Speed Limit

In a previous blog, I posited that the “speed of light” should really be called the “limit of speed” (speed limit). This is partly because light’s speed is extremely variable … scientists have recently been able to slow light down significantly … and because all other electromagnetic waves in a vacuum (and even the edge of the expanding universe) travel at close to this same maximal speed. Einstein has postulated that, at the absolute limit of speed (speed of light in a total vacuum), three rather strange things occur:

1) Time slows down to zero
2) Distance (along the speed vector) contracts to zero
3) Mass increases to infinity

Fortunately, the curve of approach to these events is very, very, very asymptotic to the limit of speed. For instance, at 10% of the limit of speed, there is almost no measurable time-slowing effect whereas at 99.99999999% the limit of speed, the length of second there is 19.6 hours on Earth (not infinity). It also seems to me, that the true limit of speed may never be fully achieved … because the above events can be also quite onerous. (Even the ether of space is not an absolute vacuum.) For example, if photons have even miniscule mass, then light achieving its absolute upper limit would have its photons more massive than a black hole. Also, if light from galaxies at the edge of space were traveling at the full limit of speed, then leaving there 13 billion years ago (in our time), it would have traveled no distance in no time (in its frame of reference … see my previous blog, “Perpetual Motion”). Thus, it would suffer no attenuation of its brightness, nor any attenuation from the trillions of other galaxies populating our universe, suggesting that our resulting night sky might be as bright as our day sky.

The following observations spring from what Einstein has postulated:

- Why is the limit of speed 186,000 miles per second? This is the real question of our age. I currently have no idea why this is so but I do believe that it might spring from the relationship between zero and infinity (notice the occurrence of these numbers in Einstein’s postulates). And this in turn depends on the mathematics of these numbers. For instance math currently recognizes that any positive number divided by infinity is zero … and any positive number divided by zero is infinity. However, math currently also says that zero divided by zero is zero. I disagree. I think it is one. And math currently also says that infinity divided by infinity is infinity. I also disagree. I think it is also one. (The reasons for these two conclusions of mine spring from limit theory.) Note that, at the limit of speed, speed is defined by zero distance divided by zero time, which, according to my mathematics, is unity. (Also, note that atomic physicists normalize all their cyclotron and linear accelerator calculations so that the speed of light becomes unity.)

- The edge of the universe is said to be expanding at the limit of speed. If one looks at one edge of the universe relative to its opposite then its total speed would far exceeds the limit of speed. Therefore speed must be relative to its point of origin.

- If speed is relative to its point of origin … not to the speed of other objects. So is speed really a vector not a scalar?

- I also wonder what effect do things traveling at or near the limit of speed not in a straight line but in a (tight) circle have on time slowing down?

- Time slows down with increasing speed. This implies that time itself has a rate of forward progress … or speed. And, since speed is a distance divided by time calculation, we have on our hands a profound paradox.

- If, at near the limit of speed, distance contracts, then why do elemental particles, when accelerated to a very high percentage of the limit of speed, get longer?

- (Somewhat related observation) Can photons in the electromagnetic spectrum outside of the visible light spectrum (such as infrared) cause photosynthesis in plants or other primitive life forms?

- Things that might travel at the limit of speed (light rays in a perfect vacuum for instance) appear to have infinite acceleration at time zero (at the instant of creation) and zero acceleration thereafter.

- Another approach to enumerating the speculated ten dimensions (see initial blog) of our existence might be:

1st dimension = distance (d)
2nd dimension = plane (d^2)
3 dimension = space (d^3)
4th dimension = time (t)
5th dimension = speed (d/t)
6th dimension = acceleration (d/t^2) (Is this then a proxy for gravity? – which on Earth is 32 feet per second per second).
7th dimension = dispersion (d^2/t)
8th dimension = dosage (d^3/t)
9th dimension = planar time (t^2)
10th dimension = spatial time (t^3)