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Its known that when you look up at the night sky at distant galaxies you are not seeing what they look like today, due to light speed being the ultimate speed limit, the light you see was actually emitted a very long time ago. So with that in mind:

If you were in a spaceship moving at light speed or very near to it, and you were traveling towards a distant galaxy. If you looked forward, would the galaxy appear to rotate faster as you closed the gap?

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  • $\begingroup$ When moving towards a galaxy AT the speed of light, you would not see it. Or anything. Because your very existence will have destroyed the whole universe. $\endgroup$
    – CuteKItty_pleaseStopBArking
    Commented Oct 28, 2021 at 22:17

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The view out the front window as you accelerate towards the speed of light is totally different than the Star Trek version.

There is angular compression, so distant objects cluster closer together, rather than zip back over your shoulders. As the objects move towards the “vanishing point”, they rotate so you are looking at their back side rather than their front side. All light is blue shifted and gets brighter. Your whole view shrinks into a blinding spot of ultraviolet rays. Then you die.

And that’s just warp 0.8

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    $\begingroup$ Gamma rays or merely ultraviolet at warp "only" 0.8? Not that it would make much of a difference to bliding or survivability. $\endgroup$
    – Oscar Lanzi
    Commented Nov 1, 2021 at 2:14
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    $\begingroup$ You’re right. No Gamma at Warp 0.8. Isaac Newton certainly would only get UV. Albert Einstein may see more shift due to time dilation? $\endgroup$
    – Woody
    Commented Nov 1, 2021 at 2:58
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    $\begingroup$ In fact the blue shift is less with Einstein due to time dilation. I calculate a factor of 3 at W0.8, which still gets you far enough into UV to do damage (otherwise visible photons raised to between 4 and 9 eV). $\endgroup$
    – Oscar Lanzi
    Commented Nov 1, 2021 at 12:20
  • $\begingroup$ You're right. Can you provide a reference? I was (obviously) unsuccessful with the physics. $\endgroup$
    – Woody
    Commented Nov 1, 2021 at 17:06
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    $\begingroup$ Thanks for walking me through that. $\endgroup$
    – Woody
    Commented Nov 1, 2021 at 20:26

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