If there were a vast lever floating in free space, a rigid body with length greater than the width of a galaxy, made of a hypothetical material that could endure unlimited internal stress, and this lever began to rotate about its middle like a propeller so that a person looking at the universe would simply see it spinning at a gentle pace like a windmill, would not its ends be moving many, many times the speed of light?

Chloe Arnold

Chloe Arnold

Answered question

2022-10-29

If there were a vast lever floating in free space, a rigid body with length greater than the width of a galaxy, made of a hypothetical material that could endure unlimited internal stress, and this lever began to rotate about its middle like a propeller so that a person looking at the universe would simply see it spinning at a gentle pace like a windmill, would not its ends be moving many, many times the speed of light?

Answer & Explanation

bigfreakystargl

bigfreakystargl

Beginner2022-10-30Added 23 answers

Of course it wouldn't - and to be honest here it's not even hard to imagine. If the lever was absolutely hard and could not bend (normally it must bend - the speed of waves in material is also limited) you'd need more energy to move it faster.To imagine this, take your bicycle and try to rotate one of its wheels. As you put your finger closer to he centre, you need stronger force (but same energy of course) to get the wheel moving. So the distance from the centre ( r) matters somehow obviously. And when you try to give the mass at the perimeter speed over c (lightspeed).However, what may be interesting for you, unreal objects may bypass the speed of light the way you tried to do it with lever. One example can be a laser beam, quickly swept over distant planet. The "laser dot" can move faster than light, but because it does not cary any information, this fact is useless (the light from laser still travels normally and takes its time to form the red dot.

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