quote:
Originally posted by Darwin:
You can't accelarate a squirrel to the speed of light squared becuase matter cannot reach the speed of light and nothing can exhead it. In this case the speed of light is just being used as a number not as a speed. Why it works out to exactly the speed of light squared is one of those quantum physic things that I don't know.
Well, we can't do this with current technology; there's some dissent on this matter in the physics community. I found an article not too long ago that mentioned an experiment where a particle was accelerated beyond the speed of light. HOWEVER (and this is a tricky point), scientists still believe INFORMATION cannot travel faster than light. So the particle can be accelerated and do damage, but it can't be used to provide FTL communication.
As for the speed of light being an important constant, it happens to be the speed of all electromagnetic waves; and, scientists believe, the speed of all forces in general. In other words, when a particle exerts a force on another particle, that force travels at 3x10^8 meters per second between the particles.
BTW - I'm posting this in a new thread, so we can stop cluttering up "Strategy" with "Theoretical Physics"...
Theoretical Physics [OT thread]
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