To much free processing power IN MY MIND! (Physics question)

Colbaker

Colbaker

Colbaker

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Right so I have a not mentally demanding job so I tend to let my mind loose on weird stuff.

Tonight I was thinking, if we find a way to manipulate the Higgs field and therefore can tamper with the mass of everything, could you reduce the mass of something to zero? Logic would dictate the answer to be no as it would then not exist or would it?

Also if you could reduce the mass of the object to just above zero would this object (say a single particle) still be governed by the special relativity rules? What I am wondering is would this tiny mass particle have the ability to travel faster than light or as the mass is so low would it be unaffected by mavity I.e could it survive the transition into a black hole?

I understand there are a few questions in there and some probably have the answer "don't know". But I was wondering if there are any current theory's or hypothesise that May in some way answer the questions.
 
I thought (and bear in mind this is GCSE physics!) that the mass of everything in a vacuum was zero, so you could reduce the mass of everything much more easily than by messing with the Higgs field?
 
Colbaker said:
Also if you could reduce the mass of the object to just above zero would this object (say a single particle) still be governed by the special relativity rules? What I am wondering is would this tiny mass particle have the ability to travel faster than light or as the mass is so low would it be unaffected by mavity I.e could it survive the transition into a black hole?
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If it has rest mass, no matter how small, it cannot travel at light speed, and it certainly cannot travel faster. Low mass reduces the energy needed to get close to light speed, but not to nothing, as relativistic mass will still rise with velocity. IIRC, you need negative mass to travel faster than light speed. This has never been proven to be impossible, but never detected either.
 
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Colbaker said:
Right so I have a not mentally demanding job so I tend to let my mind loose on weird stuff.

Tonight I was thinking, if we find a way to manipulate the Higgs field and therefore can tamper with the mass of everything, could you reduce the mass of something to zero? Logic would dictate the answer to be no as it would then not exist or would it?

Also if you could reduce the mass of the object to just above zero would this object (say a single particle) still be governed by the special relativity rules? What I am wondering is would this tiny mass particle have the ability to travel faster than light or as the mass is so low would it be unaffected by mavity I.e could it survive the transition into a black hole?

I understand there are a few questions in there and some probably have the answer "don't know". But I was wondering if there are any current theory's or hypothesise that May in some way answer the questions.
Click to expand...

Manipulating the higgs field is pretty much at the edge of theoretical physics, so that part of your question is impossible to answer.

A low mass object will still be affected by a blackhole. If an object has a modicum of energy, a blackhole will still suck it in.
They're called black holes because light cannot escape from it, and light has extremely low mass.

Yes, it would probably still be governed by special relativity.

As for travelling faster than light? If you get it to truly 0 mass? But then there are funny questions like whether it will still exist at all.
 
Colbaker said:
Also if you could reduce the mass of the object to just above zero would this object (say a single particle) still be governed by the special relativity rules? What I am wondering is would this tiny mass particle have the ability to travel faster than light or as the mass is so low would it be unaffected by mavity I.e could it survive the transition into a black hole?
Click to expand...

It doesn't matter how small the mass of an object is, it will always be affected by mavity and special relativity. Even light, which has zero mass is affected.
Also, if a particle has zero mass, it must travel at c in every reference frame. This means it cannot have a rest frame, if it did, it would have infinite time dilation and length contraction, and from it's point of view, the universe basically wouldn't exist.
 
Ok so a Photon which is a particle of light is massless (maybe?), If it has no mass how can the gravitational pull effect it to such an extent?
 
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