Is Light the Ultimate Barrier to Understanding Black Holes and Gravity?

[marlon]

Photons are not like tiny rockets speeding to catch up to c. They go as fast as the universe allows.

Huh ? When did i say that photons needed to be accelerated ? Or when did i claim they were tiny rockets ?

So, look at it this way. Objects in the universe move at c - unless they have mass, which causes them to slow down (presumably via interaction with the Higgs field).

I said photons travel at c because they have zero (rest)mass. There is nothing wrong with saying that. Point final. Also, i don't agree with what you say above. Because you seem to imply that two objects with equal mass would always travel with the same speed. Why ?

Finally, what does this have to do with my original question to Pervect ?

greets
marlon

 

[DaveC426913]

Huh ? When did i say that photons needed to be accelerated ? Or when did i claim they were tiny rockets ?

I may have underestimated your knowledge of the subject, and was attempting to address what I thought was a misunderstanding on your part. I confess I went a little too far into analogy.

If c had a different value, how does light still travel at c then ?

This statement seemed to imply that if c changed, light would not, as if light had its own preferred speed, independent of c.

I concede the conversation to those more directly involved in it.

 

[Chris Hillman]

Hi all,

This thread has gotten rather confused. Way back at the initial post

If nothing can travel faster than the speed of light, then how do black holes "exist" in our dimension? There's theories on the graviton right? Then shouldn't the graviton be traveling faster than the speed of light if it's strong enough to make light break it's own barrier?

I noticed that the problem is the same misconception discussed in http://www.math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/BlackHoles/black_gravity.html and "How does gravity escape from a black hole?" at http://www.math.ucr.edu/home/baez/RelWWW/group.html , but assumed others would point this out, so I didn't speak up. Maybe that was a mistake...

MajorComplex, does reading the above cited FAQ entry or my own archived sci.physics.relativity post on the same topic help?