Originally Posted by Zamzow
Originally Posted by vonBaur
the fact is that we are on the brink of interstellar travel (probably 200 years away or less)

And let's not even get into the fantasy world of superluminal travel - it simply does not exist, and never will. Einstein proved that. The equation for speed is distance divided by time, but time ceases to exist at the speed of light, that is why there is no definable speed that even EXISTS above the speed of light.


Well, it's not quite that simple. You left out the part about length contraction which is directly relational to time dilation and the slope of space time. Then there's the whole issue of planck length. But why? I think this is still an unsolved mystery because...

1) We don't know what space /is/! In other words, we can't define nothing, yet. Nothing is something. But what?
2) Things don't happen in physics just "because." So time essentially stalls at c because of the relativity of the relationship of the contraction and the tick rate of time within due to the ridiculous slope of the spacetime curve(relativistic mass--not to be confused as real mass). But because objects theoretically put on relativistic mass, and we have no truly defined answer here beyond Lorentz transform equations and factors...

I don't think 2 can be answered before 1, and I think there's a more logical factor beyond slope/time/length relationships. We'll never know until we can define space itself.


So, that said, who says we have to travel to any star system in a linear fashion, to begin with? We've discovered the Higgs boson, thus we now have an item that is directly responsible for giving fermions, atoms and molecules mass. And why is this important? Because mass is connected to spacetime itself. It can shape spacetime. And black holes shape spacetime better than anything--and the big bang is still re-shaping space time to this day, giving it an outer boundary, not a limitless horizon(in theory). So... we skip the space between and arrive on a doorstep.


Also, consider this: If you aren't situated in the confines of Universe, you no longer have to abide by that universe's laws. Thus these unexplained crafts that are suddenly able to accelerate and decelerate at illogical g-forces in a snap of time, the occupants inside would surely be killed, right? Only if they abide by our laws of physics. Thus M-Theory, higher planes, extradimensionality and more. Perhaps they aren't moving, per-say, or minimally at that--perhaps they move our spacetime Universe /around/ them.


If, ya know, aliens. For which we have no proof. frown

Last edited by Mr_Blastman; 06/24/19 09:42 PM.