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From: KFL@MIT-MC@sri-unix.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.physics
Subject: Speed of light
Message-ID: <4763@sri-arpa.UUCP>
Date: Wed, 7-Sep-83 00:53:00 EDT
Article-I.D.: sri-arpa.4763
Posted: Wed Sep  7 00:53:00 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 4-Sep-83 01:36:11 EDT
Lines: 20

From:  Keith F. Lynch <KFL @ MIT-MC>

      Date: 29 Aug 83 15:25:58-PDT (Mon)
        From: ihnp4!ihuxm!gjphw @ Ucb-Vax
 
           My question: does Pauli's large number hypothesis allow for a
        change in the speed of light in a vacuum with a change in the radius of
        the physical universe?
 
  Since the speed of light is now 299,792,458 meters per second BY
DEFINITION, the trivial answer is NO.  What MAY change is the length of
the meter or the duration of a second.  What does it mean for all the
meters to get shorter or for seconds to get shorter?  This would mean
that all chairs, tables, molecules, terminals, people, and everything
else would get bigger (not that anyone would notice the difference) OR
that all clocks, atoms, modems, people, and everything else would
become slower (not that anyone would notice the difference).  We could
'explain' an 'increase in the speed of light' in any of those three
ways with equal accuracy.
                                                                ...Keith