From: hinson@bohr.physics.purdue.edu (Jason W. Hinson)
Newsgroups: rec.arts.startrek.tech
Subject: Re: relative speed
Date: 5 Sep 92 20:56:56 GMT
Organization: Purdue University Physics Department

rpascazi@engws9.ic.sunysb.edu (Robert R Pascazio) writes:
>eektl@marlin.jcu.edu.au (Kenneth T Leong) writes:
>>If two starships were back to back and then both raced off at warp 10,
>>would the speed of one starship relative to the other be double? If so,
>>could this relative speed be acheived as an actual speed by a single
>>starship?
>>
>>
>>eektl@marlin.jcu.edu.au 
>
>This just goes back to the theory of relativity. The accelerated speeds
>do not effect the physical phenomena. This is because (I think) warp is
>actually light speed (warp 9 being 90 percent the speed of light). What
>warp technology is, is the creation of an anti-mass and anti-inertial
>field. This allows accelerations close to the speed of light with 
>neglegible (not logrithmic at least) increase in power consumption. 
>
>If the observer from starship A took measurments of starship B every
>once in a while, it would appear the starship is moving away faster
>than warp 10. This is because the light(probably need subspace detection
>equipment here) would take longer to reach B as A moves off. In actual
>distance though, if information could move instantaneousely the other
>ship would suffer from relativistic effects and appear to slow an never
>exceed warp 10. 
>
>					-Rob-


First, your idea about warp 9 beeing 90% the speed of light is incorrect,
Rob.  You can read the FAQ list to find out about this.

Second, I wanted to mention something about the relativity question to 
anyone who was interested in reading.  The following is an argument I
have presented before for how faster-than-light travel can be done in our
science fiction universes without violating causality and without violating
what we know to be true about "real" science. This is the only argument I
have heard that will work.

In general, if you start with two observers traveling relative to one 
another without going faster than the speed of light, and THEN you give 
them the possibilty of communicating with a signal that can travel faster
than the speed of light, then you can create a causality problem.  The 
reason for this comes from the fact that each observer has his own way
of viewing space and time that depends on his speed relative to the other
observer.  

Enter a preferred frame of reference:  Assume there is some special type
of field (perhaps part of space-time itself) that can be "warped" to allow
for a new mode of transportation. The key to this new mode would be that all
those who travel this way would have the same reference frame as the 
"special" field does, REGUARDLESS of their speed.  At first, this sounds
like a complete violation of relativity; however, think of it in this way:
Picking this field to be a particular frame of reference is no problem,
its just like choosing the Earth to be your frame of reference. The
difference is that the special field is the ONLY field that can be warped
to allow for this new mode of transportation. 

So, anyone traveling in warped space measures time and space just the same
as anyone else traveling in warped space, reguardless of speed. To make things
easy, one would also want to assume that most stars and planets do not have
very relativistic speeds with respect to the "special" field. That way, people
on Earth (for example) would measure space and time in the same way as
those traveling in warped space.

The one problem:
While traveling in warped space, you ARE violating the major postulate of
relativity: The laws of physics are the same for all observers.  Because
the speed of light is not the same for all of these travelers, certain 
laws of electrodynamics will appear differently to them.  There is nothing
COMPLETELY wrong with this (after all, it simple a postulate); however, 
it will likly make the universe itself appear quite differently.


So, the normal lenght contraction/time dialation of relativity does not
apply when you are talking about travelers in Wapred space.  We should 
remember this in future discussions.


Now I have a question:  Should this be put into some FAQList?
Perhapsd -->  FAQL: FTL travel without violating causality.

comments???

-Jay

Newsgroups: rec.arts.startrek.tech