Would faster than light travel have the greatest impact on human civilization?

[BigJ]

I was just wondering...

If we decided to send an object travelling faster than the speed of light at say, another country for example, what kinda impact are we talking about? I mean what kind of damage could you do sending say, a 40,000lb metal ball impacting say, the Eiffel Tower.

 

[Eeezee]

Originally posted by: BigJ
I was just wondering...

If we decided to send an object travelling faster than the speed of light at say, another country for example, what kinda impact are we talking about? I mean what kind of damage could you do sending say, a 40,000lb metal ball impacting say, the Eiffel Tower.

What's great is that you can do the calculations yourself for an object moving ***NEAR* the speed of light (not faster).

E^2 = p^2*c^2 - m^2*c^4

A 40,000 lb ball would be about 18,000 kg, if it were moving at 0.9c it would have an energy of about 2.93*10^21 Joules, just a little under a teraton of TNT (1 trillion tons, equal to 4.184*10^21 Joules).

The largest nuclear device ever made had the same energy as 50 megatons of TNT (50 million tons), and most modern weapons are nowhere near that large. A 40,000 lb ball moving at 0.9c would be nearly 20,000 times more powerful than the most powerful fusion bomb ever detonated by mankind. The largest atomic bomb ever used as a weapon (Fat-Man, dropped on Nagasaki) was about 21 kilotons, so ths 40,000 lb ball would have about one billion times more energy than the fat-man plutonium bomb

 

[zugzoog]

Originally posted by: BigJ
I was just wondering...

If we decided to send an object travelling faster than the speed of light at say, another country for example, what kinda impact are we talking about? I mean what kind of damage could you do sending say, a 40,000lb metal ball impacting say, the Eiffel Tower.

Well, say goodbye Earth!
The only way to do this (with our current understanding) is with an exotic object that has imaginary mass. Now we do not know if such stuff does or even if it can exist, but if it does I would imagine that the meeting of matter and imaginary matter is not going to be pretty.

Not sure why you would want to though, it would be like the person that burns down their house to kill a snake.

(please note that imaginary is used in the mathematical sense (i.e. a multiple of the square root of -1) not in the sense of "I smoked some stuff last night and imagined that I was flying").

 

[DrPizza]

Wow... so many of you with such a poor understanding of physics. This stuff is covered in my high school physics class - anything with mass traveling at less than the speed of light absolutely cannot be accelerated to the speed of light (let alone be accelerated to faster than light.)

No, it's not going to happen.
And, it'd be absolutely retarded to spend research money to try to do something that science says is impossible. Then again, that hasn't stopped them from spending money attempting to do research on other fictional concepts, i.e. esp. However, I'm not aware that science says "No, esp is impossible." Science does state that acceleration to faster than the speed of light for an object with mass is impossible.

 

[jagec]

Originally posted by: JeffreyLebowski
I don't think FTL is possible. I think the way to quickly move across space will be by the way of Battle Star Galactica does it. You create a wormhole and go through the opening. Travel like this would be almost instantaneous.

Though the way Star Trek does it is within the realms of possiblity. The ship doesn't go faster than light. The warp engines "warp" space. The warp field moves the space in front of the ship to behind it, it just does it really fast, thus making the ship move "faster than light". I actually read an article about this and scientists have figured out how it would theroretically work, we just can't harness the energy required to do it.

"Instantaneous" travel is slower than light?😕

Some people in this thread seem to have a pretty narrow-minded view of science, though...sure, Einstein's relativity forbids objects with mass from travelling the speed of light through regular space. Obviously we won't get anywhere bashing our heads against that law. But we might be able to find a sneaky way around it...as we've done many, many times in the past, with other laws that seemed so absolute at the time.

 

[imported_goku]

Originally posted by: torpid

Originally posted by: BoberFett
How would travelling end wars and resource problems?

Put everyone into a space ship that doesn't have blonde hair and blue eyes and shoot them off to some far off place, then go take all the resources they were hoarding.

Thats not how people work. People are odd, even when people are so similar, they manage to find differences in them selves and then become bitter with each other which can result in wars kind of like with tribes (look at africa). When you combine whites and blacks, they're so different yet they're probably more compatible than protestants and catholics. People are, in themselves, fscking wierd.

 

[KevinF]

The Kardashev Scale

 

[DaShen]

Read up on some quantum physics. Mind you, I only understand the general concepts. Most of the math goes way over my head, but the resources within our solar system to bend space time enough to allow a large space craft to go through, as I stated before, would require an unmeasurable amount of energy. You saying that you believe we have enough resources to do it doesn't make it true. Even fusion energy (the sun is powered by fusion and that is the largest source of energy within our solar system) isn't enough energy to do that. We would have to achieve the ability to control and create things on the quantum level, which already is totally improbable.

A very rough idea of quantum and light speed. As mass aproaches Light speed, the actual mass of the object approaches infinity. Meaning the amount of work/energy required to travel faster also approaches infinity. This is on an exponential curve. We have been able to get near weightless(massless) atoms close to light speed, but we cannot achieve light speed in even those things.

Like I said before FTL travel is possible (scientist have made photons travel faster than normal light in experiments <but are still unsure of implications> ), but humans achieving FTL travel is definitely improbable. Research into it though furthers science, so I support research, but massive research and reallocation of funds is just plain not right IMO.

 

[DaShen]

Originally posted by: jagec

Originally posted by: JeffreyLebowski
I don't think FTL is possible. I think the way to quickly move across space will be by the way of Battle Star Galactica does it. You create a wormhole and go through the opening. Travel like this would be almost instantaneous.

Though the way Star Trek does it is within the realms of possiblity. The ship doesn't go faster than light. The warp engines "warp" space. The warp field moves the space in front of the ship to behind it, it just does it really fast, thus making the ship move "faster than light". I actually read an article about this and scientists have figured out how it would theroretically work, we just can't harness the energy required to do it.

"Instantaneous" travel is slower than light?😕

Some people in this thread seem to have a pretty narrow-minded view of science, though...sure, Einstein's relativity forbids objects with mass from travelling the speed of light through regular space. Obviously we won't get anywhere bashing our heads against that law. But we might be able to find a sneaky way around it...as we've done many, many times in the past, with other laws that seemed so absolute at the time.

Yes it is. It is all relative except for the speed of light.

You may be able to bend warp space to simulate travelling faster than light, but it isn't really travelling faster than light. Bending space, especially bending space the size of a spaceship would require so much energy, it is only done by quantum physicist on paper with theoretical energy sources. There have been a few that have come close to perpetual motion generators.

Bending space enough to travel faster (but NOT FTL travel) is possible and is being researched right now. More than likely this in conjunction with better ways of preserving a natural habitat in space as well as possible cryogenics would be more feasible than FTL travel for humans.

You guys need to really read up before you make ignorant Sci-fi statements. Popular Science has a lot of Science Fiction in it. I mean in the 50s and on, it was predicted that every home would have a flying car, automated houses, and a moon colony. Have we achieved any of these things. Nope. We may have come close with automated houses, but even then, it is onyl for the extremely wealthy, and it requires a lot of juice and computing power, and it is buggy. :roll: Some people need to realize that the science fiction that they watch on TV like Star Trek, BSG, Stargate, and so on, is pseudo-science and entertainment. Granted, even pseudo-science (science fiction) can generate enough interest to create an actual technology (cell phone, automatic doors...), but these have all fallen within the range of possible science. FTL travel is possible, but improbable for humans to the point of impossible.

 

[DaShen]

Originally posted by: KevinF
The Kardashev Scale

BINGO buddy.

We aren't even Type I, yet. I have stated this before in other threads. Good find online though. 🙂

 

[yhelothar]

Originally posted by: kyparrish
I think a truly unlimited source of renewable energy with no negative environmental impact would have the greatest impact on human civilization.

There is.. solar power, except it's costly.
Nuclear power has almost no negative environmental impact, except for the masses of heated water that's dumped into the ecosystem.

 

[yhelothar]

Originally posted by: DaShen

Originally posted by: jagec

Originally posted by: JeffreyLebowski
I don't think FTL is possible. I think the way to quickly move across space will be by the way of Battle Star Galactica does it. You create a wormhole and go through the opening. Travel like this would be almost instantaneous.

Though the way Star Trek does it is within the realms of possiblity. The ship doesn't go faster than light. The warp engines "warp" space. The warp field moves the space in front of the ship to behind it, it just does it really fast, thus making the ship move "faster than light". I actually read an article about this and scientists have figured out how it would theroretically work, we just can't harness the energy required to do it.

"Instantaneous" travel is slower than light?😕

Some people in this thread seem to have a pretty narrow-minded view of science, though...sure, Einstein's relativity forbids objects with mass from travelling the speed of light through regular space. Obviously we won't get anywhere bashing our heads against that law. But we might be able to find a sneaky way around it...as we've done many, many times in the past, with other laws that seemed so absolute at the time.

Yes it is. It is all relative except for the speed of light.

You may be able to bend warp space to simulate travelling faster than light, but it isn't really travelling faster than light. Bending space, especially bending space the size of a spaceship would require so much energy, it is only done by quantum physicist on paper with theoretical energy sources. There have been a few that have come close to perpetual motion generators.

Bending space enough to travel faster (but NOT FTL travel) is possible and is being researched right now. More than likely this in conjunction with better ways of preserving a natural habitat in space as well as possible cryogenics would be more feasible than FTL travel for humans.

You guys need to really read up before you make ignorant Sci-fi statements. Popular Science has a lot of Science Fiction in it. I mean in the 50s and on, it was predicted that every home would have a flying car, automated houses, and a moon colony. Have we achieved any of these things. Nope. We may have come close with automated houses, but even then, it is onyl for the extremely wealthy, and it requires a lot of juice and computing power, and it is buggy. :roll: Some people need to realize that the science fiction that they watch on TV like Star Trek, BSG, Stargate, and so on, is pseudo-science and entertainment. Granted, even pseudo-science (science fiction) can generate enough interest to create an actual technology (cell phone, automatic doors...), but these have all fallen within the range of possible science. FTL travel is possible, but improbable for humans to the point of impossible.

Those predictions from popular science would be true if the trendline that they used in the 50s is still true in today. In the 50s, the space program was one of the highest priorities of the time. Unfortunately, it is not like that today, thus we do not get many of the predicted events from happening.

 

[Slicedbread]

Interesting read, somewhat related

 

[Eeezee]

Originally posted by: jagec

Originally posted by: JeffreyLebowski
I don't think FTL is possible. I think the way to quickly move across space will be by the way of Battle Star Galactica does it. You create a wormhole and go through the opening. Travel like this would be almost instantaneous.

Though the way Star Trek does it is within the realms of possiblity. The ship doesn't go faster than light. The warp engines "warp" space. The warp field moves the space in front of the ship to behind it, it just does it really fast, thus making the ship move "faster than light". I actually read an article about this and scientists have figured out how it would theroretically work, we just can't harness the energy required to do it.

"Instantaneous" travel is slower than light?😕

Some people in this thread seem to have a pretty narrow-minded view of science, though...sure, Einstein's relativity forbids objects with mass from travelling the speed of light through regular space. Obviously we won't get anywhere bashing our heads against that law. But we might be able to find a sneaky way around it...as we've done many, many times in the past, with other laws that seemed so absolute at the time.

No, we just know what we're talking about.

Looking to travel to another planet? You have to move through space to do so. You can warp it, exploit its curvature, etc. to give the illusion that you have traveled faster than light speed, but faster than light travel is not possible for objects with mass.