Blike is correct in that it's not done to increase the mass.

WHOA!! I've TOTALLY lost u guys!

Light has properties which seem like a wave and a particle. The wave being an eletromagnetic wave which would create a eletromagentic field and the field moves at the speed of light. Similar to electrons. When your press on your brake of the car the tailight comes on but the electrons at the contact point of the brake pedal cannot move from that contact point to the rear like water in a pipe. Instead an elctric field is created which moves at the speed of light to the tail light and the field interacts to heat up the filament in taillight and get excited electrons and see light.

 

Ag

Hey, hey!!

 

Does light travel at the cosmic speed limit because it has no mass???

 

So it takes 0 energy to make it move (or something along those lines)?

 

And while I'm at at, how come sound has a speed limit?

What is the fastest sound can travel in the densest material tested, roughly?

hmmm... I know that sound travels at about 1500 m/s through an average solid not really the densest. I would say, something like metal.

Back to your first quest about mass.

 

It all boils down to Einsteins theory of relativity and the best knowen law of relativity E=mc2

 

It states that energy (E) = Mass(M) x The speed of light squared (c2)

 

maening the faster you go the more energy you have and thus the more mass you have.

 

Hope this helps you understand it a bit better

alt_f13 said in post # :

how come sound has a speed limit?

What is the fastest sound can travel in the densest material tested, roughly?

 

you`ve partly answered your own question there, quite correctly you state it`s all about density of the medium propogating the shockwave (that we perceive as sound).

in air at 1 atmosphere it`s 330 meters/second again at standard temp and pressure.

the ait molecule will do 500 m/sec at STP.

naturaly, the more dense the material, the faster the shockwave will travel, as for it`s upper limit, I don`t know, sorry

when detonating a nuclear weapon, please make sure your critical mass is a nice shape, or it won't explode. melting and expansion caused by heat will be detrimental.

agreed, symetry and hydrodynamics play a big part in it!

it`ll either work or be a damp squib with lots of cleaning up to do after LOL

alt_f13 said in post # :

Hey, hey!!

 

Does light travel at the cosmic speed limit because it has no mass???

 

So it takes 0 energy to make it move (or something along those lines)?

 

And while I'm at at, how come sound has a speed limit?

What is the fastest sound can travel in the densest material tested, roughly?

 

I figured it out, sound has a speed limit b/c matter cannot accellerate at infinite speeds, and it takes a certain ammount of energy to get the particles moving.. duh.

 

 

 

Remember that thing where light enters and exits as if it were travelling faster than the speed of light?  Think that could be used in data transfer applications in the future?