Forums » Off-Topic
A better question:
<insert drum roll here>
... the speed of dark?
<insert drum roll here>
... the speed of dark?
I thought we covered this?
Lets first agree that "dark" refers to the absence of light in an area. We'll say visible light just to keep it simple. Light can be measured because photons can be emitted from a specific point and their speed measured. Darkness as defined above cannot be measured because it has no specific point of emmanation. Lets put a light source in a closed room (and let's agree that the room is totally empty, no air or any of that funny business). The dark now is defined by the walls, so we have some sort of boundary. Now we switch on the light. The light is emitted and strikes the walls. Of course, dark cannot be emitted, so this is just folly and conjecture anyway, but you did ask. If we measure the speed of darkness from the light source to the wall, we could make a case for -299,792,458 meters per second as the darkness is actually receeding rather than emmanating. We could also measure from the wall to the light source as the light is switched off. Here we have to use a light source that immediately stops producing light when it's turned off. Since photons don't recede, we're just measuring the wait for the last photon to leave the light source to give up. We pretty much have to measure along the line from the spot the photon impacted the wall to the light source. Here it's just a wait of 299,792,458 meters per second divided by the distance the photon had to cover to hit the wall. If darkness were matter, it would be compressed along that line. Lets say the room is 299.792,458 meters long (pulling a figure out of the air, and yes I am mathematically lazy), then it would take 1 second for darkness to cover the space from the wall to the light source. Hey! The speed of light! If we decide to measure the speed of darkness from the moment that the last photon snuffs out anywhere in the room, then darkness is instantaneous. FASTER than light, which would be a problem if darkness were matter. In an undefined area, light would pass through the patch of darkness and on it's way, again "followed" by darkness at the speed of light.
It appears to me that any time you try to measure the speed of the absence of a wave (assuming such a thing can be measured), you end up with the speed of the wave: What is the speed of silence? It's the speed of sound. What is the speed of a vacuum? Depends on whether it's on shag carpet or...no, no it depends on the speed of the material that would fill the void once the seal is broken. Air would move quite quickly, jelly would be slower....okay I'm digressing here. Are we done? I keep revising this. It's been interesting, but probably only to me.
Lets first agree that "dark" refers to the absence of light in an area. We'll say visible light just to keep it simple. Light can be measured because photons can be emitted from a specific point and their speed measured. Darkness as defined above cannot be measured because it has no specific point of emmanation. Lets put a light source in a closed room (and let's agree that the room is totally empty, no air or any of that funny business). The dark now is defined by the walls, so we have some sort of boundary. Now we switch on the light. The light is emitted and strikes the walls. Of course, dark cannot be emitted, so this is just folly and conjecture anyway, but you did ask. If we measure the speed of darkness from the light source to the wall, we could make a case for -299,792,458 meters per second as the darkness is actually receeding rather than emmanating. We could also measure from the wall to the light source as the light is switched off. Here we have to use a light source that immediately stops producing light when it's turned off. Since photons don't recede, we're just measuring the wait for the last photon to leave the light source to give up. We pretty much have to measure along the line from the spot the photon impacted the wall to the light source. Here it's just a wait of 299,792,458 meters per second divided by the distance the photon had to cover to hit the wall. If darkness were matter, it would be compressed along that line. Lets say the room is 299.792,458 meters long (pulling a figure out of the air, and yes I am mathematically lazy), then it would take 1 second for darkness to cover the space from the wall to the light source. Hey! The speed of light! If we decide to measure the speed of darkness from the moment that the last photon snuffs out anywhere in the room, then darkness is instantaneous. FASTER than light, which would be a problem if darkness were matter. In an undefined area, light would pass through the patch of darkness and on it's way, again "followed" by darkness at the speed of light.
It appears to me that any time you try to measure the speed of the absence of a wave (assuming such a thing can be measured), you end up with the speed of the wave: What is the speed of silence? It's the speed of sound. What is the speed of a vacuum? Depends on whether it's on shag carpet or...no, no it depends on the speed of the material that would fill the void once the seal is broken. Air would move quite quickly, jelly would be slower....okay I'm digressing here. Are we done? I keep revising this. It's been interesting, but probably only to me.
WE LOVE YOU
Forum Moderator
=D
Forum Moderator
=D
Wait, you work at a hospital? Why do you need to know this stuff theen?
Know? The only fact I cited is the speed of light in meters(which I looked up). The rest is mostly blathering. Somebody will be along to torpedo my reasoning shortly. Critical thinking is important in any line of work, as is being well-rounded.
hm.
FM, i needed to divide your post into paragraphs to be able to answer :)
by ways of pure logic, we would have to prove that darkness is matter, because we cannot measure the absence of something (i thought a bit about this).
the reasons for this are obvious:
to measure something, we have to be able to measure the thing itself, that is, it must be "visible", not by the naked eye, but by any tool we can use to detect "it", its location or speed, change of mass (if it has matter character), w/e.
right now, all our measuring technology is based upon the presence of matter or light (any light we know to exist, i guess, thin ice here).
as FM said, we'd always end up with the readings from what we _can_ see/detect, but not of the thing we actually wanted to measure, thus we can say it is probably the same, but we are not sure.
and when talking about pure logic, we have to be sure.
hm.. there's a error in here somewhere. i can't put my finger on it, i guess it's the problem that we cannot be sure about anything...
FM, i needed to divide your post into paragraphs to be able to answer :)
by ways of pure logic, we would have to prove that darkness is matter, because we cannot measure the absence of something (i thought a bit about this).
the reasons for this are obvious:
to measure something, we have to be able to measure the thing itself, that is, it must be "visible", not by the naked eye, but by any tool we can use to detect "it", its location or speed, change of mass (if it has matter character), w/e.
right now, all our measuring technology is based upon the presence of matter or light (any light we know to exist, i guess, thin ice here).
as FM said, we'd always end up with the readings from what we _can_ see/detect, but not of the thing we actually wanted to measure, thus we can say it is probably the same, but we are not sure.
and when talking about pure logic, we have to be sure.
hm.. there's a error in here somewhere. i can't put my finger on it, i guess it's the problem that we cannot be sure about anything...