MadSci Network: Astronomy |
This is one of the frustrating aspects of science. Science tends to be
wonderful at answering how the universe works, but is much less
successful at answering why it works the way it does. There are a
couple of perspectives on why light travels at 300000 km per second. One is
that it is just a random accident and that the speed of light could be much
faster or much slower, but was set that way in the big bang. Another is
that there are fundamental physical theories which force the speed of light
to have a particular value. Some scientists phrase this idea as "How much
choice did God have in creating the Universe?".
Einstein figured out that the constancy of the speed of light is a
fundamental property of the universe and has important consequences for the
nature of space and time. This is where the theory of special relativity
originated, and it produces bizarre effects when objects move close to the
speed of light. Check out the two fiction books below for an entertaining
discussion of how these effects would appear if the speed of light were
much smaller than it is.
Gamow, George. Mr. Tompkins in Paperback
Lightman, Alan. Einstein's Dreams
Try the links in the MadSci Library for more information on Astronomy.