OK, so what's the speed of dark?

I have always wondered if you can measure the speed of light, what about the speed of darkness? Is/can it be measured? Would it be the same as light, or would it be the negative speed of light?

Just pondering out loud.



AlBeMeT

[edit on 17-6-2008 by AlBeMet]

I don't really have the background to provide an calculated answer, but I would assume it would be the same as the speed of light. Darkness only prevails after light has moved on. So once Light was at point A and then moves to point B, darkness would take place at point A and move to point B after the Light has moved onto another point. What I am trying to say is their relationship is direct and darkness will always follow after light has moved on at the same speed.

It seems to me that darkness is what exists in the absence of light. I think darkness is more static in that it is always there, it is always present. But when there is light, you simply can't see the darkness.

I don't think darkness has a speed. Light is actually photons and darkness doesn't have any actual properties of matter that can be measured.

I would say its the speed of light. As a light source is turned off (for whatever reason) darkness follows on its heels at the same speed

reply to post by The Cyfre


Correct!! Light must have a source, we only see when the photons from that source reach our eyes. Darkness has NO source and therefore, no speed to measure. Well deduced Cyfre !!

Not 100% sure on this but I'll have a go.

Darkness is the absense of light the way cold is the absense of heat\energy, the speed of light is a constant therfore the speed of dark I would assume is the same, the speed of heating something can change therfore the speed of cooling can change.

Check out Albert Einstein, I'm sure he talked about this in one of his papers.

Okay, i'll approach this from the perspective of logic, albeit a rather amatuer fashion.

You find a box, with a fine mesh covering a small hole in one side, allowing light to enter the box.

You have a peice of card, and cover the hole with it.

Correct me if i'm wrong, but the speed of light travels much faster than the human eye can see, so one would have to assume that the light/photons come out of the box before you put the peice of card over the hole.


According to physical law (what i know of it), this has to happen, or otherwise the light/photons will transmute into heat radiation as opposed to photonic.

Because of this perspective, one can make a semi-reasonable judgement on the speed of darkness, which without lab equipment is the best you're going to get.

The speed of darkness varies, because the photon stream is cut off (hench, the growth of shadows) and because of it the photonic radiation converts to heat.

You'd think that this would contradict a particular fact to do with shade being cool (ask any wild animal and he'll tell you this), but perhaps it's simply because we haven't looked deeply enough into it - perhaps there is a layer of heat radiation along the 'surface area' of the layered shadow.

As such, there is sort of an 'invisible barrier' building up between the shade and the direct stream of light, so the shadow will grow or shrink at varying speeds depending on the concentration of photonic radiation.

One must understand that the speed of darkness is directly linked to the speed of light, the darkness reacts to it - or at least - the darkness makes room for photonic radiation if the concentration is heavy enough.

Hmm... an interesting question, one which i am in no way qualified to answer with hopes of being correct.

It's natural for us to assume that darkness is the absense of heat/energy, but that's only true when there is no heat or energy - for example; there is a difference between being outside at night and being in an underground room.

Outside there is always light, be it from the sun or the moon or even distant stars, inside there is a true 'absense' of heat/energy (with respect to the heat of the earth's core, where if you go down far enough it is indeed, very warm).

Ultimately, i'm forced to contend that even if one were to contradict common knowledge, there would be no means with which to prove the contradiction.

Still, there's a possibility that the darkness holds a few secrets...

well its all relative as a famous wired haired scientist once said.

however on several levels!!

so lets play a small little mind game.

I own a totally black Spaceship. it is black from whatever angle you look at it from, its special black Spaceship paint not hot rod "shiny black" totally black.

Now if that Spaceship is travelling at 5 km/h well then you could say black is also at 5 km/h relative to the original location of the spaceship or the observer.

Therefore its easy to see that if the spaceship goes at the speed of light the "black" would be too, certainly a Black part of the universe would be going it the speed of light.

So thats one aspect of the relativity thing, though in a very superficial way.

Now lets look at the blackness that seems to have ocured in most of the posters minds eyes, when thinking about this.

The blackness that is there after the light is gone, which would occur relatively to also be traveling at the speed of light to catch up with the light infront of it. A bit of a mind bender this one but think about the rocket again.

The rocket traveling through the "air" before it hits the "vacuum" of space, now if that rocket is going at 2000 mile an hour in its ascent to space in the earths atmosphere, it is easy to imagine the "air" taking the place in the space where the rocket was and has now left.

But 2 things here and there important to this question.
I think you see "dark" as stuff something inherently existing like the air so you imagine the dark filling the space behind the light, but think of this, the air that going into the "space" left by the rocket, would that chase to catch up the rocket at the same speed of say 2000 km/h?

when you think of it it becomes obvious that no, it does not happen like that, the space is filled from all points around it by air and not from straight behind in a piston like block of air at the same speed of the rocket.

Hopefully thinking about this makes it easier to see the idea of dark taveling at the spee of light behind light seem a little "not right" now?, but as said earlier two points, so point two

Unlike the air which is actually "stuff" something dark is nothing there is nothing as dark is nothing to travel at the speed of light, if something is not there it cannot have a velocity, as it has no starting point and end point and time in between those points, because it is nothing! that is in the classical sense of dark as we observe the dark of the heavans, because it is all very relative and mind bending.

As in the black paint rocket that is dark or black but something is still there is "stuff" and can therefore be measured ie how quickly the black object moves over light objects behind it and therefore its speed.

Now for the last point which I wont go into into detail because 2 is enough, what about a black hole ?

Whatever the speed of the black hole in a relative sense of its passage through that part of the universe, as observed by the observer could be stated as the speed of the "black" or dark, but if you measured it on the black hole itself it could be traveling at no speed at all, or even going backwards! because of what happens there with time, which speed needs and is reliant on to make a calculation of it.

So to surmise, its travels as fast as the relativaty of the observer, and it depends what you call black/dark which is relative also though in a more abstract way!

Kind Regards,

Elf

Darkness doesn't exist.

Where ever you see "dark", there is actually light present that your human eyes and many devices are just not capable of seeing. It is energy at another frequency that is there, yet not visible.

All things are created from light, all matter is "frozen light". In between exists electromagnetic radiation that is also known as "light".

So, to answer your question with your current view/belief of the universe, "darkness" would actually be the same speed as light. If ever "darkness" is seen to move faster then light, then that means light is capable of doing the exact same speed as "darkness".

You are all wrong. According to Terry Pratchet:

"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it's wrong.
No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always gotten
there first, and is waiting for it."

Originally posted by Ambient Sound
You are all wrong. According to Terry Pratchet:

"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it's wrong.
No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always gotten
there first, and is waiting for it."

Uh, if darkness is already there, then that means it didn't travel at all.

Terry Patchet's logic is flawed.

Originally posted by ALLis0NE

Originally posted by Ambient Sound
You are all wrong. According to Terry Pratchet:

"Light thinks it travels faster than anything but it's wrong.
No matter how fast light travels it finds the darkness has always gotten
there first, and is waiting for it."

Uh, if darkness is already there, then that means it didn't travel at all.

Terry Patchet's logic is flawed.

Not quite.

It relies on the possibility of darkness being a universal constant, much in the fashion that the true definition of chaos is a universal constant in that everything changes.

Light will eventually diminish, and Darkness was there all along.

Still, i'm not about to rely on the logic of a person who writes fantasy comedy, that would just be ironic.

I just know, when I enter a completly dark room with no light. All around me exists radio waves, and other electromagnetic radiation that I can not see. This means darkness doesn't exist, because in all places exists "light".

reply to post by FredT


darkness is light, just another form.

Originally posted by Anti-Tyrant
Still, i'm not about to rely on the logic of a person who writes fantasy comedy, that would just be ironic.

Now that would be ironic, wouldn't it? Some people find irony to be funny, but maybe that's just me. Just trying to lighten up the thread a little.

I actually believe that since everything in the universe is just a different form of the same thing, in a sense, everything is light. Light is everywhere in some form or other. I don't think you can really discuss light very far without getting metaphysical anyway.

Light is something. Darkness is nothing. Said another way, darkness is the absence of light. Darkness has no substance so it cannot move. What we perceive as darkness is not a thing but the absence of things.

Originally posted by Straight Razor
Light is something. Darkness is nothing.

I have to correct you here. There is actually no such thing as "nothing". Darkness is "something", that is why we are able to name it "darkness".

Darkness is not the absence of light. Darkness is the absence of visible light.


Here is another crude example:

The way colors work, when something is blue, it is absorbing every color except blue which is reflecting off into your eyes. When something is white, it is reflecting all colors. When something is "black" or "dark" it is actually absorbing all colors or "light". That is why black t-shirts are hot in the Sun.

reply to post by MischeviousElf


Whatever the speed of the black hole in a relative sense of its passage through that part of the universe, as observed by the observer could be stated as the speed of the "black" or dark, but if you measured it on the black hole itself it could be traveling at no speed at all, or even going backwards! because of what happens there with time, which speed needs and is reliant on to make a calculation of it.

Sorry for replying anonymously, but I have yet to set up an account here due to my laziness

MischeviousElf, about your blackhole statement (and I may be wrong), but doesn't a blackhole theoretically (or factually) move faster or it's pull is faster than the speed of light considering nothing can essentially escape? You'd have to travel faster than the speed of light to evade this "darkness" if i'm not mistaken ... ANYWAYS, couldn't you hypothetically say, using a blackhole model, that darkness possibly travels faster than light?

I dunno, just a thought ...

reply to post by Straight Razor


Darkness has substance. Why can't you see that.

Very good points made in this thread. That's why I love ATS most of us think outside the box. You guys really have me thinking now.

Back on topic, I believe darkness "is". In other words darkness IMO is a matter it does exist because without it light would not exist. Maybe light needs darkness to move, the same way a train needs tracks to move or a car wheels.

Just pondering out loud again.

AlBeMeT