn’t have said ‘exchange information’, since the objects are visible to each other and therefore, technically, information is passing in both directions from one to another. Passing messages back and forth is another story, though. That’s what I meant.

reply to post by Astyanax


That was a terribly painful way to get to such a simple answer
Gotchya.

I'd say the universe is a little goofy. There's no such thing as a universal clock. Velocity, acceleration, and gravity all affect time. Two atomic clocks traveling at different speeds from a given start point are actually going to have different measurements. Ditto with clocks accelerating at different rates, and also for clocks that start at the same time but with measurement occurring in different gravity fields. Since they're atomic clocks, it's not like mass or anything like friction is affecting the periodicity of a pendulum. Stuff like temperature, radiation exposure, and magnetic fields should also be controlled to some degree. So unless there's something else we don't really understand, under these circumstances time itself is progressing at different rates.

So why bring this up on a speed-of-light discussion? Speed is distance divided by time. If you can't have a universal constant for measurement of time, therefore logic would dictate that speed measurements are non-universal as well. Thus the speed of light itself is relative. In other words, the speed of light as measured is only relevant to where it's being observed. Observations in two different parts of the universe would give the same values for c, but since the t in d/t isn't the same, the c there isn't the same as c here.

Interestingly enough, large enough gravity fields cause refraction. Thus the speed of light has been observed as being variable in a vacuum. At least when it travels near large enough objects such as stars. Even Einstein himself predicted this one. But this is because time is changing.

What's funny is no matter how fast you go, you'll never be able to approach the speed of light. Because it's speed is only relative to where it's being observed. You could keep going faster and faster while doing an experiment to measure c and find that it doesn't change. However to another observer, it may be possible for you to exceed the speed of light. In which case you'll no longer be able to be observed since in that instance you'd be leaving their frame of reference. (At least until somebody discovers a way to detect any particles which may be faster than photons. But until then photons are all we have for such observations.)

The thing is that since only so much information can exist in the universe, time also comes into play in this too. From a given frame of reference nothing can't exceed the speed of light, so time itself condenses. This is what seems weird. From what I'd get, if you changed the math around to allow for variable time progression (which means a second isn't necessarily a second) - you could rework the energy equations for a constant mass and changing duration when the speed of light is approached in regards to a starting frame of reference. Reworked relativity in this regard may seem even more paradoxical than it is now (may allow even more loopholes), but might make explaining some things easier.

I don't think Einstein was too far in being wrong on what he came up with. I think he just had some oversights or questions about this, and pushed such problems to the back burner.

I think some people (or perhaps a lot) wouldn't like this though. Given the presence of any significant gravitational gradient, some measurements such as light-years are about as relevant as using the reflection of a yard stick in a funhouse mirror as a measuring tool. Sure they use gravitational lenses to make out distant objects, but there's likely more to it than that. It means a lot more corrections would have to be done which aren't currently accounted for. Variable time progression also makes dating objects harder too. Are we looking back further in time because of a strong gravitational gradient, or is that thing newly formed in a cosmic sense?

Things like black holes also become real-life tesseracts. (Some areas of space would exhibit negative refraction and other peculiarities due to gravitational lensing.) Approach the event horizon of a black hole, and instead of a pinprick singularity, it becomes vast. If the gravitational field is diffuse enough, time also slows down and the system of a black hole also becomes less energetic. Perhaps survivable even. Fall in and watch the "big bang" all over again as a universe within a universe unfolds. Stuff like that would make some other assumptions about the nature of space even more difficult to explain.

Fix that, and maybe we could get a real bona fide "theory of everything".

Such ideas could also reveal that things like the GPS constellation has some other peculiar uses if data is applied in the right way. What does it do? In order to calibrate correctly it has to measure time, distance, and correct for gravitational fields. With a large enough data set, it could likely take on Gravity Probes A&B like a champ. If able to can pick up small enough anomalies fast enough, it could detect the presence of non-conventional propulsion like a warp drive or perhaps even the entry point of a time-traveler. Would the gov't have a use for that? Likely. (If they can get data at that resolution, large objects like submarines would also be easy to localize.) Can they use it this way? They wouldn't tell us if they did. However, it is fun to speculate whether they have that capability.

Maybe I'm crazy for thinking of stuff like this. But I guess that's a special kind of madness that not everyone has. Then again, I'm not alone when it comes to this forum. (Unfortunately I'm too lazy or not in the right mental shape to do the math. I burn out too fast and easily get lost with lots of equations and numbers. Somebody better qualified would have to get the gist of such ideas, and pick up the ball from there.)

Originally posted by libertytoall


When Einstein split the atom it is my theory that he tore the fabric of space and time and the future past and present all came together in a fiery mess.

Your theory has a major problem. Einstein didn't split the atom. The first man made sustained fission reaction was in a reactor built by Enrico Fermi in a makeshift fission reactor he built in a room under the squash court at the University of Chicago in 1939, although the absolute first "atom splitting was by John Cockcroft and Ernest Walton, who used accelerated protons shot into a Lithium 7 atom to break it into 2 alpha particles in 1932, almost 3 decades after Einstein's Special Theory was published. There was no fiery mess in either 1932 or 1939.

reply to post by pauljs75


Fascinating mini dissertation. I find myself largely in the camp you describe, (if I interpret what you say correctly). If I had the means and free time I would articulate the areas described I subscribe to but I don't see that horizon approaching soon so let me make a stab at a Cliff Notes version.

c is a universal constant. c is always observed as c no matter how fast the observer happens to be traveling–the photos approaching you will be traveling c to your perspective, and the photons passing you will be traveling c to your perspective. It is space and time that warps the observations that c is not traveling c, meaning that space expansion and strong gravitational forces cause the photos to have to travel farther to reach the observer, and not that they slow down. Since traveling at great speeds approaching c, time and all atomic motion undergoes a slowing, and this slowing is proportional to some variance curve to how close to c is achieved, to the point of a photon that is traveling c, time does not exist.

Am I anywhere near your ballpark? If not excuse my interruption. I'm always fascinated about discussions of c, because c is preceded by a and b.

reply to post by ErtaiNaGia


I wasn't actually out to measure the speed of light, just the difference in distance between the the reflector on the Moon and the telescope on the Earth, due to the orbit of the Moon.

We did account for the radii of both the Earth and the Moon in our calculations, but did not account for the slowing of the propagation speed of light due to the atmosphere, nor did we account for any dilation effects of the gravity wells of either body. The effects due to either gravity or the atmosphere, upon the propagation speed of the light pulses, in this instance, would have been negligible and totally within the error limits of our experiment.

Tesla disagreed with Einstein on relativity too.

Space and time flows around our sun and then around the 9 planets. If the sun was not placed in front of us where it currently disrupts space and time, we would have a much higher speed of light to witness. But again, it's not the speed of light you're witnessing, it's the SPEED OF TIME. The speed of light itself is limited by the speed of time which is why you would get the same reading measuring light as you would for time.

Think of a watch with different sprockets where the small sprocket in the middle is like the black hole at the center of our galaxy, traveling the fastest and driving all the other sprockets(solar systems). Our sprocket/solar system, depending on size would have a unique speed then say a smaller sprocket. This is how space and time works, with circular orbital motions, where all you have to do is go to another solar system with a smaller sprocket to move faster or larger solar system to move slower compared to your own time and space.