GENERAL DISCUSSIONS

How gravity regulation works?

POSTED BY: CREVANREAVER
UPDATED: Wednesday, February 21, 2007 13:48
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Friday, February 2, 2007 9:35 PM

CREVANREAVER


According to Joss Whedon's "A Brief History of the Universe circa 2507 A.D." that was in Serenity: The Official Visual Companion terraforming the new worlds involved "gravity regulation".

Here's my theory on the subject:

Quote:

Gravity regulation involves "gravity regulation satellites". These satellites employ controlled beams of graviton streams, which specifically focus interference patterns on the "gravitational core" of a celestial body. A network of many satellites doing this results in significant fluctuation in the gravity field being imposed on that body. Controlling the focal point and interference patterns of the graviton beams enables use of this fluctuation to either decrease or increase the gravitational pull of a celestial body, literally changing its surface gravity.


Does anyone else have a theory?

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Friday, February 2, 2007 10:43 PM

THATWEIRDGIRL


huh. It's a theory. I find it highly unlikely that it's possible. But that's what science fiction is for...exploring the improbable. Oh and the human condition.



I'm sorry. I hear gravitron beam and think of Wil. I can't help it.



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Saturday, February 3, 2007 2:33 AM

ANOBJECTINSPACE


Gravity isn't something that can be put into a beam.

My theory would be that they somehow altered the Spin/size/density or all three of the planets in order to create a planet that had a Force of Gravity that was close enough to that of earth.

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Saturday, February 3, 2007 2:39 AM

LEADB


Well, if you can answer how they do artificial gravity on ships, you might get close to answering how they do it for planets. Keep in mind that even though Serenity was nigh completely inoperable in "Out of Gas", she still had gravity. This suggests it takes very little or no engery to maintain; or the system has a highly "inductive" property that allows maintenance of the gravity field despite power loss of some significant time. Or the writers didn't think about it.




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Saturday, February 3, 2007 3:09 AM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:
Gravity isn't something that can be put into a beam.

How do you know?



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Saturday, February 3, 2007 3:41 AM

ANOBJECTINSPACE


Quote:

Originally posted by citizen:
Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:
Gravity isn't something that can be put into a beam.

How do you know?



Gravitiational Force is the attraction of two bodies with a mass.

.....
"It's just an Object"

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Saturday, February 3, 2007 3:57 AM

CITIZEN


All we know is that as far as we can tell gravity only occures naturally where we have mass. Since we still don't know what 'causes' gravity for sure. Relativity says Mass warps space time in such away that it feels like Gravity, but can't tell us how Mass warps space time, Quantum Gravitational theories, OTOH, often talk about discrete particles, which is where the idea of the Graviton came from.

The point is we have no solid idea of what gravity is and what causes it, so we have no way of saying with certainty what can and what can not 'create' gravity.

And on last thing, it seems that gravity effects things that don't have mass, a photon has zero rest mass, yet light is bent by gravity.



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Saturday, February 3, 2007 4:04 AM

ANOBJECTINSPACE


Quote:

Originally posted by citizen:
All we know is that as far as we can tell gravity only occures naturally where we have mass. Since we still don't know what 'causes' gravity for sure. Relativity says Mass warps space time in such away that it feels like Gravity, but can't tell us how Mass warps space time, Quantum Gravitational theories, OTOH, often talk about discrete particles, which is where the idea of the Graviton came from.

The point is we have no solid idea of what gravity is and what causes it, so we have no way of saying with certainty what can and what can not 'create' gravity.



Quick read over Graviton. It is an interesting prospect.

.....
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Saturday, February 3, 2007 4:07 AM

FLATTOP


I'll toss my $0.02 into the mix here...

Gravity (g) is the (or one of) weakest force(s) known. It can be overcome by any of the other forces (normal force, wind (multi-ton airplanes fly daily and are the safesest (statistically) way to travel), magnetic, chemical reaction, etc.

Ships:
With g being such a weak force, I would think that generating a field to simulate/overcome it wouldn't be terribly power consuming, or complicated. The g field generators never fail, but the computer telling 'em what to do may. The inertial dampners going offline would be a software/computer problem, not an actual failure of the field generators. In OOG the lights didn't fail, nor did the coms, so the inertial dampners (g field generators) didn't fail either.
Build the g gens into the surfaces of the ship so that no matter which direction the ship accelerates, there is a field gen to pull you (or push you) in the opposite direction. Rig the computer to compensate for all but say 1/10 (or less) of the true acceleration, and put a governor on it to max out at say 4 g. 40G burn feels like 1.4 (or less), concussion blast at 100g feels like 4g governed limit, but oscillates back and forth a bit because it's more compensation than the system was strictly designed for (or it's a warning system to indicate that the ship is approaching structural limits)). Serenity can lift with such small engines and so little fuel because it has, in effect, no/little inertia (mass) that needs to be overcome. Engines keep burning in atmo just to overcome the force of the wind (nil mass <> nil surface area. Sails are lightweight, but generate large forces.), and to be ready to zoomy away, and of course, to keep life support running.

Terraforming takes/took many decades. I would suspect that on a planetary scale this would imply taking (those fed cruisers take a BUNCH of raw material to build; and releasing atmosphere from ice or rock or wherever sufficient to sustain life can't be a small amount either) or depositing (Japanese make islands from trash so why not?) material to get the mass close to correct. But they must have had it dialed pretty tight with whatever technology they had, because I'd expect there to be folk from some world where local g was say 1.5 EarthThatWas who were shorter, but much denser/stronger than norm, and other folk from planets that were 0.5 ETW that were taller and weaker...
anyway, planets... I dunno how to make 'em so close.


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Saturday, February 3, 2007 4:09 AM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by FlatTop:
I'll toss my $0.02 into the mix here...

Gravity (g) is the (or one of) weakest force(s) known. It can be overcome by any of the other forces (normal force, wind (multi-ton airplanes fly daily and are the safesest (statistically) way to travel), magnetic, chemical reaction, etc.

One of the theories why gravity is so comparitavily weak is because it interacts in all M-Theory dimensions, where as other forces don't. In other words it is no weaker than any other force, just spread more thinly.



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Saturday, February 3, 2007 4:14 AM

FINN MAC CUMHAL


Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:
Gravitiational Force is the attraction of two bodies with a mass.

That’s true, but there is a speculative particle called a graviton, which mediates the gravitational force; the gravitational analogy of the electron, which mediates the electromagnetic force. If we assume that it exists, it might be possible to direct and focus it, since the electron can be directed and focused. Although, I personally doubt it. It’s all based on aesthetics. The idea that gravity must fall inline with a general symmetry in the universe. Although, I’m not an expert on this issue, I feel like gravity may very well be a separate issue from the other forces. The General theory may never be reconciled with the Standard theory.

Edit: I see this has already been dealt with.



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Saturday, February 3, 2007 9:20 AM

ASARIAN


Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:

Quote:

Originally posted by citizen:

Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:

Gravity isn't something that can be put into a beam.

How do you know?



Gravitiational Force is the attraction of two bodies with a mass.




I don't necessarily agree. In General relativity, gravitation is not really a Force, but rather the manifestation of curved space and time. As such, light, while it has no mass, its own self, simply follows the curvature in space, generated by the mass-energy of the object in space it passes.


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Saturday, February 3, 2007 11:23 AM

DONCOAT


Like much of the science in the Firefly 'verse, there's no real canon on how the technology works. We do have a few clues, though.

In the pilot, we see the ship's gravity being switched on after the crew enters the cargo bay with the "goods". So gravity (or something that closely mimics gravity) is highly controllable.

We see action taking place on many worlds, some of which seem to be rather small moons. Yet the gravity always seems to be Earth normal -- unlikely without some sort of modification. So gravity must be controllable on a planetary scale. Yet it can't make an actual change in the mass of the body, or it would foul up orbits in a big way. (Imagine our Moon suddenly having the same mass as the Earth!) So the effect must be a local one: it provides a 1-gee field for those close to the surface, but from a distance the effect is negligible.

We have some terminology. Kaylee mentions the ship's "grav drive" in The Message, and talks about how it can interact with a planets "actual gravity".

As mentioned above, we know that an operating main engine is not required to maintain ship's gravity, for several hours at least.

Given those things, it's safe to say that the gravity technology in the 'verse must be based on new discoveries in Physics, unknown to us today. It's also likely that these same discoveries are probably behind the technology of the spaceships like Firefly that can cover very large distances very quickly -- not to mention the ships that made the trip from Earth-That-Was.

It would be fun if Joss & Co. had had more time to reveal more details. One characteristic of good S/F is to define the available tech and its limits, and stay consistently within those limits. I don't expect Firefly to be especially "hard" S/F but I'd like to know if these details had been thought out, or if they were left to be developed later (or not at all).

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Saturday, February 3, 2007 11:37 AM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by asarian:
I don't necessarily agree. In General relativity, gravitation is not really a Force, but rather the manifestation of curved space and time. As such, light, while it has no mass, its own self, simply follows the curvature in space, generated by the mass-energy of the object in space it passes.

Exactly. But still, what causes the localised warping of Space-Time and how?



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Saturday, February 3, 2007 4:03 PM

CREVANREAVER


Interesting discussion. But still I ask: Does anyone else have a theory?



Does anyone else have a theory on how gravity regulation works?

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Saturday, February 3, 2007 5:47 PM

URIAHONE


i think it works because filming low g conditions, or zero g conditions is prohibitively expensive *or it looks like crap* that's all the explanation i need.

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Saturday, February 3, 2007 6:15 PM

CREVANREAVER


Quote:

Originally posted by Uriahone:
...that's all the explanation i need.



But it's not for us nit-picking geeks.

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Saturday, February 3, 2007 7:18 PM

JONNYQUEST

"Did he just go crazy and fall asleep?"


Quote:

Originally posted by CrevanReaver:
Quote:

Originally posted by Uriahone:
...that's all the explanation i need.



But it's not for us nit-picking geeks.



Lucky for all of us the 'Verse has room enough for both schools of thought. While I enjoy picking the nit out of almost anything, I try VERY hard not to impose an expectation on a story, show or movie that will impede my enjoyment of it.

I cannot but in the most basic way explain the processor that allows me to use this computer, however, I am connected by it to this wonderful website without me needing to know. I could read up on microprocessors and become fluent in the language of computer scientists, but I don't need to. I NEED to reach out to the 'Verse.

Do I need to know about gravitation regulation? Only that we have in in the BDS/BDM. Does it have to be in technical terms defined to the nth degree? No. If that were the case we could build one now. Does the team of creative minds that has brought us to this place have all the details worked out? I hope not. I think that much of the technology we see in Firefly was either assumed (you know it's a space opera in the future: there will be gizmos.) or created from necessity. (Something has to keep our feet on the floor of the ship; not magnetic boots or a spinning hull to create centrifugal force, both being cumbersome and distracting from the drama).

It's fun to speculate on this stuff. But if I don't have an answer to any technology I see, I'm not going to lose sleep over it. I'll just bask in the electrons that convey the Signal to me.


"Well, here I am...Does that seem right to you?"

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 7:14 AM

DONCOAT


I'm with you, JQ. For hard S/F I want hard science, but Firefly isn't hard S/F so I just relax and enjoy the great characters.

That being said...

If I had to speculate, I'd go for some sort of "gravity dust" that produces a highly local spacetime distortion when electrically charged. The locality is such that it has a much sharper falloff than inverse-squared, so using it doesn't make a moon look as heavy as a planet from a distance, just creates a "skin" of higher gravity -- maybe a couple hundred miles thick before it falls off to the natural background gravity.

To use it on a planet, you charge it up and drop it from space, like a crop duster on a planetary scale. It might take a year or two to get enough down to make the moon people-friendly. The stuff acts like it's very massive, so it sinks through any surface soil/regolith down to bedrock, so you don't have to worry about it going anywhere. It holds its charge like an electret, or (if you prefer) like the buried charge in Flash memory. Maybe it decays slowly over time so you have to reseed after a decade or two to maintain the grav field.

The local grav on Serenity uses the same principle, except you have the ability to charge and discharge it at will using an electrical field. (You can even control different areas of the ship, such as the cargo hold, independently.) The engine has to work to switch the grav on and off, but the grav dust holds the charge for a long time if you don't switch it deliberately so you don't instantly lose grav when the engine shuts down. You do have to switch it off in a controlled way as you land on a planet, though, or else you'd weigh double aboard ship. Hence the potential for a bumpy ride as you reenter.

There, how's that for a fanwank? (Note to Joss: I'm available as a science consultant/continuity checker for the Big Damn Sequel.)


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Sunday, February 4, 2007 8:39 AM

CRUITHNE3753


Gravity regulation? Same physical principal as the Heisenberg compensators in Trek transporters:- "Very well, thank you!"

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 11:17 AM

CALHOUN


Quote:

CrevanReaver wrote:
Friday, February 02, 2007 21:35
According to Joss Whedon's "A Brief History of the Universe circa 2507 A.D." that was in Serenity: The Official Visual Companion terraforming the new worlds involved "gravity regulation".

Here's my theory on the subject:


Quote:

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Gravity regulation involves "gravity regulation satellites". These satellites employ controlled beams of graviton streams, which specifically focus interference patterns on the "gravitational core" of a celestial body. A network of many satellites doing this results in significant fluctuation in the gravity field being imposed on that body. Controlling the focal point and interference patterns of the graviton beams enables use of this fluctuation to either decrease or increase the gravitational pull of a celestial body, literally changing its surface gravity.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------



I see your graviton beam theory and raise it by tachyon particles.

Hasnt anyone watched Star Trek? There is always tachyons involved...


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Sunday, February 4, 2007 1:44 PM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by Calhoun:
I see your graviton beam theory and raise it by tachyon particles.

Hasnt anyone watched Star Trek? There is always tachyons involved...

Tachyons only travel faster than the speed of light because they have negative rest mass. I assume theres a time expansion issue but theres nothing in hard science that really says what happens beyond lightspeed because Special Relativity says its impossible.



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Sunday, February 4, 2007 1:57 PM

CALHOUN


Quote:

citizen wrote:
Sunday, February 04, 2007 13:44

Tachyons only travel faster than the speed of light because they have negative rest mass. I assume theres a time expansion issue but theres nothing in hard science that really says what happens beyond lightspeed because Special Relativity says its impossible.



and yet.. there they are.

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 2:01 PM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by Calhoun:
and yet.. there they are.

Yeah they have a cool sounding name. That's why every Sci-Fi show talks about Gravitons even though they don't have a clue what they are .

If they were called mundaneons it would be a different story.



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Sunday, February 4, 2007 4:25 PM

DOCTROID


Quote:

Originally posted by DonCoat:
It's also likely that these same discoveries are probably behind the technology of the spaceships like Firefly that can cover very large distances very quickly -- not to mention the ships that made the trip from Earth-That-Was.



If nothing else -- assuming (and I think you have to) interplanetary distances are comparable to what they are in our own solar system -- there's no way you're getting from one planet to another as fast as Serenity tends to unless you're going pretty darn fast -- and even then, it'll take a long time unless you accelerate pretty darn hard. In which case all the crew ought to be a thin layer of yuck on the aft bulkheads... unless the gravity generator is compensating for the acceleration to produce 1-g downward at all times.

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 5:43 PM

WRATCHIT


I think it's MAGIC!


Help me Tom Cruise! Make gravity with your witchcraft!

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 6:35 PM

VETERAN

Don't squat with your spurs on.


Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:
Quote:

Originally posted by citizen:
Quote:

Originally posted by AnObjectinSpace:
Gravity isn't something that can be put into a beam.

How do you know?



Gravitiational Force is the attraction of two bodies with a mass.

.....
"It's just an Object"



But don't they have tractor beams?

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 6:37 PM

JONNYQUEST

"Did he just go crazy and fall asleep?"


Quote:

Originally posted by wratchit:
I think it's MAGIC!
Help me Tom Cruise! Make gravity with your witchcraft!


All technology is magic when viewed by less technical. But really, at every stage, as soon as we "explain" some aspect, some other unknown is thrown into the mix.

Actually, I know Tom is the current foil, but really I think we need to take a closer look at John Travolta's nostril thingies in Battlefield Earth to witness real magic in action. Ever notice how eerily close Battlefield is to Serenity in theme and mood?




"Well, here I am...Does that seem right to you?"

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 6:42 PM

WRATCHIT


Instead of Psychlos you have the alliance.

Chiwetel looks a little like Travolta........

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 8:42 PM

URIAHONE


Quote:

Originally posted by doctroid:
Quote:

Originally posted by DonCoat:

If nothing else -- assuming (and I think you have to) interplanetary distances are comparable to what they are in our own solar system -- there's no way you're getting from one planet to another as fast as Serenity tends to unless you're going pretty darn fast -- and even then, it'll take a long time unless you accelerate pretty darn hard. In which case all the crew ought to be a thin layer of yuck on the aft bulkheads... unless the gravity generator is compensating for the acceleration to produce 1-g downward at all times.



i noticed that, but also if you noticed, that they didn't go flying into the wall every time they turned around during flight, but if they were really traveling at speeds necissary to get from one planet to the next, that would crush everybody, or take a significant ammount of time to turn around, but maybe they also have some way of defeating inertia, hell it is science fiction.

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Sunday, February 4, 2007 10:35 PM

ASARIAN


Quote:

Originally posted by Uriahone:

Quote:

Originally posted by doctroid:

Quote:

Originally posted by DonCoat:

If nothing else -- assuming (and I think you have to) interplanetary distances are comparable to what they are in our own solar system -- there's no way you're getting from one planet to another as fast as Serenity tends to unless you're going pretty darn fast -- and even then, it'll take a long time unless you accelerate pretty darn hard. In which case all the crew ought to be a thin layer of yuck on the aft bulkheads... unless the gravity generator is compensating for the acceleration to produce 1-g downward at all times.




I noticed that, but also if you noticed, that they didn't go flying into the wall every time they turned around during flight, but if they were really traveling at speeds necissary to get from one planet to the next, that would crush everybody, or take a significant ammount of time to turn around, but maybe they also have some way of defeating inertia, hell it is science fiction.



That's where the Inertial dampers come in. Hasn't anyone watched Star Trek? :)

On a side-note, it is said that, "If a starship were to jump to warp speed without using inertial dampers, the members of the crew would almost certainly die as the rapid acceleration would throw them back in to the consoles and rear walls killing them instantly. Conversely, they would also be killed if a ship were to come out of warp but in this instance the crew would be thrown forward."

I wonder how true that really is, though.

If you were to create a warp field, loosely defined as a localized, self-induced field around a ship which distorts space-time in such a manner that you're, effectively, continually propelled forward as you're warping each new section of space you traverse, then I believe the ship itself, relative to its own warp-field, would appear, to itself, as standing still. Or just appear to be travelling at the same, pre-warp speed. And this because you're not literally propelled forward THROUGH space, but rather, as it were, it is space itself, being warped, that's effectively "bend" forward (if you can call it that). You're basically just riding on its coattails. Nor is space-time warped here because you're travelling at high (near lightspeed) velocity; but rather, you bend space first, and then use the "pinch" forward.

So, that leaves me to question how much going to, or dropping out, warp would be really noticed, inertia-wise. Inertia deals with the motion of matter, and how it is affected by applied forces. Newton's First Law of Motion states: "Every body perseveres in its state of being at rest or of moving uniformly straight ahead, except insofar as it is compelled to change its state by forces impressed." Like forces that cause acceleration or deceleration. But since warping space would not be moving through space (but rather: moving space), inertia would not come into play. Turn off the warp-engine, and space around you would simply no longer be warped. So, in absentia of inertia, where's the need for Inertial dampers?

Serenity don't have warp-engines, though. Just plain jet-engines. And a standard radion-accelerator core, of course. :) The latter, I don't think, is a warp engine (let alone an FTL drive). So, I reckon Serenity would actually need Inertial dampers more than the Enterprise.

If I'm wrong, you'd best shoot me now... Or, we could talk more. :)


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Monday, February 5, 2007 8:25 AM

WRATCHIT


I will keep myself from making a Spaceballs reference right now.....lol

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Monday, February 5, 2007 11:21 AM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by DonCoat:
If nothing else -- assuming (and I think you have to) interplanetary distances are comparable to what they are in our own solar system -- there's no way you're getting from one planet to another as fast as Serenity tends to unless you're going pretty darn fast -- and even then, it'll take a long time unless you accelerate pretty darn hard. In which case all the crew ought to be a thin layer of yuck on the aft bulkheads... unless the gravity generator is compensating for the acceleration to produce 1-g downward at all times.

I think that given the concentration of planets the distances between worlds is likely to be somewhat less than our solar system. Assuming the single star system which is the front runner I think, all those worlds are going to be packed into the habitable zone, an area occupied by the Earth's orbit and at the edges Venus and Mars in our system. Now if you could make a brachistochrone type trajectory (constantly accelerating to the mid point then decelerating there after) you can travel some pretty hefty distances accelerating at only 1g. At maximum distance Mars is about 234 million miles away from Earth, if a Ship were to accelerate constantly at 1g to the mid point then decelerate at 1g thereafter it would take around four and a half days to reach Mars.
Quote:

Originally posted by asarian:
That's where the Inertial dampers come in. Hasn't anyone watched Star Trek? :)

Inertial force and Gravity are pretty much the same thing, so since Serenity obviously has an artificial gravity system that is minutely controllable there's no reason that couldn't be used to counteract the Inertia of anything inside the craft.

You'd want to tie the pilots controls into a computer which would calculate what inertial g forces are about to be incurred, and in which direction. The gravity generator would then be compelled to produce a field of equal strength opposed to it, to all intents and purposes cancelling the inertial effects out. This would also explain why the ship shakes when an unexpected event, like getting shot at occurs, since the computer wouldn't have prior knowledge.
Quote:

On a side-note, it is said that, "If a starship were to jump to warp speed without using inertial dampers, the members of the crew would almost certainly die as the rapid acceleration would throw them back in to the consoles and rear walls killing them instantly. Conversely, they would also be killed if a ship were to come out of warp but in this instance the crew would be thrown forward."

I wonder how true that really is, though.

If you were to create a warp field, loosely defined as a localized, self-induced field around a ship which distorts space-time in such a manner that you're, effectively, continually propelled forward as you're warping each new section of space you traverse, then I believe the ship itself, relative to its own warp-field, would appear, to itself, as standing still. Or just appear to be travelling at the same, pre-warp speed. And this because you're not literally propelled forward THROUGH space, but rather, as it were, it is space itself, being warped, that's effectively "bend" forward (if you can call it that). You're basically just riding on its coattails. Nor is space-time warped here because you're travelling at high (near lightspeed) velocity; but rather, you bend space first, and then use the "pinch" forward.

So, that leaves me to question how much going to, or dropping out, warp would be really noticed, inertia-wise. Inertia deals with the motion of matter, and how it is affected by applied forces. Newton's First Law of Motion states: "Every body perseveres in its state of being at rest or of moving uniformly straight ahead, except insofar as it is compelled to change its state by forces impressed." Like forces that cause acceleration or deceleration. But since warping space would not be moving through space (but rather: moving space), inertia would not come into play. Turn off the warp-engine, and space around you would simply no longer be warped. So, in absentia of inertia, where's the need for Inertial dampers?

You're absolutely right. Star Trek's warp drive is apparently the Alcubierre Warp, which forms a bubble of warped space-time around a flat region, so that the space-time in front is compressed and the space-time behind is expanded. This allows the ship to travel between two points faster than light, because it never once moves within it's local reference frame. No movement, no inertia. However Starships do have impulse drives which appear to be some sort of fusion thruster, and can attain high fractions of c in very short periods, so the crews would require protection from the effects of inertia.
Quote:

Serenity don't have warp-engines, though. Just plain jet-engines. And a standard radion-accelerator core, of course. :) The latter, I don't think, is a warp engine (let alone an FTL drive).
It's hard to tell what the radion-accelerator core is. A Radion is a scalar field in quantum field theory which describes the size of the fifth dimension as a function of the normal four dimensions of space-time. There are localized excitations which are called Radion particles, perhaps it's a power generator utilising properties of the quantum mechanics fifth dimension in some form?



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Monday, February 5, 2007 12:58 PM

DOCTROID


Quote:

Originally posted by citizen:
I think that given the concentration of planets the distances between worlds is likely to be somewhat less than our solar system. Assuming the single star system which is the front runner I think, all those worlds are going to be packed into the habitable zone, an area occupied by the Earth's orbit and at the edges Venus and Mars in our system.



But that's the part I don't buy. There are "dozens of planets and hundreds of moons" in the system; most of those moons must be orbiting gas giants. No one ever said all of the planets and moons were terraformable, but it's implied a lot of them are. So there are gas giants in the habitable zone, and gas giants sweep up everything around for a very large distance. (Like the region between Jupiter and Saturn.)

I admit I'd forgotten just how fast you can cover interplanetary distances at a constant 1g acceleration. But of course Serenity sometimes accelerates harder than other times (I presume several g sometimes), and they clearly never have anything like a 1-gravity force toward the aft of the ship, so clearly the gravity generator must be compensating.

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Monday, February 5, 2007 1:04 PM

DOCTROID


Oh, and I hadn't heard the term "radion" in physics before. Has it been around long? Seems likely to be a pretty recent coinage.

Wikipedia says "Radion is also a Russian name" so maybe the drive was just invented by someone named Radion...

(I like the other explanation, though... actually fits in with some ideas I've been working on...)

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Monday, February 5, 2007 1:31 PM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by doctroid:
But that's the part I don't buy. There are "dozens of planets and hundreds of moons" in the system; most of those moons must be orbiting gas giants. No one ever said all of the planets and moons were terraformable, but it's implied a lot of them are. So there are gas giants in the habitable zone, and gas giants sweep up everything around for a very large distance. (Like the region between Jupiter and Saturn.)

Or slightly further out, it's unclear how advanced the terraforming is. Large mirrors or some other technology could extend the habitable zone.
Quote:

Oh, and I hadn't heard the term "radion" in physics before. Has it been around long? Seems likely to be a pretty recent coinage.
The Radion scalar field first appeared in the KK-Theory published in the 1920s, though it wasn't called Radion then I think.



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Monday, February 5, 2007 3:27 PM

DONCOAT


A very much larger star than Sol would have a very much larger habitable zone. It would start farther out but extend much farther. That would make interplanetary distances larger than in the inner solar system, but would give more room for terraformable planets and moons.

The downside is that a large main sequence star doesn't last very long -- as little as 100,000 years for a really big one. But there could be a happy medium, a system that's old enough to form planets and will last long enough to be worth colonizing.

Another problem is that a large star would be more active, with a stiff stellar wind and probably a lot of flare activity; not too healthy for unprotected travelers.

Another possibility is a multiple star system. There's controversy about whether there could be stable planetary systems in a multiple, but it seems likely there could be if the stars were either very close together or very far apart.



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Tuesday, February 6, 2007 7:21 AM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by DonCoat:
A very much larger star than Sol would have a very much larger habitable zone. It would start farther out but extend much farther. That would make interplanetary distances larger than in the inner solar system, but would give more room for terraformable planets and moons.

You're probably right, given my above figures the maximum travelling time would be about a week, but we know one trip was going to take three (Out of Gas - though we also know they're taking a circuitous route), and we can infer that the time to travel between Jiang Yin and Persephone is nearly a month from Safe ("Cattle been on the ship near a month"). Though the point was that we're most likely not talking about travelling distances like Earth to Pluto, and that the travel times talked about in the show aren't excessive. Indeed there are drive systems that can easily give sustained 1g acceleration given sufficient fuel. My personal favourite for Serenity's drive system would be something like an Inertial Confinement Fusion Drive, partially based on comments from "The Tenth Crew Member" documentary where a member of the art team talks about a fusion drive. An IC Fusion drive delivers a hell of a lot of thrust and uses fuel pellets which ties in nicely with narrative from the show.
Quote:

Another possibility is a multiple star system. There's controversy about whether there could be stable planetary systems in a multiple, but it seems likely there could be if the stars were either very close together or very far apart.
There's plenty of stable orbits for Binary star systems, though I doubt you could have actually multiple stable star systems that develop naturally that close together as to make non FTL daily travel a reality. Though if I may offer a possibility, a compromise between the single and multiple star system camp, what if the 'verse is a single system, but moons orbiting gas giants in orbits as far as Jupiter have been terraformed by turning the gas giant into a small micro-star ala 2010? That may also explain why the trip between Jiang Yin and Persephone took so long, Persephone was in the normal habitable zone, Jiang Yin is orbiting one of these far out Micro-Stars.



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Tuesday, February 6, 2007 8:41 AM

DONCOAT


We should also keep in mind that planets (Greek: wanderers), well, move. The trip from A to B could be short one month and much longer the next.

An example in our own neighborhood is Earth and Mars. Sometimes Mars is quite close to us (we had a couple unusually close encounters in the last couple years) while at other times it's on the far side of the Sun from us.

I kind of like the idea of a distant-binary or -trinary system. Each of the stars could have its own system of planets. Going to one of these from the "main" system (the one with the Core Worlds) would always take a long time compared to moving around in the main system. But of course, it's all speculation, since it doesn't seem that Joss and the writers worked it out that far.


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Tuesday, February 6, 2007 9:02 AM

CITIZEN


Quote:

Originally posted by DonCoat:
We should also keep in mind that planets (Greek: wanderers), well, move. The trip from A to B could be short one month and much longer the next.

An example in our own neighborhood is Earth and Mars. Sometimes Mars is quite close to us (we had a couple unusually close encounters in the last couple years) while at other times it's on the far side of the Sun from us.

I haven't forgotten, I just didn't want to complicate the issue. My figures for a journey to Mars above suppose that Earth and Mars are roughly opposed (although they also assume a more or less straight line trajectory, something not possible without some really good heat shields ) at their closest they're 'only' about 43 million miles away from each other, or just under two days travel at a constant 1G acceleration.

I've made a few assumptions, but I don't think they're particularly unreasonable.
Quote:

I kind of like the idea of a distant-binary or -trinary system. Each of the stars could have its own system of planets. Going to one of these from the "main" system (the one with the Core Worlds) would always take a long time compared to moving around in the main system.
Assuming a Binary system there's actually three types of stable orbit. Orbits around each star, orbits around both stars in a roughly circular orbit and orbits around both stars in a figure of eight, swapping between orbiting each one. That was my personal favourite for a long time, because in this arrangement there's actually three separate habitable zones (one each around the two stars and one around both stars), and because of the varying orbit types more planets can be squeezed into them. With a trinary star system there's even more options.

Though with the fairly plain schematic at the beginning of Serenity it's a little hard to rectify without, you know, just ignoring it.



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Tuesday, February 6, 2007 7:51 PM

DOCTROID


Quote:

Originally posted by citizen:
The Radion scalar field first appeared in the KK-Theory published in the 1920s, though it wasn't called Radion then I think.



Hmm, did Kaluza and Klein actually make use of that concept? (I know their names but not a whole lot more than that...)

Anyway... search of Spires turns up a use of the term "radion" in 1998, that's the earliest I see and looks like it may be the original use: hep-th/9809124. Which predates Firefly, so this conceivably is what "radion accelerator core" refers to. And here I thought it was just a suitably tech-y sounding phrase.

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Wednesday, February 7, 2007 7:06 AM

CITIZEN


Yes, the scalar field was a part of their model, but wasn't called Radion until later (maybe 1998, maybe earlier, I don't know).



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Wednesday, February 7, 2007 2:48 PM

ZOID


CrevanReaver:

Here, I'll have a go...

I'm a physics/cosmology fanboy, so be forewarned...

Some have postulated that the universe that we see and exist in is -- in actuality -- a holographic projection. But don't think in terms of laser-generated holograms you may have seen, it goes much deeper than that; so deep in fact, that we not only do not know how it works, but we can never know how deep it goes because we are part of the system (holographic projection) and cannot get outside of it to study what actually creates the projection.

It is also postulated -- by no means without controversy -- that the universe is made up of more than the four dimensions we normally perceive as the 'spacetime continuum'. We do not 'see' these other dimensions -- between 6 and 22 additional dimensions, depending on the theoretical flavor you choose -- because they are 'wound up' very tight, say +/- the distance between an atomic nucleus and its first electron shell.

The point is, that every discrete point in the macroscopic, visible universe (not quite infinite in size, but pretty darned close) has a corresponding reference point in each of these 'rolled up' dimensions.

One last piece of the technology required to alter gravity would be a computer capable of interacting with the hologram at its most basic level, something being worked toward at this very moment in computer laboratories all over the world. With a computer sufficiently miniaturized in its mechanisms to actually use the fabric of the universe (hologram) for both storage and limitless power source, it might also be possible to 'remap' gravitic information from one massive body to another -- say, on the other side of the universe -- by means of manipulation of one or more of the microscopic 'rolled up' dimensions (since everything is made up of what boils down to Information).

Therefore, your answer is: A computer, housed on each body/ship one wanted to control the gravity of, capable of manipulating the fabric of the universe. Probably Linux-based...





Speculatively,

zoid

P.S.
We already know the trash dispensers are handled by Windows-based computers, and can presume that the advertising kiosks run on Macs...
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Monday, February 19, 2007 6:35 AM

STINKINGROSE


So each little universe has it's own red hat?

(sorry..)

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Monday, February 19, 2007 3:09 PM

ASARIAN


Quote:

Originally posted by zoid:

It is also postulated -- by no means without controversy -- that the universe is made up of more than the four dimensions we normally perceive as the 'spacetime continuum'. We do not 'see' these other dimensions -- between 6 and 22 additional dimensions, depending on the theoretical flavor you choose -- because they are 'wound up' very tight, say +/- the distance between an atomic nucleus and its first electron shell.

The point is, that every discrete point in the macroscopic, visible universe (not quite infinite in size, but pretty darned close) has a corresponding reference point in each of these 'rolled up' dimensions.


Ah, welcome to the wonderful universe of "brane worlds". :)

Though most of the math really goes way over my head (and it should, lol, I studied Law,) I'm still fascinated by such stuff. For instance, there was this article I read where the radion plays a major part in strong gravity, and it was postulated that positive density causes branes to deflect apart. However, also, in cases of "negative density", that the opposite would occur: namely, that the distance between two branes would decrease. I dunno, perhaps one could build build a standard radion accelerator core out of this principle of pulling two branes closer together? :)

Whatever the case may be (I really oughta ask our resident genius, Citizen), seems to me Joss weren't just bs-ing with this Radion stuff. And why doesn't that surprise me? :)


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Monday, February 19, 2007 4:05 PM

DROSTIE


As a person who has completed most of a Bachelor's degree in Applied Physics at an ivy-league school, I wanted to note that I find this whole discussion, er, regrettable.

The physics in Firefly wasn't meant to be all that realistic. Even in the pilot, you see a host of weird things -- like when the gravity suddenly "turns on" when air is added to the airlock. Not to mention the whole "nuclear explosion" idea that they kicked around in the commentary is a Bad Idea -- the crew needs to get accelerated forward with the ship, and if you accelerate them too hard, they're going to react like anything else that's been accelerated.

And gravitons are like photons, not electrons.

Meh.

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Tuesday, February 20, 2007 5:18 PM

ZOID


Drostie, et al:

...That's why I made the elaborate joke about OSes. Firefly is speculative fiction. Getting wrapped up in the science is ultimately unproductive; but, that is part of the allure of science fiction. What will our future be like? How will science make our lives different, for better or worse. If you can't accept that, then stay away from sci-fi. Alternatively, you could just let your hair down and engage in a little speculative daydreaming with everyone else. (NB: Don't worry, we won't tell any of your colleagues that you are a less than perfectly serious scientist.)

Fact is, if anybody knew how to manipulate gravity, we'd be doing it. ...Other than at Area 51, of course.

Second fact is, in order to even have a chance to manipulate gravity (not a given), we must first have concrete evidence that we understand how gravitic information is transmitted. Right now, that is not the case. All we have are theories that fit the math, but no empirical evidence that any of the numerous models describe reality.

Gravity is the separator between QM and Relativity, and a righteous pain in the ass. It extends from the quantum realm into (and throughout) the macroscopic universe. That's a real sticking point, isn't it? It is the weakest force, and yet it binds the galaxies together, because it also has the broadest (infinite?) range of effect.

Until these paradoxes can be reconciled in a Unified Theory, then no quantum, relativistic or hybrid theory can be considered complete.

When we do get a grip on the actual mechanics of the universe, manipulating gravity by artificial means may be allowed by the rules -- or by bending or breaking them -- and then we may be able to power starships and create planetary fields.

Once upon a time, manned flight was considered an impossible dream. "If God had intended us to fly", went the conventional wisdom, "He'd have given us wings." Now we take it for granted.

We've got 500 hundred years or so to work it out in time for a Firefly-like future tech. I'd bet on a hundred years or less...



Speculatively,

zoid

P.S.
Ponder awhile on the technology of 1507 A.D. What do you suppose the people of that time would do to you if they saw you talking into a cell phone? Using a microwave oven? Flying a Cessna Skyhawk?
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"Burn the witch!" -Man in the mob
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Tuesday, February 20, 2007 6:23 PM

DROSTIE


Quote:

Alternatively, you could just let your hair down and engage in a little speculative daydreaming with everyone else. (NB: Don't worry, we won't tell any of your colleagues that you are a less than perfectly serious scientist.)


Hey, I never said that I'm always so serious. I just think that the whole idea of speculating on the physics of a show that was *made* to be unrealistic is... well, like I said. Regrettable.

Just to indulge your speculative fantasies, though:

There are only two convenient ways I see to manage a "gravity drive:"

(1) Find a way to generate dark matter. If you've been watching Phil Plait's recent blogs, you know that the evidence for WIMPs -- Weakly-Interacting Massive Particles -- is stronger than the dark matter theory of MaCHOs. (Briefly: The MaCHO theory supposes that "dark matter" is the same stuff the earth is made of -- massive matter that doesn't, by itself, emit light. The WIMP theory states that "dark matter" is made of something else, which doesn't have a net charge, and so only acts according to gravitational forces and maybe some nuclear forces.)

If you can create a large, dense field of WIMPs beneath your ship, you might be able to maintain a gravitational field. (Why did the gravity drive unsettle Kaylee in the atmospheric entry? It might operate by a feedback system that overcompensates a tad.)

(2) Fill the peoples with a couple extra electrons, then use a plate at the top of the ship, and another at the bottom of the ship, to create a strong E-field therein.

This won't actually work. To keep the air from ionizing (which happens with an E-field of around 30 kV/cm (3 MN/C)), you want to keep the E-field below ~1MN/C. Otherwise, you'll have lightning.

People have a mass on the order of 100kg, or a weight on the order of 1 kN, so, you need a charge of about 1 mC on each person to keep lightning from striking.

But two 1 mC point charges at 1 m away from each other will repel by ~ 9 kN, or about the weight of 10 people. None of the Firefly hugging scenes would have ever worked out.

Quote:

That's a real sticking point, isn't it? It is the weakest force, and yet it binds the galaxies together, because it also has the broadest (infinite?) range of effect.


The force of an electron has a similarly infinite range of effect. The reason you don't see much in galactic electrodynamics is that the world is remarkably charge-neutral on average, because electrons and protons are unimaginably good at attracting each other.

Don't get me wrong; I think your speculations about the progress of science are sweet. Nonetheless, particle physics has been moving slowly as of late, and a big part of the problem is that we've run into a wall where science can no longer be done quite so descriptively. Our present understanding of gravity does not include anything other than mass creating the curvatures that affect everything else in the world.

On a plus note, I'd be optimistic and identify the two side engines of Serenity as ion drives. In 500 years, we might manage to make them practical. Probably, the engine involves a contained fusion reaction -- and "core containment" refers to the inevitably large amount of radiation that needs to be kept away from the crew manning the ship.

Again, the "nuclear explosion" tail-end drive is highly unrealistic, because people are on a scale where Newtonian mechanics holds very well, and human bodies don't take kindly to being accelerated at rates greater than a couple g's. Possibly, genetic engineering will improve those accelerations in the intervening years, but not to the level that they're talking about. In any case, we see people habitually stand when the acceleration is done (e.g. Jayne's "Let's moon 'em" comment), when the accelerations involved would probably toss them off of their feet.

(To be fair, someone should probably use the videos to estimate how fast Serenity accelerates with that drive--but it seems like it should probably be less than 1 g, since people habitually stand during the process.)

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Tuesday, February 20, 2007 7:16 PM

IMPERATODD


Maybe this will help:

The RPG (cannon or not) was rather realistic in terms of the technology. The production of gravity has been achieved through the unification of the fundamental forces. To be honest we can't determine how realistic the gravity regulation issue is until we crack this problem. We know how gravity behaves on galactic scales but at subatomic levels we have no clue. Quantum mechanics can't describe it, and M-theory also called string theory makes a lot of sense mathematically however it can't be tested with our current technology, and even with it there are still holes with the behavior of gravity at the sub-atomic scale. What we know is any force needs to be conducted in some way, light is a photon, electricity the electron, gravity as we understand it is likely a graviton. The gravity regulation is with graviton streams may be workable for producing a localized effect. The issue with it seeming feasible is with our understanding of the topic, we know gravity on the big scale but to know how this works, or if it can we need to know it on the small scale, and today we don't. This is the simple of it, we know it does work the universe exists we see it work, we don't know how, why, or what it looks like.

The thing about FF is it follows science pretty well as we understand it. Everything we know and see says FTL is likely not possible, and every other series messes with that observation with explanations that are half crap, half old physics text, but we love them so let it go. Firefly sees it may not happen but we still can go faster and leave our system. In addition alien life is sci-fi is portrayed in such an unrealistic way. There at best, according to the Drake equation 10,000 communicating sentient cultures in the galaxy, the chance of finding one among the 100,000,000,000 stars is slim, and them being humanoid with bilateral symmetry is so slim a telescope couldn't find it. That is one of the things I hate about star wars. IN addition the writers don't try and cover stuff we don't know with gibberish(I love trek but it at times is trying, the forehead stuff is too.) Simply put there are times when we need to be smart enough to admit how ignorant we are and look for an answer, while accepting that not everything will conform to our preconceived notions. That I learned myself and saw on Farscape.


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Were I an Alliance citizen during the War of Unification I would have been an Alliance Patriot, but I would have run guns for the Browncoats. No I am not a greedy baby eating monster! Gunrunning would have been the patriotic thing to do.

Governments have a way of warping ideals.

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Wednesday, February 21, 2007 1:26 AM

ZOID


Drostie:

From all us science fanboys and girls: Thank you for coming out to play. I appreciate how hard it must be, I really do. My bete noire is trying to explain computers (and I don't consider myself anything more than 'knowledgeable') to associates and loved ones who seem unable to grasp that the devices are, in essence, highly utile utter morons. (The computers, not the people.)

Folks just don't understand that computers have serious limitations that simply cannot be overlooked, and that no amount of wishing otherwise can overcome. The same, I suppose, is true of scientific endeavors.

Still, it is fun to think about what computers may some day be capable of, and how humanity will utilize that expanded capability. The same is true of other fields of scientific endeavor, for me.

Quote:

...But two 1 mC point charges at 1 m away from each other will repel by ~ 9 kN, or about the weight of 10 people. None of the Firefly hugging scenes would have ever worked out...

Maybe this is why Mal and Inara can never seem to work it out. They want to, but they literally just can't get together...

Quote:

...The force of an electron has a similarly infinite range of effect. The reason you don't see much in galactic electrodynamics is that the world is remarkably charge-neutral on average, because electrons and protons are unimaginably good at attracting each other...

Yeah, I was going to add that unlike other forces, which tend to cancel out, gravity is cumulative. But then I figured I'd just be belaboring the point, which I tend to do too much of as it is. You explained it much more concisely than I would have.
Quote:

...Don't get me wrong; I think your speculations about the progress of science are sweet. Nonetheless, particle physics has been moving slowly as of late, and a big part of the problem is that we've run into a wall where science can no longer be done quite so descriptively. Our present understanding of gravity does not include anything other than mass creating the curvatures that affect everything else in the world...

As I said, Gravity's a righteous pain. Why's it gotta be so difficult, so untractable? QM's the most deliriously successful theory in scientific history, yet it chokes to death on something as obvious as Gravity. Relativity, based on antiquated Newtonian physics, is the most complete theory of gravitation imaginable; but it falls into little scraps at the subatomic level. It describes how gravitation works, but it fails to explain the mechanism of why it works.

As to the "wall" y'all have run into: Don't worry. All y'all need is ever more powerful colliders, as y'all discover ever more varieties (and whole families) of sub-sub-particles. I understand miniature black holes are on the possible menu for the CERN, so, bon appetit.

There used to be a poster 'round FFFn who worked at one of the two gravity wave detectors here in the U.S. He said they hadn't found any waves, but that since the laser positioning of the detectors was so precise, they did manage to get a macroscopic superposition of up to five visible possible locations for the detector when the laser was activated. So, no gravity waves, but a possible starting point for teleportation. Science is a funny old game...

I've got to get myself to work; but I'd like to briefly add that an ion drive currently powers a probe at record speeds. Also, a nuclear mini-explosion pulse drive, rather than the all-at-once 30 megaton nuclear explosion kick in the pants wouldn't necessarily smear the ships occupants around its interior. Say, small matter-antimatter annihilations? Maybe we'll even see one at the CERN or some next-gen SSC...



Very Respectfully,

zoid
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"I aim to misbehave." -Capt. Mal Reynolds, Serenity, a.k.a. 'the BDBOF'

"Any sufficiently advanced technology is indistinguishable from magic." -Sir Arthur Charles Clarke, science fiction writer, conceptual inventor of the geosynchronous satellite

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