New world 600 light years away

[Rising-Sun]

There are reports on finding a new planet compare to earth, this one look more like jungle temperature world. Almost 600ly is pretty far and no telling when we will have techs to get into space and start moving outward.

Look forward to this in the future, but dont think i will still be alive when the time come.

Here link for details...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/45554617/ns ... nce-space/

[J HG T]

Yeah, we definetly need to get some FTL travel tech before thinking about travelling there.
As said, it's too bad that we problaby won't be alive to see any really great achievements in space technology and travel. Well, sending people to the mars and moon again is quite possible in the near future. Interesting to see how that will work out

[Data]

We should freeze ourselves until that time, I for one was born faaaaar to early for sure.

[Bingeling]

You only need some near light speed travel, and a good freeze tech. 1000 years to get there, and just a tad more than 1000 more years to get word back about success or failure (though I don't think failure would message back).

2000 years of answer time is a blink of an eye in cosmic scale.

And maybe you won't even have to freeze if you travel near enough light speed, fun times happen to time in that case. But I think maybe 1000 years as seen from Earth is a bit much.

And accelerating to light speed would take a tiny bit of time as well. Do we have a math hotshot that can quickly calculate the time to reach near light speed with 1G acceleration?

[Nedrear]

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

And maybe you won't even have to freeze if you travel near enough light speed, fun times happen to time in that case. But I think maybe 1000 years as seen from Earth is a bit much.

And while you cruise near lightspeed, beeing consumed by the time compression the earth builds wormholes and you are surprised to visit a fully equipped colony 50 "in light" years later... have fun.
Actually the sublight travel close to the light speed got the time compression problem. If you fly above light, you come home "early".

[J HG T]

Aye, time compression is very interesting thing to ponder.
Reminds me of the Alastair Reynolds "Pushing ice". Great book. Should read it again at some point.

[Stelteck]

Event with our current tech, we might be able to analyse the atmosphere of this new planet (by solar reflection).

[Nedrear]

You want to see a solar reflection on the dark side of a planet, which you can only see, because you can see the dark side in front of the star moving about? A little hard... this thing is in astronomical scales a small planet. It's not brother of Jupiter!

[Bingeling]

ORIGINAL: J HG T

Aye, time compression is very interesting thing to ponder.
Reminds me of the Alastair Reynolds "Pushing ice". Great book. Should read it again at some point.

I actually put that book away, it became a snooze-fest for me before stuff took off. So I never found any faster than light issues.

But I love his universe, and have read the revelation space trilogy. I don't so much enjoy the main plot as the universe and concepts.

Having freighter crews being in stasis most of the time, visiting planets every 30-100 years, growing almost no older between each visit while the planet population ages a lot (they of course become older with tech).

I have actually not read chasm city or the prefect, the book store never had them... And I see from wiki he has some short stories in collection taking place in the revelation space universe.

So it was probably not quite random that what I wrote reminded you of Reynolds...

[2guncohen]

ORIGINAL: J HG T

Aye, time compression is very interesting thing to ponder.
Reminds me of the Alastair Reynolds "Pushing ice". Great book. Should read it again at some point.

That book was a blast. [:D]

[Sylian]

ORIGINAL: Bingeling

And accelerating to light speed would take a tiny bit of time as well. Do we have a math hotshot that can quickly calculate the time to reach near light speed with 1G acceleration?

This question os WAY more difficult to answer than you probably think.

/physics mod on

The problem starts with the time you refer to. Time on earth? Local time in the rocket? Lets assume we are on the rocket. So we speak about the local time.
The the question arises what does acceleration of 1G mean? Things like that are easily sead but not properly defined when it comes to special relativity. One may assume that you have at each point in time an inertial frame that moves at the instantaneous speed of the rocket. In this frame(s) the acceleration should be constant 1G. Which would mean that you would in the rocket feel a constant acceleration of 1G. But from outside observers the acceleration would not be constant ofc.
Well assuming this the velocity of the rocket is: v = c * tanh (a*T/c), with c = light speed, T local time in the rocket and a the instantaneous acceleration.
lets say we want 95% of light speed, then T = 648 days = 1.77 years

/physics mod off

Awesome! I wanna find and name my own planet! And it would definitly not be Sylian 22b or something.

[shinobu]

ORIGINAL: RisingSun

Almost 600ly is pretty far...

We're going to need a LOT of Caslon mines...

[Gelatinous Cube]

Relativistic travel is possible today. If we built a ship in space, as opposed to building it on earth, we could devote all the fuel to thrust instead of escaping the atmosphere. With current technology involving plasma discharges, said ship could attain relatavistic speeds and travel lightyears and lightyears while time passed slowly in the ship.

The biggest hurdles currently with trying to build a long-distance spaceship are that you would still need to get all the parts into space, which defeats the purpose. We would need much more zero-g infrastructure, so to speak. The other big one is that we don't have a reliable means of artificial gravity, and even at relatavistic speeds these trips would take a long enough time for the lack of gravity to hurt you. Thirdly, we just don't know what kinds of hazards we would meet on the way. What if a little space-rock penetrates the fuel tank? We don't even have the technology to stop that every time.

So, getting up to speed and travelling is the easy part. It's everything else that makes this difficult.

[Simulation01]

Too bad we don't have a space program any more, or the will to invest in technology and theoretical pursuits that may get us there. [:(][:@]

[Bingeling]

ORIGINAL: Sylian
Well assuming this the velocity of the rocket is: v = c * tanh (a*T/c), with c = light speed, T local time in the rocket and a the instantaneous acceleration.
lets say we want 95% of light speed, then T = 648 days = 1.77 years

A couple of years acceleration and deceleration each in a 1000 year voyage is almost nothing

And very good point about relativity kickin in, time on the ship would be the logical one.

Given the issues of long distance communication, I guess one arrives at all kinds of paradoxes when discussing how long they have been away, and when it comes to what happens simultaneously at two planets 600ly apart.

[the1sean]

ORIGINAL: RisingSun

Look forward to this in the future, but dont think i will still be alive when the time come.

No worries, the singularity is coming soon!

[Gelatinous Cube]

ORIGINAL: the1sean

ORIGINAL: RisingSun

Look forward to this in the future, but dont think i will still be alive when the time come.

No worries, the singularity is coming soon!

Good read.. and here I thought I'd already perused Wikipedia for everything I wanted to know.

[Stormy Fairweather]

On the topic of time 'compression', I thought I would offer an insight that might help people better understand the concept. The reason matter cannot go faster than the speed of light is because it cannot go slower than the speed of light. We usually calculate speed relative to something else, without realizing that something is also travelling very fast (the earth is traveling at 100'000 km/h relative to the sun, for instance), and that all things also have speed at which they move through time. So, if you multiply the velocity of something from a truly stationary point in the three spatial dimensions, and also multiply its velocity through time, the total always equals exactly c, the speed of light. If you travel faster in space you travel slower through time, and vice versa. And this leads to counter intuitive observations; travelling slower in time means there is more time between events, so you actually go forward in time faster by traveling through it slower. That is, as a ship approaches the speed of light thousands, or even millions, of years will pass for every minute experienced on that ship. In the same vein, if matter were traveling faster than the speed of light the only way its total velocity will still equal c is if it is has a negative velocity in one of the four dimensions, and since the three spatial ones would be where the obsereved faster than light travel was taking place that only leaves the temporal one. I speculate that it will not be long before physicists working on the LHC realize the particles they observed traveling very slightly faster then light were also traveling very slightly backwards in time.

This is my understanding of the implications of relativity anyway, but I have no degrees to flaunt lending credibility to my words.

[Gelatinous Cube]

Certainly an interesting angle from which to approach the problem, Stormy. Color me impressed. Of course, I have no credentials either, so take that with some salt.

It is always important to remember that physics is an ever-changing field. Newton might have laughed at the concept of Black Holes, and Einstein certainly was not a fan of quantum mechanics at first. What we know now may be utter folly, and we may never know "the truth."

But it sure is fun trying to figure it out.

[Rising-Sun]

Before packing up and move, they better do some research and study on that planet. Could be different gravity from our, hotter or colder than our planet. Infact possible new form of diseases and other sorts, it take time to collect enough informations on new planet and anyone willing to go there and risky their lives can be a gamble, but its worth it.