As humanity’s furthest reach into the Universe so far, the two Voyager spacecraft’s well-being is of utmost importance to many. Although we know that there will be an end to any science…
I’m not insisting anything. I’m saying that, based on everything we know, the direction of light has no bearing on its speed.
Suggesting that it does just because we don’t have evidence that it doesn’t is no different, as I said, as claiming the universe was created last Thursday.
Maybe the speed of light doubles when it goes through the exact right type of orange. You can’t prove it doesn’t.
With a detector and very accurate clocks, it would be easy to say “I’m going to send a pulse at 2pm, record when you receive it” that’s measuring it in one direction
The very accurate clock needed in this case is physically impossible as far as we know, there’s no way to measure it as far as our current understanding of physics goes.
Though if you can figure out a way you should publish a paper about it.
The clocks involved in gps are accurate enough that they have to take relatively into account for gps to be accurate. That’s far more accurate than you need to measure the speed of light.
And to calculate the offset needed to get them all synced up involves calculating time dilation, which involves knowing/assuming the speed of light.
These synchronizations work just as well if the two way speed of light is different than the one way speed of light.
To know the speed of light you assume the speed of light is c, but you’re trying to calculate c so all those clocks aren’t verified synced.
Just read through the wiki or Harvard’s books if you’d like, this is an unsolved “problem” in physics for a reason or do you think no one cares about how fast c is?
I read all those and every test has reduced the amount that the speed of light could be anisotropic. From “it could be twice as fast in this direction to the other” to “it could be a small fraction of the relativistic effect of moving a clock through space.” Every improvement in measurement trends towards isotropic.
For no reason. No one is saying that it is different, only that it’s impossible to prove one way or the other. Light traveling the same speed in all directions, and light traveling at 2x c away from an observer and instantaneously on the return, and every other alternative that averages out to c for the round trip, are indistinguishable to any experiment we can conduct.
Take 30 seconds to at least glance at the article the other user posted. It’s not just myself, there are plenty of very interested physicists who also find the unprovability of the one-way speed of light interesting.
I’m also not sure what your point about orange is supposed to be. Are you suggesting that there is a particular spectra of light that we cannot test?
My reason for being interested isn’t just that I think it’s “cool”. I think it’s fascinating that a fundamental underpinning of physics has such a gap in its experimental verifiability.
It kind of is. It’s just the thing being asserted without proof is the one-way speed of light. That you don’t seem to find that interesting I guess is where we differ.
I’m not insisting anything. I’m saying that, based on everything we know, the direction of light has no bearing on its speed.
Suggesting that it does just because we don’t have evidence that it doesn’t is no different, as I said, as claiming the universe was created last Thursday.
Maybe the speed of light doubles when it goes through the exact right type of orange. You can’t prove it doesn’t.
This is slighlty different though, we only know the two-way speed of light, not the one way speed of light.
We only know that this trip, to and back, takes x seconds. We cannot prove that the trip to the mirror takes the same length of time as the way back.
The special theory of relativity for example does not depend on the one way speed of light to be the same as the two way speed of light.
Wiki
With a detector and very accurate clocks, it would be easy to say “I’m going to send a pulse at 2pm, record when you receive it” that’s measuring it in one direction
The very accurate clock needed in this case is physically impossible as far as we know, there’s no way to measure it as far as our current understanding of physics goes.
Though if you can figure out a way you should publish a paper about it.
The clocks involved in gps are accurate enough that they have to take relatively into account for gps to be accurate. That’s far more accurate than you need to measure the speed of light.
And to calculate the offset needed to get them all synced up involves calculating time dilation, which involves knowing/assuming the speed of light. These synchronizations work just as well if the two way speed of light is different than the one way speed of light.
To know the speed of light you assume the speed of light is c, but you’re trying to calculate c so all those clocks aren’t verified synced.
Just read through the wiki or Harvard’s books if you’d like, this is an unsolved “problem” in physics for a reason or do you think no one cares about how fast c is?
See also This or, more accessibly “Synchronization conventions”
I read all those and every test has reduced the amount that the speed of light could be anisotropic. From “it could be twice as fast in this direction to the other” to “it could be a small fraction of the relativistic effect of moving a clock through space.” Every improvement in measurement trends towards isotropic.
Why would the one-way speed be different? For what reason? Just because you think it’s possible?
For no reason. No one is saying that it is different, only that it’s impossible to prove one way or the other. Light traveling the same speed in all directions, and light traveling at 2x c away from an observer and instantaneously on the return, and every other alternative that averages out to c for the round trip, are indistinguishable to any experiment we can conduct.
And it’s impossible to prove that just the exact right type of orange will double the speed of light.
But there’s no reason to speculate either thing without a reason for the speculation. Your reason seems to be “I think it would be cool.”
I don’t think you realize it, but this is a very similar argument to “you can’t prove God doesn’t exist.”
Take 30 seconds to at least glance at the article the other user posted. It’s not just myself, there are plenty of very interested physicists who also find the unprovability of the one-way speed of light interesting.
I’m also not sure what your point about orange is supposed to be. Are you suggesting that there is a particular spectra of light that we cannot test?
My reason for being interested isn’t just that I think it’s “cool”. I think it’s fascinating that a fundamental underpinning of physics has such a gap in its experimental verifiability.
No, I’m saying it’s just another version of Russel’s Teapot.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell's_teapot
It kind of is. It’s just the thing being asserted without proof is the one-way speed of light. That you don’t seem to find that interesting I guess is where we differ.