@itsadeadmansparty Because the gravitational attraction of the pyramids causes you to move into the future ever so slightly faster. This is called gravitational time dilation.
He assume's a lot of physics knowledge in his explanations. For example, when he supposes that one could travel at the speed of light, he automatically jumps to the conclusion that one could reach any part of the universe instantly. That jump in logic deserves an explanation, but there isn't one.
@mabell01 The explanation is relativistic time dilation. It may be counter-intuitive but it's been confirmed. For one thing, it explains how the secondary particles from cosmic rays manage to reach the surface of the Earth even though they don't live long enough unless time dilation is taken into account.
I think if you looking for how to travel inside this solar system the only answer is Element 115 and when we run into a wall when we enter the level of understanding of the atom, which we have not even gotten close, at that point it will require some thing else, some knowledge that will explain future tech beyond(below) just atoms. Every Single Thing You Saw on Star Trek Will Exist, and the explanations wont be far from the truth. Star Trek 4 real
No form of propulsion will exist that simply can take you instantly to one side of this universe to the other, sorry it will not exist, it is physics that you will not be able to do this. There is so many factors to take into account, firstly is the laws of thermodynamics which we still have not proven to be Laws, they are Theories Only! Firstly Startrek points out that the Hull can handle only so much, 2nd Space is not empty H2 exists every so many meters.
@itsadeadmansparty LOL 3, In Space you will encounter things like dust, debri and comets. You cannot at our level of technology avoids all the dangers of space to get to a great deal of speed. The other factor is, people have not been told the truth about gravity, what they teach is lower grades about gravity is not correct at all, Gravity is caused by the Displacement of Space. There is still much to be discovered, we are only beginning this journey, it will take us to the next frontier, Space!
@itsadeadmansparty sorry by h2 I was trying to say hydrogen atoms, and by dust, i meant particles smallers than dust, composed of similar elements as a meteor would be, so meteor dust, not human skin dust, just to be clear, one day it may be possible to get close to the speed of light, but first we need the basic laws and principles of the quantum level then we can work on transluminal flight, i mean really people we just started flying in the sky, its gona be some time before light speed.
@RexVonDemon RexVonDemon sorry even I only understand the basics of the theory. I am still trying to figure an answer for you. Its called the "The Displacement Theory of Gravity" you can look it up by searching for that exactly, k its usually first result, hol dot com. BTW im no professor,
in star trek's defense, (I can honestly say I'm not a fan though) - how many people who were fans were springboarded into real science and technology careers?
but what if you weren't actually moving through space? what if you warped space around you? contracted the space in-front of you and expanded the space behind you?
my understanding of physics is limited and hobbyist at best, but I always assumed this was what star trek was meaning when they talked about "warp drive"
What's being ignored by Star Trek (and most sci fi projects) is that time is a form of space. So even given the technology you describe, it would only take Capt. Janeway a short time to return to the Alpha quadrant.
I don't see how this has much to do with Star Trek's fictional warp travel. The premis of warp is not that the ship is moving faster through space but that space is bending to bring two distant points closer together. The actual speed is nominal. The distance traveled is great at lower speed because you aren't traveling through the straight line of space to get to the destination.
an example is to take a balloon and mesure the distance from one point to it's counterpart on the opposite side. Then squish the balloon and measure the distance. The balloon keeps it's volume (to a degree) but the points become closer together. What does this have to do with traveling at or near light speed?
Anyone who say's that something is for morons must be highly incapable of reasoning with his own world to label fiction as moronic.
Star Trek does have episodes that mention worm holes (which is what you're talking about). But earlier episodes clearly present warp drive as having overcome the "light barrier" as if it were the time barrier. The point is, there's no need to go fster than light because at light speed it takes zero distance to complete a trip for those making it) no matter how far in space one travels.
I'm not saying you are wrong about the science of space travel. Also, I understand that earlier episodes of star trek were about as accurate today as alchemy was in the 16th century. But unlike Alchemy (whose practitioner's professed their science as true and based on fact) Star Trek is fiction and has always been fiction from Gene Roddenberry's first thought on the story, to the current big screen hit.
Are you saying that there is an inordinate amount of people who believe Star Trek is real?
Furthermore, Why is this so important to you? You sound like someone who auditioned for a part in a Star Trek movie and didn't make the cut. With all due respect - Why have you spent so much of your time trying to convince people that fiction isn't real? I think you could have spent your time on something a little more constructive...
My point is that the fiction producers can get away with reflects society's state of knowledge. Today, the old Flash Gordon serial looks ridiculous because everyone knows space is not blue and filled with clouds. Star Trek reveals that the public's knowledge of basic physics is non-existence. Never auditioned for anything. I even hated having to appear in some documentaries.
I will agree with you on the state of society's floundering interest in science and the communal collective of ignorance that breads false belief in fictional realities. I don't agree with calling anyone a moron because they chose to be entertained by fiction. However, your title did draw me to watch your video, and respond to it's content.
It is sad how many people simply can't distiguish the difference between fantasy and reality. But that may be a topic for anthropology, not physics and astronomy.
if light takes certain time to get from a to b, claiming that a person traveling at roughly the same speed, would take less time to cross the same distance, doesn't make sense to me. how come the same effect doesn't apply to light itself? and what's the music in this and other vids?
Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity doesn't make intuitive sense because we believe that everything moves through time at the same rate. But speed through time varies just like speed through space. It's not obvious to us because it's a strongly non-linear relationship. You have to be moving incredibly fast through space (so fast it only takes a second to get to the moon) before the change in the rate time flows becomes noticeable.
Star Trek is science FICTION, not fact. One purpose of fiction is to suspend disbelief and see what happens when an author thinks outside the box. Another is to enjoy the stories which result.
If star trek or any other scifi franchise gets just one kid interested enough to pursue science education/career, it's well worth the myth. And if it gets just one scientist to think more creatively, openly or critically, it's also worth it.
So you're saying that if I'm travelling AT the speed of light to a planet that is 100 light years away, I would arrive instantaneously??? That's bologna!! If light takes 100 years for light to reach that planet, then it's going to take me 100 years to get there if I'm travelling at the same speed as light. Sounds like Einstein's physics are a bit off.
You're assuming the time it takes to make a trip is the same in all reference frames, whether you're making the trip or just watching someone else do it. Einstein showed otherwise in 1905.
I think what you're saying, and I might be wrong, is that as a zero point observer (being the person on the spacecraft travelling the speed of light) time would essentially stop for that person. Obviously it continued for all outside observers. But the regardless, if the clock time on Earth and the planet 100 LYs away are set to the same time, it will still take you 100 years to get there, even travelling at the speed of light.
You make it sound like anyone can go from point a to point b anywhere in the entire universe in a single instant, as long as they are travelling at the speed of light. Einstein theorized that time would effectively stop for the zero point observer, which may or may not be true (we can't know for sure can we?). Regardless, just being you might be travelling at the speed off light doesn't mean time stops everywhere in the universe, which is essentially what you're inplying in your video.
You're having trouble with the idea that motion is relative to the observer, which was even known in Newton's time. If you're traveling in a jet aircraft moving at 600 mph relative to the surface of the Earth, the speed of the plane relative to you is zero. If the plane were moving at 600 mph relative to you, then touching any part of it would be instantly fatal.
Well, that goes without saying... Don't insult my intelligence. Obviously if you are travelling to a distant star at the speed of light, you will accelerate to lightspeed velocity in the comfort of your space ship, and thus won't get hit by the ship in the process. If you accelerate in a car, you can feel the G-Forces, but you're not going to be instantly crushed. The same would be assumed for acceleration to light speed. Both you and ship would be at the same relative speed during acceleration
The point of Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity is that two clocks travelling at the speed of light relative to each other can't be set to the same time.
LoL, well, does everyone's clock always tell the same time? Maybe in a perfect universe. Obviously if there are two clocks set in sync with each other, and you launched one to a planet one lightyear away, and looked at the clock (somehow) though a big telescope, the time would appear to be 1 year in the past, but that doesn't mean the people at that other planet are 1 year in he past. It's just that light is reaching us at our reference time, kind of like the speed of sound.
Have you ever seen someone down the street dribbling a basketball? You SEE the ball hit the ground before you hear the sound of the bounce. On a quantum scale, you'd also be seeing the basketball hit the ground after the fact, but I digress. :D The fact is that even though our positions in the universe are different, time moves along at the same rate, regardless. I think Einstein is wrong. Time is Finite. Light is not.
GPS devices take different rates of time flow into account and wouldn't work right otherwise. But Cosmic rays were the first proof that Einstein was right about identical clocks not running at the same rate when moving reltive to each other. If time ran at the same rate on the cosmic ray particles as on Earth, the particles wouldn't last long enough to reach the surface of the Earth but they do.
GPS satellites are clock synced on Earth and then resynced on orbit. GPS receivers on Earth merely measure the time it takes for the signal to reach the device. Because the receiver knows the position of each satellite in its signal range, it can calculate it's position relative to the orbiting satellites. It doesn't mean the clocks on the satellites are moving more slowly. Now if the Government or whomever is controlling the satillites are reporting time losses, that's another story.
The clocks in orbit can't be precisely synchronized with those on Earth without taking relativistic time dilation (due to gravity) into account. In any event, this adjustment of only microseconds is made and the system works.
The speed of light and the time have a special relation. As you approach the speed of light, the time it takes you to get somewhere shrinks, as well as the energy it takes to move another millimeter faster increases because the mass is increasing, and the dimension you are moving in shrinks. The time and dimension shrinks till it gets to 0 at the speed of light, but the energy it would take for an object to move the speed of light is phenomenal. (cont...)
Once at the speed of light, the time it takes you to get anywhere is 0 because the direction you are moving in(forward and backward) are all crammed in no space at all.
To Prof.: LOL. I don't have enough time to do video-replies.
I've a question though: theoretically speaking, would Hiro of "Heroes" and his ability to stop time / move across time be possible, then? And if so, exactly what would the so-called plausible "science" be for that to happen?
If Hrio could move very close to light speed relative to the environment, it would be close to stopping time, and Hiro could travel into the future fatser than the reference frame. But you can't move backwards in the sci fi sense. However, I have a paper just published in Physics Essays that shows how distant galaxies are moving backward in time relative to the flow of time into the future at Earth telescopes that detect the light from those distant galaxies.
Hi Prof. Nice video--I enjoyed Star Trek, but yeah, the effects of "real" light speed travel on time perception would make the series impossible. If you haven't done so, you could make a reply video that further explains how, as you approach light speed, your mass/energy also increases till it's impossible to keep up with light in the first place. To be as fast as light, you'd have to BECOME light itself. LOL, beam me up there instead.
Yes, the whole problem that all of the ships in the Star Trek fleet would have to have infinite mass is another problem. Why don't you do a video reply pointing that out?
I take issue with your statement. Considering that it's sci-fi, it's not meant to be accurate, it's meant to be inspirational. Many people were inspired by ST, and so pursued entering the science field. As an armchair science buff I know that there are inaccuracies to what is currently understood, and so what? I love the show for what it is, entertaining sci-fi. Do not discount me and other viewers as morons.
This isn't a commentary about fans but about our innumerate society. There's an episode of TNG in which Capt. Picard and Worf are in the vacuum of space walking on the hull of the Enterprise in spacesuits with magnetized shoes to stop the Borg from tampering with the ship. As they walk along you hear foley. Foley! This isn't dramatic license --like music and hearing explosions in space. It's gratuitous ignorance.
Okay so the science is a bit flawed, heisenberg compensators and warp drive etc. But it's still a good show that makes you think "that'd be cool if it worked in the real world" and it presents a society I find preferable to what we have now.
But heres one that'll make you laugh, in one episode of voyager, Janeway asks the doctor to innoculate the away team with erythrosine, personally I dont see how a pink food dye can save people from lethal radiation.
There are a lot of inside dialog gags like that. Ferengai, for instance, means "foreigner" in Farsi. And you should see what's actually printed on the labels and buttons in the bridge (so Bill Shatner tells me).
I'm doing a marathon so I'll keep my eye open for that part. I agree that our society is math innumerate. So why aren't professors and teachers trying to change that? I went through the public school system and begged for math help yet nobody cared. I came to school early because my math teacher promised to be there to tutor me, but never showed, and this was a top-rated district. I can't understand the droning arrogant stiffs I've had for math professors either.
I can only apology for the demise of public education. It's really a crime that students who want to learn get no support. It didn't use to be that way. But I think you've identified one reason for the problem. I like to put it in the form of an equation: I = ma,
oh, but Star Trek is so much fun! really, it's a code key of sorts. & i do believe many of us understand it is not perfect science that they offer. especially with the advent or rediscovery of the 'new' sciences, math & physics - much of it quite (& again)integrated. but this code key is really an invitation, of sorts, for increased awareness on many levels. though we bring to the table what we carry - so the Star Trek experience will surely mean different things to different people~~
Warping in the sense of changing the spacetime metric is indeed the explanation for gravity in General Relativity. And it does slow down time. But it has nothing to do with motion, as in Special Relativity. Also, the amount of gravity you need for noticeable time dilation requires at least hundreds of solar masses, i.e., a black hole.
True it would need such a large mass, so long as you neglect Quantum Physics. The ZPE density has been calculated at 10^94 g/cm^3, so there is your mass potential. It has been theorized that drawing this energy at a "considerable" rate would alter the space-time metric as the ZPF is itself theorized to be space-time. So warping of space-time is possible and though certain aspects of StarTrek engineering is wrong, a type of warp drive is not beyond our physical reality and w/i todays physics.
I am sincerely confused about something, and hope you can clarify for me. I have always been under the impression that one light-year is equal to the distance that light travels in one year... So if a planet was 100 light-years away, would it not take 100 years traveling at the speed of light to arrive? That's why I thought that so many people talk about the ability to travel faster than light.
If you are on the Earth and a planet is 100 light years away, then 100 years would elapse on Earth during the time a beam of light travelled from the Earth to that planet. But for someone riding on that beam, it would take zero time. The duration of an event is not the same for two people who are travelling near the speed of light relative to each other. In special relativity, this is called "time dilation."
Very common for people not familiar with Einstein's theory of relativity, which is why Star Trek is one example of how sci fi films get this wrong. There's a scene in Carl Sagan's Cosmos in which Janeway's boyfriend gets it right.
It would not take the people who do the travelling 100 years, just those who stay at home. That's the most difficult part of Einstein's discovery to understand, that the time a trip (or any event) lasts is not the same for everyone.
While it is indeed impossible to go faster than the speed of light, in principle it might be possible to circumvent the problem by suitably "warping" spacetime itself.
I cant go into details here...Please f u are interested i recomend reading the following book :
The reason is that while it may take YOU only 73 days round trip, 200 years will have passed here on Earth and everyone you cared about would have been dead for a very long time, where as "warping" what you call "space-time" and I call "aether-space" the problem of this would not arise as you have shortened your travel distance and also the temporal effects on you and those on Earth..warping works best for everyone and can be done.
It's true that it would be better if we couldtravel to a future event faster than light without time dilation,for the reason you said. But "warping" as in Star Trek or "folding space" as in Dune is fictional. The closest thing that could be real is a wormhole. But these are smaller than an atom and only last for microseconds.
I think you're misunderstanding physics. It is not currently possible to go faster than the speed of light, so it's fairly stupid to think that you can travel 100 light years instantly when light itself takes 100 years to travel that distance. The speed of light IS finite. If you and I were travelling in a ship at the speed of light, we'd still be travelling at 299,792,458 meters per second.
First of all since no expert created the universe, no one can say what humans can or cannot do with regard to the universe.
As for Star Trek, the genre is more about advancement in our humanity.
I and other morons have started a non-profit grant program for young people who wish to pursue careers in the sciences. Maybe one day one of our kids will prove what was once thought to be the impossible! TREK LIVES!
Star Trek has some great stories. TNG's "Inner Light" is my all time favorite. But you can't fall off the edge of the Earth because it isn't flat despite what Star Trek says. If America doesn't educate it's children we won't be able to compete in a global economy.
Star trek is no more for morons then the works of Jules Verne or H.G. Wells it is science fiction not science. But like all good scifi it inspires imagination.
"Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life's coming attractions"
I'm a professor of physics, and the author of dozens of physics papers published in the peer reviewed journals. I'm glad you're studying the subject. You have some more to learn. So do we all. But some things we know for sure. When you get to general relativity you'll know more about what is possible. Going faster than light speed isn't, and there's no reason to since you don't need trips that are faster than instananeous.
Star Trek is entertainment. The production crews do take artistic license regarding some aspects of science, but they've tried to be as accurate as possible depicting current scientific theory.
As for Star Trek being "for morons," ask any of the leading scientific minds of today if they were inspired or influenced by Star Trek. You'll get more "Yes" answers than "No." You might want to be a little less critical of who you might be calling a moron.
No entertainment producers try to be accurate when it comes to spacetime and no leading scientific minds think Einstein was wrong about it. It's gratuitous ignorance. The best Star Trek stories, like "Inner Light," don't depend upon scientific illiteracy.
Lots of people use GPS. It wouldn't work if it didn't adjust for time dilation. Although the speed of satellites only affects their speed through time by a small fraction of a second, the timing is critical and this has to be taken into account. To Be Continued...
By bending the spacetime around the ship, you do not travel faster than light. You ride on a wave on the spacetime. That's why it's called warp drive... also it has been stated that you leave normal space and enter subspace - where other physics apply.
If you're a trekker, how come you don't listen to the dialog? In a recent episode one of the characters said something like, "We can go faster than light but we can't make a good replicator." What happens when you bend spacetime is you get gravity, not motion. This explanation of gravity due to Einstein has been confirmed many, many times by gravitational lensing.
from an objective view, you are moving faster. that is relative to the observer ;) but technically you don't. true, you get gravity in front of the ship and negative gravity on the back. think of a single sinus wave with the ship on the position pi. since this wave is moving forward, the ship "slides" on the wave like a waverider.
i am a science major, i've had three semesters of physics at munich's top elite university. star trek is about what could be, not about what is currently unproovable.
The classical proof of relativity came from cosmic rays. These particles have very short lifetimes and wouldn't last long enough to reach the surface of the Earth if they weren't subject to time dilation. To Be Continued...
In science, the word "theory" doesn't mean conjecture as in law. It means a model (the more modern word). When we talk about the theory of gravity, the atomic theory of matter, or the germ theory of disease, that doesn't mean there may or may not be gravity, may or may not be atoms, or that germs may or may not cause disease.
So, if light can reach anywhere in the Universe in no time, why they say that the light of stars take a long time to travel to us???
crdrewsthesame 1 year ago
Question to the Professor
Why when you stand next to the Pyramids At Giza do we Age Slower?
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
@itsadeadmansparty Because the gravitational attraction of the pyramids causes you to move into the future ever so slightly faster. This is called gravitational time dilation.
ProfMichaelson 1 year ago
Zefram Cochrane's invention of the warp drive will make history in 2063. Who will be laughing then?
RexVonDemon 1 year ago
@RexVonDemon Here's hoping James Cromwell lives that long.
ProfMichaelson 1 year ago
@ProfMichaelson ah-AAAHH!! So you're a fan too!! Cheers Professor
RexVonDemon 1 year ago
He assume's a lot of physics knowledge in his explanations. For example, when he supposes that one could travel at the speed of light, he automatically jumps to the conclusion that one could reach any part of the universe instantly. That jump in logic deserves an explanation, but there isn't one.
mabell01 1 year ago
@mabell01 The explanation is relativistic time dilation. It may be counter-intuitive but it's been confirmed. For one thing, it explains how the secondary particles from cosmic rays manage to reach the surface of the Earth even though they don't live long enough unless time dilation is taken into account.
ProfMichaelson 1 year ago
@mabell01 who is "He assume's"? Who is this he?
I think if you looking for how to travel inside this solar system the only answer is Element 115 and when we run into a wall when we enter the level of understanding of the atom, which we have not even gotten close, at that point it will require some thing else, some knowledge that will explain future tech beyond(below) just atoms. Every Single Thing You Saw on Star Trek Will Exist, and the explanations wont be far from the truth. Star Trek 4 real
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
Professor, you are still incorrect.
No form of propulsion will exist that simply can take you instantly to one side of this universe to the other, sorry it will not exist, it is physics that you will not be able to do this. There is so many factors to take into account, firstly is the laws of thermodynamics which we still have not proven to be Laws, they are Theories Only! Firstly Startrek points out that the Hull can handle only so much, 2nd Space is not empty H2 exists every so many meters.
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
@itsadeadmansparty LOL 3, In Space you will encounter things like dust, debri and comets. You cannot at our level of technology avoids all the dangers of space to get to a great deal of speed. The other factor is, people have not been told the truth about gravity, what they teach is lower grades about gravity is not correct at all, Gravity is caused by the Displacement of Space. There is still much to be discovered, we are only beginning this journey, it will take us to the next frontier, Space!
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
@itsadeadmansparty sorry by h2 I was trying to say hydrogen atoms, and by dust, i meant particles smallers than dust, composed of similar elements as a meteor would be, so meteor dust, not human skin dust, just to be clear, one day it may be possible to get close to the speed of light, but first we need the basic laws and principles of the quantum level then we can work on transluminal flight, i mean really people we just started flying in the sky, its gona be some time before light speed.
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
@itsadeadmansparty I've never heard this before, why does the displacement fo space cause attraction?
RexVonDemon 1 year ago
@RexVonDemon do you know?
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
@itsadeadmansparty No,but I would like to undersand the concept.
RexVonDemon 1 year ago
@RexVonDemon RexVonDemon sorry even I only understand the basics of the theory. I am still trying to figure an answer for you. Its called the "The Displacement Theory of Gravity" you can look it up by searching for that exactly, k its usually first result, hol dot com. BTW im no professor,
itsadeadmansparty 1 year ago
@itsadeadmansparty No one is saying any form of propulsion can accelerate a material object to light speed. See the reply to mabell01.
ProfMichaelson 1 year ago
So after reading all comments here, my conclusion are: According to Einstein; All photons are, and always will be, zero (0) seconds old!?
otur1 2 years ago
in star trek's defense, (I can honestly say I'm not a fan though) - how many people who were fans were springboarded into real science and technology careers?
ObiWanShinobi1 2 years ago
I thought that one of the theorys of going back in time was going faster than the speed of light.
rinodeluxe713 2 years ago
but what if you weren't actually moving through space? what if you warped space around you? contracted the space in-front of you and expanded the space behind you?
my understanding of physics is limited and hobbyist at best, but I always assumed this was what star trek was meaning when they talked about "warp drive"
SavageHoax 2 years ago 4
What's being ignored by Star Trek (and most sci fi projects) is that time is a form of space. So even given the technology you describe, it would only take Capt. Janeway a short time to return to the Alpha quadrant.
ProfMichaelson 2 years ago
I'm confused.
If I can be anywhere in a few secs with the speed of light, why does the light itself reach from Sun to Earth in 8 mins?
IceHammer58 2 years ago
Sorry, I just saw it was already asked, OK.
IceHammer58 2 years ago
But it's a natural question.
ProfMichaelson 2 years ago
I should think about it, but actually it all makes perfect sense with the theory and researches it is built on.
I like to say it that way, because it leaves a small open window of nothing is sure, but from what we can possibly observe it is true.
Thanks for the tough.
IceHammer58 2 years ago
I don't see how this has much to do with Star Trek's fictional warp travel. The premis of warp is not that the ship is moving faster through space but that space is bending to bring two distant points closer together. The actual speed is nominal. The distance traveled is great at lower speed because you aren't traveling through the straight line of space to get to the destination.
Mitsukago 2 years ago
an example is to take a balloon and mesure the distance from one point to it's counterpart on the opposite side. Then squish the balloon and measure the distance. The balloon keeps it's volume (to a degree) but the points become closer together. What does this have to do with traveling at or near light speed?
Anyone who say's that something is for morons must be highly incapable of reasoning with his own world to label fiction as moronic.
Mitsukago 2 years ago
Star Trek does have episodes that mention worm holes (which is what you're talking about). But earlier episodes clearly present warp drive as having overcome the "light barrier" as if it were the time barrier. The point is, there's no need to go fster than light because at light speed it takes zero distance to complete a trip for those making it) no matter how far in space one travels.
ProfMichaelson 2 years ago
I'm not saying you are wrong about the science of space travel. Also, I understand that earlier episodes of star trek were about as accurate today as alchemy was in the 16th century. But unlike Alchemy (whose practitioner's professed their science as true and based on fact) Star Trek is fiction and has always been fiction from Gene Roddenberry's first thought on the story, to the current big screen hit.
Are you saying that there is an inordinate amount of people who believe Star Trek is real?
Mitsukago 2 years ago
Furthermore, Why is this so important to you? You sound like someone who auditioned for a part in a Star Trek movie and didn't make the cut. With all due respect - Why have you spent so much of your time trying to convince people that fiction isn't real? I think you could have spent your time on something a little more constructive...
Mitsukago 2 years ago
My point is that the fiction producers can get away with reflects society's state of knowledge. Today, the old Flash Gordon serial looks ridiculous because everyone knows space is not blue and filled with clouds. Star Trek reveals that the public's knowledge of basic physics is non-existence. Never auditioned for anything. I even hated having to appear in some documentaries.
ProfMichaelson 2 years ago
I will agree with you on the state of society's floundering interest in science and the communal collective of ignorance that breads false belief in fictional realities. I don't agree with calling anyone a moron because they chose to be entertained by fiction. However, your title did draw me to watch your video, and respond to it's content.
Mitsukago 2 years ago
And that was the point of doing it!
ProfMichaelson 2 years ago
It is sad how many people simply can't distiguish the difference between fantasy and reality. But that may be a topic for anthropology, not physics and astronomy.
Mitsukago 2 years ago
if light takes certain time to get from a to b, claiming that a person traveling at roughly the same speed, would take less time to cross the same distance, doesn't make sense to me. how come the same effect doesn't apply to light itself? and what's the music in this and other vids?
Acibeb 3 years ago
Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity doesn't make intuitive sense because we believe that everything moves through time at the same rate. But speed through time varies just like speed through space. It's not obvious to us because it's a strongly non-linear relationship. You have to be moving incredibly fast through space (so fast it only takes a second to get to the moon) before the change in the rate time flows becomes noticeable.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
Star Trek is science FICTION, not fact. One purpose of fiction is to suspend disbelief and see what happens when an author thinks outside the box. Another is to enjoy the stories which result.
longlakeshore 3 years ago
Tell that to soap opera actors who are routinely approached by fans who think they are their characters, not actors.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
If star trek or any other scifi franchise gets just one kid interested enough to pursue science education/career, it's well worth the myth. And if it gets just one scientist to think more creatively, openly or critically, it's also worth it.
longlakeshore 3 years ago
So you're saying that if I'm travelling AT the speed of light to a planet that is 100 light years away, I would arrive instantaneously??? That's bologna!! If light takes 100 years for light to reach that planet, then it's going to take me 100 years to get there if I'm travelling at the same speed as light. Sounds like Einstein's physics are a bit off.
BradM73 3 years ago
You're assuming the time it takes to make a trip is the same in all reference frames, whether you're making the trip or just watching someone else do it. Einstein showed otherwise in 1905.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
I think what you're saying, and I might be wrong, is that as a zero point observer (being the person on the spacecraft travelling the speed of light) time would essentially stop for that person. Obviously it continued for all outside observers. But the regardless, if the clock time on Earth and the planet 100 LYs away are set to the same time, it will still take you 100 years to get there, even travelling at the speed of light.
BradM73 3 years ago
You make it sound like anyone can go from point a to point b anywhere in the entire universe in a single instant, as long as they are travelling at the speed of light. Einstein theorized that time would effectively stop for the zero point observer, which may or may not be true (we can't know for sure can we?). Regardless, just being you might be travelling at the speed off light doesn't mean time stops everywhere in the universe, which is essentially what you're inplying in your video.
BradM73 3 years ago
You're having trouble with the idea that motion is relative to the observer, which was even known in Newton's time. If you're traveling in a jet aircraft moving at 600 mph relative to the surface of the Earth, the speed of the plane relative to you is zero. If the plane were moving at 600 mph relative to you, then touching any part of it would be instantly fatal.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
Well, that goes without saying... Don't insult my intelligence. Obviously if you are travelling to a distant star at the speed of light, you will accelerate to lightspeed velocity in the comfort of your space ship, and thus won't get hit by the ship in the process. If you accelerate in a car, you can feel the G-Forces, but you're not going to be instantly crushed. The same would be assumed for acceleration to light speed. Both you and ship would be at the same relative speed during acceleration
BradM73 3 years ago
The point of Einstein's Special Theory of Relativity is that two clocks travelling at the speed of light relative to each other can't be set to the same time.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
LoL, well, does everyone's clock always tell the same time? Maybe in a perfect universe. Obviously if there are two clocks set in sync with each other, and you launched one to a planet one lightyear away, and looked at the clock (somehow) though a big telescope, the time would appear to be 1 year in the past, but that doesn't mean the people at that other planet are 1 year in he past. It's just that light is reaching us at our reference time, kind of like the speed of sound.
BradM73 3 years ago
Have you ever seen someone down the street dribbling a basketball? You SEE the ball hit the ground before you hear the sound of the bounce. On a quantum scale, you'd also be seeing the basketball hit the ground after the fact, but I digress. :D The fact is that even though our positions in the universe are different, time moves along at the same rate, regardless. I think Einstein is wrong. Time is Finite. Light is not.
BradM73 3 years ago
GPS devices take different rates of time flow into account and wouldn't work right otherwise. But Cosmic rays were the first proof that Einstein was right about identical clocks not running at the same rate when moving reltive to each other. If time ran at the same rate on the cosmic ray particles as on Earth, the particles wouldn't last long enough to reach the surface of the Earth but they do.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
GPS satellites are clock synced on Earth and then resynced on orbit. GPS receivers on Earth merely measure the time it takes for the signal to reach the device. Because the receiver knows the position of each satellite in its signal range, it can calculate it's position relative to the orbiting satellites. It doesn't mean the clocks on the satellites are moving more slowly. Now if the Government or whomever is controlling the satillites are reporting time losses, that's another story.
BradM73 3 years ago
The clocks in orbit can't be precisely synchronized with those on Earth without taking relativistic time dilation (due to gravity) into account. In any event, this adjustment of only microseconds is made and the system works.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
The speed of light and the time have a special relation. As you approach the speed of light, the time it takes you to get somewhere shrinks, as well as the energy it takes to move another millimeter faster increases because the mass is increasing, and the dimension you are moving in shrinks. The time and dimension shrinks till it gets to 0 at the speed of light, but the energy it would take for an object to move the speed of light is phenomenal. (cont...)
ZerroShadows 3 years ago
Once at the speed of light, the time it takes you to get anywhere is 0 because the direction you are moving in(forward and backward) are all crammed in no space at all.
ZerroShadows 3 years ago
To Prof.: LOL. I don't have enough time to do video-replies.
I've a question though: theoretically speaking, would Hiro of "Heroes" and his ability to stop time / move across time be possible, then? And if so, exactly what would the so-called plausible "science" be for that to happen?
TachieBillano 3 years ago
If Hrio could move very close to light speed relative to the environment, it would be close to stopping time, and Hiro could travel into the future fatser than the reference frame. But you can't move backwards in the sci fi sense. However, I have a paper just published in Physics Essays that shows how distant galaxies are moving backward in time relative to the flow of time into the future at Earth telescopes that detect the light from those distant galaxies.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
Hi Prof. Nice video--I enjoyed Star Trek, but yeah, the effects of "real" light speed travel on time perception would make the series impossible. If you haven't done so, you could make a reply video that further explains how, as you approach light speed, your mass/energy also increases till it's impossible to keep up with light in the first place. To be as fast as light, you'd have to BECOME light itself. LOL, beam me up there instead.
TachieBillano 3 years ago
Hi Tachi:
Yes, the whole problem that all of the ships in the Star Trek fleet would have to have infinite mass is another problem. Why don't you do a video reply pointing that out?
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
"Star Trek is for Morons"
I take issue with your statement. Considering that it's sci-fi, it's not meant to be accurate, it's meant to be inspirational. Many people were inspired by ST, and so pursued entering the science field. As an armchair science buff I know that there are inaccuracies to what is currently understood, and so what? I love the show for what it is, entertaining sci-fi. Do not discount me and other viewers as morons.
olives639 3 years ago
This isn't a commentary about fans but about our innumerate society. There's an episode of TNG in which Capt. Picard and Worf are in the vacuum of space walking on the hull of the Enterprise in spacesuits with magnetized shoes to stop the Borg from tampering with the ship. As they walk along you hear foley. Foley! This isn't dramatic license --like music and hearing explosions in space. It's gratuitous ignorance.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
That was First Contact.
Okay so the science is a bit flawed, heisenberg compensators and warp drive etc. But it's still a good show that makes you think "that'd be cool if it worked in the real world" and it presents a society I find preferable to what we have now.
But heres one that'll make you laugh, in one episode of voyager, Janeway asks the doctor to innoculate the away team with erythrosine, personally I dont see how a pink food dye can save people from lethal radiation.
coyran 3 years ago
There are a lot of inside dialog gags like that. Ferengai, for instance, means "foreigner" in Farsi. And you should see what's actually printed on the labels and buttons in the bridge (so Bill Shatner tells me).
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
I'm doing a marathon so I'll keep my eye open for that part. I agree that our society is math innumerate. So why aren't professors and teachers trying to change that? I went through the public school system and begged for math help yet nobody cared. I came to school early because my math teacher promised to be there to tutor me, but never showed, and this was a top-rated district. I can't understand the droning arrogant stiffs I've had for math professors either.
olives639 3 years ago
I can only apology for the demise of public education. It's really a crime that students who want to learn get no support. It didn't use to be that way. But I think you've identified one reason for the problem. I like to put it in the form of an equation: I = ma,
meaning Ignorance = Mass x Arrogance.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
Nice formula. Btw, in the fifth season extras, Gene talks about how he appreciates those who question the science view of Star Trek.
olives639 3 years ago
oh, but Star Trek is so much fun! really, it's a code key of sorts. & i do believe many of us understand it is not perfect science that they offer. especially with the advent or rediscovery of the 'new' sciences, math & physics - much of it quite (& again)integrated. but this code key is really an invitation, of sorts, for increased awareness on many levels. though we bring to the table what we carry - so the Star Trek experience will surely mean different things to different people~~
11moonelf 3 years ago
Warping in the sense of changing the spacetime metric is indeed the explanation for gravity in General Relativity. And it does slow down time. But it has nothing to do with motion, as in Special Relativity. Also, the amount of gravity you need for noticeable time dilation requires at least hundreds of solar masses, i.e., a black hole.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
True it would need such a large mass, so long as you neglect Quantum Physics. The ZPE density has been calculated at 10^94 g/cm^3, so there is your mass potential. It has been theorized that drawing this energy at a "considerable" rate would alter the space-time metric as the ZPF is itself theorized to be space-time. So warping of space-time is possible and though certain aspects of StarTrek engineering is wrong, a type of warp drive is not beyond our physical reality and w/i todays physics.
AetherProponent 3 years ago
Like Stan Deyo said...."you just didn't see how Houdini did it."
AetherProponent 3 years ago
I am sincerely confused about something, and hope you can clarify for me. I have always been under the impression that one light-year is equal to the distance that light travels in one year... So if a planet was 100 light-years away, would it not take 100 years traveling at the speed of light to arrive? That's why I thought that so many people talk about the ability to travel faster than light.
GasolineWaltz 3 years ago
If you are on the Earth and a planet is 100 light years away, then 100 years would elapse on Earth during the time a beam of light travelled from the Earth to that planet. But for someone riding on that beam, it would take zero time. The duration of an event is not the same for two people who are travelling near the speed of light relative to each other. In special relativity, this is called "time dilation."
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
Hey, thanks... I have a feeling that this may be a common misconception.
GasolineWaltz 3 years ago
Very common for people not familiar with Einstein's theory of relativity, which is why Star Trek is one example of how sci fi films get this wrong. There's a scene in Carl Sagan's Cosmos in which Janeway's boyfriend gets it right.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
It would not take the people who do the travelling 100 years, just those who stay at home. That's the most difficult part of Einstein's discovery to understand, that the time a trip (or any event) lasts is not the same for everyone.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
While it is indeed impossible to go faster than the speed of light, in principle it might be possible to circumvent the problem by suitably "warping" spacetime itself.
I cant go into details here...Please f u are interested i recomend reading the following book :
"THE PHYSICS OF STAR TREK "by Lawrence M.Krauss
ObsidianHelios 4 years ago
Why would you want to go faster than light speed when at that speed it takes zero time to complete a trip?
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
The reason is that while it may take YOU only 73 days round trip, 200 years will have passed here on Earth and everyone you cared about would have been dead for a very long time, where as "warping" what you call "space-time" and I call "aether-space" the problem of this would not arise as you have shortened your travel distance and also the temporal effects on you and those on Earth..warping works best for everyone and can be done.
AetherProponent 3 years ago
It's true that it would be better if we couldtravel to a future event faster than light without time dilation,for the reason you said. But "warping" as in Star Trek or "folding space" as in Dune is fictional. The closest thing that could be real is a wormhole. But these are smaller than an atom and only last for microseconds.
ProfMichaelson 3 years ago
I think you're misunderstanding physics. It is not currently possible to go faster than the speed of light, so it's fairly stupid to think that you can travel 100 light years instantly when light itself takes 100 years to travel that distance. The speed of light IS finite. If you and I were travelling in a ship at the speed of light, we'd still be travelling at 299,792,458 meters per second.
BradM73 3 years ago 2
First of all since no expert created the universe, no one can say what humans can or cannot do with regard to the universe.
As for Star Trek, the genre is more about advancement in our humanity.
I and other morons have started a non-profit grant program for young people who wish to pursue careers in the sciences. Maybe one day one of our kids will prove what was once thought to be the impossible! TREK LIVES!
darlenamarie 4 years ago
Star Trek has some great stories. TNG's "Inner Light" is my all time favorite. But you can't fall off the edge of the Earth because it isn't flat despite what Star Trek says. If America doesn't educate it's children we won't be able to compete in a global economy.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
Star trek is no more for morons then the works of Jules Verne or H.G. Wells it is science fiction not science. But like all good scifi it inspires imagination.
"Imagination is everything. It is the preview of life's coming attractions"
Albert Einstein
darthvadon 4 years ago 10
I'm a professor of physics, and the author of dozens of physics papers published in the peer reviewed journals. I'm glad you're studying the subject. You have some more to learn. So do we all. But some things we know for sure. When you get to general relativity you'll know more about what is possible. Going faster than light speed isn't, and there's no reason to since you don't need trips that are faster than instananeous.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
"ProfMichaelson,"
Star Trek is entertainment. The production crews do take artistic license regarding some aspects of science, but they've tried to be as accurate as possible depicting current scientific theory.
As for Star Trek being "for morons," ask any of the leading scientific minds of today if they were inspired or influenced by Star Trek. You'll get more "Yes" answers than "No." You might want to be a little less critical of who you might be calling a moron.
buckaroohawk 4 years ago
No entertainment producers try to be accurate when it comes to spacetime and no leading scientific minds think Einstein was wrong about it. It's gratuitous ignorance. The best Star Trek stories, like "Inner Light," don't depend upon scientific illiteracy.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
The gratuitous ignorance in entertainment is worse than gratuitous sex & violence.
chulapen 4 years ago
You're right. Global warming, scare resources devoted to finding NEOs, etc. will do in our civilization if not out species.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
Lots of people use GPS. It wouldn't work if it didn't adjust for time dilation. Although the speed of satellites only affects their speed through time by a small fraction of a second, the timing is critical and this has to be taken into account. To Be Continued...
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
you obviously don't know how warp drive works...
LMUli 4 years ago
It's imaginary but expressly a method of travelling faster than light speed.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
By bending the spacetime around the ship, you do not travel faster than light. You ride on a wave on the spacetime. That's why it's called warp drive... also it has been stated that you leave normal space and enter subspace - where other physics apply.
LMUli 4 years ago
If you're a trekker, how come you don't listen to the dialog? In a recent episode one of the characters said something like, "We can go faster than light but we can't make a good replicator." What happens when you bend spacetime is you get gravity, not motion. This explanation of gravity due to Einstein has been confirmed many, many times by gravitational lensing.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
from an objective view, you are moving faster. that is relative to the observer ;) but technically you don't. true, you get gravity in front of the ship and negative gravity on the back. think of a single sinus wave with the ship on the position pi. since this wave is moving forward, the ship "slides" on the wave like a waverider.
i am a science major, i've had three semesters of physics at munich's top elite university. star trek is about what could be, not about what is currently unproovable.
LMUli 4 years ago
Key word-THEORY of relativity. Prove it.
triassicranger 4 years ago
The classical proof of relativity came from cosmic rays. These particles have very short lifetimes and wouldn't last long enough to reach the surface of the Earth if they weren't subject to time dilation. To Be Continued...
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago
In science, the word "theory" doesn't mean conjecture as in law. It means a model (the more modern word). When we talk about the theory of gravity, the atomic theory of matter, or the germ theory of disease, that doesn't mean there may or may not be gravity, may or may not be atoms, or that germs may or may not cause disease.
ProfMichaelson 4 years ago