Interstellar travel

[meridannight]

for those who don't know (as of May, 2015):

Measurements of the EmDrive experimental engine with this interferometer have been taken to suggest that Faster-Than-Light space travel might be a possibility.

this is exceptional!

Harold Sonny White is a scientist working at NASA, currently trying to develop a warp drive capable of faster-than-light travel. not kidding. it's based on the concepts of a Mexican physicist Miguel Alcubierre, who proposed a theoretical way to achieve it.

Alcubierre drive

Harold Sonny White is a genius though. i've been following his work for a few years now, and he's gonna achieve something monumental with his research.

[jimcrackcorn]

I watched a TV show about this recently. It's amazing to think we could travel at speeds faster than light.

We could actually travel to planets similar to ours. I just wonder what we would bring with us when we can finally travel to another planet,,,, religion? war?

Respectfully,
Jimerooo

[meridannight]

We could actually travel to planets similar to ours. I just wonder what we would bring with us when we can finally travel to another planet,,,, religion? war?

yeah, Vatican will have to develop its own warp drive. hold your breath.

[Emiliano]

That's incredible... I'd love to see that, but I remember learning one consequence of traveling at that speed. If the crew would want to return to Earth, it'd be like they were time traveling into our future, right? So part of me would certainly want to go and be and explorer, but the idea of not being able to return to an Earth that I knew would hold me back. I was just thinking that'd make a good sci Fi movie, but that's basically planet of the apes, right?

[meridannight]

but I remember learning one consequence of traveling at that speed. If the crew would want to return to Earth, it'd be like they were time traveling into our future, right?

actually, the effects of special relativity should not apply since you are not, in fact, moving. you have no speed, or acceleration (nothing can move faster than light, this thing doesn't violate that principle – which is the beauty of it; it is that amazing!). this is coordinate displacement, achieved through compression and rarefaction of space, to which there are no speed limits. you should be able to 'move' at multiple C-s without suffering the consequences of aging slower than the people you leave behind.

[Cobalt]

I just want to visit Uranus. *snicker*

[Emiliano]

actually, the effects of special relativity should not apply since you are not, in fact, moving. you have no speed, or acceleration (nothing can move faster than light, this thing doesn't violate that principle – which is the beauty of it; it is that amazing!). this is coordinate displacement, achieved through compression and rarefaction of space, to which there are no speed limits. you should be able to 'move' at multiple C-s without suffering the consequences of aging slower than the people you leave behind.

My mind is my favorite thing to have blown.

[ceez]

I hope I get to see this in my life time

[starlight]

Maybe be off topic a little but isnt it strange how there was no flight up till around 100 years ago and then suddenly its all a big boom and like it is now.

[1and1]

That's incredible... I'd love to see that, but I remember learning one consequence of traveling at that speed. If the crew would want to return to Earth, it'd be like they were time traveling into our future, right? So part of me would certainly want to go and be and explorer, but the idea of not being able to return to an Earth that I knew would hold me back. I was just thinking that'd make a good sci Fi movie, but that's basically planet of the apes, right?

Indeed. If you meet and exceed the speed of light, you should effectively meet the light that was sent out BEFORE / EARLIER / PREVIOUSLY. Thus, moving faster through space = moving slower through time. Slower and slower until you actually end up "going backwards".

The reverse of this theory is that, to move faster through time you need to move slower through space. This connects with what I learnt in the 4 part documentary I watched on YouTube.

This is, I might add, what I have come to understand. I may be wrong.

As for what film explores all this? Interstellar, of course

The theory is that, black holes warp and distort time, slowing it down. Stretching light and everything that enters them to the max, before destroying it.

In the film Interstellar, they get close enough to the black hole that they can survive and get away again, but when the get away from the black hole, they find that the rest of the crew, and in fact planet Earth, have all aged much faster. Because near the black hole, lightwaves have been stretched (slowed down, taking longer to travel). So they "stayed in the past". While the rest of the universe moved forward.

So yes you can use light speed travel to go into the future, but in order to do so, you would have to travel away AND THEN back again.