ELI5) Does displacement have a speed?

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So if i say drop a giant iceberg big enough to make a visible difference in the water level of the ocean, would all the levels around the earth rise simultaneously? or would a wave of heightened water level travel across the ocean to the other side, suggesting tides dont exist ofcourse.

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In: Physics

3 Answers

Anonymous 0 Comments

So here’s the thing. *Nothing* occurs simultaneously (except perhaps for some weird quantum entanglement on a sub-atomic level).

No “thing” can move, under any circumstances, beyond the speed limit of light speed. Everything, literally everything, propagates through a medium at some speed or another and that speed is never higher than “c”.

So yes, a wave of water would propagate through the world’s oceans, either above or below sea level.

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