this post was submitted on 18 Dec 2024
105 points (94.1% liked)

ShowerThoughts

2061 readers
149 users here now

Sometimes we have those little epiphanies in the shower.. sometimes they come from other places. This is a home for those epiphanies.

founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
 

You just need to go around the world fast enough that it's always one time.

you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] [email protected] 17 points 9 hours ago (2 children)

This is actually correct, but not for the reason you might think. It has nothing to do with time zones.

In physics, time is quite literally defined as "what a clock would read". As you approach the speed of light, time dilation approaches infinity and therefore your rate of proper time approaches zero.

If you reach the speed of light, your rate of proper time exactly equals zero and thus the clock is correct 100% of the time.

There is one caveat: in order to reach the speed of light, your mass must equal exactly zero. In which case you can only travel at the speed of light since deceleration is not possible.

Bearing that in mind, it would be correct from a physics standpoint to claim that a broken clock accurately measures the proper time of a photon (or other massless particle).

[–] [email protected] 5 points 5 hours ago* (last edited 1 hour ago)

Even more apt: a zero mass clock would be broken a priori

[–] [email protected] 4 points 5 hours ago (1 children)

At C, wouldn't time be pretty much irrelevant though?

[–] [email protected] 3 points 5 hours ago

Sounds to me that even though your massless clock would be always right, time doesn’t really mean anything in that situation. It’s like having a ruler for measuring how purple yesterday is.