May the Force be with you
Posted on 01/06/2006 10:07:57 AM PST by epluribus_2
AN EXTRAORDINARY "hyperspace" engine that could make interstellar space travel a reality by flying into other dimensions is being investigated by the United States government.
The hypothetical device, which has been outlined in principle but is based on a controversial theory about the fabric of the universe, could potentially allow a spacecraft to travel to Mars in three hours and journey to a star 11 light years away in just 80 days, according to a report in today's New Scientist magazine.
The theoretical engine works by creating an intense magnetic field that, according to ideas first developed by the late scientist Burkhard Heim in the 1950s, would produce a gravitational field and result in thrust for a spacecraft.
Also, if a large enough magnetic field was created, the craft would slip into a different dimension, where the speed of light is faster, allowing incredible speeds to be reached. Switching off the magnetic field would result in the engine reappearing in our current dimension.
The US air force has expressed an interest in the idea and scientists working for the American Department of Energy - which has a device known as the Z Machine that could generate the kind of magnetic fields required to drive the engine - say they may carry out a test if the theory withstands further scrutiny.
Professor Jochem Hauser, one of the scientists who put forward the idea, told The Scotsman that if everything went well a working engine could be tested in about five years.
However, Prof Hauser, a physicist at the Applied Sciences University in Salzgitter, Germany, and a former chief of aerodynamics at the European Space Agency, cautioned it was based on a highly controversial theory that would require a significant change in the current understanding of the laws of physics.
"It would be amazing. I have been working on propulsion systems for quite a while and it would be the most amazing thing. The benefits would be almost unlimited," he said.
"But this thing is not around the corner; we first have to prove the basic science is correct and there are quite a few physicists who have a different opinion.
"It's our job to prove we are right and we are working on that."
He said the engine would enable spaceships to travel to different solar systems. "If the theory is correct then this is not science fiction, it is science fact," Prof Hauser said.
"NASA have contacted me and next week I'm going to see someone from the [US] air force to talk about it further, but it is at a very early stage. I think the best-case scenario would be within the next five years [to build a test device] if the technology works."
The US authorities' attention was attracted after Prof Hauser and an Austrian colleague, Walter Droscher, wrote a paper called "Guidelines for a space propulsion device based on Heim's quantum theory".
Zephraim Chochran was pig herding lib wino who stole the technology from Rutan.
"Professor Jochem Hauser, one of the scientists who put forward the idea, told The Scotsman that if everything went well a working engine could be tested in about five years."
We canna due it cap'n, we need mure powa
yeppers, of course "relative" being the key meaning to that presumption.
So, that observation holds true when velocity is not a factor, and I am standing still next to you...or not moving very fast, or moving at the same speed you are. We, at that point, would all be considered moving at the speed of light relative to one another, and time is not a factor.
But in terms of traveling from point A to point B (over distance and when velocity matters) light in the relavistic world is 186,000 per sec. And, hypothetically, as you approach C, let's say you're in a ship and your twin brother is still on earth...time on your watch...though seemingly still ticking away the minutes, time is ticking away far slower then the watch on your brothers arm as he stands back on earth (motionless compared to you). Thus, relative to your brother you are now moving through time as well as traveling over a distance. (Typical analogy)
Thus, time is relative and the speed of light constant.
wayfriggincoolbumpforlater!
Yet light slows when traveling through matter as density increases.
"Actually, relativity does not preclude faster than light travel, which is common at the quantum level. Since the connections between quantum mechanics and gravity are not worked out in the generally accepted models of physics, we are due for some major surprises. Notably, the proposed drive works by manipulating gravity, a common literary device in science fiction. Perhaps it will also be a feature of manned space vehicles in the next decade or two."
My guess is 50-60 years away and that the first two decades will be unmanned crafts. The technology is one thing, producing technology to keep us alive and healthy at the same time is something else.
ONE POINT TWENTY ONE JIGGAWATTS?!?!?!?!
LOL!
Fascinating...
That, and because at speeds greater than c, your mass becomes imaginary, or complex. It's a multiple of the square root of one.
I'm a bit confused about the power requirements. According to the PDF paper, they need a field on the order of 30-50T to test the theory. It all comes down to current density, but it doesn't strike me that a really staggering amount of power should be required (though, of course, I'm too lazy to dig out my textbook and do the calculation). In school we had a 1T coil that was a couple of feet across so tens of Tesla doesn't sound like something insurmountable. One thing I found vague, though, was whether they meant 30T generated by the stationary superconducting coil or the moving coil. It seems to me that they meant the moving coil, but the language was vague.
"If it's not Scotish... it's crap!" (/So I married an Axe Murder)
Also unclear is how they generate a "gravity drive" from an electromagentic field without current science being able to define or determine what a graviton really is, except for it being the messenger particle of the force of gravity. Hard to manipulate something you cannot ascertain as of yet. (Except of course in theory...you might not have know what it is, if you know it is there...may be there thinking.)
There are four universal force...EM, the electromagnetic force, is completely seperate from the gravitaional force...though many have speculated you can use one (EM) to manipulate the other (Gravity)...and of course an inter-relationship of all those forces (and linkage) brings us back to M-Theory...do we already have an answer to unified field theory?
Maybe Dr. Hauser thinks he does...supposedly the answer lies in a mathematic tensor equation using topology (non linear geometry).
I hope this guy proves himself right.
Four universal force(s)
Gravitational
Electromagnetic
Strong (Nuclear)
Weak (Radioactive Decay)
All things in the EM spectrum do. (light, radio waves, etc.)
However, nuetrinos, which theoritically may travel faster than light...do not slow down.
Here's my take on what they're doing (I'm not an advocate -- before yesterday I'd never heard of Heim theory). It looks like they're taking the R4 Minkowski space from Einstein and extending it to 8 dimensions. It lets them come up with a set of metrics, for instance for the photon, W bozon, Z boson, graviton, etc. (that is, for the fundamental forces). Apparently the math also lets them come up with additional metrics, for two postulated particles that they have named gravitophotons and quintessense particles, corresponding to two additional postulated fundamental forces.
By manipulating the math it looks like they're expressing the photon metric in terms of the postulated gravitophoton metric. When they do this, it's in the form of a scalar potential, a vector potential, and an additional tensor potential (the scalar and vector potentials are reminiscent of the Lorenz force law we all know and love). The paper attempts to devise an experiment in which most of the terms cancel and only the gravitophoton component remains, which they interpret as a condition where gravitophoton particles dominate in the region of the magnetic field. Because of the properties of the postulated positive and negative gravitophoton particles, they propose that the effect should be a cancellation of the existing (Earth's) gravitational field if the strength of the gravitophoton field force is high enough.
There seems to be lots of hand-waving in the PDF, and I get the impression that a large piece is missing, that is, something detailing the fundamentals of Heim theory. This is really necessary to try to understand what they're claiming is going on, and barring that one is forced to take them on faith. Hopefully they will come out with something comprehensive that starts with basic principles and leads to their conclusions. I did a web search and there is a claim that Heim theory predicts the masses of several subatomic particles to within several decimal places of precision of experimental values, which has apparently never been done elsewhere, so perhaps this theory holds promise.
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.