problemecium

-9001 / 10 for not watching Firefly. Your ship would be cooler if you'd watched Firefly, even if you built the exact same ship ;P Rate either spaceship; I don't care.

Meh, for me it's only on page 120. As you can see, I bent your spare too.

I've heard of the Congo and the Democratic Republic of the Congo, but not the IJN Kongo. Kerbal version of the Congo maybe? 5/10 for me being unable to tell whether it's good or not.

I have thought for a while that it'd be a really cool sci-fi engine if you essentially took a railgun and, instead of feeding it bullets, fed it a continuous stream of conductive fluid or plasma that it would shoot out in a similar fashion to a VASIMR. Such a design could maintain high thrust (if given sufficient electric power), but retain Isp savings akin to those of an ion drive by virtue of expelling exhaust linearly as opposed to just blasting it out via pressure in whichever direction it wants to go.

I'd say yes too. If a wormhole is simply a tunnel you've built out of spacetime, gravity should propagate through it like everything else. Thus, if you have a big gate on the ground and the other end in space, if a ship approached while in space, it would actually start to feel gravity from the other end of the wormhole as it approached, increasing gradually until when it reached the other end it was in a 1 G gravitational field. The real question is this: which way would the propagated gravity "point"? - Would it drag the ship "sideways" relative to the gate, so that it would have to thrust in the opposite direction in order to not miss the opening? - Would it simply spread out omnidirectionally with no polarity, creating a depression in spacetime just like a normal gravitational field and thus cause the ship to be "sucked in" by gravity coming through from the other side? I'm inclined to go with the second one based on my understanding of physics, but it's a topic for discussion nonetheless.

My brother and I had a discussion recently about time loops in which he gave me a pretty interesting idea. If a time loop, i.e. a closed timelike curve, occurred, we'd have a situation akin to Groundhog Day where a person or other object returns to the same point in time repeatedly. There are three hypothetical ways in which this can go down (that I can think up anyway): - The time traveller "rewinds" along with everything else (Groundhog Day style), and Physics is deterministic, meaning that any given event has a single, calculable outcome (but perhaps difficult or impossible to measure) - The time traveller "rewinds" along with everything else (Groundhog Day style), and Physics is nondeterministic, meaning that a given event has an element of randomness affecting its outcome (and thus information can be lost forever, a horrifying concept for modern physicists) - The time traveller does not rewind along with everything else: time travel in the style of "The Time Machine" or "Harry Potter". I'll leave a discussion on this for another time, partly because while it entails a closed timelike curve in a technical sense, it's not really a "time loop" as generally understood. In the first situation, every single time the loop "loops", the exact sequence of events occurs the exact same way, including any and all information that may or may not exist. Thus people within the loop will experience the same sequence of events in exactly the same fashion - not like in "The Time Machine" where the first time his wife is shot and the second she is run over; spacetime does not care whether an event is "important" or not. Rather everything will happen the exact same way in every reference frame within the curve, and the people will even have the same memories and sequences of thought. In such a situation, the curve itself is undetectable by anyone. It could be happening to all of us, right now, and we would have no way to tell or reason to care. So for all practical purposes, the loop never really counts as happening to begin with. In the second situation, every time the loop "loops", there is a nonzero chance (big or small as you like) that any event might be slightly or significantly different. So you might stub your toe the first time, but just barely avoid stubbing it the second. Whether or not you remember previous iterations, if the loop is allowed to repeat infinitely, there is a 100% (or at least infinitely close to 100%) chance that an event will occur within the loop that breaks the loop, i.e. prevents further iterations from occurring. Thus the loop will inevitably cease to exist sooner or later. Since the nature of a time loop is such that its "start" and "end" points are not separated by any distance in time in the outside universe (a closed loop), this means that as soon as any CTC forms, in that same exact instant it will collapse and cease to exist. This is currently only a logically-based hypothesis, but if true (I have a good feeling), it means we needn't worry about whether or not we generate CTCs - we'll either not care or they'll take care of themselves.

Thanks! xD

I think I get it now, if I understand Silver_Swift's story about the drones correctly. That said, I guess all of us on the doubting team were right in our hunch that it wouldn't be easy. Also, if I understand everything correctly, C will not self-destruct, because it is programmed to do so only after receiving the order from D, which cannot occur until C has itself informed D, regardless of whether A1 occurred. And since C is moving forward in time, in its own reference frame it cannot send a message and receive a reply to that same message before sending it. We can only hope for the sake of future space colonization efforts that the universe does pardon CTCs and that the Chronology Protection Conjecture is wrong, or that there is an unknown law of physics that will come to the rescue.

I'm with NecroBones. There is no need to change the Kerbodyne parts to make sure they always look like the SLS, because KSP is KSP, not SLS Simulator. I'm sure SLS Simulator would be great, but that is not this. There is, however, a need to fix the horrible alignment on the stripes.

I still feel like we haven't established a concrete connection between warp and time travel. We've successfully addressed that the structure of relativistic field equations is such that it does not preclude time travel for an FTL traveler, and that barring an unknown variable, this means that somewhere out there, a "solution" must exist to the equations. So has anyone actually found one? Has anyone proven mathematically that such a solution must not only exist but be at least as feasible as the warp drive was to begin with? That's what I'd like to know. I'd like to see either the actual math that equates to backwards time or an example of a specific sequence of actions that results in time travel. The closest I've seen so far is Silver_Swift's story about two locations in which events occur outside one another's light cones. So for third parties flying around the universe, Event A1 may occur before B1 or vice versa. Makes sense. But in order for information about which happened first to get to any party involved, wouldn't both events need to enter his or her light cone first? So on Planet B a huge missile is fired toward Planet A. By sheer coincidence, Planet A's scientists launch a big satellite around the same time. Shortly thereafter, astronomers on Planet A see a huge missile coming, and there's nothing anyone can do about it. But when the missile arrives, by sheer coincidence the satellite blocks it and the world is saved. Physicists on Planet A surmise that based on the missile's speed, it was launched before the satellite was ever launched, and that they lucked out when they decided to launch it. Meanwhile Jeb is in a rocket flying past and sees the satellite launch first and then the missile. Aha! So the physicists were wrong. He goes to tell them about it, but in so doing he must travel slower than light, so by the time he gets there, the missile has already hit the satellite. More importantly, the missile has entered Planet A's light cone, so the fact that it had been launched had been visible to astronomers already. His perspective was perfectly valid way out in space, but in this reference frame he's wrong. Right? Assuming I thought that through, let's run it again. Planet B launches missile while Planet A launches satellite around the same time. Val, in space, sees the missile launch and realizes that by the time the Planet A-liens see it, it will be too late to do anything. Incidentally, she notices that their satellite has not been launched from her point of view. No matter though - she has a world to save. She warps to Planet A at ludicrous speed to warn them. They are still debating whether to launch the satellite, and she convinces them that it's of world-shattering importance. Thus they launch it. A while later, astronomers spot the missile coming and are glad they launched the satellite. When the missile arrives, the satellite blocks it and saves the world. Everything's cool. But wait! The physicists calculate the missile's incoming speed and surmise that it launched before their satellite did. How did Val manage to see it coming... wait no. They surmised that last time around too. Val has warp, so of course she can warn them before the missile comes into view. Once more, with feeling! Planets A and B launch their respective thingies around the same time. Secret Agent Kirrim is in space flying around (in the opposite direction as Val last time) and sees the satellite go up first. Cool, a satellite. Then he sees the missile launch shortly thereafter. Oh no! Better warn the A-liens. He warps to Planet A at ludicrous speed and tells them there's a big deadly missile coming. Unfortunately, there's no sign of any missile to be seen in the sky. People ridicule him and his claims to have outrun light. But then, a while later, a huge deadly missile appears on scope and the astronomers realize to their dismay that it's too late to do anything. Fortunately, the satellite blocks the missile and the world is saved. Kirrim is honored for his pure-hearted attempt at heroism. But oh no - physicists have calculated that the missile was launched before the satellite, which was already in orbit by the time Kirrim landed. Yet Kirrim claims to have seen the satellite go up first. They argue at length over whether Kirrim has traveled in time or is simply insane. As far as I understand it, the question is of trivial importance. Of course people from different reference frames will disagree on the sequence of (unrelated) events. Special Relativity warned us about that. By warning the A-liens, Kirrim had to enter their light cone and thus their frame of reference. His recollection of history ended up out of order, but as far as I can tell he's still in the present.

Can I be one of them? I don't care which xD There seems to be a lot of competition for Bill, so I could be Bob maybe. My brother used to call me "Bob" as a baby...

8/10 Looks very believable, but why is the shield so big? The ship, not the whale. Unless you want to rate the whale xP

You cannot wipe the screen with no hands. ;P

So if I get in a spaceship and accelerate to 0.99999 c, then I flip on the warp drive, go somewhere, and then accelerate to 0.99999 c in the other direction, I end up in the past? Okay so I'm on Earth and I want to troll the universe. I rev up to near light speed and travel for several hours to KIC 8462852. When I arrive, 1400 years have passed. Rather than slow down, I switch on the warp drive and zoom back to Earth in five minutes. When I shut off the warp drive, presumably my momentum is conserved (no idea how I managed to stay inside the bubble, but no matter), so I find myself shooting back toward KIC 8462852 at near light speed. The current year on Earth is 3415. I had seen Earth's future history go by in slow motion the first time I left, so I'm surprised to find that when I look at it now, everything's all shiny and futuristic. I blame time dilation for this. Enraptured by the future, I slow down so I can stay and watch it. In so doing I accelerate strongly, which to me is equivalent to putting myself in a strong gravitational field. Time thus slows down for me, and by the time I've stopped, a few weeks have gone by. I'm still in Year 3415 though. After getting my fill, I accelerate toward Earth until I reach near light speed, then flip on the warp again and zoom over to KIC 8462852. My time spent accelerating was for me a few minutes, but for outside observers a few weeks. When I go back to the distant star, five more minutes go by. I arrive there and... as far as I can predict I don't run into any future or past versions of myself. Or did I do it wrong?

It was definitely Scott Manley or someone else, of that I can assure you. ;P

Type hrain hyte prain rhyte pain !!!!!!!!!!!!!!! my posts are much more exciting when i can type in all caps now and then :\

This update is mostly splacepane themed.

Can I make a humble request? This thread's been around a while and I keep seeing it on the front page, and the title says "star near the Milky Way." But the star is IN the Milky Way - it's NEAR Earth (on a cosmic scale). Would someone mind indulging my obsessive compulsion and fixing the title? That'd be great, Thx ^^;

Nobody has explained this in detail at all though. People keep repeating "FTL = CTC = time travel = impossible" but nobody ever explains the details about WHY. WHY is it possible to come back before the photon left? HOW would you do such a thing? And please don't say "because FTL means a CTC." That's like saying electrolytes are what plants crave because Brawndo has electrolytes and Brawndo says it has what plants crave.

^ Exactly what I was saying earlier ^^ All the physicists criticizing the warp drive for being a magical time machine sound very confident about it, but I have yet to hear any explanation of specifically HOW a warp drive performs time travel. But they must have some idea, or they wouldn't have a leg to stand on, right? I, and I think most of us here, could really use a step-by-step description if anyone can provide one.

-44 Team Zero shall stand firm!

(Statements retracted after more thorough reading of the above posts and decision to not participate in the argument after all)

Apparently recent advances in geology have indicated that while not the primary driving force, oceans are indeed necessary for Earth-like plate tectonics. o_O

Indeed. It's all well and good for a proof-of-concept, but we're going to have trouble capturing Princess Vespa if we can't make this work in space ;P