A Question Concerning Material Structure and the Speed of Light

If a laser pointer - featuring a laser at each end (front and back, so to speak) - were traveling at 6,000 miles per second in a vacuum and within the confines of a universal frame of reference (no observers affecting the frame of reference), what would happen to it (relativity speaking) if both lights (front and back) were suddenly turned on? Einstein's Relativity theories insist that something has to give (speed equals distance divided by time) and it cannot be the speed of light, since that speed is immutable. Adding 6,000 miles per second to 186,000 miles per second must be accounted for. The complication is that with a laser light beam coming from both the leading and tailing ends of the pointer device, what's added at one end is subtracted at the other end. Theoretically, anyway. So, is it a case where any material or time contraction is mathematically challenged by an equal expansion?

I'm just trying to better understand the immutable nature of the speed of light, and how far the rest of reality has to bend in deference to this one and only one constant.

originally posted by: NorEaster
If a laser pointer - featuring a laser at each end (front and back, so to speak) - were traveling at 6,000 miles per second in a vacuum and within the confines of a universal frame of reference (no observers affecting the frame of reference), what would happen to it (relativity speaking) if both lights (front and back) were suddenly turned on? Einstein's Relativity theories insist that something has to give (speed equals distance divided by time) and it cannot be the speed of light, since that speed is immutable. Adding 6,000 miles per second to 186,000 miles per second must be accounted for. The complication is that with a laser light beam coming from both the leading and tailing ends of the pointer device, what's added at one end is subtracted at the other end. Theoretically, anyway. So, is it a case where any material or time contraction is mathematically challenged by an equal expansion?

I'm just trying to better understand the immutable nature of the speed of light, and how far the rest of reality has to bend in deference to this one and only one constant.

Oh relativity

You hit the nail on the head when you mentioned frame of reference.

from the point of view of the laser no discernible difference.

From an observer the light would just appear redshifted or blue shifted depending on the observers position.

The light however would still travel at 186k kms in both directions.

If you want to understand why I can explain.. just ask which part you don't understand.



Korg.

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

The light however would still travel at 186k kms in both directions.

If you want to understand why I can explain.. just ask which part you don't understand.

Korg.

But, if the pointer is already traveling 6K miles per second, then how can the light that it produces travel from its already 6k miles per second (adding that 6K to the standard, and immutable 186K of c) without violating its immutable 186K c?

That's a place to start, I suppose.

a reply to: NorEaster well light is not a constant and fluctuates light is not constant,
link2 also i find mans comprehension of time is flawed .

so i guess im saying that the pointer would be like a car on a motorway ,so the light would fluctuate till the 6000 miles per second was subtracted from 186,000 then stabalize at 180,000 all in a human nano second.
sorry its my best guess

originally posted by: stuthealien
a reply to: NorEaster well light is not a constant and fluctuates light is not constant,
link2 also i find mans comprehension of time is flawed .

so i guess im saying that the pointer would be like a car on a motorway ,so the light would fluctuate till the 6000 miles per second was subtracted from 186,000 then stabalize at 180,000 all in a human nano second.
sorry its my best guess

That's one hell of a fluctuation. You'd think that someone would've noticed the potential for it long ago if that were true.

originally posted by: NorEaster

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

The light however would still travel at 186k kms in both directions.

If you want to understand why I can explain.. just ask which part you don't understand.

Korg.

But, if the pointer is already traveling 6K miles per second, then how can the light that it produces travel from its already 6k miles per second (adding that 6K to the standard, and immutable 186K of c) without violating its immutable 186K c?

That's a place to start, I suppose.

The speed of the moving object does not get added or subtracted to the speed of light.

This might make it easier to follow: How fast does a moving light source go?

Now light is also a wave and so, it also shows the Doppler effect. But you have to be travelling very much faster before you see any effect. So if you were driving your car at close to the speed of light, an external observer would see that your front headlights would appear more blue than normal and your rear taillights would appear more red than normal. The driver himself wouldn’t actually see anything different from normal because he’s not moving relative to the source of the light. Just as the driver of a fire engine hears his siren at a constant pitch because he’s not moving relative to the siren. Looking out the window though, the driver would be moving relative to any landscape that he was moving past, and he would see objects in front of him appear bluer than normal and objects behind him appearing redder than normal.

Hope this helps,

Korg.

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

originally posted by: NorEaster

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

The light however would still travel at 186k kms in both directions.

If you want to understand why I can explain.. just ask which part you don't understand.

Korg.

But, if the pointer is already traveling 6K miles per second, then how can the light that it produces travel from its already 6k miles per second (adding that 6K to the standard, and immutable 186K of c) without violating its immutable 186K c?

That's a place to start, I suppose.

The speed of the moving object does not get added or subtracted to the speed of light.

This might make it easier to follow: How fast does a moving light source go?

Now light is also a wave and so, it also shows the Doppler effect. But you have to be travelling very much faster before you see any effect. So if you were driving your car at close to the speed of light, an external observer would see that your front headlights would appear more blue than normal and your rear taillights would appear more red than normal. The driver himself wouldn’t actually see anything different from normal because he’s not moving relative to the source of the light. Just as the driver of a fire engine hears his siren at a constant pitch because he’s not moving relative to the siren. Looking out the window though, the driver would be moving relative to any landscape that he was moving past, and he would see objects in front of him appear bluer than normal and objects behind him appearing redder than normal.

Hope this helps,

Korg.

So, if the photons that are originating from a light source are racing ahead of that light source that is already traveling 6,000 miles per second, that extra speed isn't added onto the 186,000 miles per second. Seems a bit counter intuitive, and it also seems to negate the need for time dilation and length contraction in other examples.

originally posted by: NorEaster

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

originally posted by: NorEaster

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

The light however would still travel at 186k kms in both directions.

If you want to understand why I can explain.. just ask which part you don't understand.

Korg.

But, if the pointer is already traveling 6K miles per second, then how can the light that it produces travel from its already 6k miles per second (adding that 6K to the standard, and immutable 186K of c) without violating its immutable 186K c?

That's a place to start, I suppose.

The speed of the moving object does not get added or subtracted to the speed of light.

This might make it easier to follow: How fast does a moving light source go?

Now light is also a wave and so, it also shows the Doppler effect. But you have to be travelling very much faster before you see any effect. So if you were driving your car at close to the speed of light, an external observer would see that your front headlights would appear more blue than normal and your rear taillights would appear more red than normal. The driver himself wouldn’t actually see anything different from normal because he’s not moving relative to the source of the light. Just as the driver of a fire engine hears his siren at a constant pitch because he’s not moving relative to the siren. Looking out the window though, the driver would be moving relative to any landscape that he was moving past, and he would see objects in front of him appear bluer than normal and objects behind him appearing redder than normal.

Hope this helps,

Korg.

So, if the photons that are originating from a light source are racing ahead of that light source that is already traveling 6,000 miles per second, that extra speed isn't added onto the 186,000 miles per second. Seems a bit counter intuitive, and it also seems to negate the need for time dilation and length contraction in other examples.

I know it is counter intuitive, but it is defiantly how it works.

You see light travels in at 186k mps regardless of the speed of it's source.

To understand time dilation this is a very good vid that explains it well.

a reply to: NorEaster

Light is both a wave and a particle. Like a metronome, as the light rises and falls, it is going to have the same distance per second, but the rate of its crests is what is going to change. So, the light in front of the craft will have a different frequency than the light behind the craft. Other than that, their speeds will be the same.

What if a craft went at the speed of light and attempted to emit a laser forward, what then? Could there be some type of light build-up similar to a sonic boom? It would be interesting to find out.

originally posted by: Nechash
a reply to: NorEaster

Light is both a wave and a particle. Like a metronome, as the light rises and falls, it is going to have the same distance per second, but the rate of its crests is what is going to change. So, the light in front of the craft will have a different frequency than the light behind the craft. Other than that, their speeds will be the same.

Exactly. you got it.

In otherwords... the frequency of the light changes... hence red or blue shifted.

What if a craft went at the speed of light and attempted to emit a laser forward, what then? Could there be some type of light build-up similar to a sonic boom? It would be interesting to find out.

Nope no light barrier such as a light build up. Nothing that has a rest mass value can reach the speed of light. The true equation e=mc2 is exactly that at light speed mass is converted to energy.



Korg.

a reply to: Korg Trinity

Could a photon be a binary particle with a dark sub-particle that maintains the mass and an energetic cloud that conserves the extra energy? If that energetic cloud were shared among photons, that might explain why a single photon behaves like a particle while multiple photons behave like a wave. Perhaps the frequency of the light is conserved in the orbital rate of the luminescent cloud? I'm not into physics at all (other than an introductory class in undergrad), so that might be the stupidest thing anyone has ever said, but it just struck me as possible.

a reply to: Nechash

Maybe the mass could come from the nucleus of the atom and the energetic cloud from the electron as it passes on its way out? This could explain why a photon discharge causes an electron to drop in orbit (it loses energy) and why an absorption causes it to rise. It would also explain why light has no electric charge.

originally posted by: Nechash
a reply to: Korg Trinity

Could a photon be a binary particle with a dark sub-particle that maintains the mass and an energetic cloud that conserves the extra energy? If that energetic cloud were shared among photons, that might explain why a single photon behaves like a particle while multiple photons behave like a wave. Perhaps the frequency of the light is conserved in the orbital rate of the luminescent cloud? I'm not into physics at all (other than an introductory class in undergrad), so that might be the stupidest thing anyone has ever said, but it just struck me as possible.

Ironically there is such a thing as an Anti-photon... but it is the same as a photon.... Photons do not have any rest mass... in other-words they need zero energy to move but they do have relativistic mass which is to say they can exert a force relative to their energy equivalent of mass.

There has been some experimentation with photon Bose-Einstein condensation... which is a state of matter in which all particles in a cloud act in unison in a kind of quantum state, caused by supper low temperatures.

But this has absolutely nothing to do with the price of eggs

Korg.

a reply to: Korg Trinity

If a photon and an anti-photon collide, do they annihilate each other?

originally posted by: Nechash
a reply to: Korg Trinity

If a photon and an anti-photon collide, do they annihilate each other?

Yes and not just in theory we have observed it many many times in high energy collisions. Normally what happens when they collide is they produce other sub atomic particles such as electron-positron, quarks or other fleeting particles, all energies accounted for of course.

Korg.

a reply to: NorEaster

Gravity mesess things up. You can have two lights going the speed of light but throw gravity in and although both are going the speed of light, realitive to each other one is getting to where its going faster.
Is there a actually vacuum any where in the universe? Gravity seems to be everywhere at various places.

originally posted by: ZeussusZ
a reply to: NorEaster

Gravity mesess things up. You can have two lights going the speed of light but throw gravity in and although both are going the speed of light, realitive to each other one is getting to where its going faster.
Is there a actually vacuum any where in the universe? Gravity seems to be everywhere at various places.

This is called gravitational lensing and is a very useful feature of gravity, as it allows us to see around objects and helps us calculate distances more accurately.

Korg.

originally posted by: Korg Trinity

originally posted by: Nechash
a reply to: Korg Trinity

If a photon and an anti-photon collide, do they annihilate each other?

Yes and not just in theory we have observed it many many times in high energy collisions. Normally what happens when they collide is they produce other sub atomic particles such as electron-positron, quarks or other fleeting particles, all energies accounted for of course.

Korg.

I think you were thinking about 'proton and anti-proton'. A photon and anti-photon (which is the same particle) have almost no reaction cross section. I don't believe there has been any direct observation (which could only happen by rare QED effects, instantiating virtual electron/positron pairs and scattering off of them).

originally posted by: Nechash
a reply to: Korg Trinity

Could a photon be a binary particle with a dark sub-particle that maintains the mass and an energetic cloud that conserves the extra energy?

No and yes. There is no mass with photons, so no dark-subparticle exists, nor is there any experimental phenomenon requiring its existence.

The 'energetic cloud' is known as the electromagnetic field. The photon is a particular 'configuration' of the quantum wavefunction of the electromagnetic field.

If that energetic cloud were shared among photons, that might explain why a single photon behaves like a particle while multiple photons behave like a wave.

Correct, multiple photons sum up their electric and magnetic fields which, in the classical limit (what we ordinarily observe) behaves like a common wave. The 'energetic cloud' is only one and shared, there is *THE* electromagnetic field, not individual distinct ones attached to distinct photons.

Perhaps the frequency of the light is conserved in the orbital rate of the luminescent cloud? I'm not into physics at all (other than an introductory class in undergrad), so that might be the stupidest thing anyone has ever said, but it just struck me as possible.

If by "the orbital rate of the luminescent cloud" you mean the frequency of oscillation in the electromagnetic field, then this is true. In free space, electromagnetic waves have no dispersion, redshift (excluding gravitation on the large scale) or aberration: they maintain their color and velocity indefinitely. When you interact with atoms, these properties may change as the electromagnetic fields shake the electrons in atoms which can respond in complicated ways.

originally posted by: Nechash
a reply to: NorEaster
What if a craft went at the speed of light and attempted to emit a laser forward, what then? Could there be some type of light build-up similar to a sonic boom? It would be interesting to find out.

Firstly, a craft cannot go at the speed of light, only slower.

There will be some 'build-up' but it will not be similar to a sonic boom which is a shock wave. The build-up will be noticed that the frequency of the light will be higher looking at the moving source than at a stationary source, even though the wave would propagate at the same speed no matter what.

There is a phenomenon of effectively shock waves in light, but only when propagating through material substances where the effective speed of light (for a certain frequency range) is substantially less than the free space speed of light 'c'.