John Baez wrote:there isn't really anything
to say about van Flandern's misunderstandings of general relativity
that hasn't already been said before.
...
By the way, Paul might enjoy reading an article in the physics FAQ
that was written precisely to address the issue that van Flandern
seemed to find most persistently confusing: the issue of whether
general relativity succeeds in incorporating the principle that
no causal influence travels faster than light. (It does.)
houserichichi wrote:No, all force fields do not move at light speed.
The force carrier of the electromagnetic field is the photon, of the strong field is the gluon, of the gravity field (will be) the graviton, and of the weak field are the W's and the Z.
The photon, gluon, and (predicted) graviton are massless. The W's and the Z are not. Any massless particle necessarily travels at the speed of light whereas anything with mass can not. Thus the weak field travels slower than light while the other three do not.
Even then, strong force can be attributed to pions (depending on exactly what we're referring to) in which case it too is slower than light since pions have mass.
darthbadass wrote:Carrier particles are BS, pure and simple. Particles do not carry forces, fields carry forces. They say the photon is the carrier of the EM force is the photon but this is simply not true: photons are by-products of EM interactions. Personally I do not believe in gravitons but if there is one then it is a by-product of gravitational interactions, just as gluons and W/Z bosons are by-products of the strong and weak forces. Fields, not particles, are where the answer lies. There would be no 8 minute delay as gravity propagates (nearly) instantaneously, gravity is faster than light.
Hugh wrote:If the Sun were to suddenly disappear, would the Earth instantly fly off into space along a straight line or would there be an approximate 8 minute delay before it did so?
WalkingEagle wrote:But to answer your question.... No. Wouldn't the gravitational pull of Jupiter and the other gas giants prevent that?
WalkingEagle wrote:We wouldn't ever know.
We would all be dead in a very short time.
WalkingEagle wrote:Hugh wrote:If the Sun were to suddenly disappear, would the Earth instantly fly off into space along a straight line or would there be an approximate 8 minute delay before it did so?
We wouldn't ever know.
We would all be dead in a very short time.
WalkingEagle wrote:But to answer your question.... No. Wouldn't the gravitational pull of Jupiter and the other gas giants prevent that?
moonlord wrote:We could know the truth, for very little time, that's true, but the information travels quickly these days .
jinydu wrote:the gravitational pull of Jupiter on the Earth is orders of magnitudes weaker than the gravitational pull of the Sun on the Earth, not nearly enough to stop the Earth from flying away.
Mghty Moop wrote:However i beleive that in order to get a grasp of this question one needs to define what gravity is. now as we all know acceleration creates the effect on increased mass by cover a shorter distane in increased time, as with acceleration all gravity is is the intertial force created by the temoral motion of mass through time, why does create an intertial force? this is because this 'time' travel bends the pacetime continuam. so were a mass suddenly to dishappear one must suggest as to whether the space time continuam would instantaneousely leap back to the position it would have been in without the mass or would the process take time, i believe that it is very messy and probably inefficient to imagive gravity as a particle wave of any sort. perhaps the answers to such questions about gravity could be answered better by investigating the 'elasticity' of space time rather than the speed of a particle. however the only way to investigate such a theorum would be near the boundary of a black hole so it may be some time before we could answer a question like that
Icon wrote:to me it would be 8 min because even if light suddenly stops, there would still be leftover gravity that is still pulling, because you only stopped the supply not the stream, there is still a little stream to last 8 min
Hugh wrote:If one is spinning a rock tied to the end of a string around in a big circle, and the string breaks, does the rock fly off instantly or is there a delay?
houserichichi wrote:There's a delay. It's just so small that you don't know it. If the length of string was a light-minute away it would take 1 minute for the rock to actually go off on its own. No information can be transmitted faster than light.
Hugh wrote:If the string breaks near the rock, it flies away almost instantly. If the string were to totally vanish, it flies away almost instantly.
houserichichi wrote:I think the big kicker to what you said is "almost instantly". Almost is a relative term and instantly is something that is well defined.
houserichichi wrote:I'll admit, I hadn't considered the case when the string breaks near the rock
houserichichi wrote:As far as I understand it nothing, not even the transfer of information, exceeds the speed of light. Superluminal scissors makes for an interesting google search. I think it was discussed years back!
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