How Does Light Reach It's Speed?

Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

"Old One Eye" wrote in message
...
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee


Literally, a spark, a sudden change in voltage at the atomic level.
For every photon there is an equal and opposite rephoton.
http://www.androcles01.pwp.blueyonde...k/rephoton.gif

Old One Eye wrote:
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

Light's photons have no rest mass. Standard theory says
that any massless particle must travel at c, the speed of
light. There's no acceleration involved, they're "born"
moving at c.

"Greg Neill" wrote in message
m...
Old One Eye wrote:
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

Light's photons have no rest mass. Standard theory says
that any massless particle must travel at c, the speed of
light. There's no acceleration involved, they're "born"
moving at c.



Its still a fair question. While they were created moving at c, it took
energy.

AFAIK, there are two main sources of photons. One is the acceleration of an
electrically charged particle, eg an electron. The electron loses speed
which supplies the photon with its energy.

The other is subatomic particle decay and collisions, where even uncharged
particles can collide or decay to produce photons, and in this case the
energy comes form the different before and after masses of the particles.

Are there others that are fundamentally different? Chemical reactions and
black-body radiation would seem to be examples of the first source.

Peter Webb wrote:
"Greg Neill" wrote in message
m...
Old One Eye wrote:
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

Light's photons have no rest mass. Standard theory says
that any massless particle must travel at c, the speed of
light. There's no acceleration involved, they're "born"
moving at c.



Its still a fair question. While they were created moving at c, it took
energy.

AFAIK, there are two main sources of photons. One is the acceleration of
an
electrically charged particle, eg an electron. The electron loses speed
which supplies the photon with its energy.

The other is subatomic particle decay and collisions, where even uncharged
particles can collide or decay to produce photons, and in this case the
energy comes form the different before and after masses of the particles.

Are there others that are fundamentally different? Chemical reactions and
black-body radiation would seem to be examples of the first source.

Photon production always requires the involvement of electrical
charge, even if the charges are associated with the nucleus of
an atom in the case of nuclear decay, or quarks making up an
otherwise neutral particle. Note that in high energy collisions
that produce new particles charge is conserved.

Old One Eye wrote:
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,

Quite literally, it starts out at that speed. There's is no acceleration
required because a photon only exists at that speed. If it goes down to
zero then it stops to exist.

Yousuf Khan

"Greg Neill" wrote in message
m...
Peter Webb wrote:
"Greg Neill" wrote in message
m...
Old One Eye wrote:
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

Light's photons have no rest mass. Standard theory says
that any massless particle must travel at c, the speed of
light. There's no acceleration involved, they're "born"
moving at c.



Its still a fair question. While they were created moving at c, it took
energy.

AFAIK, there are two main sources of photons. One is the acceleration of
an
electrically charged particle, eg an electron. The electron loses speed
which supplies the photon with its energy.

The other is subatomic particle decay and collisions, where even
uncharged
particles can collide or decay to produce photons, and in this case the
energy comes form the different before and after masses of the particles.

Are there others that are fundamentally different? Chemical reactions and
black-body radiation would seem to be examples of the first source.

Photon production always requires the involvement of electrical
charge, even if the charges are associated with the nucleus of
an atom in the case of nuclear decay, or quarks making up an
otherwise neutral particle. Note that in high energy collisions
that produce new particles charge is conserved.


Thanks. I had always wondered how come a neutron and an anti-neutron can
produce a pair of gamma rays; as I understand your explanation the quarks
within them provide the (fractional?) electric charge to get the ball
rolling, as it were.

It still an interesting exception, though.

On Mar 7, 7:04*pm, (Old One Eye) wrote:
Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

Einstein said the fastest signal in time is light speed. Therefore
time gives light its velocity.

On Mar 10, 5:44*pm, BURT wrote:
On Mar 7, 7:04*pm, (Old One Eye) wrote:

Hi. I'm a lay person when it comes to science. But I'm inquisitive. My
question is: What is the force or power that propels light to it's
amazing speed? Is it repelled by it's source. Please help me to
understand. Thanks,
Lee

Einstein said the fastest signal in time is light speed. Therefore
time gives light its velocity.

Light does not accelerate. It is pushed instantaneously at C.