Posted on 06/18/2016 6:21:05 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
Love this “doesn’t defy this law.”
Maybe something comes out that will cause these “laws” to have to be rewritten, or maybe thrown out entirely.
They make it sound like as long as it doesn’t defy a law, it’s allowed.
Laws are for little particles.
The physics as we understand them are as defined by our understanding. Things may change...be prepared as I always say ...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5WYUNHeftrM&index=15&list=RDDJZYdlBwgCU
...the EM drive uses electromagnetic waves as fuel...Perhaps I missed it -- What produces the electromagnetic waves? I didn't see that stated in the article.
“Alpha Centauri, in just 92 years”
Only 92 years? What would they do if they got there and there were no habitable planets?
I assume that would be electricity generated by solar panels or a nuclear reactor.
I read Arthur C. Clarke's story in Boys Life in 1964!
"Sunjammer" is a science fiction short story by Arthur C. Clarke, originally published in 1963, and included in the March 1964 issue of Boys' Life.
(from Wikipedia)
History of conceptP> Johannes Kepler observed that comet tails point away from the Sun and suggested that the Sun caused the effect. In a letter to Galileo in 1610, he wrote, "Provide ships or sails adapted to the heavenly breezes, and there will be some who will brave even that void." He might have had the comet tail phenomenon in mind when he wrote those words, although his publications on comet tails came several years later.[3]
James Clerk Maxwell, in 1861–64, published his theory of electromagnetic fields and radiation, which shows that light has momentum and thus can exert pressure on objects. Maxwell's equations provide the theoretical foundation for sailing with light pressure. So by 1864, the physics community and beyond knew sunlight carried momentum that would exert a pressure on objects.
Jules Verne, in From the Earth to the Moon,[4] published in 1865, wrote "there will some day appear velocities far greater than these [of the planets and the projectile], of which light or electricity will probably be the mechanical agent ... we shall one day travel to the moon, the planets, and the stars."[5] This is possibly the first published recognition that light could move ships through space.
Pyotr Lebedev was first to successfully demonstrate light pressure, which he did in 1899 with a torsional balance;[6] Ernest Nichols and Gordon Hull conducted a similar independent experiment in 1901 using a Nichols radiometer.[7]
Albert Einstein provided a different formalism by his recognizing the equivalence of mass and energy. He simply wrote p = E/c as the relationship between the momentum, the energy, and the speed of light.
Svante Arrhenius predicted in 1908 the possibility of solar radiation pressure distributing life spores across interstellar distances, providing one means to explain the concept of panspermia. He apparently was the first scientist to state that light could move objects between stars.[8]
Friedrich Zander (Tsander) published a technical paper in 1925 that included technical analysis of solar sailing. Zander wrote of "using tremendous mirrors of very thin sheets" and "using the pressure of sunlight to attain cosmic velocities".[9]
Konstantin Tsiolkovsky first proposed using the pressure of sunlight to propel spacecraft through space and suggested, "using tremendous mirrors of very thin sheets to utilize the pressure of sunlight to attain cosmic velocities".[10]
JBS Haldane speculated in 1927 about the invention of tubular spaceships that would take humanity to space and how "wings of metallic foil of a square kilometre or more in area are spread out to catch the Sun's radiation pressure".[11]
J.D. Bernal wrote in 1929, "A form of space sailing might be developed which used the repulsive effect of the Sun's rays instead of wind. A space vessel spreading its large, metallic wings, acres in extent, to the full, might be blown to the limit of Neptune's orbit. Then, to increase its speed, it would tack, close-hauled, down the gravitational field, spreading full sail again as it rushed past the Sun."[12]
The first formal technology and design effort for a solar sail began in 1976 at Jet Propulsion Laboratory for a proposed mission to rendezvous with Halley's Comet.[2]
Come back?
a tiny effect with no practical applications, if that
I’m pretty sure the novel “Planet of the Apes” opens with a couple out cruising in their spacecraft almost getting into trouble utilizing a solar sail. Haven’t read it since the early 1970s.
If the trip is 92 years, I am thinking you are not coming back.
Cool, a photon drive!
Now when they can eliminate the Romleons with a photon Torpedo I’ll be impressed.
It actually shinnies up gravitational waves like a rope-climber. :-]
Oh goody...the first guy postulates what is essentially a maser and wants to claim some work product from the internal cavity.....yawn....delusion is hard to knock down
Even if you had enough fuel, good luck finding Earth.
First designed by British scientist Roger Shawyer back in 1999, the EM drive uses electromagnetic waves as fuel, and creates thrust by bouncing those microwaves back and forth within a metal cavity to trigger motion. According to Shawyer's calculations, that could produce enough thrust to blast humans to Mars in just 70 days, and potentially even help us reach the next star system, Alpha Centauri, in just 92 years, all without the need for heavy, expensive rocket fuel. ... the EM drive doesn't use any fuel propellants, and so it doesn't have an exhaust, and so... it can't produce thrust. Even though it does... a potential solution, from physicists at the COMSOL company, the University of Helsinki, and the University of Jyväskylä in Finland... the EM drive doesn't actually defy Newton's third law, because it does produce exhaust... more specifically, photons that have become paired up with another out-of-phase photon in order to shoot out of the metal cavity and produce thrust... because photons need to become paired up in order to escape the fuel cavity, so that the two photons in those pairs are out of phase, which means they completely cancel each other out and have no net electromagnetic field.So, while I was thinking all this over, a clown car pulled up, and a midget in a raggedy andy wig jumped out, set up stepladder, and another midget dressed just like him climbed up the ladder and smashed a pie in my face.
A wasted two centuries.
Yeah, I cannot find my keys most days.
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