Bilbo's Questions on life and stuff

[Kev]

Firstly, are you talking about the actual size of the known universe doubling or every single thing in it ? For instance, we know that Wales stays exactly the same size as it was the day before and we can determine this by measuring it with known units of measurement. If you're saying that the units of measurment somehow double without us knowing, a metre (for example) is measured in light-seconds and is roughly one three hundred millionth of a light-second. Since the speed of light and seconds* are constant we know that any change in its size would be, um, rapidly detected.

*Seconds are measured by the atomic radiation of the caesium 133 atom which again wouldn't alter should everything be secretly doubling in size.

God I'm bored.

Light is absorbed by things it reflects off and the photons are also then radiated in different colours. Even the act of seeing light absorbs and slightly alters it. Light energy tends to disperse and increase its distribution and so the high frequency energy drops rapidly below visibility. That's why turning off a light source simply results in the room going black when the light is turned off. The energy is rapidly dispersed and the room goes dark. Shining a torch allows a strem of light to eventually disperse, radiate, split into different frequencies, turn into other energy eg. heat.

Alcohol stinks because of the other stuff in it reacting with enzymes in your mouth. But it generally just stinks anyway as it's full of esthers and other compounds which give off smells. Something that's been refines like vodka which is close to pure alcohol (and water) doesn't smell as much. If you drink bottle or cask conditioned beer that still has yeast in it it's still fermenting when you drink it and reacts with enzymes in your digestive system to create even more smells.

My friend you may have only 1 reputation on this board but I can certainly see your true value. Allow me to add to your rep.

The second answer in particular sounded incredibly clever and articulate. I didn't understand it but that is doubtless because my intellect does not match your own.

Very clever man!

[Kirkland Laing]

And you've got to have enough light energy for it to actually do something. Shining a torch at the moon just isn't going to cut the mustard, much as setting off from England to drive to India with a teaspoon of petrol in your tank just isn't going to work. So just turning a light on in a room doesn't exactly create huge quantities of energy just bursting to get out and travel at a couple of hundred thousand miles a second. You really need a great big fucking electron beam to do that properly.

[BoxingGorilla]

I am sure that people would notice things doubling in size when the electric bill came.

[No Contest]

And you've got to have enough light energy for it to actually do something. Shining a torch at the moon just isn't going to cut the mustard, much as setting off from England to drive to India with a teaspoon of petrol in your tank just isn't going to work. So just turning a light on in a room doesn't exactly create huge quantities of energy just bursting to get out and travel at a couple of hundred thousand miles a second. You really need a great big fucking electron beam to do that properly.

I was baffled when I saw a program on space exploration, the probe satellite that they were using had a photon engine which just looked like a light beam shooting out the back, and that was what was propelling it thousands of miles out in space...off topic but interesting.

[El Kabong]

It's amazing what they can do these days the telescopes are amazing as well....see any pictures of all the galaxies from deep space....well not ALL the galaxies but a good amount of them, thousands of them


I always wonder...you see models of our Solar System and it's always perfectly horizontal....well what is up and down in space in regards to how Earth is orbiting

[Dizaster]

I remember reading somewhere that if the speed of light did not travel at the speed of light, but infact traveled very slowly,,,,

You could stand still in a fully lit room, but if you took a step forward, their would be black space where you were just standing, and would take a certain time to fill up again with light... That would be fun....

Another one is, if 2 twins were born at the same time (duh), both put on precise identical watches set to the exact same time, then one stayed on earth while the other traveled at near the speed of light and then returned to earth, The twin that was travelling at near speed of light would still look young (in their 20's), and the one that stayed on earth would be old (in their 80's)....
That's only if you consider that their is only one real time... See, if you looked at the twins watches. The one that went into space would have a watch that said 20 years had passed, and the one from earth would say that 80's had passed... So relatively, they are both aging at the exact same rate,,, just the further away from gravity you are and the faster you travel, the slower time goes... (well, relative to earth time that is...)

But then, even earth time is not 'exact'

They tested this by taking 2 very very precise clocks, and placing one at the bottom of a large dam, and one at the top.. If you sat at the bottom with that clock, you could measure that it kept exact seconds..... If you sat at the top and measured that clock, that would also keep exact seconds.. But if you bring them together after a day, the one that was at the top of the dam will be behind the one at the bottom. Seeming that it ticked slower...

If the effects were exhagerated, you could sit at the bottom with your own ticking watch, and look up at the top top clock and see that it was ticking slower, but as you climbed up the dam, they would slowly even up until you reached the same height and they would be ticking at the same speed..

*strange*

So basically, if 2 twins were born, and one went to live on the highest mountain while the other lived at see level, and met back up in 80 years, one would be older (only by a small amount though, compared to the lightspeed example).

We live in a strange strange world....

And this type of stuff freaks me out..