![]() Galileo and an assistant each stood on a different hilltop. In the 19th century, James Bradley measured the speed of light by observing an aberration. In the 18th century, Ole Roemer calculated the speed of light by observing the eclipses of Jupiter’s moon, Io. The final step is to calculate the total distance that the light has traveled within the time. Galileo Galilei was the first person to attempt to measure the speed of light, in the early 1600s. In the 17th century, Galileo attempted to measure the speed of light by timing how long it took for light to travel between two hills. One night over drinks at a conference in San Jose, Miles. ![]() You can use our time lapse calculator to help you with this calculation.įor this example, the time that the light has traveled is 100 seconds.Ĭalculate the distance that the light has traveled. From Galileo to today, how physicists have measured and modified the speed at which light travels. Unlike looking at the speed of a sports car or a train, the speed of light is extremely fast, so the time interval that we look at is usually measured in seconds instead of minutes and hours. The next step is to know how much time the light has traveled. Hence, the speed of light is 299,792,458 m/s.ĭetermine the time that the light has traveled. Firstly, the physical consequence of traveling at the speed of light is that your mass becomes infinite and you slow down. You can perform the calculation in three steps:Īs mentioned, the speed of light is the fastest speed in the universe, and it is always a constant in a vacuum. Hence, let's have a look at the following example: As the speed of light is constant, calculating the speed of light usually falls on calculating the distance that light can travel in a certain time period.
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