Question for all you physics/math wizards...
- Thread starter Ebannaw
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Considering that in real 3D space the energy required to propel an electron to the speed of light is greater than the entire energy output of the Milky Way... I'd say if you could somehow drop out of Supercruise (read beyond 3D universe) and still be at speeds over 1C you'd probably create the next Big Bang... or worse.
AFAIK, the usual defence of crazy speeds in SC is that it uses some sort of warp-drive based technology, which means you're not actually moving, space is just warping. Or at least, you're not actually moving at the speed you think you are. It raises an interesting question though. If you "warped" into a planet, might not the planet start to move along your warp trail with you?
EDIT: That would take so much energy, that your drive would fail to warp the space, presumably, and you'd "drop out" of SC, which one could argue is exactly what happens when you approach a celestial body.
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Velocity is just as important as mass. Give a marble enough energy and it could erase half the Earth. Of course, the super unlikely part is finding a way to put that much kinetic energy in a marble.
AFAIK, the usual defence of crazy speeds in SC is that it uses some sort of warp-drive based technology, which means you're not actually moving, space is just warping. Or at least, you're not actually moving at the speed you think you are. It raises an interesting question though. If you "warped" into a planet, might not the planet start to move along your warp trail with you?
With a Warp bubble big enough it could.. I belive Geordi LaForge was able to extend the warp field around a rogue planet/moon to correct its orbit once.
At those speeds mass matters little. If you took a penny and accelerated it to 5C and smashed it into a planet, that planet would cease to exist.
Ahhh Geordie. I miss you. I know recently the energy requirements for warp travel have been....revised! But I imagine something of that scale is beyond "if the mass of the milkway were converted into energy" levels.
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So that makes me wonder...
FSD tech seems to be the most powerful tech in the entire ED universe, and even lil cute sideys have one.
Wouldn't someone have weaponized this technology, and perhaps used it to destroy planets, stars, GALAXIES?!
Yes, quite possibly. In fact, I half-wrote/started a sci-fi story of my own a few years ago, and I proposed that various propulsion technologies could be weaponised. One could argue a rocket is just a weaponised rocket engine though.
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So that makes me wonder...
FSD tech seems to be the most powerful tech in the entire ED universe, and even lil cute sideys have one.
Wouldn't someone have weaponized this technology, and perhaps used it to destroy planets, stars, GALAXIES?!
At first glance, it doesn't seem like FSD is employing vast amounts of energy to do its work. The variances in power plants are small enough to suggest that FSD is not that energy intensive and, therfore, not that dangerous.
So that makes me wonder...
FSD tech seems to be the most powerful tech in the entire ED universe, and even lil cute sideys have one.
Wouldn't someone have weaponized this technology, and perhaps used it to destroy planets, stars, GALAXIES?!
Remembering that all this is made out of handwavium I think the FSD's theory is inherently safe because of the energy requirement to shift an object into a higher dimension. The process is directly tied to the object's mass and of course when you deal with mass you're automatically talking about gravity. If you think as gravity as an extension of the object's mass accomplished through waves you can see why the warp bubble would disrupt itself once it comes into contact with a greater opposite force (planet or interdiction overload). In a way Newton applies there which is pretty cool, and that is why in the scanner you see the planet's gravity well almost as a series of waves. FD really caught the spirit of this.
The best part is under Acubierre's theory it should work... we just aren't there yet with research and development.
If we took account of relativity an infinite amount of energy and like someone else said possibly a big bang.
If we stick to Newtonian mechanics approximately 18x10^21 Joules assuming you are doing 1c. Enough to wipe out a planet given that the Hiroshima bomb released 63x10^12 Joules.
If we stick to Newtonian mechanics approximately 18x10^21 Joules assuming you are doing 1c. Enough to wipe out a planet given that the Hiroshima bomb released 63x10^12 Joules.
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Lots of chatter on something like this is good to see. Just wait until the people who really understand this stuff come along.
Ok I think I answered it. Anyone feel free to correct my calculations.
Kinetic energy is half of mass by velocity squared.
Energy is [[mass (kg’s)] x [[velocity (meter per second)] squared]]/2
So a stock vulture is 347 tons fully fueled. 347, 000 Kg’s
The speed of light 299,792,458 meters a second.
So at 50c in your example you are travelling 14,989,622,900 meters a second.
Squared is 224,688,794,684,204,410,000 and then by 347,000
This gives you 77,967,011,755,418,930,270,000,000 and then divide by 2
39 Trillion Trillion joules roughly. 39 ‘yottajuoles’
The largest man made nuclear explosion was 210 Petajoules
I yottajoule is a billion petajoules.
so you would yield about 185 million more times than that.
You double the speed it gives you 4 times the energy. Half the speed it’s ¼ the energy.
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Velocity is way more important than mass. You double the mass you double the damage. you double the velocity you quadruple the damage.
Kinetic energy is half of mass by velocity squared.
Energy is [[mass (kg’s)] x [[velocity (meter per second)] squared]]/2
So a stock vulture is 347 tons fully fueled. 347, 000 Kg’s
The speed of light 299,792,458 meters a second.
So at 50c in your example you are travelling 14,989,622,900 meters a second.
Squared is 224,688,794,684,204,410,000 and then by 347,000
This gives you 77,967,011,755,418,930,270,000,000 and then divide by 2
39 Trillion Trillion joules roughly. 39 ‘yottajuoles’
The largest man made nuclear explosion was 210 Petajoules
I yottajoule is a billion petajoules.
so you would yield about 185 million more times than that.
You double the speed it gives you 4 times the energy. Half the speed it’s ¼ the energy.
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Velocity is way more important than mass. You double the mass you double the damage. you double the velocity you quadruple the damage.
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Instant annihilation of you and the planet.
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Just the explosion of your Vulture hitting ground at the speed you would cruise around in normal space. That's the nice thing about FSD technology. You never travel faster than light, you just reduce the distance (you shift the space frame) that is needed to travel the distance. The faster than light speeds that are indicated in the HUD are just the relative speeds you would travel if you weren't shifting the space frame.
Well that's a curious question but worthy of further thought.
First of all, I'm not quite sure of what mechanism the FSD uses to propel a craft past C. Undoubtedly it is not a conventional drive of any sorts. HOWEVER, if you look at the back of the starships in elite you will see nacelles which do seem to suggest they are propellant drives. Still, the way e=mc^2 works, and the limited amount of fuel the ships carry, they most assuredly aren't using conventional methods to accelerate to C.
Now, since they go beyond C, it is impossible for them to be utilizing conventional drives. So... what do they use? This is a mystery. But it is IMPORTANT.
Why?
Well, different methods to achieve "speeds" beyond C (they aren't really speeds at this point since it is non-conventional locomotion and would require a big discussion on general relativity, special relativity, m-theory, brane theory and more) will require different amounts of power, and likewise, these methods would also determine your level of interactivity with the ED universe's space-time. We already know FSD space violates C with information transfer of object placement (i.e. ships 500 light seconds away are reported instantly) so frankly the likelihood of some higher-dimensional rift being used is more likely than not. And, if this were the case, the energy wouldn't exactly be bound to the lower plane either--it might even be completely irrelevant.
What does this mean?
Well, it means it is hard to say just how much energy would be released. There's not enough information available to be sure. Since I've deducted as much as I can above, it really is the only honest answer.
You asked for a nerd response--there you go.
I've spent years studying physics btw, I'm not making any of that up.
Mass means nothing. Speed is what does the real damage. For example, I take a bullet, I walk over to you and throw the bullet as hard as I can off you. Chances are it'll give you a bruise at the most, certainly not enough to kill you.
Now I put that bullet in a gun, the gun can give the bullet way more energy ( speed) than I could with my hand. I shoot you with the bullet, chances are you are dead or dying. The bullet did way more damage to you this time due completely to the fact that it was going faster, that it had more energy.
I could gave way more examples, some less graphic than others. Nevertheless, the more energy you can give something, the more damage it will do.
Back to the question, if you drop out of supercruise while going 100c, chances are your ship will vapourise as it returns to normal space time and it may even rip open the fabric of space in the area , possibly destroying the planet indirectly.
Strange things happen when you bend the laws of physics.
the math wouldn't make sense since it takes an infinite amount of energy to accelerate beyond c relatively.
So how does SC work? The only way it can work is if your ship is not moving faster than light at all relatively (probably not moving faster than normal thrust can propel you).
Since it's purposely vague in how this stuff "works" i would assume the mechanism requires a certain amount of empty space around your ship to work ...hence the gravity/mass lock issues etc. So your ship's computer drops you out while you are safely able to still enter SC and avoid the obstacle. If it didn't you would be forced out as whatever magic lets you SC fails ....leaving you probably somewhat deep in mass lock territory and you would have to normal thrust for a very very long time likely. That is if the mechanism doesn't cause ship destruction / etc when dropping to normal space within a dense gas / matter.
Debating how SC works is kind of pointless though. It's first and foremost function is gameplay oriented. Not concerned with being realistic at all. so trying to figure out what would happen realistically based off something that has no basis in reality or even science fiction is going to go no where.
But if you want to understand how high velocity and kinetic energy scales... read up on damage to satellites and space stations caused by paint flecks the size of a grain of sand moving at not even a fraction of light.
So how does SC work? The only way it can work is if your ship is not moving faster than light at all relatively (probably not moving faster than normal thrust can propel you).
Since it's purposely vague in how this stuff "works" i would assume the mechanism requires a certain amount of empty space around your ship to work ...hence the gravity/mass lock issues etc. So your ship's computer drops you out while you are safely able to still enter SC and avoid the obstacle. If it didn't you would be forced out as whatever magic lets you SC fails ....leaving you probably somewhat deep in mass lock territory and you would have to normal thrust for a very very long time likely. That is if the mechanism doesn't cause ship destruction / etc when dropping to normal space within a dense gas / matter.
Debating how SC works is kind of pointless though. It's first and foremost function is gameplay oriented. Not concerned with being realistic at all. so trying to figure out what would happen realistically based off something that has no basis in reality or even science fiction is going to go no where.
But if you want to understand how high velocity and kinetic energy scales... read up on damage to satellites and space stations caused by paint flecks the size of a grain of sand moving at not even a fraction of light.