Warp Drive article on the Discovery website

[Nyrath]

Re: Warp Drive article on the Discovery website

 

You explanation looks good to me. With the exception of the twin paradox.

 

Explanation of the Twin Paradox to follow. Those who don't care can skip the rest of this post.

 

One twin being older is due to simple relativistic time dilation.

 

The Twin Paradox is due to the fact that since Relativity says that everything is relative (i.e., there are no preferred frames), you can say that the rocket left Earth then came back, OR you can say that the rocket stayed stationary while the Earth and the entire universe move away then came back.

 

If you take the first view, the twin on the rocket should be younger. If you take the second view, the twin on Earth should be younger. They cannot both be younger than each other, so it is a paradox.

 

The paradox is resolved when you take acceleration into account.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_paradox

[Zeropoint]

Re: Warp Drive article on the Discovery website

 

It gets worse. If Cliff sees two events, separated in space happening at the same time, i.e. simultaneously, Sam and Diane will both agree that the events are NOT simultaneous. They will disagree, however, on which happened first.

 

This isn't a question of not seeing things correctly--all three observers are correct. Simultaneity is relative.

[Dr. Anomaly]

Re: Warp Drive article on the Discovery website

 

The paradox is resolved when you take acceleration into account.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Twin_paradox

Yup. Acceleration is what makes the difference.

 

Acceleration establishes a frame of reference.