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Old 04-20-2007, 09:49 AM
HRHGavin
 
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Default If your in the back of a train traveling at the speed of light......?

(I know its from a movie, buts it's still a good question)
and you run to the front of the train are you travelling faster than the speed of light?
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Old 04-20-2007, 09:55 AM
smartprimate
 
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If you are in a train traveling at the speed of light, then you and the train are pure energy. Going ahead of where you are will not improve your speed.
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Old 04-20-2007, 09:58 AM
Lin
 
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Yes. You'll get there before you leave. (Or you might meet up with Marty McFly)
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:00 AM
ethslan
 
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That is like asking if u are in the back of a train or a plane going 400 miles per hour & u run to the front, are u travelling faster than 400 miles per hour.
Well, are u? Obviously not.
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:01 AM
Aman17
 
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yes im travelling at the speed of light becoz the train would b moving with a good speed+im moving with speed of light.If the both speeds are added up then it would b 3*10^8 + 60km/hr of the train. it would be just a very little greater than the speed of light
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:01 AM
hznfrst
 
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Grammar first: the contraction for "you are" is "you're" - "your" means belonging to you (I know everyone does it but that doesn't make it right). Also, your first "it's" is missing its apostrophe.

Anyway, the answer is no for two reasons: you can never go as fast as light in the first place no matter how hard you try. However, if you adjust the question to be traveling at 99% c and you could run at 1% c, you would still not be moving at c.

This is because the speed of light is always measured to be the same no matter how fast the observer is moving, and nothing with mass can ever go that fast no matter what. Even two spaceships traveling towards each other at 99%c would see each other approaching at something less than c, despite the fact that 99+99=198. Relativity is cool!
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:03 AM
John S
 
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Theoretically, yes. The speed of light is only PRESUMED to be the maximum speed attainable, but light has mass, and it can be bent around a heavy planetary gravity field, so that might also increase its speed, meaning that under the train circumstances you could be travelling faster than light. Unless, of course, it was The Orient Express, and Hercule Poirot was in the passageway. You'd never get past him, and that would be that.
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:06 AM
Phillip
 
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Good question.
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:07 AM
Rowena Rose
 
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To travel faster than light u'll have to be faster than 360 000 000km per second. Well if there's a stretch of land that a train and you can travel this much of distance than you are technically travelling faster than the speed of light.
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Old 04-20-2007, 10:57 AM
Pete S
 
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The right answer here is from
hznfrst
You can't travel faster than 299792458m/s! You'd be infinite mass, and other rather interesting relativistic effects!
Well done Einstein.
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