The proverbial box is a set of constraints to one’s thinking. In other words; limitations, and pre-conceived notions. I am not permitted to make a statement without backing it up, and neither should the mysterious “they”. But they do.

When breaking boards in martial arts, they tell you to focus past the surface of the board by about six inches. Why? If you focus on the surface of the board as a limitation, you will simply make painful contact with the board more often than breaking it. After all, isn’t breaking the board with your fist the process of putting your fist PAST the board? Trust me, if you break a board in this way, there is no pain as all the kinetic energy goes into breaking the board and not your knuckles.

Throughout our lives, we are taught that there are limiting factors to everything. For example, they always say that nothing can travel faster than light. Isn’t that what they say? Have you ever questioned it? Have you ever asked them why? Just why? It seems that after thirty years of asking that question, with the exception of a complicated mathematical formula that Eienstein himself did not understand (his wife was the math whiz, he couldn’t even balance his checkbook) they just keep repeating that nothing can travel faster than light. Over and over, they keep just repeating it as if that would get one to simply accept it over time.

If the speed of light is thought of as a limitation, one simply will not surpass it because you won’t even try. Why would you? It’s impossible. Or is it? Breaking the board is impossible without extending one’s fist further than the board’s surface. Yet, one can focus past it and one can break the board. Two different things? Yes they are but the principle is the same: if you never try, you will never succeed.

The reason they keep repeating the same things over and over, as I see it, is either that they really don not know or that they are brainwashed and wish you to be too. There is something else going on too; the whole idea is based on a fundamental flaw in the understanding of electrons. It is easy to understand why this flaw in their thinking developed in the first place. After all, they were presented with the correct data, that electrons are particles and waves, but they thought that something could not be both, so they decided on waves. In truth, electrons are particles that create a field effect that makes them appear much like a wave.

Take sound for example. It behaves like a wave, because it is. However, whatever gives off the sound must be moving, yes? So if say a speaker on a stereo system is moving, it follows to reason that it gives off sound. So far so good. If sound is a sort of abstract concept, then the speaker might appear as if it WERE sound. Not only that, but whatever medium that were transmitting the sound should appear it be what sound is composed of since that medium, say air in this case, was invisible and undetectable otherwise. So speakers are made up of sound and sound is composed of air particles. Since sufficiently loud sound can cause something to move, it can turn things into speakers, or move speakers.

If the speaker stops moving, then what happens? No sound. But it is still there and still detectible, but now it’s a solid thing and not a wave! Heavens to Betsy! It can’t be both! So since it spends most of it’s time giving off sound, we can assume it is made up of sound. So the limitations of sound apply to the speaker. Case closed. You cannot move a speaker faster than sound because it is made up of sound. Therefore the Doppler effect will squish the speaker into the shape of a teardrop as it approaches the speed of sound, and since stereos are made with speakers and/or attached to speakers, they cannot me moved faster than sound.

The parallel is like this: Electrons when excited give off light. However, if the excitation stops and so does the light, the electrons are still there. Light is composed of waves in a sea of photons. If the photons are not moving, they are as undetectable as the non-moving air was in the above example. The photons are still there, they are just not moving. Electrons make waves in the photon “soup” much as speakers make waves in the air. The final proof in the pudding is that you cannot put sound into an open dish and expect it to still be there in the morning, but you can do that with electrons.

Let’s examine a few things first. “Nothing can travel faster than light” not sound, not light, not x-rays, not information. Hmmmm, it seems to me that there was an interesting observation and test made in the 1990’s that would disprove that and it has been shrouded in debate ever since.

A very clever scientist observed that the amplitude of a wave built up in distance faster than the propagation of the wave. So, it was tested to see if that a wave of incredible amplitude could reach a distant object faster than a laser. It did, and the scientific community split on the issue. There were those that saw it as a way to at last transmit information faster than light but there were also those holdouts that believed that the signal traveled backward in time. If that were the case, one could not plot it out the sign wave that is a radio wave could we? Since one of the axises is time, it would be shown to go backward, but it does not. This is well established, but they would rather challenge this than let an unproved theory be challenged. A double standard if ever there was one. “Science” is full of those.

If they were right about the time thing, I’d say it was more of a way of traveling backward in time – an even more controversial thing that they seem to ignore as long as they can keep their “no traveling faster than light” thing, but they also say no traveling back in time, unless you’re traveling faster than light because that is the only way it could be done. When faced with faster than light information transmission, they bring out the time travel stuff. To put it into perspective, you cannot have so many gallons of water in the ocean that the size of the gallon becomes negative. They are indeed talking about changing the size of a unit of measure, because they have so much of something or so little of another. Velocity is measured by how much distance is traveled in a period of time. Most of us are familiar with miles per hour of kilometers per hour. Either way, it is distance over time. What is wrong with say, four billion miles per femtosecond? That has to be exceeded before the time can be so small as to be indistinguishable from a negative number. I lay some of the problems with the Calculus at the altar of significant figures.

The measured number is the number you have, forget about significant figures as they are what separates classical physics from quantum mechanics – as the effect of one fades, the other takes over. The “observed” gap is a calculated, or rather a truncated one. Forget significant figures and they match-up. Oh, I know what it’s all about, but sometimes you have to use what you have and see what it points to. The facts are often close but not exactly what is observed, and sometimes the math gets in the way.

So, if the number is possible, how does it become physically backward with smaller numbers? You might as well ask what is one mile north of the north pole they say, because they really don’t understand it themselves, so they try to get you to shut up with that one. Don’t worry, that’s not the same argument, not by a long shot.

Now that theory that matter would collapse at or near the speed of light is one I might think could not happen, but for a different reason. In short, if electrons are waves, then they would not be able to complete orbits when the nucleus is moving at the speed fo light – so you get matter collapse. If they are particles, they can complete the orbits. You see, if they are waves, the Doppler effect collapses matter at that speed. Why can’t any physicist phrase it that way? It is theorized that the field around an electron that gives a sort of force field to the matter but I say the larger field of this type is made up of multiple physical impacts from the electron itself, much in the same way gasses inside a rubber balloon can keep it inflated. Electronic fields make magnetism, and not everything is magnetic. In fact, most materials resist magnetic fields – when the magnetic field is strong enough. It has proven to be a method of levitation but not a practical one. However, it may be that the field around the electron itself is what keeps it in erratic orbit around the nucleus. If that is so, then matter may indeed shrink or even lose cohesiveness at speeds approaching that of light, but you see, it is a similar effect for a different reason. Personally, I think that matter would be able to maintain cohesiveness, but it may just become less visible as photons pass through the spaces normally taken up by the fields made by the electrons and the nucleus IF and this is a big if, they collapse at the speed of light, but I believe that fields are a little different from waves since waves are made up of changing fields, and that the amplitude of a wave – being the creation of one field, can move faster than light so it might not be a factor. In any case, it is my conviction that fields can be static, such as with a permanent magnet, and in that way they are not affected by the dreaded Doppler effect. If, however, things tend to become invisible as they approach the speed of light, then it would be beneficial.

When one travels at greater and greater velocities that begin to approach the speed of light, certain other factors come into play. One of them being photodynamics. You see, as you approach such speeds, the Doppler effect rears it’s ugly head in the form of light that reelects off the leading edge of an object and gets shifted into the often lethal gamma rays. Lets not forget ambient light – the light that is passing by, minding it’s own business and you happen to scoop it up and shift it into gamma rays. I call this the snowplow effect.

How would it be to arrive at a populated world halfway across the galaxy, to say “Hello, we come in peace.” to the inhabitants there, just as they are killed by the gamma rays you made on your way. Not a good thing I dare say. Something has to be done to prevent this. One approach may be to bend the light around the vehicle and another may be to allow the light to pass through it. The latter may be a natural effect as mentioned earlier. If this really occurs naturally, it might explain why we haven’t “seen” or observed in any other way, anything going as fast or faster than light. The other thing is it might explain some of the seemingly spontaneous, and lopsided, explosions that have been observed in space without any sort of explanation. A heavenly body can suddenly and inexplicably explode much in the same way as a chicken’s egg might if struck by a high-velocity bullet. Indeed, the physics of the detonation is very similar.

In any event, it seems that it would be possible to travel faster than light if fields and not waves held matter together. Fields may also be the form of propulsion that could get us there as well. Remember the build up of the electrical field that moved faster than light? If it were able to do so as a form of say, an ion accelerator perhaps (a modified form of ion drive like that used by Deep space 1) with a field that pulses by building and collapsing (sideways radio) with enough intensity as to be able to push physical matter, could theoretically work. However, to paraphrase Mr. Spock: “The power cost would be enormous.”

Keep thinking.