If light travels at different speeds through different mediums, then it's possible to travel faster than the speed of light. Just have the light travel through something like water or glass because light travels through those things slower than it does through space. So even though it's impossible to travel at light speed in space, it might be possible to travel faster than the speed of light through water, but in space. Or...if light travels at the light speed from our perspective, then we must be traveling at the speed of light from the light's perspective. Even better: If the edge of the universe if expanding faster than the speed of light from our perspective, then we must be moving away from the edge of the universe faster than the speed of light from the universe's perspective. From the universe's perspective, we are moving faster than the speed of light! [spoiler] Unfortunately, light would also be moving faster than the speed of light from the universe's perspective. Damn light :( [/spoiler]

No, the only reason light goes "slower" in a medium is because the matter absorbs and redirects the photons as they travel. Essentially, light doesn't travel any slower, it just as to take the long way.

I think that's a common misconception because light actually does travel slower in different mediums such as water and glass and it's not because it's taking a longer path. Light is an electromagnetic wave (EM wave) and when these wave come in contact with an object (like glass), the waves cause the electrons of that object to oscillate. Since electrons have charge, they also have an electric field associated with them. But now that light is causing electrons to move about, the electric field associated with the electrons start to vary and because of that varying electric field, the electrons produce their own electromagnetic wave (light)...but these new EM waves from the atoms are out of phase with the EM waves of light (ex: one EM wave looks like cos(theta) while another EM wave which is out of phase looks like cos(theta + pi/2)). If you were to add all those EM waves together, then the net result (the superposition of the waves) would be an EM wave that has a slower phase speed than that of an EM wave in space. [spoiler]If what you said was true, then the amount of time it takes light to travel through an object would be completely random because the amount of time an atom takes to absorb and emit photons is almost random. So, sometimes while we're shining a light through an object, we would see the flow of light just stop for a very short time or get more intense...which is not the case in reality. [/spoiler]

Oh, I never knew that. Thanks for the info. But, doesn't that violate special relativity? After all, the velocity of light is a universal constant.

The [i]speed[/i] of light in a [i]vacuum[/i] is a universal constant. When people talk about the speed of light, they are almost always referring to the speed of light in a vacuum. Light can have different speeds through different objects but in a vacuum (space), it will always be the same and nothing can surpass it...not yet anyways. So, no, it doesn't violate special relativity because Einstein was referring to the speed of light in a vacuum.

Now this is a revelation.

Light to us is insanely fast. But in the whole grand scheme of the universe its slow as -blam!-.

But then *hits blunt* If light is the fastest. But slow in overall on the grand scheme of the universe. Doesn't that mean the universe is the fastest. [spoiler]ayyyyyy lmao [/spoiler]

Technically yes. The universe is expanding at faster then the speed of light.