When the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) began operations, a small but noisy group of people tried to stop it out of fear. Their reasoning: The energies produced as protons slammed into each other at close to the speed of light would be sufficiently high to create miniature black holes or other exotic, destructive things. The fruits of human curiosity would be the literal end of the world. Particle accelerators, cosmic and terrestrial: The Crab Nebula superonva remnant (Credit: NASA, ESA, J. Hester and A. Loll, Arizona State University) and the CMS detector at the LHC (Credit: © 2008 CERN). Those fears were unwarranted for a simple reason: Earth is bombarded by much higher-energy particles all the time, and we havent been eaten by a planet-munching black hole yet. In fact, the universe has many naturally-occurring particle accelerators that are far more powerful than the LHC, exceeding even anything we could build in the foreseeable future. Anything exotic we can create in our labs, the cosmos has beaten us to it. Like colliders on Earth, astronomical accelerators use magnetic fields to whip particles up to nearly light speed. Additionally, the universe uses shock waves, the powerful compression of plasmas to speed particles and ram them into each other. Those intense, high-energy processes take place near black holes or neutron stars, during supernova explosions and in the hot remnants those explosions leave behind. This violence generates electrically charged particlesmostly electrons and protons, with a smattering of helium nucleineutrinos, and gamma ray photons. Of those, protons are the most interesting: they have an effective combination of high mass (in particle terms!) and fast speed. When they reach Earths atmosphere, they collide with air molecules and produce cascades of other particles, which we call cosmic rays. The energy for particle creation in the upper atmosphere is more than a factor of twenty greater than at the LHC, said Glennys Farrar, professor of physics at New York University. Most impressive of all are ultra-high-energy cosmic rays, which reach energies 100 million times greater than the fastest protons produced in the LHC. While astronomical sources may be good accelerators, that doesnt mean the cosmos is full of good colliders. Our Earth-bound experiments are designed to focus beams of protons or other particles into tight bunches (thats the technical term!), then send those bunches slamming into each other from opposite directions. That sort of thing is rare in space: A cloud of gas left after a supernova may be full of fast-moving protons, but direct collisions are not very common. However, Earth itself is part of the Universes collider, the accidental target for beams of cosmic rays from deep space. As Farrar pointed out, Accelerators concentrate the beam so while the total collision rate of [cosmic rays] with atmospheric nuclei is higher than in accelerators, we only see a tiny fraction of the collisions. The key is energy: If two protons collide with enough velocity, some of the energy of their motion can be converted into mass, creating new particles in accordance with E = mc2. The result is a number of particles of many types, from ordinary stuff like electrons and photons to rarer specimens. Among the exotica are certain types of mesons, which are made of two quarks instead of the three that compose protons and neutrons; they were first discovered in cosmic ray detectors in 1936. Since theyre short-lived, these mesons must have been born in collisions in Earths atmosphere; otherwise they would have decayed during the long trip across space. But even more exotic things could pop out of the froth of cosmic ray collisions: unusual quarks, Higgs bosons, or even as-yet unseen particles predicted by theories such as supersymmetry. However, most of these are even more short-lived than the mesons, decaying into bursts of more ordinary particles that might reach cosmic ray detectors on Earths surface. Collisions might make a few stable exotics such as hypothetical weakly-interacting massive particles (WIMPs), which are candidates for dark matter, but based on current experimental limits, their numbers must be few. Its unfortunate that the most interesting collisions take place high in Earths atmosphere, where we cant observe them directly. Farrar said, Even when we see them, e.g., with the Auger detector which is the largest in the world, the fact that Higgs [bosons] are produced is not evident because the Higgs just decays to ordinary particles which have no special character when they hit the detector. Thats in contrast with human-built colliders: Researchers put a lot of effort into finding the telltale decay products from a Higgs particle, but the detectors have to sit near the point of collision to have any hope of doing so. Nevertheless, the collisions in the upper atmosphere are still potentially helpful for particle physicists. Farrar noted that current observations of the cosmic ray spectrum may indicate a transition to a new regime of [high-energy physics], not accessible at the LHC. Its tricky work, but what worthwhile scientific endeavor isnt? Researchers are never satisfied, especially when they consider what might be created in collisions inside supernova remnants and other distant events. Even if an individual collision that makes something exotic is extraordinarily rare, there are plenty of potential sources and lots of time. Yet we might never know, since we cant observe these events closely enough to see anything but the decay products that eventually reach us. Powerful as they are compared to the LHC, Farrar pointed out that even supernova remnants are puny particle accelerators compared with whatever makes the ultra-high-energy cosmic rays. If these are also protons from deep space, they must be from extremely powerful phenomena: highly magnetized neutron stars, the most energetic black holes, or maybe even something new we havent figured out yet.One thing we can say for certain, though, is that scientists are clever, and may yet figure out inventive ways to study cosmic colliders. It may turn out that the laboratory of the Universe will teach us things about fundamental particles and forces. LINK....http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/blogs/...particle-colliders-that-put-our-own-to-shame/ AboveAlpha
One contention which has merit IMO is that Space and Time do not really exist, they are constructs, "just a mathematical abstraction" as Heinlein put it. And if that is so the whole idea building a ship or machine that enables FTL travel may be unnecessary. We may do it by thought alone, like the Guild navigators folded space in Dune. And like them, we may need help. Could it be that someday the psychedelic drugs we see as such a scourge on society will give us the stars?
NASA probes have proven that large celestial bodies of mass generate the necessary Gravitational Effect to Warp Space-Time. Probes were able to place certain stars into Visual Line of Sight that should not have been able to be seen as they were stars having angular positions that would have placed them behind the physical edges of our sun. Yet the NASA probes where able to visually see these stars....why? Because our Sun has sufficient mass to generate enough Gravitational Effect to WARP the Space-Time around it thus the Light or Photons emminating from those stars curved around the gravitational generated curving or warping of Space-Time. In order to Warp or Fold Space-Time to a sufficient enough degree to be able to travel Interstellar Distances a HUGE amount of Energy would have to be generated to represent MASS. AboveAlpha
True. Also time dilation and 'time travel' has been proven as real by many empirical experiments. Some used veloicty and atomic clocks, others used mass vs distance from center of mass to slow time relative to the other clock on the ground (the other was on a mountain which was farther from the center of the earths mass than the ground bound clock). Revas twilight zone of the PF; Time really is the strangest thing. In my more paranoid moments I feel its just a construct woven in the fabric of the universe cage that keeps us in our enclosure called life without spending too much time trying to escape. Ones pet will not run away if that pet doesn't know anything exists outside its fence, we are much the same I feel. That is why truth is so elusive and why understanding reality will not happen. It may be the reason quantum and classical physics don't bridge the gap and are like oil and water, eh? The only questions is who are our masters that made this time corrupted zoo? Ding ding DING ding....... ok I cant do the twilight theme song... Back to semi reality ; The past, present, moment, and the future are not points on a linear scale but rather they are like the raisins in a loaf of raisins bread the universe being the loaf. Weird but understandable. Of course there is an arrow of time that fools us into thinking time is linear but in reality physicists say the time line is reversible, a glass should unbreakable as easily as it breaks. Time only seems to flow or be linear. A thought experiment I had concerning time referencing the above paragraph; I was watching a TV program when it used the raisin bread analogy and was talking of Einstein etc when I had a crazy thought. Could the past present and future all be in superposition (in the quantum sense) ? Its more accurate than thinking of time as flowing or linear, and they all could exist in the same place. I haven't done any math mostly because I struggle with the most basic math of that sort. I would like to see someone good with those type of calculations do some basic research. Who knows maybe you could unify classical and quantum physics as a offshoot of your research! A GUT then a TOE at last! ~reva~
The Gravity Probe B satellite, launched in 2004 and operated until 2005, detected frame-dragging and the geodetic effect. The experiment used four quartz spheres the size of ping pong balls coated with a superconductor. Data analysis continued through 2011 due to high noise levels and difficulties in modelling the noise accurately so that a useful signal could be found. Principal investigators at Stanford University reported on May 4, 2011, that they had accurately measured the framing effect relative to the distant star IM Pegasi, and the calculations proved to be in line with the prediction of Einstein's theory. The results, published in Physical Review Letters measured the geodetic effect with an error of about 0.2 percent. The results reported the frame dragging effect (caused by the Earth's rotation) added up to 37 milliarcseconds with an error of about 19 percent.[52] Investigator Francis Everitt explained that a milliarcsecond "is the width of a human hair seen at the distance of 10 miles".[53] In January 2012, LARES satellite was launched on a Vega rocket[54] to measure Lense–Thirring effect with an accuracy of about 1%, according to its proponents.[55] This evaluation of the actual accuracy obtainable is a subject of debate. At its introduction in 1915, the general theory of relativity did not have a solid empirical foundation. It was known that it correctly accounted for the "anomalous" precession of the perihelion of Mercury and on philosophical grounds it was considered satisfying that it was able to unify Newton's law of universal gravitation with special relativity. That light appeared to bend in gravitational fields in line with the predictions of general relativity was found in 1919 but it was not until a program of precision tests was started in 1959 that the various predictions of general relativity were tested to any further degree of accuracy in the weak gravitational field limit, severely limiting possible deviations from the theory. Beginning in 1974, Hulse, Taylor and others have studied the behaviour of binary pulsars experiencing much stronger gravitational fields than found in our solar system. Both in the weak field limit (as in our solar system) and with the stronger fields present in systems of binary pulsars the predictions of general relativity have been extremely well tested locally. May 29, 1919 On May 29, 1919, the moon’s silhouette crept slowly over the sun, bringing premature night to observers in a broad swath of the Southern Hemisphere between South America and Africa. Few onlookers realized that this event would provide the first successful test of Albert Einstein’s theory of relativity. A few pinpoints of light — a group of stars called the Hyades — twinkled around the shimmering halo remaining in the sky. These stars were the focus of a team of British scientists who watched the eclipse from both sides of the Atlantic. Astronomer Andrew Crommelin directed efforts in Sobral, Brazil, while astronomer Arthur Eddington led the joint expedition from his camp on the island of Princípe, part of the São Tomé and Princípe archipelago off the west coast of Africa. Both teams had an assortment of steel telescopes, astronomical measuring devices and motorized reflective mirrors — all the equipment necessary to perform a historic experiment that would have profound consequences in all areas of science. The seed for the 1919 eclipse expedition was planted four years earlier, when Einstein published his general theory of relativity, a theory built upon the foundation of his earlier special theory of relativity. Together, these works proposed a paradigm shift in physics. In this new view, length and time were not consistent everywhere. These measures, instead, varied between frames of reference, while the speed of light remained constant from every perspective. To accommodate these changes, the universe was now described not in three dimensions, but in four-dimensional coordinates of space-time. And, most important for the Eddington experiment, the theory predicted an unusual astronomical phenomenon: starlight would bend around massive objects like the sun. Arthur Eddington was just one member of a team of British scientists who watched the eclipse from both sides of the Atlantic as they watched for the appearance of the Hyades. This is two teams with a few telescopes using visual data to prove starlight would bend around massive objects like the sun.....and they did a good job. But it was not until the Modern Era that such things could be measured precisely and verified. AboveAlpha
Those GPS Satellites have to keep having their internal clocks reset constantly or else the system would not work due to TIME DILATION. And contrary to what some people think....YES....FORWARD TIME TRAVEL IS POSSIBLE...as we do it all the time. Backward Time Travel.....that's another story entirely as in my head the Universe would not allow a PARADOX...such as you go back in time and shoot your Gradfather thus your Dad or Mom is never born thus you could never be born thus you could not be creating this Paradox. What I think might happen is BACKWARD TIME TRAVEL.....only allows a person to travel back to a NELY CREATED DIVERGENT UNIVERSAL PAST REALITY.....that is an offshoot created and coming from the MAIN CURRENT OR STREAM of our BASELINE UNIVERSAL GROUPING UNIVERSAL REALITY. AboveAlpha
EXCERPT OF 'ABOVE ALPHAS' POST..... EXCPERT FOR BREVITY>>>>>>>> <<<<END OF EXCERPT AboveAlpha, In your cut and paste (above) are you agreeing with 10A or rebutting him? I agree with 10A that in the early 1900's ie 1919, Eddington used empirical evidence to validate the accuracy and correctness of Einstein's general theory of relativity. * (Sir Ed employed a solar eclipse in his experiment). reva
I wrote a few tens of threads about Godel universes and time dilation etc. Its interesting to note relativistic effects are occurring even at very slow sub light speed relative (relative for measurement) velocities. I like to think about it because of its influence on time and of course reality. When atomic clocks were used in experiments we could also then calculate with planck level exactness how much younger an airline pilot etc was than his earth bound fellows. . (there are 10 to the 43 power planck seconds in a normal second!) I think one guy, a cosmonaut was much less than a second younger and he was the youngest! Not too exciting! The prevailing theory on backwards time travel is, and that is if it is accomplished which is an extraordinarily huge 'if') the sad fellow that gets to try is ends up in a new universe split off from his. Its exactly the same as his old universe but with him in it, and he may never return to his home universe.reva
And that is the problem physicists are having with it, it is impossible, using current understanding. That is why academia would not even look at it, much less test one of these drives. It will probably turn out to be a failure, once they get more tests accomplished. For we cannot forget that one of the test engines didn't have the configuration to created that minute thrust, yet it produced it, as the other engine did. Probably is why your spider sense reacted. Of course, I want it to be true, and would be even more tickled if it brought change to what we thought we knew. LOL.
Well, if Consciousness is Fundamental, and those drugs allow an expansion of the reducing valve(the brain) perhaps access to a different quality of Consciousness allows unlimited space travel. Faster than the speed of thought. While in another quality state of consciousness, the thought creates the reality, for reality comes forth from Consciousness, and it is what Consciousness makes it, via information, just like a computer generating a virtual reality. It sure would be a helluva change in paradigm.
Improved acceleration and fuel-to-mass ratios are never going to produce viable interplanetary travel. I have great hopes about the recent discovery of artificial warping of space, however.
I agree with him I am just saying it was 1919!!! Not exactly an era when precision was famous. AboveAlpha
EXCERPT FROM AB OVE ALPHAS POST>>>> <<<<< Alpha do you want to correct your oh so obvious 'falsehood' (above) before I do? (Hint; think Newton, think third, think grade school science) sorry to be so brutal but I am astonished at the number of comments made here at PF science section that I have to correct. That's especially true when one considers I am one of those backwards bible belt preacher types! ~reva~
I don't have a personal problem with you my friend. You might think I do as many times as I disagree or correct you, however for the record I don't. Anyway, that said, the late 1800's to beyond the early 1900's the general public & professionals were better at obtaining precision measurements and using them to produce fine products than we are today, imo. kThe reason for their skills was the great emphasis put on students to learn math etc sans calculators Google enabled phones. At one time I thought as you, that is until I read the history and worked on some products produced by our great great great granddads and moms.~reva~
We should start a thread on time travel, but for now, can a person exist prior to his birthday or live beyond his, as yet unknown, expiration date?
As indicated by One Mind and Aleksander Ulyanov, consciousness is the key. Some people can go anywhere within several layers of the multiverse. To do this, they leave their bodies behind and manifest a physical existence that goes with the territory or is vague enough to go with any territory. No spaceship is necessary for this mode of travel. The rest of us consider a spaceship to be a necessity, but we may be forced to adapt it and ourselves in special ways to overcome the constraints inherent in realities, the characteristics that make realities what they are. UFOs make the trip like its no problem and they defy the laws of local physics at will in our environment when they execute seemingly impossible maneuvers that should tear them apart or at least kill the occupants. A critical clue is the absence of vehicle controls familiar to us, namely: dials, levers, switches, and gauges. This tells us that the operator has control via a psychic interface with the onboard machinery. Furthermore, the vehicle and occupants must be able to disconnect from or neutralize the local reality as if enveloped in a force field or some type of shielding. The reality inside the ship cant be the same as the reality outside. The old adage is: if youre going to play the game, you should play by the rules. That approach wont cut it. This game is all about intervention, isolation, and manipulation of the process that puts the rules in effect. QM seems so strange but should not be so surprising. It crosses the local reality boundary, leaving behind a local artifact: the assigned speed of light. In the next higher layer of the multiverse, the local clock is a billion times faster. The upper 1/10[SUP]th[/SUP] of 1% in the elites echelons of power, control, and extreme wealth have figured out how to do much of what the rest of us are still pondering and are holding out on us.
I prefer to listen to what Tom Campbell has to say about such scenarios. Going back in time is just a matter of accessing the digital reality database. Along with past actualized history, there's past unactualized probable/significant histories that were computed as time progressed. All of the stored scenarious can be experienced. Participation in them is indistinguishable from real life. Deviations can be inserted to cause branching, but these are not stored very long if not of sufficient significance. The important point is that the stored scenarious are not realities; they are just simulations. That's why you can't alter your future by going back and eliminating an ancestor, and that's why you normally can't get permanently stuck in the past. Real time travel is an extreme consideration that goes beyond this availability of weirdness. The same process can be said about future probable realities. California didn't fall off the map at 2012, even though that might have been the way we were headed. The future is not a singular scenario written in stone. Free will and mass consciousness may have made a difference.
I understand what you think I am saying that is a big mistake....but the efficiency of a ROCKET AS FAR AS THRUST is much greater in an Atmosphere than in a Vaccum. Now in a vacuum there is no air resistance thus a Rocket can accelerate faster and of course less or lack of Gravity help this.....but think about the concept I was attempting to explain comparing a guy holding a CO2 Fire Extinguisher in Space and a Guy that had say 1000 base balls. Now if the guy with the base balls used say.....A RUBBER BAND SLING SHOT....and loaded a single baseball into this sling shot and fired it as he held it as if he was standing up straight and aiming for the sky exept he did this in space......the sling shot would sling the ball in one direction and the man would move a bit in the other direction. Compare this to the much smaller amount of mass that is coming out of a CO2 Fire Extinguisher. If the man did the same thing as far as pointing it the same way and kept his body straight as he could.....he would very quickly accelerate in the oposite direction and even though the guy with the 1000 baseballs even if he shot off every ball which would equal a mass perhaps 10,000 times the CO2 release.....that baseball guy WOULD NEVER OBTAIN THE RATE OF ACCELERATION AND VELOCITY OF THE BASEBALL GUY. Now why is this? Hint....I already explained it. AboveAlpha
I didn't think we had issues? LOL!!! The other man is correct but as I stated...it was 1919!! There were TWO TEAMS WITH SCOPES. There were ZERO CONTROL GROUPS. But he did prove it. AboveAlpha
Interesting topic. I've always been kind of interested in time/space travel, though I can't claim to know a lot about it. Maybe someday we will learn how to use worm holes to travel from galaxy to galaxy. I've read some interesting theories regarding "bending" light curves and things like that.
Total hogwash. The efficiency of a rocket in space (vacuum) is much higher because there's no atmospheric back pressure. A rocket engine is approximately 30% less efficient at sea level than in a vacuum. This is the equation for thrust: Notice the subtraction of ambient pressure to the thrust, Pamb. That would be provided by an atmosphere and would be 0 in an ideal vacuum (e.g. space). As far as baseballs vs a fire extinguisher, there is simply much more energy in a compressed gas. Just as a back of the napkin calculation, using a typical fire extinguisher with 9 kg of CO2 pressurized at 70 bars with a volume 0.018 cubic meters, specs from here: http://www.aespl.com.sg/pdf/FIRE EXTINGUISHER-CO2.pdf Using Brode's equation for approximating the energy where E=[(P2-P1)V]/(y-1), where P2 = pressure of the cylinder, P1 = ambient pressure (there's that pesky atmosphere again), and y = heat capacity ratio for CO2, you get (7000000)(.018 )/(1.28-1) or 450 kJ of energy (assuming we can get all the energy out). For the baseball the equation is simply kinetic energy .5mv^2, assume an average baseball weight of 0.145 kg and a velocity of 60mph or 26.8 m/s, the kinetic energy is 52 Joules, and throw a thousand you get 52 kJ of energy. You also get less velocity on the astronaut since momentum must be conserved, and 1000 baseballs weighs 145 kg compared to 9kg of the extinguisher gas, and both have to be accelerated using the available energy, and that loss of energy would not accelerate the astronaut.. All this assumes you can actually throw a baseball or activate a fire extinguisher in line with your own center of mass, or either one is going to spin the astronaut. That would be very hard to do I think throwing a baseball.
