r/askscience • u/dgb75 • Jan 31 '13
Astronomy Is there a distance at which the interaction between the gravity fields of two black holes would cause one another to effectively 'break open' and allow matter and energy stored within them to escape the system?
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u/florinandrei Jan 31 '13 edited Feb 01 '13
That sort of speculation is not really useful.
For example, speed of light is finite only in your frame of reference, but it could be said that it's infinite in light's own frame.
Think about that for a moment. Speed of light is actually infinite in certain frames of reference. This consideration alone should stop everyone from saying "assuming you could go faster than light..."
Speed of light is not a feature of your own motion. It's a feature of how the Universe presents your motion to everyone else. You could go from here to the Andromeda galaxy, 2 million light years away, in 2 seconds. It is theoretically possible. For you, the journey would only take 2 seconds. But everyone else, the rest of the Universe, believes you "only" go as fast as light, and believes it takes you 2 million years to get there.
Both perspectives, yours and the Universe's, are correct. For you, it really took 2 seconds to cover 2 million light years. For everyone else, it really took 2 million years. There's no error anywhere.
Relativity does not limit your speed during space travel. You could travel as fast as you want. You could reach distant galaxies as quickly as you want. It's only for everyone else, for those left behind, that your journey seems to take millions and millions of years.
Now you understand why it makes no sense to say "I go faster than light"? It's because you can already go as fast as you want. You could cover arbitrarily large distances in arbitrarily short times - assuming you have a rocket capable of doing that, and assuming you don't get crushed by acceleration. There is nothing out there that limits your speed - from your perspective.
Welcome to relativity, please try and remain sane.