I call Captain

sniper_spike · Post by **sniper_spike** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 6:51 pm

Yah, if it existed.

Kurt_ · Post by **Kurt_** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 6:54 pm

Triton's right.

Don't quote me on my 68% Grade 11 physics knowledge, but I believe that everything taht travels at the speed of light breaks up into pure energy.

As for this:

They Have accelerated Atoms past the Speed of light to create relly funky phenomenon like Quarks and Anti-matter

Each proton/neutron is composed of 3 sub-atomic particles called quarks. SUB-atomic. Meaning that it's no longer an atom. Meaning you'd no longer have atoms.

But then I'm reading this:
http://digg.com/science/What_happens_wh ... _of_light_

And it brings up an interesting point. Light can be slowed down in a medium. So you can theoretically have something travelling at the speed of light in a dense medium. But have fun getting a spaceraft to move through a block of diamonds. (Diamonds, being the most dense material on Earth, slow light down by an index of 2.42)

The speed of light (according to Google) is 299 792 458 m / s

Using the index of refraction in Diamond, the speed of light in a Diamond is 123 881 180.99 m / s

In Diamond, light will travel 41% slower, enabling objects (that can travel through Diamonds [which is basically only some sort of radiation without mass] to travel at the speed of light in that medium.

Post by **Triton** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:15 pm

the fun thing is that at sublight speeds (speeds approaching the speed of light) you get what they call the "time dilation effect". the closer to the speed of light an object is moving (in this instance lets say a spacecraft) the slower time will pass for the object, sort of. say the ship is moving at 99% the speed of light. it could go from earth to alpha centari in lets say one month ship time, but outside the ship a decade or more may have passed. this is also called "time debt" and until we get a mode od travel that is "faster than light" either wormholes or whatever interstellar travel will be very confusing and annoying. just think, you go to alpha centari, have aged a month. stay there for a month and then go back. 3 months have passed for you, but becasue of time debt it has been 20 years and one month since you left!. using that you can almost accheve immortality tho, travel interstellar spaces and since you are going so fast time is slowed down for you, centuries could pass outside this sort of "time bubble" while only years of subjective time have passed! physics and things like that atre a bit confusing at times (like trying to visualize planck space. involves quanta and other things, black body radiation) whee theoretical physics!

Sir Games-A-Lot · Post by **Sir Games-A-Lot** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:23 pm

No comment.

I usually don't pay much attention to this hyper-theoretical (no pun intended)
mumbo-jumbo, primarily because I believe that any significant advances in those areas will not be made for hundreds or possibly thousands of years and when they come they will be so far removed from our inaccurate guesses and theories that it would be like comparing Volta's experiments to the bleeding edge of todayâ€™s electrical and electronic devices.

Thus, I don't really care when people tell me how fast a bunch of physicists can shoot tiny particles of matter down miles of pipe and then try to convince me this pursuit will lead to hyperspace travel by 2060 or unlock the secrets of the universe.

O.K. so that wasn't really no comment.

The irony of the whole situation is if you asked some one if they thought we would have faster than light travel or some similarly fantastic technology by 2050 you would probably get a "yeah I guess so", but if you ask if it's possible to build a portable PS2 you will probably get the response "No way man that's totally impossible" yet here we are and there they aren't.

Sorry if I offended anyone

.

Kurt_ · Post by **Kurt_** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:24 pm

I remembered some animated videos from my trip to the Perimeter Institute for theoretical physics, and it had some cool (and completely unrelated to this tpoic) animations where it showed a visual view (opposed to the other kind of view) of what you would see approaching the speed of light.

Go to the Downloads section for the videos:

http://www.anu.edu.au/Physics/Searle/index.html

It's extremely cool. Check it out. Watch "Viewing Special Relativity"

It starts out normal then adds all the theoretical things such as the Doppler Effect. It's ub3r 1337

Radon199 · Post by **Radon199** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:26 pm

Ya, the astronots that go up in space, because they orbit around the earth at such high speeds that they actually aged a 10th of a second less than everyone on earth. In fact even moving anything faster than not moving, like driving a car, but theres so little a speed drecreese in time that it's hardly even mesurable witout 10 million digits.

Kurt_ · Post by **Kurt_** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:29 pm

Not to mention the aging effects of gravity.

(Wow this thread got off topic)

Somebody living on a mountain will age slower than one at sea level. Not by anyhting noticable, if even a second in their lifetime. Theoretical Physics is great. I just suck at the math part

gamer2 · Post by **gamer2** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:30 pm

You know triton that is exactly what happened to the Astronaugts in The Origanol Planet of the Apes, Leaving Earth in 1975 and Aproaching the Speed of light, that caused them to Age only 2 months when the earth had aged 2000 years.

By the Way As you approach the Speed of Light the Energy need goes down, pretty soon you could ride along time on Inertia

and Beryllyum Sphers(sp?) could do it

Kurt_ · Post by **Kurt_** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:31 pm

Spheres, and Beryllium. Wow we are SO nerdy!

Post by **Triton** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:37 pm

you might be right gamer2 but i dont think so. to acheive the speed of light you would need an infinate ammount of infinate energy(e=mc suared ya know) , even getting to 99% light speed would take more energy that all the power plants on earth make in a year probably. those big particle acceleraters like at CERN use as much power in one go as a mediun sized city does in an entire day, they have their own power plants to run it. and that is to accelerate one atom to near light speed

Kurt_ · Post by **Kurt_** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:40 pm

Wow Triton. That post had you spelling like a n00blet.

Seriously guys, check out those videos. They are extremely neat if you're into anything sciencey.

Radon199 · Post by **Radon199** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:44 pm

Thats what makes me thing a cosmic cannon would be the answer to lightspeed travel. If you built a lightspeed cannon on the moon and placed a ship inside. The Moon would have to be turned into on big battery to store all the energy most likly collected from the sun. Then the ship would be firred out of the cannon that would most likly be through the core of the moon, effectivly turning the moon into the cannon itself. The ship would have to be fired eather through protonic induction or more space folding. The ship would fly out at near the speed of light, then it would fire it's engines with it's limited fuel supply to reach the speed of light, then just cost till you reach your desdination.

sniper_spike · Post by **sniper_spike** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:48 pm

Radon199 wrote:Thats what makes me thing a cosmic cannon would be the answer to lightspeed travel. If you built a lightspeed cannon on the moon and placed a ship inside. The Moon would have to be turned into on big battery to store all the energy most likly collected from the sun. Then the ship would be firred out of the cannon that would most likly be through the core of the moon, effectivly turning the moon into the cannon itself. The ship would have to be fired eather through protonic induction or more space folding. The ship would fly out at near the speed of light, then it would fire it's engines with it's limited fuel supply to reach the speed of light, then just cost till you reach your desdination.

Gosh Kurt's right.

Kurt_ wrote:Spheres, and Beryllium. Wow we are SO nerdy!

Kurt_ · Post by **Kurt_** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 7:49 pm

Well to me having something accelerate to the speed of light in a matter of seconds is crazy. (see railgun)
People would be cooked alive, and you'd have to replace the entire barrel of you so-called cosmic cannon each time. And if it was lauching something which had enough shielding to protect it and withstand that sort of acceleration, it would cost at least a couple 100 million every launch. (Ok so maybe 100 million is a litte high)

Radon199 · Post by **Radon199** » Thu Jan 12, 2006 8:09 pm

I never said it would be logical... I was just thinking it would be cool

Plus by the time we have the money and the skills to graft a cannon into the moon we will have invented inertial dampeners.