Question

The guru of a yogi lives in a Himalayan cave, \[1000\,{\text{km}}\] away from the house of the yogi. The yogi claims that whenever he thinks about his guru, the guru immediately knows about it. Calculate the minimum possible time interval between the yogi thinking about the guru and the guru knowing about it.

Answer 1

Hint: First of all, we will assume the thought of the yogi travelling to the guru, propagates at the speed of light. After that, we will use the formula of velocity and manipulate accordingly by substituting the required values to obtain the answer.

Complete step by step answer:
There is a guru and a yogi. The yogi lives in a Himalayan cave. The distance of separation between the guru and the yogi is \[1000\,{\text{km}}\]. According to the yogi who claims that whenever he thinks about his guru, the guru immediately knows about it.We are asked to calculate the minimum possible time interval between the yogi thinking about the guru and the guru knowing about it.

To begin with, we know that in this case, we are talking about thought. In the universe, there is nothing comparable to the speed of light. The speed of light is the fastest in our universe. Let us assume that the thought travels at the speed of light. The magnitude of the speed of light is a huge factor.

Let us proceed to solve the problem. We have the distance of separation between the yogi and the guru. The thought travels at the speed of light, as we can assume.
The distance is given as \[1000\,{\text{km}}\].
We will convert it into an S.I system of units.
$1000\,{\text{km}} \\
\Rightarrow 1000 \times {10^3}\,{\text{m}}$

We know a formula which gives the velocity, which is shown below:
\[v = \dfrac{d}{t}\] …… (1)
Where,
\[v\] indicates the velocity of light.
\[d\] indicates the distance of separation.
\[t\] indicates the time taken.

Now, we substitute the required values in the equation (1) and we get:
$v = \dfrac{d}{t} \\
\Rightarrow 3 \times {10^8} = \dfrac{{1000 \times {{10}^3}}}{t} \\
\Rightarrow t = \dfrac{{1000 \times {{10}^3}}}{{3 \times {{10}^8}}} \\
\therefore t = \dfrac{1}{{300}}\,{\text{s}} \\$
Hence, the minimum possible time interval between the yogi thinking about the guru and the guru knowing about it is \[\dfrac{1}{{300}}\,{\text{s}}\].

Note:While solving this question, most of the students seem to have confusion regarding the type of the question. They think that it is a philosophical question. However, it is not. We should remember that the thought which is very fast, but still cannot exceed the speed of light. So, we assume that though travels at the speed of light. Also, we should remember that it is necessary to take all the units involved in the formula, same.