Why cosmic speed limit. I have a suggestion, what do you think?

Rick's is the only correct answer in the bunch. Maxwell, in his famous equations, actually predicted the speed of light to within a remarkable accuracy. These are the equations that show electro-magnetic fields are manifest of the same EM force, which is carried by photons (this the light speed).

But Michelson-Morley in their well known experiments, showed the speed limit possibility in that they found that photons in a vacuum only traveled at one speed no matter what the source and observer were or were doing. For example, when going directly into the Sun the speed was C; when going away from the Sun it was also C. That was an amazing result because one would have thought photons would come in faster going into their source than going away from their source.

But that was not the case. They went the same speed... C. Why is that, Einstein wondered.

Why is C no matter what? His first answer was the special theory of relativity. Here he posited that time and space had to adjust to keep C at C no matter what.

Time and space are the variables, the speed of light is the constant. In fact, when a platform moves, we know it's time rate slows down to dt < dT where dT is normal time for a body at rest. Couple that with C is C is C no matter what and we can write C dt = ds < dS = C dT where ds < dS is contracted space on the moving platform and dS is normal space.

And as you can see ds/dt = C = dS/dT; C is C is C no matter what because both time dt infinity. That is to say, the inertia of a mass m grows so large at speeds just shy of the speed of light, that there is not enough force or energy in the whole universe to make it go that last little bi to reach v = C. In fact, we can use the M equation to show that the only... only way an object can actually go the speed of light, where v = C, is for m = 0.

That means the things has to be rest massless; you know, like photons. See source. BTW, to set the story straight because there is a lot of misinformation in some of the other answers, e = mC^2, which is the energy mass equivalency term, does not... not mean the mass m is going C speed.

To the contrary m is called rest mass because it is the mass when that platform is at rest, v = 0. The C^2 in e = mC^2 is just a constant of proportionality. That's all it is.

It's a number, which when multiplied by mass in kg and C is in mps, will give the energy equivalent in Joules. And to a point, as I assert earlier, the only way m could go at C is for it to be mass less, m = 0, like photons.

Big thumb up to Rick B. Let's forget for a moment about _why_ the speed of light is a universal constant. It just is, OK.

Now let's say that you are floating in space beside a laser beam and you measure its speed. What do you get? You get C of course.

Let's say that Alan is moving away from you, in the direction of the beam at 0.6C (from your point of view). Alan measures the speed of the beam. What does he get?

Well since we are assuming that the speed of light is a _universal_ constant, then he too must get C for his answer. Let's say that Beth is receeding from Alan at 0.6C (from Alan's point of view.) She measures the beam. It's still universal.

She must get C for her answer. OK. Now let's say that you send a signal by interrupting the beam.

From Alan's point of view, the beam is travelling at the speed of light. The signal must reach him, and pass him by going the speed of light. From Beth's point of view, the beam is travelling at the speed of light.

She too must see the signal approach, and then pass her by at the speed of light. So how fast is Beth going from _your_ point of view? Well, if you can send her a signal via a light beam, then she obviously can _not_ be receeding from you any faster than (or even as fast as) the speed of light.

In other words, 0.6C+0.6C must be less than C. A guy named Hendrik Lorentz figured out the formula to add up the speeds. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lorentz_tra... ____________________________________ A small thumbs up to Oldprof who explained _why_ we think the speed of light is a universal constant.

Only thing is, he twisted it up a little bit. Einstein was _not_ the person who proved why C is universal. That was all due to Maxwell, and due to the failure of the Luminiferous Aether theory.

There actually were a bunch of people who contributed to the theory of relativity. Einstein's contribution was to pull all of the separate threads together and tie it into a self-consistent whole. Einstein thought about the meaning of Lorentz's equations, and he thought that the Universe must be a somewhat weirder place than we thought.

Einstein realized that to make sense of it all, we needed to think differently about energy, about momentum, and ultimately, about space and time. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_...

I cant really gove you an answer,but what I can give you is a way to a solution, that is you have to find the anglde that you relate to or peaks your interest. A good paper is one that people get drawn into because it reaches them ln some way.As for me WW11 to me, I think of the holocaust and the effect it had on the survivors, their families and those who stood by and did nothing until it was too late.