JustinC
The first explanation is that mass increases as matter approaches the speed of light, so it would take more and more force to further accelerate an object as it approaches the speed of light. This seems wrong to me for some reason. One's mass doesn't objectively (from all reference frames) increase, does it?
The mass does indeed increase since energy and mass are the same thing {E=mc^2}The "rest" mass of an object is different from one that is moving in accordance with this formula. m = m'/[sqrt{1-v2/c2}]This is the lorentz transformation of mass.
Since I cannot faithfully reproduce the formula m' is the rest mass while the m we seek is the relativistic mass.Now if the velocity {v}is equal to the speed of light {c} then our formula becomes m'/sqrt{1-1} which is the sqrt of 0 therefore division by zero not allowed means that the limiting case as a mass approaches the speed of light scales up exponentially and soon requires a greater amount of energy than is presemt within the universe.Thus an object with any mass at all must eventually become incapable of further acceleration due to the mass increase.
Photons of light avoid this by having no mass or rather by being simply energy with the characteristic that it can never go slower than the speed of light for the medium within which it travels.
This message has been edited by sidelined, Sun, 2005-07-10 08:51 PM
Nature uses only the longest threads to weave her patterns, so each small piece of her fabric reveals the organization of the entire tapestry