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Off-Topic Discussion => General Discussion => Topic started by: Setekh on October 07, 2001, 02:19:00 am

Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Setekh on October 07, 2001, 02:19:00 am: Here's a question: just how many projected ways are there of interstellar travel?

I was just reading a book called Space by Stephen Baxter and the ideas it proposed on interstellar travel were fairly interesting. In Space, humanity learned to travel to the stars on the backs of another race called the Gaijin ('foreigners' in Japanese, the race that discovered them), who have been using a network of points around their part of the galaxy called 'Saddle Points'. Each Saddle Point, focused around areas near large gravity wells (typically stars) were quantum-linked to exactly one Saddly Point elsewhere, and the explanation was that two quantum-linked objects, given enough energy, could produce replicas of any items (ships, people, whatever) on one side or the other by recording the items quantum state (thereby destroying the item), and then reproducing an item with the exact same quantum state (all the same atoms and their positions, etc.) on the other side. This required a tremendous amount of energy.

Anyway, it worked practically like this - spaceship enters a Saddle Point Gateway at Point A. Gateway reads the ships quantum state, destroying the ship; Then the ship's quantum state is beamed, at lightspeed, to Point B, where another Gateway is waiting to receive the signal. Ship is recreated, down to every last quantum state, at Point B.

However, the signal from Point A to Point B only travels at lightspeed - hence, if Point A was 1000 light years from Point B, when the ship was recreated at the other side (complete with crew), the captain and everyone else would be the same age, but one millenium hence. If they made the round trip, they would return to their point of origin 2000 years into the future, though they themselves would only have grown a few minutes older.

So, that intrigued me. There are dozens of other projected and imagined methods of interstellar travel around - subspace, hyperspace, sublight travel by 'normal' space engines (eg. the Shuttle), being launched out of a cannon at relativistic speeds, Linear Displacement Systems (gooooo IW2!), antimatter engines - what do you guys all think? Are there any others I've missed that you guys would like to have a go at explaining?

[This message has been edited by Setekh (edited 10-07-2001).]
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Nico on October 07, 2001, 05:32:00 am: look at that already (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/smile.gif)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Thorn on October 07, 2001, 07:42:00 am: I've seen some pretty neat ideas for drives on TV, one of which was a very small craft which would deploy a huge sail, the sail would catch the particles and whatnot emitted by the sun and fly off....
Only problem would be stopping (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)

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Knowledge is power. Power corrupts. Study hard kids! Be evil!
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Culloden on October 07, 2001, 10:57:00 am: 1. Well, there's NASA's probe 'Deep Space 1' which has succesfully tested a Xenon fueled 'Ion Drive' which can provide 10x the thrust per pound of fuel than a typical chemical engine, although it has a truley dreadful accelertion time.

2. Then there are the Russians, who are experimenting with ships propelled by Solar Sales which would be pushed along by subatomic particles in the Solar wind kinda like a normal sale catches the wind. I'm not sure how big the sales would need to be, but theoretically, they could propell a ship at 1/10 the speed of light. This would make a journey to the nearest star last a short 40 years.

3. Of course, there are wormholes, which theoretically do exist, although very small (with a diameter less than hat of an electron. In theory, if a device could be made to 'pull open' one of these wormholes, they could become a pratical form transport although such a device woiuld require a tremendous amount of energy.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Thorn on October 07, 2001, 11:00:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by Culloden:
2. Then there are the Russians, who are experimenting with ships propelled by Solar Sales which would be pushed along by subatomic particles in the Solar wind kinda like a normal sale catches the wind. I'm not sure how big the sales would need to be, but theoretically, they could propell a ship at 1/10 the speed of light. This would make a journey to the nearest star last a short 40 years.

Thats what I was talking about. From what i heard, it would have to be a huge sail.

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Knowledge is power. Power corrupts. Study hard kids! Be evil!
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Culloden on October 07, 2001, 11:09:00 am: I'd guess that for a ship the size of the space Shuttle, you would need two sales each with an area of around 2-3km squared - possibly larger to get it up to the speeds I talked about above.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Stryke 9 on October 07, 2001, 11:14:00 am: Wormholes. Direct connections to far distant points in space via a somethingth-dimensional rip. You don't even have to sit through the few seconds of wierd animation that Subspace offers, you just go through and you're there- unless it closes halfway throuh, and then you're dead in both places.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Thorn on October 07, 2001, 11:15:00 am: Depends on the.... weather (I guess). If there is any major solar activity (ie. flares) you wont be needing a very big sail...

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All those who believe in psychokinesis, raise my hand.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Culloden on October 07, 2001, 11:17:00 am: Hmm...

I wonder what it would be like to be stuck in a collapsing worm hole.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Stryke 9 on October 07, 2001, 11:18:00 am: Like getting stuck in a tree-shredder. Burt since there's no "in-between", just (theoretically) the two points, you'd probably simply get sliced in half.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Culloden on October 07, 2001, 11:27:00 am: *Remembers FS1 End Cutscene*
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Fozzy on October 07, 2001, 12:58:00 pm: I wish SG-1 (Stargate) was real (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/wink.gif)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Nico on October 07, 2001, 02:08:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Fozzy:
I wish SG-1 (Stargate) was real (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/wink.gif)

You won't fit a colossus through that tho (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/smile.gif) (exepted if there's bigger ones in the series of course)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Nico on October 07, 2001, 02:38:00 pm: lol, I just noticed I didn't put the link in my first post :þ
http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/PAO/warp.htm ("http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/PAO/warp.htm")
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Eishtmo on October 07, 2001, 03:19:00 pm: On the sail idea, there is a pretty good idea of using laser sails instead of solar ones for deep space travel. The laser is huge, and based at home and the ship is push the ship to a good chunk of the speed of light. The problem is that its hard to stop once you get there.

I've actually followed research into real starships (no warp drives) for a while now. Here's some of the stuff I've found:

Starship Design Project ("http://sunsite.unc.edu/lunar/school/InterStellar/SSD_index.html")
Warp Drive When? ("http://WWW.LERC.NASA.GOV/WWW/PAO/warp.htm")
Stellar Windjammers ("http://www.sjgames.com/gurps/Roleplayer/Roleplayer29/MagSails.html")
Space Colonization ("http://www.aleph.se/Trans/Tech/Space/")

Most of those links should work. My apologies if they don't.

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Visit Warpstorm. ("http://www.warpstorm.com") Do it now.

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I know there is a method, but all I see is madness.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Dark_4ce on October 07, 2001, 03:38:00 pm: Yeah, I watched this one documentary on Discovery on space travel, they mentioned the sails aswell as wormholes. Then it also spoke of another system where the ship moves near lightspeed via pulsed nuclear explosions. Simply put, a nuke is set of behind the ship, and the ship is propelled forward, then another one is blown behind it, and another and another, thus making a sort of pulsed nuke drive!
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Nico on October 07, 2001, 03:40:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Dark_4ce:
Yeah, I watched this one documentary on Discovery on space travel, they mentioned the sails aswell as wormholes. Then it also spoke of another system where the ship moves near lightspeed via pulsed nuclear explosions. Simply put, a nuke is set of behind the ship, and the ship is propelled forward, then another one is blown behind it, and another and another, thus making a sort of pulsed nuke drive!

Better have a good hull (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/smile.gif)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Carl on October 07, 2001, 04:32:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Thorn:
Thats what I was talking about. From what i heard, it would have to be a huge sail.

25 miles across and 1000th the width of a paper bag.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Carl on October 07, 2001, 04:34:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Setekh:
Each Saddle Point, focused around areas near large gravity wells (typically stars) were quantum-linked to exactly one Saddly Point elsewhere, and the explanation was that two quantum-linked objects, given enough energy, could produce replicas of any items (ships, people, whatever) on one side or the other by recording the items quantum state (thereby destroying the item), and then reproducing an item with the exact same quantum state (all the same atoms and their positions, etc.) on the other side. This required a tremendous amount of energy.

i doubt anyone would do that because they would die just to have their quantum clones sent across the galaxy.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: RoachKoach on October 07, 2001, 05:03:00 pm: if u accelerate a body at 9.8m/s sq. for 1 year (365x24x60x60 secs) u should be moving at the speed of light - or i think a little faster. Tell me if im wrong.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: ^Graff on October 07, 2001, 05:38:00 pm: It's impossible to reach the speed of light through normal accel. The theory of relativity states that the closer to the speed of light an object gets, the heavier it becomes. Therefore, the energy required to accelerate it becomes greater, and the amount of energy required to accelerate an object to the speed of light is astronomical(read: it takes more energy than every star in the universe put together has generated since time began).
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: jonskowitz on October 07, 2001, 06:01:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Dark_4ce:
Yeah, I watched this one documentary on Discovery on space travel, they mentioned the sails aswell as wormholes. Then it also spoke of another system where the ship moves near lightspeed via pulsed nuclear explosions. Simply put, a nuke is set of behind the ship, and the ship is propelled forward, then another one is blown behind it, and another and another, thus making a sort of pulsed nuke drive!

That's old news. You're talking about the ORION project from the 60's. Great idea that was killed by politics. NASA didn't want it because it would be a top seceret project (anything that didn't generate a huge fanfare was concidered bad). The fact that the ship carried atomic warheads for its propulsion fuel violated about a dozen international treaties governing space-based weapons. Shame too, from what I understand they had almost completely solved all of the technical difficulties to build such a ship.

Quote
Originally posted by ^Graff:
It's impossible to reach the speed of light through normal accel. The theory of relativity states that the closer to the speed of light an object gets, the heavier it becomes. Therefore, the energy required to accelerate it becomes greater, and the amount of energy required to accelerate an object to the speed of light is astronomical(read: it takes more energy than every star in the universe put together has generated since time began).

Now we're getting into some wierd relativistic stuff. Beleive it or not, the true speed of light is infinite, so it is indeed impossible for any object to reach lightspeed. However, there is no maximun velocity that an object can reach accordingto an observer in the same reference frame.

What's happening is time is slowing for the object moving at relativistic speeds, but the object itself doesn't care and simply preceives that it is still accelerating and that objects around it moving at higher and higher rates of speed. In essence once an object hits relativistic speeds it is no longer increasing its spacial velocity, but is instead alterting it's chronological velocity.

It is because of this 'time dialation' that we slow moving slugs (relativistically speaking) preceive light as moving 300,000 km/s.

Now I'm betting that most of you are sitting there in a mild state of disbeleif saying to yourselves "I wish this dumbass would just shut up, he obviously is pulling all of this out of his arse anyway..." so here's the proof of my argument. Any two objects, regardless of thier velocities relative to each other will always preceive light to be moving at the same rate regardless of any other factors. This can only be true if the speed of light (before taking time dialation into account) were indeed moving infinitly fast.

I'll bet that'll keep some of you awake all night long (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)

[This message has been edited by jonskowitz (edited 10-07-2001).]
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: QXMX on October 08, 2001, 01:01:00 am: Well, with the current state of physics, there's probably as many as you can imagine. How many are actually feasible, though, is a different story. The Capsule Drives are pretty cooooooool, but I'm all up for Warp Travel (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/smile.gif)

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Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Nephilim on October 08, 2001, 01:28:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by jonskowitz:

Now I'm betting that most of you are sitting there in a mild state of disbeleif saying to yourselves "I wish this dumbass would just shut up, he obviously is pulling all of this out of his arse anyway..." so here's the proof of my argument. Any two objects, regardless of thier velocities relative to each other will always preceive light to be moving at the same rate regardless of any other factors. This can only be true if the speed of light (before taking time dialation into account) were indeed moving infinitly fast.

I'll bet that'll keep some of you awake all night long (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)

Actulally, sorry to say, but your wrong. As i remember from a old episode of bill nye years back (and other stuff), light has a unit property, unlike a person throwing a ball at 100 mph on a truck moving 55 mph totalling the speed of the ball at 155 mph, light is always going to be traveling at a constant rate no matter what.
My analogy:
The USS Enterprise and voyager want to have a race. Now thay both enther warp speed, voyager pulls ahead about 3000 kms but then the enterprise matches it's speed so the overall distance between the two ships is 3000 kms now as the ships aproach the speed the speed of light, voyager appears to slow down, and as both ships pass the speed of light, the image of voyager would appear to fall behind. Soon after it would appear that voyager is next to the enterprise and then shortly after that, that the enterprse is ahead of voyager. All things being equal and both ships haven't change the distance between them, When they emerg at ther destination, voyager will be ahead 3000 kms worth still.
What i'm getting at is that the light from voyager is constanly being emited so once they pass the speed of light, the light is unable to keep up with it's source so looking out a window with binoculars in ten forward on the enterprise you would see only the light that is older than the light from voyager, (distorted starts planets whatever) There is also that time warp factor but thats another argument. (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)
There now i'm going to bed (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/tongue.gif) (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/wink.gif)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Setekh on October 08, 2001, 01:50:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by Carl:
i doubt anyone would do that because they would die just to have their quantum clones sent across the galaxy.

Going by the book, it tells that a person's consciousness is relayed over, so the person stays 'alive'. Kinda like the bad guys in Sixth Day, I guess - to everyone else, it would be the same person. But I'm really not sure.

Of course, that means that an entire person - including their consciousness, their thoughts - can be stored digitally, and chucked across the galaxy (or the Universe).
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: joek on October 08, 2001, 09:31:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by Thorn:
I've seen some pretty neat ideas for drives on TV, one of which was a very small craft which would deploy a huge sail, the sail would catch the particles and whatnot emitted by the sun and fly off....
Only problem would be stopping :D

Actually, for a trip around the Solar System, stopping wouldn't be a problem.

Imagine that you're solar sail ship is in the same orbit around the Sun as the Earth. You unfurl the sails, reflect Sun's light, and you're off. But what you do (just like sailing a boat) is keep your sail at an angle (45%) to the sun. (ASCII diagram below :)

DIRECTION OF THRUST
__
ORBITAL |\ /
<----- | \ /^
DIRECTION \ \ /^|
----- /^| | --------------
/^| ||
/^| || |
^| || ||
| || || |
SUN'S RAYS

This would push you away from the Sun in your orbit, therefore making you spiral towards the outer Solar System (Mars, Jupiter, etc).

When you get out far and you want to come back, what you do is angle your sail the other way (45%) (ASCII diagram below :)

DIRECTION OF THRUST
___
\ /|
^\ / |
|^\ /
--- | |^\ --------------
ORBITAL / | ||^\
<----- | || |^\
DIRECTION | || ||^
| || || |
SUN'S RAYS

This will slow down your orbial velocity, making you fall back in towards the sun.

Using this, you could make a system of ships constantly flying around the solar system, carrying people and cargo through the solar system.

Quote
Originally posted by jonskowitz:
You're talking about the ORION project from the 60's. Great idea that was killed by politics.

It's also interesting to note that the project did product a small test vehicle called "Put-Put" which used five chemical explosives to launch it 60 meters into the air.

science program voice: For more info on this and other topics like this, check out The Starflight Handbook ("http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0471619124/qid%3D1002551802/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F0%5F1/107-1974636-7423726") by Eugene Mallove and Gregory Matloff.

EDIT: forgot to turn off smilies, and the diagram got messed up a little, but you get the idea.

Joe.

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www.joek.com ("http://www.joek.com/")
Revelations: A FS2 Campaign ("http://www.joek.com/other/freespace/")

[This message has been edited by joek (edited 10-08-2001).]
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Eishtmo on October 08, 2001, 11:04:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by joek:
For more info on this and other topics like this, check out The Starflight Handbook ("http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0471619124/qid%3D1002551802/ref%3Dsr%5F11%5F0%5F1/107-1974636-7423726") by Eugene Mallove and Gregory Matloff.

I actually have a copy of that sitting right next to me. I used it to find some of the distances to FS stars.

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Visit Warpstorm. ("http://www.warpstorm.com") Do it now.

---------

I know there is a method, but all I see is madness.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Styxx on October 08, 2001, 11:16:00 am: Well, with my copy of Einstein's "Relativity: the Special and the General Theory" right beside me, I can add two things to enlighten this debate:

1. The speed of light is constant at 300000Km/sec, and independs of any frame of reference.

2. Any frame of reference is never better or worse than any other frame of reference.

These two simple statements are the basis for the whole theory of relativity, just think about it. Everything else is just consequence.

And as for my own idea about interstellar travel, I think that the best way is through sheer will of thought. You wish hard enough, and you'll get anywhere you want. (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: jonskowitz on October 08, 2001, 12:57:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Styxx:
Well, with my copy of Einstein's "Relativity: the Special and the General Theory" right beside me, I can add two things to enlighten this debate:

1. The speed of light is constant at 300000Km/sec, and independs of any frame of reference.

2. Any frame of reference is never better or worse than any other frame of reference.

Exactly my point. Light will always appear to move @300,000 km/s regardless of the veiwer's reference frame.

Quote

And as for my own idea about interstellar travel, I think that the best way is through sheer will of thought. You wish hard enough, and you'll get anywhere you want. (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)

Let me know when you get to Alpha Centauri (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif)
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Setekh on October 13, 2001, 01:15:00 am: Quote
Originally posted by joek:
Actually, for a trip around the Solar System, stopping wouldn't be a problem.

That's true. But for interstellar voyages - you wouldn't be able to change your vector if you weren't near a solar source. So if you started a voyage to another star system, you'd be in for the long haul. Unless, I suppose, you hopped from star to star instead of a direct trip.

Oh, and there's something else. Here's a thought: say that there is no way to travel faster than light. Or at least, no race has ever found one.

The nature of our race's population is such that our numbers increase exponentially - doubling every twenty years or so (IIRC - we'll just use these figures for argument's sake). Now, for a while, we'll be able to expand fast enough - after Earth has been filled to capacity, we'll have to expand, effectively, to another Earth-sized planet within twenty years. Right?

But then that figure will become two Earth-sized planets, and then four, and then eight - and we'll have to expand faster and faster. But eventually, we'll be restricted by the speed of light - the lightspeed cage will stop our race from reaching a certain population, because we just won't be able to expand fast enough. We'll run out of space, and not be able to find more quickly enough.

Does that make sense at all? If so, then every race, depending on how fast their population grows, is doomed to reach a certain population, and no more, before they start to deteriorate.

[This message has been edited by Setekh (edited 10-12-2001).]
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Eishtmo on October 13, 2001, 02:55:00 pm: Actually, as a civilization becomes more advanced, the population growth curve begins to level off. In Europe, for example and the last time I checked, the birth rate is actually going down (not to say Europeans are more advanced, but they just use a lot of condoms (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/smile.gif)). Likely by the time two or three Earth sized worlds are filled, the growth rate for a species as a whole will have leveled off.

And even if light speed was the limit, that wouldn't keep a race from "star hopping" as they expanded outward. The homeworld might still be the center of the system, but after a while, it wouldn't be the sole jumping off point of traders and colonizers.

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Visit Warpstorm. ("http://www.warpstorm.com") Do it now.

---------

I know there is a method, but all I see is madness.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Thorn on October 13, 2001, 03:08:00 pm: Ahhh, I shouldve paid more attention in physics..
my brain hurts...
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: jonskowitz on October 13, 2001, 05:53:00 pm: Quote
Originally posted by Eishtmo:
Actually, as a civilization becomes more advanced, the population growth curve begins to level off.

I think a betteer word to use is "industrialized" (sounds more PC anyway (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/biggrin.gif))

It's all economics. Once it no longer becomes advantagious to have large families people won't procreate as quickly, and once it becomes disadvantagious growth will slow to a crawl. Like in Eishtmo's example, America, Europe, and most other highly industrialized societies the growth reates have plumited to all time lows and in some areas is actually in a state of declination.

The reason is simple. In an industrialized society kids are freaking expensive! Not just medical care but clothing, feeding, paying for college, ect.
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: Ace on October 13, 2001, 11:13:00 pm: The trick with relativity and inertia itself are that they only effect objects which can be acted upon by other objects.

If you remove or displace that, then both relativity and inertia are nullified. (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/wink.gif)

What is Ace trying to say is less confusing words? FTL is as simple as throwing away the ruler...

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Staff member FreeSpace Watch
http://freespace.volitionwatch.com/ ("http://freespace.volitionwatch.com/")
Title: Methods of interstellar travel
Post by: jonskowitz on October 13, 2001, 11:19:00 pm: Well said! (http://dynamic.gamespy.com/~freespace/ubb/noncgi/lol.gif)

Unfortunately, 'throwing awaqy the ruler' is far more difficult than that sentence makes it sound. Kip Thorne once said that the more basic the physical laws that you are trying to circumvent the more difficult it is to do so.