Break the speed of light with a pair of scissors?

Using stringumalong theory N=15 we see in N5 and N6 that is possible, in N10 to 15 not and we just do not know in the others.

jarsmack wrote:

What if there were a parallel universe and it was populated with people who were ten thousand miles tall? If they took a pair of scissors that were, say, 1,000 miles long and closed them in an instant, could they possibly break the speed of light?

I had a dream about this as a kid, and I've always wondered if it were possible.

If "an instant" is zero time, then yes.

jarsmack wrote:

What if there were a parallel universe and it was populated with people who were ten thousand miles tall? If they took a pair of scissors that were, say, 1,000 miles long and closed them in an instant, could they possibly break the speed of light?

I had a dream about this as a kid, and I've always wondered if it were possible.

If you close a normal pair of scissors in an instant then it would break the speed of light.

the reality of it wrote:

If you close a normal pair of scissors in an instant then it would break the speed of light.

No, it would equal the speed of light. At the speed of light time stands still, meaning that the scissors would go directly from open to closed without anything in between.

So to answer the original question, no, going faster than light is impossible.

jarsmack wrote:

What if there were a parallel universe and it was populated with people who were ten thousand miles tall? If they took a pair of scissors that were, say, 1,000 miles long and closed them in an instant, could they possibly break the speed of light?

I had a dream about this as a kid, and I've always wondered if it were possible.

I am sure it depends on Schrodingers cat and if it has it`s tail in the way.

Mr E-man wrote:

No, it would equal the speed of light. At the speed of light time stands still, meaning that the scissors would go directly from open to closed without anything in between.

So to answer the original question, no, going faster than light is impossible.

But in a parallel universe the laws of physics could be completely different. Things might be able to go faster than the speed of light.

You people are sooooooo stupid. And don't get me started on perpendicular universes.

the reality of it wrote:

jarsmack wrote:

What if there were a parallel universe and it was populated with people who were ten thousand miles tall? If they took a pair of scissors that were, say, 1,000 miles long and closed them in an instant, could they possibly break the speed of light?

I had a dream about this as a kid, and I've always wondered if it were possible.

If you close a normal pair of scissors in an instant then it would break the speed of light.

Also if you shine a laser on a wall from far away and move it the spot will go faster than light.

Mr E-man wrote:

the reality of it wrote:

If you close a normal pair of scissors in an instant then it would break the speed of light.

No, it would equal the speed of light. At the speed of light time stands still, meaning that the scissors would go directly from open to closed without anything in between.

So to answer the original question, no, going faster than light is impossible.

Okay, so your saying that at the speed of light time stands still? Really? That for one is completely false. Speed of light is just shy of 300 million miles per second. So seeing as how time is used in the measurement of the traveling of light that is debunked.

Faster than the speed of light is speculation, there is the wormhole theory but I'm not going to get into that on this board.

yes, if you were that large, on a train equally as large, and the train was traveling at the speed of light, then the scissors would appear to immediately shut.

i tried this once.

Finish high school and then get back to me on that one. It's called Einstein's theory of relativity.

Only if they were on a plane that was taking off from a treadmill.

jarsmack wrote:

What if there were a parallel universe and it was populated with people who were ten thousand miles tall? If they took a pair of scissors that were, say, 1,000 miles long and closed them in an instant, could they possibly break the speed of light?

I had a dream about this as a kid, and I've always wondered if it were possible.

The point where the scissors cross is really just a phase velocity, and these phases can go faster than the speed of light. So the answer to your question is yes. But it is just a phase velocity (no physical particles are moving faster than the speed of light, for example); you can't use it to send information faster than the speed of light, however, which is really what the speed of light limitation states (violates causality).

Now, having said that, there are a slew of quantum mechanical effects that defy this rule, such as the Copenhagen interpretation of collapse of the wave-function, or the Einstein-Podolsky-Rosen effect (see

, for example)....but these types of non-local behaviors are for another thread. If curious, read up on "Quantum Entanglement" or "Hidden Variables in Quantum Mechanics".

Mr E-man wrote:

Finish high school and then get back to me on that one. It's called Einstein's theory of relativity.

I was going to leave your comment alone until you became pretentious. By your post, It's obvious you know nothing about relativity other than what you read in some "wow, isn't physics cool" book you found at a used book store.

the plane takes off

It's called special relativity. It dictates that as objects approach the speed of light time slows down. Travelling at the speed of light you would appear to be moving infinitely fast (apparent to an observer) therefore could make insurmountable gaps in absolutely no time at all. This is why the idea of Interstellar travel is a possibility because the faster we travel the less apparent time it takes to get places.

You could think of it like the universe is expanding and light is tighed to the fabrics of the universe. Really relative to the universe we are the ones who are moving at the speed of light, not light.

Ok, I actually have taken a relativity class and think that this is an excellent question. There are alot of paradoxes that seem to arise in relativity.

One thing that you may not be aware of is that part of special relativity states that an objects inertia approaches infinity as its velocity goes to the speed of light. That would mean that the force required to close these scissors would go to infinity. So to close them in an instant would be impossible, the scissors would just break.

There are other cool "paradoxes"

This will do a much better job at explaining than I can.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ladder_paradox

gobbly gook wrote:

I was going to leave your comment alone until you became pretentious. By your post, It's obvious you know nothing about relativity other than what you read in some "wow, isn't physics cool" book you found at a used book store.

I made two statements in my original post:

1) If an object were to move at the speed of light, the motion would be invisible. It would appear to go directly from A to B (from the relatively stationary bystander's perspective).

2) It is impossible for matter to reach the speed of light.

I would appreciate it if you could try to contribute by explaining to me why those statements are so wrong. This is a summary of the current argument:

"x=y"

"no it doesn't"

"oh, okay"

Point well taken.

quote]

I made two statements in my original post:

1) If an object were to move at the speed of light, the motion would be invisible. It would appear to go directly from A to B (from the relatively stationary bystander's perspective).

2) It is impossible for matter to reach the speed of light.

I would appreciate it if you could try to contribute by explaining to me why those statements are so wrong. This is a summary of the current argument:

"x=y"

"no it doesn't"

"oh, okay"

Point well taken.[/quote]

Mr E-man is rolling his mustache between his fingers while typing with his toes and blowing his nose with his anus.... simultaneously.

phase velocity, etc etc. blades can't move faster than c.