The Speed of light messes with my head By Katherine Lightwood

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The Speed of light messes with my head

By Katherine Lightwood


 Have you ever thought what would it look like to ride alongside the beam of light...?

This is a question Einstein asked over hundreds of years ago. Now, the trouble was he couldn't do this experiment so he had to use his imagination (A thought experiment) to figure out what a reasonable outcome would be.

Well!! Einstein's intuition told him that the world would feel the same in all the frame of references moving with constant velocity. These are called 'inertial frame of reference'. So, it doesn't matter if you are on a train, a plane or a car or in feet. As long as you are moving at a constant velocity the laws of physics should apply exactly in the same way. And this is what called the principle of 'Relativity'.

Now, let's imagine a situation, let's say a thought experiment...Imagine you are traveling in a train or a metro (Subway) and that train is traveling at the speed of light. Now imagine you hold up a mirror in front of your face... will you be able to see your reflection...? Now, the problem is in order to see your reflection light has to bounce off my face and travel to the mirror. But if the mirror is going forward at the speed of light, how is the light ever going to catch up??? So, a logical answer would be 'NO' you can't see your face in the mirror when you are traveling at the speed of light.

But here, it violates the principle of relativity because it means that you can tell that you are in a frame of reference that's going at the speed of light that way. Now, let's consider the other option. Suppose you are seeing your reflection in the mirror, which means the light must be traveling from your face to the mirror at its regular speed which is the speed of light.

But again here comes another problem, someone outside the train would see the light traveling twice at the speed of light. Because you are already traveling at the speed of light and the light is traveling at the speed of light relative to you... Now, I don't know if that is making any sense because my brain is already hurting as I am articulating these thoughts and also enjoying it.

Well!! that leads to a really inconsistent answer because how can a speed of light be twice the speed of light in that frame of reference...?   So, Dear Mr. Einstein's conclusion was that you must see your reflection otherwise it violates the principle of relativity. But in order for you (inside the train) to measure the same speed of light as someone outside the train, the train must actually contract in the direction that it's moving and your time must tick by slower relative to someone outside.

Therefore, the answer to my question at the start of the blog is that 'we will never know' and that how my heart keeps braking forever... Wish we could know. Damn the truth always lies in the restricted area.

So, that was my thought of the day. To see more posts like this make sure to visit our main page. And Do not forget to visit our institute's page to know more about graphic design, 3D, animation courses and other awesome stuff. Till then good day to you.

 Katherine Lightwood 

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