Warp Drive May Be More Feasible Than Thought, Scientists Say

[KalElFan]

[note crossposts]

A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...

http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/

It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
So running with that and speculating...

10c would still be limiting beyond stars more than, say, 50
light years away (10 years return trip plus whatever time
spent there; also 10 years to get data back). But trips to Mars
and the like would be a couple of minutes if the bubble and
space warp needn't involve any issues equivalent to the
spacecraft speeding up and slowing down. It says that the
spacecraft is in the bubble of normal space, and only the
space exterior to that is manipulated.

I'm also wondering if this concept might more easily open it
up to the next step, theoretically, which would be establishing
permanent warp bubbles on each end and then somehow
connecting those, yielding a wormhole or equivalent. I
seem to recall that theoretical technology was also limited
by energy requirements, which this new approach seems to
have all but resolved based on the description (again, in
theory -- the energy requirements went from Jupiter-sized
to space probe sized according to the article.)

Maybe we'll know more when Star Trek 5 (in the latest
continuity) comes out in 2025. :-)

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 9/17/12 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
> [note crossposts]
>
> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>
> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/
>
>
> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
> equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
> at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
> So running with that and speculating...

Actually, if you read closely it talks about using the MASS ENERGY
equivalent of Voyager 1 (rather than the mass-energy equivalent of
Jupiter), which would be beyond our current civilization's ability to
generate in reasonable situations, but does put it in the range of
"plausible for very high tech society" instead of "only for Sufficiently
Advanced beings".


--
Sea Wasp
/^\
;;;
Website: http://www.grandcentralarena.com Blog:
http://seawasp.livejournal.com

[Wayne Throop]

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/

: It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the equivalent
: of ten times the speed of light would be feasible, at energy
: requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.

So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things.
Which is odd, because I thought it was a relative of alcubirer warp,
which is definitely based on general relativity.

( I say it's a "relativity is wrong" concept, since a speed limit
based on energy seems to say there's a prefered frame. There are
maybe ways to account for that, but mostly... no. )

[KalElFan]

"Wayne Throop" wrote in message news:13479...@sheol.org...

> "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
>
>> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/
>>
>> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the equivalent
>> of ten times the speed of light would be feasible, at energy
>> requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
>

> So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things...

Conceptually, it's not FTL it's warping space so that the
distance is reduced. What's not clear to me is whether the
ship in the "normal space" bubble needs to be moving at
close to c, or conceivably only a fraction of c, to achieve
the equivalent of 10c that the article mentions.

(Also, for the inevitable foxnews derangement syndrome
posts to rasw and sp, space.com was the FOX source and
similar articles are also popping up elsewhere including
on the cbs site.)

[KalElFan]

"Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" wrote in message
news:k381q5$bri$1...@dont-email.me...

> Actually, if you read closely it talks about using the MASS ENERGY
> equivalent of Voyager 1 (rather than the mass-energy equivalent of
> Jupiter), which would be beyond our current civilization's ability to
> generate in reasonable situations, but does put it in the range of
> "plausible for very high tech society" instead of "only for Sufficiently
> Advanced beings".

Okay, but I don't think that distinction quite captures the huge
difference as well as the math does. The mass of Jupiter is
1.8986x10^27 kg according to wiki. Assuming I have the zeros
right that's...

1,898,600,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg or 1.8986 octillion kg.

It's only 722kg for Voyager 1, so Jupiter is about 2.6 septillion times
bigger. The magnitude of the difference is enormous, and the 722kg
seems trivial by comparison. It seemed plausible to me that 722kg
might be the weight of the material in one big H-bomb for example,
whereas if Jupiter-size is required it's probably what Michio Kaku
would classify as a Class II Impossibility, or at the very least a very
high Class I.

I decided to check the energies involved a bit further. Anyone feel
free to correct this. I see a wiki reference (at the same URL below,
in the second paragraph) that says a hydrogen bomb can yield a
theoretical maximum of 25 terajoules of energy per kilogram. So
that'd be 25*722 =18050 terajoules, or 18.05 petajoules, as the
equivalent energy for the mass of Voyager 1. This URL also says
the U.S. has produced a 100 petajoule bomb, and the Soviets had
one that was twice as big (so 200 petajoules) and would've been
420 petajoules in its full form:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon_yield

Directing and/or harnessing those kinds of energy levels for the
purposes of the warp drive, as opposed to blowing something up
real good, would be a major challenge. But at least we seem
to be talking the energy equivalent of one big H-bomb, rather
than 2.6 septillion big H-bombs.

[Lofty Goat]

On Mon, 17 Sep 2012 16:39:33 -0400, Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor) wrote:

> On 9/17/12 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
>> [note crossposts]
>>
>> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>>
>> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-
feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/

This looks like a rehash of the Alcubiere "drive", which is a really nifty
idea until one steps out of the spaceship. Then one experiences tidal
force that would destroy anything, and leave the bits and pieces back at
their point of origin.

I want to go faster than light as much as anyone does, but this doesn't
look promising.

Wait. It /is/ the Alcubiere drive. [sigh]

--
Goat

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

That's per kilogram of BOMB.

Here we're talking about the mass-energy of the WHOLE THING, the
thousand kilograms or so converted directly by E=MC^2. That's... a lot
more. 2.1481 x 10^4 megatons, roughly. If we're talking about
something half that mass, okay, it's a mere ten thousand megatons or
around 4.5 x 10^19 joules.

[Joe Pfeiffer]

The big red flag for me is "This ring, potentially made of exotic
matter...". So it's "if this form of matter, which we have no reason to
believe exists (and the story doesn't even say which flavor of exotic
matter is needed), then here is something cool we can do with it". That
makes it pretty totally speculative, in the sense that there is no
reason to think it could actually happen.

[MITO MINISTER]

On Sep 18, 5:23 am, "KalElFan" <kalel...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote:
> [note crossposts]
>
> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>

> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feas...

>
> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
> equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
> at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
> So running with that and speculating...
>
> 10c would still be limiting beyond stars more than, say, 50
> light years away (10 years return trip plus whatever time
> spent there; also 10 years to get data back).  But trips to Mars
> and the like would be a couple of minutes if the bubble and
> space warp needn't involve any issues equivalent to the
> spacecraft speeding up and slowing down.  It says that the
> spacecraft is in the bubble of normal space, and only the
> space exterior to that is manipulated.
>
> I'm also wondering if this concept might more easily open it
> up to the next step, theoretically, which would be establishing
> permanent warp bubbles on each end and then somehow
> connecting those, yielding a wormhole or equivalent.  I
> seem to recall that theoretical technology was also limited
> by energy requirements, which this new approach seems to
> have all but resolved based on the description (again, in
> theory -- the energy requirements went from Jupiter-sized
> to space probe sized according to the article.)
>
> Maybe we'll know more when Star Trek 5 (in the latest
> continuity) comes out in 2025.  :-)

Uh, it's all about the details.

[Wayne Throop]

:: So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things...

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: Conceptually, it's not FTL it's warping space so that the distance is
: reduced.

You're missing the point. Whether the distance is reduced, or if pixies
turn it into tachyon correspndence particles, or if, unlike either
of those, it's an alcubiere warp, the fact that they are saying it's
limited to 10c without saying wrt what, strongly implies a prefered frame.
Or to summarize, it's one of those "relativity is wrong" things.

: What's not clear to me is whether the ship in the "normal space" bubble

: needs to be moving at close to c

Sigh. Relativity means never being able to say you are "close to c".
The whole concept of "close to c" *requires* a "wrt what" to make any
sense whatsoever in relativity. In relativity, c is invariant,
and no matter how you accelerate to try to catch up with a photon,
it'll *always* be showing you it's heels at the same rate as ever,
and so it'll always be receding from you at c, and you're no closer
to c than when you started. No matter how you go, there c is.

And yes, that means all those Analog stories from the 70s about needing
to get "close to c" before the tachyon whatsis would work (tachyons
being big in the 70s and all) and you could "tunnel" ftl, were bogus as
bogus can be, and were just another form of saying "relativity is wrong".
Mind you, I got nothing against relativity being wrong, but they seemed
to claim it was compatible, which it ain't.

And no, Niven's attempt in "One Face" to say that the universe as a
whole is the wrt what, doesn't fix that, since that's just relying on
Mach's Principle, and as we all know

Von dem Mach'schen Prinzip sollte man eigentlich
uberhaupt nich mech sprechen.
--- Einstein, 1954, letter to a colleague
see Pais, "Subtle is the Lord", p288
(any errors in transcription probably mine)

ie, it's Just Yet Another Way to say "relativity is wrong".

Now, alcubiere warp or wormholes *can* be done such that you've still
got relativity. But, of course, noth of those require exotic matter with
negative energy, which may be incompatible with other bits of physics,
casimir effect notwithstanding.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casimir_effect#Wormholes

And you've still got to deal with the "ftl+relativity = time travel" issue.

There is no pain you are receding
A distant ship's smoke on the horizon
You are only coming through in waves
Your lips move but I can't hear what you say
--- Pink Floyd, singing about lightspeed invariance

"Luckily, as all bean farmers know, Phaseolus limensis perishes
when exposed to dry air and overly nitrogenous soil."
"But you hit it with a hammer."
--- Jimmy Neutron and Carl Wheezer
(explaining how to defeat a
giant mutant man-eating lima bean)

[Wayne Throop]

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: It's only 722kg for Voyager 1, so Jupiter is about 2.6 septillion

: times bigger. The magnitude of the difference is enormous, and the
: 722kg seems trivial by comparison. It seemed plausible to me that
: 722kg might be the weight of the material in one big H-bomb

First, kg is a unit of mass, not weight. Just saying.

Second, the largest bomb ever detonated by humans is
the so-called "Tsar Bomba", which was under 60 megatons,
but the energy equivalent of 722 kg is 15 gigatons.

If I've done the arithmetic correctly; "if I'm wrong please correct".

Not that that invalidates your main point, the absolute punyness
of 722 kg compared to jupiter's mass.

This is my stop
Got to get off
I might go pop
Excuse me
Excuse me
--- Daria Morgendorffer

[KalElFan]

"Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" wrote in message

news:k38pj4$an2$1...@dont-email.me...

> That's per kilogram of BOMB.
>
> Here we're talking about the mass-energy of the WHOLE THING, the
> thousand kilograms or so converted directly by E=MC^2.

Which is what I thought the "theoretical maximum" in the article was
referring to, but you're right it doesn't. Since the point here was to try
to equate the required energy to something we're familiar with in terms
of our existing technological capability, here's a wiki excerpt that can
provide an adjustment to my estimate of one H-bomb.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mass%E2%80%93energy_equivalence#Efficiency

... In nuclear fusion... no more than about 0.03% of the total mass of
the entire weapon is released as usable energy..."

So if we conceptually thought of Voyager 1's 722kg as H-bomb material,
which is what I was doing, the 18.05 petajoules I arrived at was only .03%
of the required energy. That implies 18.05/.0003 = just over 60,000 PJ,
or 6*10^19 of energy, required for the proposed/speculated warp drive.
That's close to what you arrived at here:

> ... That's... a lot more. 2.1481 x 10^4 megatons, roughly. If we're

> talking about something half that mass, okay, it's a mere ten thousand
> megatons or around 4.5 x 10^19 joules.

Getting back to this page and its list of H-bombs:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_weapon_yield

The Castle Bravo device was the largest US test and yielded about
63 petajoules. Almost a thousand of those might be required. The
Tsar Bomb was more than 3 times as big, so perhaps only 300 of
those would be required. (Wayne in the other post arrived at 250
Tsar bombs.)

So my one H-bomb estimate was wrong (way low,) but I think the key
here is that the required energy may nevertheless be what a few
hundred H-bombs could produce. That's not an inconceivable amount
of energy, whereas 2.6 septillion times that (Jupiter-sized equivalent)
is unfathomable.

[KalElFan]

"Lofty Goat" wrote in message
news:zNmdnUyEb6MUR8rN...@giganews.com...

> This looks like a rehash of the Alcubiere "drive", which is a really
> nifty idea until one steps out of the spaceship. Then one experiences
> tidal force that would destroy anything, and leave the bits and pieces
> back at their point of origin.
>
> I want to go faster than light as much as anyone does, but this
> doesn't look promising.
>
> Wait. It /is/ the Alcubiere drive. [sigh]

Duh. The article *says* it's a refinement of Alcubierre (two r's).
It mentions that was 1994 but had the Jupiter-size mass-energy
requirements. There are obviously other technological issues,
but the energy requirements being reduced to something we
can produce now is a huge leap and removes arguably the
biggest obstacle that the 1994 theory had. It's 250 Tsar bombs
versus 2.6 septillion times that number.

[KalElFan]

On sci.physics "john" wrote in message
news:a9a00a78-9abc-408a...@googlegroups.com...

> On Monday, 17 September 2012 16:11:24 UTC-6, David Johnston wrote:
>
>> [The "exotic matter" is] just an arbitrary substance with the right
>> properties to make the math work.
>
> Hey!!
> Like Dark Matter!!

My high school physics teacher circa 1973 used to ask "What do
physicists do when they don't know something?" so he could give
the answer "They make it up." He'd even introduce the constant
c that way.

Postulating something like exotic matter or dark matter or dark
energy, when we don't really have a clue what any of those are
or might be or how they work, is a problem with any hypothesis
or theory of letter representing a constant. Still, if the math of
a theoretical warp drive says that the equivalent of 250 Tsar
bombs of energy is required, versus 2.6 septillion times that
when it was proposed 18 years ago, it's theoretical progress,
eh? :-)

[KalElFan]

"Wayne Throop" wrote in message news:13479...@sheol.org...

> "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com> [wrote]

>
>> It's only 722kg for Voyager 1, so Jupiter is about 2.6 septillion
>> times bigger. The magnitude of the difference is enormous, and the
>> 722kg seems trivial by comparison. It seemed plausible to me that
>> 722kg might be the weight of the material in one big H-bomb
>
> First, kg is a unit of mass, not weight. Just saying.

Right, but it's common to refer to a 722kg mass as weighing that,
whereas one doesn't think of a planet's weight and hence mass is
the term used. Point conceded that mass is technically the correct
term for the 722kg as well though.

> Second, the largest bomb ever detonated by humans is the
> so-called "Tsar Bomba", which was under 60 megatons, but
> the energy equivalent of 722 kg is 15 gigatons.

The 15 gigatons being 15,000 megatons, which is 250 times
the Tsar bomb's 60 megatons (250 x 60 = 15,000). This is
arithmetic as you said, but it's the "number of h-bombs" that
people can relate to because we're already capable of that
technologically.

> Not that that invalidates your main point, the absolute punyness
> of 722 kg compared to jupiter's mass.

Yes, instead of "250 Tsar bombs" or "less than 1,000 H-bombs,"
the energy requirements for this warp drive were "2.6 septillion"
times those numbers of H-bombs back in 1994 when the warp
drive was proposed. The 250 or < 1,000 would be within our
technology, though directing or harnessing it is a big challenge.
Two septillion times that is unfathomable.

[KalElFan]

"Joe Pfeiffer" wrote in message news:1bfw6go...@pfeifferfamily.net...

> The big red flag for me is "This ring, potentially made of exotic
> matter...". So it's "if this form of matter, which we have no reason to
> believe exists (and the story doesn't even say which flavor of exotic
> matter is needed), then here is something cool we can do with it". That
> makes it pretty totally speculative, in the sense that there is no
> reason to think it could actually happen.

John was comparing it to Dark Matter though, and wasn't this issue
of how to build the ring the same in 1994? Yes, it's an obstacle, but
the septillions of H-bombs of energy was a conspicuously bigger one,
no?

[KalElFan]

"Wayne Throop" wrote in message news:13479...@sheol.org...

> "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com> [wrote]

>
>> Conceptually, it's not FTL it's warping space so that the distance
>> is reduced.
>

> You're missing the point. Whether the distance is reduced... the fact

> that they are saying it's limited to 10c without saying wrt what,
> strongly implies a prefered frame. Or to summarize, it's one of those
> "relativity is wrong" things.

But the"strongly implies" clashes with your "relativity is wrong". I
also see another post that postulates how it might not be that,
and another speculating on how it might or might not affect
causality. I was also speculating whether it might make creation
of a wormhole more feasible, since a theoretival version of that
also required enormous, unfathomable energies.

>> What's not clear to me is whether the ship in the "normal space"
>> bubble needs to be moving at close to c
>

> Relativity means never being able to say you are "close to c".

> The whole concept of "close to c" *requires* a "wrt what" ...

Right, but as with your kg is mass nitpick, the context here
makes these kinds of points pointless. The context is our
frame of reference, which is by an large universally the
same wherever you and I and everyone else on planet earth
are. So "close to c" means the speed it would take to have
a spaceship plausibly go to a neary star and back within a
lifetime and so on.

As support for your theoretical nitpick about whether the
proposed warp drive violates relativity, the discussion may
be relevant. But I've already blown that off as something
your own wording and other posts have speculated on. It
may or may not be an insurmountable problem, or suggest
the theory is impossible, just like the exotic matter might.
But the warp drive update (if correct) does solve the energy
requirement issue.

[snip more out-of-context discussion, in terms of the main
improvement in the new warp drive article]

But I will quote your part here:

> And yes, that means all those Analog stories from the 70s about

> needing to get "close to c" before the tachyon whatsis would work...

And yada yada yada yes science fiction is not science fact, and it
never was and never will be. But much of science fiction does draw
from improvements in scientific knowledge and understanding, and
it also inspires new advances and people going into science-related
jobs and so on. Star Trek probably did more to popularize the concept
of warp drive and many other technologies than anything else has.
Virtually all the articles on this mention Star Trek. (Which is why I
think the crossposts are appropriate.)

[dx...@albury.nospam.net.au]

KalElFan wrote:

<Snip>

> Conceptually, it's not FTL it's warping space so that the
> distance is reduced.

What intrigues me is what happens when space is being warped by several
space ships travelling in different directions *at* *the* *same*
*time!!* e.g. if one space ship wanted to travel from the bottom of one
of the spiral arms of our galaxy to the top, and at the same time a
second space ship wanted to travel from the centre of our galaxy to the
outer edge along the spiral arm, and a third space ship wanted to travel
from the inner edge of one of the spiral arms of our galaxy to its outer
edge, i.e. in three dimensions at the same time.

Space must be warped really, really, strangely!!

Daniel

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Tue, 18 Sep 2012 21:58:37 +1000) it happened
"Dani...@teranews.com" <dx...@albury.nospam.net.au> wrote in
<WlZ5s.1291$TA5...@newsfe05.iad>:

I read the paper, and here is a NASA Dr (!) with an other way to bind SciFi people
to 'NASA", he prososes an experiment but does not do it.
I think he should do his experiment first and then blabber about why it does not work if he has nothing better to do.
It is not that NASA does NOT have the equipment to do this very simple experiment that he
says will have a similar effect as the first working nuclear fission pile had on humanity.
Until he does that failed experiment it is just an other Phd tissue paper.
I am talking about this paper:
google
20110015936_2011016932.pdf
Warp Field Mechanics 101
Dr. Harold "Sonny" White
NASA Johnson Space Center
2101 NASA Parkway, MC EP4
Houston, TX 77058

Why do I think his experiment will fail? In fact I dunno, but in my theory putting more pepper on a pepperoni pizza makes it lift of.
I need a $$$$$$$$$$$$$$$$ grant to do the experiment.

But, hey,. they should have all the stuff, so what is he waiting for?

[Walter Bushell]

In article <abpf6d...@mid.individual.net>,

"KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote:

> [note crossposts]
>
> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>
> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than
> -thought-scientists-say/
>

Warp drive may be easier than though, but only for those for whom
thinking is very difficult.

--
This space unintentionally left blank.

[Nadegda]

Walter Bushell formulated the question :

Telling tales on yourself?

[Wiseguy]

Walter Bushell <pr...@panix.com> wrote in
news:proto-5D6523....@news.panix.com:

Not to mention spell-checking.

[Nadegda]

Proper spelling is essential to effective communication.

[Hunter]

------
This is why I love science fiction, including sci fi that is set two,
three, four hundred years in the future. It pushes the imagination to
inspire people to see if it is possible. Science fiction only set
about 50 years in the future is nice but it doesn't push the
possibilities to the limit.

------>Hunter

"No man in the wrong can stand up against
a fellow that's in the right and keeps on acomin'."

-----William J. McDonald
Captain, Texas Rangers from 1891 to 1907

[KalElFan]

"Dani...@teranews.com" wrote in message
news:WlZ5s.1291$TA5...@newsfe05.iad...

> What intrigues me is what happens when space is being warped
> by several space ships travelling in different directions *at* *the*

> *same* *time!!* ...

By then they'll have built the Intragalactic Highway System, with
appropriate warp drive on- and off-ramps, and bridges where their
paths intersect and so on. :-)

My last response to Wayne got sent out with some typos and a
few edits missing, but for example at one point I said science
fiction is not science fact and never will be. That holds, because
by definition "fiction" at any given time isn't fact. But the fiction,
if it's proves prescient enough, might become fact and my last
draft would have made that point.

The way you've described it evokes space being manipulated
over large distances. I've always assumed the tech wouldn't
have that problem. If space is being warped ahead of and
behind the ship, I conceptualize that as propagation of the
warped space and the bubble within it. So normal space is
restored in the wake.

If that's the right way to conceptualize it, then space everywhere
else in the galaxy is unaltered. There's only whatever discrete
area of space is being manipulated by the warp drive at any
given point of the journey from A to B, then the next discrete area
and so on. The article had this passage:

"Furthermore, if the intensity of the space warps can be
oscillated over time, the energy required is reduced even
more, White found"

Oscillation implies a cyclical technology consistent with the
way I'm speculating it would work, and have to work.

I note Jan is skeptical that Dr. White (of NASA or some close
link to it) may just be ginning up interest and buzz among the
sci-fi buffs, for something he knows is still no more plausible
pie in the sky than it was 18 years ago. Maybe. But maybe
not, eh? :-)

[HVAC]

On 9/17/2012 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
> [note crossposts]
>
> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>
> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/
>
>
> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
> equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
> at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
> So running with that and speculating...

Since no one knows how to warp space, it is simply mental masturbation.










--
"OK you cunts, let's see what you can do now" -Hit Girl
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CjO7kBqTFqo .. 变亮

[Nadegda]

HVAC expressed precisely :

> On 9/17/2012 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
>> [note crossposts]
>>
>> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>>
>> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/
>>
>>
>> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
>> equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
>> at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
>> So running with that and speculating...
>
>
> Since no one knows how to warp space, it is simply mental masturbation.

I have the ability to warp space.

[Wayne Throop]

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: Duh. The article *says* it's a refinement of Alcubierre (two r's).

: It mentions that was 1994 but had the Jupiter-size mass-energy
: requirements. There are obviously other technological issues, but the
: energy requirements being reduced to something we can produce now is a
: huge leap and removes arguably the biggest obstacle that the 1994
: theory had.

But of course the important point to remember is that that was the
*easy* part to improve, while the issues of how to turn one on or off,
how to avoid temporal ambiguity, and how to produce negative mass, are
totally ignored. Much as if I improved my perpetual motion machine plans
to require only a few thousand kilograms by cleverly reshaping the flux
oscillator instead of a few jupiter masses.

[Wayne Throop]

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: Postulating something like exotic matter or dark matter or dark

: energy, when we don't really have a clue what any of those are or
: might be or how they work, is a problem with any hypothesis or theory
: of letter representing a constant. Still, if the math of a
: theoretical warp drive says that the equivalent of 250 Tsar bombs of
: energy is required, versus 2.6 septillion times that when it was
: proposed 18 years ago, it's theoretical progress, eh? :-)

There's a problem with comparing the negative mass required for warp or
wormhold to things like neutrinos, WIMPS, lifhtspeed invariance, etc.
And that is, *those* were postulated to account for observations, while
negative mass was postulated onaccounta wishful thinking. Casimir effect
notwithstanding.

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 9/18/12 10:20 AM, Wayne Throop wrote:

> There's a problem with comparing the negative mass required for warp or
> wormhold to things like neutrinos, WIMPS, lifhtspeed invariance, etc.
> And that is, *those* were postulated to account for observations, while
> negative mass was postulated onaccounta wishful thinking. Casimir effect
> notwithstanding.
>

What about "strange matter"? Is that also a solution in search of a
problem, so to speak? I've seen it used in several stories.

[Wayne Throop]

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: But the"strongly implies" clashes with your "relativity is wrong".

No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.

[Wayne Throop]

: "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com>
: What about "strange matter"? Is that also a solution in search of a

: problem, so to speak? I've seen it used in several stories.

If by strange matter you mean condensed nuclear matter partly composed of
strange quarks (ie, "quark soup"), then the strange quark was postulated
to account for observations, and the possibility it could behave
as... strangely as it does is a possibility derived from the standard
model. As used in science fiction, it may be a form of bolonium, much
like hyperstable tranuranic elements, intelligent polywater, and the such.
That is, a convenient preexisting buzzword to avoid sayig "pixie dust".

See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strange_matter

"Oh don't worry. It's just a technical term.
Means I'm going to make them into soup."

--- Dark Lord Chuckles the Silly Piggy

[David DeLaney]

KalElFan <kale...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote:
>"Wayne Throop" wrote in message news:13479...@sheol.org...

>> Relativity means never being able to say you are "close to c".
>> The whole concept of "close to c" *requires* a "wrt what" ...
>
>Right, but as with your kg is mass nitpick, the context here
>makes these kinds of points pointless. The context is our
>frame of reference, which is by an large universally the
>same wherever you and I and everyone else on planet earth
>are. So "close to c" means the speed it would take to have
>a spaceship plausibly go to a neary star and back within a
>lifetime and so on.

...which means you're assuming "with respect to (wrt) the nearby star and
the Solar System, which are moving at small speeds relative to each other".

In other words, your spaceship is never getting 'close to c' - it always sees
light going at c away from or towards it. OTHER PEOPLE are seeing it getting
'close to c' relative to THEM, assuming THEY are not moving and it is. And
these other people are also seeing the SAME light going at c in any direction,
at the same time the rapidly-retreating spaceship is in ITS frame of reference.

See my bee-in-a-balloon post from a while back for a more concrete example.

>But the warp drive update (if correct) does solve the energy
>requirement issue.

Assuming you can make the warp drive work; sneaking the energy requirement
in in another way as "oh, we just have to make this exotic matter ring first"
doesn't really help.

Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting from d...@vic.com "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
http://www.vic.com/~dbd/ - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.

[Michael Stemper]

I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c. If I
sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the light
all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.

I did like the way the ship pictured in the Fox article looked like
Obi-Wan's ship from _Attack of the Clones_.

--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
Life's too important to take seriously.

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 9/18/12 1:56 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
> In article <13479...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>> : "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
>
>> : But the"strongly implies" clashes with your "relativity is wrong".
>>
>> No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
>> they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.
>
> I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c. If I
> sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the light
> all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.

Of course not; it'd go charging ahead of you at 1C relative to you.
Someone standing outside watching you go by at 10C would see you firing
11c beams of light. Then the resistance of the ether would slow it down!

[JRStern]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 09:46:14 -0400, HVAC <mr....@gmail.com> wrote:

>On 9/17/2012 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
>> [note crossposts]
>>
>> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>>
>> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/
>>
>>
>> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
>> equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
>> at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
>> So running with that and speculating...
>
>
>Since no one knows how to warp space, it is simply mental masturbation.

Yah. Truly dumb article.

Man walks down the street to buy some hamburger, sees a big sale sign
across the street, "Special! Hamburger $1.00/pound!", so he walks
over there - but they're out of hamburger. So he goes back to his
usual store, where the price is $3.00/pound. "Hey!" he tells the
butcher, "The price is only $1.00/pound across the street!" Butcher
just looks at him, "Yeah, that's the price I sell it at, too, when I
don't have any."

oooooold joke

J.

[Michael Stemper]

In article <k3acpr$d13$2...@dont-email.me>, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> writes:
>On 9/18/12 1:56 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
>> In article <13479...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>>> : "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>

>>> : But the"strongly implies" clashes with your "relativity is wrong".
>>>
>>> No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
>>> they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.
>>
>> I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c. If I
>> sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the light
>> all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.
>
> Of course not; it'd go charging ahead of you at 1C relative to you.
>Someone standing outside watching you go by at 10C would see you firing
>11c beams of light.

Oh, sure. That makes sense. Accelerating at one light-velocity, no doubt.

> Then the resistance of the ether would slow it down!

But, I always heard "resistance is useless"!

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 9/18/12 2:06 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
> In article <k3acpr$d13$2...@dont-email.me>, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> writes:
>> On 9/18/12 1:56 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
>>> In article <13479...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>>>> : "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
>
>>>> : But the"strongly implies" clashes with your "relativity is wrong".
>>>>
>>>> No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
>>>> they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.
>>>
>>> I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c. If I
>>> sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the light
>>> all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.
>>
>> Of course not; it'd go charging ahead of you at 1C relative to you.
>> Someone standing outside watching you go by at 10C would see you firing
>> 11c beams of light.
>
> Oh, sure. That makes sense. Accelerating at one light-velocity, no doubt.

No, the light's not accelerating.

(BTW, to me the "accelerating at one light" bit in Skylark made perfect
sense, and if you do the math, you can see that he meant exactly what it
appeared to mean)

>
>> Then the resistance of the ether would slow it down!
>
> But, I always heard "resistance is useless"!
>

FUTILE. Resistance is FUTILE. (if less than one ohm).

[Double-A]

On Sep 18, 6:46 am, HVAC <mr.h...@gmail.com> wrote:
> On 9/17/2012 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
>
> > [note crossposts]
>
> > A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>

> >http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feas...

>
> > It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
> > equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
> > at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.
> > So running with that and speculating...
>
> Since no one knows how to warp space, it is simply mental masturbation.

Space warp has to be possible. How do you suppose God gets around?

Double-A

[Michael Stemper]

In article <k3ae3t$mha$1...@dont-email.me>, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> writes:
>On 9/18/12 2:06 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
>> In article <k3acpr$d13$2...@dont-email.me>, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> writes:
>>> On 9/18/12 1:56 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
>>>> In article <13479...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:

>>>>> No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
>>>>> they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.
>>>>
>>>> I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c. If I
>>>> sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the light
>>>> all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.
>>>
>>> Of course not; it'd go charging ahead of you at 1C relative to you.
>>> Someone standing outside watching you go by at 10C would see you firing
>>> 11c beams of light.
>>
>> Oh, sure. That makes sense. Accelerating at one light-velocity, no doubt.
>
> No, the light's not accelerating.
>
> (BTW, to me the "accelerating at one light" bit in Skylark made perfect
>sense, and

if you throw in a random assumption about what it means, and

> if you do the math, you can see that he meant exactly what it
>appeared to mean)

>>> Then the resistance of the ether would slow it down!
>>
>> But, I always heard "resistance is useless"!
>
> FUTILE. Resistance is FUTILE. (if less than one ohm).

That's what the Johnny-come-lately Borg might say. The originals, the
Vogons, said "useless". Accept no substitutes~

[Wayne Throop]

Oh, I neglected to respond to one relevant point:

:: KalElFan <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
:: The context is our frame of reference, which is by an large

:: universally the same wherever you and I and everyone else on planet
:: earth are. So "close to c" means the speed it would take to have a
:: spaceship plausibly go to a neary star and back within a lifetime and
:: so on.

So, a prefered frame. So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things.

[Wayne Throop]

::: But the"strongly implies" clashes with your "relativity is wrong".

:: No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
:: they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.

: mste...@walkabout.empros.com (Michael Stemper)
: I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c.

Well, that goes without saying. Or maybe it didn't.

: If I sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the

: light all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.

No. Although what happens when it reaches the warp boundary is a bit odd,
and might to an outside observer resemble just that. Or be compressed at
the warp boundary like light circling an event horizon. Hard to visualize,
but locally, the ship is just sitting there, motionless, as always.

: I did like the way the ship pictured in the Fox article looked like

: Obi-Wan's ship from _Attack of the Clones_.

Heh. Yes. Why have it any shape in particular.
If these guys were real physicists, it should be a small sphere.

[Joe Pfeiffer]

"KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com> writes:

> "Joe Pfeiffer" wrote in message news:1bfw6go...@pfeifferfamily.net...
>
>> The big red flag for me is "This ring, potentially made of exotic
>> matter...". So it's "if this form of matter, which we have no reason to
>> believe exists (and the story doesn't even say which flavor of exotic
>> matter is needed), then here is something cool we can do with it". That
>> makes it pretty totally speculative, in the sense that there is no
>> reason to think it could actually happen.
>
> John was comparing it to Dark Matter though, and wasn't this issue
> of how to build the ring the same in 1994? Yes, it's an obstacle, but
> the septillions of H-bombs of energy was a conspicuously bigger one,
> no?

I didn't see anywhere that the exotic matter needed for the ring was
dark matter.

Picking which of those problems is bigger is probably not important.
The exotic matter problem is "we have no reason to think it's possible
in any sense at all", while the energy requirement was "we have no reason
to think we'll ever be able to do it". Reducing the energy requirement
moves the latter to "OK, there is some remote chance we could actually
do that part".

[Wayne Throop]

: "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com>

: (BTW, to me the "accelerating at one light" bit in Skylark made

: perfect sense, and if you do the math, you can see that he meant
: exactly what it appeared to mean)

Hm. As I recall, when I did the math, it didn't work out at all,
compared to other numbers given in the serialized version that
Gutenberg has. Could you be a bit more specific?

And would it really hurt him to have said "lightspeed per second" or
whatever unit of time he meant to imply? It's something most anybody
properly respectful of units would do.

And good luck with surviving that acceleration with the padded
seats in the gimballed cage. Yep, iirc, "padded seats"
was pretty much the solution to that little issue. Yeesh.

And don't even *try* to justify "lightspeed squared".
George O Smith eventually had his characters apologize for that one,
and rightly so.

[Wayne Throop]

: Double-A <doub...@hush.com>
: Space warp has to be possible. How do you suppose God gets around?

God doesn't need to get around. He's alreay there, much like the
superhero Omnipresent Man. His infinite intelligence is distributed
over the universe, and any part is omniscient in its pastwards lightcone.

[Wayne Throop]

: Joe Pfeiffer <pfei...@cs.nmsu.edu>
: Picking which of those problems is bigger is probably not important.

: The exotic matter problem is "we have no reason to think it's possible
: in any sense at all", while the energy requirement was "we have no
: reason to think we'll ever be able to do it". Reducing the energy
: requirement moves the latter to "OK, there is some remote chance we
: could actually do that part".

But it's easy to pick out which is a bigger problem.
If you've found a way to shrink your perpetual motion machine
from jupiter size to 1000 kilograms size, you've solved the
easy part of making a perpetual motion machine actually work.

[Double-A]

On Sep 18, 12:00 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> : Double-A <double...@hush.com>

I'm glad you have it all figured out.

Double-A

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 9/18/12 2:33 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
> In article <k3ae3t$mha$1...@dont-email.me>, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> writes:
>> On 9/18/12 2:06 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
>>> In article <k3acpr$d13$2...@dont-email.me>, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com> writes:
>>>> On 9/18/12 1:56 PM, Michael Stemper wrote:
>>>>> In article <13479...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>
>>>>>> No, it merely means, to convince me it's compatible with relativity,
>>>>>> they'd have to explain from which orfice they pulled that 10c limit.
>>>>>
>>>>> I'd be happy if they could explain what it would mean to go 10c. If I
>>>>> sat on the nose cone and pointed my flashlight forward, would the light
>>>>> all fall behind me at 9c? That makes my brane hurt.
>>>>
>>>> Of course not; it'd go charging ahead of you at 1C relative to you.
>>>> Someone standing outside watching you go by at 10C would see you firing
>>>> 11c beams of light.
>>>
>>> Oh, sure. That makes sense. Accelerating at one light-velocity, no doubt.
>>
>> No, the light's not accelerating.
>>
>> (BTW, to me the "accelerating at one light" bit in Skylark made perfect
>> sense, and
>
> if you throw in a random assumption about what it means, and

Nothing random about it. You've been given a parameter, acceleration,
and a number to go with it; the obvious, and trivial assumption is that
the velocity (feet/miles/furlongs per second) given is the value of the
acceleration (V-per-second). It's obvious, trivial to recognize, and...

>
>> if you do the math, you can see that he meant exactly what it
>> appeared to mean)

So it's even verifiable that he meant exactly what he said, using
"acceleration of one light" as shorthand for "acceleration of one
lightspeed per second", or ~300,000km/sec/sec.

>
>>>> Then the resistance of the ether would slow it down!
>>>
>>> But, I always heard "resistance is useless"!
>>
>> FUTILE. Resistance is FUTILE. (if less than one ohm).
>
> That's what the Johnny-come-lately Borg might say. The originals, the
> Vogons, said "useless". Accept no substitutes~

Vogons? ORIGINAL?

The line in THAT form (Resistance is Useless) originally belonged to
Doctor Who's Cybermen, starting in 1965.

[Jan Panteltje]

On a sunny day (Mon, 17 Sep 2012 16:23:35 -0400) it happened "KalElFan"
<kale...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote in <abpf6d...@mid.individual.net>:

I we assume an aether for a moment,
and then light (EM waves) is ripples in that aether,
compare it to a pond with water, and pressure waves are the light [1],
THEN to get faster than the propagation speed of those pressure waves,
we need to move the WATER too.

So we would have to move the aether.
Einsteinions call that moving [distorting] space time.
Very simple concept in reality .

[1] Note: Maxwell's equations are based on fluid dynamics.

Q

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

On 9/18/12 2:50 PM, Wayne Throop wrote:
> : "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com>
> : (BTW, to me the "accelerating at one light" bit in Skylark made
> : perfect sense, and if you do the math, you can see that he meant
> : exactly what it appeared to mean)
>
> Hm. As I recall, when I did the math, it didn't work out at all,
> compared to other numbers given in the serialized version that
> Gutenberg has. Could you be a bit more specific?

We just did the math in another thread here on r.a.sf.w, not more than
a month or two ago. Maybe less. Basically that works out to 30 million
gravities, which agrees with the distance flown by the Skylark over the
period of time given in its initial flight.

> And good luck with surviving that acceleration with the padded
> seats in the gimballed cage. Yep, iirc, "padded seats"
> was pretty much the solution to that little issue. Yeesh.

No, it was "special arrangements" which included all sorts of
shock-absorbers. Yes, it wouldn't work, but he didn't just have padded
seats.

I actually found a workaround for it in the background I had to create
for Marc C. DuQuesne in _Grand Central Arena_. Given what Doc did for
_Lensman_, I'd like to think he'd have found my approach fitting with
his universe.

>
> And don't even *try* to justify "lightspeed squared".
> George O Smith eventually had his characters apologize for that one,
> and rightly so.
>

[DougL]

On Sep 18, 1:43 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> Oh, I neglected to respond to one relevant point:
>

> :: KalElFan <kalel...@yanospamhoo.com>

> :: The context is our frame of reference, which is by an large
> :: universally the same wherever you and I and everyone else on planet
> :: earth are.  So "close to c" means the speed it would take to have a
> :: spaceship plausibly go to a neary star and back within a lifetime and
> :: so on.
>
> So, a prefered frame.  So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things.

Wayne, general relativity is one of those "relativity is wrong"
things. GR allows both time travel and FTL travel without any exotic
matter or other maybe impossible things. Spinning black holes exist
in nature. It is overwhelmingly likely that some of them are galactic
masses and big enough to permit a crewed ship to pass through without
being ripped to shreads by tides, not that a crewed ship is needed to
create a paradox.

If you take time travel as impossible then GR is neccessarily
incomplete to an extent that we can reasonably approximate by saying
"it's wrong". If you don't take time travel as impossible then FTL is
also possible (since the main argument that FTL is impossible is that
it is always equivalent to time travel in some reference frame and if
there is no preffered frame then this is equivalent to allowing time
travel in any and all frames).

So either GR is wrong or it allows FTL and time travel both.

But GR depends only on some fairly straightforward mathematical
physics and three axioms. The existence of a preferred speed is
observable and is well verified by fairly straightforward
observations. The LACK of a preferred frame and the LACK of any way to
determine an objective value for the local gravity gradient are both
unobservable and unprovable. They are in fact mathematical axioms
adopted for convienence, not the result of experimental observations.

It fime travel and FTL are impossible then one of the two axioms that
says something does not exist is wrong. It's just a matter of which
one and of what the correct version is like. The correct version needs
to be pretty similar to the current version, but it won't be the same.

[Howard Brazee]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 14:00:28 GMT, Hunter <buffh...@my-deja.com>
(Hunter) wrote:

>This is why I love science fiction, including sci fi that is set two,
>three, four hundred years in the future. It pushes the imagination to
>inspire people to see if it is possible. Science fiction only set
>about 50 years in the future is nice but it doesn't push the
>possibilities to the limit.

Sometimes. I see a lot more near future SF extrapolating than I see
far future SF extrapolating.

If we extrapolate our current computers and communications very far,
we get a kind of literary event horizon where the characters are too
different for us to care about.

--
"In no part of the constitution is more wisdom to be found,
than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace
to the legislature, and not to the executive department."

- James Madison

[Wayne Throop]

: DougL <lamper...@gmail.com>
: Wayne, general relativity is one of those "relativity is wrong"
: things.

Right. Special relativity is wrong globally, but correct locally.
And general relativity provides for things like an Einstein-Rosen
bridge, aka, wormhole. However, it doesn't provide for them to
be traversable, naicr. For that, you need bolonium.

: GR allows both time travel and FTL travel without any exotic matter or
: other maybe impossible things.

I'm pretty sure that turns out not to be the case. The spinning
ultradense cylinder stuff requires the cylinder to be infinitely long;
just making it immensely long, or expecting effects towards the center,
didn't work out iirc. And spinning black holes aren't expected to
have bridges inside 'em.

: If you take time travel as impossible then GR is neccessarily

: incomplete to an extent that we can reasonably approximate by saying
: "it's wrong".

That's not at all clear. If you add some mechanism to the chronoprotection
hypothesis, you get a theory that's entirely compatible with GR. *That*
would make it "not-wrong", even though you changed the theory. However,
adding prefered frames is sort of incompatible, without a lot more
song and dance to justify it.

: So either GR is wrong or it allows FTL and time travel both.

Apparently, you mean something different by "wrong" than I do.
For me, either you can extend a theory in a compatible way,
or you can revise it in an incompatible way. The former way,
the previous theory remains "right" in a reduced context.
The latter way, the previous theory makes wrong predictions
even in its former realm of applicability (that is, the new
theory introduces no new realm of applicability).

: The LACK of a preferred frame and the LACK of any way to determine an

: objective value for the local gravity gradient are both unobservable
: and unprovable.

Nonsense. They'd be emininetly observeable if they existed. They
merely haven't been observed. Which is not at all the same thing as not
observable. For example, if FTL travel always occured in one frame, and
you couldn't make it work in any other frame, you would have observed that
the laws of nature that govern your FTL widget aren't frame-independent as
relativity requires. That means, you re-write that axiom. If you merely
forbid time travel with a chronoprotection axiom, you don't have to change
the other axioms. You'll also rule out FTL if you do that, of course.

So. NAICT, GR currently *allows* closed timelike loops etc.
It doesn't actually insist they *must* exist. Which means that
a further resitriction can be compatible, and have the theory
"remain right" in the sense noted above.

The laws by which the states of physical systems undergo change are
not affected, whether these changes of state be refered to one or
the other of two systems of coordinates in uniform translatory motion.

--- Einstein, 1905

[Wayne Throop]

: "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com>

: No, it was "special arrangements" which included all sorts of

: shock-absorbers. Yes, it wouldn't work, but he didn't just have
: padded seats.

I count shock absorbers as included in "padded seats". If the
seats also had spring suspension, that'd count as padding too.
For this context. Now, if he'd had them immersed in breathable
liquid, I'd be much less disgruntled. Still wouldn't work for
anything built of matter made of atoms like we got, but I'd be
less disgruntled. But that's pretty extreme, and maybe not even
conceivable at the time. Maybe if he'd improved on water beds
and sneaked it in ahead of Heinlein. Or something.

Note of course that padded (and specially suspended) seats were also the
gag Verne used to shoot folks out of an orbital cannon. Wouldn't have
worked for him either, but easier to forgive I expect, since a) it'd be
a one-shot impulse, and b) it's far less acceleration iirc.

: We just did the math in another thread here on r.a.sf.w, not more than

: a month or two ago. Maybe less. Basically that works out to 30
: million gravities, which agrees with the distance flown by the Skylark
: over the period of time given in its initial flight.

I missed it. I'd be thrilled if somebody could provide a reference.
And it still wouldn't have harmed anything for EE Smith to be explicit
about the units, since that's what a physicist or most any engineer
would do. Would lend verisimilitude to it, for little or no cost to you.
Or him. Or anybody, really.

Aside: the above reminds me that a year is roughly 30 megaseconds.
What a coincidence.

[Michael Stemper]

Good point. I'd forgotten them (possibly due to current lack of a working
VCR), but they do have priority over the Vogons as well as the newby Borg.
So, "resistance is useless" must very definitely be considered the
canonical version.

[Michael Black]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012, Hunter wrote:


> This is why I love science fiction, including sci fi that is set two,
> three, four hundred years in the future. It pushes the imagination to
> inspire people to see if it is possible. Science fiction only set
> about 50 years in the future is nice but it doesn't push the
> possibilities to the limit.
>

But set it far enough in the future, and they can just make things up.
Just because someone thinks "warp drive, hey that's a good thing" doesn't
mean it can exist. Nobody's going to be around that far in the future to
complain when the book is wrong.

A lot of science fiction, as fun to read as it is, has turned out wrong
already, leaving us with disillusion. The planets aren't hospitable, not
the way we read about it back when. Travel to the moon isn't even
happening, when all the fuss back then was about the first step, the
assumption being that once it was done, it would become routine. What if
there is no valid method of getting to another solar system, other than
taking forever? The "language" of science fiction has infiltrated us, I
doubt anyone doesn't know about the idea of "warp drive", yet that doesn't
make it real, does't mean someone can figure it out once it's "invented".

Far from people solving these things, we've ended up with nothing, and not
even the illusion that we'll be in space "any day now". I'm not sure a
reality has been created to replace that now false reality we grew up
with.

I'd also argue that good science fiction is based on reality. So you
can't extend that to the way future, but you can to the near future. And
then it's not so much that science fiction has caused science to happen,
but that the science caused the fiction, and then time enough later, the
real science has become practical.

Science fiction often hasn't been good about seeing the future, except
when extrapolating. I was rereading Heinlein's "Door INto Summer" a few
weeks ago. The main character is in 1970, creating useful robots, then
goes into deep freeze till 2000. When I read it about 1976, the first
future it looked to was in the past, and no level of robots like in the
book. It was also a weird selection, cheap robots, something like $39.99,
but a waving of a magical wand about how they are really powered.
Something bout memory tubes, which suggests no real "intelligence". And
then he cooks up a drafting machine, yes it's better than doing it by
hand, but he doesn't envision being able to save things electronically?
He just wants to be able to type and have the diagram plotted out on
paper. He later stuffs all the blueprints and written material in the
robot, no sign of using computers for writing, and keeping things
electronically.

It's easy to claim that science ficiton invented things, but often it
works the other way around. And you can have some great vision set
hundres of years in the future, and if somehow the invention comes true,
it just may have happened anyway.


Yes, a lot of current science fiction is in the near future, about social
things rather than technical. It's missing something by not being about
technical, perhaps lost something because the future caught up and we
dont' see those Pan Am flights to the moon. That may have made science
fiction more conservative, or maybe it's because the authors coming in
were more interested in the social aspects. It was pretty common in the
golden age for the authors to have interest in science, to have hobbies
like astronomy or chemistry or amateur radio, I'm not so sure that happens
with the incoming authors now. So they write about the world they dream
of, which is differently socially, rather than the technological gadgets
that were often important to the authors in the old days. Of course, once
those things were "invented", it's harder to come up with a different
future technology wise, so that technology may have moved to the
background.

The reality is the future is our childhood, that time when we read science
ficiton so heavily and believed in that future. The "real future" ie now,
is very different from what was anticipated, yet also never quite as good
as what we expected.

Michael

[G=EMC^2]

On Sep 18, 3:00 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> : Double-A <double...@hush.com>

That goes well with GEMC^2 So send $.3.00 to Herbert Glazier 108
Everett St. Easthampton Mass. 01027,and get my equation dated and
signed. Letter from Pope Denedict XVI,and a surprize gift. That goes
for all my friends TreBet

[Lord Androcles, Zeroth Earl of Medway]

"Michael Black" <et...@ncf.ca> wrote in message news:Pine.LNX.4.64.12...@darkstar.example.net...

What people consider good sci-fi is a quite normal human interaction

story with a technological twist. Asimov’s robot yarns aren’t really

about robots, they are about people and he made his robots as human-

like as he wanted. Heinlein’s “Moon is a Harsh Mistress” is about

the political views of an anarchist and war, a sequel of the American

War of Independence. All the critters in Star Trek are humanoid with

funny heads, the series revolves around the crew and very few of those,

just the lead actors.

In the 1980’s I visualised a flat TV hanging on the wall, a LED per pixel.

Now I have one with a far better resolution than I’d imagined.

Technologically it’s a marvel, over 2,000,000 pixels, but the programmes

are no better or worse, the images are still talking heads. ASIMO, the

Japanese anthropomorphic critter, can walk and talk, but what I want

it for if I had one is for it to load and unload the dishwasher. sci-fi

is actually techno-fantasy, science is far too boring for the average joe.

Repetitively testing water to ensure it is fit for human consumption is

science and as dull as dishwater. Fiction is about people for people,

even cartoon animals are fundamentally people, and that applies to

sci-fi as it does to an historical novel set in the past. The gadgets in

the Flintstones are as amusing as the gadgets in in the Jetsons.

Funnier and more imaginative, even. Fred Flintstone operating a

dinosaur as if it were a crane while working in a quarry? That’s

funny. Yet during the recent Olympics I was watching dressage.

People in fancy dress getting a horse to dance? And people clapped.

-- This message is brought to you from the keyboard of
Lord Androcles, Zeroth Earl of Medway

 

 

 

 

 

[Walter Bushell]

In article <j5oh58dsqtk52v16d...@4ax.com>,

Howard Brazee <how...@brazee.net> wrote:

> On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 14:00:28 GMT, Hunter <buffh...@my-deja.com>
> (Hunter) wrote:
>
> >This is why I love science fiction, including sci fi that is set two,
> >three, four hundred years in the future. It pushes the imagination to
> >inspire people to see if it is possible. Science fiction only set
> >about 50 years in the future is nice but it doesn't push the
> >possibilities to the limit.
>
> Sometimes. I see a lot more near future SF extrapolating than I see
> far future SF extrapolating.
>
> If we extrapolate our current computers and communications very far,
> we get a kind of literary event horizon where the characters are too
> different for us to care about.

It's worse than that. Writers don't understand them or their problems
and we don't even know what technologies will be operational. I
remember reading stories where they had interplanetary space ships and
navigators used slide rules. Bujold started the replicator series in
'89 and the people have comconsoles, but apparently few have cell
phones.

--
This space unintentionally left blank.

[G=EMC^2]

My convexing of space touches on "space warping" It goes with my idea
space is foeshortened in a space ship going at 9.999999999 of c in the
direction it is going. We know its inner micro space is foreshotened
in the diection it is going. reality is if a paricle could ever reach
c it would be a black hole,and have the mass of a universe You can
do a lot with this far out thinking. Its worth a post of its own O
ya TreBert

[Martin Phipps]

On Sep 18, 4:23 am, "KalElFan" <kalel...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote:
> [note crossposts]
>
> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>
> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-feas...
>
> It doesn't get into too much detail, but mentions that the
> equivalent of ten times the speed of light would be feasible,
> at energy requirements found in space probes like Voyager 1.

Actually, no, you misunderstood. Mass is equivalent to energy. The
amount of energy they say would get warp drive up and running would be
equivalent to the MASS of the space probe Voyager 1. That's just to
get it going.

Anyway, yeah, so "warp drive" has always been based on real science
but scientists always figured it was impossible to get it to work.
Obviously if warp drive is possible then so is time travel. Again,
the energy requirements necessary were always assumed to be
prohibitive.

Martin

[William December Starr]

In article <13479...@sheol.org>,
thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) said:

> But of course the important point to remember is that that was the
> *easy* part to improve, while the issues of how to turn one on or
> off, how to avoid temporal ambiguity,

Is this a problem?

> and how to produce negative mass, are totally ignored.

-- wds

[William December Starr]

In article <13479...@sheol.org>,

thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) said:

> And don't even *try* to justify "lightspeed squared". George O
> Smith eventually had his characters apologize for that one, and
> rightly so.

Did Roger MacBride Allen apologize too? (_The Torch of Honor_,
1985... hmm, ISFDB does say that he came out with a revised
version in 1995, as part of the _Allies & Aliens_ omnibus of
revised versions of _Torch_ and _Rogue Powers_. Maybe he fixed it
there.)

-- wds

[William December Starr]

In article <13479...@sheol.org>,
thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) said:

>> always did like the way the ship pictured in the Fox article

>> looked like Obi-Wan's ship from _Attack of the Clones_.
>
> Heh. Yes. Why have it any shape in particular.
> If these guys were real physicists, it should be a small sphere.

Painted with cow markings?

-- wds

[Quadibloc]

On Sep 18, 3:52 pm, Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> wrote:
> What if
> there is no valid method of getting to another solar system, other than
> taking forever?

It's entirely reasonable to conclude that it will be a long time, if
ever, before technologies are developed to allow spaceships to travel
faster than at 1% of the speed of light. That's true enough.

Does that mean, then, that interstellar travel is impossible?

What about the Human Genome Project, and the advances in electronics?
It may take centuries to travel to the nearest solar system, but if
people live for millenia, whether biologically or as uploads, then
such travel stops being wholly impractical.

And this idea has already been used by some science-fiction authors.

John Savard

[William December Starr]

In article <WlZ5s.1291$TA5...@newsfe05.iad>,
"Dani...@teranews.com" <dx...@albury.nospam.net.au> said:

> What intrigues me is what happens when space is being warped by
> several space ships travelling in different directions *at* *the*
> *same* *time!!* e.g. if one space ship wanted to travel from the
> bottom of one of the spiral arms of our galaxy to the top, and at
> the same time a second space ship wanted to travel from the centre
> of our galaxy to the outer edge along the spiral arm, and a third
> space ship wanted to travel from the inner edge of one of the
> spiral arms of our galaxy to its outer edge, i.e. in three
> dimensions at the same time.
>
> Space must be warped really, really, strangely!!

I thought relativity meant that you can't say "at the same time."

-- wds

[Wayne Throop]

:: how to avoid temporal ambiguity,

: wds...@panix.com (William December Starr)
: Is this a problem?

Yes. Implying time travel opens a whole kettle of worms of a different color.
Not that that makes it impossible, mind you, but the kettle's still there.

[William December Starr]

In article <13480...@sheol.org>,

But is it a _problem_, or an opportunity?

(Whenever someone says "FTL, relativity, causality, pick two," I
think "Well, empirically we seem to _have_ relativity whether I want
it or not, so I guess it's causality that's gonna have to go...")

-- wds

[Wayne Throop]

: wds...@panix.com (William December Starr)
: I thought relativity meant that you can't say "at the same time."

The alternative interpretation is, for any two spacelike separated
events, there exist frames in which the events are at the same time,
and thus, anything outside the lightcone is potentially "at the same time"
from any given point on your worldline

Plus, since I expect the notion is what happens when they reach the
same point in space, "same time" becomes unambiguous again; it's
only simultaneity *at* *a* *distance* that's defunct and/or ambiguous.

[Rod Speed]

Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote

> Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> wrote

>> What if there is no valid method of getting to
>> another solar system, other than taking forever?

> It's entirely reasonable to conclude that it will be a long time,
> if ever, before technologies are developed to allow spaceships to
> travel faster than at 1% of the speed of light. That's true enough.

> Does that mean, then, that interstellar travel is impossible?

Impractical and unlikely anyone will bother, anyway.

Tho given what some loons will do, like crossing the Brooks Range
solo on foot, I guess its possible some loon will try it sometime.
http://www.abc.net.au/austory/specials/alaskaandme/default.htm

Bit of a cost problem tho.

> What about the Human Genome Project, and the advances in electronics?

That one doesn't have the problem with the
laws of physics that interstellar travel does.

[Wayne Throop]

:::: how to avoid temporal ambiguity,

::: Is this a problem?

:: Yes. Implying time travel opens a whole kettle of worms of a
:: different color. Not that that makes it impossible, mind you, but
:: the kettle's still there.

: wds...@panix.com (William December Starr)
: But is it a _problem_, or an opportunity?

It's an opportunity to get into many difficult problems.

: (Whenever someone says "FTL, relativity, causality, pick two," I think

: "Well, empirically we seem to _have_ relativity whether I want it or
: not, so I guess it's causality that's gonna have to go...")

Sort of a case of "cut off your nose to spite your face". Or something.
That is, I reeeeeeeeeely want FTL, so I don't care what other nonense
has to go along with it, even if I disappear in a puff of logic.

[Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)]

Though The Master also had "Resistance is Futile" in 1976.

[William December Starr]

In article <13480...@sheol.org>,
thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) said:

>> (Whenever someone says "FTL, relativity, causality, pick two," I
>> think "Well, empirically we seem to _have_ relativity whether I
>> want it or not, so I guess it's causality that's gonna have to
>> go...")
>
> Sort of a case of "cut off your nose to spite your face". Or
> something. That is, I reeeeeeeeeely want FTL, so I don't care
> what other nonense has to go along with it, even if I disappear in
> a puff of logic.

Hey, anything that gets us out of this fucking child-safe No Fun
Universe we seem to be stuck in.

(Well, almost anything. "Lovecraft was right" I could do without
in real life.)

-- wds (and "Lovecraft was an optimist" is *right* out)

[Wayne Throop]

:: It's entirely reasonable to conclude that it will be a long time, if

:: ever, before technologies are developed to allow spaceships to travel
:: faster than at 1% of the speed of light. That's true enough. Does
:: that mean, then, that interstellar travel is impossible?

: "Rod Speed" <rod.sp...@gmail.com>
: Impractical and unlikely anyone will bother, anyway.

:
: Tho given what some loons will do, like crossing the Brooks Range solo
: on foot, I guess its possible some loon will try it sometime.
: http://www.abc.net.au/austory/specials/alaskaandme/default.htm
:
: Bit of a cost problem tho.

Xref Vinge's "Across Realtime" (omnibus of "The Peace War", "The
Ungoverned", and "Marooned in Realtime"). As the singularity approaches,
individuals have more and more wealth available to them, as compared to
previous ages. Today, anybody (or at least manybodys) can buy more kinds
of things and has in some ways more economic power than whole nations did
a thousand years ago. Extrapolate this as the Singularity approaches.
Then, at some point, corporations, co-ops, and eventuall individuals, will
potentially have the economic resources to launch interstellar probes.

And in "Marooned in Realtime", a person comes back from just such
an expedition, bringing much information about how the Singularity
works out lots of other species. Among other things. And then plays
a part in the plotline. And even for the stay-at-homes, individuals
near the Singularity end up having resources the nations now don't have,
basically analogous to how a serious survivalist or even a dedicated
camper could have goods and services that, compared to long enough ago,
a whole tribe or nation couldn't field.

"The Ungoverned" is set about the time pre-Singularity when
individuals have enough resources to field nuclear weapons...
Stross deals with similar issues in either "Singularity Sky",
or "Iron Sunrise".

(FWIW, "Marooned in Realtime", is set 70 million years post-Singularity.
But that's mostly because of technology that originated in "The Peace
War". But I digress.)

Anyways, even if you don't take the "wealthier then empires but not so
slow" meme seriously, there's some interest in the general notion imo.
And it's relevant to the near future; in terms of manned spaceflight
(or even just canned electronics instead of canned apes).

[Martin Phipps]

On Sep 18, 12:52 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> :: So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things...
>
> : "KalElFan" <kalel...@yanospamhoo.com>
> : Conceptually, it's not FTL it's warping space so that the distance is
> : reduced.
>
> You're missing the point.  Whether the distance is reduced, or if pixies
> turn it into tachyon correspndence particles, or if, unlike either
> of those, it's an alcubiere warp, the fact that they are saying it's
> limited to 10c without saying wrt what, strongly implies a preferred frame.
> Or to summarize, it's one of those "relativity is wrong" things.

I see what you mean. On Star Trek when the ship is traveling at sub-
light speeds time dilatation should come into play. In one Star Trek
novel it was actually mentioned that Yeoman Rand was physically
younger than the age provided by Star Fleet records because before she
served on the Enterprise she had spent time on a ship that traveled at
sub-light speeds and was thus still physically a teenager even though
her records say she was in her twenties. Fine, but there's a big
problem with the way warp drive is described on Star Trek.

In the Star Trek Technical Manual it claims that to reach warp drive
the ship has to "approach the speed of light" and then due to a
"quantum effect" exceed light speed and enter warp. This is complete
and utter bullshit: you can never "approach the speed of light": no
matter what speed you are traveling at light will always be moving
away from you at the same speed.

But it doesn't have to be that way: if you warp space so that the
distance to a star ten light years away is now one light year then you
could conceivably travel at close to the speed of light and get there
in one year instead of ten. Of course, you would still have to travel
at close to the speed of light so time dilatation would still come
into play. I think Gene Roddenberry must have had a sense that this
was true and that's why he came up with the idea of "Star Dates"
because he knew that when it came to keeping records it wouldn't make
much sense to rely on the time as measured by the ship's clocks. The
idea is this: if you are traveling at sub-light speed and you enter
warp then time dilatation should still be a consideration.

Unfortunately, this was never capitalized upon in any of the Star Trek
series: the obvious example would have been Voyager; they were always
saying that it would take 70 years at maximum warp to reach Earth but
that presumably refers to time as measured back on Earth and not on
board Voyager. If they could enter warp while traveling at, say, 99%
of the speed of light then it would have taken about a year or so for
them to reach Earth, the only problem being that anybody they knew
would be long dead because 70 years had passed on Earth. I'll never
understand why they kept stopping at planets along the way: I thought
the mission was to get home. It was a really stupid premise for a
Star Trek series.

Martin

[Dimensional Traveler]

On 9/17/2012 8:24 PM, Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor) wrote:
> On 9/17/12 8:54 PM, KalElFan wrote:
>> "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" wrote in message
>> news:k381q5$bri$1...@dont-email.me...
>>
>>> Actually, if you read closely it talks about using the MASS ENERGY
>>> equivalent of Voyager 1 (rather than the mass-energy equivalent of
>>> Jupiter), which would be beyond our current civilization's ability to
>>> generate in reasonable situations, but does put it in the range of
>>> "plausible for very high tech society" instead of "only for Sufficiently
>>> Advanced beings".
>>
>> Okay, but I don't think that distinction quite captures the huge
>> difference as well as the math does. The mass of Jupiter is
>> 1.8986x10^27 kg according to wiki. Assuming I have the zeros
>> right that's...
>>
>> 1,898,600,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 kg or 1.8986 octillion kg.
>>
>> It's only 722kg for Voyager 1, so Jupiter is about 2.6 septillion times
>> bigger. The magnitude of the difference is enormous, and the 722kg
>> seems trivial by comparison. It seemed plausible to me that 722kg
>> might be the weight of the material in one big H-bomb for example,
>> whereas if Jupiter-size is required it's probably what Michio Kaku
>> would classify as a Class II Impossibility, or at the very least a very
>> high Class I.
>>
>> I decided to check the energies involved a bit further. Anyone feel
>> free to correct this. I see a wiki reference (at the same URL below,
>> in the second paragraph) that says a hydrogen bomb can yield a
>> theoretical maximum of 25 terajoules of energy per kilogram.
>
> That's per kilogram of BOMB.
>
> Here we're talking about the mass-energy of the WHOLE THING, the
> thousand kilograms or so converted directly by E=MC^2. That's... a lot
> more. 2.1481 x 10^4 megatons, roughly. If we're talking about
> something half that mass, okay, it's a mere ten thousand megatons or
> around 4.5 x 10^19 joules.
>
>
"21.5 kilotons of TNT-equivalent energy" per gram for 100% matter to
energy conversion. At least according to wikipedia.

[Dimensional Traveler]

Sooo, who first said "Resistance is irrelevant"?

[KalElFan]

"David DeLaney" wrote in message
news:slrnk5hcf...@gatekeeper.vic.com...

> KalElFan <kale...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote:
>
>>"Wayne Throop" wrote in message news:13479...@sheol.org...
>>
>>> Relativity means never being able to say you are "close to c".
>>> The whole concept of "close to c" *requires* a "wrt what" ...
>>
>> Right, but as with your kg is mass nitpick, the context here
>> makes these kinds of points pointless. The context is our
>> frame of reference, which is by [and] large universally the
>> same wherever you and I and everyone else on planet earth
>> are. So "close to c" means the speed it would take to have
>> a spaceship plausibly go to a neary star and back within a
>> lifetime and so on.
>
> ...which means you're assuming "with respect to (wrt) the
> nearby star and the Solar System, which are moving at small
> speeds relative to each other".
>
> In other words, your spaceship is never getting 'close to c' -
> it always sees light going at c away from or towards it. OTHER
> PEOPLE are seeing it getting 'close to c' relative to THEM,
> assuming THEY are not moving...

We have (i) the interior of the bubble where the ship is,
(ii) the bubble boundary and whatever unique characteristics
that may have, (iii) the warped space outside the bubble
boundary, (iv) the boundary between the warped space
and the normal or renormalized space, and finally (v) the
various observers along the trip route.

They've told us the "equivalent" of 10c is doable in this
concept, "equivalent" because it isn't FTL it's the effect
of the space warping around the bubble that makes the
trip shorter. It seems irrelevant to me what that would
look like to us because it probably disappears along the
route before we even see it.

But yes, the "equivalent" of 10c and implications of that
(e.g., stars 50 light years away taking 10 years to get
there and back) is from our frame of reference.

The first perspective -- the ship within the bubble -- was
what I was initially interested in. I wasn't sure if the ship
was "moving" through that space inside the bubble, and
if so how fast. Anyway, having read up on it apparently
it's not moving, the space warp around it is doing all the
work.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive

Some excerpts:

"In 1994 Alcubierre proposed... creating a wave
which would cause the fabric of space ahead of
a spacecraft to contract and the space behind it
to expand... The ship would then ride this wave
inside a region of flat space known as a warp
bubble, and would not move within this bubble,
but instead be carried along as the region itself
moves as a consequence of the actions of the
drive... conventional relativistic effects such as
time dilation would not apply in the way they
would in the case of a ship moving at a very great
velocity through flat spacetime, relative to other
objects.... a light beam within the warp-bubble
would still always move faster than the ship.

" ... a ship using the warp to accelerate and decelerate
is always in free fall, and the crew would experience
no accelerational g-forces..."

It goes on, but conceptually I guess the interior of the
bubble is very similar to our perspective outside the
entire system. They just remain in the ship for the 1
year (or whatever) trip, to the star system 10 light
years away. Maybe they have a holodeck to keep
themselves amused. :-)

[Wayne Throop]

: "KalElFan" <kale...@yanospamhoo.com>
: They've told us the "equivalent" of 10c is doable in this concept,

: "equivalent" because it isn't FTL it's the effect of the space warping
: around the bubble that makes the trip shorter.

Sigh. Everybody always says "the space is warped to make the trip shorter",
or some such similar popularization. Which is nonsense (or another way
to say "relativity is wrong"), since in relativity, there *is* no
"space", there is only spacetime.

Basically, I'm complaining that that popularization is totally ignoring
all the interesting stuff, just like popularizations that mention time
dilation and space contraction but ignore relativity of simultaneity
are why relativity is the worst-popularized theory evaaaaaar.
Even worse than evolution, and that's a strong criticism.


"There is no Dana, only Zuul." --- Zuul

[Lofty Goat]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 07:08:01 -0400, KalElFan wrote:

> Duh. The article *says* it's a refinement of Alcubierre....

So very sorry. Didn't bother to look at the picture the first time
through.

The idea is still loony.

--
Goat

[Martin Phipps]

On Sep 18, 10:26 pm, "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)"
<seaw...@sgeinc.invalid.com> wrote:
> On 9/18/12 10:20 AM, Wayne Throop wrote:
>
> > There's a problem with comparing the negative mass required for warp or
> > wormhold to things like neutrinos, WIMPS, lifhtspeed invariance, etc.
> > And that is, *those* were postulated to account for observations, while
> > negative mass was postulated onaccounta wishful thinking.  Casimir effect
> > notwithstanding.
>
>         What about "strange matter"? Is that also a solution in search of a
> problem, so to speak? I've seen it used in several stories.

Strange matter is real though.

Martin

[David DeLaney]

DougL <lamper...@gmail.com> wrote:
>thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
>> So, a prefered frame. �So this is one of those "relativity is wrong" things.
>
>Wayne, general relativity is one of those "relativity is wrong"
>things. GR allows both time travel and FTL travel without any exotic
>matter or other maybe impossible things. Spinning black holes exist
>in nature. It is overwhelmingly likely that some of them are galactic
>masses and big enough to permit a crewed ship to pass through without
>being ripped to shreads by tides, not that a crewed ship is needed to
>create a paradox.

...a), spinning black holes are QUITE sufficient in and of themselves to
qualify as "exotic matter"; WE certainly can't make them or do engineering
with them, and b) there are some possibly-severe issues with doing this even
with a spinning, charged black hole, one of which comes out as "the spaceship
comes out in a part of the universe which is Absolutely Inaccessible from
our part by any other means, and can't go back either; if it tries again
it just hops further over another Inaccessibility gap".

>If you take time travel as impossible

Nope. But "impossible without involving exotic matter"? Yes. This includes
any matter that is in such a state that it is, or approximates, a black
hole, a cosmic string, negative-energy matter, imaginary-mass matter,
a bounded 2-brane, etc etc. You don't get closed-timelike-loop solutions
in GR without some such thing making the math technically Interesting
somewhere in or around the loop.

So basically "we can see that the math allows it, but we can't get there
from here". Our corner of the universe appears to be safe for causality.

>The LACK of a preferred frame and the LACK of any way to
>determine an objective value for the local gravity gradient are both
>unobservable and unprovable. They are in fact mathematical axioms
>adopted for convienence, not the result of experimental observations.

...Michelson and Morley would like to have a word or two with you. If there
IS a preferred frame somehow, we've never found it, or found any way to
pick it out. This is rather inconsistent with what most of the theories
that _use_ a preferred frame are trying to use it for.

(Yes, there's a frame where the background matter/radiation of the universe
is, collectively, at rest. It does not seem to be any more preferred than
any other.)

Dave
--
\/David DeLaney posting from d...@vic.com "It's not the pot that grows the flower
It's not the clock that slows the hour The definition's plain for anyone to see
Love is all it takes to make a family" - R&P. VISUALIZE HAPPYNET VRbeable<BLINK>
http://www.vic.com/~dbd/ - net.legends FAQ & Magic / I WUV you in all CAPS! --K.

[Rod Speed]

"Wayne Throop" <thr...@sheol.org> wrote in message
news:13480...@sheol.org...

> :: It's entirely reasonable to conclude that it will be a long time, if
> :: ever, before technologies are developed to allow spaceships to travel
> :: faster than at 1% of the speed of light. That's true enough. Does
> :: that mean, then, that interstellar travel is impossible?
>
> : "Rod Speed" <rod.sp...@gmail.com>
> : Impractical and unlikely anyone will bother, anyway.
> :
> : Tho given what some loons will do, like crossing the Brooks Range solo
> : on foot, I guess its possible some loon will try it sometime.
> : http://www.abc.net.au/austory/specials/alaskaandme/default.htm
> :
> : Bit of a cost problem tho.
>
> Xref Vinge's "Across Realtime" (omnibus of "The Peace War", "The
> Ungoverned", and "Marooned in Realtime"). As the singularity approaches,
> individuals have more and more wealth available to them, as compared to
> previous ages. Today, anybody (or at least manybodys) can buy more kinds
> of things and has in some ways more economic power than whole nations did
> a thousand years ago. Extrapolate this as the Singularity approaches.
> Then, at some point, corporations, co-ops, and eventuall individuals, will
> potentially have the economic resources to launch interstellar probes.

Yeah. In the past you had to grovel to some king or other to get them
to fund the expedition like Columbus etc did. Now you can quite easily
afford to save from your work to pay for the smaller boats that can do
the same sort of trip if you want to.

At the other extreme, if we ever do end up with completely automated
production of anything we ever need goods wise, there is no reason
why an interstellar probe can't be done like that too and its just a
matter of someone deciding they want one etc.

> And in "Marooned in Realtime", a person comes back from just such
> an expedition, bringing much information about how the Singularity
> works out lots of other species. Among other things. And then plays
> a part in the plotline. And even for the stay-at-homes, individuals
> near the Singularity end up having resources the nations now don't have,
> basically analogous to how a serious survivalist or even a dedicated
> camper could have goods and services that, compared to long enough
> ago, a whole tribe or nation couldn't field.

> "The Ungoverned" is set about the time pre-Singularity when
> individuals have enough resources to field nuclear weapons...
> Stross deals with similar issues in either "Singularity Sky",
> or "Iron Sunrise".

> (FWIW, "Marooned in Realtime", is set 70 million years post-Singularity.
> But that's mostly because of technology that originated in "The Peace
> War". But I digress.)

> Anyways, even if you don't take the "wealthier then empires but not so
> slow" meme seriously, there's some interest in the general notion imo.

Sure.

> And it's relevant to the near future; in terms of manned spaceflight
> (or even just canned electronics instead of canned apes).

Sure.

[David DeLaney]

Double-A <doub...@hush.com> wrote:
>Space warp has to be possible. How do you suppose God gets around?

He moves in mysterious ways. So we don't know.

[David DeLaney]

Howard Brazee <how...@brazee.net> wrote:
>If we extrapolate our current computers and communications very far,
>we get a kind of literary event horizon where the characters are too
>different for us to care about.

Yep. Vernor Vinge pointed this out, in several ways, Some Time Ago. (Daniel
Keys Moran's Continuing Time timeline was getting there as well.)

Bookworm, Run!; Marooned in Realtime; True Names; etc.

[David DeLaney]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 16:50:21 -0700 (PDT), Quadibloc <jsa...@ecn.ab.ca> wrote:
>On Sep 18, 3:52 pm, Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> wrote:
>> What if
>> there is no valid method of getting to another solar system, other than
>> taking forever?
>
>It's entirely reasonable to conclude that it will be a long time, if
>ever, before technologies are developed to allow spaceships to travel
>faster than at 1% of the speed of light. That's true enough.
>
>Does that mean, then, that interstellar travel is impossible?

Nope.

But if we run into an impenetrable sphere 500 AU out, on which the rest of
the universe turns out to be projected somehow from the other side, then
that would be one way to impossibilize it. There are others.

>What about the Human Genome Project, and the advances in electronics?
>It may take centuries to travel to the nearest solar system, but if
>people live for millenia, whether biologically or as uploads, then
>such travel stops being wholly impractical.
>
>And this idea has already been used by some science-fiction authors.

ObSF: Sheffield, _Between the Strokes of Night_.

[David DeLaney]

William December Starr <wds...@panix.com> wrote:
>thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) said:
>> But of course the important point to remember is that that was the
>> *easy* part to improve, while the issues of how to turn one on or
>> off, how to avoid temporal ambiguity,
>
>Is this a problem?

...if you manage to destroy causality in our corner of the Universe, then
yes, that generally comes across as a major problem.

[Howard Brazee]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 21:17:06 GMT, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop)
wrote:

>Right. Special relativity is wrong globally, but correct locally.
>And general relativity provides for things like an Einstein-Rosen
>bridge, aka, wormhole. However, it doesn't provide for them to
>be traversable, naicr. For that, you need bolonium.

"Globally" is an odd word to use in this conversation.

--
"In no part of the constitution is more wisdom to be found,
than in the clause which confides the question of war or peace
to the legislature, and not to the executive department."

- James Madison

[David Johnston]

On 9/18/2012 5:50 PM, Quadibloc wrote:
> On Sep 18, 3:52 pm, Michael Black <et...@ncf.ca> wrote:
>> What if
>> there is no valid method of getting to another solar system, other than
>> taking forever?
>
> It's entirely reasonable to conclude that it will be a long time, if
> ever, before technologies are developed to allow spaceships to travel
> faster than at 1% of the speed of light. That's true enough.
>
> Does that mean, then, that interstellar travel is impossible?

No. It means interstellar travel is impractical.

>
> What about the Human Genome Project, and the advances in electronics?
> It may take centuries to travel to the nearest solar system, but if
> people live for millenia, whether biologically or as uploads, then
> such travel stops being wholly impractical.

Yes, several thousand years inside a small box or a virtual reality that
will leave you totally out of touch with the world outside.

[Howard Brazee]

On Tue, 18 Sep 2012 23:31:08 -0400, d...@gatekeeper.vic.com (David
DeLaney) wrote:

>>If we extrapolate our current computers and communications very far,
>>we get a kind of literary event horizon where the characters are too
>>different for us to care about.
>
>Yep. Vernor Vinge pointed this out, in several ways, Some Time Ago. (Daniel
>Keys Moran's Continuing Time timeline was getting there as well.)
>
>Bookworm, Run!; Marooned in Realtime; True Names; etc.

Vinge is pretty good at getting around this limitation.

So much fiction is based upon A not being aware of what B is doing.
Ubiquitous instant information changes everything.

[Brad Guth]

On Sep 18, 12:00 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> : Double-A <double...@hush.com>

> : Space warp has to be possible.  How do you suppose God gets around?
>

> God doesn't need to get around.  He's alreay there, much like the
> superhero Omnipresent Man.  His infinite intelligence is distributed
> over the universe, and any part is omniscient in its pastwards lightcone.

Sounds like aether.

[Wayne Throop]

: d...@gatekeeper.vic.com (David DeLaney)
: (Yes, there's a frame where the background matter/radiation of the

: universe is, collectively, at rest. It does not seem to be any more
: preferred than any other.)

And by "collectively at rest" is usually meant
"frame in which cosmic background radiation is isotropic".

[Wayne Throop]

: d...@gatekeeper.vic.com (David DeLaney)
: ...if you manage to destroy causality in our corner of the Universe,

: then yes, that generally comes across as a major problem.

The Eschaton definitely thinks so.

I am the Eschaton. I am not your god.
I am descended from you, and I exist in your future.
Thou shalt not violate causality within my historic light cone.
Or else.

--- found carved on large diamond slabs on many planets,
showing up at about the time when humans become capable
of causality violating technology,
from "Singularity Sky"/"Iron Sunrise"

[Wayne Throop]

::: Space warp has to be possible. How do you suppose God gets

::: around?

:: God doesn't need to get around. He's alreay there, much like the
:: superhero Omnipresent Man. His infinite intelligence is
:: distributed over the universe, and any part is omniscient in its
:: pastwards lightcone.

: Brad Guth <brad...@gmail.com>
: Sounds like aether.

Only to the hearing and/or thinking impaired.

[Brad Guth]

On Sep 18, 10:29 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> ::: Space warp has to be possible.  How do you suppose God gets
> ::: around?
>
> :: God doesn't need to get around.  He's alreay there, much like the
> :: superhero Omnipresent Man.  His infinite intelligence is
> :: distributed over the universe, and any part is omniscient in its
> :: pastwards lightcone.
>

> : Brad Guth <bradg...@gmail.com>

> : Sounds like aether.
>
> Only to the hearing and/or thinking impaired.

Your faith-based closed mindset is noted.

What part of being a terrorist isn't desirable to a ZNR Atheists like
yourself?

[Martin Phipps]

On Sep 19, 9:40 am, "KalElFan" <kalel...@yanospamhoo.com> wrote:
> conventional relativistic effects such as
>   time dilation would not apply

Well, it would or else you'd have to imagine a special frame of
reference. In relativity, everybody moving at constant velocity
thinks they aren't moving and can't perform an experiment that will
tell them they are moving. Thus if a space ship is moving at half the
speed of light and "enters warp" there should be time dilatation
before and after entering warp.

Martin

[Wayne Throop]

: Brad Guth <brad...@gmail.com>
: Your faith-based closed mindset is noted.

Your retreat to scripted catchphrases is quick as ever.

: [.. blah blah blah ..] Atheists like yourself?

Who said I'm an atheist? Whoever it was is wrong.

[Hunter]

On Mon, 17 Sep 2012 21:20:57 -0500, Lofty Goat <rlwa...@gmail.com>
wrote:

>On Mon, 17 Sep 2012 16:39:33 -0400, Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor) wrote:
>
>> On 9/17/12 4:23 PM, KalElFan wrote:
>>> [note crossposts]
>>>
>>> A Space.com article, referencing a conference on Friday, via Fox...
>>>
>>> http://www.foxnews.com/science/2012/09/17/warp-drive-may-be-more-
>feasible-than-thought-scientists-say/
>
>This looks like a rehash of the Alcubiere "drive", which is a really nifty
>idea until one steps out of the spaceship. Then one experiences tidal
>force that would destroy anything, and leave the bits and pieces back at
>their point of origin.
>
>I want to go faster than light as much as anyone does, but this doesn't
>look promising.
>
>Wait. It /is/ the Alcubiere drive. [sigh]
>
>--
>Goat
-----
Then don't step outside of the space ship. :-) Here is another article
on it:

Once thought to be a completely fictional concept, what would
intergalactic space exploration be like for we the human race if we
were to figure out how to take the faster-than-light propulsion system
known as warp drive we’ve seen used in great science fiction pop
culture like Star Trek, and make it a reality?

Something so ambitious is still little more than a fantasy…but a
fantasy of some of the smartest people to ever walk this planet. But
even though it is still a fantasy, NASA doesn’t think the warp drive
is as impossible as was once thought.

NASA’s Advanced Propulsion Theme Lead for their Engineering
Directorate, Dr. Harold 'Sonny' White, is so sure that warp drive is
possible, that he’s already working on tests to successfully figure
out how it works, saying 'Perhaps a Star Trek experience within our
lifetime is not such a remote possibility.'

White wrote about the breakthrough in an article co-authored by
Catherine Ragin Williams Sure for Icarus Interstellar. Basically, the
plan is for the Eagleworks Laboratories team to create a microscopic
warp bubble using loopholes found in mathematical equations. If
successful, this would give them the blueprints to grow the tests from
there and eventually progress it to a much larger and much more useful
warp bubble.

They explain it much better than I ever could, obviously, so here’s
how they present it:

'Those equations are tested using an instrument called the White-Juday
Warp Field Interferometer. At JSC, Eagleworks has initiated an
interferometer test bed that will try to generate and detect a
microscopic instance of a little warp bubble. Although this is just a
tiny instance of the phenomena, it will be existence proof for the
idea of perturbing space time, a 'Chicago pile' moment, as it were.
Recall that December of 1942 saw the first demonstration of a
controlled nuclear reaction that generated a whopping half watt. This
existence proof was followed by the activation of a ~ four megawatt
reactor in November of 1943. Existence proof for the practical
application of a scientific idea can be a tipping point for technology
development.

By harnessing the physics of cosmic inflation, future spaceships
crafted to satisfy the laws of these mathematical equations may
actually be able to get somewhere unthinkably fast—and without adverse
effects. The math would allow you to go to Alpha Centauri in two weeks
as measured by clocks here on Earth. So somebody’s clock aboard the
spacecraft has the same rate of time as somebody in mission control
here in Houston might have. There are no tidal forces inside the
bubble, no undue issues, and the proper acceleration is zero. When you
turn the field on, everybody doesn’t go slamming against the bulkhead,
which would be a very short and sad trip.'

Exactly. That’s what I was thinkin’ was what would need to be done,
too.

The biggest problem with pulling this off has been finding the energy
source to do it. When discussed strictly “academically,” it was
estimated that an amount of exotic matter/negative pressure equal to
the size of Jupiter would be required to create a “useful” warp
bubble. The British Interplanetary Society estimated back in the ’70s
that just to get to Barnard’s Star 6 light years or 380,000
astronomical units (380,000 trips from the sun to Earth) away in 50
years, it would require a 54,000-metric ton (119,050 lbs.) spacecraft
(100 times the mass of the 400-metric ton International Space Station)
that’s made up of 92% fuel to pull it off.

But White has now shown that they can reduce the amount of energy
required from the size of Jupiter down to a size smaller than the mass
of the Voyager 1 spacecraft, which is 500 kilograms (1,102 lbs.), by
'first optimizing the warp bubble thickness, and further by
oscillating the bubble intensity to reduce the stiffness of space
time.'

It’s all just as fascinating as it is confusing. And many will say
it’s all just talk and that warp drives are just as impossible now as
they were when we first saw them used on Star Trek. But if we always
just assumed the impossible to be impossible, we’d be far less evolved
than we are…or perhaps even extinct.

Now we just need to figure out how to hit ludicrous speed.

[edit]

http://tinyurl.com/9kn8v55

Is warp drive really possible? I don't know but I think we took a step
toward making it real by at least reducing the energy requirements,
which is likely to be the biggest technical obstacle of all.

------>Hunter

"No man in the wrong can stand up against
a fellow that's in the right and keeps on acomin'."

-----William J. McDonald
Captain, Texas Rangers from 1891 to 1907

[Brad Guth]

On Sep 18, 11:07 pm, thro...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) wrote:
> : Brad Guth <bradg...@gmail.com>

Your actions and reactions are all that matters.

So, why are you keeping your faith-based distance from aether, as
being everywhere and like God coexisting with ordinary matter without
any binding factors?

Do you have any objective proof that gravity or its aether is not
representing an instantaneous force in all possible directions?

[Michael Stemper]

In article <13479...@sheol.org>, thr...@sheol.org (Wayne Throop) writes:
>: "Sea Wasp (Ryk E. Spoor)" <sea...@sgeinc.invalid.com>

>: (BTW, to me the "accelerating at one light" bit in Skylark made
>: perfect sense, and if you do the math, you can see that he meant
>: exactly what it appeared to mean)
>
>Hm. As I recall, when I did the math, it didn't work out at all,
>compared to other numbers given in the serialized version that
>Gutenberg has. Could you be a bit more specific?

After a fight at the end of Chapter 11 leaves DuQuesne, Vaneman, and
company unconcious, the ship heads out of the Solar System at full
acceleration. Chapter 12 starts:

For forty-eight hours the uncontrolled engine dragged DuQuesne's
vessel through the empty reaches of space with an awful and
constantly-increasing velocity. Then, when only a few traces of
copper remained, the acceleration began to decrease. [...] When
the last particle of copper was gone, the ship's speed became constant.

Later in the chapter, DuQuesne says, "We must be somewhere in the
neighborhood of two hundred thirty-seven light-years away from home."
In a strictly Newtonian universe, the constant acceleration necessary
to travel 237 ly in 48 hours from close to a standing start is
15,355,220 gravities.

One light-velocity per second of acceleration works out to 30,612,245
gravities, which is within a factor of two of the right value.

>And would it really hurt him to have said "lightspeed per second" or
>whatever unit of time he meant to imply? It's something most anybody
>properly respectful of units would do.

A little annoying, yeah.

--
Michael F. Stemper
#include <Standard_Disclaimer>
Life's too important to take seriously.