The speed of gravity is either infinity or millions of times faster than the speed of light. If the speed of gravity was the speed of light, then heavy objects passing near the earth would have more gravity than objects passing away. Less of the gravity beans would be arriving to be measured. Like the red shift in light or the doppler effect with sound.
I see gravity as more of a property of the universe, every atom in the universe is attached to each other atom in some way.
Wait, what? Did you read the article? The propagation of the curvature of spacetime happens at the speed of light. If it didn't you could use large amounts of energy to propagate information faster than the speed of light, which screws the hell out of causality (using the light cones). If you have a good math background you can solve for it using the equation.
I see gravity as more of a property of the universe, every atom in the universe is attached to each other atom in some way.
Please don't do science like this. You should use experimentation to differentiate between theories.
Maybe data could travel faster than light if we find a property of the universe which goes faster than light.
I imagine a bowling ball rolling down a blanket stretched tight at half light speed. The bowl shape of the blanket in front of the bowling ball would be very different from the rear. I'm just pointing out that if gravity goes light speed, then something coming toward the earth at half light speed will have a longer delay for us to feel the gravity, and as the object leaves the earth, its gravity will linger longer. Maybe it's true, it boggles my mind.
If gravity is light speed, then an object travelling toward you at light speed will have no gravity until it has touched you. We should be able to detect shock waves like a jet breaking the sound barrier breaking all the windows in a community because the sound builds up. Gravity would build up too.
I'm by no means well-versed in the special theory of relativity, but I believe one of its results is that light seems to travel the same speed at you no matter what your own speed may be (since it's all relative anyways, there's no absolute frame of reference for you to really measure your own speed), as a consequence of the Lorentz transformations.
I think this was confirmed in an experiment where scientists measure the speed of light from the sun both during sunrise and sunset, since the relative speed between the sun and the measurement devices are different due to earth's rotation (sorry, don't have a link handy for all this, I probably got some details wrong but you get the idea).
I guess the theory of general relativity would extend this to gravity.
problem because if you had a stable highly elliptical orbit of two bodies, the attraction would be greater during the approaching phase than the departure phase. The equation would not be balanced. Elliptical orbits would degrade due to the pulling being greater on arrival than departure. This is not the case. Maybe it is only a problem as you approach light speed.
No, the article describes something totally different. It talks about cases where an orbit decays because the gravity is felt at a different location from where you expect.
Comments
The speed of gravity is either infinity or millions of times faster than the speed of light. If the speed of gravity was the speed of light, then heavy objects passing near the earth would have more gravity than objects passing away. Less of the gravity beans would be arriving to be measured. Like the red shift in light or the doppler effect with sound.
I see gravity as more of a property of the universe, every atom in the universe is attached to each other atom in some way.
Wait, what? Did you read the article? The propagation of the curvature of spacetime happens at the speed of light. If it didn't you could use large amounts of energy to propagate information faster than the speed of light, which screws the hell out of causality (using the light cones). If you have a good math background you can solve for it using the equation.
I see gravity as more of a property of the universe, every atom in the universe is attached to each other atom in some way.
Please don't do science like this. You should use experimentation to differentiate between theories.
Maybe data could travel faster than light if we find a property of the universe which goes faster than light.
I imagine a bowling ball rolling down a blanket stretched tight at half light speed. The bowl shape of the blanket in front of the bowling ball would be very different from the rear. I'm just pointing out that if gravity goes light speed, then something coming toward the earth at half light speed will have a longer delay for us to feel the gravity, and as the object leaves the earth, its gravity will linger longer. Maybe it's true, it boggles my mind.
If gravity is light speed, then an object travelling toward you at light speed will have no gravity until it has touched you. We should be able to detect shock waves like a jet breaking the sound barrier breaking all the windows in a community because the sound builds up. Gravity would build up too.
That's not how you add speeds in a relativistic world.
If something is moving at the speed of light, then light (or gravity) is emitted from it also at the speed of light.
But if you add the two together, it doesn't equal twice the speed of light. Yes, I know it's weird, but that's where the whole time dilation comes in.
I'm by no means well-versed in the special theory of relativity, but I believe one of its results is that light seems to travel the same speed at you no matter what your own speed may be (since it's all relative anyways, there's no absolute frame of reference for you to really measure your own speed), as a consequence of the Lorentz transformations.
I think this was confirmed in an experiment where scientists measure the speed of light from the sun both during sunrise and sunset, since the relative speed between the sun and the measurement devices are different due to earth's rotation (sorry, don't have a link handy for all this, I probably got some details wrong but you get the idea).
I guess the theory of general relativity would extend this to gravity.
There are experiments currently underway to detect gravitational waves, see for example http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitational_wave_detector#Spe...
I feel a Timecube coming on...
If the speed of gravity was the speed of light, then heavy objects passing near the earth would have more gravity than objects passing away.
This is a problem because...?
problem because if you had a stable highly elliptical orbit of two bodies, the attraction would be greater during the approaching phase than the departure phase. The equation would not be balanced. Elliptical orbits would degrade due to the pulling being greater on arrival than departure. This is not the case. Maybe it is only a problem as you approach light speed.
I believe the submitted article gives an example where orbits degrade in just the way you describe.
No, the article describes something totally different. It talks about cases where an orbit decays because the gravity is felt at a different location from where you expect.
As I mentioned in a different comment, that's not what happens.