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Why can't one-way speed of light be measured using a timer start that is electronically connected at midpoint?

I'm sure I'm missing something, but why can't an experiment be built with two timers that are connected electronically by a start switch half-way between light start and stop points? Would not using using a different medium than light to sync the clocks avoid errors from multidirectional light travel and time dilation?

Qmechanic
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Clayton Chavira
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  • I can't see why this question should be closed. There are peer-reviewed research papers in physics about the 1-way vs. 2-way speed of light. Isotropy of space is taken as a postulate when we derive special relativity, and it's perfectly legitimate to ask what happens if we drop this assumption. – user34722 Mar 25 '23 at 00:00
  • Perhaps the original poster of the question can give a bit of context, like what the one-way speed of light means. Many people haven't heard of this (unless they've watched https://youtu.be/pTn6Ewhb27k) – user34722 Mar 25 '23 at 00:03
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    More on one-way speed of light – Qmechanic Mar 25 '23 at 08:58
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    Does this answer your question? What is wrong with these ways of measuring one-way speed of light? – Dale Mar 25 '23 at 11:34
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    @user34722 it is a legitimate question which has been answered over and over and over again. It is about as frequently duplicated as a question can be. I can only link to one duplicate in the official close reason, but see the tag search in Qmechanic’s comment for many others – Dale Mar 25 '23 at 11:38
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    I see. The original reason for closure said that the question was off-topic for Physics StackExchange. Looks like that's been updated. – user34722 Mar 25 '23 at 16:35

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