Faster Than Light: Four Phenomena That Beat The Cosmic Speed Limit

Einstein's theory of special relativity establishes the cosmic speed limit, which is the speed of light. However, some things in our universe don't really follow this rule to the letter...

The Cosmic Speed Limit

The speed of light is widely known to be the absolute pinnacle of movement. When Albert Einstein first entwined mass and energy in his theory of special relativity, it basically established the Universe’s speed limit at 299,792 kilometers per second (186,282 miles per second).

According to Einstein, nothing in the Universe that has mass could either match, or move faster than, light.
But that doesn’t mean that nothing can move faster than light. In truth, physicists have discovered a number of phenomena that have the ability to match, and actually beat, the speed of light. Here’s a look at some of them.

Quantum Entanglement

In his presentation on Big Think, physicist Michio Kaku said that “If I have two electrons close together, they can vibrate in unison, according to the quantum theory.” Yet, when those electrons are separated even by a vast amount of space, they still retain this special line of communication.

“If I jiggle one electron, the other electron ‘senses’ this vibration instantly, faster than the speed of light. Einstein thought that this therefore disproved the quantum theory, since nothing can go faster than light,” says Kaku.

Einstein himself referred to it as “spooky action at a distance,” though it is actually known as quantum entanglement. It’s a rather complicated bit of physics, but this video by Veritasium breaks down how it all works in rather simple terms.

The Luminal Boom

Like the sonic boom, a luminal boom happens when something accelerates to a point that it breaks the light barrier. As spectacular as it seems, in truth, this phenomenon happens everyday inside nuclear reactors.
Known as Cherenkov radiation, this blue glow is caused when the core of a reactor is submerged in water, where light moves at a reduced speed, while the electrons generated by the reactor move past the speed of light. This creates a sort of shock wave of light.

As the aforementioned may indicate, the key to all of this is the medium which light (and other substances) are moving through.  In a vacuum, light is far faster. But in ice and other mediums, light goes a lot slower. Thus, things can travel faster than light in certain mediums—but not a vacuum, so Einstein’s theories are still intact.

Wormholes

If popular science fiction is to be believed, travelling through the stars will heavily rely on ships being able to move faster than light. Indeed, if you were working strictly with Einstein’s theory of special relativity, your dreams of interstellar travel would stay firmly planted on solid ground.

Thankfully, Einstein’s general theory of relativity opened another possibility by weaving together space and time. As Kaku notes, “the only viable way of breaking the light barrier [for humanity and the like] may be through general relativity and the warping of spacetime.”

This is done through what are called wormholes, which are tears in the fabric of spacetime that would allow one to “pass through” to whole other region in the Universe. The biggest problem with this idea is the energy that it would take to hold that wormhole open…and of course, all of the hazards that would come with diving into it…and also, we have no evidence that they actually exist or are anything but hypothetical.

Loopholes

Einstein’s theory says that nothing “with mass” could pass the speed of light, so it’s reasonable to consider that other things that don’t have mass could potentially achieve this feat. One such thing is simply empty space.

To clarify, relativity says that objects cannot travel faster than the speed of light through spacetime. It doesn’t, however, have anything to say about spacetime itself. And in fact, spacetime is expanding and pushing matter apart faster than the speed of light; however, matter is not really traveling through spacetime….spacetime is pushing it.

In this respect, every portion of space is expanding and stretching. It’s not even that the edges are flying outwards, but that spacetime itself—the area between galaxies, stars, planets, you and I—is stretching. And it is doing so faster than the speed of light.