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From: student@nmtvax.UUCP
Newsgroups: net.physics
Subject: Re: Query - re. Speed of Light
Message-ID: <489@nmtvax.UUCP>
Date: Fri, 7-Oct-83 14:13:31 EDT
Article-I.D.: nmtvax.489
Posted: Fri Oct  7 14:13:31 1983
Date-Received: Sun, 9-Oct-83 09:20:08 EDT
References: <249@flairvax.UUCP>
Organization: New Mexico Tech, Socorro, NM
Lines: 48

>From Micheal Ellis:

>Now wait... going the speed of light is not in violation of any law of
>physics I know! To my knowledge, your clock slows down as you approach the
>speed of light, and completely stops should that speed ever be attained.
>That means that you can never `do anything' at C -- you are `frozen' as
>long as you continue to travel this speed.  Therefore, you cannot turn on
>your headlights while traveling at C.
>
>To actually accelerate to C would, of course, require dumping mass-energy
>as you accelerated, until your `rest mass' becomes zero, since it takes an
>infinite amount of energy to accelerate a positive `rest mass' to C.  Your
>car and headlights, as well as you yourself, would have to transform
>themselves into some pretty elusive stuff, `weighing' nothing in your
>coordinate system (who needs to, since you can't do anything there
>anyway!).

Einstein's theory of relativity states that in an inertial frame
all observers will see the same thing. An inertial frame is a
little hard to understand but it is basically a frame of
reference where all of Newton's Laws are observed to be followed.
Thus the Earth's surface is not an inertial frame since gravity
bends objects into parabolas not straight lines as seen from an
observer.
  When in an inertial frame the observer notices time chugging
along at 3 X 10 exp 8 meters per second. That is correct Einstein
(and those who talk about relativity) measure time in meters. A
person can do anything he wishes, including turning on the
headlights.
  To accelerate up to NEAR c the objects rest mass approches
infinity not zero. This is because of Newton's Second Law of 

F = dp/dt or more commonly F= ma.

The second version does not hold for high velocities since the
mass is now a function of velocity in

m = m sub naught / ( 1 - beta sup 2 ) sup 1/2

where beta is the fraction of your velocity over the velocity of
light.

 For those of you who are still confused I suggust reading
"Spacetime Physics" by Taylor and Wheeler.

Sincerely;
Greg Hennessy;
..ucbvax!unmvax!nmtvax!student