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anth
Member
# Posted: 27 Sep 2004 16:16
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How real is Star Trek?



In this thread i'll be looking at just how real aspects of Star Trek are compared to our knowledge of the universe, and the physics within it.

Star Trek has inspired many to join branches of space science or to become astronauts or just backyard astronomers like myself. Therefore it's had a profound effect on our exploration of the cosmos on many levels. Is this influence firmly in the form of a publicity tool? Or are there elements within this great show that have inspired through realism?

Maybe Star Trek and science fiction in general replace the need for real space exploration. And create the illusion we are a technologicaly advanced and space faring society. When in reality we are in all probablilty far from it. We are certainly lucky to be alive at the dawn of the space age. A time maybe when some future members of a federation of planets may look back and say "the turn of the millenium, that was when things gathered pace,and we started out on this path to the stars.". But then again we could be several decades or even hundreds of years from that being the case.

I'm somebody who is a keen follower of the space program, and an avid astronomer, and also somebody who can't get enough of all manner of space exploration news and the sights of the universe. I'm also a sci fi nut. And a trek fan since i was old enough to understand TOS shows on BBC TV. Star Trek inspired me and coupled with being born in July 1969 gave me a passion for real manned space flight and the exploration of space in general. Given those facts i think i can post here without bias! *L* Cos, i really want Trek to be true. Apart from the Borg heading for sector 001 and stuff like that.

Ok, now the evidence for or against Star Trek. Feel free to defend or agree, this will be ongoing. And i hope quite interesting. :)

Part One: Could you really hide a starship in a nebula?



No way! The typical density of gas in one of those pretty nebulae that you see in pictures from the Hubble Space Telescope are only at most a few hundred atoms per cubic centimeter. If your sensors used light, there would be no problem seeing them to a distance limited by the resolution of your optical sensor/telescope.

If you were using radio waves, however, the interior of a nebula can contain ionized gas for many cubic light years. Ionized gas at these densities would become a good cloak to a tiny star ship if the sensor was operating at one of the frequencies 'mirrored' by the plasma in the nebula.  But that's only at one frequency.

So the notion of hiding in some fog like cloud is totaly wrong. To give you some idea of what i mean i'll give you one example. If you collected all the dust from the great Orion Nebula ( that's about the only nebula we can easily see with the naked eye. And it's very bright and noticable.) you'd have about enough matter to make a pencil! These nebula are certainly not dense, most of the time you'd not even know you were inside one. It's only from a distance they look cloud like.

So, The Wrath of Khan would certainly not have been the fantastic movie it was had it been real. Also The Enterprise D probably would have been assimulated in Best of Both Worlds with no hiding place. :P

Oh well, better luck next time.



anth
Member
# Posted: 30 Sep 2004 00:11
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can we ever hope to have Warp Drive and interstellar travel?



This is probably the biggest driving force (quite literaly) behind the Star Trek story lines. Imagine a season or seven seasons of a Star Trek series where the ship doesn't arrive anywhere! Due to the distances in our galaxy being enormous as they are, sadly that would be the scenario with real life engines.

With todays propulsion technology we could only hope to get to our neighbour Mars in six months, Venus perhaps in a shorter timeframe ( but..that's not a nice place to visit. Makes Mars look like a resort destination.) . And that's the tiniest imaginable fraction of the distance to even the nearest star. Warp Drive theory was adopted as a story telling device in Trek. Allowing the USS Enterprise, Defiant, or Voyager to arrive at a new destination each week for another great story to unfold. In reality we have nothing approaching Warp Drive, or the power sources needed to produce it. In Part two of this topic we'll be looking at Warp Drive, if it's possible and exactly what it is, and the prospects for mankind reaching the stars.

I'm attempting to keep this simple, so please stay with me! ( believe me..i need it to be too! :P )

Warp drive.

Here’s the premise behind "warp drive": Although Special Relativity theory forbids objects to move faster than light within spacetime, it is unknown how fast spacetime itself can move. A Warp Drive operates by expanding space time behind your Starship and contracting it in front. Once this happens you jump to a point in front removing the need to travel that full distance. Or more accurately, you have travelled that distance,  but your Warp engines sort of shrank it for the duration of your trip.

The idea of expanding spacetime is not new. At the beginning of the Universe, shortly after the Big Bang, it is thought that spacetime expanded faster than the speed of light during the early moments of the Big Bang. So if spacetime can expand faster than the speed of light during the Big Bang, why not for our warp drive? These theories are too new to have either been discounted or proven viable.

Any sticky issues?

Yes... First, to create this effect, you’ll need a ring of negative energy wrapped around the ship, and lots of it too. It is still debated in physics whether negative energy can exist. Classical physics tends toward a "no," while quantum physics leans to a "maybe, yes." Second, you’ll need a way to control this effect to turn it on and off at will. This will be especially tricky since this warp effect is a separate effect from the ship. Third, all this assumes that this whole "warp" would indeed move faster than the speed of light. This is a big unknown. And another thing is generating power to create this energy. It's pretty certain Anti Matter is not enough of a bang to do so.

The reality of our space ships.



The most obvious challenge to practical interstellar travel in real life is speed. Our nearest neighboring star is 4.2 Light Years away. Trip times to reach our nearest neighboring star at conventional speeds would be prohibitively long. At 55 miles-per-hour car journey if you could drive it for example, would take over 50 million years to get there!  You'd want alot of sweets to suck on for that journey. At a more typical spacecraft speed, for example the 3-day trip time that it took the Apollo spacecraft to reach the moon, it would still take over 900 thousand years! And even if we consider the staggering speed of 37-thousand miles-per-hour, which was the speed of the NASA Voyager spacecraft as it left our solar system years ago, the trip would still take 80,000 years. In conclusion, if we want to cruise to other stars within comfortable and fundable time spans (say, within 5 years.) we have to figure out a way to go faster than light.

Let's see how our rocket designs, and our proposed deigns would fare.



Here are four examples [See the large graphic above] of what it would take to send a canister about the size of a Shuttle payload (or a school bus) past our nearest neighboring star...and allowing 900 years for it to make this journey. 900 years is a figure that makes the numbers small. If you want a short trip, well, read on and see why that's not going to happen!

If you use chemical engines like those that are on the Shuttle, sorry, there isn’t enough mass in the universe to supply the rocket propellant you’d need! Remember you have to carry that propellant. The more you take the more fuel you need to push it along too. Chemical rocket engines are very poor in terms of efficiency.

So let’s step up to next possibilities, nuclear rockets with a predicted performance that’s 10 to 20 times better!

Well...it’s still not looking all that good. For a fission rocket you would need a BILLION SUPERTANKER size propellant tanks to get you there, and even with fusion rockets you would still need a THOUSAND SUPERTANKERS!

Even if we look at the best conceivable performance that we could engineer based on today’s knowledge, say an Ion engine or an antimatter rocket whose performance was 100 times better that the shuttle engines, we would need about ten railway tanker sized propellant tanks.

That doesn’t sound too bad, until you consider that we didn’t bring along any propellant to let us stop when we get to the other star system...or if we want to get there quicker than 9 centuries.

Once you add the desire to actually stop at your destination, or if you want to get there sooner, you’re back at the incredible supertanker situation again, even for our best conceivable rockets.

In conclusion, we’d really like to have a form of propulsion that doesn’t need any propellant! This implies the need to find some way to modify gravitational or inertial forces or to find some means to push against the very structure of spacetime itself.

The cold reality

The Space  Shuttle travels at about 5 kilometers/sec or 11,000 miles/hour very roughly. Saturn is 9.5 AU or 883 million miles distant, so we are talking about 80,000 hours or just over 9 years. But the Shuttle is obviously not equipped for such a journey.

Using the kinds of propulsion systems we have, and taking advantage of a 'gravitational slingshot' from Jupiter, we could probably get up to 150,000 miles per hour. The Galileo probe managed to get to about 106,000 miles per hour and currently holds the record for the fastest speed ever achieved by an artificial body.

The nearest star is Proxima Centauri at a distance of 4.2 light years. At a speed of 150,000 miles per hour, it would take about 17,900 years to reach this star. At that point, you would then have to figure out some way to loose a lot of your velocity, or you would fly right past this star into the depths of interstellar space.

Is antimatter real? and available?



Antimatter spacecraft like this one could some day shorten a trip to Mars from 11 months to one month.

Yes, Antimatter is real, we've observed it, and even created it. But, right now it would cost about One-Hundred-Billion dollars to create one milligram of antimatter. One milligram is way beyond what is needed for research purposes, but that amount would be needed for large scale applications. To be commercially viable, this price would have to drop by about a factor of Ten-Thousand.

And what about using antimatter for power generation? - not promising.

It costs far more energy to create antimatter than the energy one could get back from an antimatter reaction. Right now standard nuclear reactors, which take advantage of the decay of radioactive substances, are far more promising as power generating technology than antimatter. Something to keep in mind, too, is that antimatter reactions - where antimatter and normal matter collide and release energy, require the same safety precautions as needed with nuclear reactions.

light sails.



Light sails are another possibility. Rather than use rockets, why not use light. When light strikes an object, it pushes on it ever so slightly. Use lots of light over a very large area, and the forces get noticeable. That is the idea here. Robert Forward proposed using a 10-million-gigawatt laser to shine through a thousand kilometer Fresnel lens onto a thousand kilometer sail. With these numbers, it is claimed that one could send a thousand-ton vehicle with crew to our nearest star in 10 years!

What’s the catch? That 10-million-gigawatt laser. That power level is ten thousand times more than the power used on all the Earth today.

So, Forward revised the concept to more reasonable power levels. This time it only has a 10-gigawatt microwave laser (still a feat unto itself), and this time the vehicle is a frail 16 grams of fine wires spread over just one kilometer. The sail has all its sensors and stuff built right into its array of wires.

This and similar concepts are still under investigation. Significant advances are still required, however, before we can create such systems and before we have a sufficiently robust space program that could put them in space.

The bottomline.

So, the bottom line is at this moment in time we have no Warp Drive. It's just an unproven theory. As you have read we do have some promising designs on the drawing board that could make travel to other stars possible for humans. But those trips are a far cry from arriving at numerous destinations in days, or hours as seen on Star Trek.

Only one StarShip desig has stood the test of time. The Orion Project.

The basic Orion design: Helix-shaped containers house hydrogen bombs, to be ejected through a hole in its pusher plate. A project to explore the feasibility of building a nuclear-pulse rocket powered by nuclear fission. It was carried out by physicist Theodore Taylor and others over a seven-year period, beginning in 1958, with United States Air Force support. The propulsion system advocated for the Orion spacecraft was based on an idea first put forward by Stanislaw Ulam and Cornelius Everett in a classified paper in 1955. Ulam and Everett suggested releasing atomic bombs behind a spacecraft, followed by disks made of solid propellant. The bombs would explode, vaporizing the material of the disks and converting it into hot plasma. As this plasma rushed out in all directions, some of it would catch up with the spacecraft, impinge upon a pusher plate, and so drive the vehicle forward.



These ideas come from the British interplanetary Society, and the U.S. And there is much talk of it being revived. So maybe just maybe Orion could kick start the evolutionary path that could lead us to the stars, and see us embarking on a true Star Trek



david1
Member
# Posted: 1 Oct 2004 02:14
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well to travel in space ... i think ... way before we develope that technology ... we have to land on our own moon first ... because there is another technology which is lacking ... and that is a technology to protect the ship from insterstaller/solar radiation ...

as for if we've every landed on the moon ... 2007 ... we will know when the japaneese probe takes a close up look at the moon ... then nasa will have explaining to do ... or the consipiracy theroasists :D

anth
Member
# Posted: 1 Oct 2004 14:28
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David.

We have the technology to shield us against this radiation both galactic and solar. Several metres of lead would do it. Problem is our primitive rockets cost so much to deliver a pound of cargo into orbit we could never hope to keep anything on budget by launching that amount of weight. So we'll have to be innovative and invent something to shield us in the mean time.

As it stands an atronaut could just about complete a Mars mission and stay  just inside the NASA career recommended radiation dose. But only just.

A moon base would probably largely be underground, using natural resources to shield us. Perhaps robotic missions to the Moon could construct this, together with short duration manned Lunar excursions. I hope we do soon have a Moon base. The far side of the Moon would be a wonderful place for an optical space telescope or radio telescope.

As for the Apollo landing sites, there's also a private company launching a probe to the Moon, with high res images of the Apollo sites high up on its agenda for imaging. This is another reason why it's total rubbish to suggest NASA faked these landings, they would never be short sighted enough to believe nobody would ever go to the Moon in the future and discover their hoax.

And anyway The Apollo Moon landings are predicted in that Bible code.  :P  So it must be true.

anth
Member
# Posted: 7 Oct 2004 03:45
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Do we have anything like Commander Data, Tricorders, or even Droids!?



Both Robots and computer technology are i feel the one type of technology featured in Trek that's well on track to deliver what we see on our screens, or even surpass that of StarFleet by the time we get to the time frames of the Trek shows. And both are being used to a great extent already in our real present day space program.

As i type this the twin Mars rovers are still working hard on another world. Robotics have allowed us to explore the cosmos since the dawn of the space age. And the fact that the Mars rovers continue to operate in extreme conditions well past their warranty period is proof that this science is improving all the time.


( NASA's Mars rovers are still exploring the Martian wilderness.)

I'll be showing just a few examples here of the technology literaly just around the corner, within a year or so infact that resembles what some might call the Sci-Fi vision of Star Trek.

A present day space ship engineers best friend...And much more!



Astronauts onboard the International space station ( ISS ) recently requested a 'tricorder'-like capability," referring to the portable device that landing parties on Star Trek would use to survey the atmospheres of alien planets.


(Star Treks own PSA.)

NASA  took things a step further and said we can give you a 'tricorder' by all means and a personal digital assistant in one! ... And make it autonomous,".

It looks like something straight out of a Star Wars movie. And to hear it described -- a self-propelled, floating, talking, computerized personal assistant with artificial intelligence -- you might suspect it really is a "droid" from a science fiction movie or something which Starfleet would commision.



The similarity to a science fiction design isn't a coincidence. It was actually inspired by the small floating sphere that Luke Skywalker sparred against in the original Star Wars!

The idea may have its roots in science fiction, but this droid is quickly becoming a reality at NASA's Ames Research Center.

Soon these little robots, called "Personal Satellite Assistants" (or PSAs for short), may be flying on board the space shuttle and living in the International Space Station (ISS). They will help the crew save valuable time by assisting with routine chores. And they could be lifesavers when emergencies arise.

To watch a Quicktime video animation of a PSA droid click below.
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/images/PSA/psa4.mov

The PSA, about the size of a softball, will move independently in the weightless confines of orbiting space vehicles, serving as an extra eye, ear and nose for space crews and ground teams.

The PSA will be equipped with a variety of sensors to check environmental conditions in a space vehicle such as the temperature, air pressure and the amount of oxygen, carbon dioxide and bacterial growth.

The robot will be controlled in several ways. "When the crew is interacting with it, they will give it directions or goals, and the PSA will execute those commands," said Yuri Gawdiak, principal researcher for the project at the Ames center in Moffett Field, California.

The PSA Droid will be onboard the Space Station sometime around 2005-06 if all goes well.

Meet The Robonaut.



The next generation of spacewalkers could fix faulty satellites and space stations without breaking a sweat, needing a meal or expecting a paycheck. Already the first one, a metal humanoid known as Robonaut, has developed an impressive level of dexterity.

Resembling a centurion, the prototype is a big leap ahead in attempts to develop robots for use in space, according to NASA. Within a few years, similar Robonauts could work outside the confines of a spacecraft, performing routine maintenance alongside astronauts.

"We've made some pretty significant steps forward. Previous ones were larger and not as dexterous as current ones," said Chris Culbert, chief of robotics systems at NASA's Johnson Space Center in Houston.

Predecessors suffered from problems with bulk. But Robonaut has slimmed down to the size of an astronaut in a spacesuit, the ideal size for working with equipment designed over the decades for human-sized users.

Robonaut possesses flexible and sophisticated arms and hands, complete with five fingers, a sturdy torso and a head equipped with two color cameras for stereoscopic eyes. A skin made of woven material similar to spacesuit fabric protects vulnerable areas against radiation and the extreme temperature variations of space.


The likeness between Robonaut
and 'Star Wars' bounty hunter
Boba Fett is strictly a
coincidence, NASA said


More flexible than humans

In some ways, Robonaut exhibits more flexibility than humans. Its wrists can rotate more, for example. It can grip power tools and tether ropes, but its strength does not yet match that of its biological cousins.

"If you'd thumb wrestle Robonaut now, you'd win. In a couple years from now, that probably won't be true," Culbert said.

The design of Robonaut's crude nervous system, a web of sensors, software and circuits, was borrowed from human anatomy. Engineers concentrated most of the controls and command structures in a mechanical backbone.

"There's no brain in the head because it's limited in size. It pretty much all goes in the torso. We don't have to worry about a digestive system."

Such robots would complement astronauts, not replace them. During spacewalks now, astronauts devote as much as one-third of their time to tasks like installing foot restraints and laying out tools, routine jobs that a robot could perform, Culbert said.

Controlled in virtual reality



Robonaut lacks the critical and creative intelligence necessary to handle complex tasks and unpredictable obstacles that often crop up in orbit.

"They can't think on the fly like humans," Culbert said.

But Robonaut he has plenty of mechanical moves, controlled by a human with virtual reality eyes and hands. In a demonstration, cameras in Robonaut's head beam visual information to eyeglasses worn by a NASA technician, who directs the robot's arms and fingers by moving gloves wired with sensors.

The system "gives a human the impression he's in the robot," Culbert said.

Sporting an epoxy helmet inspired by centurion armor, Robonaut resembles Boba Fett, an interstellar bounty hunter in the Star Wars movie series. NASA said the likeness is purely coincidental.

"We didn't intend for it to look like Boba Fett," Culbert said. "We took it from a generic head model. We haven't contacted George Lucas to see how he feels about it yet."

Exploring new worlds.



ASIMO from the Honda company in Japan is probably the best looking, most human acting robot around. Infact when you see him walk it could be an astronaut in a suit that you're seeing.

The advantages of such a human looking robot are simular to the previously featured Robonaut. He's designed to use tools and elements of the space station and those of the Hubble telescope that were designed for humans to use.  Why bother re-designing everything to accomadate certain designs of robots when we can design a robot to use those already in use and available.

If robots like ASIMO work on future manned Moon bases or Mars bases they will no doubt drive the same rover vehicles, or use the same tools that we will. So, eye sensors in the right place, arms, hands, and legs will be needed.

To wrap it all up.

OK, we dont yet have computers like those on the Enterprise. But if computer technology holds its present course projections suggest we'll have better ones by the time we arrive in the 23rd century. Robots too are well on course. Our robotic space explorers may not yet have embarked on a "Star Trek" but they are involved right now in an ongoing Planet quest. And robots will shortly be working along side humans in space.

The familiar Sci-Fi scenario of human space travellers becoming friends and companions to a helpful robot i believe is just around the corner. I mean, if you we're onboard the International Space Station, working alone with just the little Droid seen above with artificial inteligence  for company, wouldnt you start thinking fondly of it while you're away from family and friends?

And Commander Data may still be a hopeful "holy grail" of present day robotic experts, but don't forget he is too in Star Trek, he's the product of a miraculous breakthrough by Dr Soong. One that's not yet been reproduced by others. And that's how it works. We're progressing well with this technology right now. And the evolution of it will one day bring about the great leap to Androids.

I'm pleased to say that this whole area is very accurate within Star Trek. Or even perhaps the Trek and Sci-Fi vision may turn out to be quite conservative regarding robots and space travel.

darth_alus
Member
# Posted: 11 Oct 2004 09:45
Reply 


Star Trek is not the most real sci-fi ever but it is entertaining..and thats all that matters, right?
If we want a documentary then we can watch a documentary channel.
However i would like to add my view.
The ships themselves are quite accurate, but i have never ever been fond of the aliens. They are far to humanoid for my liking.
I have always thought that real Aliens would be beyond our imagination. The limitations of our laws and science would be nothing to them. But in Star Trek they always seemed to resemble humans.
Am i rong?

jadzia_jones1
Member
# Posted: 11 Oct 2004 10:42
Reply 


No your not wrong i don't think.. just as u say.. its a TV series.. and we want something we can relate to.. I much prefer Worf as a klingon the way he is..rather say.. a 2 ft blue slimy thingy .. dribbling gunk out of what ever *l*.. and slurps when he talks..

I think its something in us.. where not so frightened of things we can relate with.. like humanoid aliens..I would rather see a klingon or an Andorian coming at me..than something i cant even fathom.. in reality..

I expect aliens are nothing like us humans..  but i would like to think that we have something in common

* Jadzia *



darth_alus
Member
# Posted: 11 Oct 2004 11:03
Reply 


Exactly my point. Spot on.
We can grow attached to humanoid aliens...and often in my case grow more attached to them then the human characters.
Because it is nice to see a lovable alien, or a strong a powerful one. And since these are usally humanoid aliens we can almost imagine what it would be like to be one of those aliens. They have the same emotions etc etc.
However..take the Xenomorphs(From the movie Alien and Aliens) for example..how many of us can relate to one of them as opposed to Chewbakka?

jadzia_jones1
Member
# Posted: 11 Oct 2004 11:55
Reply 


Yes that's true.. but that predator is a right ugly breast verrrry scary.. but in the end he proved to have a heart ( aliens V predator ) where as the ' tribbles' are cute but a right pain in the butt *l*

Don't know if they have the same emotions as us .. valcuns are cold and hard and have no emotions.. and the Borg.? nasty.. the Jem Hadar are nothing to write home about ..I could go on..

But then again all us 'earthlings' are different and some are down right nasty

* Jadzia *

darth_alus
Member
# Posted: 11 Oct 2004 12:45
Reply 


Nasty? Oh you just described me! :k  :D
Well you have just mentioned some of the most vile aliens in the universe but i could just as easily mention many nice aliens..or atleast humanlike aliens such as E.T, Chewbakka, the creatures on Endor(dont know their names!;), Yoda, and countless aliens from Star Trek.
See this was a brilliant topic! An endless debate!

anth
Member
# Posted: 12 Oct 2004 02:25
Reply 


<!--QuoteBegin--darth_alus+Oct. 11 2004,09:45--></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td><b>Quote</b> (darth_alus @ Oct. 11 2004,09:45)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"><!--QuoteEBegin-->Star Trek is not the most real sci-fi ever but it is entertaining..and thats all that matters, right?<br>If we want a documentary then we can watch a documentary channel.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--><br>Quite true. Star Trek should not be a substitute for a factual documentary. Nor should a documentary be a replacement for for Sci-Fi.<br><br>Sci-Fi fills us with wonder, and generates a curiousity that has been a spark to many a journey into real space endevours. It's also of course, just damn good fun and the best entertainment around, wether it be on TV, in the cinema, in novels, comics, or a computer game.<br><br>I'm not here to say if it's not real its garbage. I'm both a keen astronomer and a huge Sci-Fi fan. Basicaly the Space forum at OTF pretty much is here to bridge the gap between the Sci-Fi connections of Trek and Star Wars. It's a window to allow us to track mankinds exploits in space and apply them to the shows we love.<br><br>Many of us would like to feel Star Trek may be a blue print for the future. And the forum here is a way of monitoring that blue print.<br><br>Thanks Jadz and Darth, you make some excellent points.  <!--emo&:)--><img src="http://www.outpost10f.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/smi.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':)'><!--endemo--> <br><br>The subject of aliens is one i was very much looking forward to covering. And to discuss with others is great.<br><br>People who say there's nothing out there, we're alone, are just not thinking. They can have no concept of just how big the universe is. Or even our galaxy. With over 200 billion stars in our galaxy, 99% of which surely have worlds orbiting them. A large percentage should have life. But, no way could we prepare ourselves for just how exotic that life may be. Just look at life forms on Earth that have evolved in unusual locotions. Blind fish, and mammals, and lifeforms in the deep ocean which look like sci-fi visions! All those unusual creatures exist in our own familiar biosphere too.<br><br>Star Treks aliens are probably too humanoid yes. But as has been well pointed out so far that is largely for storytelling purposes. Although this issue was addressed in an episode of TNG when it was revealed that an ancient race with a "humanoid" shape had seeded the galaxy with its DNA. And Klingons, Romulans, Cardassians, and Humans we're all born of that common material.<br><br>The big questions are why have we not been invaded by Borg type aliens? or visited by friendly races around the galaxy? Is the fact we have not had our eyes opened to a Trek style community of alien races proof that there are none?

darth_alus
Member
# Posted: 12 Oct 2004 08:01
Reply 


I am truly speechless...you just summed it all up anth. I would just like to add that i have always been a fan of any decent sci-fi movie. And i was completely blown away with Star Wars when i first saw it and i have watched almost all the Star Trek series (save Enterprise) So when i say it lacks in realisim it is not ment to an insult but a general comment.
Anth:Happy to contribute ;)

voyman
Member
# Posted: 25 Oct 2004 09:08
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<!--QuoteBegin--anth+Oct. 12 2004,02:25--></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td><b>Quote</b> (anth @ Oct. 12 2004,02:25)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"><!--QuoteEBegin-->Many of us would like to feel Star Trek may be a blue print for the future.<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--><br>I think you may not be too farr off the mark with that.  In at least TOS and TNG (series where Gene Roddenberry was running things), he was giving us a blueprint for the future.<br><br>But he was also giving us something else.  A blueprint for society.  In nearly (I say nearly because I haven't seen them all) every episode he's challanged some social belief.  Now it's not everybodys belief, but the belief held by the masses.  He challanged racial hatred, he challanged what he thought to be the failings of society.  And in my opinion he was right.  He challanged us, through the series, to make ourself a better person.<br><br>In First Contact, Picard mentioned that they don't use money anymore, and it's all done in the spirit of exploration.  This ideal society.  One where people work because they want to.  Because they want to challange themselves.<br><br>Granted, todays society would never be able to achieve the breakthroughs required for Gene's blueprint of the future untill they work on Gene's blueprint for society.<br><br>I hope this made sone sense at all. <br><br><!--EDIT|voyman|Oct. 25 2004,09:11-->

anth
Member
# Posted: 25 Oct 2004 16:47
Reply 


Voyman,

You have hit the nail on the head.

The two have to go hand in hand. We have some awesome tools already to explore and even colonise space. Money is a big factor in hampering exploration. All this talk of Bush iniating a new era of space exploration is not backed up with a fraction of what is currantly being spent on weapons and the military. And even new proposals for a replacement shuttle have to be Ok'ed by the airforce for possible use by them.

We are certainly nowhere near being ready to go forth into space and do deeds "for all mankind". China requested to be part of the international manned space community. But the U.S said no, your technology is too primitive. A country that is willing and has vision has been forced to re-invent the wheel as far as space exploration goes due to politics.

The international space station project has been one long squabble from the start. And lets face it things down here on Earth are far from the Utopia that gene painted in his series.

The one bright spot is the divisions of the space community that deal with robotic/unmanned craft and probes. For some reason when humans are out of the exploration picture alot of squabbles and politics are left to one side. Space agencies seem to work together and many projects are multi national nowadays.

maybe one day all the wars, suspicion, and the upmanship in the world will stop. If that happens i believe the pieces of the Trek world will fall into place. If the money from government arms projects and "defence" can be utilized for space exploration and to better society then things will snowball and we can finally begin putting the innovations and brilliant technology we have even today into use.



anth
Member
# Posted: 27 Oct 2004 09:23
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Worm Holes. Are they real?



Although they may seem more the stuff of science fiction than science fact, physicists first dreamed up the idea of wormholes. In 1935, Albert Einstein and Nathan Rosen realized that general relativity allows the existence of “bridges,” originally called Einstein-Rosen bridges but now known as wormholes. These space-time tubes act as shortcuts connecting distant regions of space-time. By journeying through a wormhole, you could travel between the two regions faster than a beam of light would be able to if it moved through normal space-time. As with any mode of faster-than-light travel, wormholes offer the possibility of time travel.



Can this kind of intersteller short cut be possible?

But, a worm hole that could be used for us to travel through is constructed of one Black Hole, and one White Hole. Yes, a White Hole! The big problem is White Holes do not really exist away from the papers or equations of a few scientists and theorists. They are pure theory, unlike Black Holes which are observed phenomena. Some say they "could" exist. But it's not proven.

I've heard some say a Worm Hole is two black holes joined together forming a bridge between two regions of space. Black holes are real so.... so to must wormholes be real! In a vast universe surely two Black Holes must link together somewhere? But remember what a black hole is? It's a collapsed star so massive that its gravitational pull will not allow anything to escape, not even light. That's why they're black after all. So if you could enter one and begin this Worm Hole journey to another Black Hole somewhere else in the Universe how would you emerge from the one at the other end? Nothing could emerge. And nobody could ever imagine the forces at work insdie even the smallest Black Hole. That's why a Worm Hole consisting of Two Black Holes is a no no for us to travel through.


( Hubble snaps a Black Hole. You can't see the Hole just
the mass of dust and Star material being pulled in. )

Inside a Black Hole, aside from the huge ripping gravitational forces you'll have all the radiation sucked in from that region of space. So, if you by some impossible means escaped being ripped, stretched, and torn apart you'll be fried by galactic radiation and heat. So entering a Worm Hole is pretty much impossible. Very impossible infact!

If you could survive there's also the problem of time travel. You most certainly would be crossing the universe at huge velocity. And it's a proven fact of Einsteins theory of relativity that time dialation exists. Which means the faster you go time moves differently. Star ships in Star Trek travel almost 90,000 light-years when travelling through the Bajoran wormhole, from the Alpha Quadrant to the Gamma Quadrant. It would take a Federation starship almost 600 years to travel this distance at warp factor nine, but by passing through the wormhole, it takes mere minutes. So time dialation would certainly come into play. Einstiens theory involving this time dialation has been measured by placing an atomic clock onboard the Concord aircraft and leaving one on the ground. The two were out to each other. And also the Apollo astronauts had aged very slightly less during thier high speed trip to the Moon and then back to Earth than they would have if they'd stayed at home.

So, potentialy you could emerge from the other end of the Worm Hole before you left! This would of course cause huge problems for a working Starfleet organisation. Would you have older versions of yourself flying around and living a life if you came back? Possibly there would be multiple copies of yourself if you've made numerous Worm Hole trips. ( don't ask me to explain the time travel stuff, it does my head in. :P )

Also until recently, theorists believed that wormholes could exist for only an instant of time, and anyone trying to pass through would run into a singularity ( the heart of the Black Hole.) . But more recent calculations show that a truly advanced civilization might be able to make wormholes work. By using something physicists call “exotic matter,” which has a negative energy, the civilization could prevent a wormhole from collapsing on itself. The stuff of science fiction, to be sure. But perhaps some day in the far future, it could also turn into science fact. In Star Trek most wormholes are either naturally occurring or the result of dangerous warp drive malfunctions. Such wormholes tend to oscillate wildly across time and space, thus making them useless for normal interstellar commerce. The Bajoran Wormhole in Deep Space Nine was the only known stable wormhole in existence. Which suggests that even in the Trek era we do not pocess the technology to tame wormholes.

To sum up.

Any trip through a Black/White Hole Worm Hole would be one way. Remember there would be no escape from the black hole at the departure end for the return. Only with a White Hole at the other end. White Holes "pop" matter into the universe as opposed to sucking it up like Black Holes. So at the other end you'd have to formulate your Black Hole for entry and tie it to a White Hole at your home location. And take this theoretical exotic matter with you or gather to make the Worm Hole stable to get home.



In short. Don't hold your breath for Worm Holes to provide us with travel to distant stars. Unless maybe an ancient civilization has left some Stargate here millenia ago! Star Treks use of Worm Holes although not exactly real is working our imaginations. The shows do introduce us to real theories and that's great. We cannot rule out thier existance. But applying them to our life today or in the near future seems wild. Maybe in thousands of years we could harness the type of technology needed for such trips. You never know you may meet somebody tomorrow who has made one many thousands of years from now! *L*

anth
Member
# Posted: 9 Nov 2004 14:16
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Trek gets it right! With Deep Space Nine's Bajoran Solar Sailing ship.



The Bajoran light sail ship was a type of vessel used many centuries ago by spacefaring Bajorans. As early as the 16th century, these ships were regularly plying the spacelanes of the Bajor system. One such vessel was even able to traverse interstellar distances to arrive in the Cardassian system.

There were many different variants of this type of ship, from small pleasure yachts used by individuals for short excursions to the moons of Bajor, to large freight hauling models. They all had a basic design lineage, consisting of some sort of a crew or cargo section along with some sort of sailing device attached to it. The sails came in just as many different configurations as the ships themselves. Many of the smaller vessels, as pictured above, used sails that were mounted to the side of the ship. Other larger vessels used sails that were tethered to the front of the crew compartment, which would serve to pull the vessel.

Solar sail vessels work on the principle that light itself can exert a force on matter. Because this force is so small, large, highly reflective sails had to be used. And, as logic would dictate, the larger the craft, the larger the sails would have to be. Some of the large freight ships had sails that extended for kilometers.

In addition to the solar sails, most of these vessels usually had some form of auxiliary propulsion. This usually came in the form of small chemical thrusters that were used for both reaction control and for minor maneuvering. Some models, though, relied on gyroscopic stabilizers to move about their axiis, but they also usually featured some sort of maneuvering thruster system for those times when the solar sails were unusable.

Because the speed of light is finite, the solar sail ships were limited to it as well. In fact, most solar sail ships could not be expected to go much faster than 0.001c. But, as was found out forty years ago by Captain Benjamin Sisko, one solar sail vessel was able to break the light barrier.

Sometime in the 1500's, a solar sail vessel was passing through Bajor's Denorias Belt when it encountered a tachyon eddy. The superluminal tachyons hit the solar sails with such force that it was flung into warp speed. The vessel was then able to travel great distances, untill it stopped in the Cardassian system. According to Cardassian archeological records, the solar sail ship crashlanded on Cardassia. There has been no evidece, though as to the fate of its crew.

This information would not have been uncovered, though, if Capt. Sisko had not built a sailing vessel of his own and traced that perilous flight to Cardassia. The Cardassians had always dismissed the stories and myth and legend. But, once they were faced with the fact that Capt. Sisko's tiny vessel was sitting in their space, they knew that they had no choice but to admit the truth, and they even revealed the existance of the archaological dig that uncovered the original vessel on Cardassia Prime.

Quite soon we could easily follow Captain Sisko's journey closely, by sailing to Mars or even Jupiter.



The Reality of light sails.

The concept of "sailing" using the sun's rays was first devised nearly 400 years ago by astronomer Johannes Kepler, who noticed that comets' tails are blown by an apparent solar wind. He figured the same force could be harnessed to propel space vessels.

In fact, the solar sail designed by Friedman's group isn't exactly blown by solar winds. Unlike a breeze, which pushes the canvas of a traditional sail, light particles generate their force by striking the mirror-like surface of the ultra-thin sail and reflecting from it. This reflection creates a very tiny force (about the force of a postage stamp resting in your palm), but it is constant and, in the vacuum of space, can accelerate over weeks and months to reach velocities faster than any chemically fueled spacecraft to date.

To maximize the amount of energy taken from reflecting light photons, each of the eight blades of Cosmos 1's sail will span 47 feet. The sail, itself, however will be fairly flimsy and made of a Mylar material that's not much stronger than typical plastic wrap. Friedman isn't sure how long the sail will persist in its orbit, but he says even if it lasts just a half-hour he will consider the mission a success. Since it will be deployed in the cluttered environs of Earth's orbit, Friedman anticipates some minor damage to the sail, although it will be reinforced with rip-stop features.

NASA researchers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena have been working on their own space sail concept and had planned to launch a probe that would zip around the outer solar system using the force of solar particles.

JPL's craft would use a sail made of unusually thin, but strong, carbon fiber material. While about as thin as a piece of notebook paper, the carbon fiber could withstand intense heat from the sun and so could fly closer to the fireball for maximum propulsion. A flight test of the craft had been scheduled for 2007, but was indefinitely postponed due to a lack of funding, according to JPL's Sarah Gavit.

Sailing on a Beam



Other rocket scientists, meanwhile, are investigating a form of space sailing that wouldn't rely on energy from the sun. Robert Winglee of the University of Washington in Seattle says his concept could get people to Mars and back in an astounding 90 days (current technology would require about two-and-a-half years of travel to make the trip).

The new concept would deploy an intermediate space station that would beam a stream of plasma, or magnetized particles. The space station would use solar energy to generate the beam of magnetized particles from a nozzle about 100 feet wide. By capturing these particles in its sail, the spacecraft would be propelled as the particles bounce from its surface. Winglee estimates the system could propel a craft to spectacular speeds of about seven miles per second.

Winglee and his students are refining models for the idea with funding from NASA's Institute for Advanced Concepts.

"Standard chemical propulsion systems would require long missions to Mars," said Winglee. "What we're saying is you can put the power on a space station, lighten up the spacecraft and increase speed. This will give you major savings in cost."

Even though it might be the fastest idea out there, it's unlikely to play an immediate role in President Bush's mandate, announced last January, to launch manned missions to the moon and on to Mars. Despite the advantage in speed, the science.

One of the main challenges now, is making sure the sails unfurl without a hitch in space and can then be adequately manipulated by remote control. In a test three years ago, Friedman's group launched a suborbital version of Cosmos 1 that never managed to open its two-bladed sail. This time around, Friedman says he's more hopeful the test will work. But, he adds, there's still a lot of work ahead.

"It will take time," he said. "But in the long run I think sailing of some form will be what space exploration will look like. This is just the beginning.

Sci Fi style but Feasable technology is within our grasp

So, at last, Star Trek style space flight is a reality. I remember watching a Russian test flight of a light sail in space on video. So it truly is a reality. And these new designs look set to take us further. Maybe not all the way to Cardassia quite yet. But to our neighbouring worlds. And projections are that a light sail craft could deliver us to our nearest star Proxima Centuari within 10 years.

Light sails are i firmly believe the key to mankinds first intersteller journeys and those historic journeys to the planets withing our own solar system. And wouldnt it be ironic if the first journeys by humans to new worlds are carried out in sailing vessels?

Trek gets it right this time. And shows us our greatest leaps  may not require the technology or super engines of some sci fi visionaries. :)

darth_essex
Member
# Posted: 2 Feb 2005 21:53
Reply 


This reply is in reference to the earlier post about us being invaded or visited by aliens; Take a look around you, our planet is pretty far away from the rest of the galaxy, which brings up a freaky little thought, perhaps we are an endangered species. on this planet, what do we do with our own endangered animals? we place them in protective areas far from contact with possible danger.  And no contact from aliens? how do you know? they may very well be right around us observing us all the time. This much is certain, we are far to dangerous to be running amok. Look at the damage and violence we have brought to our own planet. Or is this our planet at all???

anth
Member
# Posted: 3 Feb 2005 05:08
Reply 


Darth Essex : That's a very good theory. We're certainly out on the edge of our galaxy.

That fact alone could explain why we've not been visited or had contact.

cowhunter
Member
# Posted: 3 Feb 2005 20:28
Reply 


Anth

Fascinating information. Thanks for your time and research.  I am often reminded by the technological wonders of our time that would be considered magic by the ancient peoples of a verse from the Bible, in regards to the Tower of Babel                                                                        

Genesis 11:6: And the Lord said, Behold the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do.

Who knows but if the Lord tarries that we may accomplish some of what  is theorized about today.



captaindanny
Member
# Posted: 21 Jul 2005 05:48
Reply 


well looking at our current space techno it could take milions off years before whe could even reach the next solar system :P :D :k  (i wanna travel trought space like the uss. voyager :o)

polson
Member
# Posted: 25 Jul 2005 21:33
Reply 


Star Trek is real, all of it. *nods*  So is Stargate.

Cowhunter...uh...I could entirely be wrong, but isn't the point of that passage, "Look!  humanity has united, they have come together, they are of one mind and purpose...and what they've decided to do is try to be GOD!" In other words...humanity is in a life long quest not to be accountable to anyone but itself, which is WHY our society is so NOT what Gene Roddenberry envisioned?

But you know, I could just be insane or something.

lythria_2005
Member
# Posted: 31 Aug 2006 06:46
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===THE LATEST NASA "WARP" THEORY===

Firstly, I do not know whether anyone has posted this, but I have just read it on the NASA site, and I thought it would be an interesting debate for the scientisit among us.

NASA have recently stated that atoms ARE NOT the smallest thing now known to man. They have admitted that ATOMS consist of a base "thing"...they are calling these things Quarkes. (It is higly unlikely they were named after Quarkles.)...

They have recently stated that they have yet another theory into faster-than-light travel, and how it is not a plausible idea at this point in our scientific understanding but they have stated that it IS POSSIBLE.

And it is possible due to our frindly Tachyon particles. You see, Tachyon particles do exist, They are nothing like our ST version, but they are there. NASA scientisits have stated that certain relationships between certain atoms are inexplicable, unless a particle that OPPERATES OUTSIDE THE RULES OF RELETIVITY is emplyed.

That's where our friendly Tachyon comes in. Tachyon's travel far faster than the speed of light, due to the fact that they opperate outside the rules of time and space. A Tachyon particle could appear right next to your head, and then, within a moment, reappear somewhere else in the timeline (future or past) in exactly the same spot. Now, wrap your head around this: there are an infinite number of moments in any given second, (that should give you some idea of how fast the little beggers are)...

Basically, NASA's "theroy" about these Tachyon particles existing, is not bullet proof, but highly probable none-the-less.

Anyway, on to the bit you're all waiting for...

In oreder to travel faster-than-light, NASA are saying you would have to do one of two things.

A - Create a piece of technology that turns you, and the ship you are in, into Tachyon particles, thus giving you the ability to enter "subspace" and reappear at any location in space OR time. The problem with this is the place in space/time travelled to CANNOT BE CONTROLLED and thus, you end up with what is called "THE GRANDFATHER PARADOX"...If you appear in the future, you do not exist, therefore you are destroyed. If you go to the past before you were born, you do not exist, therefore you are destroyed. If you appear at a time where you do exist, you either destroy your other self, thus destroying yourself, as you are from the future, and cannot exist if a past self did not exist, or you destroy yourself (this is due to the fact that you cannot have multiple versions of yourself occupying the same timeline).

All highly complex, I know...

B - You are, somehow, able to control the time factor of the Tachyon's you become, thus enabling you to stay in the same timeline, adn travel to any point in the Universe...but there is a problem. Tachyon's only move a small fraction, therefore, if you were to attempt to move to another point in space...you would basically have to "pull" space around you.
Imagine this. You give a large piece of material to four people. They are positioned in the corner. They are told that they have to get to the centre of the material but they are not allowed to move. What do you think they are going to do?...pull the centre towards them, thus ripping the cloth.
If multiple ships were to attempt faster-than-light travel, using the above "Tachyon Technology," they would basically rip space apart.
And nobody wants nasty holes in space.....

Anyway, that is the basic jist of this latest theory...

(PLEASE NOTE: ALL OF THE ABOVE HAS BEEN LABELED A THEORY BY NASA AND THUS HAS NOT BEEN PROOVEN, APART FROM USING OTHER THEORIES AND ESTABLISHEDSCIENTIFIC UNDERSTANDING....but that's not really "credible proof now, is it?)
This short rhyme should tell you how Tachyon's work.

There was a young women named Bright,
Who speed was far faster than light,
She went out one day,
In a relative way,
And returned on the previous night!

Anyway, I'd be interest to see what others think of this theory, some of the theories abou tTachyon's may be wrong, due to the fact that the information I found differed, such as the fact that some say Tachyon's can move more than fractionally, and some say they cannot...

cmdr_worf
Member
# Posted: 6 Nov 2006 01:33
Reply 


I have really enjoyed reading this informative and well thought out thread Anth, thanks for your time in researching all of this.
I am curious as to how a 'Solar-sail ship' would decelerate though? I have always been led to believe that if you apply thrust in a vacuum, the object will continue to move until thrust is applied in the opposite direction...
Also, do you know of any theories about the sling-shot round a star to travel through time? This is one Trek theory that has always seemed very odd to me!
Thanks.

Qapla'!

aeon
Member
# Posted: 6 Nov 2006 02:12
Reply 


<!--QuoteBegin--lythria_2005+Aug. 31 2006,06:46--></span><table border="0" align="center" width="95%" cellpadding="3" cellspacing="1"><tr><td><b>Quote</b> (lythria_2005 @ Aug. 31 2006,06:46)</td></tr><tr><td id="QUOTE"><!--QuoteEBegin-->NASA have recently stated that atoms ARE NOT the smallest thing now known to man. They have admitted that ATOMS consist of a base "thing"...they are calling these things Quarkes. (It is higly unlikely they were named after Quarkles.)...<!--QuoteEnd--></td></tr></table><span id='postcolor'><!--QuoteEEnd--><br>Subatomic physics ftw <!--emo&:D--><img src="http://www.outpost10f.com/iB_html/non-cgi/emoticons/haw.gif" border="0" valign="absmiddle" alt=':D'><!--endemo-->

anth
Member
# Posted: 6 Nov 2006 03:10
Reply 


cmdr_worf : Thanks for the comments. I keep meaning to re-visit this topic. I'll have to give some more subjects some thought for it. :)

They did not really show this in DS9. As it was not needed for their plot line. But, you're quite right. You would need to apply equal velocity from the opposite direction in order to stop. Fortunately you are in most cases heading for another Sun in an alien system.

Solar sail designs in the real world take this into consideration though. You would have no choice but to start slowing down early in order to stop at the place you're travelling to. For the sake of keeping things simple we'll say you begin slowing down at the half way point in your journey.

It's most likely you'd be heading for another star system. The principles which are pushing you away would begin slowing you down ( the light from a star in your destination star system ). As light begins to hit your sail from the alien star you would slow down. The closer you get to it, the stronger the destination stars light becomes.

This means we can't take the maximum speed reached, and use it to simply work out how long it would take to reach a star.


Cmdr worf makes a great point there. You would hit your maximum velocity, then for the second half of your journey you would have be slowing down.

They had this problem in real life with the Apollo Moon missions for example. It took several days to reach the Moon. The rockets used could have got them to the moon in a matter of hours.

However the moons gravity is so weak, and has no atmosphere to use other methods of slowing down like aero braking. Meaning the space craft would have to apply the same thrust used to make it move at the high speeds needed to get it to the moon in hours, in order to stop.

There was no way NASA could launch something big enough to fire rockets for a braking manouever like that on the Saturn 5 Moon rocket. Docking with a huge braking system rocket segment in Earth orbit would mean an extra launch and even more cost. Of course if they did scale up the moon vehicle, they would need more thrust to get it all moving, meaning more thrust needed to stop, and so on, and so on!

So, they did the most practical thing. They approached the Moon at a slow velocity. One which their small rockets could over come when braking.

This is why you can do sums which show Mars would be reached  in six months using Apollo technology. Some people mistakenly times the distance of Mars with how many days it took to reach the Moon. Getting a figure of 100's of days.

Mars is bigger, it has more mass than the Moon. It has a atmosphere, a technique called air braking can dip part of the space ship into Mars atmosphere and slow down. meaning you can approach Mars at higher speeds than they could the Moon.

This demonstrates it's the destination which dictates the journey time. If we use primitive rockets as we do now. Or even Solar Sails it would be the same.

If we take as an example a destination star system which has a very bright star, thousands of times brighter than our Sun. Then light from it will slow you down way before the half way point from Earth. Only when we approach a alien star system which has equal brightness to our sun will we hit maximum velocity at the half way point.

It occurs to me, that we could not visit any Star system with a smaller sun than we have using a Solar Sail method. Why? Because as Isaac newton said, every action has to have an opposite reaction. Meaning we need equal or greater light from a destination star to make us stop.

If we travel to a small star we would not be able to stop without modifying the ship in some way.



cmdr_worf
Member
# Posted: 21 Dec 2006 14:38
Reply 


Further to my difficulty in believing the sling-shot theory used in TOS for time travel, I found this interesting article....
http://www.mjyoung.net/time/stvoyage.html

anth
Member
# Posted: 28 Dec 2006 17:47
Reply 


Do we have a Holo Deck yet?



Holosuites are found on most stations and ships and are used for recreation and training. They are square rooms with a complex set of sensors, holographic generators, force field projectors, miniature tractor beams and micro transporters on all walls and the ceiling and floor. When in use most of the objects are holographic force fields covered by holograms, but key items are replicated and beamed into the room. Holosuites use safety overrides to protect the user.

Meanwhile, back on Earth, and firmly in reality....

We have the VirtuSphere platform. consisting of a large hollow sphere that sits on top of a base and allows the sphere to rotate 360 degrees. Wearing a wireless, head-mounted
display, users can step inside the sphere to fully interact in immersive virtual environments. The VirtuSphere enables 6 degrees of freedom – one can move in any direction; walk, jump, roll, crawl, run over virtually unlimited distances without
encountering real-world physical obstacles.







The "VirtuSphere" Is cutting edge virtual reality. It's the closest thing we have right now to a Star Trek holo deck. Sad isnt it!? *L*

I did get my hopes up when i found this...



But, when i clicked on the thumb nail, the "LIS Experimental holodeck room" didnt look quite so cool. Still, i want one! Just the thing for a cold miserable day in the UK! To have breakfast and look out on a tropical beach!

In reality, the LIS Holodeck, and the VirtuSphere are nothing like a holodeck, sorry to break that to you folks. Although i confidently expect virtual reality to improve many thousands of times over, just like all forms of computer releated hardware and software will. It does not and will not ever deliver the true holodeck experiance.

Holodecks, as you know use projections, which simulate depth of field, they trick your brain into believing you're in a truly vast 3d environment. Objects are conjured up via replicators, and transporter technology.

In trek a holodeck can put sand beneath your feet, immerse you in water, create warm breezes, in short, they can create any environment anywhere, they can recreate people, events, and places.

How long will it be before we have computers that will do that? Reassuringly if we project ( no pun intended! ) into the timeline of the Trek future, and use growth in computers over the last 20 years as a guide, we will have awesome machines, possibly capable of extremely sophisticated virtual reality. Then of course, there is the expected leap into Quantum Computing still to come. Which could multiply our progress a billion fold!

Maybe replicators will have been invented with the help of Quantum computers? lists of inanimate objects could be held on a hard drive and created from atoms by a computer, to recreate a room, or a beach! together with clever projection techniques. I believe that is quite possible.

I have trouble imagining realistic people in that real life holodeck tho, but if you take a look a CG effects right now, it's not hard to believe in hundreds of years you could go on a date with a projection of Marilyn Monroe! But, i think it would be just an image, and no interaction! Sorry guys. :P

What if they were real?

Something i've always thought of immediantly after the "A holodeck would be so amazing, i could...etc...etc" thought, is what would happen to the human race if everybody had a Trek type holodeck?

If the technology dropped into our laps right now, what do you imagine would happen?

I believe, and i'm not exaggerating here, it could possibly be the last invention ever invented.

Why do most of us work or try to better ourselves? To get the money to do things. What things? To see new places? get new things? Improve their life or the lifes of others around them? A holodeck removes the need for all that, and delivers it on a plate!

In many cases the need to explore, and journey to new places is removed too.

People get obsessed with the internet or video games right now. Imagine a holodeck addiction! How many people would happily live their perfect idea of a life inside their holodeck?

I really believe society would crumble. If we got that holodeck technology too soon. So, in my opinion, its probably best we wont have it or anything remotely like it for several hundred years! In that time, lets hope we as a species are ready for it.

I think our first step to a holodeck is not the Virtu Sphere, but the holographic TV.



The above image looks impressive. But when all is said and done, its a digital video projector poited at a bit of clear plastic!

The big breakthrough will be true 3d imagery. From the brief bit of research i've done. I would put real life true 3D holographic projections on a par with level of sophistication seen at the dawn of computer animation.



A big leap forward will be a Star Wars type holographic projection. But, even that is light years away from the Trek Holodeck.

So, to round up? I have to say, the Myth of the Holodeck? Confirmed? Busted? Or Plausible? ( Ooops, my favourite factual TV show creeping in there! :P )

I'd have to say, very plausable, by the time we get to the dates we're talking about in the Trek timeline.

If expected advances in computers are made that is. I'm not to sure about forcefield shrouded holograms letting you touch projections though. But, who knows!

I would be very interested if anybody would like to comment on this post, or if you've found some cool examples of virtual reality, or holodeck rooms working right now in real life. :)



cmdr_worf
Member
# Posted: 29 Dec 2006 12:37
Reply 


I agree with you Anth, with the pace of change in computer technology, it may be possible to have such virtual reality devices in the 24th century. I always find it interesting to look at technology of a hundred years ago, compare it to today's, and then predict what we might achieve in another hundred years time (Give or take a Roswell type incident that increases our knowledge overnight! :D)

I also agree with your interesting points about the social impact such a device would have if it were introduced now. On the positive side though, it would also rid the world of hunger and want. Which in turn would rid us of the need for war and class struggles. The ultimate downside to this is that it would remove the need to better ourselves through competition, which is the ultimate driving force behind evolution. This would result in Humans stagnating and possibly becoming extinct the way that Dodo's did when they weren't compelled to adapt and evolve.

Keep up the good work - I enjoy reading your contributions :)

anth
Member
# Posted: 30 Dec 2006 03:32
Reply 


Worf : Thanks. :)

I'm sure you're right, for a large percentage of the world the benefits would be amazing. I'm also sure the short term outcome would be a very happy period for mankind.

Slowly though, the pull of getting everything you ever wanted in your holodeck would overtake the need to study for years, or train for an important job, or to simply work hard all week to contribute to society.

Possibly though, there would be some positive outcomes, not everybody would be seduced by 24/7 fun, pleasure, or greed.

Many people enjoy their work or research, suddenly they could find themselves in a never before dreamed of lab, or work place, fully kitted out with instruments or tools needed to make their breakthroughs.

Those who could strike a balance would enjoy a standard of life which we cannot even comprehend right now. Others i'm sure will just lose themselves completely inside their little room.

polson
Member
# Posted: 30 Dec 2006 08:06
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Query, when did NASA figure out the quarks thing?  Maybe I just watch waaaaaaaay too much sci fi, but I already knew about quarks and have since, well a long time, I don't remember how long.

I don't remember getting taught about them in school but I vaguely recall reading about them in my research for random projects....


You know it's really funny how grudgingly scientists can sometimes admit what they've always held to be true is false, or how it's some big announcment "whoa, hold the phone everybody!  we do NOT have everything figured out!  We are so so so sorry for leading you all astray.  Now this here, this is the new truth.  We'll let you know next week when we change it."  There is so much mystery to life, so much more to examine and discover and it seems to me that scientists - and the people who listen to them, because for real, a scientist's job is to test hypothesis - wouldn't have such a defensive attitude towards new ways of looking at the universe.  Why do we teach in school "the smallest thing is an atom!" when any day we could discover quarks?  What now?  Quarks are the smallest thing?  What happens when we figure out what a quark is made of?  Why can't they just teach "We THINK that quarks are the smallest thing ever and at this point in time our technology and resources available to us cannot prove that there is anything smaller."  Seems to me that's just a little bit more truthful, and a little bit more credible.

But that's just one of my own personal rants about people who run around with science as the foundation of their lives with little regard for the fact that our science is constantly changing and there is no 100% truth in what we know today compared to what we will know tomorrow.  Except some people like a lack of stability, and to them I say, enjoy.

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