Hacker News seems to be going down hill if a link to a mass media explanation of a clever gedankenexperiment suddenly becomes a design (!) for a "warp engine".
It is an interesting idea from science fiction point of view.
The aim of this paper is not to discuss the plausibility of warp drive, the questions associated with violation of the null energy condition, or issues regarding causality.
The aim of this paper is to suggest that a warp bubble could be generated using ideas and mathematics from quantum field theory, and to hypothesize how such a bubble could be
created by a sufficiently advanced technology. </quote>
Quote from article:
While the theory rests on relatively firm ground, the next question is how do you expand space behind the ship and contract it in front of the ship?
Quote from Star Trek:
Scotty: "It's no use Cap'n, I just dont have the power!"
Another quote from the article:
"What the scientists were able to estimate was the amount of energy necessary, if the technology was available, to change these dimensions: about 10^45 joules."
That's the energy contained in (roughly) 22 x 10^43 Big Macs... easy, lets do it!
It's an interesting mind game. Don't expect it to be happening any time.. uh.. more or less ever. From the article:
...were able to estimate was the amount of energy necessary, if the technology was available ... about 10^45 joules
How much is that?
"That's about the amount of energy you'd get if you converted the entire mass of Jupiter into pure energy via E = mc^2," said Cleaver
But even disregarding the energy needs, they don't know how they'd actually interact to produce the warping they'd need:
"These calculations are based on some arbitrary advance in technology or some alien technology that would let us manipulate the extra dimension,"
On the other hand, it is an extremely interesting mind game, and who knows, there may even be some interesting consequences, at least in theoretical physics.
"That's about the amount of energy you'd get if you converted the entire mass of Jupiter into pure energy via E = mc^2," said Cleaver
Or, to put it in terms (slightly) more easily visualised, that's the total amount of energy put out by all the stars in the Milky Way galaxy every 31 years.
Let me see. With a hand-crank you could get about 25 watts, so... given all six billion humans you could generate that much energy in... uhh, 5.2 * 10^27 fortnights.
With a hand-crank you could get about 63.108 poundal-furlongs per lunar year, so... given all six billion humans you could generate that much energy in... uhh, 5.2 * 10^27 fortnights.
Apparently I'm quite taken with this paper based on the number of comments I've been adding.
An interesting note that the discovery.com story left out:
Page 11: "This energy requirement would drop dramatically if we assumed a thin-shell of modified
spacetime instead of bubble encompassing the volume of the craft."
The Jupiter-size calculation is based on generating a warp bubble to fill the volume of space of a 10m x 10m x 10m ship. If we only need to produce a warp bubble as a thin shell around the outside of that volume, but not to fill it, then the energy requirements drop dramatically.
If my Star Trek lore is remembered right, the warp fields are only produced around the starships, but do not fill the volume.
Why am I being down-voted for my comment? People generally under estimate the rate of technological progress. When researchers in the 30s thought about utilizing fission for energy, much less weapons, they broadly thought it would take hundreds of years to become practical. Come 1944, Hiroshima and Nagasaki went up in smoke and radiation.
Once we develop a mathematical understanding of how we can manipulate various forces of nature, practical applications tend to evolve very, very quickly. This has been done over and over throughout history.
Simply because we don't have a complete understanding of how to build a device described in the story NOW has no impact on what we discover and are able to build in the next few decades.
Isaac Asimov wrote a corollary to Clarke's First Law, stating
"When, however, the lay public rallies round an idea that is denounced by distinguished but elderly scientists and supports that idea with great fervor and emotion -- the distinguished but elderly scientists are then, after all, probably right." - Wikipedia article on Clarke's 3 laws
Just because it seems impractical today doesn't mean it will soon be possible; the great ideas that were scoffed at remain fresh in the memory because the geometrically more numeric unworkable ideas have faded into obscurity. Plus it's impossible--I mean, c'mon, focusing the entire 31-year energy output of the Milky Way?
Also quoted:
"In 'Against the Fall of Night' the human race has mysteriously regressed after a full billion years of civilization. Humanity is faced with the remnants of its past glories: for example, a network of roads and sidewalks that flow like rivers. Although physically possible, it is inexplicable from their perspective. Clarke's Third Law explains the source of our amazement as our limitation, rather than the impossibility of the technology."
Another counter-argument to your quote is that "distinguished but elderly scientists" very publicly claimed it was impossible to fly, as late as 1904. Some even proclaimed this after the Wright brothers had done it.
As for the amount of energy, that is an estimate based on this very early design hypothesis. It points us in the right direction to continue research, but does not necessitate there will not be much more energy efficient ways to power such a device.
Your comment was probably modded down since it didn't seem terribly well informed, nor to add much to the conversation. Are you sure you understand quite how much energy 10^45 joules is? And the fact that they have absolutely no idea how said energy would be applied anyway?
Come 1944, Hiroshima and Nagasaki went up in smoke and radiation.
Really? Did they rebuild them so they could get nuked again in 1945?
