Jump to content
SASS Wire Forum

STAR TREK / WARP DRIVE Real per NASA?


Aunt Jen

Recommended Posts

If WARP Drive is the speed if light and WARP 8 is 8 times the speed of light....Still take 6 months to get to nearest star, other than our sun...if I remember correctly our nearest star is 4 light years away...Then again, maybe time does something strange at that speed...Just thinking...

 

Texas Lizard

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I seem to remember that each warp factor was ten times the one before... "warp factor 1" was the speed of light; "warp factor 2" would have been ten times that, and so on... kinda like a slide rule! :)

 

Hmm... didn't read the whole article, but it made me think more of Dick Tracy and the Magnetic Air Cars. :rolleyes:

 

Dick%20Tracy%20Flying%20Air%20Cars_zpsby

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Okay people, you have a fundamental misunderstanding of Warp speed. The designator is cubed.

Warp 1 is the speed of light. Warp 2 is 8 time the speed of light, or 2X2X2 times. Warp three is 27 times the speed of light, and so on.

Didn't you study this in "Warp Drive Basics" back in school?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Unfortunately the EM drive system talked about in that article doesn't "warp" anything. It's what science fiction authors have called a reactionless thruster - a device that makes thrust without expelling any propellant.

 

All rockets to date have made thrust by shooting propellant (burning gas, compressed air, steam, even electrically charged xenon) out the back, which causes forward thrust according to Newton's 3rd Law. What makes this EM drive different is there's nothing but microwaves shooting out the back, yet it still seems to make thrust.

 

This is a big deal because with traditional rockets even if you have unlimited power, you can't carry unlimited propellant. Eventually you'll run out. That's why satellites fall out of orbit after months or years of service. (Like the MESSENGER probe that just crashed into Mercury.) They have plenty of electricity thanks to their solar panels, but there's nothing left to shoot out of the rocket engines to boost it back into a safe orbit.

 

If this EM drive really works, electricity is all it needs. You can have thrust for as long as you have power, and you don't have to haul along tons of propellant so you have more room for crew & supplies.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So I'm seeing

 

Cars in BkadeRunner

Star trek shuttle craft

Alien city ships in independence day

Day the earth stood still ship

Starmsn recovery craft

All ships in Close Encounters...

 

Hover, move, rise....all without rocket blast

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For the record, in the original series, Warp 5 was 5 times as fast as warp. In the next generation they changed it up. I thought they changed it so it was logarithmic, but maybe it was cubed each time.

 

Time is supposed to do funny things at the speed of light. I think it slows down as you go faster and would stop at the speed of light. Obviously that's not something they can know for sure though.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I do not know where our learning of the cosmos will take us on speed of light issues, and neither does anyone, but I do have faith that bright, inquisitive minds using the scientific method (and generous grants :) ) will find that path.

 

When I worked at JPL one summer in college, a hundred years ago, I used to have the greatest fun at lunch "arguing" with scientists. They would, of course, tell me the science behind my Star Trek questioning, and I'd sit there and counter with logic, extrapolations.

 

People "knew" walking was the way from A to be. Then we conceived the wheel.

The earth was obviously flat...

We thought flying faster than the speed of sound was impossible, as the compressed air would be too hard, but now it's a daily event.

Flying to the moon was unthinkable at one time.

Other than such as missing an Grand Unified Theory in physics..., I think we thought we were getting a handle on the universe, until some folks discovered Dark Matter and Dark Energy—then it turned out we had only conceived of some 4% of it so far...

The speed of light is the top speed limit of the cosmos?

 

I am a nerd (without the math). It's my nature in a lot of ways. It's partly me, because I was in the N.S.A. before Painless came along, but then I lived with him for 20 years and he was a REAL nerd to the max, which I ADMIRE. :) I felt like I married Elvis or something.

 

Yet, as much as I admire the sciences, I am also humble about them, in that I believe we are only beginning to scratch the surface paint of the Star Ship Enterprise with no idea, yet, what we're looking at. What will we think of the universe in 1000 years? In 1,000,000? Oh! How I'd love to be here to see!

 

My thinking, extrapolation, is that with continued learning and greater collation of what we've learned, we'll find new aspects of of the cosmos that relate, and NEW ways of lOOKING at things, that will likely lead to advancements of which we cannot as yet even conceive. It is exciting, to one who used to ignore my school teachers in H.S., reading books on the back row by Heinlein, Bradbury, Burroughs, and Asimov. :)

 

I get jazzed just thinking about it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So I'm seeing

 

Cars in BkadeRunner

Star trek shuttle craft

Alien city ships in independence day

Day the earth stood still ship

Starmsn recovery craft

All ships in Close Encounters...

 

Hover, move, rise....all without rocket blast

 

Well, right now we're talking about maybe enough thrust to lift a couple of feathers off the ground. We'll probably still need chemical rockets to get into space. But once you're out of the gravity well, you can run this thing continuously and build up some impressive speed.

 

Another article I read about the EM drive said it might be able to accelerate a ship at 0.001g. That means from a dead stop a ship can reach a tenth of the speed of light in ten days. It's still a long haul to the next star, but it makes the solar system way more accessible.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All this will happen when they can speed up the flow of electrons...Till then we will just run into things....Because by the time the computer has charted your course, you will be 200 light years past it...Or buried 200 miles into it...

 

Texas Lizard

Link to comment
Share on other sites

 

Another article I read about the EM drive said it might be able to accelerate a ship at 0.001g. That means from a dead stop a ship can reach a tenth of the speed of light in ten days. It's still a long haul to the next star, but it makes the solar system way more accessible.

Arthur C Clark will be so happy, and so will I!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All this will happen when they can speed up the flow of electrons...Till then we will just run into things....Because by the time the computer has charted your course, you will be 200 light years past it...Or buried 200 miles into it...

 

Texas Lizard

Yea! growing pains! I love it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Ms Jen, remember the ion drive ship in "The Martian...?" Slow but steady acceleration!

 

This discussion reminded me of an Arthur C Clarke story I read in Boy's Life Magazine as a kid - March 1964 edition.

 

You can read it here:

 

Sunjammer (or "The Wind From the Sun")

Link to comment
Share on other sites

So I'm seeing

 

Cars in BkadeRunner

Star trek shuttle craft

Alien city ships in independence day

Day the earth stood still ship

Starmsn recovery craft

All ships in Close Encounters...

 

Hover, move, rise....all without rocket blast

And cars in "The Fifth Element" -- one of my guilty pleasure movies.

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I loved Arthur Clarke! I still do. Some people have got it, and he's one of them.

 

5th Element: I had to watch that movie 5 times before I enjoyed it. Which makes one wonder why I watched it 5 times! :)ni had a crush in Bruce Willis. All he had to do was look at me on the screen... And I've been to Egypt... I still don't like the production design--what is that? Steampunk something or other?---but it IS a great film, and I do have a DVD of it, too. And I do NOT like Zorg. :(

 

But yes. The cars in there, too.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I loved Arthur Clarke! I still do. Some people have got it, and he's one of them.

 

5th Element: I had to watch that movie 5 times before I enjoyed it. Which makes one wonder why I watched it 5 times! :)ni had a crush in Bruce Willis. All he had to do was look at me on the screen... And I've been to Egypt... I still don't like the production design--what is that? Steampunk something or other?---but it IS a great film, and I do have a DVD of it, too. And I do NOT like Zorg. :(

 

But yes. The cars in there, too.

The girl was pretty good looking too...Would not throw her out...But more room is always nicer...WARP Dive, maybe the Twilight zone....

 

Texas Lizard

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Jen:

When the Star Trek series first hit TV, I was immediately a fan. I grew up with Heinlein and Asimov and Clarke and the rest. I was in the army in 64 at Ft. Sam Houston TX. A half dozen of us guys would get together and watch the TV show, then talk about it over a few beers. (A couple of the guys snuck out of guard posts to watch.) During those discussions (?) we had some questions, so we wrote a letter to the TV show and asked. Things like when you're traveling at Warp six ( Which we figured was 32 times light speed) and you came to a panic stop more would happen than just leaning forward in your seat for a second. Same with cornering. A sharp left at light speed would cause a lean to the right? And when did they un-invent seat belts? The crew would get tossed out of their seats and bounce on the floor nearly every week. Then there were the explosions in space that we could hear, but sound doesn't travel in space' etc. We didn't really expect an answer, But a couple weeks later we got a letter from Arthur C. Clarke himself, who was technical advisor for the show. WOW!! like hearing from God! He said he'd argued with Rodenberry and the producer on all that stuff, but they said this was TV and they had to show the audience something so they'd know what was happening. One of the other guys drew the long straw and got to keep the letter.

 

This is already too long. The gist of it is there was a booklet of background info that the show sent to writers wit stuff like Spock is 8 times stronger than a normal human, and so on. None of us were ever able to get a copy, and I was transferred right then and got tangled up with army stuff.

 

Himself

Link to comment
Share on other sites

String theory

 

Imagine your in a sling shot, rubber bands with tens of billions of tons of force, that will warp you factor when it let's go

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I seem to remember that each warp factor was ten times the one before... "warp factor 1" was the speed of light; "warp factor 2" would have been ten times that, and so on... kinda like a slide rule! :)

 

Hmm... didn't read the whole article, but it made me think more of Dick Tracy and the Magnetic Air Cars. :rolleyes:

 

Dick%20Tracy%20Flying%20Air%20Cars_zpsby

THE NATION THAT CONTROLS MAGNETISM CONTROLS THE UNIVERSE!

Diet SMith :D

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Suppose you were in a car going faster than the speeed of light, and you turned the headlights on.

Would they work?"

 

Stephen Wright :lol:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Howdy,

The warp drive factors changed in various star treks.

Its entertainment, folks.

Lighten up.

And I could never figure how they could miss with those space guns.

Wouldn't you just turn on a laser put the dot on the target pull the trigger

and WHAM. No curve of ballistics. No gravity to pull the energy burst.

How did they ever miss anything.

and I apologize ahead of time. Don't mean to hijack the thread.

This new drive is news to me and amazing if true.

Lets take foreign aid and build a rocket...or a nonrocket whatever ya call it....

Best

CR

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Suppose you were in a car going faster than the speeed of light, and you turned the headlights on.

Would they work?"

 

Stephen Wright :lol:

Who cares...By the time you turn them on, you are already there...

 

Texas Lizard

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Howdy,

The warp drive factors changed in various star treks.

Its entertainment, folks.

Lighten up.

And I could never figure how they could miss with those space guns.

Wouldn't you just turn on a laser put the dot on the target pull the trigger

and WHAM. No curve of ballistics. No gravity to pull the energy burst.

How did they ever miss anything.

and I apologize ahead of time. Don't mean to hijack the thread.

This new drive is news to me and amazing if true.

Lets take foreign aid and build a rocket...or a nonrocket whatever ya call it....

Best

CR

Yep,

 

The actual speed in multiples of c varied a lot. It changes series to series, episode to episode and even within the same episode.

 

As for accuracy, if we were as bad at hitting targets as they were, CAS would still be in search of its first clean match. :P:D:lol:

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I think the theory is that light waves only shine on people to whom you're related:

 

Theory of Relativity.

 

This means if you were in your car at the speed of light, 670616629 mph, and you turned your lights on, they Would shine if your mother in law is in the car. They would not shine if your girlfriend was in the car. So if you,re carrying a relative, your beams would shine ahead of you as usual, even if you were already going the speed of light, brcause it's Relative. And if you were with your girlfriend and turned your lights on, you would actually be going in reverse time direction, because if u were in the carcw ur girlfriend, then you would be turning the lights OFF.

 

Now, this may seem confusing.

 

If so, then mayhap I will remind you that these theories were all written by people who (per the Big Bang Theory) had only read of girlfriends in comic books.

 

Nonetheless, it is true that having ur mo in law in the car means she will be impressed you turned the lights on. Which is better than being depressed.

 

And, no, I have not been drinking. But if I'm going Fast enough inmay have gone back into the past to a time when I had.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

For the record, in the original series, Warp 5 was 5 times as fast as warp. In the next generation they changed it up. I thought they changed it so it was logarithmic, but maybe it was cubed each time.

 

Time is supposed to do funny things at the speed of light. I think it slows down as you go faster and would stop at the speed of light. Obviously that's not something they can know for sure though.

Mass does very funny things as well. Current theory states that at the speed of light mass is infinite.

 

Seems that a couple of young mathmaticians wondered what would happen if you used a value larger than c in the equation.

 

Turns out the equation works for all values between c and 2c in reverse. As soon as you are going faster than the speed of light your mass starts to decrease. So the faster you are going the less mass you have.

 

Not sure what happens as you approach 2c but I susect the equation hits negative infinity.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Howdy,

I have this theory on driving minivans.

Cops never pull over minivans cause way back one of em got handed a loaded

baby diaper....

Drive any how you want in a minivan.

Drive the same way in a Orange Z/28 and get pulled over for a lecture.

Even if ya aint speeding.

 

So the lights would be ON but the beams would not project beyond the bulbs.

Next question......?

Best

CR

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I've been kidding around a lot with this one.

 

But this exact question is answered here

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SpeedOfLight/headlights.html

 

Here is a snippet without the math.

 

"...If you want to know what happens when you are driving at very nearly the speed of light, an answer can be given. Within your car you observe no unusual effects. You can look at yourself in your mirror which is moving with the car and you will look the same as usual. Looking out of the window is a different matter. The light from your headlights will always go at the speed of light in your reference frame. It will strike any object in its path and be reflected back. Everything else will be coming towards you at nearly the speed of light, so the light reflected from it will be Doppler shifted to very high frequenciestowards the ultraviolet or beyond. If you have a suitable camera you could take a snapshot. The objects passing are contracted in length but because of the different times of passage for the light and effects of aberration, the snapshot will show the objects you pass as rotated. See the relativity FAQ Penrose-Terrell Rotation."

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site, you agree to our Terms of Use.