Solar System Vs. Galaxy
POSTED BY: MadJack
UPDATED: Tuesday, January 11, 2005 17:41
VIEWED: 40136
PAGE 9 of 14
Quote:
Originally posted by Grounded:
If the orbits of the planets were erratic they'd have a lot more than earthquakes to worry about! I think the point is that if there was a star cluster then planets wouldn't be able to form stable orbits in the first place.
They'd constantly get tugged out and end up as frozen bodies spinning in interstellar space. Earthquakes would not be a big problem I don't think.
Erratic orbits will screw up your weather something fierce, but generating earthquakes? Don't think so.
Remember that time scale is important. If you can maintain a stable orbit of say 1000 years, a mere eyeblink on the cosmological scale, why not? Besides which, 1000 years gives you time to figure out a more permenent solution.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
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Quote:
Originally posted by Noocyte:
We already know that ships in the 'verse are able to generate artificial gravity, at least within their own hulls, without the need to spin sections of the ship for centripedal "gravity." Hell, they can even turn it on and off (witness the boxes crashing to the deck near the beginning of "Serenity," when everyone was safe and sound in the airlock). This would, I believe, make it necessary to have some ability to locally alter the curvature of spacetime. Indeed, this is done in such a blase, no-fuss way that no one ever comments on it (except for Kaylee with the buffeting in "The Message"), and it works even when primary power is out (OOG). Incidentally, it would also be robust enough that rich folks with all manner of expensive stuff would choose to live on floaty island estates...and, presumably still get insurance!
So, the question which occurs to me is whether such an ability to essentially alter the gravitational constant in the vicinity of the ship might not in itself constitute a way to get around the light-speed barrier, and so enable interstellar travel without all the fireworks of a Warp Drive (and so escape specific mention as a separate drive system, being a subset of the "grav drive"). The problem of being able to exceed C in flat space would be sidestepped because space would not, strictly speaking, be flat around the ship (this might also address the issue of the folks planetside getting older a lot faster from a ship's crew's perspective, what with them zooming around at near-relativistic speeds all the time. Time dilation for such a well-travelled crew would be a Big Problem. For example, Badger might have aged as much as a few years between "Serenity" and "Shindig!").
So, is there anyone with enough of a knowledge of General Relativity to comment on such wildly speculative stuff?
Keep Flyin'!
Department of Redundancy Department
Yes. His name is Miguel Alcubierre, who was a grad student at the University of Cardiff, and now working at the Max Plank Institute in Germany, (under one of his old professors I think.)
In 1994 he wrote a paper, (apparently as a lark) about how to achieve FTL travel within the confines of GR. It can be found at athttp://xxx.lanl.gov/PS_cache/gr-qc/pdf/0009/0009013.pdf.
There has been an interesting exchange about whether this would work or not, exclusively on technical issues and not the underlying theory. There is a big question about whether quantum effects would rule it out, and several work arounds have been written up and worked out.
In essense, you are right. If you can control gravity to the extent we have already seen, you should be able to do FTL rather easily.
"Wash, where is my damn spaceship?"
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Quote:
Originally posted by RocketJock:
A question that's been bothering me. If the Alliance (or whatever ancestor of the alliance sponsored the great emmigration) has terraformation technology advanced enough to reshape 70-100 worlds in less that 500 years, then why did they leave Sol system to begin with?
(stuff cut)
The main reason Earth was abandonned, for me, has more to do with political reasons than technical ones (and this is 100% speculative). The Alliance (as a very autocratic organization) wants to have complete control of all human colonies. If humanity was spread out over more than one system, and FTL had not been invented, then it would take decades for either people or messages to go from one system to another. This would make it impossible for a unified government to exist, and the different solar systems would almost certainly develop their own independent governments.
The Alliance, or whatever government existed before this, would not allow this. Thus, Earth and the Sol system was deliberately allowed to fall into decay when the Alliance decided to centralize humanity in the new system, which had more viable planets and resources. They would do this by deliberately ignoring environmental problems on Earth, strip-mining resources on Earth and other planets to make their colony ships, economic embargos, even military action.
Hans
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Okay, I've been a silent member of this board for a while now ( mostly cause i could never remember my gorram password and didn't want to bother calling it back up ) but being the giant science geek i am i can't stay silent any longer.
Now, I've read this thread from tip to tail and have cobbled together my own history of everything. No doubt one much in error but here goes.
IT's my understanding that the Alliance itself wasn't a formal goverment till after the indipendance war ( and as has been previously stated i think, we've no idea how long that war lasted. ) So here's what i think happened. The two majour powers on earth that was ( being the american and Chinese ) were able to launch the majourity of colony ships ( most likely mutli generational ones) when whatever happened back in good old sol was gonna happen. As such their cultures came to dominate the new home of humanity. At some point after the founding of the new worlds the alliance formed, possibly as a economic union or mutual protection pack from raiding/warring colonies. That alliance decided that voluntary joining of same wasn't good enough anymore and launched a war on the colonies that hadn't already joined up ( and as has been stated in teh show that the rim is being pushed out we can assume that between the start of the war and the placement of firefly some growth occured as well ) which could mean that a war was raging on the core planets for long enough that the planets on the (then) rim ( Shadow perhaps ) wouldn't have been embroiled in the war till much later, perhaps long enough for a young malcom reynolds to come of age and join up to defend his home.
Now, what does this have to do with the whole 1 system/many systems question?
Not much, just a background on where I'm coming from.
Now someone else posted in this thread that it's possible that the drive we see Serenity using, the 'full burn' is just a menthod of getting to a FTL safe launch point. Something to get to the edge of systems rather then a point to point drive.
This, to me, makes sense. If the Firefly 'verse does have FTL then perhaps the drive system can't be used(safely?) inside a system's gravity well.
That would allow for both the measurments we see in the show ( all intrasystem distances ) while still allowing the possibility of a multi system universe.
This, to me, makes the most sense. Traveling through the vast space between systems, even with the fun of a 'streaky' star filled window, hardly makes good TV so it's understandable that they would leave that out ( as they do most of the travel time between places in a system ). So, basically i think it's both, I think there's a number of fairly close ( and by close i mean a few light years ) each with a few terraformed worlds & moons ( Wouldn't put it past the alliance to 'make' a few worlds out of anything floating around if they felt the need and plopping them in the 'habitable' zone of a star ) This would solve everything. The number of planets in a system could be maintained at a reasonable number for all and allow the use of some for of Intersystem travel ( be it FTL, Jump Gates, what not )
So, there's my two cents, pick it apart all you like and my appologies for any spelling/grammer errors. I can't do either if my rutting life depended on it.
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Ah, jump gates, yes - then a more specific geographic correlation could be formed between systems (need to travel to a specific jump gate to get to a specific system). The Alliance would like that! 
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I have posted my speculative map of the Firefly system in the Blue Sun room...
http://www.fireflyfans.net/sunroomitem.asp?i=840
Notes:
As one can see, I am a believer in the “one-system” theory, and think the show takes place in a single star system. I am aware of the arguments against this theory, but it still feels right to me. The purpose of the map was to help me visualize what the system might look like.
I was going to include another map tracing the journey of Serenity over the course of the show, but decided against it. The great Firefly Timeline ( www.mts.net/~arphaxad/firefly.html) by Edgar Governo shows that there are several gaps between episodes of up to several months, and it was too hard to speculate on where the ship was during those periods.
Some notes on the map:
- “Number of habitable worlds” includes both moons and planets in that planetary system, as applicable. The names of habitable moons are indicated next to the appropriate planet; unnamed or non-life supporting moons are not shown.
- I speculate that there is an "optimal life zone", where earth-like planets occur naturally, and a "marginal life zone", where extensive terraforming is needed and planets are never 100% earth-like. Obviously, the core planets are in the optimal zone and the rim/border planets are in the marginal zone. Only orbits in the optimal and marginal life zones are shown, with the exception of the planet in orbit #1 (outside life zone). There are presumably other planets beyond orbit #17 that are outside the marginal life zone. This is probably Reaver territory...
- The name of a planet is bolded. In some cases the name of a planet is not known and only the names of mentioned moons are shown.
- On the map, the position of the planets on their orbits is shown for reference purposes only. Actual position will of course vary over time as the planets move about their orbits.
- Where possible I tried to use travel times mentioned in the show to get an idea of a planet’s/moon’s position. However, there are only a few travel times mentioned and almost no distances. I figured that in most cases it would take a couple days for a ship to travel from one planetary system to another assuming they are in relatively close orbits and the planets are in the same general arc coming out from the sun. For example, in “Serenity” it takes two days to reach Whitefall from Persephone and another two days or so to reach Beaumonde. Persephone seems to be in a semi-civilized region of space (but outside the Core) while Whitefall is definitely out in the wilder part of the system. We can assume at the time of the episode both planets were in the same general position on their orbits – if Whitefall had been on the other side of the system the travel time would have been weeks, not days.
Hans
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I have to say that this has been the most enjoyable thread I've read in a long time! I can't commit to any side though, simply because I'm not convinced that the Joss-man himself has figured out all the extents of the Firefly verse. Travel times seem to be dictated by the needs of the script, and (to borrow a line I've read somewhere) ships "move at the speed of plot."
But I'm with the rest of y'all in that I'd love an answer to this question.
In regards to why humans left Earth in the first place, from Mal's intro my understanding is that "the Earth got used up," meaning we finally burned through all the natural resources mother-Earth had to give. No great disasters or political machinations -- she simply couldn't sustain us any longer.
Perhaps the movie will prompt Joss to flesh out the 'verse in more detail, and give us the single vs. multiple system answer once and for all.
Hey, it could happen!
-tRR
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Well, I used the recently-leaked map from the movie as a basis for my own map using the program It's Full of Stars (IFOS is a GREAT free program, by the way!).
It's all in 3-D positioning, using a 4-solar-system, very, very tight star cluster. Not TERRIBLY realistic, but a compromise between galaxy and solar system, and completely consistent with said leaked map.
If anyone wants the IFOS file from me - it's got the systems all worked out, by the way - let me know.
Haken, if you don't want it here, I'll take it down!
Here's the Blue Sun Room link:
http://www.fireflyfans.net/sunroomitem.asp?i=1718
- Forrestwolf
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... some things I learned about the 'verse.
People in the 'verse are stupid. They use terms like 'universe' and 'galaxy' to refer to anything not on a planet. This is as intentional on the show as much as it is unintentional in real life.
Everything revolves around a Big Blue Sun. 
There are dozens of planets and hundreds of moons. Certainly enough to call it 'big' and small enough not to need warp nacelles. Thank the 'verse!
Personally, the show seems to be obvious about it's setting. Why people argue about it really mystifies me.
But hey, don't mind me. Please continue.
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I reckon the majority of Firelfy takes place within our own Solar system, but that is not to say it goes beyond it.
There are many reasons I believe that it takes place around, Mars, the Sun, Jupiter, Earth-that-was...many little clues and pointers within the show, and many signs that we are still hanging around Jupiter and so forth
http://www.fireflyfans.net/thread.asp?b=2&t=6528
I've wrote some about it on that thread
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