Re: Crap physics

Joe E. Dees (jdees0@students.uwf.edu)
Wed, 3 Jun 1998 22:56:25 +0000


> Date: Thu, 04 Jun 1998 12:31:05 +0000
> From: Damien Broderick <damien@ariel.ucs.unimelb.edu.au>
> Subject: Re: Crap physics
> To: extropians@extropy.com
> Reply-to: extropians@extropy.com

> At 10:05 PM 6/3/98 BST-1, Tony Hollick wrote:
>
>
> >>> the red photons MUST travel
> >>> at 2c relative to the blue photons.
>
> >> No, this is not true. They travel at the same speed, with different
> wavelengths.
>
> > You completely miss the point. [...]
> > Northbound blue passes southbound blue at 2c.
> > [...] The situational logic is unbreakable.
>
> Tony, really, this is village idiot level.
>
> a + b
> _________
>
> ab
> 1 + ____
> c^2
>
> When a and b are c, the combined velocities are c.
>
> Another way to look at it is to say that the photons experience no elapsed
> time from emission to absorption, hence the distance they cross is
> effectively zero.
>
> Is this so hard to grasp?
>
> Damien Broderick
>
From what I understand, higher frequency light travels a longer
path than lower frequency light due to the necessity of bouncing from
center to circumference and back more times per distance (shorter
wavelength = more waves per distance). If you could pull the 3-d
sine curves out into a straight line, the distance traversed per time
unit would be the same; however, taking the curved distance involved
in wave travel into account, higher frequencies will travel a bit
slower.
Joe Dees