General > Discussion

Wormhole travel vs. FTL engines

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BTAxis:
He was never arguing against FTL (in the sense of wormholes, at least). What's your point?

GopherLemming:

--- Quote from: Destructavator on February 17, 2009, 11:16:33 pm ---I think it is unknown in today's world if Superphotonic travel will ever be possible for things other than some particles on the atomic scale (and I admit I'm not a science major)
--- End quote ---

Wormholes are not superluminal travel in a strict sense, since special relativity is a local effect, and locally the speed of light is not exceeded.

As for FTL... It is entirely possible that the foundation of modern physics is false, but currently there are many reasons why matter with mass/information cannot reach c (and why massless matter must travel at c, but i won't go into that). The easiest to explain are time dilation and length contraction.
As an object accelerates, an outside observer views it's time slowing and it's length, contracting. At 0.86 c (relative to the observer) the object is aging at half the speed and it's length is half it's length at a standstill. At c the object would not age, and it has no length. This is bad. Any faster and the object's demensions (both space and time) would be negative. This is really bad.


--- Quote from: vedrit on February 17, 2009, 02:52:17 am ---The theory is entirely plausible, even for the real world. Wormholes are, in lamemans terms, tunnels in space
--- End quote ---

I really dislike this analogy. Unfortunately, I can't think of one that is as easy to understand and more accurate. And It isn't entirely plausible, since the amount of energy required to create and manipulate a stable wormhole would be much higher then all the energy generation by powerstations on the earth in the last hundred years.


--- Quote from: Destructavator on February 17, 2009, 11:16:33 pm ---there was once a time when people thought we'd never break the sound barrier and safely travel faster than the speed of sound, as well as a time when people thought we'd never have working aircraft of any kind.
--- End quote ---

And I continue my efforts in proving them right!

Edit: As always, i'm arguing for the sake of arguing, not suggesting a change in the game.

vedrit:
The argument against FTL, again according to theories, is that mass X requiers exponentially more energy to reach the speed of light.
And I must have missed an article somewhere, as last I heard, wormholes were natural phenomenon. I know, I know, we in the real world cant even contain lightning, but its on its way. Is it not possible that aliens with their advanced knowledge have managed to contain the univers's wonder? At any rate, a wormhole certanly seems a whole lot energy-cheaper than FTL, or even near light speeds. How many tons are spacecraft?
Perhaps we could use both. FTL for small ships, like scouts, and wormholes for larger ships, like harvesters or motherships?

BTAxis:
All FTL in the game is wormhole based. Small craft don't have FTL at all; they are dependent on a FTL capable carrier ship to take them to and fro.

GopherLemming:

--- Quote from: vedrit on February 18, 2009, 04:08:49 am ---The argument against FTL, again according to theories, is that mass X requiers exponentially more energy to reach the speed of light.
--- End quote ---

It is impossible for a mass to reach the speed of light at all, because at c the mass would have infinite kinetic energy. There is no limit how close to c a mass can get, but energy increases exponentially as you accelerate...


--- Quote from: vedrit on February 18, 2009, 04:08:49 am ---And I must have missed an article somewhere, as last I heard, wormholes were natural phenomenon
--- End quote ---

It's very unlikely, with all the conditions required for a wormhole, that they or a natural occurance, and they have never been detected. Can't rule it out, but they would never be as common as any other stellar object

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