Cloudscape

Perhaps matter cannot go faster than light because all matter is light.
E=mc^2, meaning that mass is in fact condensed energy; energy in its purest form is light. Perhaps, then, matter in fact consists of photons which have somehow become condensed into more complex structures.

Light moves at a constant speed in vacuum but can slow down in other media because it bounces back and forth from atom to atom. Scientists have even managed to freeze light altogether: firing it through hot rubidium atoms, they locked it in place by trapping it in between two control beams, which interacted with the rubidium atoms to create layers which reflected the photons back and forth. Clearly, it is possible for light to be still. Perhaps, matter is light that constantly rebounds in some kind of subatomic system, a solidified version of photon gas.

In photons, all energy is kinetic, equal to mc^2, while they have no mass-energy. If matter is condensed light, then its mass is actually condensed kinetic energy. In the form of light, all mass-energy is converted into kinetic energy; it is obvious then, that no matter can go faster than light, as for that to happen, more than 100% of its energy would have to be kinetic, meaning that its every photon would have to move in a line. In fact, because of this, matter that would move at the speed of light would necessarily disintegrate.
Since photons have maximum speed, then if all matter consists of photons, one can't really increase its speed; rather, when increasing the net speed of a mass, one employs part of the intrinsic speed of its photons, which is normally almost fully neutralized. This could be compared to the wind, which is caused by a difference in temperature: in this way, the speed of the individual atoms also causes the speed of the air itself, even though the speed of the atoms actually remains unchanged.

If this is true, one could say that the speed of light is absolute for similar reasons that the speed of sound is. Air atoms always move with about the same speed; but usually they move in a random way, so that they do not move on larger scale. When sound waves are produced, however, they collectively move at the speed of sound. This would be very similar to how photons would behave. According to the Bohm Interpretation, photons merely behave like a wave because they move collectively according in a wave function, much like air atoms; in fact, photon waves might actually be no more than an analogy to sound waves.

Remember that air atoms move at a speed of 330 meters per second even though it is more or less still on larger levels, aside from a much slower wind, and that the same counts for the atoms in any matter: all atoms move at their own speed of sound, that is to say, the speed at which sound travels through them. For iron, this is 5 kilometers per second, far higher than in air, and yet it manages to remain solid because of the forces that bind the atoms together, producing energies stronger than those of the atoms' movements. In diamond, this is even as high as 12 kilometers per second, though it is the hardest natural material. Perhaps there is a force that at some level could glue even photons together, despite their speed of 300.000 kilometers per second.

If air atoms were in a closed system, then over time all air atoms would have exactly the same speed, since their kinetic energy would have distributed over the entire system. Without interaction with other systems to cause differences in energy levels, their energy would become evenly spread in accordance to the law of entropy. This is what would have happened for the photons the universe would comprise: they would have exchanged their energy just as air atoms would, but over a period of thirteen billion years, until their speed would become almost perfectly constant. Because everything in the universe is made of the same photons, there was no outward influence to cause gradients in their kinetic energy.

However, like the speed of sound, the speed of light might only be absolute on a small scale. Even though air atoms themselves move at a speed of 300 meters per second, the air itself can move far faster than this speed, for instance, if the air is moved by an airplane, and perhaps photons might themselves move at a speed faster than 300.000 kilometers per second if moved by something larger — such as, for instance, the Big Bang.

The consensus among scientists is that the explanation for the faster-than-light expansion of the universe is that it is not the universe itself, but space which expands. Perhaps it is in fact the universe which expands, because the universe, like the airplane, is so large that the speed of light no longer applies.

Moreover, the Big Bang took place before the speed of light was established, since this happened only later, as the photons exchanged their energy until all had the same speed, at least, on a small level.

It may also be possible that all energy has the same constituents as photons are themselves composed of, which would likewise always have the speed of light. What those may be, however, is highly speculative, as they would be beyond the level even of elementary particles. If all elementary particles have the same basic constituents, however, this would explain how elementary particles can bring others into being. Photons themselves can be converted into any kinds of other particles, for instance. Usually, when two particles interact (read collide) with one another with enough energy, their kinetic energy is converted into other particles. However, if two photons interact with one another with enough energy, they are entirely converted into other particles. This is basically the time reversal transformation of the combination of matter and antimatter particles, which yields photons.

When photons are converted into matter, their energy would be transferred into these particles. Thus, it is obvious that the energy in the photons is of the same form of that of the particles, and therefore, has the same particles at some level. This would also mean that all energy is kinetic, since the energy of photons themselves is also entirely kinetic. That all forms of energy can be converted into one another seems to indicate that all energy is the same, or is comprised of the same. Otherwise, they could interact, but no more than this; they could not be turned into one another.

If matter consists of photons, speed cannot be added to the photons: they can only be brought to move more in the same direction, so that they no longer brake one another as much. The more the matter is sped up, the more the photons move in the same direction. This is much like the wind causes air atoms to move in the same direction, or a supersonic airplane does so: the air atoms are pushed in one direction against one another until they move in that direction, and so are the photons when matter is converted into energy.

At relativistic speeds, however, the matter is moved at such speed that its mechanisms break down; the matter starts to return more to its original state, in the form of a ray of light.

As the movement of the object as a whole increases, the movement of the particles relative to one another decreases, as the latter movement happens in another direction other than that of the movement of the object itself. The kinetic energy of the particles within the object becomes converted into the kinetic energy of the object as a whole.

As the photons are pushed against the light barrier, all particles approach the same speed, that is, the speed of light, and the closer they approach it, the more they slow down. The faster the particles are pushed against this barrier, the more they are slowed down. Particles that travel in the direction opposite to the direction of travel are least changed.

As the particles collide, the collisions in the direction of travel are decreased in force, while the collisions in the direction opposite the direction of travel are increased in force. This causes a net "force" in the direction opposite that of travel, although this force is arguably fictitious. It is another matter with width, since it is only axially, that is, in the direction of travel, that the particles approach the speed of light. Laterally, only the speeds of the particles are changed, while the ratios of speeds remains the same.

The particles of a still body can move freely in all directions, but in a relativistic body, they can barely but move in only one direction, since movement in any other direction would slow the body down, and the only way a body can have such speed is by having all its particles move almost straight in the same direction. The movement of the particles in the object is turned into the movement of the object itself. Because of this, the particles slow down relative to one another, so that their interactions also slow down, and therefore so does their entire physics and chemistry. It is because of this that time dilates as speed increases, since time, as well as speed, is itself but movement, and the former needs to be converted entirely into the latter in order for the speed of light to be achieved.

Time is the result of movement, but the movement that causes time almost ceases at speeds near that of light. In fact, time, as well as space, are both themselves but movement, for if nothing moved, everything would stay exactly where and when it was, so that space and time would become irrelevant: the only time would be now and the only space here, and so they would always stay. It is in this that time and space are one and the same.

Mainstream scientists have another way of explaining time dilation, yet I have come to the same conclusion through other premises, though using the same postulate that the speed of light is absolute. The speed of light is not absolute relative to any frame of reference, but it is nonetheless an absolute property. The speed of light is immanent in all energy, and therefore, the laws of physics are still invariable in any frame of reference and the Theory of Relativity is actually preserved, although reinterpreted. As the speed of light remains invariant, the other normally invariant properties like time and space also become variant at relativistic speeds.

If we base the "velocity" of an object not on how fast it goes relative to other objects but rather base it on its kinetic energy, then velocity is an absolute property rather than one that is relative. Velocity should be measured as how fast it goes relative to how fast it can go (that is, relative to the speed of light). An object can only achieve a certain velocity until all its energy has turned into kinetic energy. The absolute velocity of a non-relativistic object equals the square-root of two times its kinetic energy divided by its mass. Velocity is a property of the object itself, but one that is very hard to measure.

If there is a change, then there is obviously a rate at which this change happens. As gravity causes a change in gravitational potential, then it must therefore have a speed of propagation. This speed would be greater than that of light.
If the influence of gravity was instantaneous, it would be acausal. Einstein himself did not believe in a force acting from a distance.

http://ldolphin.org/vanFlandern/gravityspeed.html

We could find evidence of whether the speed of gravity exceeds that of light or not by observing interacting galaxies: as galaxies merge, the tidal forces between them become increasingly strong. If these tidal forces have a lag, this means gravity needs time to travel.
Another indication could be giant diffuse galaxies (GDGs): these can be some 6 million light years or 1,8 million parsecs in diameter, gargantuan compared to the 100.000 light years of the Milky Way galaxy. Galaxies can move at a speed of hundreds of kilometers per second, so if GDG's can move at equal speeds, it's essential that the speed of gravity would exceed that of light, as GDG's could otherwise not be kept together.
Why? Consider a galaxy of 6 million light years in diameter whose center moves at a speed of 100 kilometers per second. If gravity travels at the speed of light, then by the time the star at one end will be attracted by the center of the galaxy only within 3 million years. By this time, as 100 km/s is one three thousandths of the speed of light, it has traveled thousand light years. As a result, giant diffuse galaxies would have to be very elongated and diffuse at one end, and very compacted and dense at the other, so that it would have a distinctly oval shape, leaving behind stars in a comet’s tail. Thus, unless giant diffuse galaxies barely move, the speed of gravity must be greater than the speed of light.