Quote from: Smithsonia on June 09, 2009, 03:38:00 AM
Warp speed is a story tellers device only. Otherwise every space adventure would have the crew sealed in lava lamp hibernation tubes for the entire movie.

I always appreciate when in Star Trek they say such and such a galaxy is 10,000 light years and then proceed to jump to Warp factor 9 or 10... however instead of arriving in 1000 years from now (you do the math) they cut it down to 10 minutes. Even the writers of this alternate reality can't keep it straight in their heads. Why should any of you?

Warp travel is not point-to-point in real space, its using an alternative, as yet inaccessible / undiscovered channel to bridge the distance point-to-point.

If you want a real relativistic headache, read some of Card's Ender's books.

Quote from: Smithsonia on June 09, 2009, 03:38:00 AM
Warp speed is a story tellers device only. Otherwise every space adventure would have the crew sealed in lava lamp hibernation tubes for the entire movie.

I always appreciate when in Star Trek they say such and such a gallaxy is 10,000 light years and then proceed to jump to Warp factor 9 or 10... however instead of arriving in 1000 years from now (you do the math) they cut it down to 10 minutes. Even the writers of this alternate reality can't keep it straight in their heads. Why should any of you?

Warp drive rolls off the tongue so much easier than Tesseract drive, which pre-dates Star Trek by about 4 years.  (From A Wrinkle in Time, not geometry.)

Quote from: Smithsonia on June 09, 2009, 03:38:00 AM
Warp speed is a story tellers device only. Otherwise every space adventure would have the crew sealed in lava lamp hibernation tubes for the entire movie.

I always appreciate when in Star Trek they say such and such a gallaxy is 10,000 light years and then proceed to jump to Warp factor 9 or 10... however instead of arriving in 1000 years from now (you do the math) they cut it down to 10 minutes. Even the writers of this alternate reality can't keep it straight in their heads. Why should any of you?

Warp Factors are not a linear measurement.

The mathematical equation won't reproduce here, but it is available here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Warp_drive.

There's also this: "Exact velocities were only given in the Voyager episode The 37's where Tom Paris describes Voyager's velocity at warp factor 9.9 as being about 4 billion miles per second, which would be over 21000 times the speed of light."

FWIW


In 2007, physicist Richard Obousy proposed that a warp drive could be created by directly manipulating the extra dimensions of string theory.[7] His idea suggests the expansion of space-time is a consequence of the vacuum ground-state of higher dimensional graviton fluctuations. The vacuum energy equations can be expressed as:



In this model, it is the radius of the extra dimensions that directly controls the expansion of space. Obousy suggests that it is superstrings that wrap around the extra dimensions and thusly keeping them compact, but that a sufficiently advanced civilization might influence a string and locally adjust the size of the extra dimension creating a controlled expansion and contraction of the space surrounding an interstellar craft. In July of 2008 it was reported that two Baylor University physicists have outlined how a faster-than-light engine could be created by manipulating the 11th dimension, a special theoretical construct of m-theory.

According to research by Finazzi, Liberati und Barceló the "warp bubble" seems to be unstable.

I hope that clears things up...

Quote from: Eclipse on June 09, 2009, 06:26:55 AM

I hope that clears things up...

Yep, clear as mud! 

Eclipse wrote:
Warp travel is not point-to-point in real space, its using an alternative, as yet inaccessible / undiscovered channel to bridge the distance point-to-point.

Ed O'Brien says:
To argue about the fiction in science fiction is worthless. New science will make some SiFi irrelevant and some prescient. I can't tell which will work out until the science comes along. I also can't account for all manner of concoction in the interim.

Science Fiction is a work of good storytelling first with splashes of good science for effect. The effect is to suspend disbelief. Suspending disbelief is the work of the writer. Proving something to the point of belief is the work of science. Don't confabulate the two.

"Confabulation: The building of fantasies and presentation in a logical manner for a personal agenda." All science fiction is confabulation - the personal agenda is book sales or respect. Some things will work out in the end, most won't. Science Fiction writers give us visions and dreams. Scientist and engineers give us reality.

You gotta know the point in which these two things are different. Otherwise all unidentified blinking lights in the sky become aliens from another dimension. AND, your mother a demon spawn from Hades that must be cleansed from the firmament. Crazy in -- gives you crazy out. Good writing in -- gives you nightmares or dreams and the rest we'll have to work out later.

Even if the discovery we make is not "Warp Drive," I am always amazed at the discoveries made in the process of trying to get there, sometimes far more [immediately] beneficial than the end product.

I saw an interview with Gene Roddenberry regarding the "Transporter." It was a storytelling device he came up with to save money in the original Star Trek series. He couldn't afford to make a fully sized Space runabout that people walked in to and then project it into a model on the shuttle bay of the Enterprise.

Instead he came up with the a room of blinking lights and camera tricks and called it the "transporter." "Beam me up Scotty", was a tool, a device, to save production costs. Since then many people have confabulated science and storytelling to make the thing work. And now, there are actual scientists who postulate the science of the transporter. BUT, it is still and probably will remain a storytelling, production money saving device. Good story telling doesn't make it true. It makes you think it is true.

Oh and for my friend, colleague, and squadron mate Scott Orr/Rotorhead. 21000 times the speed of light going to a Galaxy 10,000 light years away makes the trip to that place 173 days or better than a year round trip. Meaning in a 5 year mission... 4-5 stories. The rest is travel time, BORING. "Warp drive" even if they get it working won't be worth much more than the near by cluster of suns and planets. You best hope they get it to 1000 times that 21,000 times the speed of light.

Quote from: Smithsonia on June 09, 2009, 02:57:43 PM
I saw an interview with Gene Roddenberry regarding the "Transporter." It was a storytelling device he came up with to save money in the original Star Trek series. He couldn't afford to make a fully sized Space runabout that people walked in to and then project it into a model on the shuttle bay of the Enterprise.

Instead he came up with the a room of blinking lights and camera tricks and called it the "transporter." "Beam me up Scotty", was a tool, a device, to save production costs. Since then many people have confabulated science and storytelling to make the thing work. And now, there are actual scientists who postulate the science of the transporter. BUT, it is still and probably will remain a storytelling, production money saving device. Good story telling doesn't make it true. It makes you think it is true.

Oh and for my friend, colleague, and squadron mate Scott Orr/Rotorhead. 21000 times the speed of light going to a Galaxy 10,000 light years away makes the trip to that place 173 days or better than a year round trip. Meaning in a 5 year mission... 4-5 stories. The rest is travel time, BORING. "Warp drive" even if they get it working won't be worth much more than the near by cluster of suns and planets. You best hope they get it to 1000 times that 21,000 times the speed of light.

You realize that the galaxy is 100,000 Ly in diameter don't you? The nearest star system to earth is the Alpha Centauri system at 4.3 Ly. there are thousands of stars within 500 Ly of us. At 21000c it would take 8.5 days to travel 500 ly. There's a lot to see in just that small volume.

David Sinn;

Thank you. I do know those numbers. Let me know when you get back from your journey to Alpha Centari... and we'll talk. I imagine migration over many millennium is possible. In the same way that man colonized the earth without cars... we had to go old school slow. That is not what I was speaking about. Exceeding the speed of light by 21000 times is what I was speaking about.

In my case the discussion was about what is known. What is unknown. What is possible using what is known. AND, how writers use the magic of storytelling to confuse/suspend belief/or weave a tale for the audience. I can't make it any plainer. Being that I am a writer - I am not confused about what I invent and what I know is true. Gene Roddenberry and Harlan Ellison both despaired about the same. Whitley Strieber does too or does not... but that's another discussion entirely. For further insight please read all of this http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Whitley_Strieber

In the same way that all magicians want to fool and amaze you. Ethics dictates that they tell you it is theatrical magic but it is not real. In the same way fiction writers should ethically defend their own work but never say that it is fact. So I am not studying the Klingon language either.

I am not trying to throw cold water on good SciFi... just point out that their are those who see too much science in their science fiction. Oh look there's a 500 foot tall spider irradiated by the most recent North Korean nuclear bomb test... please pardon me, but I must run for my life now.

Man, I tried to get a grip on all this math and my brain just slipped out my left ear.  Thanks guys......



Oh and  "KHAN!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Quote from: esilassy on June 10, 2009, 06:11:49 PM
Man, I tried to get a grip on all this math and my brain just slipped out my left ear.  Thanks guys......



Oh and  "KHAN!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Welcome to the Kobiyashu Maru Test! This is definitely a "no win scenario" that even Kirk couldn't figure out. Darn it, Jim, I'm a doctor not a theoretical physicist.

Quote from: Eclipse on June 09, 2009, 06:26:55 AM

I hope that clears things up...

Hey I'm happy when the 182 does 130 knots on RTB!

Quote from: flyerthom on June 11, 2009, 03:16:33 AM

Quote from: Eclipse on June 09, 2009, 06:26:55 AM

I hope that clears things up...

Hey I'm happy when the 182 does 130 knots on RTB!

Speed doesn't have to be FTL to be good. 

"Reality is just a crutch for people who can't handle Science Fiction."

It sez so right here on my button.

YMMV!

Quote from: flyerthom on June 11, 2009, 03:16:33 AM

Quote from: Eclipse on June 09, 2009, 06:26:55 AM

I hope that clears things up...

Hey I'm happy when the 182 does 130 knots on RTB!

I remember one time I was coming back from a SAREX, and I had a 180kt groundspeed in the 182. I was so excited I could barely contain myself!

Quote from: SJFedor on June 11, 2009, 08:14:10 AM
I remember one time I was coming back from a SAREX, and I had a 180kt groundspeed in the 182. I was so excited I could barely contain myself!

Change of pants needed no doubt!   

Quote from: SJFedor on June 11, 2009, 08:14:10 AM

Quote from: flyerthom on June 11, 2009, 03:16:33 AM

Quote from: Eclipse on June 09, 2009, 06:26:55 AM

I hope that clears things up...

Hey I'm happy when the 182 does 130 knots on RTB!

I remember one time I was coming back from a SAREX, and I had a 180kt groundspeed in the 182. I was so excited I could barely contain myself!

Reminds me of my police ridealong with the trooper who was going 180. THAT required a change of pants...

LOL, not even the speed of sound is the same (fixed) however it was once thought to be. Moreover, 50 years even 10 years ago, the concepts of then, are the norms of today, some at least.

Quote from: BrandonKea on June 06, 2009, 12:32:23 AM
Now we just wait for 2030 for Zefram Cochrane to be born, and another 33 years on top of that for First Contact.... get a book folks, it could be awhile.

Who's Zefram Cochrane?