- Dec 14, 2018
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Mathematically, this contradicts your previous statement. As you have pointed out, you can only measure light by reflection. This is because you can't synchronize a timing device at the source and origin, because as soon as you move one of them, their reference point changes. So reflected light that originates and ends at the same location is the only way to do it.also It is interesting that we can’t see any planets further than 6000 light years away. Planets are seen with reflective light which we do know is 186,000 miles per second.
So let's assume that you put a mirror on the moon, and for ease of calculation assume that the moon is exactly 186,282 miles away. (299,792 kilometers) So you do your experiment and determine that it takes exactly two seconds for the light to be reflected back to you.
By your own statements, you don't know how long it took to get there, but somehow you know how long it took to get back. If the times were different, you wouldn't actually know either speed. It could take 3 times as long to get there. (1.5 seconds --> Moon / 0.5 seconds return), or it could be (0.5 seconds --> moon / 1.5 seconds return). All you know is the total time. Maybe it's the reflected light that is instant and it takes a full 2 seconds to get there.
You could apply this reasoning to other waves too. How do you know that a radio wave (which scientists believe also travels at the speed of light) isn't going 10x the speed of light most of the way, and then slows down to a crawl when it's a few hundred feet from your antenna?
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