Re: Faster Than Light Travel

In message <8625650F.00690B5A.00@notes.vastar.com>
	  "Chris McCurry" <CMCCURR@vastar.com> wrote:

> But thinking about it, I can only think of three truly different ways
to
> travel at high speeds in S.Fiction.  Every thing else is just a
variation
> of one of those themes:
> 
> 1) hyperspace / warp space / worm holes / etc.
> 2) Folding / warping (changing the reality of space time)

I'd say wormholes fall more into category 2, and
how is 'warp space' different from 2 as well (it's
name suggests it's warping spacetime at any rate).

There are radically different types of wormholes. A
lot in science fiction are just "open wormhole at A
to B, and travel through it", where end B is created
magically hundreds of lightyears away.

Traversable wormholes OTOH are (very briefly)
where you 'grow' a quantum wormhole up to practical
size. At this point, both ends (end 'A' and end 'B')
are still next to each other.

Both ends can be moved independently, but obey all the
normal laws of physics - ie, they cannot travel faster
than light. So you can't travel to worlds you haven't
been to before instantly, but you have to set up a
wormhole link first (which may take hundreds of years).

> 3) conventional travel  straight line,  (if one believes: the light
barrier
> is just another barrier than every thinks can not be surpassed.  Much
like
> the sound barrier back in the way days. < we just don't know how /
> theoretically>)

The sound barrier was not seen as impossible to pass - it
was widely known that bullets did it all the time. It was
just the difficulty of keeping the plane in one piece as
the speed of sound was approached.

> if any one can think of something else that's no related to any of
these
> (is truly different)	please let me know...

To add:

4) Time machine (ignoring the fact that FTL drives are time
machines anyway). Travel to your destination taking a year
and a day while in cryofreeze. Travel back in time one year,
and hey presto, it's only taken you one day to travel that
distance (which could be a light year).

5) Newtonian physics. E.E. Smiths inertialess drives are
an example. Ignore relativity altogether, and just keep
on accelerating to really fast speeds.

-- 
Be seeing you,
Sam.