VonHelton Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 slashdot: Warp Engines In Development? Toloran writes "Although a stable of Sci-Fi space travel, it is often deemed to be just that: Fiction. However, it seems that one is currently in development. "The theoretical engine works by creating an intense magnetic field that, according to ideas first developed by the late scientist Burkhard Heim in the 1950s, would produce a gravitational field and result in thrust for a spacecraft. Also, if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would result in the engine reappearing in our current dimension."" :stare: Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VonHelton Posted January 9, 2006 Author Share Posted January 9, 2006 A German scientist has claimed that we could have a working Star Trek style warp drive in the next five years. http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2148187/warp-drive-five-years :o Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evil Enigma Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 Am I just supposed to take these people's words for it? I don't see any scientific proof or equations. I think someone has been watching to much Star Trek. NASA can't even get most of their current equipment to work right. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
VonHelton Posted January 9, 2006 Author Share Posted January 9, 2006 I submit that it's always been posible, we just needed to get past our pre-concieved ideas. :) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
StitchInTime Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 I just hope it doesn't just turn out to be something like "Event Horizon." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evil Enigma Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 It's posible just not probable. I'd get past my pre-concieved ideas if I saw some facts and figures. :p Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
thejman Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 Heim's theory could not only unify General Relativity with Quantum Mechanics, but also lead to 'hyperspace' travel which might allow travel to Mars in a couple of hours and to a star 11 light years away, in 80 days! Heim (who died in 2001) was a reclusive, handicapped German physicist who had both his hands blown off, and was 90% blind and deaf due to an explosion accident. In the early 1950s, Heim began to rewrite the equations of General Relativity in a quantum framework. He drew on Einstein's idea that the gravitational force emerges from the dimensions of space and time, but suggested that all fundamental forces, including electromagnetism, might emerge from a new, different set of dimensions. He proposed a new two-dimensional "sub-space" onto Einstein's four-dimensional space-time. In Heim's six-dimensional world, the forces of gravity and electromagnetism are coupled together. In Heim's view of space and time, it is possible to convert electromagnetic energy into gravitational and back again, and he speculated that a rotating magnetic field could reduce the influence of gravity on, say, a spacecraft, enough for it to float off. His theory also accurately predicts the masses of particles from first principles, something that the Standard Model of physics cannot do. Another physicist, Dröscher, extended the theory such that you can derive the four forces known in physics: the gravitational and electromagnetic forces, and the strong and weak nuclear forces. Furthermore, two more fundamental forces emerge. These are related to the familiar gravitational force: one is a repulsive anti-gravity similar to the dark energy that appears to be causing the universe's expansion to accelerate. And the other might be used to accelerate a spacecraft without any rocket fuel. This will require a huge rotating ring placed above a superconducting coil to create an intense magnetic field. With a large enough current in the coil, and a large enough magnetic field, Dröscher claims the electromagnetic force can reduce the gravitational pull on the ring to the point where it floats free. Gravitophotons would interact with conventional gravity to produce a repulsive anti-gravity force. To completely counter Earth's pull on a 150-tonne spacecraft a magnetic field of around 25 tesla would be needed. His basic theory was developed in near isolation from the scientific community. Heim's handicap led him to prefer this isolation as the effort of communication in a university environment was too much of a strain. A small group of physicists who learned of Heim's work and studied it in sufficient detail to recognise its potential is now trying to bring it to the attention of the scientific community. Recently a series of presentations of Heim theory were made by Haeuser, Droescher and Von Ludwiger. A paper based on the former was published in a peer-reviewed American Institute of Physics journal in 2005. This article has won a prize for the best paper received in 2004 by the AIAA Nuclear and Future Flight Technical Committee. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Evil Enigma Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 OK, that sounds cool. It kinda like "Star Trek" meets "Event Horizon" meets "Doctor Who". A high gravity,warp bubble that dematerializes the vehicle and enables FTL speed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TFMF Posted January 9, 2006 Share Posted January 9, 2006 I watched one of the DVD extras for Voyager i think it was. And it was a documentary about all the tech they used in Star Trek and how plausable it was. They said the idea of Warp was quite possible but that they didn't think Sub-Space was real or whatever.... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GhostShadow Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 These scientist speak of space and time and how to manipulate it... I dont think that these scientist even have the mental capiblity to comprehend the vast ammounts of variables that would need to be addressed before this is even put on the drawing bord. We as humans think that our technology is so advanced and that it can do what ever we dream, well maybe- just maybe its not. We cant even cure the most simple cold, but we can treat it. We are still plauged by fammen. And what is this about we could have it in 5 years? maybe we could figure a lot of the equations in 5 years but i think we are still 50-100 years from having the resources. and i have a question; This will require a huge rotating ring placed above a superconducting coil to create an intense magnetic field. With a large enough current in the coil, and a large enough magnetic field, Dröscher claims the electromagnetic force can reduce the gravitational pull on the ring to the point where it floats free. Gravitophotons would interact with conventional gravity to produce a repulsive anti-gravity force. To completely counter Earth's pull on a 150-tonne spacecraft a magnetic field of around 25 tesla would be needed. where would we get the enregy to spin the magnites? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greyCell Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 first of all we have to diffrintiate between 2 things: the theoritical ability to propel faster than light, and the actual ablility to do it. why are people excited about this? because by the rules of relativity we are theoritically unable to propel faster than light, even a theoritical break through would be great. the only problem is no matter how excited we are we can't claim to have the answer, all the quantum gravity theories out there including the string theory, the p brane theory, the quantum loop gravity theory, the dynamic eather theory, and some forms of a chaos theory do not fully succed in unifying gravity and quantum mechanics. some of those theories are not even complete, some of them only apply to certain extremeties like very low gravity fields or some other constraint that makes the theory incomplete, that is why scientists developed m theory, the theory we dont have, they say that m theory is the generalization of all of those theories. but we dont even have anything close to M theory, what we know is how it would be, but we dont know how to actually get that theory. some scientists beleive that we need a new form of mathimatics, just like we needed integration and diffrintiation to understand newtonian mechanics, here we are facing the same delima. people are over zelious, you ask a scientist is super luminal space travel possible, most pop science people would say YES and list some theories, the only problem is that thier proof is just like trying to calculate how much energy is needed to escape earth without knowing the constant of gravity, it is just not possible, we dont have a theory that combines quantum mechanics and gravity, now i know that people will fire a load of theories in my face , but beleive me all these theories are incomplete and are only applicable to certain situations. one of the most succesful attempts to build a theoritical model of a FTL engine is known as the Alcubierre drive: Alcubierre drive as shown in the the summary of the theory it is built on building a bubble or more precisely a wave that travels in space, the space ship would ride the wave and thus it would be propeled along with the wave, although the wave it self would cross normal space in super luminal speeds it wouldnt violate relativity because the ship wouldn't be moving faster than light inside its local frame of reference which is inside the wave or the bubble it self "please when comenting on this theory dont comment on the few lines ive just written read the summary in the link above first". only problem now is how do we make a spacetime bubble: we need to stretch space in a wave, causing the space "ahead" of a spacecraft to contract along the axis the spacecraft wishes to travel in and the space "behind" it to expand. how we will accomplish this is for anyone to figure out. what is great about this theory that makes it more plausibble than other theories is that it is theoritically complete, all its theoritical elements are there, we know that spacetime is streatchable, and we know what causes this deformation or warping in it, we just do not know how to practically cause this in a controlled way, and we dont know how the ship would leave this bubble once it has reached its destination. but all of these are practical issues, it may take us centuries to get there, but we know that it is possible, alcubierre proposed in 94 is using exotic matter , the only problem is we dont know if ity really does exist, we know that exotic effects do exist such as in the casimir effect where exotic effects take place in what is known as negative pressure closely related to negative masses of the exotix particles, so there is theoritically a chance. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
S0V13T Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 Hence the saying: One may know how to conquer go faster then light without being able to do it. - "The Art of War" Chapter 4, Paragraph 4 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mav Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 It will be several lifetimes before this becomes plausible. We cannot even venture out of our solar system yet, and all of a sudden warp-style travel could be opened up as a possiblity? Nah, too much too fast. Maybe if we take larger steps without making leaps we'll get there but like we just put the rover thing on Mars in the last 2-3 years ya know, it's data transmission was around the same speed as a 56k modem over the distance of Mars-to-Earth... Our "space station" hold's like what, less than 10 people? We still build huge rockets that must be moved via insanely huge tank-like mobile devices to a launch pad. It'll be the next few generations that might see this, our great grandchildren most likely. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GhostShadow Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 It will be several lifetimes before this becomes plausible. We cannot even venture out of our solar system yet, and all of a sudden warp-style travel could be opened up as a possiblity? Nah, too much too fast. Maybe if we take larger steps without making leaps we'll get there but like we just put the rover thing on Mars in the last 2-3 years ya know, it's data transmission was around the same speed as a 56k modem over the distance of Mars-to-Earth... Our "space station" hold's like what, less than 10 people? We still build huge rockets that must be moved via insanely huge tank-like mobile devices to a launch pad. It'll be the next few generations that might see this, our great grandchildren most likely. I agree, we dont even have hy-bird cars to the mass ppl yet. And all of the sudden we have warp in 5 years. I dont think so. I know that the US Air force is looking into this also since it too is working on developing a, 'star fleet', if you will. But i dont think that the US Military even has this kind of money. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mav Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 S Air force is looking into this also since it too is working on developing a' date=' 'star fleet', if you will. [/quote'] lol..bad flashbacks to President Reagan announcing the launch of project Star Wars, the defense system that was "state of the art" for its time >_< Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theaveng Posted January 10, 2006 Share Posted January 10, 2006 re: Reagan's Star Wars. Where do you think the anti-missile missiles came from (example Patriot)? Directly from that research. We are still plauged by fammen. Correctly spelled Famine. Comes directly from the Old French word "faim" meaning hunger which evolved from Vulgar Romans' "famina". At one time the phrase "I have famine" simply meant you were really hungry. Bodies travel through the universe because they are following curves in space. Like a ball follows a roulette wheel or track. So developing a warp drive could be as simple as bending space into curves which the spaceship would follow. PROBLEM: An engine would have to be really, really massive to overcome the local curvature caused by the Earth & the Sun! troy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
greyCell Posted January 11, 2006 Share Posted January 11, 2006 Bodies travel through the universe because they are following curves in space. Like a ball follows a roulette wheel or track. So developing a warp drive could be as simple as bending space into curves which the spaceship would follow. PROBLEM: An engine would have to be really, really massive to overcome the local curvature caused by the Earth & the Sun! i have to diasgree in this case size does not matter the former quote has a couple of erros number one bodies do not travel in space BECAUSE they are following the curves in space. or more precisely not only curves in space that causes them to move, curves in space is gravity, gravity can do 2 things, it can move a body which was initially stationary relative to the body pulliug it by gravity, and it can change the course of motion of a body from a straight line into a curve under the force of cravity like in the motion of celestial bodies around the sun. but a body which is simply moving through space and it is so far away from any massive bodies, so that practically the gravitiational field is so weak it is practically negliegable, that the body will move in a straight line relative to a reference frame and it wouldn't be moving or following curves in space. bending space is not simple because to acieve warp travel not only to we have to bend space we have to bend it massively, the curvatures predected needed for the alcubierre drive i mentioned a couple of posts up is close although a bit smaller than the curvature created by a black hole. and the second reason it is not simple to bend space to acieve warp travel is that we have to warp it in a very controlled manner. masses warp spacetime around them in the same manner that a big ball placed on thin leather membrane bends that membrane. it creates a kind of a vally around it and it sits in the deepest point of that valley, that means that in most cases the gravitational field is uniform all around the mass, all the gravitational equatuions do not mention the direction between the 2 bodies a s a factor in the magnitude of gravity pulling on the body, only the masses of the 2 bodies "relativistic masses if you apply relativity" and the distance between them. but it makes no difference if the body pulled by gravity is on the right of the mass pulling it or on the left, only the distance matters. my point is that the normal curvature created by masses in spacetime is uniform in all directions. however a curvature needed for a warp drive must contract space before the ship and expand space behind it. that is why creating a warp drive is not as simple as curving space. the only theoritically possible manner to do that is exotic matter, matter which is repelled by gravity, it can be used to curve space in a manner opossite to which norma matter curves it. using exotic matter along with normal matter in different combinations we can create a non uniform gravitational field. PROBLEM: An engine would have to be really, really massive to overcome the local curvature caused by the Earth & the Sun! relatively speaking the curvature caused by the sun and the earthvand the entire solar sytem is so superficial compared to the curvature neeeded to warp travel that taking it into considiration while calculating how much we need to warp space time to travel in it in a super luminal speed is like taking into considiration a 3 mm high dent in the road while calculating the course of a car on that road. the curvature made by the solar sytem is negligable for any practically calulating how much we need to curve space. remeber that i used a metaphor for the contineous curvature used to propel the ship in warp speed as a wave of space time travelling through spacetime, the effect of the sun on the wave the ship will ride is like the efrect of a haf a meter wave on a tsunami. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bones2097 Posted January 11, 2006 Share Posted January 11, 2006 hey they said some dude wrote a paper where is it? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
theaveng Posted January 11, 2006 Share Posted January 11, 2006 Troy's post is in error. number one bodies do not travel in space BECAUSE they are following the curves in space. or more precisely not only curves in space that causes them to move, curves in space is gravity, gravity can do 2 things, it can move a body which was initially stationary relative to the body pulliug it by gravity, and it can change the course of motion of a body from a straight line into a curve under the force of cravity like in the motion of celestial bodies around the sun. No. YOUR post is in error. Your description violates the Max Speed = C rule. Bodies do not move because the Sun says to the Earth "move towards me". That would require instantaneous communication/infinite speed, which is a violation of the Max Speed = C rule. I can't believe you made such an elementary error. No. Bodies move because Earth looks at its current position in space, and sees a funnel sloping towards the Sun, and follows that inward sloping curve. That is consistent with our understanding of curved spaced & does not violate the C = Max speed rule. Also, who says a warp drive has to exceed lightspeed? Poor assumption. In theory, a warp drive could boost a spaceship to a mere 1000 miles an hour for slow orbital maneuvers. In early tests of the warp prototype, it probably won't exceed 10 mph. troy Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
GhostShadow Posted January 13, 2006 Share Posted January 13, 2006 "The scientists of today think deeply instead of clearly. One must be sane to think clearly, but one can think deeply and be quite insane." - Nikola Tesla I think that this quote fits best here. I found it as a quote on one of the mail things i do. and i thougt about this thread. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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