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Originally posted by teflonian
I think he was being a bit sarcastic there Knifemissle... I am suprised he was so kind in his response to your very patronising words.
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Really? It seriously doesn't look sarcastic to me. It even has a winky smiley on it!
If it were just a small or simple mistake, I would simply have corrected it and moved on (nothing to see here...). However, when a post is
that dense with egregious misinformation and as long and detailed as it was, that's not just a small or simple mistake. I was only a
little patronizing, and there was no flaming whatsoever!
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It is my belief that it is more or less a given that what we post is information to the best of our own personal knowledge. I do agree with you on the point that we should take the time to correct what we believe to be misinformation. Take for example, your own post...
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I don't entirely agree with you.
saltfish's post is so amazingly erroneous that I suspect it's mostly his own pet theories based on what little he does know or has heard, which is fine and not something I would ever condemn. However, I think we all recognize when we're sure of something or not and to post speculative information as if you're sure of yourself is what I'm trying to dissuade.
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Your point may be valid in a vacuum, but light does travel slower in air, glass, water, or any other medium besides a perfect vacuum.
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Yeah, this has been brought up in
Tilted Knowledge before and, I think, it was claimed that this happend because of the interaction between the light and the constituent particles of the medium. They absorb and re-emit the light and this interaction takes time. I'm not certain of this but I'm willing to take his word for it, for now. This would mean that light still travels at
c in between the constituent particles and only it's
macroscopic speed is below
c. This would explain why this phenomenon has no bearing on relativistic effects.
Special Relativity is based on how light travels at a constant speed,
c,
regardless of which reference frame you observe it from!
Still, what you say is correct, light travels less than
c through a medium...