Loading...
Please wait, while we are loading the content...
Similar Documents
The VSL Discussion: What Does Variable Speed of Light Mean and Should we be Allowed to Think About ?
| Content Provider | Semantic Scholar |
|---|---|
| Author | Unzicker, Alexander |
| Copyright Year | 2008 |
| Abstract | Abstract In the past years, variable speed of light (VSL) theories have been of growing interest but also a sub-ject of controversial discussion. They have been accused both for tautologies and for violating specialrelativity, and concerns have been expressed about the validity of such approaches in general (e.g. Ellis,astro-ph/0703751). Without trying completeness on the issue, the example of Einstein’s VSL attempts(1911) and Dicke’s ‘electromagnetic’ theory (1957) are urges to give some comments on the above criticism. Introduction Exotic theories. Of course, ‘variability’ can en-compass a lot of aspects. One may introduce dis-persion, considering a dependency on λ, or on v, vi-olating Lorentz-invariance. Most of these proposalsdo not have sufficient experimental support at themoment, though many of them are interesting andseem as good as inflation for resolving the flatnessand horizon problems in cosmology; this however isnot the focus of interest here, since comments on[1] with respect to modern VSL theories [2] havealready be given [3]. There, appropriate referenceand a clear discussion of older attempts are how-ever missing. These so-called [2]Conservative theories suffered an even harsher‘Not even wrong’- criticism of being tautological.The argument is the following: ‘One assumes a goodclockcanbe constructed,andthen usesthe timing ofreflected electromagnetic radiation to determine thedistance. But then the (physical) speed of light ofnecessity has to be unity, precisely because all elec-tromagnetic radiation travels at the speed of light,and distances are being determined by use of suchradiation.’ ([1], sec. 2). One may wonder what factshould be proven by that statement. All that followsindeed from the definition of SI units, but in myhumble opinion something can either be measuredor defined, not both. Thus c = 1 is not a physical ne-cessity but at best a mathematical convention; onemay further ask if it is a possible, reasonable or eventhe only practical one. At the very end, this is not ascientific question; to illuminate the practical valueof c = 1, we investigate the following toy theory: |
| File Format | PDF HTM / HTML |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | https://arxiv.org/pdf/0708.2927v3.pdf |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | http://arxiv.org/pdf/0708.2927v3.pdf |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | http://arxiv.org/pdf/0708.2927v2.pdf |
| Alternate Webpage(s) | http://arxiv.org/pdf/0708.2927v1.pdf |
| Language | English |
| Access Restriction | Open |
| Content Type | Text |
| Resource Type | Article |
