this post was submitted on 08 Aug 2024
898 points (98.5% liked)

Science Memes

16713 readers
1245 users here now

Welcome to c/science_memes @ Mander.xyz!

A place for majestic STEMLORD peacocking, as well as memes about the realities of working in a lab.



Rules

  1. Don't throw mud. Behave like an intellectual and remember the human.
  2. Keep it rooted (on topic).
  3. No spam.
  4. Infographics welcome, get schooled.

This is a science community. We use the Dawkins definition of meme.



Research Committee

Other Mander Communities

Science and Research

Biology and Life Sciences

Physical Sciences

Humanities and Social Sciences

Practical and Applied Sciences

Memes

Miscellaneous

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] synapse1278@lemmy.world 78 points 1 year ago (18 children)

If I understand that right, gravity also moves in space at the speed of light, therefore Earth will keep on orbiting for 8min around nothing?

[–] vithigar@lemmy.ca 63 points 1 year ago* (last edited 1 year ago) (13 children)

Kind of. The concept of simultaneity breaks down at distances where the speed of light matters. If we base it on what we currently observe and call "now" on the Sun the eight minute old state we currently observe then what does "now" on earth look like from the point of view of the Sun at that same moment? You can't reconcile a single "now" for observers in both locations.

An alternative take which is also consistent with observable physics is that the speed of light is infinite but it's causality itself that propagates at c.

Thinking in those terms also makes a number of relativistic effects more intuitive. You need infinite energy to reach the speed of light simply because it's infinitely fast. Time dilates when moving because you're encountering approaching causality earlier than you otherwise would have. Time "stops" for anything traveling at the speed of light because at infinite speed it just experiences literally everything in its line of travel at once and the concept of "after" becomes meaningless, encountering all future oncoming causality in a single instant.

This was a bit of a tangent but it's something that has fascinated me for a long time.

[–] curiousaur@reddthat.com 2 points 1 year ago (2 children)

Information can only travel at the speed of light.

[–] tetris11@lemmy.ml 4 points 1 year ago (1 children)

Yes, but bad news travels much faster, and the sun disappearing would be very bad news to at least some people.

[–] insufferableninja@lemdro.id 1 points 1 year ago

bad gas travels fast in a small town

load more comments (10 replies)
load more comments (14 replies)