Warp Drive=quantum tunneling ??? (just a thought)

[Thomas Schoene]

Here's a question that occured to me while following the Warp Theory thread.
To the physics types out there, is quantum tunneling an instantaneous process?
If so that might explain some of the comments in the Tech manual. If the Warp
drive is basically forcing all of the subatomic particles within the Warp field
to tunnel (the same distance in the same direction at the same time) that might
fit with the Tech Manual's assertion that the Warp drive works by "allowing
[a starship] to stradle the speed of light (c) "wall," alternating between two
velocity states while remaining at neither for longer than the Plank time."
(TechMan page 54) Under this scheme the ship sort of "stuttersteps" alternately
STL and FTL and so doesn't violate the prohibition against travel at light
speed from the relativity eqns. It also expalins the assertion on p25 that
"Warp flight operations do not produce direct acceleration stresses."

Just my $0.02 from someone whose knowledge of quantum mechanics is limited to
Scientific American and the popular versions of Hawking and Feynman. If I
really screwed up the physics or if this has been dealt with already my
apologies.
--
Tom Schoene
w...@cornella.cit.cornell.edu -or- w...@vax5.cit.cornell.edu
-------------------------------------------------------------------
"Whenever you're holding all the cards why does everyone else turn
out to be playing chess?"

[Jason W. Hinson]

In article <1992May6.2...@vax5.cit.cornell.edu> w...@vax5.cit.cornell.edu (Thomas Schoene) writes:

(stuff deleted)

>to tunnel (the same distance in the same direction at the same time) that might
>fit with the Tech Manual's assertion that the Warp drive works by "allowing
>[a starship] to stradle the speed of light (c) "wall," alternating between two
>velocity states while remaining at neither for longer than the Plank time."
>(TechMan page 54) Under this scheme the ship sort of "stuttersteps" alternately
>STL and FTL and so doesn't violate the prohibition against travel at light
>speed from the relativity eqns. It also expalins the assertion on p25 that
>"Warp flight operations do not produce direct acceleration stresses."

First comment: The way I understood the Tech manual, the technique of
"straddling" then speed of light wall no longer than "Plank time" was only
used in the original prototypes of the warp engine. As it also says on
page 54: "they continued to pioneer advances in warp physics that would
eventually jump the wall altogether and explore the mysterious realm of
subspace that lay on the other side."

Second comment: I would think the reason that "warp flight operations do
not produce direct acceleration stresses" would be because the warp field
acts equally on everything within it. If you had to push on the back of the
ship to make it go, then there would be a stress involved, but with a
warp field, its like every particle in the ship is being pushed on at the
same time. The particles in the back do not have to transfer their energy to
the front of the ship before the ship will move.

-Jay