How faster do you age when going at the speed of light?
206 replies, posted
[QUOTE=lazyguy;19452840]But if you have two galaxies moving at 0.8c then the denominator is 1.64c so you end up with a value of slightly less than c and HOLY SHIT!!!
[editline]11:09PM[/editline]
But at CERN they said that the particles in the LHC were going at nearly twice the speed of light :([/QUOTE]
To first: Correct.
To second: They never said this. They maybe said, two counter-propagating beams at nearly the speed of light.
Fifth page. In all likelihood no-one will really read this, but what the hell, it's something I know about.
The phenomenon of aging slower whilst traveling at greater velocities is known as time dilation. Einstein predicted it with his theory of general and special relativity, and it was later proved with a number of experiments, including the Pound-Rebka experiment at Harvard.
Simply put, the faster you move, the more slowly you age (as has been stated). We have no idea why this occurs, but then science answers how, not why.
Another point is that when in a gravity well, such as a planet, you will age more slowly.
[QUOTE=Yahnich;19235161]What I find intriguing is that the time speediness isn't vice versa. Technically, if time goes slower when you go faster, time should go faster when you go slower, ergo, time should blitz past you if you stand completely still, yet this does not happen. Yeah I realize this only happens with extreme speeds, but still, interesting to think about.[/QUOTE]
This has already been answered, but so has the rest of my post. Anyway, yes the planet's hurtling around, both orbiting the Sun and spinning around its own axis. Since we're in a gravity well, we're also aging at a slower rate than we would be in space.
However, in order to fully experiment with your hypothesis, we would need to leave the galaxy entirely, as the gravitational force from all the stars and satellites actually keeps you moving at the speed of the galaxy (however many hundreds of thousand of miles per hour that is). Otherwise, any cosmo and astronauts would have been left behind as soon as they hit orbit. Whoosh, bye bye!
We'd have to fully leave the galaxy's gravity well, make sure we weren't in any others, and then kill our momentum, since there's no air resistance to slow us. It would be very interesting to see what would happen then.
[QUOTE=QwertySecond;19462621]We'd have to fully leave the galaxy's gravity well, make sure we weren't in any others, and then kill our momentum, since there's no air resistance to slow us. It would be very interesting to see what would happen then.[/QUOTE]
That's the point, we can already test this. Right now you're at rest with the chair you're sitting on(assuming you're sitting on one), yet time doesn't fly by for you. There's no difference between measuring the time difference between you and the chair and going outside the galaxy and stopping relative to that. Also, being in a gravity well is irrelevant and wouldn't change the time dilation relative to another object in the same field as you.
This has probably already been said before, but I'll still say it.
Going by Einstein's general theory of relativity (Energy is matter times the speed of light squared), it would take an infinite amount of energy to move anything at the speed of light.
...I have no idea how this works, but I read it in Hawking's book. :downs:
[QUOTE=OLLIE!;19235001]As you go faster and faster, time appears to slow down. If you could go 99.99999% of the speed of light, you would hardly age at all in 100 years.
According to our current understanding of physics (and this is subject to change) you can never move at the speed of light, although with enough power you could approach it very nearly. The faster you go, the more time slows down.[/QUOTE]
So wait, if I fly at sea peg level on the equator counter-rotation of earth ~30.3km/s time would stand still?
[QUOTE=aVoN;19462494]To first: Correct.
To second: They never said this. They maybe said, two counter-propagating beams at nearly the speed of light.[/QUOTE]
No, I went there during a holiday to the French Alps (they have a visitors' centre place that's quite good, as well as a tour of actual science places, but you have to book like six months in advance), and there was definitely a leaflet that said the particles were moving together at nearly twice the speed of light. I can remember asking my dad how that was possible, and he said it was because they were moving towards each other.
[editline]11:36AM[/editline]
So I guess whoever wrote that leaflet messed up.
[QUOTE=3v3ryb0dy;19462848]So wait, if I fly at sea peg level on the equator counter-rotation of earth ~30.3km/s time would stand still?[/QUOTE]
Yes, because the earth doesn't orbit around the sun which doesn't orbit around the center of our galaxy which doesn't orbit around god-knows-what. :downs:
Surely you'd age the same. Just because you're going faster than the light around you is travelling, why does that suggest that time 'speeds up'? What, are you time travelling too when you go faster than sound? Why does everything revolve around light with we humans?
[QUOTE=Darkcoder;19462755]That's the point, we can already test this. Right now you're at rest with the chair you're sitting on(assuming you're sitting on one), yet time doesn't fly by for you. There's no difference between measuring the time difference between you and the chair and going outside the galaxy and stopping relative to that. Also, being in a gravity well is irrelevant and wouldn't change the time dilation relative to another object in the same field as you.[/QUOTE]
If the chair and myself were in the same gravity well, then yes, there would be no time dilation between me and it. However, that was not the scenario I was describing.
Yahnich was asking about having time flash by if there were no time dilation.
In order to achieve this, you would need to be utterly motionless (v=0) and out of a gravity well (Egp=0).
If a space craft falls into a black hole, (and ASSUMING you'd survive long enough), the space craft would last for a second or two, according to the pilot.
According to mission control, it would last for considerably longer, for example a minute (pulling that value out of my arse, I have no idea what it would really be).
I'm in the void, you're on Earth. 1 second for me is 2 seconds for you. Time would not fly by at a terrific speed, but it would pass faster.
We cannot test this, as we're in the galaxy and moving with it. We can only predict it.
[QUOTE=QwertySecond;19465540]Yahnich was asking about having time flash by if there were no time dilation.
In order to achieve this, you would need to be utterly motionless (v=0) and out of a gravity well (Egp=0).[/QUOTE]
The point I was trying to illustrate is that there's no difference between you observing something such as your watch on Earth, or if you were observing it in a spaceship going at .99c relative to Earth, or if you were orbiting a black hole, or if you were outside of the Milky Way or if you removed the rest of the universe; because being utterly motionless and without dilation doesn't make sense in the context you're talking about it.
To make a simpler example, let's say you had a planet that was a perfect sphere and on its surface were 2 identical balls next to each other and there's nothing else in the universe. If the planet isn't rotating, then the gravitational forces on both balls would be identical(well, because of their gravity they'd be pulling into each other by the same amount, so it'd be mirrored). These balls would be at perfect rest with each other; relative to one another they have 0 velocity, and they share the same time dilation. If you then created an engine and added it to the opposite side of the planet and started moving the planet at some speed(relative to the exhaust fume trail left behind), the balls would still remain at perfect rest with one another, and they would still retain identical time dilation.
If at this point you removed the engine and removed the exhaust fumes, the planet and balls would be identical to how they were before you added the engine, there would be no discernible difference. Now, if you removed the planet, the balls would remain identical and still be at rest with one another. Their dilation rates relative to one another would also be the same, if you put the planet back and say... altered the mass of it, varying between whatever density and something close to what's required for it to collapse into a black hole, the balls would still remain the exact same at all times.
This is all because time dilation only exists when you view something that either isn't at rest with you, or it's in a different gravitational field intensity(though I think this is a requirement of being at rest anyway). Thus, my chair for all intents and purposes has 0 velocity relative to me and 0 gravitational difference, now I know this isn't strictly true because my chair is closer to Earth but they're virtually the same, moving away from this galaxy would only lessen the margin of difference between the chair and me, there's nowhere in this universe you can go where 2 separate objects in space are at perfect rest(I'm pretty sure at least).
[edit] better example: if you placed clocks all around the universe, one on Earth, one in the void between galaxies, one orbiting a black hole, one moving away from earth at .99c etc. If you teleported to each one individually, the time for them will increment at the same rate while you're looking at the clock you're next to, but if you visit another you'll see the time is obviously different because of the relative differences, but when you get there, the time will increment at a constant rate until you move somewhere else. Thus the time passing for you on Earth is no different than time passing for you outside of this galaxy. Thus for you, there is no velocity and there is no dilation, that only exists when you're comparing something to something else.
[QUOTE=DimJim;19462792]This has probably already been said before, but I'll still say it.
Going by Einstein's general theory of relativity (Energy is matter times the speed of light squared), it would take an infinite amount of energy to move anything at the speed of light.
...I have no idea how this works, but I read it in Hawking's book. :downs:[/QUOTE]
Actually, it's special relativity and E = mc² is nothing todo with timedilletation. E = mc² is the energy out of a particle [b]at rest[/b]. A moving particle has the energy [img]http://math.daggeringcats.com/?E = \frac{mc^2}{1 - (v/c)^2}[/img]. The reason is the gamma-factor, resulting from Lorentz-Transformation ([img]http://math.daggeringcats.com/?\gamma = \frac{1}{1 - (v/c)^2}[/img]. This factors simply comes from the postulate that physics has to work the same for everyone in every frame of reference so they measure the speed of light the same, no matter in what frame of reference).
[editline]07:20PM[/editline]
[QUOTE=lazyguy;19463022]No, I went there during a holiday to the French Alps (they have a visitors' centre place that's quite good, as well as a tour of actual science places, but you have to book like six months in advance), and there was definitely a leaflet that said the particles were moving together at nearly twice the speed of light. I can remember asking my dad how that was possible, and he said it was because they were moving towards each other.
[editline]11:36AM[/editline]
[U]So I guess whoever wrote that leaflet messed up[/U].[/QUOTE]
I underlined that part which is important :)
Wouldn't you just die, since a light year is like 1,000,000 times faster.
[QUOTE=laughaholic;19468242]Wouldn't you just die, since a light year is like 1,000,000 times faster.[/QUOTE]
light year is a unit of distance measurement
[QUOTE=prospekt_au;19463473]Surely you'd age the same. Just because you're going faster than the light around you is travelling, why does that suggest that time 'speeds up'? What, are you time travelling too when you go faster than sound? Why does everything revolve around light with we humans?[/QUOTE]
The speed of light is constant in all reference frames. To account for this when you're traveling next to a light beam your mind must slow down so that the beam appears to still be traveling at the same speed faster than you as if you weren't moving. This sounds strange but it's been proven repeatedly by experiment.
[QUOTE=Darkcoder;19467311]Well written, literate post[/QUOTE]
Ah, I see what's happened. I think you misread my earlier statement. You're right, on all counts.
What I said was that being motionless in the void would result in time passing faster for you. I should have included [i]relative to an observer[/i].
You're absolutely correct saying that for you, no matter where you are, time passes the same in your perception. However, I was arguing from a third party's perspective, which I didn't state. I assumed everyone would think the same way.
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