What is the most likely future method of FTL

[lajoswinkler]

AFAIK quantum entanglement cannot be used to relay information faster than light. Unless the current theories are wrong to some extent, of course...

@OP: At any rate, we can't "break" the laws of physics. We can only find ways to make them work in our favour

I know about that, but that's not well established and tested like other basic stuff. It's still something rather new and maybe there'll be some progress with it. Fingers crossed.

[Rage097]

I think the aclubierre drive is plausible.

Although a Slipspace drive would be awesome *Engage Halo fanatic mode*

[lajoswinkler]

I think the aclubierre drive is plausible.

Although a Slipspace drive would be awesome *Engage Halo fanatic mode*

It is plausible. The problem is that we don't have any means of warping space. Not even theoretical let alone practical.

It's like "if humans could wave their hands faster than the speed of sound, they would break the sound barrier". Of course they would, but we can't wave our hands that fast. Get it?

[andrew123]

I hope we find a way to mutate slipspace... on a side note, how would an atmospheric ftl jump look like for the odsts...

[Vaebn]

None, because going faster than the speed of light leads to causality violations therefore currently appears to be a logical paradox.

[/party pooper]

[Seret]

I hope we find a way to mutate slipspace... on a side note, how would an atmospheric ftl jump look like for the odsts...

Very bad for anybody nearby I suspect. It really depends on what kind of technology you imagine would be used to travel FTL, but whatever is involved it would likely be expending energy on the scale of sizeable chunk of the world's nuclear arsenal all going bang in one place.

[Holo]

The most likely future method of FTL?

Traveling Faster Than Light, like it has been since the term was invented.

That's like going up to a doctor and saying "Doing surgery is easy. All you need to do is do surgery, like you do since it was invented."

[Aghanim]

Everyone I've been thinking for this all of this time and no one ever addresses this: What will happen if a FTL ship hits Earth because of navigational error/terrorists/hijackers whatever? Will Earth get destroyed? Or damage is local?

[Seret]

First of all, there's no particular reason to think that FTL travel is possible, so it's not something I'd lose sleep over. Secondly, the amount of energy released by a ship moving at near light speed will depend on its speed and mass. It's unlikely that a ship would be able to have enough kinetic energy to destroy the Earth, because a ship would have to expend a planet's worth of energy to reach that kind of speed. This stretches plausibility IMO.

In general however, an impactor will dump all it's kinetic energy into Earth's atmosphere and then into the Earth itself. For any sensible mass and velocity of impactor damage would be localised, but with a big enough hit you can get some pretty long range effects, such as hot debris causing fires as it comes back to Earth, and dust in the atmosphere changing weather patterns.

Interestingly a high-speed ship wouldn't necessarily have to hit the Earth to hurt us. Theoretical toys like the Alcubierre warp drive have been predicted to cause a potentially unlimited burst of high energy radiation at their destination. So an alien ship coming out of warp could sterilise half the planet just by turning up.

[Mod_Man_117]

Everyone I've been thinking for this all of this time and no one ever addresses this: What will happen if a FTL ship hits Earth because of navigational error/terrorists/hijackers whatever? Will Earth get destroyed? Or damage is local?

I would be more concered about the FTL drive's power source which at an absolute minimum is nuclear (this is acctually no-where near powerful enough to power all currently theorised FTL) and is most likely an absurd amount of antimatter (that is the only way to get a good enough energy density to power an alcubierre drive, even then it would be LOTS of antimatter) The radiation alone from a severe antimatter reaction would eassily kill all life on earth and enough antimatter could acctually destroy a planet.

[andrew123]

On a side note, if we ever get an AI to control our ships, I hope that it doesn't end like this story:

http://halosn.bungie.org/fanfic/?story=kabu0108100533201.html

[trekkie_]

I don't think light speed is possible in the sense of a craft being accelerated to that speed. I'd believe matter transporters would be more plausible, since you can lay a network of them to your destination, without the need for space craft. Of course, you wouldn't want to use it for travel beyond the solar system, because it's still limited by light speed, and I wouldn't want to be transmitted for years just to reach the closest planet.....even though that would effectively be like stasis, if one of the links broke, you'd either be screwed or have to be sent back.....and if one of the relays broke on the way back too....you'd really be screwed.

In order to reach light speed, we probably need elements we don't even know exist yet, and that may not even exist remotely close to us. Our best bet is probably solar systems with unusual stars that may be capable of producing and spewing out exotic elements.....but we'd have to reach them by conventional means first, i.e. less than light speeds.

Short of that, I'm thinking there probably never will be light speed travel, let alone FTL. Our civilization might end long before we reach that capability even if it is possible. In the end, we may find that FTL is impossible and that the universe is just too vast. At least we have a solar system though, Imagine what it'd be like if earth was the only thing in our solar system. We'd really be isolated, and probably wouldn't even bother with space travel at all.

[andrew123]

I say that ftl is possible... if not a long way off. The current theories for ftl can't be proven or disproven but will certainly be areas of interest for quite a while even if it isn't possible.