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Author Topic:   Speed of Light
David Carroll
Junior Member (Idle past 4234 days)
Posts: 12
From: Fairmont, West Virginia, USA
Joined: 08-22-2012


Message 242 of 268 (671346)
08-24-2012 1:01 PM
Reply to: Message 241 by Alfred Maddenstein
05-14-2011 11:17 AM


Re: c & t
What about this: What if the speed of light ("c") originally was much faster than it is now, but at the moment of change to a slower constant, all the light that was already in transition were "grandfathered", as it were? Thus, light coming now from sources billions of light-years away is light traveling at a much more dramatic speed. This is because the light would have been emitted from the sources before the change in "c" occurred, but because it was already in transition before that change, its speed was grandfathered.
And then wouldn't this account for the red-shift? If c were faster, then wouldn't the space dimension parallel to the direction of the faster-c light-beam undergo a Lorentzian expansion/dilation? (Since, if c were faster, time by definition would undergo a negative dilation, i.e. a positive time-contraction....and to preserve the geometry of the spacetime frame belonging to this faster-c light beam, a negative Lorentzian contraction, i.e. a positive Lorentzian expansion/dilation, would have to result). This Lorentzian expansion would flatten out the light-wave, causing its energy to shift to the red. Or, another way of putting it, since a faster c would result in a higher momentum (everything else being equal) for the photon in question, the energy required to make a photon go faster would have been "taken" from the energy of the wavelength in order to preserve conservation of energy, producing a red-shift for that photon.
Any thoughts?

This message is a reply to:
 Message 241 by Alfred Maddenstein, posted 05-14-2011 11:17 AM Alfred Maddenstein has not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 243 by David Carroll, posted 08-24-2012 1:18 PM David Carroll has not replied
 Message 244 by Stile, posted 08-24-2012 1:42 PM David Carroll has replied
 Message 250 by NoNukes, posted 08-25-2012 9:43 AM David Carroll has not replied

  
David Carroll
Junior Member (Idle past 4234 days)
Posts: 12
From: Fairmont, West Virginia, USA
Joined: 08-22-2012


Message 243 of 268 (671351)
08-24-2012 1:18 PM
Reply to: Message 242 by David Carroll
08-24-2012 1:01 PM


Re: c & t
I also have a more general question. I could "propose a new topic" for this, but it really does relate to the question of the Speed of light, even if it doesn't necessarily touch on questions of Creationism (at least not yet).
Does the force of gravity weaken in frames approaching c?
Imagine a spaceship moving very fast, very close to the speed of light (c). Also, this spaceship is so large that it contains two objects the size of our own moon. Now, according to the laws of relativity, the masses of the two moon-sized objects increase relative to a stationary observer. But also, because of time-dilation, closing movement between these two objects would be slower to a stationary observer than it would be to those on board. Moreover, if the direction of the mutually attractive movement of the two moon-sized objects were parallel to the velocity of the spaceship, the Lorentzian contraction would cause the movement apparent to a stationary observer to be even slower. But, from my stationary point of view, this should NOT occur. If the masses were larger, then the gravitational pull between the two objects would be larger, resulting in a faster mutually attractive acceleration of the two objects. But from my binoculars, I don't see this. I see attractive movement much, much slower than it should be from my point of view, especially considering that the masses have increased.
Therefore, shouldn't the gravity field for an object of given rest-mass DECREASE as it approaches c?
Sorry to pose questions that are probably elementary to most of you. I am not a professor, or even a student (at least not formally) of physics, so these questions are new and original in my own mind (though I'm sure not in reality). The little physics I have is from my Navy nuke days (and a little pop-science reading). Any answers would be appreciated.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 242 by David Carroll, posted 08-24-2012 1:01 PM David Carroll has not replied

  
David Carroll
Junior Member (Idle past 4234 days)
Posts: 12
From: Fairmont, West Virginia, USA
Joined: 08-22-2012


(1)
Message 245 of 268 (671429)
08-24-2012 11:59 PM
Reply to: Message 244 by Stile
08-24-2012 1:42 PM


Re: c & t
But from what I understand, the speed of light can be measured only if the transmitter and the receiver are both laboratorically at hand. We would need to know both that the source is "d"-distance away from the receiver and that the receiver intercepted the photon at "t" time after the transmitter emitted it. The only thing we can know about a photon, whose "transmitter" is not at human hand, is its energy/momentum (or its position within the matrix of the intercepting mechanism, of course, but that's irrelevant here). But its energy could mean a number of different things: if it has a blue wave-length, it could mean that the excitation energy of the transmitting reaction had an energy equivalent to just that amount of blueness at rest....and that, therefore the transmitting source is at rest relative to us. It could ALSO mean that the excitation energy of the transmitting source was more to the red, but that source is moving toward us. It could even mean that the source is moving away from us, but the excitation energy of the source was equivalent to violet wavelengths. Or - as is my contention - it could possibly mean that the speed of light has changed over time, or possibly over space.
One could make judgments about the nature of the transmitting source, but one has to be careful here. Parallax is helpful only within relatively short distances (parallax works by the same principle whereby you stare at a spot on the wall and alternately close one and then the other eye - the apparent discrepancy between the two apparent spots can be used, trigonometrically, to determine the distance of the spot from the bridge of your nose......same principle, but telescopes instead of eyes, and stars instead of spots). We could judge by the stage of development that the star or galaxy is in. But here we have to be careful too: if there is dark matter, this would certainly mess with the rate of development of a star or galaxy. And not only dark matter, but a number of other factors mess with this too: space warps associated with expanding universe, black hole singularities, or nihilarities (a pet theory I'm presently working on: I'd love to discuss it, but I'll withhold myself).
I hope this made sense. My roommate is watching stand-up comedians and it's messing with my concentration.
Edited by David Carroll, : misspelled "nihilarties". also wanted to include the word "pet".

This message is a reply to:
 Message 244 by Stile, posted 08-24-2012 1:42 PM Stile has seen this message but not replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 247 by NoNukes, posted 08-25-2012 1:22 AM David Carroll has replied
 Message 256 by Son Goku, posted 08-28-2012 4:12 AM David Carroll has not replied

  
David Carroll
Junior Member (Idle past 4234 days)
Posts: 12
From: Fairmont, West Virginia, USA
Joined: 08-22-2012


Message 246 of 268 (671437)
08-25-2012 1:10 AM
Reply to: Message 244 by Stile
08-24-2012 1:42 PM


Re: c & t
I have also touched on this same concept of a changing speed of light in another thread (the one dealing with carbon-dating), where I touch on what a changing c would imply on the quantum level. Any "wave" is a disturbance in the field involved: a photon is a disturbance in the electro-magnetic field. But there are also waves (and associated particles) in the weak nuclear field and the strong nuclear field. Thus, a change in c would imply a change in the speed of propagation of waves in the electro-magnetic field and the weak field and the strong field. This would, in my opinion (none of this has been proven empirically.....it is indeed speculation on my part, but based strongly on a general knowledge of how physics works), result in a change of rate at which the strong field, weak field, and electro-magnetic field interact with each other. An isotope decay is a result of such interaction. If c changed, the rate of these interactions would also change.
The beauty of this hypothesis is that it would solve the isotope decay problem and the starlight travel-time problem in one fell swoop. But it needs a lot of fleshing out on my part. Plus, the gravitational field works entirely differently on a whole 'nother level from the other fields....I mean in a way vastly different than the way, say, the strong field differs from the electro-magnetic field.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 244 by Stile, posted 08-24-2012 1:42 PM Stile has seen this message but not replied

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David Carroll
Junior Member (Idle past 4234 days)
Posts: 12
From: Fairmont, West Virginia, USA
Joined: 08-22-2012


Message 248 of 268 (671440)
08-25-2012 2:05 AM
Reply to: Message 247 by NoNukes
08-25-2012 1:22 AM


Re: c & t
I apologize for using the word "laboratorically". What I meant by this word was not a literal laboratory with walls and and people in white coats, but simply a way to convey the idea that the distance between the transmitter and the receiver are pre-determined (as they would be in a laboratory, even if this "laboratory" would be our solar system). Such would be the case with the sun and Io, both of whose distances can easily be determined by parallax and luminosity without any significant factors that would fudge these. And since the light dealt with here came from the sun, whatever photos emitted from it would have our normal c (since any "grandfathered" higher-c light beams would be billions of light years away from the sun by now).
As far as dark matter goes, if we assume that dark matter has a non-uniform density distribution across the universe, which is only fair considering that we can't directly see it anyway, a star in between two masses of dark matter may, or perhaps surrounded by some halo of dark matter, would have its gravitational field something to contend with.

This message is a reply to:
 Message 247 by NoNukes, posted 08-25-2012 1:22 AM NoNukes has replied

Replies to this message:
 Message 249 by NoNukes, posted 08-25-2012 3:05 AM David Carroll has not replied
 Message 252 by Percy, posted 08-26-2012 9:49 AM David Carroll has not replied

  
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