Warp vs hyperspace

Tech^salvager · Post by **Tech^salvager** » 2004-12-07 08:16am

This is not a vs on speed, but on which could become real. Is anyone of these possible in real life?

Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba · Post by **Nieztchean Uber-Amoeba** » 2004-12-07 08:17am

Not in the slightest.

Chris OFarrell · Post by **Chris OFarrell** » 2004-12-07 08:23am

Both are horribly unrealistic and its more likely then not that we will never break the lightspeed barrier.

Stofsk · Post by **Stofsk** » 2004-12-07 08:52am

Er...

Warpdrive is apparently less 'unrealistic' than hyperdrive, according to a friend of mine who studies astrophysics. What he meant was, I think, that the 'math works' for warpdrive, but less so for hyperdrive. (and wormholes? forget it...) I don't know what that really means though.

Now, if you mean are they PRACTICAL, then no, neither one of them is. Nor is likely to. Ever. We may dream to see one in real life, but dreams are not reality. Sometimes that can be a good thing.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2004-12-07 11:56am

Stofsk wrote:(and wormholes? forget it...)

Actually, of the three, wormholes are the most justified. General Relativity explicitly disclaims knowlege of what happens to something which passes through the circular non-singularity in the middle of a black hole which is spinning fast enough that it forms an annulus.

Next would be attempts to gatherr enough negative energy to power a 'warp drive', but the symmetries which restrict negative energy pretty thoroughly rule that out.

Elheru Aran · Post by **Elheru Aran** » 2004-12-07 12:21pm

.......

negative energy???.....

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2004-12-07 12:55pm

It was mentioned in a SciAm article a few years back, as a genuine effect which was published in regular legit scientific journals (as opposed to SciAm). And no, we're not talking mere gauge invariance here. IIRC, it went something like this:

You pass a lot of energy through a space (in the form of EM waves), and abruptly remove it. Because of the continuity of derivatives in QM, the energy overshoots zero and briefly becomes slightly negative. You have to put a heck of a lot of regular positive energy into a region for a long time to get just a little negative energy in that region for just a moment.

It looks like getting lucky on Google with "negative energy" yields the reference I was thinking of.

Trogdor · Post by **Trogdor** » 2004-12-07 08:14pm

I've googled negative energy in the past and just gotten a lot of crap about karma and astrology. I'd like to know how you got meaningful stuff.

And negative energy isn't that realistic so far as I know, at least no more realistic than having negative 5 lbs. of something.

SirNitram · Post by **SirNitram** » 2004-12-07 08:39pm

Negative energy works on paper.. On paper alone. We've never found any. It's theorized to be the source of the mysterious antigravity effect observed on universal scales(IE, you tend not to notice it unless the objects involved are, oh, half the diameter of hte universe apart), but that theory is tenuous at best. The idea is basically making a dimple in spacetime and 'riding' the two curves, so that the distance between Point A and Point B is shorter.

As you can expect, the energy expenditure for a spacetime ripple that profound are.. Obscene.

Now, the idea of Hyperdrive as an alternate dimension carries zero scientific water... however there's a new interpretation put forth by the AOTC ICS. It suggests that the ship can, through means beyond our understanding, convert enough of the ship from 'normal' matter into an exotic form that has 'complex mass'. What's complex mass? Short version, it's mass which can only be expressed by taking the square root of a negative number.

This, of course, sounds pretty off the wall. But, much like Alucubrrie Warp drive, the math works. You can get 'max speeds'.. That is, less than infinite dialation.. Above c when you use a complex number for the mass of the ship. And complex mass has apparently been observed(In highly exotic matter composed of 'Hyperons'. I'm convinced the guys running the projects I've read about were Wars Geeks. They tentatively call matter composed of Hyperons as Hypermatter.), so that's one-up over Warp.

Read into it as you will. Both work on paper. Only one has even a smidgen of a chance working in reality. And you'll never see either one in use in your lifetime or your grandchild's.

GeneralTacticus · Post by **GeneralTacticus** » 2004-12-08 01:35am

Trogdor wrote:I've googled negative energy in the past and just gotten a lot of crap about karma and astrology. I'd like to know how you got meaningful stuff.

Hmmm... potential for warp drive based on harvesting people's depression, then?

Shinova · Post by **Shinova** » 2004-12-08 01:47am

GeneralTacticus wrote:
Trogdor wrote:I've googled negative energy in the past and just gotten a lot of crap about karma and astrology. I'd like to know how you got meaningful stuff.
Hmmm... potential for warp drive based on harvesting people's depression, then?

We should do that. Make the world a happier place.

Winston Blake · Post by **Winston Blake** » 2004-12-08 01:54am

I think that basically, warp drive and hyperdrive as shown are absurdly impossible, but rationalisations (specifically Alcubierre's warp drive and Saxton's sub-planck tachyonic conversion) are barely possible, remotely, in theory, at the current level of physical evidence.

SirNitram wrote:there's a new interpretation put forth by the AOTC ICS. It suggests that the ship can, through means beyond our understanding, convert enough of the ship from 'normal' matter into an exotic form that has 'complex mass'.

As a side note, is Saxton's tachyonic thing on the Hyperspace page of SWTC the same idea as this complex mass stuff in the EP2ICS?

All i can see is "Hyperdrives adjust faster-than-light 'hypermatter' particles to allow a jump to light-speed without changing the complex mass and energy of the ship." If it doesn't change the ship's complex mass, that means it's mass was complex before then, so i don't understand your 'normal matter -> complex matter' thing.

Winston Blake · Post by **Winston Blake** » 2004-12-08 01:56am

Shinova wrote:
GeneralTacticus wrote:
Trogdor wrote:I've googled negative energy in the past and just gotten a lot of crap about karma and astrology. I'd like to know how you got meaningful stuff.
Hmmm... potential for warp drive based on harvesting people's depression, then?
We should do that. Make the world a happier place.

Maybe that explains how Federation pseudo-communism can work- they've literally sucked the naughty bits of humanity out of everyone in the Federation.

Pcm979 · Post by **Pcm979** » 2004-12-08 02:00am

Hrm. That means, however, that they should be actively formenting depression and woe so there's more to be used.

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2004-12-08 04:34am

Warpdrive is apparently less 'unrealistic' than hyperdrive, according to a friend of mine who studies astrophysics.

Your friend is wrong. Plain and simple.

There ARE calculations and maths and such and such for something that eggheads do, in fact, call "warp drive". However, its hypothesized method of operation is not similar in the slightest to what Star Trek presents. There's no "subspace", for example.

Naming coincidence, nothing more.

Dooey Jo · Post by **Dooey Jo** » 2004-12-08 05:13am

SirNitram wrote:And complex mass has apparently been observed(In highly exotic matter composed of 'Hyperons'. I'm convinced the guys running the projects I've read about were Wars Geeks. They tentatively call matter composed of Hyperons as Hypermatter.)

Actually, hyperons are baryons composed of combinations of u-, d- and s-quarks. Hypermatter is stable combinations of hyperons, and it is very dense since the s-quark is more than 20 times heavier than the u- and d-quarks (it's hyper-dense matter). It does not have complex mass, and the name hypermatter is probably just a naming coincidence.

Winston Blake · Post by **Winston Blake** » 2004-12-08 06:29am

Dooey Jo wrote:Actually, hyperons are baryons composed of combinations of u-, d- and s-quarks.

Well, that's true in a sense, but hyperons are actually any baryon that's more massive than a nucleon (as in hyper=greater), so other quarks can also form hyperons.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2004-12-08 01:27pm

1st: tachyons have a max speed of 2c. This is markedly slower than the listed speeds for hyperdrive.

2nd: if we had ANY evidence for tachyons (complex-massed particles), that would be all over the news, because it would disprove the principle of equivalence, and thus General Relativity. We'd get to keep about half of Special Relativity, but many of its predictions and especially the no-preferred-rest-frame prediction (which is the reason it was devised in the first place) would have to go out the window. Basically, we would have just disproven all of 20th century physics except quantum mechanics. It would be far far far worse than discovering magnetic monopoles.

3rd: negative energy is not psychology-related. Get that shit away from me. Even so, I'm not sure I buy it, but if verified I can fit it into my understanding of the universe.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2004-12-08 01:28pm

SPOOFE wrote:
Warpdrive is apparently less 'unrealistic' than hyperdrive, according to a friend of mine who studies astrophysics.
Your friend is wrong. Plain and simple.

There ARE calculations and maths and such and such for something that eggheads do, in fact, call "warp drive". However, its hypothesized method of operation is not similar in the slightest to what Star Trek presents. There's no "subspace", for example.

Naming coincidence, nothing more.

And what, conversion to tachyons resembles in any way the hyperspace transition? At least warp drive is supposed to bend space, which is kind of in the right direction.

Dooey Jo · Post by **Dooey Jo** » 2004-12-08 02:13pm

Winston Blake wrote:
Dooey Jo wrote:Actually, hyperons are baryons composed of combinations of u-, d- and s-quarks.
Well, that's true in a sense, but hyperons are actually any baryon that's more massive than a nucleon (as in hyper=greater), so other quarks can also form hyperons.

Yes, you're right, of course. Hypermatter with an s-quark is called strange matter IIRC and is theoretically the most stable of all the possible types. Anyway the point is that they don't have complex mass.

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2004-12-08 02:20pm

1st: tachyons have a max speed of 2c. This is markedly slower than the listed speeds for hyperdrive.

Bullshit. Nothing is known about tachyons, first of all. Second, they behave opposite to regular matter... you need to apply energy to SLOW THEM DOWN as opposed to speed 'em up. Removing energy causes them to go faster.

And what, conversion to tachyons resembles in any way the hyperspace transition?

When did I say anything remotely like that, you moron?

At least warp drive is supposed to bend space, which is kind of in the right direction.

Uh, no. Star Trek's "warp drive" sinks a ship into subspace. In case you haven't noticed, "subspace" doesn't exist.

There is NO significant similarity between ST's propulsion and actual current theories.

SPOOFE · Post by **SPOOFE** » 2004-12-08 02:21pm

I said...

Nothing is known about tachyons, first of all.

I should rather say "nothing substantial". It's all guesswork at this point. Hell, nobody knows if they even exist.

Post by **Darth Wong** » 2004-12-08 02:41pm

Anyone who says that violating one particular law of physics is "more realistic" than violating another is being either facetious or stupid. But by all means, if this person feels that it is "more realistic" to warp spacetime with a small amount of mass/energy than it is to have a complex mass and "flip it over" the asymptote, let him explain how it would be done, even in terms of vague theory.

The Dark · Post by **The Dark** » 2004-12-08 03:58pm

Elheru Aran wrote:....... negative energy???.....

Look up the name Alcubierre on Google. He postulated a FTL drive system based off negative energy about a decade ago.

drachefly · Post by **drachefly** » 2004-12-08 06:43pm

Darth Wong wrote:Anyone who says that violating one particular law of physics is "more realistic" than violating another is being either facetious or stupid.

I must disagree, DW. Some laws are much better tested than others. A good portion of physics is an attempt to find places where out current laws ARE violated. Yet this is not a random search. Some parts of our theories are much looser than others.

Magnetic monopoles? Only thing saying they don't exist is the facile observation that we haven't seen any.

Charge-Parity-Time symmetry violation? Well, it would make some rules look less pretty, but it would not signficantly screw up the entire model of the universe.

Particles moving faster than c? There goes every reason to motivate relativity. There are a hell of a lot of correct predictions that were made on relativistic theory, which would then be falsified. That's some serious business.

Transmutation of the elements when you put them in a pentagram and say 'om mani padme hum'? OK, that I think we can rule out.

Spoofe wrote:When did I say anything remotely like that, you moron?

Basically, I was saying that if there is ANY similarity between warp drive and spatial warps, it's better than hyperspace has. And some of the warp drive mechanisms suggest that space is indeed bent in some way. That's all.

SPOOFE wrote:Bullshit. Nothing is known about tachyons, first of all.

LOL. We don't know anything about a particle we predicted? The basic idea is that Special Relativitistic equations appear to support solutions with imaginary mass (particles which ignore its guiding principles), which move at velocities ranging from c to 2c, with KE behaving symmetrically to normal KE, reflected around c.

That was the initial prediction. If there is some other particle that moves faster than 2c, it is some other particle that moves faster than 2c, and it is not a tachyon.

Much like, if a Griffon suddenly walked up to you, you would be shocked, but perfectly within your rights to say that it was not a Dragon.