Gravity generators?

[Themohawkninja]

If the only reason we need "gravity" on spacecraft in the first place is human bone and muscle degeneration, then trying to create artificial gravity is a bit of an over-engineered solution. It could be solved with something as simple as suit with elastic bands, or with drugs and gene therapy to take another angle.

There is another very important reason that can't be solved with non-acceleration-based means. Fetal development. Fetuses developing in microgravity have very brittle bones, little muscles, and have a poor sense of direction (in rats at least, no human tests have been done on this topic).

[K^2]

It could be solved with something as simple as suit with elastic bands, or with drugs and gene therapy to take another angle.

Somewhat related to the plot of Falling Free by Lois McMaster Bujold, part of Vorkosigan Saga. Good read.

[agent_0004]

I wil do some looking into this and see what i can do. no doubt i will need some Javascript and C# it's just a question (as we all know "Is it possible"). right now you can make art. gravity by rotating the rocket at i think 4m/s.

[WinkAllKerb'']

never underestimate the power of what our space engineers are able to do !?! xD

[rtxoff]

As long as we do not 100% understand the mechanics behind gravity we do not know if we can create artificial gravity or not.

Fact is that no human beeing undestands yet what gravity really is. One day we may be able to produce something like gravity plates in Star Trek or even shields against gravity.

Also the concept of inertia is mystery to mankind yet. Nobody really understand why masses tend to keep their movement to a direction. Sure there are many different theories but they all still have to be proven.

As long as this stuff stays a mystery everything could be possible in the future.

[Sirrobert]

5 months old. Does this count as a necro already?

[K^2]

As long as we do not 100% understand the mechanics behind gravity we do not know if we can create artificial gravity or not.

Fact is that no human beeing undestands yet what gravity really is.

That's not even a little true. People who don't study the subject seem to greatly underestimate how much we really know about it. We know how it works. We've basically known since Einstein wrote his paper on General Relativity. But there were a lot of open questions on whether it really works this way, why the curvature, and why it seems so different from other forces. We have answers to these questions now. In fact, we've had these for over half a century as well. We now have a unified model that covers all of the natural forces, and we know the conditions on generating said forces.

But even all of that information is tangent to the main point. Had we discovered that Einstein's equations were wrong, we'd need to learn more about gravity. But they are not. And General Relativity already gives us way more information about the nature of gravity that we've known about electromagnetism by the time radio was invented. All the people had to go on were Maxwell's Equations, without having any idea why they work. And that's all you need to figure out how to generate electromagnetic waves, manipulate the charges, and build at least rudimentary versions of any electronic device we have today.

If we ever learn to manipulate gravity the way we manipulate electric fields, it will not come from any new understanding of gravity itself. Just like our ability to replace radio lamps with silicon, and build computers that don't have to be a size of the large city did not come from any changes in our understanding of electrodynamics. We know how to generate gravity. We know how to manipulate it and make it do just about anything we want. What we don't know how to do is make the source smaller than a planet. But we have some ideas, and we are making great progress. Nothing to say that we won't run into impossible problems along the way, but we are definitely moving along right now.

[rtxoff]

That's not even a little true. People who don't study the subject seem to greatly underestimate how much we really know about it. We know how it works. We've basically known since Einstein wrote his paper on General Relativity. But there were a lot of open questions on whether it really works this way, why the curvature, and why it seems so different from other forces. We have answers to these questions now. In fact, we've had these for over half a century as well. We now have a unified model that covers all of the natural forces, and we know the conditions on generating said forces.

But even all of that information is tangent to the main point. Had we discovered that Einstein's equations were wrong, we'd need to learn more about gravity. But they are not. And General Relativity already gives us way more information about the nature of gravity that we've known about electromagnetism by the time radio was invented. All the people had to go on were Maxwell's Equations, without having any idea why they work. And that's all you need to figure out how to generate electromagnetic waves, manipulate the charges, and build at least rudimentary versions of any electronic device we have today.

If we ever learn to manipulate gravity the way we manipulate electric fields, it will not come from any new understanding of gravity itself. Just like our ability to replace radio lamps with silicon, and build computers that don't have to be a size of the large city did not come from any changes in our understanding of electrodynamics. We know how to generate gravity. We know how to manipulate it and make it do just about anything we want. What we don't know how to do is make the source smaller than a planet. But we have some ideas, and we are making great progress. Nothing to say that we won't run into impossible problems along the way, but we are definitely moving along right now.

So please explain then to me, what exactly causes masses to attract each other? And please i would also like to know what exactly causes inertia?

I want to build a spaceship and i need this information.

[N_las]

So please explain then to me, what exactly causes masses to attract each other? And please i would also like to know what exactly causes inertia?

I want to build a spaceship and i need this information.

Masses (or energy in general) bend space-time. Objects with no force acting on them will travel straight paths through space-time. Because of the curvature of space-time (caused by the masses) those straight lines look like curved paths that look like masses are attracting each other. In this picture, gravity isn't a force like electro-magnetism but a result of the properties of space-time.

(To make this clearer: An orbit around the earth is actually a straight line in space-time. From our point of few it looks like a circle because of the curvature of space-time caused by the earth.)

I really don't understand why so many people are saying gravity is a huge mystery.

You can now ask, why objects travel straight paths through space-time. Or why masses bend space-time. But that are different questions. And this "why, why, why" game can be played with anything: It is a huge mystery why you drive to work every monday. Because you need the money? Why do you need the money? Because you need to buy food? Why? Because you don't want to starve? Why? (If you ever had a 5-year-old around you, you know what I mean.)

And inertia: Objects travel straight paths through space-time. To change that path one need to exert a force. The force needed is proportional to the mass (or energy in general) of the object.

Edited May 25, 2014 by N_las

[Sirrobert]

So please explain then to me, what exactly causes masses to attract each other? And please i would also like to know what exactly causes inertia?

I want to build a spaceship and i need this information.

Because mass bends space time.

As soon as we figure out how to bend space time at will, I have no doubt we can generate gravity at will to

[rtxoff]

This is always the same with scientists, they are pretending that they know everything but in reality they know nothing and most of them not seeking the answers to the questions. I asked a very legit question and i am getting hammered down with with some childish answers. My initial post stated that we do not know what gravity really is and that did not changed yet. Explaining it through space time curvature describes only its effects not why mass causes this bend in space time. Every teen having internets knows this nowadays but to say we really understand it is far from the truth. A real scientist says to himself, i do not know but i will try to find out. Only quacksalvers know everything better then everybody else. I am not an scientist but my common sense tells me that some things going on in science are soooo wrong.

[N_las]

This is always the same with scientists, they are pretending that they know everything but in reality they know nothing and most of them not seeking the answers to the questions. I asked a very legit question and i am getting hammered down with with some childish answers. My initial post stated that we do not know what gravity really is and that did not changed yet. Explaining it through space time curvature describes only its effects not why mass causes this bend in space time. Every teen having internets knows this nowadays but to say we really understand it is far from the truth. A real scientist says to himself, i do not know but i will try to find out. Only quacksalvers know everything better then everybody else. I am not an scientist but my common sense tells me that some things going on in science are soooo wrong.

So ancient romans would have no idea why sailboats work, because they didn't know what causes the wind?

The answers aren't childish. You asked how sailboats work, we described what sails are, and how wind causes a pressure difference between both sides of the sail. We made clear how a pressure difference on a huge area equates to a force acting on the sail, and how this force is acting on the ship.

Pointing to the fact that we don't know what causes the wind doesn't strip us of our knowledge of sailboats.

We know what gravity is, how it works. We know how to generate gravity (by great masses, rotation, usw.). The reason why energy has the feature to bend space-time is not important for that.

So please, explain why you go to work each monday? I doesn't matter what the answer is, I can always ask: "And why....", "And why...", "And why...", to infinity. If i get to the point were you can't answer anymore, I can proudly claim: "Ha, you don't even know why you go to work each monday, your struggles to explain that are childish and common sense tells me there is something soooo wrong with you. Only quacksalvers claim they know why they go to work."

You don't have to wonder why you would be "hammerd down" if you say things like "nobody understands what gravity is". But I don't really see were this "hammering" took place... we simply answered your questions, and you were not satisfied with the answers.

Edited May 25, 2014 by N_las

[rtxoff]

So ancient romans would have no idea why sailboats work, because they didn't know what causes the wind?

The answers aren't childish. We described what sails are, and how wind causes a pressure difference between both sides of the sail. We made clear how a pressure difference on a huge area equates to a force acting on the sail, and how this force is acting on the ship.

Pointing to the fact that we don't know what causes the wind doesn't strip us of our knowledge of sailboats.

We know what gravity is, how it works. We know how to generate gravity (by great masses, rotation, usw.). The reason why energy has the feature to bend space-time is not important for that.

Well it is very important to know it, it is probably one of the keys for exploring the Galaxy and more and it is also the key for the OP's question about gravity generators for which we have no answers yet.

We can't confirm or deny if they ever will be possible. And for me gravity generators are clearly not some sort of great compressed mass which you can't turn on or off. They are devices which you can mount on the floor of a spaceship to produce earth like gravity or turn it off completely or even regulate it to some other values. Maybe such devices will exist one day maybe not.

I for my part am done with this thread, i have nothing more to add to this discussion, you can believe in the stuff i said or not. I believe in this. It's up to you to believe whatever you want.

[xcorps]

Because mass bends space time.

As soon as we figure out how to bend space time at will, I have no doubt we can generate gravity at will to

And that begs the question "if we can bend space time, will we really need to?"

[Othuyeg]

Instead of crazy electric charges and suddenly fried astronauts we could simply feed the astronauts with plenty of iron or substitute their bones for metal. Then just build electric magnets to the floor.

Jiggly bodyparts, hair, clothing and non metallic objects will still float, but hey atleast you can now walk on the floor. Kind of.

[K^2]

So please explain then to me, what exactly causes masses to attract each other? And please i would also like to know what exactly causes inertia?

I want to build a spaceship and i need this information.

It's extremely straight forward. Gravity is a gauge force of the local Poincare symmetries. (Yang-Mills theory. Note: Wikipedia incorrectly states that it's an SU(N) theory. Yang-Mills is valid for any Lie group, including Poincare. Just in case you'll want to look this up.) The conserved charge of Poincare group is the stress-energy tensor, and it is also the charge to which the gravitational field couples. In other words, things that are source of gravity are also the things that are attracted by gravity. That answers part of your question. The other part is why these things have mass. Well, that's also pretty straight forward. The stress-energy tensor is a frame-invariant quantity, which, when projected onto a particular frame of reference, gives you the four-momentum density. (p^μ = T^{μν}u_ν) In other words, once you pick a particular frame of reference, the gravitational field generated by an object corresponds to its energy and momentum. The Lorentz-invariant magnitude of the four-momentum vector is the rest mass. (p^μp_μ = m²) So it's not so much that mass causes gravity, as that anything that generates or is affected by gravity will also have mass. (That mass could be zero. E.g. photons.) Inertia is just as trivial. For free-propagating matter (as opposed to virtual or confined particles) the four-momentum and the proper velocity vectors have the same direction. That's a consequence of field equations for matter. And since proper velocity always has magnitude c, this means that any acceleration requires a change of momentum. Rate of change of momentum is what we call a force. So force is needed to alter trajectory, and that's inertia.

I don't know how much it's going to help you in building a ship, but that's exactly how these things work.

[KvickFlygarn87]

When we find that damn Higgs Boson, maybe!

[K^2]

When we find that damn Higgs Boson, maybe!

We have. I believe, it was last year when they moved it up from suspected to be observed to confirmed. And it has nothing to do with gravity. It's responsible for some bosons in electroweak having mass, and contributes a bit to the mass of some other particles. But most of the mass is dynamically generated, anyways.

[Sirrobert]

Well it is very important to know it, it is probably one of the keys for exploring the Galaxy and more and it is also the key for the OP's question about gravity generators for which we have no answers yet.

We can't confirm or deny if they ever will be possible. And for me gravity generators are clearly not some sort of great compressed mass which you can't turn on or off. They are devices which you can mount on the floor of a spaceship to produce earth like gravity or turn it off completely or even regulate it to some other values. Maybe such devices will exist one day maybe not.

I for my part am done with this thread, i have nothing more to add to this discussion, you can believe in the stuff i said or not. I believe in this. It's up to you to believe whatever you want.

Except you did not ask about gravity generators. Your question was literally: "what exactly causes masses to attract each other?"

And we awnsered that question.

And that begs the question "if we can bend space time, will we really need to?"

Well, if we can bend spacetime, we can use a warpdrive. So probably

[K^2]

Take a paper sheet' date=' draw two point, if you want to join thoose two point without drawing a line, fold the paper.[/quote']

Now imagine that you can only move within the sheet, which is the case with space-time. Did this whole procedure help you get from one point to another faster? Not at all. Within the sheet of paper you still have to travel the same distance.

[Sirrobert]

Now imagine that you can only move within the sheet, which is the case with space-time. Did this whole procedure help you get from one point to another faster? Not at all. Within the sheet of paper you still have to travel the same distance.

It does if you press the points tougether.

And than do some phsycis magic that produces a wormhole

[K^2]

It does if you press the points tougether.

And than do some phsycis magic that produces a wormhole

But you can't "press them together". You have to change topology of the sheet to do that. Which you cannot do if you cannot unweave the fibers that make up the sheet, and weave them back together differently. Similarly, we have no way of changing topology of our space-time. It's entirely possible that primordial wormholes exist, and can be manipulated to create such "shortcuts", but you can't create a new one. There is no mechanism predicted or observed that alters topology.

[Skyler4856]

Gravitomagnetic effect

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gravitoelectromagnetism

That's probably the closest item I could find

[SphereX]

Not sure about star trek style deck plating but I'm pretty sure I have an idea for a functional gravitational propulsion generator that would also be able to be used for lift in relation to air travel... Don't want to stay to much until I have access to a mech lab... But the design I have in mind will work with the materials we have now, it's just a lot of computer timing will be necessary or it's flight path will be about an erratic as flubber

[DDE]

1 hour ago, SphereX said:

Don't want to stay to much until I have access to a mech lab...

Welcome to the forums, but unless you’ve got neutronium in there you’re not going to make a mechanical gravity manipulator.