• [object Object]@lemmy.ca
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    20 days ago

    Okay, but what if I go the speed of light minus 1m/s and shine a flashlight, can I catch the photons?

    • smiletolerantly@awful.systems
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      20 days ago

      No

      That’s not a physics statement btw. I just think that you, personally, are too slow to be able to do that. Offense intended.

    • OwOarchist@pawb.social
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      20 days ago

      You can catch the photons just fine without needing to go absurdly fast. Just put your hand in front of the flashlight beam, and you’ll catch lots of them.

    • nexguy@lemmy.world
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      20 days ago

      Light ALWAYS travels away from you at the speed of light no matter how fast you and your flashlight are going. Something has to give and that is time. It may look to outside observers, not traveling that fast along with you, that light is going 1 m/s faster than you… but you would also appear to be moving in super slow motion trying to reach out for the beam. The faster you go the slower time moves for you.

    • webghost0101@sopuli.xyz
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      20 days ago

      I think the answer is that you are only traveling at almost light speed from reference frame of your start position.

      The light of the lamp travels at light speed from your own reference speed which to you in a vacuum is 0.

      Anyone correct if wrong please?

      • thisbenzingring@lemmy.today
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        20 days ago

        Any observations wouldn’t see anything but the whole light

        I believe this is explained by Einstein in his example of the train in the Theory of Relativity

    • AirBreather@lemmy.world
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      20 days ago

      You’re already traveling at the speed of light minus 1m/s relative to a reference frame that’s traveling away from you at that speed.

    • ZombieCyborgFromOuterSpace@piefed.ca
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      20 days ago

      No. Ever heard of the doppler effect?

      Light behaves like a wave. But instead of hearing sound in a higher/slower pitch relative to the source, you’d be seeing a different color.

    • merc@sh.itjust.works
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      20 days ago

      If you’re going at the speed of light minus 1 m/s and you turn on a flashlight, the beam emitted by the flashlight will be travelling at the speed of light, according to your measurements. Time passes slower the faster you travel.