JPL's FTL project.

DavidMcC · **#21** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 01, 2013 1:06 pm

What you guys need is an expert witness. Try Samantha Carter of Stargate Command. :roll:

DavidMcC · **#22** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 01, 2013 2:21 pm

laklak wrote:I hear that infernal steam locomotive may attain speeds of 25 miles in a single hour! Balderdash! The human body is not built to withstand accelerative forces of that magnitude, it will kill anyone foolish enough to ride on it.

What's that? Speed of sound? Nonsense! No aircraft is capable of breaking the sound barrier, and never will be! It's simply physically impossible, as any aeronautical engineer worth his salt will tell you.

At least nobody thought that steam engines going faster than 25mph or aircraft breaking the sound barrier broke the laws of physics! I think it is naive to extraplolate from past technological achievements to argue that anything and everything is achievable. There are still laws of physics.

DavidMcC · **#23** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 01, 2013 2:23 pm

... I'm sorry to see lucek and laklak joining the ranks of the over-credulous. The others, I half expected.

DavidMcC · **#24** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 01, 2013 2:36 pm

... Dream on, I guess. Stil haven't seen evidence of real worm-holes (or an explanation of how one controls a black hole), or the the option of moving at FTL through being further away than the most red-shifted known galaxy!

DavidMcC · **#25** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 01, 2013 2:57 pm

I checked out the Alcubierre paper on FTL travel without wormholes, in IOP Science:
http://iopscience.iop.org/0264-9381/11/5/001/pdf/0264-9381_11_5_001.pdf

This doesn't mean that our observers will be travelling faster than light: they always move inside their local light-cones. The enormous speed of separation comes from the expansion of spacetime itself.

That makes FTL travel pseudoscience in my book, because being that far away in order to move at FTL is absurd.

lucek · **#26** by **lucek** » Sep 01, 2013 6:48 pm

DavidMcC wrote:
lucek wrote:
CdesignProponentsist wrote:The type of FTL travel mentioned already exist.

The interior of black holes and likely positions much further than our observable limit in the larger universe are both moving FTL from our reference point.

So this isn't pseudoscience, just impractical.

Yeah like I said the outermost parts of the universe have moved ~3 times as far as they would had they traveled at C. Our universe is closer to 100 billion light years across because of GR instead of the ~28 billion that would be predicted by just saying FTL is impossible.

Lucek, there is a big difference between suggesting that the universe as a whole may have expanded at an FTL rate, and suggesting that it is possible to build a machine to travel at FTL rates. (Unless you want to build a machine as big as the universe, of course! )

Don't move the goal post. You claimed FTL was impossible not that it wasn't practice (even then you are overestimating the effects needed.) and I showed by direct observation that no it wasn't. Sorry but don't try to back peddle or just come out and say your previous statement was misinformed.

DavidMcC wrote:What you guys need is an expert witness. Try Samantha Carter of Stargate Command.

For note you are the only one here not taking this seriously. You pretend that this is some pipe dream based off scifi and then to prove that you imply the only experts on the theories are fictional. Despite the fact I can produce the equations right her and now or point you to many theoretical physicists some of which Nobel prize winners talking about just this very thing. But no, because you don't want to do the reading the work doesn't exist.

DavidMcC · **#27** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 02, 2013 10:46 am

lucek wrote:
DavidMcC wrote:
lucek wrote:
CdesignProponentsist wrote:The type of FTL travel mentioned already exist.

The interior of black holes and likely positions much further than our observable limit in the larger universe are both moving FTL from our reference point.

So this isn't pseudoscience, just impractical.

Yeah like I said the outermost parts of the universe have moved ~3 times as far as they would had they traveled at C. Our universe is closer to 100 billion light years across because of GR instead of the ~28 billion that would be predicted by just saying FTL is impossible.

Lucek, there is a big difference between suggesting that the universe as a whole may have expanded at an FTL rate, and suggesting that it is possible to build a machine to travel at FTL rates. (Unless you want to build a machine as big as the universe, of course! )

Don't move the goal post. You claimed FTL was impossible not that it wasn't practice (even then you are overestimating the effects needed.) and I showed by direct observation that no it wasn't. Sorry but don't try to back peddle or just come out and say your previous statement was misinformed.

Now you're being silly. I think it IS impossible to reach FTL by being further away than the most distant visible galaxy, because you would need FTL to get that far away to start with. Have you never heard of "catch 22"?

DavidMcC · **#28** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 02, 2013 10:50 am

... You can only get from here to there at FTL if you don't actually start from here. That's what the Alcubierre paper says, in effect.

DavidMcC · **#29** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 02, 2013 10:52 am

... I get the impression I'm talking to a bunch of 'Trekkies with attitude! :roll:

lucek · **#30** by **lucek** » Sep 02, 2013 4:33 pm

DavidMcC wrote:
lucek wrote:
DavidMcC wrote:
lucek wrote:
Yeah like I said the outermost parts of the universe have moved ~3 times as far as they would had they traveled at C. Our universe is closer to 100 billion light years across because of GR instead of the ~28 billion that would be predicted by just saying FTL is impossible.

Lucek, there is a big difference between suggesting that the universe as a whole may have expanded at an FTL rate, and suggesting that it is possible to build a machine to travel at FTL rates. (Unless you want to build a machine as big as the universe, of course! )

Don't move the goal post. You claimed FTL was impossible not that it wasn't practice (even then you are overestimating the effects needed.) and I showed by direct observation that no it wasn't. Sorry but don't try to back peddle or just come out and say your previous statement was misinformed.

Now you're being silly. I think it IS impossible to reach FTL by being further away than the most distant visible galaxy, because you would need FTL to get that far away to start with. Have you never heard of "catch 22"?

Just wow. You do realize that every part of space is expanding, it's not just the farthest parts. We currently have no way of creating the amount of expansion however as I pointed out, the article you are calling pseudoscience never claimed there was. It was just talking about the calculations and what they may possibly mean in 100 years or more. Sorry but move on. You are arguing against general relativity. Not some quack. Not a lone nut. The math isn't in question.

lucek · **#31** by **lucek** » Sep 02, 2013 4:36 pm

DavidMcC wrote:... I get the impression I'm talking to a bunch of 'Trekkies with attitude!

No You are just talking to people who in effect are traveling FTL at this very moment (relativity, no universal frame of reference.)

Thommo · **#32** by **Thommo** » Sep 02, 2013 5:12 pm

From conversations I've had in the past neither wormholes nor warp technology are violations of relativity, this is why they have been staples of science fiction for so long - because they remain compatible with science, even if totally speculative.

Incidentally FTL speeds aren't forbidden in special relativity, what is forbidden is the amount of energy required to accelerate a massive particle to the speed of light (it diverges, i.e. you need "infinite" energy input). But the basic idea behind warp technology is that you cause a contraction of space just ahead of a moving body so that it can travel with an "average speed" faster than light by actually traveling a shorter distance.

Needless to say that no such technology is currently available, or anything other than fiction at this point, so future creation of the technology or ruling out of it is a valid line of highly speculative research.

iamthereforeithink · **#33** by **iamthereforeithink** » Sep 02, 2013 5:28 pm

Of course, it doesn't help that negative vacuum energy tends to not be in stock at the local hardware store.

THWOTH · **#34** by **THWOTH** » Sep 02, 2013 7:50 pm

DavidMcC wrote:... Note that the thread has been moved to "pseudoscience". Clearly, the mods agree with me.

!

GENERAL MODNOTE
For the information of all members: The moderators move threads as a matter of forum housekeeping, of trying to find the appropriate context for the matter in hand. It does not mean that the mod-team agree with or endorse one view over another. Considering the OP and the nature of the discussion this thread has now been moved to the Science >> Physics section.

:cheers:

Paul Almond · **#35** by **Paul Almond** » Sep 02, 2013 9:11 pm

DavidMcC wrote:... I get the impression I'm talking to a bunch of 'Trekkies with attitude!

I get the impression that I am talking to someone who doesn't understand what he is talking about and who first claims (wrongly) that ideas like this violate relativity and then moves the goalposts by going on about the burden of showing that things like this "exist" and then going on about the practical difficulties of controlling them (and people on the other side had acknowledged that there are issues like this).

I think talking to you is a waste of time, and I am done with this thread. I will need to have experiential evidence, made available to me in a conversation between me and you, that something that you have to say that is worth discussing with you actually exists before I will converse with you again about anything, unless the continuation of my life happens to be contingent on having a discussing with you, as I have better things to do and really have contempt for your lazy "star trek" ad hominem when it is clear, from your very first claim about the speed of light that you are totally out of your depth.

lucek · **#36** by **lucek** » Sep 02, 2013 9:47 pm

Paul Almond wrote:
DavidMcC wrote:... I get the impression I'm talking to a bunch of 'Trekkies with attitude!

I get the impression that I am talking to someone who doesn't understand what he is talking about and who first claims (wrongly) that ideas like this violate relativity and then moves the goalposts by going on about the burden of showing that things like this "exist" and then going on about the practical difficulties of controlling them (and people on the other side had acknowledged that there are issues like this).

I think talking to you is a waste of time, and I am done with this thread. I will need to have experiential evidence, made available to me in a conversation between me and you, that something that you have to say that is worth discussing with you actually exists before I will converse with you again about anything, unless the continuation of my life happens to be contingent on having a discussing with you, as I have better things to do and really have contempt for your lazy "star trek" ad hominem when it is clear, from your very first claim about the speed of light that you are totally out of your depth.

Now the thread is where it belongs would you like to talk about the article?

DavidMcC · **#37** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 03, 2013 12:03 pm

Oh, wow! At least one of the mods has gone all Trekkie! I've got bad news for you - FTL travel in the local universe ain't physics.
Still, I can't stop anyone dreaming, I suppose... :roll:

Thommo · **#38** by **Thommo** » Sep 03, 2013 12:49 pm

DavidMcC wrote:Oh, wow! At least one of the mods has gone all Trekkie! I've got bad news for you - FTL travel in the local universe ain't physics.
Still, I can't stop anyone dreaming, I suppose...

What are you trying to say? Nobody (including the cited researcher) has claimed to be able to travel faster than light. This is a discussion of research into the possibility, which includes either ruling it out or ruling it in.

The methods discussed do not violate any form of relativity.

DavidMcC · **#39** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 03, 2013 1:09 pm

Thommo wrote:
DavidMcC wrote:Oh, wow! At least one of the mods has gone all Trekkie! I've got bad news for you - FTL travel in the local universe ain't physics.
Still, I can't stop anyone dreaming, I suppose...

What are you trying to say? Nobody (including the cited researcher) has claimed to be able to travel faster than light. This is a discussion of research into the possibility, which includes either ruling it out or ruling it in.

The methods discussed do not violate any form of relativity.

The Alcubierre paper does not simply say no-one has been able to do it, but implies that FTL relative to where you are is not consistent with SR. As for GR, it is only a mathematical abstraction that appears to allow for "worm-holes". Yet such entities have not been not observed, and even if they existed, using one would involve falling into a black hole, which cannot be recommended as a mode of transport!:
http://www.space.com/20881-wormholes.html

Certain solutions of general relativity allow for the existence of wormholes where the mouth of each is a black hole. However, a naturally occurring black hole, formed by the collapse of a dying star, does not by itself create a wormhole.

DavidMcC · **#40** by **DavidMcC** » Sep 03, 2013 1:14 pm

It's all very well having an open mind, but belief in the practical possibility of FTL is more like the "lid flapping in the wind" (to quote RD on creationism)!

JPL's FTL project.

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