Could you see dinosaurs by getting 100 million light years from Earth and using a very powerful telescope?
Since that light would have emanated from Earth 100 million light years before (assuming there were dinosaurs on Earth 100 million years ago)? I don't see why not. Now all I need is a way to instantly get 100 million light years from Earth and a telescope somehow powerful enough to view small details on Earth from 100 million light years away. Difficult, but it sounds easier than building a time machine.
Sam2010-10-09T11:47:04Z
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The best theoretical way to accomplish this would be to find a black hole that is 50 million light years away and to look at the light that is slingshoted back to us. Light that left the Earth 100 million years ago would have traveled out to the black hole, slung around it, headed back, and would just now be arriving back at Earth for us to see.
Now for the bad news. Almost all light from the Earth is reflected sunlight. The sun can only put out so many photons of light. A certain percentage are absorbed by the two trips through the atmosphere (one trip to hit the dinosaur, and another after it's reflected off). Another percentage is lost as scattered light and not reflected off the dinosaur. Still more light is lost as it impacts the interstellar gases. Finally, we are looking at very unidirectional light, which is a very small percentage of all the light that was reflected in the first place (most went off in other directions).
What this boils down to is that we'd be lucky to spot 1 photon of light that has made the trip, not to mention the millions of photons we'd need to get anything resembling a picture. Even if we could get enough photons, we'd be exposing that photo for such a long period of time, that the movement of all the dinosaurs would blur together.
No, because of the fact dinosaurs died out sixty 5 million years in the past. you would be approximately 5 million years too overdue. in case you have been between sort of sixty 5 million and 230 million gentle years away, you're able to certainly see dinosaurs on the earth, in concept. In prepare, actual obstacles on how telescopes artwork could recommend that resolving a individual dinosaur at such an excellent distance could require a ridiculously super telescope. No, larger than that. we are speaking reflecting dishes the size of finished famous individual structures right here.
Sorry mate, it's impossible (as far as we know) to travel faster than light. In fact, it's exactly as impossible as building a time machine - almost any FTL drive can be rewired to make a time machine, and vice versa. If you travelled 100 million light years from Earth at near lightspeed, it would take you 100 million years, and all you'd see is what happened shortly after you left.
On the other hand, if some aliens left a sufficiently large mirror in the right place 50 million years ago, then yes, you could see dinosaurs. So don't lose hope.