Loozer
Rear Admiral
I've been doing a little research concerning the differences in aspects in common Scifi and actual reality, here are a few, I would like some feedback on other details, if anyone can list any more, that would be great.
1. Sounds in space Most of space is a hard vacumn, with a molecule or two of hydrogen floating around in every cubic meter, not nearly enought to transmit sound. Every sound in the movies, from photon torpedoes and laser beams to exploding starships,would never happen in real life. For that matter you'd never see laser beams in space either, since in a vacuum there's no medium to reveal them.
2. Faster than-light travel Warp drives and hyperspace are very useful in science fiction, but there's one catch. According to Einstein, the speed of light isn't just a good idea, it's the law. Nothing can go faster than the speed of light in a vacuum(that's about 186,000 miles per second). Even inching toward the speed of light is difficult, immense energy is required to get to even a fraction of the speed of light,and the closer you get, the more energy is required. The amount of energy you'd need is infinite. So just tossing in a few dilithium crystals into the warp drives isn't going to make it happen.
There are loopholes in our understanding of physics that make faster-than-light travel theoretically possible. For example, it's theoretically possible to create a "bubble" of space that breaks itself off from other space and moves faster than light relative to that space (all the while everything inside both"spaces" moves no faster than the speed of light). This is known as an Alcubierre Warp Bubble. The catch (there had to be one) is that these bubbles require the exisitence of exotic matter that has negative energy, and wouldn't you know, there's not really any lying around, and it's not clear that any actually exists.
3. Laser Bolts you can dodge Let's review a fundamental fact of light (which is what lasers are):It travels at 186,000 miles per second. So the idea of ducking before the laser hits you is just plain silly. Not to mention, of course, the idea of a laser bolt being visible as a streak that has a beginning a middle and an end. Most "laser beams" in science fiction movies travel slower than bullets do today. Let's see Obi-Wan whip his lightsaber around fast enough to stop the spray from a Mac-10 (and let's not even begin to talk about all the things wrong with a sword made of light.)
4. Time Travel The same relativistic principles that keep us from going faster than light also keep us from traveling backward in time. It's possible to slow down time, the closer you get to the speed of light, the slower time moves for you relative to your original frame of reference but to get the clock spinning in the other direction would require you to go faster than light. Again, there are theoretical loopholes that could allow it, wormholes, actually which are "tunnels" in the fabric of space-time that could possibly allow travel back in time. But once again, keeping these wormholes open would require exotic matter with negative energy. Which we do not know really exists.
These are just a few. Can anyone else think of any, they would like to post?
1. Sounds in space Most of space is a hard vacumn, with a molecule or two of hydrogen floating around in every cubic meter, not nearly enought to transmit sound. Every sound in the movies, from photon torpedoes and laser beams to exploding starships,would never happen in real life. For that matter you'd never see laser beams in space either, since in a vacuum there's no medium to reveal them.
2. Faster than-light travel Warp drives and hyperspace are very useful in science fiction, but there's one catch. According to Einstein, the speed of light isn't just a good idea, it's the law. Nothing can go faster than the speed of light in a vacuum(that's about 186,000 miles per second). Even inching toward the speed of light is difficult, immense energy is required to get to even a fraction of the speed of light,and the closer you get, the more energy is required. The amount of energy you'd need is infinite. So just tossing in a few dilithium crystals into the warp drives isn't going to make it happen.
There are loopholes in our understanding of physics that make faster-than-light travel theoretically possible. For example, it's theoretically possible to create a "bubble" of space that breaks itself off from other space and moves faster than light relative to that space (all the while everything inside both"spaces" moves no faster than the speed of light). This is known as an Alcubierre Warp Bubble. The catch (there had to be one) is that these bubbles require the exisitence of exotic matter that has negative energy, and wouldn't you know, there's not really any lying around, and it's not clear that any actually exists.
3. Laser Bolts you can dodge Let's review a fundamental fact of light (which is what lasers are):It travels at 186,000 miles per second. So the idea of ducking before the laser hits you is just plain silly. Not to mention, of course, the idea of a laser bolt being visible as a streak that has a beginning a middle and an end. Most "laser beams" in science fiction movies travel slower than bullets do today. Let's see Obi-Wan whip his lightsaber around fast enough to stop the spray from a Mac-10 (and let's not even begin to talk about all the things wrong with a sword made of light.)
4. Time Travel The same relativistic principles that keep us from going faster than light also keep us from traveling backward in time. It's possible to slow down time, the closer you get to the speed of light, the slower time moves for you relative to your original frame of reference but to get the clock spinning in the other direction would require you to go faster than light. Again, there are theoretical loopholes that could allow it, wormholes, actually which are "tunnels" in the fabric of space-time that could possibly allow travel back in time. But once again, keeping these wormholes open would require exotic matter with negative energy. Which we do not know really exists.
These are just a few. Can anyone else think of any, they would like to post?