Astronomy: many "neutron stars" aren't made of neutrons.....

[Dogbert]

Very hipothetical question:

Is it possible to assume for a second that with the movement of Earth, the solar system and our galaxy, we're actually constantly moving around the universe at a speed close to the speed of light ?

Now, if it is, let's assume we can "anchor" someone or something to a particular spot in the universe. According to the first assumption, it'll appear to us that this thing is moving almost in the speed of light (?).

Now, since our perspective is somewhat distorted since by moving around the universe, how would we perceive that "anchored" thing ?


Even worse, what if we find out that by summing up all the movements (planet, solar system and galaxy) in the universe we realise that our absolute movement is in variable speed measuring from 0 to almost the speed of light ? In this case an "anchored" object would seem to accelerate (kind of phase out) and deccelerate back till it's in synch with us.

Wait a tick, Bazell, if I travel back to 1969 and I was frozen in 1967, presumably, I could go visit my frozen self, but, if I’m still frozen in 1967 how could I have been unthawed in the Nineties and travel back to, oh no I’ve gone cross-eyed.
I suggest you don’t worry about that sort of thing, and just enjoy yourself. That goes for you all, too.

[Technoid]

Here comes the fun part:

We do the same with a ship:

Astonout Joe is send out with the ultra super duper FAL(Fast as Light) ship to retrieve the mirror.

He travels the same path as the ray at the same speed (To ease things he is able to "scope" the mirror up without loosing speed).

1. how old will his twin Jack be when he is home again? (he is 20 at the start of the voyage)

2. How old is joe?

3.Remeber that Joe's speed was constant.

4.Elaborate on why!

Chew on this!

[Dr Mordrid]

1. We always "make" gravity in a space ship. It's an intrinsic property of the interaction between spacetime, the ship and its occupants. The question of using it for propulsion is a matter of control.

2. Sure. This is no different than using signalling mirrors on Earth.

Dr. Mordrid

[Technoid]

Note that I have made these "questions" to point out some inconsistencies with time dilation and to rattle the minds of the readers!

[cjolley]

Joe, having used up his brother, and all the other matter in the universe, as fuel to accelerate a massive object to the speed of light, is not conserned about the age of his brother anymore.

chuck

[MadScot]

Originally posted by Dogbert
Very hipothetical question:

Is it possible to assume for a second that with the movement of Earth, the solar system and our galaxy, we're actually constantly moving around the universe at a speed close to the speed of light ?

Sure, but we are in an inertial frame of reference. It really doesnt matter if everything is moving together at any speed, because choice of reference point is arbitrary. It all works out the same in the end.

It is interesting to notice that the speed of light in a vaccume is constant for every observer. If I am moving toward a distant star at high speed and you are moving away from the star at a very high speed, we both see the light from the star as moving at the same speed by us, even if the difference in our speeds is greater than the speed of light! The difference we would see would be the red-shift (for you) and the blue-shift (for me) created by the Doppler effect. The speed of light is an observational property, not an absolute one.

MadScot

[Technoid]

Originally posted by cjolley
Joe, having used up his brother, and all the other matter in the universe, as fuel to accelerate a massive object to the speed of light, is not conserned about the age of his brother anymore.

chuck

Really funny!

And a great way to avoid the question:

Technicalities!

[cjolley]

Originally posted by Technoid
....Technicalities!

That's the point of course.
It's not the age of the FTL ship that is a paradox, it is the ship it's self.
chuck

[Technoid]

Imagine this:

You light a match.

On the match head life emerges made of fire.

And in time a civilisation emerges.

Develops science and start to map out the universe (from their viewpoint: the burning match head).

Then they ask themselves: Is there something beyond our universe?

They actively try to probe and outside the fire but their sensors and instruments just present paradoxes singularities and other impossibilities.

They conclude that nothing exists outside the fire and that life is impossible there…

The match burns out…

Q. Why did they never “see” us?
A. Their sense of the laws of physics worked was “incompatible” with “our” laws of physics.

Does the above example seem familiar?

[BuddMan]

You're moving a little beyond the science and getting into existance theories. That's a whole other field. It's like saying can something 2-Dimensional precieve something that is 3-Dimensional?

And then we could go even further to say that we as 3-Dimensional creatures will never be able to touch/become/create 2-Dimensional objects, but we understand what it is. Now why is that??

P.S. I know why you put in that analogy. I just had to go off on a limb here though.

[cjolley]

1, We can only see things from our perspective.
2, We will never know how things "realy" work.
3, What is reality?

Reminds me of when I lived in the dorms at school

chuck

[KRSESQ]

Greebe!!! Found your answer!!!

>>>What was that element they discovered not to many years ago... 113 ? (something like that)

by accident two Westinghouse Engineers were testing a new 'tube'. Once energized as they discovered later with aid of a ultra high speed lab camera the field produced allowed this element to exist in it's normal state (size) within the crt of a computer used for monitoring (closest to it). The elements size was larger than the interior of the crt and thus exploded (not implode) once the vacuum was released the element went back to it's bonded size. <<<<

From the April, 1996 issue of Discover Magazine:

Albert Manque', of the Centre de l'Etude des Choses Assez Miniscules in Paris and a colleague "have discovered an extraordinary new fundamental particle. Although the particle exists for just millionths of a second, it is the size of a bowling ball.

Manque' and his colleague Jean-Xavier Zweistein call the new particle a Bigon...Their main research consists of building better vacuum tubes to replace microchips. "We are the only physicists working on that, more or less," says Manque'...They were running a large current through one of their tubes when the moniter of a nearby desktop computer exploded.

...The physicists set up a video camera and repeated the experiment with the same results. In one of the video frames a black bowling-ball-size object hovered above the wreckage of the computer. In the next frame it is gone...

"Bigons could be responsible for ball lightening, migraines, the unexplained failure of equipment and souffles, spontaneous human combustion--I don't know, maybe earthquakes even...An archeologist colleague here at the center believes a bigon may also have brought down the walls of Jericho. You know that story, too, has never been explained to our satisfaction."

Straight from the horse's mouth, so to speak.

Kevin

[cjolley]

Sounds like it came from the other end of the horse to me
chuck

[Dr Mordrid]

Note: April 1996

http://www.discover.com/science_news/fool/fool96.html

Dr. Mordrid

[RedRed]

DOH!

OI, Dr M.....
Matrox RT.X100
What be that, then???????


Regards
RedRed