posted
1) What happens if you're on an interstellar voyager, travelling at the speed of light, and you turn on the headlamps?
2) If olive oil is made of olives, and soy oil is made of soy, what's Johnson & Johnson's Baby Oil made of?
3) What were to happen if there were no hypothetical questions?
4) If the other queue is always shorter, what happens when you step out of line?
5) If you know they know you know they know, and they know you know they know, and even if you know they know - what happens if you don't know?
6) The bread's chance of falling on the butterside may be proportoinal to the price of the carpet, but what happens if it's a dancefloor?
7) Since cats always fall on their legs, what happens if you spread butter on a cat's back and drop it on the expensive carpet?
8) What's the real value of x?
9) How many lawyers, Russians, Americans, Jewish mothers, phychos, prostitutes and German soldiers does it really take to change a lightbulb, and what about combinations? Where do electricians fit in?
[Except for (2) and (7), all were mine. Add your own!]
[ April 14, 2005, 03:41 PM: Message edited by: Jonathan Howard ]
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I know we're not supposed to answer them but I think I can answer the first one, and since I'm not a science-person I'm rather proud of myself so I'm going to give it a shot.
Since the speed of light is always constant, the light will not travel any faster, as it would if you threw a ball from where you were flying, for example. Therefore, the lamp would appear dark to you.
quote: Since the speed of light is always constant, the light will not travel any faster, as it would if you threw a ball from where you were flying, for example. Therefore, the lamp would appear dark to you.
Actually, the speed of light is constant for all observers, moving or not. So to you, the lamp would appear normal. This is, of course, assuming you somehow managed to overcome the physical impossibility of moving at the speed of light.
Posts: 2149 | Registered: Aug 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
The speed of light cannot equal itself and 0 at the same time. Yes, I saw Einstein's formula, and it simply is impossible.
Say you were on a train, moving at 120 KpH. You then walf to the carriage's front at 5 KpH. The observer wouldn't see you at 125 KpH but at 120 KpH. A kilometre at different speeds is a different legth, and a second is also subjective to movement. But how can the "v" of "c" change? I never quite got the reason. Why, if one galaxy moves at [what in Hebrew is called] Azimut 0 at 80% the speed of light, and another in Azimul 180 (opposite direction) at 80% of the speed of light, they move relative to each other at a speed under 100% of c?!
How come? Physics drives me nuts! 120 + 5 isn't 125, terms change according to others, the universe was formed from a singularity and now c is the maximum, except it's slowing down itself!
posted
Wait, maybe c is a constant regardless of distance and time? In other words, is "c" "v"less because it's not dependant on any of the x,y,z,t dimensions?
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
| IP: Logged |
quote: But if you're behind the lamp you would see the light.
By saying this you're saying that the light from the lamp is traveling slower than the speed of light, which can't happen. My personal belief is that you would see everything in front of you that is sending it's electrons backward. But as soon as you turn around, everything behind you is a pitch black void.
Posts: 1660 | Registered: Jan 2000
| IP: Logged |
posted
I believe that light's view works in a variation on Newton's third law: whatever condition causes us to see light at a different way, a reverse situation also exists to even it out. So it isn't really dependant on time, we are.
And the back of my neck burns at the pain of light, or "p". Sunburns...
quote: 7) Since cats always fall on their legs, what happens if you spread butter on a cat's back and drop it on the expensive carpet?
The cat walks away, licks off the butter, gets sick, and comes back to the carpet to throw it up. Then you are beaten within an inch of your life by the owner of the carpet.
Posts: 21182 | Registered: Sep 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
Because I didn't get what KoM has to do with this.
Alcon, don't you use the word train on Raia, I'm warning you. Not even as a joke. She might get humiliated.
Posts: 2978 | Registered: Oct 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
I do like physics, as demonstrated by my first post on this thread. I'm also hopeless at it, also as demonstrated by my first post.
Posts: 8473 | Registered: Apr 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
According to his schedule that he posted on some other thread he’s at school during the day working on his doctorate in physics and can’t post but can read. So I’m sure he’s been reading and has his post all typed up and ready to go. I guess you could say that KoM is the Hatrack Physics expert.
Posts: 2845 | Registered: Oct 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I happen to think that since both you and the lamp are travelling in the same frame, light from the lamp will indeed reach you, because light is emitted in all directions, not just in the direction of travel. The time it would take for light to appear would be the speed of light divided by the displacement between your eyes and the lamp. Maybe Posts: 2756 | Registered: Jul 2002
| IP: Logged |
posted
Jon Boy, Hawaii has interstate freeways because the construction of those freeways was paid for with money from the interstate system.
JH, I'm not sure anyone knows exactly why the speed of light is constant for any frame of reference, it just is. Einstein, in his theory of special relativity, takes it as axiomatic that the speed of light is constant. He does this based on experimental evidence in Maxwell's work with electromagnetism. But anyway, if one were travelling arbitrarily close to the speed of light relative to the rest frame of an observer on Earth, and then turned on headlights, the traveller would see the light moving away from him at the speed of light.
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Look, you can't travel at exactly lightspeed, OK? And if you did, we have absolutely no idea what would happen, the equations break down. So let me assume that 99.99999% of lightspeed was actually meant.
As Miro pointed out, to you the light would look quite normal, at least inside your spaceship. When reflected off objects ahead of you, however, it would get strongly blueshifted - as far as you're concerned, it's those objects that are travelling at near c. For speeds sufficiently close to light, you could use an ordinary flashlight as a tanning lamp, or even an X-ray generator.
For an outside observer, the light would appear strongly blueshifted (if he was ahead of you) or redshifted (if behind).
Posts: 10645 | Registered: Jul 2004
| IP: Logged |
posted
First, you couldn't go the speed of light, you'd use up all the energy in the universe just to accelerate you close (but never reaching [quantum effects ignored]) to the speed of light. So for the sake of argument, lets say you are going some appreciable percentage of the speed of light (say 99.99%).
The speed of light, in a vacuum, is constant in all frames of reference (it equals c). Therefore the lamps would light up exactly like when you drive down the street at 50km/h. To compensate, any observer not in your frame of reference (not acclerating/moving in the same direction/speed) would see the light also moving at c, but you would be literally elongated (or shrunk, I always forget which). In return, you viewing the observer observing you would notice that they were aging faster (or slower, once again I forget which).
The speed of light (in a vacuum) never changes, it's everything looking at it that changes.
posted
saxon, I dunno, he just looked at me funny, so I got mad, and yeah, maybe I pushed him down, but really, did he have to bite my little toe off??
I guess you could say our difference is irreconcileable (sp).
posted
Have you guys been asked this question before by someone who was just making up the answer or something?
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
Maybe this is a regional thing. Because I've heard the same answer from people from at least two different regions of California, plus Virginia and Arizona. And it's not the one you know.
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
How many of you are taking your questions from Gallagher?
"Then you drive in a parkway and park in a driveway. Cargo goes by ship. Shipment goes by truck. You have a pair of panties, but just one bra."
Posts: 4534 | Registered: Jan 2003
| IP: Logged |
posted
I heard the first one about ten years ago from a friend at swim team. I have no idea where she got it, but I imagine it's been around for a while. The second one was, I think, a "Confused Philosopher" question on an Air Farce sketch.
Posts: 2849 | Registered: Feb 2002
| IP: Logged |
Printer-friendly view of this topic
![[Confused]](confused.gif)
![[Evil]](graemlins/evil.gif)
![[Big Grin]](biggrin.gif)
![[Dont Know]](graemlins/dontknow.gif)
