🚀 go-pugleaf

In article <32890596...@pegasus.cc.ucf.edu>,
Mehmet Avcioglu  <mta5...@pegasus.cc.ucf.edu> wrote:
>Scott Hess wrote:
>> This isn't really a matter of opinion.  To prove that you can't go
>> faster than the speed of light, I don't have to opine that your
>> vehicle will fall apart, or your mind cannot take it, or that there's
>> no mechanical means to connect enough engines, or anything like that.
>> I can just prove that YOU CAN'T GET THERE FROM HERE!  You could take
>> _all_ the mass in our universe, convert every last particle to energy
>> (for maximum boost) and shoot it all in one direction - and you still
>> will not manage to accelerate yourself to light speed.  The problem is
>> that the amount of acceleration to add a given amount of velocity
>> increases exponentially to infinity.
>
>I guess you are talking about that equation that calculates the amount
>of mass needed to speed something up. I think it was something like this
>(Sorry, I really don't know much about this stuff)
>
>Mass = [Something That I don't remember] / (c - speed)

mass = (rest mass)/sqrt(1 - v^2/c^2) is the formula.
If you are going the speed of light (by magic, of course :), it becomes
division by zero, and it's undefined.  But actually, the situation is
defined, because photons travel at c all the time.. the difference between
photons and us is that photons exist at c, they never start off at speed 0
and approach c.  The formula doesn't apply to them because they don't have
to approach c from some lesser speed, whereas we do, and there's the rub:
we have to approach c from some lesser speed.. repeat it to yourself.  Just
like the man said, you can't get there from here.

>
>According to the above equation, If you wanted to reach the speed of
>light, your equation would turn out to be division by zero, and you
>would end up with infinity. Actually it is not infinity, it is
>undefined. Consider the posibility that you already passed the speed of
>light, your result is no longer undefined. I really think there is an
>exception to this equation.

There is a theory that particles exist at speeds above c, they're called
tachyons (sp?).  If you examine the above formula, which you'll note is
different from yours in a significant way (the sqrt), you'll notice the
mass of a tachyon is imaginary, and that it travels backwards in time,
and that it has imaginary dimensions (the formula for computing length
along the axis of motion is similar to the mass formula).

>
>> [I had a roomate who once would start a conversation with something
>> like "But let's say you _could_ go faster than the speed of light."
>> How can you start a conversation by invoking magic?  I just wonder why
>> people so seldom say things like "What if pi was exactly 3.5?" or
>> "What if e was 3.1415926...?" or "What if i was not imaginary?"]
>
>Didn't a French matematician in 19th century proved that PI was equal to
>2. I mean, not really proved it, but came up with the answer "PI is
>approching to 2". A half-circle with a radius of one has the half
>circumference PI. If you put two smaller half-circles inside that
>half-circle with radiuses .5 you'll get half circumferences PI/2 for
>those 2 smaller ones. Then you replace the half-radius of these smaller
>half-circles with x and take the limit approaching 0. After some more
>math PI comes up equal to the diameter of the first half-circle which
>was 2. I think there is a glitch in there somewhere (probably related to
>the L'Hospital rule), but I couldn't explain it.
>
>I am not saying that PI is 2, but our knowledge of math, physics, our
>knowledge of the workings of the universe is not that solid.

Agreed.  We don't know why the universe does what it does, but we do
know what it's doing.

>
>Thomas Alva Edison once said, "We don't know one millionth of one
>percent about anything".
>
>- Mehmet


-- 
Glenn Lamb - mum...@netcom.com -- Finger mum...@netcom.com for PGP Key.
PGPprint = E3 0F DE CC 94 72 D1 1A  2D 2E A9 08 6B A0 CD 82
Reply address set to mum...@no-spam.netcom.com to fudge USENET scanners.
Be sure to send replies to mum...@netcom.com