Magueijo, a 40-year old native of Portugal, puts forth the heretical
idea that in the very early days of the universe light traveled
faster—an idea that if proven could dethrone Einstein and forever
change our understanding of the universe. He is a pioneer of the
varying speed of light (VSL) theory of cosmology -an alternative to the
more mainstream theory of cosmic inflation- which proposes that the
speed of light in the early universe was of 60 orders of magnitude
faster than its present value.
Solving the most intractable problems of cosmology in one brilliant
leap, Magueijo’s varying-speed-of-light theory (VSL) would have
stunning implications for space travel, black holes, time dilation, and
string theory—and could help uncover the grand unified theory that
ultimately eluded Einstein.
Joao Magueijo's radical ideas intend to turn that Einsteinian dogma
on its head. Marueijo is trying to pick apart one of Einstein’s most
impenetrable tenets, the constancy of the speed of light. This idea of
a constant speed (about 3×106 meters/second) -is known as the universal
speed limit. Nothing can, has, or ever will travel faster than light.
Magueijo -who received his doctorate from Cambridge, has been a
faculty member at
Princeton and Cambridge, and is currently a professor at Imperial
College, London- says: not so. His VSL theory presupposes a speed of light that can be energy or time-space
In his fist book, Faster than the Speed of Light, Magueijo
leads laymen readers into the abstract realm of theoretical physics,
based on several well known, as well as obscure, thinkers. The VSL
model was first proposed by John Moffat, a Canadian scientist, in 1992.
carefully builds the foundations for a discussion of Big Bang
cosmology, and then segues into the second half of the book, which is
devoted to VSL theory.
Like most radical, potentially seminal thinkers, Magueijo shakes
the foundations of the physics community, while irritating off many of
his fellow scientists. VSL purposes to solve the problems at which all
cosmologists are forever scratching: those inscrutable conceptual
puzzles that surround the Big Bang. Currently many of these problems
have no widely accepted solutions.
Could Einstein be wrong and Magueijo right? Is he a gadfly or a true, seminal genius? Time will tell.
Posted by Casey Kazan.
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