That falls in the domain of the application guys. He is in the theory arena....

[beer]


Scott

That really smart guy was Einstein and he pulled some pretty cool stuff out of his ass. Basically, the Theory of Relativity is accepted as a theory(about as accepted as it can get in science-an unproven idea is a hypothesis) because it made sense when scrutinized and matched scientific experimentation exactly. One way to understand the time dilatation is to consider what happens to a beam of light in a moving vehicle. From an observer outside the vehicle the beam of light has to go slightly further than it goes for the observer inside the vehicle. Hence, it takes longer for the outside observer.
To understand this you must understand what is "majical" about lightspeed: Lightspeed is the one great constant in the universe against which all else is compared. Lightspeed is *constant* and unchanging. It IS time in a sense. That's what Einstein realized from other earlier experiments that allowed him to come up with Relativity.

Due to the idea 2 paragraphs above, the length of an object from the two reference frames is different. Other dimensions of an object do not change, ie depth and height wouldn't change-only the plane of movement perpendicularly.

Mass increases with speed due to conservation of momentum. Einstein conceived of this while considering two high speed objects colliding with the constraints noted above.

These were thought experiments considered by Einstein based on info gathered from earlier experimenters on light and its speed. He followed this by writing simple yet elegant equations to describe what he thought would happen with regards to length, time and mass. They are very similar equations and have been shown to match experiment. Time dilatation, which matched his equation exactly, between a staionary atomic clock(cesium) and one in motion around the earth. Another example is the acceleration of an electron in a particle accelerator. They were able to achieve a speed high enough to increase the mass of the electron 40,000 times. This was very close to lightspeed. There are many other examples.

At low, "nonrelativistic speeds" thes changes are incredibly small and inconsequential. As speed increases these changes increase exponentially and as we get close to lightspeed their graphs(ie values) approach infinity.

You really have to grasp the lightspeed IS time thing to understand it. I don't claim to fully understand it BTW. My wife always tells me a long winded SOB when I explain anything.

No, it only matters if they want to go back. Its bad for trade, but quite doable for migration.  And no I don't mean generation ships either.

But you got to wonder- why? There is SOOO much in the way of building materials in this solar  system. We have a almost incomprehensable amount of time left untill the Sun runs out of gas. And FTL is really TOO fast for flying around within the solar system.

Certainly its possible and one day we will do it one way or another. However, the nearest star is just shy of 4 light-years. But who the hell wants to spend a minimum of 5 years in a spaceship-more like 10-20- just from the nearest star, not a more likely 50-100 or more to a solar system with intelligent life. My .02.

edited to reply: there are plenty of building blocks but not much more habitable space. Most of the planetary mass in our solar system is gaseous-Jupiter, Saturn, Neptune. Mercury and Venus are extremely hot and Venus has a most inhospitable atmosphere. Uranus and Pluto are colder than a witch's...and dark, also. That pretty much leaves Mars. Even it is cold and barren with an extremely thin atmosphere. Nowhere any of us would want to live. With a huge amount of effort we might be able to colonize a couple of planets and a few moons. After a brief rush of "pioneers" few would be interested. You have to find more habitable planets and they ain't everywhere.

There is a possiblity that life will be found in some very unexpected places however. We are built on carbon and based on the chemistry of water. There is no need for organisms elsewhere to operate under those constraints, IMHO.

AR15fan, relativity has been PROVEN! Two identical clocks were built; one went with the Apollo astronauts and one stayed on Earth...the Apollo clock was effected by relativity resulting from the seven mile per second delta vee and was slower on return than the earth clock...

Relativity is incestuous.

Point taken, but a lot depends on what we find at our nearest stellar neighbors.  Its far easier to send a probe to the nearest star-once you take a human crew out of the equation intersteller missions get downright attractive.

And the reaction would depend on what those probes found. When Europeans found silk and spice in the east Indies and Japan, they had no trouble finding crews to spend TWO years in leaky tubs with bad food to sail around Africa to Indonisia, China, and Japan. Two years on a starship would be downright plesant to being a crewman on Magellans [i]Victoria[/i] I would bet.

See my edited reply to your edited reply[:)]

Well then, it's time that the physicists redo the equations.....

Physics is still in it's infancy.  Heck, people use to think that the Earth was the center and the sun went around the Earth!

The last time I saw a program on this stuff... they said that there were two main equations... one was the 'traditional' one and the other dealt w/ particals.  But the two equations didn't work 100%.  NOw, when you find an equation that works w/ everything... sub-atomic & time.... then things might be possible.

Then again, I might be talking out of my @$$.....

"Never say never...."

You're talking about hte disparities between quantum mechanics and relativity. Einstein never fully came to grips with quantum mechanics and said that,"God doesn't role dice with the universe".
Supposedly, however, M-theory does fit pretty well...Don't ask me, I don't understand it but it has to do with string theory and quantum mechanics.

Oh well I am a space colony fan drjarhead. I am very fond of the idea of building habitats in orbit and living there. Look how hard it is to crawl out of the gravity well we are starting in. Why would you want to go back and crawl down another one? Its so much easier once you are up to stay up.

You are thinking of this I think:
[url]www.sciam.com/2000/0900issue/0900scicit6.html[/url]

I posted it in another thread that someone started about this same topic a few weeks ago.

Edit:  They appear to have taken that link down.  I will leave it up in case it comes back.  Here is another article I found:
[url]http://www.cnn.com/2000/TECH/space/07/20/speed.of.light.ap/[/url]

There is probably more if you search google for "cesium faster than light" as this experiment dealt with supercooled cesium.

The two equations are einstein's general theory of relativity and quantum mechanics.  Many physicists are working on getting these theories combined (quantum gravitation etc.).  Things like string theory are floating around as potential "Theories of everything" but they are all in their infancy.  Here's a nice page that introduces what string theory is all about:  [url]http://superstringtheory.com/[/url]

Thing is, even if you find a way that would theoreticly allow you to exceed- or even just reach- light speed. How would you power it?

We can't even build a nuclear fusion plant that will exceed breakeven for more than a few seconds. Finding a compact source of power is rather important too.