A Warp Drive Is Within Our Reach, Apparently.

[Johnny Impact]

That. Sounds. Awesome. Disappointing that it wasn't very good overall.

Who wrote it, might I ask?

John Ringo.

The main series goes A Hymn Before Battle, Gust Front, When the Devil Dances, Hell's Faire. There are six or eight more books of side stories.

Ringo has some good ideas. His problem is his writing is poorer than most other scifi authors I've read. His prose doesn't flow and his characters seem flat. I didn't care much about the plotlines either -- we blow aliens up in one place, they blow us up in another, humans get some new weapons, massive pointless carnage and literal rivers of blood, rinse and repeat. It all blurs after a while.

He's also a little too in love with the military, by which I mean American Earth military. He must have been in the service at some point.

 

[Vigormortis]

Released merely days after the Steam game FTL was released...coincidence?

To be honest, this sounds like magic to me. MIT voodoo. But then, so does everything more advanced than a kettle...can anyone with some science knowledge tell me, yay or nay whether this is legit?

The simple answer is, it's theoretically legit. The issue is really a matter of specifics and logistics.

For example, the scientists in the article have shown that, huzzah!, it's technically possible to bend space-time, with much less energy than originally thought (but still quite vast), in such a way as to allow a craft to travel faster than light.

The question then is, just how in the flippity hell do we bend space-time like that and how do we generate those vast levels of energy? (and that's just two, over-simplified questions on the matter)

So again, theoretically "legit". Just...logistically unfeasible at the moment.

captcha: nobody home
Well then, apparently Captcha thinks I'm a moron. Guess you should disregard my post.

 

[Zen Toombs]

I don't believe in alien lifeformes.

Really? You do realize there are about as many stars in the galaxy as there are grains of sand on all of the beaches of Earth, and planets are even more common. There are so many that it would actually be all but impossible for there to NOT be life outside Earth.

Mind you, it does not follow from that argument that there are alien species above Earth right now, in process of abducting aliens and anally probing random humans.

You see all this sci-fi stuff, well it turns out that humanity may be the Vulcans, the Asari. We are the ancient race that discovers younger civilisations

Every sci-fi show was right all along! Humans ARE superior!

 

[Tippy]

10x light speed? WAY too slow, it would still take hundreds of years to get anywhere respectable. It would take over 4 months just to travel to our next-door star (Alpha Centauri), which the equivalent of traveling like...a tenth of a millimeter if our galaxy was as big as the US. Way, way too slow.

Yes I'm aware that time will probably stop (or even go backwards) for the people inside the spacecraft, but that doesn't change the fact that time will pass normally for everyone else outside the spacecraft (e.g. the people waiting back on earth), all relevant people will have long since died by the time said spacecraft returns.

Also you can't call this a "warp drive", the original idea behind the warp drive was something that could travel enormous distances in space via a wormhole. So thousands of lightyears could essentially be made instantaneous by traveling through a hole in space-time.

 

[Pfheonix]

Here's the scoop:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/49064028/ns/technology_and_science-space/

Now, aside from the fact that I had heard about this a few months ago on a National Geographic show, it's still pretty neat to think that we're actually experimenting with stuff like this.

This, however, did give me a rather interesting thought...lets assume that all the UFO stories are "fake". That is to say, they're not alien crafts, but rather just super-secret military test-flights of super-secret aircraft. Tying this back into the notion of developing a warp drive, suppose we do and go out to explore the galaxy. Now, pretty much all scenarios of a First Contact situation seem to be of the assumption that whatever we find out there will be much more advanced than us.

Well what if that's a load of bullshit? What if we go out there and find that there is other intelligent life out there, societies and races we can only imagine...yet WE'RE the ones who are technologically superior to them. In fact, it turns out that humanity is the top species in the galaxy. What do you think would happen to us as a people and society should we one day find out that we're the dominant species in the galaxy?

Personally, judging by the history of advanced cultures meeting more primative ones here on our planet, I honestly don't think we'd be very neighborly...

Inb4 religious zealotry: Religious Zealotry.

We're going to try to convert them, then we'll systematically rape them of their resources, then we'll take their planet after killing them. Oh, and did I mention the slavery? Yes. Slavery. ALL OF THE SLAVERY.

 

[Basement Cat]

That. Sounds. Awesome. Disappointing that it wasn't very good overall.

Who wrote it, might I ask?

John Ringo.

The main series goes A Hymn Before Battle, Gust Front, When the Devil Dances, Hell's Faire. There are six or eight more books of side stories.

Ringo has some good ideas. His problem is his writing is poorer than most other scifi authors I've read. His prose doesn't flow and his characters seem flat. I didn't care much about the plotlines either -- we blow aliens up in one place, they blow us up in another, humans get some new weapons, massive pointless carnage and literal rivers of blood, rinse and repeat. It all blurs after a while.

He's also a little too in love with the military, by which I mean American Earth military. He must have been in the service at some point.

I love Ringo's work. His 'Legacy of the Aldenata' series, aka "The Posleen Wars" is a great read, but it's more for people who dig military sci-fi than just straight forward sci-fi. And he has a great sense of dark humor bubbling throughout his works. I suggest it to anyone who enjoys good sci fi--but start with the first book: A Hymn Before Battle. Good stuff.

Oh, and yeah, he was a military man. He was in the 82 Airborn Division. Yep, Airborne. That's what gives his stories the "realistic" touch so many other writers lack when writing about the military. And he's funnnnnyyyyy!

 

[deleted_by_strongbad]

Assuming we get to the point where we are exploring and we do encounter another species, I think that unless that species is equal or superior to us that there is a very good chance we won't acknowledge it as intelligent if they have resources that we want, if they don't they will probably just be forgotten except for shows on the Discovery: Galaxy channel.

In all honesty, if one of those DARPA synthetic-intelligent life programs went haywire and we unleashed a steel plaque upon the universe I would be more optimistic about the future of life here than us going to the stars.

 

[Redingold]

Now hold on here, the energy requirements aren't the only thing wrong with an Alcubierre drive.

There's also the problem that is has to be negative energy, which we have no idea how to produce (you can do fancy things with lasers to create small-scale effects in space-time which have similar properties, but these don't scale well). There's also the problem that once we've collected this matter, you can't shape it into the right shape without it travelling faster than light on local scales, according to work done by Sergei Krasnikov. This requires the existence of tachyons, which don't necessarily exist.

Furthermore, it has been suggested that Hawking radiation formed by the bubble would destroy anything placed inside it while the bubble moved at FTL speeds. The exotic matter also has to be compressed into a shell that is extremely thin, only a few thousand Planck lengths. Finally, it turns out that when such a warp drive is functional, the front becomes causally disconnected from the back, which means the signals cannot traverse the length of the ship and so the ship cannot be steered nor the warp drive turn off.

In short, don't get all excited over this, there are still many, many problems to be sorted out.

 

[Allthingsspectacular]

Not gonna happen. Because the great filter.

We will inevitably destroy ourselves before we are ever able to travel the stars. Mother nature wouldn't be that stupid.

http://io9.com/great-filter/

Given the rise of cybernetics, I don't think this is true at all.

 

[RedDeadFred]

It's very interesting but the part about needing an "exotic" material kind of makes me doubt that this will work.

captcha: not yet. My thoughts exactly.

 

[Ignuus66]

Sorry to be the spoilsport here, but there are multiple problems with the alcubierre drive. Namely, we have to find some form of Exotic matter, which has only been theorized to exist. (much like white holes) Next there is the quite sizable problem of the fact that nothing from the back of the bubble can move to the front, which would cause serious problems for electronics, as they could only work in 2 dimensions, which would make it impossible for them to work in the bubble itself. Then there is the problem of energy. The amount of energy equivalent to 722 kg is MASSIVE, and the only efficient way to generate that much is Antimatter, and then there is the problem of detonating, creating and CONTAINING 722kg-s of antimatter, which would be enough to vaporize Europe (and probably make life extinct) if used in a bomb.

 

[Da Orky Man]

That's a cool article. I hope we do manage FTL travel - I mean, it obviously wouldn't be for mass usage, but it would still be awesome.

Now, I wonder if we're gonna be able to get past the "artificial gravity" hurdle?

For now, centrifuge pseudogravity ought to do fine. Otherwise, I'm rather excited for this development. We went from several galactic masses, to a solar mass, to a few Jupiter masses, and now to a few tons.

 

[Da Orky Man]

The cool thing about "Star Trek" (yes, I used "cool" and "Trek" in the same sentence!) is that ALL the technologies are feasible or theoretically possible because Gene Roddenberry always had an actual consulting physicist or two in tow.

No, it isn't. Star Trek is one of the softest, least scientifically rigorous science fiction shows out there. Battlestar Galactica, Stargate, Babylon 5, all better than Star Trek when it comes to science.
Not to say it isn't good, I quite like me some Trek, especially DS9, but to say it's at least semi-realistic in terms of science is just bollocks.

 

[Twilight_guy]

Scientists theorize about a possible way to travel faster then light and do an experiment that's as crude as a stone wheel compared to an atomic clock and we're suddenly wondering when we can book a trip to the nearest star. You know why aliens don't want to visit us? We're dumb and overly excitable creatures.

 

[Templarixx]

If we find a race inferior to us, most of the countries will fight over who gets its land and who can enslave it. This will most likely cause a massive war between nation and possibly cause our extinction. If we find a race superior to us, we will most likely attempt to make relations with them, the relations will fail, and we will fight them. This will possibly cause our extinction as well. Even though discovering other life is interesting, it will most likely cause our deaths.

 

[SnowBurst]

warp (faster then light travel) PHYSICALLY impossible itll never happen unless einstein gets proven wrong which he wont. if wormholes get proven to existance then maybe that way but ftl travel is impossible even to put in perspective it would take like 100 thousand years at light speed to get from one of the galaxy to the other let alone other galaxies it would take over a year at light speed to get to the nearest star aswell and about 20 years to the nearest possibly habitable planet

There are a lot of presumptions in your post.

Firstly, faster than light travel is theoretically possible. Hell, Einstein himself theorized several ways, including wormholes.

A common misconception is that Einsteins theories of relativity prove that nothing can travel faster than light. This is false. What they prove is that nothing can accelerate to light speed or beyond. There is a difference.

Secondly, the ideas of warp drives and other faster-than-light travel methods aren't just the crazy ramblings of sci-fi writers. They are often the very real theories of very intelligent physicist. Like in the case of this particular news item. You should read the article before jumping to any conclusions.

Now, for clarity's sake, a few corrections. (It's kind of dickish of me, but sometimes I can't help myself. My apologies.)

The Milky Way is roughly one-hundred thousand light-years across. So, at light speed, it would take one-hundred thousand years just to cross our galaxy, let alone go to other galaxies.

Speaking of which, the closest large galaxy to us (not counting dwarf galaxies that orbit our galaxy, like the large and small Magellanic Clouds), is Andromeda. It is a little over 2.5 million light years away. Ergo, at light speed, it would actually take 2.5 million years to get there.

Our closest neighboring star, it's approximately 4.24 light years away, resulting in a 4.24 year travel time at light speed.

As for the closet habitable planet, well...that distinction actually belongs to Mars. But since we're talking extra-solar planets, we honestly can't say. There could be habitable worlds around Alpha Centauri, there could be ones farther out. We just don't know yet.

So one could be within 5 light years. Or, there may be no other habitable worlds for hundreds of light years. We just don't know yet.

im not going to dignify that with a response, have u studied physics? because i have so ye if u have im sure i know more for one mars IS NOT habitable it needs to be Terra formed you dont know shit about it if you say mars is habitable -_-

 

[Shock and Awe]

I am quite sure that these UFOs were just either natural phenomena or military aircraft, and these aircraft were certainly not testing warp drives, remember during the 60s the USAF actually tested some saucer designs.

OT: This is really exciting for me as I have been hoping for Lunar bases and regular travel to Mars by my death, if this actually goes somewhere we may be out of the solar system by then. This is fantastic news and I can't wait to get more on it. As for us making contact with intelligent life it probably will not happen in our life time one way or the other. However, I would bet there is life other then us in the local stellar neighborhood of at least the microbial variety. There may even be another industrial species around the galaxy, but we'll probably never know.

im not going to dignify that with a response, have u studied physics? because i have so ye if u have im sure i know more for one mars IS NOT habitable it needs to be Terra formed you dont know shit about it if you say mars is habitable -_-

Actually, Mars is fairly benign by most standards. Compared to the Moon or any other planets it'd be much easier to work on.

I also like how you hit that one bit after he basically fact checked you.

 

[Lord Garnaat]

You know, I've got to ask: why is it that everyone is assuming that if we come across a less advanced civilization we'll automatically try to kill and enslave them? I realize that humans can be jerks sometimes but killing and enslaving things indiscriminately is sort of frowned upon now. The people in charge of meeting an alien species aren't going to start slaughtering them because once word gets out about that then the public will have their heads.

Also, what point would there be to doing that? Why travel millions of miles across the universe to just start murdering things? That's the problem I have with the idea that aliens will always be hostile to us: that they're assuming that the aliens either have no concept of morality or are stupid enough to not see the benefit of just getting along with people.

Personally, I think that humanity is meant to be the precursor species: the huge, technologically advanced race that leads the galaxy. And when we meet an alien race we'll try to get along with them, just like we do with our own countries, because the alternative is morally reprehensible.

 

[Vigormortis]

warp (faster then light travel) PHYSICALLY impossible itll never happen unless einstein gets proven wrong which he wont. if wormholes get proven to existance then maybe that way but ftl travel is impossible even to put in perspective it would take like 100 thousand years at light speed to get from one of the galaxy to the other let alone other galaxies it would take over a year at light speed to get to the nearest star aswell and about 20 years to the nearest possibly habitable planet

There are a lot of presumptions in your post.

Firstly, faster than light travel is theoretically possible. Hell, Einstein himself theorized several ways, including wormholes.

A common misconception is that Einsteins theories of relativity prove that nothing can travel faster than light. This is false. What they prove is that nothing can accelerate to light speed or beyond. There is a difference.

Secondly, the ideas of warp drives and other faster-than-light travel methods aren't just the crazy ramblings of sci-fi writers. They are often the very real theories of very intelligent physicist. Like in the case of this particular news item. You should read the article before jumping to any conclusions.

Now, for clarity's sake, a few corrections. (It's kind of dickish of me, but sometimes I can't help myself. My apologies.)

The Milky Way is roughly one-hundred thousand light-years across. So, at light speed, it would take one-hundred thousand years just to cross our galaxy, let alone go to other galaxies.

Speaking of which, the closest large galaxy to us (not counting dwarf galaxies that orbit our galaxy, like the large and small Magellanic Clouds), is Andromeda. It is a little over 2.5 million light years away. Ergo, at light speed, it would actually take 2.5 million years to get there.

Our closest neighboring star, it's approximately 4.24 light years away, resulting in a 4.24 year travel time at light speed.

As for the closet habitable planet, well...that distinction actually belongs to Mars. But since we're talking extra-solar planets, we honestly can't say. There could be habitable worlds around Alpha Centauri, there could be ones farther out. We just don't know yet.

So one could be within 5 light years. Or, there may be no other habitable worlds for hundreds of light years. We just don't know yet.

im not going to dignify that with a response, have u studied physics? because i have so ye if u have im sure i know more for one mars IS NOT habitable it needs to be Terra formed you dont know shit about it if you say mars is habitable -_-

It's very hard to read your typing. I'm not saying that to be insulting, I just mean there are a lot of spelling errors and no punctuation. This often leads people to dismissing what you're saying, regardless of content. I'm not one of these people, mind you. I'll read and pay close attention to every word someone types, out of respect. But a lot of people won't, sadly.

Anyway, Mars is "habitable" in that it can support Earth-like life. The carbon-dioxide rich atmosphere is prime for simple plant life. (one of the proposed terra-forming methods would be to grow vast farms of ferns and algae to convert the atmosphere)

It's also considered "habitable" because it can be easily transformed to support basic human life. Something like Venus, for example, could really never be considered "habitable" as it could never really be terraformed. In any meaningful way, that is.

Furthermore, everything I said is true. If you don't believe that then you must'nt have been paying attention in physics class. Einstein himself postulated on the possibility of matter moving faster than light, so long as it wasn't accelerated to those speeds. Likewise, it has been discovered (as was discussed in the article, by the way) that while the speed of light, or C, is the cosmic "speed limit" for matter, it does not apply to the fabric of space-time.

This is the essence of a warp-drive. It revolves around the concept of condensing space-time in front of the craft and expanding it behind. This allows the craft to travel in a pocket of "smooth" space-time at sub-light speeds, while the bubble itself travels at faster-than-light speeds.

It's a concept that was proven feasible, if impractical, in the 90's. However, it was shown that the sheer amount of energy needed to create such a field was virtually unattainable. This recent discovery found that, with a modification to the geometry of the field design, the field could be generated with far less energy requirements.

But hey, you're studying physics, right? I'm sure your professors will cover these topics at some point. I hope you enjoy your studies. Physics is a truly fascinating topic.

....................

Quick question: Does posting a reply saying, "I'm not going to dignify that with a response" count as a response?

 

[GTwander]

What do you think would happen to us as a people and society should we one day find out that we're the dominant species in the galaxy?

Step 1: Slavery
Step 2: ?
Step 3: Profit

Though, 3 billion people will then be screaming "dey took er jerbs" once all McDonalds' are ran by Twileks.