Is the speed of light really the fastest speed in the universe? In fact it's "slow as a turtle"

When the term "speed of light" is mentioned, I don't know what everyone will think of in the first place. In a short period of time, when the whole world is illuminated, I believe many people will sigh at the amazing speed of light transmission. And scientists are even more hopeful, and want to make the speed of human beings reach the speed of light successfully one day in the future.

However, what many people do not know is that although the speed of light can indeed be regarded as the fastest speed in the reference frame of the earth, when we enlarge the reference frame to the entire universe, the speed of light may not be as fast as people think. In this regard, many people can't help but ask, how is the speed of light calculated? What is faster than light? In fact, the speed of light is as slow as a turtle? What would happen if we humans reached the speed of light?

Next, let us understand this question together, is the speed of light the fastest speed in the universe? Why do scientists say that the speed of light is as slow as the speed of a turtle?

Calculation of the speed of light

The first is the origin of the calculation of the speed of light. In modern society, with the progress and development of human science and technology, we already have many methods to accurately measure the specific value of the speed of light. But if it was put in the past, when human tools and related instruments were not accurate, how did they calculate the speed of light?

In fact, since the speed of light was proved to be a finite speed in the seventeenth century, countless scientists have wanted to get the specific value of the speed of light in some way. But it was not until 1849, more than 170 years later, that the French physicist Armand Fizeau came up with a wonderful method to measure the speed of light under very limited conditions at the time.

The French physicist used a semi-mirror to deflect the light source through the teeth of a gear while he watched from behind. When the gear rotates, the light must be blocked by the gear. Under such basic conditions, it is only necessary to continuously increase the distance between the observer and the observation position and the rotation speed of the gear, and the speed of light can be calculated and measured.

However, what Fizeau did not expect was that until it was 8000 meters away from the mirror, the number of gears increased to 720 teeth, and the speed reached 12.67 rpm, he finally discovered the reflected light for the first time. obscured and disappeared. Through the comprehensive calculation of the above data, Fizeau finally calculated that the speed of light is 315,000 km/s.

Although there is a certain error between this number and the contemporary calculated speed of light, considering the actual measurement conditions at that time, it is definitely a remarkable achievement to be able to control the error within the range of 5.1%. As for this test method, it is actually the very famous rotating gear method in physics.

faster than light

After the speed of light was measured, humans once believed that this speed was the fastest speed in the world or even the entire universe. After all, in terms of human cognition at that time, even the top scientists in the world could hardly imagine what kind of speed could surpass the speed of light.

However, with the passage of time and development, when human beings began to continuously explore space, they suddenly discovered that in the vast universe, the speed of light may not be the fastest speed. Not only that, compared to the shock that instantly filled the entire world on Earth, light in the universe never seemed to fill any area.

In this regard, scientists can not help but suspect that perhaps the speed of light is not the fastest speed in the universe. It is precisely because the speed of light cannot catch up with this speed that we feel it so clearly. More importantly, when scientists observed various rays of light in the universe, they unexpectedly discovered that some of the rays of light were still constantly being transmitted even though they were not blocked or affected by any celestial bodies during the propagation process. "fall back".

Especially in the galaxy space farther from the earth, this phenomenon is more obvious. Scientists are puzzled by such a situation, and it was not until the theory of space expansion that superluminal speed was put forward that scientists had a new understanding of the "regression" of light in the universe.

It turns out that in terms of the actual scope of the universe, it is actually much larger than the observable universe that we humans can observe. Scientists predict that even at the speed of light, it will take at least 23 trillion years to travel from one part of the universe to the other.

But in fact, the universe we are currently in is in the stage of continuous expansion. The cosmic space between celestial bodies and galaxies is too wide, so the speed of the entire expansion will naturally far exceed the speed of light. So even if a beam of light does shoot from one end of the universe to the other, that beam of light will never come to an end.

If this beam of light can exist forever, perhaps only when the universe enters the contraction stage, this beam of light has a chance to reach the other end. It's just that at that time, whether the basic rules of the universe will change, then no one can make a conclusion. Therefore, the speed of light is by no means the fastest speed in the universe. In terms of the expansion speed of the universe at this stage, it far exceeds the speed of light.

The speed of light is as slow as the speed of a turtle

So in the universe, is the speed of light really as slow as the speed of a turtle? In fact, the answer is not the same. The main reason for such a statement is that the moving speed of light does not change in different reference systems, so people feel different.

You must know that on Earth, although light can instantly cover all our human sights, if we go to the universe, we can even observe the trajectory of light through certain methods. In addition, humans can also see the time it takes for light in space to move from one celestial body to another. In fact, the speed of light is not as fast as humans think.

When calculating the speed of light on Earth, the unit of time is often measured in seconds. In space, it takes about 8.3 minutes for light to travel from the earth to the sun; it takes about 22.3 minutes to travel from the earth to Mars; if it is to further outer space, it can only be calculated in light years.

It can be seen that there is nothing wrong with the statement that the speed of light is as slow as the speed of a turtle in different reference systems, or standing at different angles. Of course, it is worth mentioning that, according to scientists' judgments, when moving in some galactic space, the speed of light tends to be faster than people think. The main reason why this happens is that the galaxy itself is also moving.

Take the nearest galaxy Andromeda as an example. When the speed of light travels from the Milky Way to Andromeda, it takes less time to travel to other galaxies within the same distance than to other galaxies. The main reason why this happens is that the Andromeda constellation is moving towards the Milky Way constellation.

Humans reach the speed of light

So what happens if humans move at the speed of light? In this regard, it is necessary to judge from the following aspects. The first is that when humans are infinitely close to the speed of light, the most obvious change is that time gradually slows down and the mass of objects gradually increases. Especially in the universe, human beings will have a more intuitive feeling for the quality of celestial bodies.

The second is that when the human speed reaches the speed of light, according to the theory of Einstein's theory of relativity, it is the same as infinitely approaching the speed of light. The greater the speed, the slower the time. And when the speed reaches the speed of light, time will stand still.

In many film and television works, we can see pictures or superpowers in which time is still. From the point of view of physics, it can actually be regarded as the owner of this superpower. When time is still, his own movement speed reaches the speed of light.

Finally, if the speed of human beings can exceed the speed of light, then his dynamic mass will be greater than infinity, and the inertia will be greater than infinity. In this case, even if it is as small as a human being, it can easily smash a certain planet and continue to fly forward. And when he looked back in the process of moving, because the speed of light was not as fast as him, there would not be any light, just a bottomless darkness.