Continuum Distortion Propulsion: Warp Drive from Star Trek
POSTED BY: ZeframCochrane
UPDATED: Friday, March 11, 2005 02:09
VIEWED: 5863
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Star Trek actually has some of the slowest space travel of any interplanetary sci-fi show. Even Babylon 5, with its relatively primitive Earth-ship technology, had uber-fast hyperdrive.
The problem with Trek's 'slow' FTL capability is that it was often ignored. Distant outposts could have live communications with places outside their immediate vicinity, when the reported speed of subspace communications indicates delays of minutes or hours.
Shuttles and Runabouts would ferry people across vast distances over a commercial break, when the reported speeds of such vehicles indicate travel times of weeks or months even to reach nearby systems.
Trek wasn't fast at all... unless the story needed it to be.
Of course, we Firefly fans can't complain about Trek. We don't know anything about Serenity's propulsion, nor can we even be certain how many solar systems are involved, nor anything, really. It's the opposite of Trek. We can complain about Trek for the particle of the week, but we can also complain about Firefly for not explaining anything at all about the technology.
--Anthony
"Liberty must not be purchased at the cost of Humanity." --Captain Robert Henner
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Quote:
Originally posted by AnthonyT:
We can complain about Trek for the particle of the week, but we can also complain about Firefly for not explaining anything at all about the technology.
This is a very good point. But I'm willing to forgive Firefly on this issue because tech isn't as central to the stories as it is in Star Trek, and leaving it unspecified does let them get away with travel-as-fast-as-it's-convenient without the contradictions you point out in Star Trek.
In general, sci-fi is good about this, in that the authors can choose to emphasize what they want and gloss over the rest. Kurt Vonnegut is my favorite for this property - when he needs to, he'll do stuff like just propose a race of aliens that look like toilet plungers with a hand holding an eyeball at the top of the stick, and it fits just fine in the story. I wouldn't put up with that in Babylon 5 or a Larry Niven book, because they've set things up to need to be more plausible.
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Quote:
Originally posted by ZeframCochrane:
For those of you who have never understood Warp Drive, here is the explanation...
... Speeds below warp 10 are plotted on an exponential curve. Thus, whereas a ship traveling at warp factor 1 is traveling at the speed of light, a ship moving at warp 2 is traveling at 10 times the speed of light, a ship flying at warp 3 is traveling at 39 times the speed of light, a ship at warp 4 is at 102 times the speed of light, warp 5 is 214 times the speed of light, warp 6 is 392 times the speed of light, warp 7 is 656 times the speed of light, warp 8 is 1,024 times the speed of light, and warp 9 is 1,516 times the speed of light. Warp 9.9 is 3,053 times the speed of light. The curve becomes extremely steep at that range, and enormous increases in speed are needed to progress from warp 9.91 to warp 9.92.
Forgive me, and I know my math skill suck... but how are these numbers you've listed exponential?
I always thought, exponential means a figure would increase based on multiplying it by a specific factor, usually itself... so if warp 1 is C (with "C" being the speed of light), wouldn't warp 2 be 2C, Warp 3 would be 4C, warp 4 8C, warp 5 16C, warp 6 256C, warp 7 65536C, etc?
Ow... my head...
--Jefé The Hat
***************************
--Don't bother trying to predict, figure out, second guess, criticize, or suggest anything that comes from the mind of Joss Whedon, for you shall usually be wrong, and shall find out the Truth and Purpose in due time.
(This is the Truth of Whedoning)
"I like smackin 'em"--Jayne
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Quote:
Originally posted by BadgersHat:
I always thought, exponential means a figure would increase based on multiplying it by a specific factor, usually itself... so if warp 1 is C (with "C" being the speed of light), wouldn't warp 2 be 2C, Warp 3 would be 4C, warp 4 8C, warp 5 16C, warp 6 256C, warp 7 65536C, etc?
That's a geometric progression.
Quote:
Originally posted by BadgersHat:
Ow... my head...
Math can get that way.
----
"Canada being mad at you is like Mr. Rogers throwing a brick through your window." -Jon Stewart, The Daily Show
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Quote:
Originally posted by ZeframCochrane: For those of you who have never understood Warp Drive, here is the explanation...
Continuum Distortion Propulsion or as it is more commonly known, warp drive, is a technology that allows space travel at faster-than-light speeds. In the simplest terms, it does this by contracting spacetime in front of the ship and expanding spacetime behind it. A starship itself rests in a bubble between the two spacetime distortions. This warped space, together with the region between it, accelerates off at "warp speed" and the vessel then essentially surfs the wave in spacetime created by this distortion. Travel at velocities exceeding the speed of light is possible in this fashion because the starship is, strictly speaking, stationary (relative to the space of its warp bubble) while spacetime itself is moving. Since spacetime itself is moving and the starship is not actually accelerating, it experiences no time dilation, allowing the passage of time inside the vessel to be the same as that outside it.
The warp engine is works by burning deuterium to create gases, which are then forced together with antimatter in the form of antihydrogen. The is mediated through an assembly of dilithium crystals, which resist antimatter bombardment when subjected to high-frequency electromagnetic fields. This reaction produces a highly energetic plasma, called electro-plasma, which is channelled by magnetic conduits through a power transfer grid. The electro-plasma is funneled to plasma injectors into a series of field coils, which are made of a substance called verterium cortenide. When this substance is energized, it causes the energy frequencies in the plasma to shift into subspace (a domain outside normal three dimensional space), generating multilayered "warp fields" that form a "subspace bubble" that envelops the starship, distorting the geometry of space and moving the starship at velocities that exceed the speed of light. These velocities are referred to as warp factors.
Warp fields are measured according to the amount of subspace stress they generate; field stresses are measured in cochranes. Fields that are below warp factor 1 are measured in units a thousands times smaller called millicochranes. A field of one cochrane or greater is often referred to as a warp field. The warp scale has been drawn up so that warp 10 is infinite velocity; in theory any vessel traveling at this speed would occupy every point in the universe at once. As a warp field approaches the stress needed to achieve this speed, the power requirements rise dramatically and the warp drive efficiency drops.
Speeds below warp 10 are plotted on an exponential curve. Thus, whereas a ship traveling at warp factor 1 is traveling at the speed of light, a ship moving at warp 2 is traveling at 10 times the speed of light, a ship flying at warp 3 is traveling at 39 times the speed of light, a ship at warp 4 is at 102 times the speed of light, warp 5 is 214 times the speed of light, warp 6 is 392 times the speed of light, warp 7 is 656 times the speed of light, warp 8 is 1,024 times the speed of light, and warp 9 is 1,516 times the speed of light. Warp 9.9 is 3,053 times the speed of light. The curve becomes extremely steep at that range, and enormous increases in speed are needed to progress from warp 9.91 to warp 9.92.
Crossing the warp barrier requires a disproportionate amount of energy. Once the warp threshold has been passed, the power needed to maintain the field lessens.
What? How? What?
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It's the FIELD COIL, you dummy!
Chrisisall
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Wait, no... you're right....what?
Chrisisall
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It's often nice to try and make sense out of science fiction, but sometimes the writes are not internally consistent enough to make this a practical enterprise (pun intended). Your explanation of a space warp similar to the famous Alcubierre relativity solution certainly fits certain aspects of Star Trek (not least of which is the name "warp drive" since space is actually warped in the process). But Star Trek provides too many exceptions to fit this handy hypothesis. What about all that stuff about a ship entering a dimension or what-not called subspace? How does this fit into your warp drive framework?
And why does a matter-antimatter reaction produce plasma? Is there a surplus of matter?
Finally, why am I bothering to speculate about this?
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