- #1
Longstreet
- 98
- 1
I know crazy unsupported theories aren't supposed to be posted, but I have been working on some fiction which requires faster than light travel. I have read many other guides to ftl in SciFi, and I had origionally fitted in a form of hyperdrive, which would simply avoid the issue by ignoring the relevant dimensions of space. But, I don't like it either. Anyway, if it's ok here is what I made up so far. Admin I don't mind to delete if it really shouldn't be here:
Of course, causality is a concern, but I think I can say that if you change reference frames such that causality would be violated that the negative energy wouldn't necessarily look as negative, lessening the exceedence of the speed of light and allowing causality to be restored. I'm wondering if that even makes sense in the concepts of the paradox, even though negative energy can't exist in the equations.
Also it seems that the ship would have to be isolated from the effects of negative energy for the ftl to be usefull for a number of reasons; the ship falling apart and the crew aging and dieing from the opposite of the twin paradox.
So, I guess my question now is does this make any more sense than the other SciFi forms of ftl, or is it just as "magical"? What really would happen if you had negative energy, assuming of course it could exist appart from normal energy.
The speed of light is the relative propagation of disturbances to the background “medium”. All energy propagates at the speed of light, either in the form of a photon or a fermion. Negative energy can be used to oppose this.
When normal energy propagates it warps space and time and causes the phenomenon known as gravity. Everything in the immediate vicinity is effected by this and everything slows down, like it got stuck in a muddy space-time rut. The negative energy acts in the opposite way, altering space and time so that everything speeds up. A single notohp (get it, negative photon), or small number of notohps, will still traverse at the speed of light. But as these particles build the cumulative effect of the negative energy causes the relative propagation to exceed the speed of light.
The amount of negative energy needed to complete a hyperspace jump depends on the mass of the ship, how far the destination is, and how quickly the arrival is desired. The mass of the ship and the distance traveled both increase the demand in a linear fashion; in other words twice the distance means twice the demand. This may be larger or smaller depending on how much in-jump navigation is required. The amount of negative energy used through the time dimension has a minimum at the speed of light which is considered the optimal. Going too slow actually increases the demand in a linear fashion. However, as the traversal time goes to zero, the needed negative energy approaches infinity.
Of course, causality is a concern, but I think I can say that if you change reference frames such that causality would be violated that the negative energy wouldn't necessarily look as negative, lessening the exceedence of the speed of light and allowing causality to be restored. I'm wondering if that even makes sense in the concepts of the paradox, even though negative energy can't exist in the equations.
Also it seems that the ship would have to be isolated from the effects of negative energy for the ftl to be usefull for a number of reasons; the ship falling apart and the crew aging and dieing from the opposite of the twin paradox.
So, I guess my question now is does this make any more sense than the other SciFi forms of ftl, or is it just as "magical"? What really would happen if you had negative energy, assuming of course it could exist appart from normal energy.