Speed of light fibre optic signals which travel 30–40% slower at the speed of light through glass. There are different ways to determine the value of "c". One way is to measure the actual speed at which light waves propagate, which can be done in various astronomical and earth-based setups. However, it is also possible to determine "c" from other physical laws where it appears, for example, by determining the values of the electromagnetic constants "ε" and "μ" and using their relation to "c". Historically, the most accurate results have been obtained by separately determining the frequency and wavelength of a light beam,
Variable speed of light in 1957, and by several researchers starting from the late 1980s. The speed of light in vacuum instead is considered a constant, and defined by the SI as 299792458 m/s. Variability of the speed of light is therefore equivalent with a variability of the SI meter and/or the SI second. VSL should not be confused with faster than light theories; nor should it be confused with the fact that the speed of light in a medium is slower than the speed of light in vacuum depending on the medium's refractive index. While Einstein first mentioned a variable speed of light