🚀 go-pugleaf

In message <SHESS.96N...@howard.one.net> - sh...@one.net (Scott Hess)12
Nov 96 09:40:02 writes:
<stuff deleted>
:>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.
:>

There is a problem with 'proof' in this context.  No one has proved absolutely
that you cannot travel as fast or faster than the speed of light.  What has
been proved is that if you make a certain assumption then this is true.  If I
remember correctly, Einstein assumed that

  The speed of light is constant in a vacuum

This is to say that if the source of light is at rest with respect to us then
the speed of light has a certain value.  If the source of light is travelling
at a high rate of speed with respect to us (100,000 miles per second for
example), the speed of light is the same and it is the same for an observer at
rest with respect to us (for example us) and for an observer traveling with
the source of light.

Einstein then worked out the implications of this ASSUMPTION and one of them
was that funny things happened as you approached the speed of light.  One of
them was that the amount of energy required to accelerate increased rapidly as
one approached the speed of light to the point that to make it the last small
amount of speed increase would require infinite energy.  The logical
interpretation of this is that one could not travel AT the speed of light.

One thing that bothers me a lot is that so many people don't realize the proof
is based on assumptions.  If there is any problem with the assumptions then
the proof is worthless (except as an exercise or demonstration of logic).  In
this case, Einstein made a rather odd assumption about the constancy of the
speed of light in a vacuum.  The only justification that I'm aware of for this
assumption is that the results that depend on it have been verified.  Not only
did this assumption explain the Michaelson-Morley experiments but it made
predictions which no other theory of the time predicted and the predictions
came true.  By the scientific method (which is so rarely taught properly any
more), we have to live with this assumption and its consequences until one of
two things happens.  First, a consequence arises that contradicts experimental
data.  That is, a prediction of the Special Theory of Relativity proves false.
 Second, another theory is proposed on different (or at least modified)
assumptions that satisfactorily explains all the phenomena that Special
Relativity handles and either does so in a more satisfactory manner or
correctly predicts things that Special Relativity doesn't handle.

I have never seen any study (which doesn't mean there isn't one) which
addressed being on the other side of the speed of light.  I can hear the cries
now.  How can you get there if you can't get to the speed of light.

Back when I studied quantum mechanics I was taught some weird stuff and it is
not just theory but is used in electronics every day.  If you have a particle
in a place and state and there is a barrier that the particle cannot overcome
(it would take infinite energy for the particle to exist at the barrier), it
is possible for the particle to get to the otherside by a phenomenon known as
tunnelling.  It only works if the barrier is infinite.  This is what we were
taught and I don't doubt that a lot has happened to the theory and practice of
tunnelling since then.  However, it made me wonder if it were possible to
tunnel through the speed of light.  Get from this side to the other without
every being AT the speed of light.

I am not read in the current state of theorectical physics so it is quite
possible that this has been addressed and dealt with.  However, as it is
presented the only proof offered is that it is impossible (according to
Special Relativity) to get to the speed of light.  Nor, by extension, can one
travel to and throught to get to the other side.  Has anyone ever addressed
what the state of things would be IF you were already on the other side.  Does
it create any problems (other than how did you get there)?  It certainly
causes some problems in Einstein's equations.  However, does that matter.  I
don't know if the equations are appropriate on the other side.  Using
Einstein's equations on objects traveling faster than the speed of light may
be as invalid as applying Newton's related equations on space objects moving
each at 90% the speed of light.  Newton's results would be wrong.  Einstein
could also be wrong if you got beyond the speed of light.  I accept there
application up to and AT the speed of light.  But I ask has anyone shown that
they apply beyond or are we all stuck on this side because we can't imagine
tunnelling thorugh the speed of light.

If I were investing money, I would not invest money in a company that planned
to tunnel through the speed of light until something in the way of a
theoretical basis for doing so was found and some practical results validated
the theory.  However, speculation is fun and maybe someday it will lead
someone to discover something really new.