Error in "Cosmos"?

Well, going on the theory that you COULD move a sphere to light-speed, then the EM will never reach the sphere - but would be trailing behind it.

Not only that, but you could not see the sphere coming, as all the light that bounces off its forward section is returning to your eyes just as fast as the sphere is moving towards you. In other words, there'd be no warning that it was coming.

Here's an even MORE interesting thing.

Say that you were inside a space ship that could travel NEAR the speed of light (something which is possible). You'd find that your ship-board computer would suddenly massively slow down, and your wires would melt! This is because the electricity going through the wires and cables of your ship also cannot exceed the speed of light! So any signals moving forward in the direction that the ship is going, will take longer to get to you. In other words, the Resistance (in Ohms) will increase - meaning the wire will get hotter - and will likely melt.

So not only is it impossible for a ship to reach the speed of light physically, but electronically too!

I've always wondered this though;

Let's go back to your sphere. It's travelling along at the speed of light, and has light reflecting off of its front. Since the light that reflects is going JUST AS fast as the sphere, you can imagine the front of the sphere becoming a dense mass of photons - as they literally cannot go any further.

What were to happen if the sphere then accelerated to FASTER than the speed of light? Would it simply re-reflect the photons, pushing them with it? Or would it create the light-equivilant of a sonic boom, a photonic boom? In essence, the photonic boom theory should be correct, since both sound and light are waves. Imagine, a massive explosion of light - with seemingly no reason why!

Imagine you're in Tokyo, and I'm in Oklahoma. Now, imagine we're talking to each other on Short Wave radios. Next, Imagine I have a Laser aimed at a mirror on the Moon, which will bounce the Laser beam down to your exact position, and you have a device which can read that Laser.

You clearly hear me say, "NOW!", on the radio, which indicates that I've pulled the trigger to fire the Laser...but...your device doesn't do anything for about three seconds.

TELL ME WHY.

Clue: It has nothing to do with satellites.



[edit on 14-12-2005 by Toelint]