navigating at faster than light speed?

[ColJack]

after reading the "more physics" thread, we've gotten on to time travel and light speed etc.. so it got me thinking..

if you're traveling very fast through space, at 100 times the speed of light say, then how do you navigate?
you could aim your ship at the star you want to travel to, but if it's 100 light years away, then in a year when you get there, nothing will be where you though it would be since what you saw when you set off was actually 100 years ago..

 

[ColJack]

WTH?? I was posting this from GD.. I'm sure I was...

mods, can you mive it please?

 

[ban-all-sheds]

Should you bother trying to discuss FTL travel with people who can't even cope with aeroplanes and conveyor belts?

 

[LoveRocket]

This would be notifiable work. Are you competent to travel at faster than light speeds?

I really think you should employ an astrophysicist (check that they are a member of a competent persons scheme first)

 

[joinerjohn]

Would be quite easy ColJack.
Powerful computers would calculate the position of the star in a hundred years time and navigate there.
The only other problem you'd have though,,, How would you know the star had not gone supernova in the intervening year??
By that, what I really mean ,,, If it's a hundred light years away, then when you set off, unbeknown to Earth observers, the star could have exploded in a supernova 50yrs down the line. You get half way there and suddenly, your target has expanded to a million times it's size then exploded with the force of 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 Hiroshima sized bombs.

I'll leave the outcome to Sci Fi writers though.
Beam me up Scotty.

 

[imamartian]

Would be quite easy ColJack.
Powerful computers would calculate the position of the star in a hundred years time and navigate there.
The only other problem you'd have though,,, How would you know the star had not gone supernova in the intervening year??
By that, what I really mean ,,, If it's a hundred light years away, then when you set off, unbeknown to Earth observers, the star could have exploded in a supernova 50yrs down the line. You get half way there and suddenly, your target has expanded to a million times it's size then exploded with the force of 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 Hiroshima sized bombs.

I'll leave the outcome to Sci Fi writers though.
Beam me up Scotty.

The only other problem you'd have though

Are you sure that would be the only other problem?

But surely, if we had the techno know-how for all of this, then surely we'd know pretty accurately at what stage in its life the star was.... i.e. that it wasn't on the verge (within 50 years) of becoming a supernova?

 

[joinerjohn]

Yes, But, your forgetting about the advanced alien civilizations that probably blow up stars for a living, so they can harvest rare materials.
If any of them happened to be in the area, you'd be pretty miffed.

 

[Johnmelad502]

Should you bother trying to discuss FTL travel with people who can't even cope with aeroplanes and conveyor belts?

SMF!

 

[lifesagasman]

If the light from a star is millions of years old, there is no way of knowing, when you set off, that it even exists any more, so why bother?

 

[imamartian]

If the light from a star is millions of years old, there is no way of knowing, when you set off, that it even exists any more, so why bother?

Maybe if we have the technology to enable us to travel faster than the speed of light then we'll have some particle or wave we can accelerate to a billion times the speed of light, and fire that towards the star and catch the rebounding wave/particle. It would only take a few minutes(?!) to get a response!

 

[lifesagasman]

That's a good idea!!

Then we can travel to a barren rock in no time and still be home for tea!

 

[imamartian]

That's a good idea!!

Then we can travel to a barren rock in no time and still be home for tea!

are you suggesting i stole my idea from a Famous Five book?

 

[lifesagasman]

I think I would have said 'lashings of ginger beer'

 

[Space cat]

If the light from a star is millions of years old, there is no way of knowing, when you set off, that it even exists any more, so why bother?

We know enough about stars to make pretty accurate predictions as to where they'll be and what state they'll be in a million years from now. Getting there is the problem. The Enterprise doesn't travel faster than light. It compresses space ahead and travels at sub-light speed through that.

Now gravity warps space but we don't, as yet, have any way of making it to order. I know I've said it before but I'll say it again anyway; the so-called weakest known force will be the toughest nut to crack. There's also a world shortage of dilithium crystals ---

 

[lifesagasman]

..and ginger beer....