Expert: Jayendra Upadhye - 5/11/2005

Question
I am curently reading the book "The iron Sun" by Adrian Berry about crossing the universe through black holes. Can you tell me why when travelling at the speed of light, time becomes negligable? i know distances become tiny but surely time still exists?
Thankyou any help would be greatly appreciated.

Answer
Hi Jonathan,
Truly speaking, I am NOT an expert on relativity!
But I can just say this ..that for the lorentz contraction (shortening of length along direction of travel) and for the Einsteinian upper limit on travel to hold. (300,000 km / sec), time will perforce have to slow down!
Like all relativistioc phenomena, this "upper limit" is the one that drives all other associated phenomena such as
lorentz length contraction, increase in inertial mass, the slowing down of time, red / blue shifting of light (doppler shift) etc.
Sorry I cannot bring you uptodate on the maths part that governs all the above.
That is not my "province"!
Jayen