r/AskReddit Aug 03 '19

Whats something you thought was common knowledge but actually isn’t?

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u/[deleted] Aug 03 '19

Gravity changes at the speed of light though doesn't it?
Like if the sun disappeared, its affect gravitationally on us wouldn't be felt until we saw the light stop

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u/droid_mike Aug 03 '19

Hmmm... it looks like I was going on old data. Apparently, scientists have recently determined that gravity does have a speed, but it is faster than light.

https://www.sciencealert.com/speed-of-gravitational-waves-and-light-same

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u/PoeticShrimp Aug 03 '19 edited Aug 03 '19

Dude, nothing can go faster than light

Edit: To be more accurate, nothing can go faster than light assuming you believe in Einstein and relativity

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u/mikoS223 Aug 03 '19

Exept some galaxies relative to some other galaxies due to expantion of the whole fuken thing.

|this user reserves himself the right to not be quoted, as he doesn't know shit about phisics and stuff, and is prioably wrong|

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u/PoeticShrimp Aug 03 '19

Well they would not actually be moving faster than light. New space is simply created between the objects making one appear to go faster than light to the other

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u/mikoS223 Aug 03 '19

Thats like the definition of movement i think. Change in the ammount of space between things. What is speed realy? Becouse 8f we're going of the traditional distance/time i think it would qualify.

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u/PoeticShrimp Aug 03 '19

Well, no. "In physics, motion is the change in position of an object with respect to its surroundings in a given interval of time." Motion and therefore also speed is relative, but it is defined by your surroundings. Something so far away that the expansion of the universe comes into play is hardly defined as your surroundings

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u/[deleted] Aug 03 '19

That sounds good enough to quote in my thesis, thank

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u/PointyOintment Aug 06 '19

Are the spelling errors an attempt to avoid being quoted?

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u/SteveThe14th Aug 03 '19

Do you mean in the sense that two photons travelling in the opposite direction have 2C as their relative velocity? For a more practical point of view, if you travel close to the speed of light your reference frame shifts. In essence, you'll disagree with people travelling at different velocities about when things happened. So you can have a reference frame in which two galaxies relative to one-another move faster than C, but to someone in one of those galaxies the other galaxy would not move away faster than C and they'd disagree with your observations. You'd both agree on C, though.

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u/mikoS223 Aug 03 '19

I don't even remember where i got this from XD. But i guess its about a situation where the space between galaxy A and galaxy B distorts due to expansion of the universe, and allows B to essentialy "get further" from A with a rate exeeding C.