Calling bullshido on ground fighting teachers.

**Tom Kagan** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 5:46pm

Originally Posted by drummerboy

Tom, you are wrong.
NO information can travel faster than the speed of light.
This is one of the paradoxes that led Einstein to think about the curvature of space.
In reality the disappearance of the sun would cause a ripple in the fabric of space that would start travelling at the speed of light and only AFTER it reached the earth it (the earth) would change its trajectory.

Reading: Elegant Universe by Brian Greene
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/037...books&v=glance

Tomas

There is enough evidence to show that the speed of gravity - if you can quantify it as "speed", it's not, really, hence my qualifier in my previous post - is at least the speed of light. However, Einstein's model is not the only model out there. There are some really really smart folk who say the "speed" of gravity has been measured, but there are just as many really really smart folk who dispute this.

Einstein insisted that "god does not play dice with the universe." What if he did? It's as good a theory as any "spooky action at a distance" that Einstein refused to accept. :smile:

**dramaboy** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 5:47pm

Originally Posted by Locu5

Uhhh, what about the twin-photon experiment?

You mean where you generate a photon pair and send each photon in opposite direction? I'm not clear about that. Isn't it that you can detect only one of them?
The spooky phenomenon?
I think they still move at the speed of light relative to each other.
But that's really over my head.

Tomas

**dramaboy** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 5:50pm

Originally Posted by Tom Kagan

There is enough evidence to show that the speed of gravity - if you can quantify it as "speed", it's not, really, hence my qualifier in my previous post - is at least the speed of light. However, Einstein's model is not the only model out there. There are some really really smart folk who say the "speed" of gravity has been measured, but there are just as many really really smart folk who dispute this.

Einstein insisted that "god does not play dice with the universe." What if he did? It's as good a theory as any "spooky action at a distance" that Einstein refused to accept. :smile:

I don't think the spooky action requires the photons to travel at more that the speed of light relative to each other. But that's a bit too much for me.
Anyway, I think it's pretty clear that gravity does not act instantenously.

Tomas

**Omar** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 5:57pm

Originally Posted by Dreadnought

Gravity acts at lightspeed but that is irrelevant. As for acceleration, do you have proof to show that punches accelerate faster than 9.8m/s^2 on average?

That's easy enough. Drop a steel ball bearing and see if you can punch the ground before the brick lands. I'm pretty sure the negative acceleration cause by the atmoshphere on the ball bearing should be less than your fist as the denstity of most forms of steel is greater than that of most people. Add to that the relative small surface area of the bearing and the high drag created by your clothing. You could try the test naked in order to reduce the impact of this contaminating factor in the experiment but I am pretty sure that even handicapped by your clothes you can beat the ball bearing to the ground.

:smileinbo

**Captain Spaulding** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 6:16pm

He's talking about Bell's Theorem.

If I understand it correctly, it states that any two particles that have been in contact remain correlated in a way that is not explained by information traveling between them (assuming that information cannot travel faster than light).

**Shuma-Gorath** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 6:20pm

Originally Posted by Tom Kagan

If gravity were a propagating force in a fashion similar to a wave (i.e. like light), a relatively simple test would show it moving at a speed at least 20 times the speed of light.

More sophisticated measurements would show it propagating at greater than 2 times 10 to the 10th power faster than the speed of light.

How are you taking these measurements?

**Shuma-Gorath** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 6:24pm

Originally Posted by Omar

That's easy enough. Drop a steel ball bearing and see if you can punch the ground before the brick lands. I'm pretty sure the negative acceleration cause by the atmoshphere on the ball bearing should be less than your fist as the denstity of most forms of steel is greater than that of most people. Add to that the relative small surface area of the bearing and the high drag created by your clothing. You could try the test naked in order to reduce the impact of this contaminating factor in the experiment but I am pretty sure that even handicapped by your clothes you can beat the ball bearing to the ground.

:smileinbo

Not only do you have a brick coming out of nowhere in the experiment setup (probably because you are obtuse and people like to throw bricks at you), but you are neglecting the original purpose of the comparison and also straw-manning to an experiment of an isolated object in (relative) free-fall to one being acclerated in the direction of gravity.

**Tom Kagan** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 7:48pm

Originally Posted by Dreadnought

How are you taking these measurements?

LOL. Okay, ya'got me. Even though the "Your Martial Arts Sucks" is immune from the "bullshido" call, I'll procrastinate further by elaborating. They're relative measurements. I'm just fucking with you because he brought the propagation of gravity in the galaxy into a discussion of the acceleration of gravity on earth. Gravity may be the common factor, but propagation delays at distances measured in astronmical units are irrelevant to the earth's mass affectation on a mass the size of a person at distances where you can throw someone.

You know, when I was a little kid, I remember reading a story about how scientists were "surprised" by the apparent findings that the universe did not rotate about an axis. This realization, in their minds, was an apparent aberation to the then known laws of celestial bodies. I remember immediately thinking "these guys were a bunch of idiots. You can't see rotation unless you have something outside the frame in order to measure it. Don't they know the universe can't do that?" I was maybe 6 years old at the time - wrote a letter to the editor and everything.

Truth be known, the whole sun disappearing trick is actually a straw man argument, too. (So, be careful about calling "straw man" on others :smile:) Basically, what it says is we are going to instantaneously violate umpteen known laws of physics and remove all of the matter comprised of the sun's mass from the known universe without any other causative effect. However, we're going to keep a few convenient laws of physics in place and say the space time "unwarping" will ripple out to a planet still dutifully abiding by a few other laws just to try and explain a point. Unfortunately it doesn't work that way - unless there is a frame of reference outside the universe to observe it. Now, if that external frame of reference does, in fact, exist, then it proves Einstein was wrong in the first place. If that's true, all bets on that pair of dice god is holding are off. :smile:

Stupid trivia: Scientists have figured out how to slow down light to 1 MPH recently. But, what is not as well known is they have been able to speed light up by over 25% for decades over very short distances. Recently, they were able to speed it up by 200% at a distance of over 100 feet (meters? it escapes my stupid trivia memory).

Even stupider trivia: My mom took a job at Princeton just to meet Einstein. Unfortunately, he died in the intervening three weeks it took her to quit her old job and move.

**dramaboy** · Posted On: 1/26/2006 8:12pm

Originally Posted by Tom Kagan

Stupid trivia: Scientists have figured out how to slow down light to 1 MPH recently. But, what is not as well known is they have been able to speed light up by over 25% for decades over very short distances. Recently, they were able to speed it up by 200% at a distance of over 100 feet (meters? it escapes my stupid trivia memory).

Can you get me a ref on that? I'd be interested in readng it.

Originally Posted by Tom Kagan

Even stupider trivia: My mom took a job at Princeton just to meet Einstein. Unfortunately, he died in the intervening three weeks it took her to quit her old job and move.

Could it be that her reputation preceeded her? (by speed not exceeding the speed of light?)
Just kidding, that's a nice story for your kids if you have any.

Now back to the accelerating fists...:)

Tomas