Skip to content

Important Message

You are browsing the archived Lancers Reactor forums. You cannot register or login.
The content may be outdated and links may not be functional.


To get the latest in Freelancer news, mods, modding and downloads, go to
The-Starport

Physics help

This is where you can discuss your homework, family, just about anything, make strange sounds and otherwise discuss things which are really not related to the Lancer-series. Yes that means you can discuss other games.

Post a reply

Warlord Bob

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 1:32 pm

Physics help

I need help on my physics homework, well not really. But it makes a great excuse for yet another faster than light style thread. I just read a chapter on special relativity and while there are a few things I don't get (like why doesn't the twin on earth get younger?) but one revalation is that time stops at lightspeed from our frame of reference. This means that nobody on board could ever return to our space-time because they would have to tell the ship to decelerate, which takes time. What's more, the acceleration would be infinitely "slower" so you could never decelerate or accelerate. Could you?

Argh! My mind is so full of thoughts. I must get them all sorted out before they fade...

If you were traveling at relativistic speeds, you would eventualy apear (to you) to be traveling at lightyears per year/hour/second. That's pretty darn fast. To return to the same timeframe as the rest of our universe you would have to start decelerating waaay before your destination, which is ok because you would have planned for such things.

Ok, the twin thing. One twin on earth, one in a ship. The one in the ship is traveling at 99.5c (c=speed of light) for one ship year. Why, since from the ships point of view Earth was traveling at 99.5c for one ship year, is the twin on earth now biologicly 9 years older?! Who is to say which is the ship, ship or earth? Relativly to each other they both behave identicly. Does it have somthing to do with changing between frames of reference or space-times?

Tutor coming in 3 hours. He'll make everything ok...

EDIT; There. Better?

Edited by - Warlord Bob on 2/5/2004 1:45:15 PM

Griffon_26

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 1:37 pm

make that last twin part a bit clearer, I think you structured it....wrong

Esquilax

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 3:11 pm

Read "The Universe in a Nutshell" by Stephen Hawking. He tackles those very issues. It's a good book too, I'd answer your questions, but I'm a bit rusty. I think it has to do with the relativistic curve of space-time...

Fear Factor

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 3:28 pm

A twin. 25 years old. One of them becomes an astronaut and travels for 1 year at the (nearly) speed of light. After one year, he's 26 years old. His twin brother, however, is 75. That's the theory. It's been a while, and I'm no expert, and I just read that somewhere.

Warlord Bob

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 3:45 pm

And it's true too! My problem is, why is it true rather than the reverse?

The relativistic effects of speed as you aproach the speed of light make a nice (prepare for bad spelling) aspmtote. 99.5(%)c and 99.6c would be very different where as 1(%), 5, 20c are much the same.

I shall keep an eye out for that book when I get the one I need for school (see what's that your reading thread)

EDIT: Problem solved! It's because the speed of light is constant for ALL frames of reference. A givin light beam for the twin in the ship would apear to move at the speed of light, but it wouldn't be, since "c" is constant! So time is in fact slower for the twin in the moving space ship

Edited by - Warlord Bob on 2/5/2004 5:59:17 PM

Arania

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 10:45 pm

Problem solved! It's because the speed of light is constant for ALL frames of reference. A givin light beam for the twin in the ship would apear to move at the speed of light, but it wouldn't be, since "c" is constant! So time is in fact slower for the twin in the moving space ship


I dont mean to brag, but i discovered that at age thirteen.

BlazeME

Post Thu Feb 05, 2004 11:34 pm

I'm so confused.


BlazeME: Flameus Muchus n00bus

Help me on Outwar.com

The Ninja

Post Fri Feb 06, 2004 1:41 am

and yes, this would all be physically impossible. anyway, bob, what year physics is this you're doing? just out of curiosity. cos im in Yr 12 (final year here in aus) and i havent done reletivity yet.

jake

-------------------------
at the end of the day, the kings and pawns bo back in the same box.

kimk

Post Fri Feb 06, 2004 5:38 am

i'm sure all thsi can be logically re-written. someone should do it.

Sh|ft

Post Fri Feb 06, 2004 12:35 pm

I'll try to make this as simple as possible.

The faster you go, the slower you age. Your perception of time is slowed down with your aging.

The person on Earth isn't going very fast, so s/he ages normally.

When you return to Earth after going so fast, you will find that you are younger than your twin, because you aged more slowly while travelling at high speeds in space.

Griffon_26

Post Fri Feb 06, 2004 1:25 pm

we are all travelling through 4 dimentions at the speed of light....time, and 3 space dimentions. When we begin moving, we divert some of our time motion to space movement motion, and thus time goes slower. Light, has diverted ALL of its time motion to movement through space, and thus does not age, it doesn't travel through time at all.

Warlord Bob

Post Sat Feb 07, 2004 9:00 am

@Jake - Not easy, but indeed possible since we don't reach the speed of light in these musings . (If we did, we could NEVER decelerate! Think on that...) The way everyone (except us) uses "year X" confuses me. I think year 12 corresponds to 11th grade but I'm not shure... I know! I'm 16, 17 in March. How old are you?

@Kimk - Yes it can! Behold my textbook

@ShiftViper - True, but this whole thread is about this...
All motion is relative. ALL. So who's to say that the earthbound twin is the one moving slowly? I'll tell you who! Einstien! Fortunately, no matter what you do, light moves at the same speed. Strange little thing that, but true. If you were moving at nearly light speed, right beside a light beam, it would STILL be going at "c" or the speed of light... relative to everyone outside your ship (like folks on earth) AND relative to you! That's the great part! Since "c" is constant for all frames of refference it mandates that time be slower for you, that a second takes longer, and so light apears to be still going the same speed. This means btw that you would see the universe going by out the window at many times the speed of light, since time is slowed down (alot by this point) and you are moving so fast.

I love figuring stuff out

Edited by - Warlord Bob on 2/7/2004 9:01:21 AM

Return to Off Topic




Hosted by The Starport • Theme by ST Software