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What is possible in Star Trek scientifically.

The size of the TOS communicators could be rationalized by the power source taking up much of it, while the circuitry takes little room, to allow the device to transmit/receive over such extended distances without a support network.

An iPad being able to be reconfigurable may be just a matter of software. Then it would be very much like a PADD. An iTouch may be even closer at least in terms of size.

Carrier sized starships could only be rationalized by relatively easy access to energy to propel and support such constructs. Otherwise your starships likely shouldn't be as large. I also think we would see more automation than what Trek usually shows.
 
I also think we would see more automation than what Trek usually shows.

Well, you don't need people for almost anything a Starship does. Exploration certainly does NOT require people - our space probes and rovers have proved that.

Then again, no one actually needs to climb Mt. Everest - we could build, if we so desired, a ski lift of some variety to carry visitors to the top of Mt. Everest. But doing so would defeat the purpose of challenging oneself by the climb.

I think the best justification for there being so many specialists on a Starship is that a fair number of people would not be satisfied with a utopian (cashless?) society in which they merely read books or hung out in a holodeck all day.

People want to see things first hand and they want to be challenged. And this is why a Starship (arguably) relies upon people for so many of its functions (it allows us to feel useful - and we aren't content to look at snapshots sent back by probes).
 
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Manned deep space travel will happen if it becomes feasible for us to go.

If we could have:
- extended human lifespan
- human hibernation
- fast relativistic travel

...then we could have manned starflight.

But the scenario I see out of this would span hundreds and perhaps thousands of years of humanity seeded on far flung stars. You wouldn't see Federations and Empires like in Trek.
 
If the theory of particle entanglement can ever be exploited for practical purposes I think it could have far reaching consequences. It's remotely possible you could have an instantaneous communication system from it. If so then instantaneously communicating across light-years in realtime could happen.

Could tachyons (if they exist) ever be used to transmit information? If so then you'd have another version of FTL communication.

These are cases of there's no proof that such things do not or cannot exist...yet.

Or I ain't got a freakin' clue what I'm talking about. :lol:

Manned FTL is a whole other issue and one I think would require something truly revolutionary in regard to physics.

Well, I don't know much about it myself, but here is what I've gathered...

The problem with quantum entanglement is that even though the effect appears to be instantaneous (there are some physicists who hold out for old-fashioned hidden variables), one cannot (according to what I've read) use those instantaneous effects to communicate information that would result in a causality violation at the level of relativity theory.

Basically, you know that if a particle is "spun up", that its sister particle will be found to be "spun down", but you can't control which way it will go, so you couldn't send a message using spin measurements.

But particles can be entangled not only with regards to their spin, but also with regards to their momentum (which includes position via Heisenberg uncertainty) and energy.

The most successful entanglement is made through 'parametric down conversion' - a photon enters a nonlinear optical crystal and two entangled (regarding spin/energy/mometum) photons of lower energy come out.


Yes, one cannot choose which spin/momentum/energy a measured particle will have.

But one can choose either to measure a particle (let's say, 1) or not to measure it (let's say, 0).

In the case of spin, one cannot differentiate between a fuzzy (non-measured) and a measured particle which is why one can only transmit noise aka useless information via this method.
But in the case of momemtum, one can differentiate between measured and fuzzy particles with a standard double-slit experiment - fuzzy particles would create an interference pattern, measured particles (with 'fixed' position), only a difraction pattern.

Meaning, in theory, one should be able to send 1s and 0s - useful information - instantaneously.

I heard John Cramer works on an experiment along those lines; however, he's been at it for years with no published anything - is this due just to the insufficiency of current experimental apparatus or is there an as yet undiscoverred effect that prevents instantaneous communication via entanglement?
 
But particles can be entangled not only with regards to their spin, but also with regards to their momentum (which includes position via Heisenberg uncertainty) and energy.

The most successful entanglement is made through 'parametric down conversion' - a photon enters a nonlinear optical crystal and two entangled (regarding spin/energy/mometum) photons of lower energy come out.


Yes, one cannot choose which spin/momentum/energy a measured particle will have.

But one can choose either to measure a particle (let's say, 1) or not to measure it (let's say, 0).

In the case of spin, one cannot differentiate between a fuzzy (non-measured) and a measured particle which is why one can only transmit noise aka useless information via this method.

But in the case of momemtum, one can differentiate between measured and fuzzy particles with a standard double-slit experiment - fuzzy particles would create an interference pattern, measured particles (with 'fixed' position), only a difraction pattern.

Meaning, in theory, one should be able to send 1s and 0s - useful information - instantaneously.

I heard John Cramer works on an experiment along those lines; however, he's been at it for years with no published anything - is this due just to the insufficiency of current experimental apparatus or is there an as yet undiscoverred effect that prevents instantaneous communication via entanglement?
I am not a quantum physicist, so I can't speak with any special claim to authority.

The books and articles I have read indicate that you cannot, in principle, send useful information via quantum entanglement.

That one cannot do so is basis for the truce between quantum physics and relativity theory - basically, "You can ask, but nature won't tell." The theoretical and actual experimental set-ups I have heard of indicate that mother nature always seems to know if you've peeked and will smudge out any useful data. If one could send information faster than light, this would set the stage for causality violations according to relativity theory (i.e., changing the past).

Of late, however, I have heard reports of experiments which (or which purport to show the possibility of being able to) glean information from these particles.

The import of all this, if it is right, would be earth-shaking.

It may be the case, for example, that there really is a preferred frame of reference lurking in the background somewhere - if so, sending information FTL would not result in causal violations.

More radically, we may getting close to proving that the universe admits of causal paradoxes. Just being able to send a message to the past is enough.
 
The size of the TOS communicators could be rationalized by the power source taking up much of it, while the circuitry takes little room, to allow the device to transmit/receive over such extended distances without a support network.
In Mirror Mirror, Kirk indicated that all the communicators possess a subspace transmitter, this might be the reason that they're larger than a modern cellphone.

Well, you don't need people for almost anything a Starship does. Exploration certainly does NOT require people - our space probes and rovers have proved that.
The Apollo Eleven landing, as it turned out, was going to be onto a field of large boulders, Neil Armstrong shut the autopilot computer completely off and landed the spacecraft using solely his eyes and hands.The Mars Opportunity rover was stuck once in soft soil for 40 days, an astronaut with a shovel on the mission could have dug it out. The Mars Spirit rover had it's right front wheel jam, necessitating driving the rover backwards from that point on, again a human on-scene likely could have fixed the problem. The Galileo space probe's high gain antenna failed to completely open after launch, easy fix for a Human mechanic, the resulting Jupiter mission was severely restricted.

If anything NASA has shown just how much People are needed.

:):)
 
The Apollo Eleven landing, as it turned out, was going to be onto a field of large boulders, Neil Armstrong shut the autopilot computer completely off and landed the spacecraft using solely his eyes and hands.The Mars Opportunity rover was stuck once in soft soil for 40 days, an astronaut with a shovel on the mission could have dug it out. The Mars Spirit rover had it's right front wheel jam, necessitating driving the rover backwards from that point on, again a human on-scene likely could have fixed the problem. The Galileo space probe's high gain antenna failed to completely open after launch, easy fix for a Human mechanic, the resulting Jupiter mission was severely restricted.

If anything NASA has shown just how much People are needed.

:):)

That's the spirit!

I still disagree though, in part, because in the future we should have even better probes and rovers.

Even so, the most amazing astro-science at the end of the 20th century was done by unmanned machines. Voyager, Casinni, Venera, the Hubble telescope (a short list), for example, provided us with amazing data, that for the most part, we could not have accessed with manned flights. And these were our first fledgling attempts.

America's next generation of jet fighters is projected to be unmanned, because we are now at a stage where you don't need to have a pilot.

And don't forget the danger and impracticalities of manned flight.

The degradation of the body in zero g.

Perpetual cosmic background radiation.

Food, water, air, heat needs which require more space, more system redundancy, more energy, and severely constrict how far you can go. We are STILL getting data from the Voyager probes.

Cabin fever. How would you like to be trapped in a capsule for a few years?


No, when we go - it won't be because we really have to but because we really want to.

Standing on the moon is a much more inspiring even in human history than simply looking at video postcards from Voyager.
 
I think our best hope for most of this stuff is via technology transfer from a visit by a race of advanced, benevolent aliens.
 
A lot of SF in television and film tends to be behind the ball by several years compared to the ideas explored in SF literature. There are a lot of ideas presented in SF lit that are founded on reasonable theory and even current research. Sometimes we get an inkling of it in TV and film.

The biggest things Trek gets wrong (in light of our current understanding) are also the most prominent.

FTL starflight - I'm still hesitant to totally rule this out because there is the ever so small window of possibility to it. A lot of things would have to happen for it to be realized. Yet even if it is I don't see this happening anytime soon. If at all then it could likely be hundreds to thousands of years away. And without FTL there are no interstellar Federations and Empires.
Teleportation - Again it's a very small window of possibility, but one I suspect even less likely than FTL. It could be conceivable that something might be teleported, but likely not a living organism, particularly a complex one like a human being. Trek sidesteps the issue that what is likely happening is that the original is being destroyed and a copy being constructed on the other end. So effectively anyone stepping into a transporter is being killed and replaced by a duplicate. And so you have to recreate that person's consciousness as well as body and mind.
Abundant habitable worlds - Personally I believe there are Earth like habitable worlds in the galaxy, but I suspect they're relatively few and remote from each other. Consequently Trek's abundance of humanoid life is highly improbable to next to zero. I think there is alien intelligence in the galaxy, but it isn't anywhere nearby. And that intelligence isn't likely to be humanoid. A scarcity of Earth like worlds and alien races in reasonably close proximity also contributes to the unlikelihood of interstellar governments or cooperatives.
Subspace radio - This is something that I think has a somewhat more likelihood of being developed. Not necessarily subspace, but some form of very fast communication system.
Alien hybrids - I think Spock and other Trek hybrids are extremely unlikely. How likely is it that human body biology would be compatible enough with alien biology to allow for a hybrid even with genetic engineering?
Artificial gravity - Call me an optimist, but I'm not ready to rule this one out yet. I think it's remotely possible that sometime down the road artificial gravity and/or gravity manipulation of some form will be possible and without resorting to centrifugal force.
Holodeck - Holograms are a fact, but interacting with them as seen in contemporary Trek is something else which I think unlikely. I think a more likely scenario is a holographic facility in conjunction with virtual reality and connecting to you through some manner of interface, some lightweight eye wear and possibly body suit to physically experience what you're seeing. You could possibly interact with other people simultaneously. I think the gaming industry (as well as the military) are incrementally moving toward this. Current interactive gaming, simulations, and physical interaction like the Wii systems are the earliest and rather crude forms of what is to come. It's also possible that one day the brain can be interfaced with sophisticated systems to direct and/or influence dreaming.
Consciousness transference - I think transferring a consciousness (or swapping them) from one person to another strays into the realm of the supernatural. But...copying someone's consciousness and memories and placing that somewhere else such as an artificial body or storage might not be so crazy.
 
Holodeck - Holograms are a fact, but interacting with them as seen in contemporary Trek is something else which I think unlikely. I think a more likely scenario is a holographic facility in conjunction with virtual reality and connecting to you through some manner of interface, some lightweight eye wear and possibly body suit to physically experience what you're seeing. You could possibly interact with other people simultaneously. I think the gaming industry (as well as the military) are incrementally moving toward this. Current interactive gaming, simulations, and physical interaction like the Wii systems are the earliest and rather crude forms of what is to come. It's also possible that one day the brain can be interfaced with sophisticated systems to direct and/or influence dreaming.

I read a recent article describing the use of ultrasonic waves to make a hologram of water drops 'tangible'.
 
Holodeck - Holograms are a fact, but interacting with them as seen in contemporary Trek is something else which I think unlikely. I think a more likely scenario is a holographic facility in conjunction with virtual reality and connecting to you through some manner of interface, some lightweight eye wear and possibly body suit to physically experience what you're seeing. You could possibly interact with other people simultaneously. I think the gaming industry (as well as the military) are incrementally moving toward this. Current interactive gaming, simulations, and physical interaction like the Wii systems are the earliest and rather crude forms of what is to come. It's also possible that one day the brain can be interfaced with sophisticated systems to direct and/or influence dreaming.

I read a recent article describing the use of ultrasonic waves to make a hologram of water drops 'tangible'.
At one of the biomedical engineering conferences, I saw an amazing demo of a BMI that allowed an imobile person's EEG signals to do all sorts of things, such as manipulate computer programs. I wonder if the reverse will ever be realized: ie, send signals to the brain to influence perception. They already have implantable mini computers in the brain to stop people sufferring from tremor diseases from shaking.

Of course, the brain remains one of the most poorly understood organs.
 
It's important to distinguish between the general idea and how it was accomplished. There might be ways for instantaneous transport without dematerializing and rematerializing an object. We might discover a quite novel way to do a lot of the things depicted. So far we've recreated a lot of magic from ancient stories with technology, we'll probably do the same with a lot of the things we see in Star Trek. And we probably won't be to able to guess which ones, nor how.

Faster than light travel – highly unlikely. Current theories don't say that FTL travel is impossible. They just say that an object having a velocity bigger or equal to lightspeed is impossible and requires infinite energy. The velocity of objects travelling in a warp field or through a wormhole doesn't exceed lightspeed. No current laws of physics broken there. Well, the second law of thermodynamics and causality will be broken, but only to the extend that with the introduction of wormholes we no longer have a system where they apply globally (not to mention that both are currently tested only at locally anyway).

If faster than light travel is possible then so is time travel, and since I think time travel is impossible, so is faster than light travel.

Time travel – highly unlikely. Like FTL travel, it doesn't violate any physical laws. However, the possibility of time travel would carry many implications that are a bit too large to assume that it is likely. It would imply that time isn't linear, that the past still exists at some form and you can look into it or go there. It also creates a numerous paradoxes. They are easily resolvable but the problem is that all resolutions are insane.

Faster than light communication – same as above. With a note, quantum entanglement doesn't allow faster than light communication, and is unlikely to ever will, and if you do you'd have to rewrite the entire quantum mechanics.

Communicators – parts already here, parts highly unlikely. They include FTL communication, and that part is impossible. Sending signals that can reach everyone on the entire planet seems unlikely, but with a power source big enough and sending a directed signal after the initial handshake it might work. But they will likely be illegal and/or dangerous, and they'll interfere with each other if too many people have
them. Also, current low frequency transceivers that are good approach for handling this problem, and they need big antennas.

Tricorder – parts already here, the interesting parts highly unlikely. Well, it's just a computer that makes passive and active scans. We already have those, and we'll improve them. The problem is that they find information that simply isn't there and isn't acquirable. You can't detect a person walking behind a wall for all that I know, even with an active scan. You can't go that much further than what you can see with your eyes. The part that they can interface with any computing device and do crazy stuff is also impossible.

Medical tricorder/scanners – yes. Fortunately, some wavelengths pass through human tissue, so these are entirely possible. We just need a few advances in artificial intelligence.

Interactive computers – unlikely. We will probably develop the technology, but this is an incredibly inefficient and uncomfortable interface. It just won't fly. It might work for pocket computers, though. By the way, artificial intelligence is very far from achieving that kind of sophistication. I even think that it's going in the wrong direction. I don't except the technology in less than 50-100 years.

Androids
– of course. We'll have real androids as soon as we get real artificial intelligence. And we'll have androids as intelligent as my ex in 10-20 years.

Phasers
– well, laser weapons, yes. Won't be anything like their TV counterpart, but they will be here. They just need nuclear energy cells or something. I imagine them firing an invisible and silent but lethal laser beam. You just press a button on a device, and magically a person on the other side of the street gets a huge injury.

I don't know about the stun setting, and if that one is possible, but you can certainly cause the target 1st degree burns if you wanted. That might cause them enough pain to stop them them from whatever they were doing. It would be dangerous to the eyes, though.

Sonic disruptors – as a device that knocks you on the ground, yes. As a device that kills, I hope not.

Transporters – highly unlikely. We might be able to do something similar with single particles very soon. However, transporting entire objects separating them from their environment is a task so big that I can't even think about it.

However, while we are rewriting the laws of quantum mechanics for the FTL communication above, we might find other ways to do it. You just have to make the atoms think that they are where you want to transport them, and they will be there. Or you might create a mini wormhole and make the body fall through it. Or you might change the notions of the geometry of space and go around the wall of a completely enclosed space.

Forcefields – likely, but probably not as they are shown.

Suspended animation – yes. But I have a feeling that the process will be too intrusive for the body, and people are unlikely to want to go ahead with it.

Mating between different species not from the same family – no.

Artificial gravity – we already have it. But it's a bit expensive and requires massive spacecrafts. Now, if you can create gravitational radiation, you might have a direct approach. I find this not very likely, but not impossible either.

Holodecks – yes. Different technology, of course. I think that neural interface will be the common way, but normal holograms would also exist. They might be able to interact with objects, too.

Tractor beams, holograms that can touch you – no and yes. Unlikely in the form they were shown, but you can create technology that exerts forces on objects and you might use it to construct something that works similar in some of the situations. But the nature of the objects is important. You might have medical holograms, but they can only utilize equipment designed for the use of a hologram. No holographic lungs, though.

Accessing minds through technology - unfortunately, yes. It's only a matter of time. But you won't be able to read them like a book. Brains allow only active access. Like smart cards, it would be hard to read them if the card doesn't cooperate.

Using neural interface to control computers, implants, artificial libs and stuff
– yes. We can already control our own limbs which are a kind of machines. So we can use construct other machines that we can control too. And the brain is very clever at interfacing with anything. But you might have to do it at early age.

Universal translator – yes, no and no. Translating, yes. Learning languages automatically, yes. Seamless translation, no. Learning almost any language automatically without external aid, no. Doing it in a blink of an eye, no. And everyone who needs to understand the foreign languages will have to carry them.
 
The notion causality violations rule out endruns around special relativity forget that special relativity means before and after can be different for observers. Causality violations in the same reference frame are certainly not accepted by relativity but some interpretations of quantum mechanics seem to accept something very like them. However, "FTL"/time travel are indeed as yet theoretically possible. I would submit they are practical impossibilities.

One thing in Trek I think is impossible is the sensors they use in space. They are extracting information that just isn't there. It's the same problem that rules out the Universal Translator.

There does not seem to be any justication, even handwaving the engineering, for force fields as seen in Trek.

Space war, borders in space, such are bilge.
 
One thing in Trek I think is impossible is the sensors they use in space. They are extracting information that just isn't there. It's the same problem that rules out the Universal Translator.
A Universal Translator borders on magical science. For a translator to work it would need some common frames of reference. It would need to recognize something to even get started and it would take time to work. A fast acting translator would only work if the languages were already programmed into it.

Scanning for life signs isn't so easy to write off as long as it's defined what you are scanning for. Trek sensors also seem to work at FTL speeds and so that ties in with signals being able to travel at FTL. If that could be made to work than certain sensing functions might be possible.
 
Lol, reading this thread for some reason brings to my mind "cavemen" trying to explain the future uses of fire. While I don't fully buy into Kurzeil's "singularity" playing out as soon or as magical as he paints it, I do think that after a certain point of time in the future it's pretty pointless for us to guess what will and will not be possible.
 
Well, we've gotten as far as we have because there is an understanding of the principles of physics, chemistry, and biology. Prior to the 20th century, we were much closer to the Stone Age in terms of technological understanding.

Using the same principles of physics, we can deduce a lot of things correctly. And the energy coefficient required in high speed space travel is huge. You can't get around this fact. Not only do you need tremendous energy to get going, you need that same amount to stop. And if you want to do it expeditiously (meaning a few days rather than several years to reach cruising speed), you MUST have inertial dampeners or else everybody turns to jelly at the far wall. That requires a huge amount of energy as well. And then there's artificial gravity so everybody can do their tasks with greater ease (we're designed to operate in a gravity environment), which also requires energy. It's a very energy costly thing, traveling at high speeds through space!

So, we're going to need a magnificent breakthrough in energy science. Something far more powerful than atomic energy. And quite frankly, at the rate things have been going, this is a very, VERY long way off. As YARN pointed out, the cost of technological innovations is getting much more expensive as time goes on. The rate of dramatic leaps of technological progress across the past century is starting to slow.

And even if we could travel at light speed... there are VERY few worlds within reach of 25 years having the possibility to sustain life. Beyond that, it goes into many hundreds of years to reach any planet that might sustain intelligent life.

That darned energy problem. If we don't solve it, we're stuck with planet Earth. And we must get VERY good at efficient living with a minimal footprint before we worry more about anything else... or it'll all be over for this current species at the top of the food chain.
 
By the way, I predict that genetic science will supersede artificial intelligence technology, probably pushing us toward modifying chimpanzees to do menial work for us (all the while enjoying the servitude) before we ever see androids filling this kind of role. A monkey won't cost very much to have (a pet that does chores) while an android would be much more expensive. Androids would probably be used in much higher technology functions, in limited numbers. So yes... "Beneath the Planet of the Apes" may have been more prophetic than many people ever thought (at least about apes working in servitude for human beings).
 
I disagree. I think most people would be much more apprehensive of the "slavery" aspect of using genetically enhanced monkeys. Just imagine the uproar from organizations like PETA if you even suggested this was possible.
 
Indeed. When it's time to railroad, you railroad.

If Einstein is right, there is no possible FTL railroad.

You might not be able to "push" an object with mass faster than light, but that doesn't mean we won't be able to effectively travel from point A to point B in less time than light would require to travel the distance.

Yes - general relativity allows for space warps or wormholes if you can generate negative pressure and have sufficient energy.

Quantum mechanics allows for FTL, too. For example, as per Heisenberg's uncertainty relation, one can't determine the position and the momentum of a particle with arbitrary precision on axis x, y, z.
Meaning, if on x axis you determine the momentum of a particle with sufficient precision (the measurement taking 5 seconds), the position of the particle will becaome 'fuzzy', uncertain on this axis, the particle simultaneously occupying positions stretching, let's say, a light year (yes - a quantum particle can occupy more than one position at the same time - it's called superposition) .
 
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