WEBVTT - Listener Questions 69 0:00:08.160 --> 0:00:11.280 Hey, Daniel, would you rather live in the Star Wars 0:00:11.520 --> 0:00:13.480 or Star Trek universe? 0:00:14.480 --> 0:00:16.239 Oh? Man, I'm not sure. 0:00:16.640 --> 0:00:18.680 I guess I'd prefer to live in the one that's 0:00:18.760 --> 0:00:21.760 more scientific, you know, that follows actual laws. 0:00:22.040 --> 0:00:25.400 I think they use more particle names in Star Trek. 0:00:26.520 --> 0:00:29.200 They might be made up. I know in Star Wars 0:00:29.360 --> 0:00:33.559 they use Midi Chlorians, which are definitely not made up. 0:00:33.760 --> 0:00:36.000 Yeah, but I think Star Wars leans on the little 0:00:36.000 --> 0:00:38.800 magic aspect a bit too much. I think Star Trek 0:00:38.920 --> 0:00:41.479 is trying to sound more scientific at least. 0:00:41.960 --> 0:00:46.120 I mean, isn't that basically our jobs, right? We're always 0:00:46.120 --> 0:00:48.000 trying to sound more scientific. 0:00:49.760 --> 0:00:51.600 I mean I do my best to sound like a 0:00:51.600 --> 0:00:53.240 physics professor. I hope it's working. 0:00:53.560 --> 0:00:56.480 I yeah, I think you had me fooled there for. 0:00:56.400 --> 0:00:58.920 A minute, you and all the listeners. 0:00:58.960 --> 0:01:01.560 I hope the big reveal. 0:01:17.240 --> 0:01:19.639 Hi, I'm Daniel, I'm a particle physicist and a professor 0:01:19.720 --> 0:01:20.600 at UC Irvine. 0:01:20.840 --> 0:01:22.479 Really really, I promise I am. 0:01:23.800 --> 0:01:26.640 I'm Katie Golden. I'm none of those things, but you know, 0:01:26.880 --> 0:01:30.880 I do have an animal biology podcast, and I'm interested 0:01:30.920 --> 0:01:32.679 in physics, or. 0:01:32.680 --> 0:01:34.679 At least you can make it sound like you are. 0:01:35.040 --> 0:01:37.000 That's so interesting, Daniel. 0:01:38.760 --> 0:01:42.480 And Welcome to the podcast Daniel and Jorge Explain the Universe, 0:01:42.520 --> 0:01:46.560 a production of iHeartRadio in which we sound interested in 0:01:46.600 --> 0:01:49.400 the big questions of the universe, because we really really 0:01:49.480 --> 0:01:52.840 are interested. We want to know how everything works, where 0:01:52.880 --> 0:01:55.320 it all came from, how it all comes together to 0:01:55.400 --> 0:02:00.400 create our amazing, glittering, beautiful, mysterious cosmos, and we want 0:02:00.400 --> 0:02:03.280 to make sure that everybody out there understands things as 0:02:03.320 --> 0:02:06.400 well as we do and as well as we don't. 0:02:06.880 --> 0:02:09.600 Thanks very much Katie for joining me on today's episode. 0:02:09.800 --> 0:02:14.320 I'm super excited. I love to hear people's questions because 0:02:14.400 --> 0:02:17.480 usually they are something that I am also curious about, 0:02:17.520 --> 0:02:19.360 and I also don't know the answer to. 0:02:20.639 --> 0:02:21.200 That's right. 0:02:21.280 --> 0:02:24.160 Many of our episodes are us explaining a concept in 0:02:24.160 --> 0:02:27.000 physics to you, but we don't want this podcast to 0:02:27.040 --> 0:02:29.640 be a one directional lecture. We want it to be 0:02:29.720 --> 0:02:33.120 a conversation. We want to know what you are wondering 0:02:33.160 --> 0:02:35.840 about when those ideas don't click in your mind. We 0:02:35.880 --> 0:02:38.799 want to hear from you so we can help you understand. 0:02:39.200 --> 0:02:41.359 So please, if you have questions, right to me to 0:02:41.600 --> 0:02:45.280 questions at Danielandjorge dot com. Everybody gets an answer from 0:02:45.280 --> 0:02:46.720 a real live physics professor. 0:02:46.880 --> 0:02:48.079 They really really do. 0:02:48.639 --> 0:02:51.400 And sometimes I hear a question from listeners, I think, well, 0:02:51.440 --> 0:02:54.120 I bet a lot of people ask this question, or 0:02:54.160 --> 0:02:56.680 a lot of people would appreciate the answer, or that 0:02:56.760 --> 0:02:58.960 one would be fun to joke with Katie about. So 0:02:59.080 --> 0:03:00.760 let's do it on the podcast. 0:03:01.160 --> 0:03:04.840 No physicists were harmed in the making of this Listener 0:03:04.960 --> 0:03:07.520 Questions episode. 0:03:06.960 --> 0:03:08.560 Not yet, but I'll keep you up to date. We'll 0:03:08.560 --> 0:03:09.400 see if that changes. 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:19.519 And so today on the podcast, we'll be answering Listener Questions, 0:03:19.760 --> 0:03:21.880 Episode number sixty nine. 0:03:22.520 --> 0:03:24.519 There's nothing funny about that number. 0:03:25.200 --> 0:03:28.800 Absolutely nothing. We have been counting down to Listener Question 0:03:28.960 --> 0:03:31.600 sixty nine ever since we've been doing Listener Questions and 0:03:31.639 --> 0:03:33.519 we realized we were going to get there. 0:03:33.800 --> 0:03:36.480 I get it. The six looks like a nine upside down. 0:03:36.560 --> 0:03:37.800 That's what's funny about it. 0:03:39.560 --> 0:03:41.840 Yeah, that's exactly what's funny about it. It reminds me a 0:03:41.880 --> 0:03:45.760 little bit of when comic Shoemaker Levy hit Jupiter. When 0:03:45.800 --> 0:03:47.800 it ran around the sun. The comment broke up into 0:03:47.880 --> 0:03:50.880 like twenty six pieces. So somebody in NASA was like, ooh, 0:03:51.160 --> 0:03:54.360 let's give the comet pieces names and we'll use letters 0:03:54.400 --> 0:03:56.560 because there's twenty six of them. So there was the 0:03:56.600 --> 0:03:59.680 A fragment, the B fragment, the C fragment, and then 0:03:59.760 --> 0:04:02.840 when the first piece hit Jupiter, they called it the 0:04:02.880 --> 0:04:05.040 A spot, and the next one when they hit they 0:04:05.040 --> 0:04:07.360 called it the B spot. And then when they got 0:04:07.400 --> 0:04:09.320 up to the F spot, they realized, uh oh, they 0:04:09.360 --> 0:04:11.560 had a problem with the next one because were they 0:04:11.600 --> 0:04:14.800 really going to write a scientific paper about Jupiter's G spot. 0:04:15.080 --> 0:04:18.440 I have no idea what you're talking about. That just 0:04:18.520 --> 0:04:21.400 sounds like numbers and words to me. 0:04:22.160 --> 0:04:24.159 So they ended up talking about the F spot and 0:04:24.160 --> 0:04:26.880 then the G impact site, and then the H spot. 0:04:27.000 --> 0:04:30.839 Somehow that sounds dirtier to me. I don't know impact 0:04:30.960 --> 0:04:31.960 site all right. 0:04:32.839 --> 0:04:35.279 Anyway, we've got to do our best to extract humor 0:04:35.360 --> 0:04:37.760 from science. But on today's episode, we are not just 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:39.840 making jokes about the number sixty nine. We were answering 0:04:39.920 --> 0:04:43.720 questions from listeners like you, and today's episode is discussion 0:04:43.760 --> 0:04:48.400 of a question from Dale from Washington. Here is Dale's question. 0:04:49.120 --> 0:04:52.400 Hello, Daniel and Jorge, This is Dale from Chattarroy, Washington. 0:04:52.960 --> 0:04:55.800 I was watching Star Trek the other day and it 0:04:55.839 --> 0:04:59.520 occurred to me that when the Enterprise D is cruising 0:04:59.760 --> 0:05:02.440 a speed of warp six and the stars were all 0:05:02.480 --> 0:05:05.880 speeding by, they maybe shouldn't have been able to see 0:05:05.920 --> 0:05:09.840 them due to blue shift. Would the light be shifted 0:05:10.240 --> 0:05:14.680 all the way into ultraviolet or maybe even X rays 0:05:14.920 --> 0:05:18.320 or even further down? Is that even possible at a 0:05:18.400 --> 0:05:22.320 large percentage of the speed of light? Anyways, thanks for 0:05:22.400 --> 0:05:23.400 listening to my question. 0:05:24.320 --> 0:05:26.200 All right, Katie, are you a Star Trek fan? Have 0:05:26.240 --> 0:05:27.799 you wondered about this yourself? 0:05:27.960 --> 0:05:31.040 So? I have watched a good amount of Star Trek, 0:05:31.240 --> 0:05:34.800 and I I'm always kind of I don't know. I 0:05:34.800 --> 0:05:38.560 guess I kind of gloss over the weird engineering babble. 0:05:38.839 --> 0:05:42.360 It doesn't it's like we got to put the transoperitors 0:05:42.640 --> 0:05:47.960 or interopertors on the warp schism. I don't really know. 0:05:48.760 --> 0:05:51.760 And like I'm also a little bit confused about the 0:05:51.800 --> 0:05:54.560 concept of the warp drive. I know there are different 0:05:54.640 --> 0:05:58.560 like warp speeds, but like the idea, I guess is 0:05:58.600 --> 0:06:03.120 that what you're like ending space and making the ship 0:06:03.480 --> 0:06:05.680 go across. I don't know. Do you know if they 0:06:05.720 --> 0:06:08.200 ever did like an explanation of warp drive. 0:06:09.120 --> 0:06:11.560 Well, one of the funny things about Star Trek is 0:06:11.600 --> 0:06:14.960 that it's not really science fiction. I mean, they don't 0:06:15.000 --> 0:06:18.039 actually have any sort of explanation for what they're doing. 0:06:18.440 --> 0:06:21.400 It's exactly as you described. It's like particle babble. 0:06:21.880 --> 0:06:22.760 It's sort of like. 0:06:22.720 --> 0:06:25.120 The way jen Ai is. You know, you ask chat 0:06:25.160 --> 0:06:28.119 gbt to generate an answer to physics question and it'll 0:06:28.160 --> 0:06:31.120 generate a bunch of words which sound like an answer, 0:06:31.600 --> 0:06:33.240 and Star Trek is kind of like that. It's like, 0:06:33.279 --> 0:06:35.839 here's a convincing number of words which sort of sound 0:06:35.920 --> 0:06:39.200 like an explanation for the science, but it's really nonsense, 0:06:39.440 --> 0:06:42.040 you know. And I gotta love that about Star Trek. 0:06:42.040 --> 0:06:44.280 They're not really trying to be hard sci fi. They 0:06:44.279 --> 0:06:46.080 sort of make fun of themselves a little bit. They 0:06:46.080 --> 0:06:49.120 don't take themselves too seriously. The science of Star Trek 0:06:49.240 --> 0:06:51.919 is not like crisply thought out and click together into 0:06:51.920 --> 0:06:55.440 some coherent explanation, as you'll see when we dig into 0:06:55.560 --> 0:06:58.320 what a warp drive is in Star Trek and what 0:06:58.360 --> 0:07:01.200 it should look like when you look out right. 0:07:01.680 --> 0:07:05.640 But the idea being that you're going really really fast, 0:07:05.800 --> 0:07:07.920 like is the idea that you're going at the speed 0:07:07.960 --> 0:07:08.400 of light. 0:07:09.080 --> 0:07:12.000 The idea of a warp drive in physics aside from 0:07:12.040 --> 0:07:15.080 star trek is an attempt to move faster than the 0:07:15.120 --> 0:07:18.280 speed of light. So we have this frustrating limitation on 0:07:18.320 --> 0:07:21.320 all motion in the universe that nothing can move faster 0:07:21.440 --> 0:07:23.880 than the speed of light through space. So if you 0:07:23.880 --> 0:07:25.840 want to fly to Alpha Centari and it's three light 0:07:25.960 --> 0:07:28.240 years away, it's going to take you at least three 0:07:28.320 --> 0:07:31.200 years to get there because you can't even go at 0:07:31.200 --> 0:07:33.960 the speed of light. Nothing with mass can move even 0:07:34.000 --> 0:07:35.880 at the speed of light, and nothing at all can 0:07:35.920 --> 0:07:38.360 move faster than the speed of light. And the speed 0:07:38.400 --> 0:07:40.200 of light is really really fast, you know, one hundred 0:07:40.240 --> 0:07:43.520 and eighty six thousand miles per second is incredibly fast, 0:07:43.880 --> 0:07:48.040 But distances in space are incredibly vast, and so stars 0:07:48.080 --> 0:07:50.760 are far apart even compared to the speed of light. 0:07:51.160 --> 0:07:54.040 So our galaxy, for example, is one hundred thousand light 0:07:54.120 --> 0:07:56.480 years across. You wanted to go from here to the 0:07:56.480 --> 0:07:59.000 other side of it and back, we're talking two hundred 0:07:59.040 --> 0:08:03.240 thousand years even if you're a photon. So it's incredibly 0:08:03.280 --> 0:08:06.640 hard to get around the universe because the speed of 0:08:06.720 --> 0:08:10.200 light is actually very very slow. And in science fiction 0:08:10.360 --> 0:08:13.720 universes people often want to have like galaxy spanning empires 0:08:13.800 --> 0:08:16.560 or civilizations that go from star to star, and it's 0:08:16.680 --> 0:08:19.120 kind of hard to make that work unless you have 0:08:19.520 --> 0:08:22.520 faster than light travel. So a warp drive in physics 0:08:22.560 --> 0:08:25.040 is a way to try to circumvent use loopholes in 0:08:25.080 --> 0:08:28.440 special relativity to make it possible to go from here 0:08:28.480 --> 0:08:31.600 to there in less time than a photon would take. 0:08:32.440 --> 0:08:36.480 Okay, so it's some kind of magic. 0:08:37.800 --> 0:08:40.080 Well, there really is a concept in physics of a 0:08:40.120 --> 0:08:43.120 warp drive, and it doesn't break special relativity. The law 0:08:43.160 --> 0:08:46.520 in special relativity says you can't move through space faster 0:08:46.640 --> 0:08:49.920 than light does. But a warp drive doesn't move through space. 0:08:50.040 --> 0:08:53.319 It actually compresses space. Because what we've learned in the 0:08:53.400 --> 0:08:55.839 last one hundred years or so is that space is 0:08:55.880 --> 0:08:58.720 not just like an empty backdrop on which the things 0:08:58.760 --> 0:09:01.800 in the universe happen. It's actually like a thing. It 0:09:01.800 --> 0:09:05.679 has features, It can bend and curve and ripple and expand. 0:09:06.240 --> 0:09:08.720 And so if, for example, you could compress the space 0:09:08.800 --> 0:09:11.439 between here and a distant star so that it's not 0:09:11.480 --> 0:09:14.880 actually as far, then you could just move a lower 0:09:14.920 --> 0:09:17.200 than the speed of light but still get there very 0:09:17.280 --> 0:09:20.160 very quickly. That's the basic idea of a warp drive, 0:09:20.160 --> 0:09:22.240 and people want to know more about the physics of 0:09:22.280 --> 0:09:24.679 a warp drive and is it possible. Can check out 0:09:24.760 --> 0:09:27.679 some of the episodes that we have about warp drives. 0:09:27.920 --> 0:09:29.880 But that's actually a possibility. We don't know how to 0:09:29.880 --> 0:09:32.280 make it work. We don't have to build one, but 0:09:32.440 --> 0:09:35.120 the laws of general relativity say it might be possible. 0:09:35.120 --> 0:09:38.520 And we're talking about in our real universe. In Star Trek, 0:09:38.679 --> 0:09:40.480 their warp drive is a little bit different. 0:09:40.760 --> 0:09:44.360 Okay, so how does the Star Trek warp drive quote 0:09:44.440 --> 0:09:45.400 unquote work. 0:09:46.000 --> 0:09:48.199 So the basic principle is the same, is that you're 0:09:48.240 --> 0:09:50.760 going faster than the speed of light. And they have 0:09:50.840 --> 0:09:53.960 these warped levels, so like warp one, warp two, warp three, 0:09:54.000 --> 0:09:57.320 each of those goes faster and faster, and for example, 0:09:57.360 --> 0:09:59.640 and warp nine point nine is the maximum that they 0:09:59.640 --> 0:10:01.559 could have do. And if they ever go warp nine 0:10:01.559 --> 0:10:04.160 point nine, you can really see it straining their ship. 0:10:07.040 --> 0:10:10.160 That seems like airplane or boat logic right where it's 0:10:10.200 --> 0:10:12.559 still the idea that you are like moving in a 0:10:12.600 --> 0:10:17.000 way where there is some kind of like resistance against 0:10:17.000 --> 0:10:20.520 your ship, and then if you're going faster, there's more 0:10:20.640 --> 0:10:24.280 strain on the ship. But if this is about scrunching 0:10:24.440 --> 0:10:27.400 space time. It doesn't seem like that would have the 0:10:27.480 --> 0:10:30.680 same kind of effects as say, like a jet plane 0:10:30.720 --> 0:10:32.760 trying to a sound barrier. 0:10:33.480 --> 0:10:36.240 Yeah, exactly, But the warp drive on Star Trek isn't 0:10:36.280 --> 0:10:40.480 a general relativistic squeezing space creating a warp bubble kind 0:10:40.480 --> 0:10:43.199 of situation. They don't explain at all how it works. 0:10:43.200 --> 0:10:44.680 It's just sort of like, we can go faster than 0:10:44.720 --> 0:10:45.240 the speed of light. 0:10:45.320 --> 0:10:46.599 We have a warp drive. 0:10:46.679 --> 0:10:51.400 Right, Okay, so part of the question was about blue ships. 0:10:51.480 --> 0:10:54.000 So the idea is like, so, okay, you have one 0:10:54.040 --> 0:10:57.840 of these warp drives where you can go faster than 0:10:57.920 --> 0:11:01.959 the speed of light, and there is the obvious question 0:11:02.040 --> 0:11:04.760 of what would like look like to you? But can 0:11:04.800 --> 0:11:07.760 you explain what the question asker means when they talk 0:11:07.800 --> 0:11:08.959 about blueshift? 0:11:09.120 --> 0:11:11.920 Yeah, I think basically he's wondering, what does it look 0:11:12.000 --> 0:11:14.959 like out the window when you are doing the warp drive? 0:11:15.120 --> 0:11:15.240 Right? 0:11:15.720 --> 0:11:17.840 And this is one of my favorite parts of science 0:11:17.880 --> 0:11:21.200 fiction is thinking about the consequences, like you've created this 0:11:21.280 --> 0:11:23.840 new technology or discovered this new bit of science, what 0:11:23.840 --> 0:11:25.600 does that mean? Not just for like what is it 0:11:25.640 --> 0:11:27.880 like to be human? In that universe, but what are 0:11:27.920 --> 0:11:29.079 the experiences like. 0:11:29.040 --> 0:11:31.559 Of using it? And the best science fiction. 0:11:31.360 --> 0:11:32.960 Are the ones that have really thought this through and 0:11:33.000 --> 0:11:36.320 come up with creative or interesting or surprising results. 0:11:36.800 --> 0:11:39.640 It's like in a B movie, the science fiction B 0:11:39.800 --> 0:11:42.480 movie where it asks if bees were sentient and all 0:11:42.520 --> 0:11:46.480 went on strike, would that be good or bad for 0:11:46.520 --> 0:11:49.640 the planet. But we were talking about some of the 0:11:49.640 --> 0:11:51.840 best science fiction movies, so of course I thought of 0:11:51.960 --> 0:11:53.480 B movie, but going. 0:11:53.600 --> 0:11:56.800 Absolutely yeah, definitely a high point in the science fiction 0:11:56.920 --> 0:11:57.560 movie canon. 0:11:58.440 --> 0:11:59.840 But in this case they're wondering. 0:11:59.679 --> 0:12:01.480 Like, well, it look like if you looked out the 0:12:01.520 --> 0:12:04.520 window while you were going faster than the speed of light, 0:12:04.559 --> 0:12:07.400 which is a really cool question. And the writers on 0:12:07.440 --> 0:12:10.160 these TV shows, or the visualization artists or wherever it's 0:12:10.200 --> 0:12:13.840 responsible for this, typically do this by making the stars 0:12:14.040 --> 0:12:17.079 streak by right like you see this in Star Wars 0:12:17.240 --> 0:12:20.240 the stars go from points to these lines, and on 0:12:20.360 --> 0:12:23.679 Star Trek they have this particular visualization where the stars 0:12:23.679 --> 0:12:26.480 aren't completely solid lines, they sort of zoom by, so 0:12:26.520 --> 0:12:29.760 it looks like you're whizzing through the universe and seeing 0:12:29.760 --> 0:12:32.640 the stars go by really fast. And the question is like, 0:12:33.040 --> 0:12:35.680 would you really be able to see the stars, because 0:12:35.720 --> 0:12:38.960 wouldn't their frequency be shifted by the Doppler effect, so 0:12:39.080 --> 0:12:41.920 they'd be so blue that you couldn't see them. The 0:12:42.000 --> 0:12:45.240 Doppler effect being that if something is moving relative to you, 0:12:45.280 --> 0:12:49.560 the light it emits changes frequencies. So, for example, stars 0:12:49.600 --> 0:12:52.360 from other distant galaxies are all moving away from us 0:12:52.400 --> 0:12:55.480 as the universe is expanding, and so the light from 0:12:55.520 --> 0:12:58.520 those stars is shifted red because the stars are moving 0:12:58.559 --> 0:13:02.680 away from us, Galaxies like Andromeda are moving towards us, 0:13:02.920 --> 0:13:05.839 so light from Andromeda is shifted blue. So if you 0:13:05.880 --> 0:13:08.600 were right next to Andromeda and not moving relative to it. 0:13:08.679 --> 0:13:11.320 You would see it's pure light as it's actually emitted. 0:13:11.600 --> 0:13:14.600 We see that light at higher frequencies it's blue shifted 0:13:14.880 --> 0:13:18.120 more towards ultraviolet and X ray then it would be 0:13:18.320 --> 0:13:20.880 if we weren't moving relative to Andromeda. It's actually a 0:13:20.960 --> 0:13:23.800 really powerful way to measure the velocity of distant stuff 0:13:24.000 --> 0:13:26.680 by measuring its red shift or its blue shift. So 0:13:26.720 --> 0:13:29.720 the question is asking, like, wouldn't the stars out the 0:13:29.760 --> 0:13:32.360 window be so blue shifted that they would be invisible? 0:13:32.720 --> 0:13:36.400 I see right, Because if you're moving away or towards something, 0:13:36.440 --> 0:13:39.440 it's like the wavelength of that light that would be 0:13:39.640 --> 0:13:41.600 hitting your eye is going to change. 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:42.440 Yeah, exactly. 0:13:42.520 --> 0:13:45.120 It's basic physics of the Doppler effect. It's like when 0:13:45.160 --> 0:13:47.600 a police siren is coming towards you, it sounds one way, 0:13:47.600 --> 0:13:49.720 and when it's moving away from you, it sounds another way. 0:13:49.960 --> 0:13:51.680 It's the same effect but applied to sound. 0:13:51.800 --> 0:13:54.079 Yeah, it sounds like we woo we woo, and it 0:13:54.200 --> 0:13:56.640 goes like wee woo woo woo. 0:13:57.840 --> 0:13:58.680 Yeah exactly. 0:13:59.080 --> 0:14:01.720 And that also for light, because light is a wave 0:14:01.800 --> 0:14:05.679 in the electromagnetic field. And so he's asking about that, 0:14:05.960 --> 0:14:07.600 and so I did a little bit of digging into 0:14:07.640 --> 0:14:10.400 the physics of star trek warp drives, and I was 0:14:10.440 --> 0:14:13.559 wondering also, like why are we seeing stars whoosh by? 0:14:13.920 --> 0:14:15.640 Like is that realistic? 0:14:15.880 --> 0:14:16.000 Right? 0:14:16.120 --> 0:14:18.840 Because warp nine is pretty fast, but it's not actually 0:14:18.920 --> 0:14:21.440 that fast. Like I said, it takes two days to 0:14:21.480 --> 0:14:24.400 go like ten light years. But if you look at 0:14:24.400 --> 0:14:27.040 the window of the enterprise, you see stars whoshing by 0:14:27.160 --> 0:14:29.840 all the time. The thing is that stars are way 0:14:29.880 --> 0:14:32.680 too far apart for that to happen. Yeah, I mean 0:14:32.720 --> 0:14:36.440 stars are typically like three four five light years apart. 0:14:36.600 --> 0:14:38.960 So if you're only going ten light years every two days, 0:14:39.240 --> 0:14:41.520 then you should see like a star whoosh by like 0:14:41.800 --> 0:14:44.080 every twenty four hours. But if you look at the 0:14:44.080 --> 0:14:46.640 window of the enterprise, it's like ten stars a second. 0:14:46.800 --> 0:14:50.320 So they've taken some real liberties in that visualization. 0:14:50.400 --> 0:14:52.840 I mean one way, I know that Star Trek is 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:56.720 sort of not going with the we are scrunching up space. 0:14:57.040 --> 0:14:59.760 But if you were scrunching up space, I could see 0:14:59.760 --> 0:15:04.320 an argument for there being some kind of weird optical effect. 0:15:04.440 --> 0:15:08.520 Not necessarily stars wooshing by, but you know, I remember 0:15:08.520 --> 0:15:10.880 in an episode where we talked about your point of 0:15:10.960 --> 0:15:13.160 view from a black hole, where it's like if you 0:15:13.240 --> 0:15:17.200 have a very dense point where it would suck in light. 0:15:17.960 --> 0:15:21.720 So maybe if you're scrunching space, you could I don't 0:15:21.760 --> 0:15:27.160 know exactly how this would work. I'm now beyond my understanding, 0:15:27.240 --> 0:15:29.320 but I guess there could be some kind of weird 0:15:29.400 --> 0:15:30.920 optical effect. 0:15:32.440 --> 0:15:35.480 I think that kind of creativity in science should get 0:15:35.520 --> 0:15:39.120 you a spot as physics consultation on Star Trek. 0:15:39.320 --> 0:15:42.320 Sweet so I can just say, uh, oh, the gasorp 0:15:42.360 --> 0:15:44.040 azorp drive went down. 0:15:46.240 --> 0:15:47.840 No, I think there's a lot of room for like, 0:15:47.920 --> 0:15:50.120 how could we make this work? What would you have 0:15:50.160 --> 0:15:53.560 to do is there any explanation in science? But anyway, 0:15:53.600 --> 0:15:55.800 let's take the star trek warp drive and just say 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:58.360 somehow it makes you be able to move faster than 0:15:58.400 --> 0:16:01.360 the speed of light. Physics is spended or we've discovered 0:16:01.360 --> 0:16:04.040 if the special relativity is wrong or whatever. We're moving 0:16:04.040 --> 0:16:05.800 faster than the speed of light. What would it look 0:16:05.880 --> 0:16:08.040 like out the window, the front window, the side window, 0:16:08.160 --> 0:16:11.120 the back window. And Dale's totally right that the Doppler 0:16:11.120 --> 0:16:14.160 effect is a big effect. You're moving very fast relative 0:16:14.200 --> 0:16:16.280 to these stars, which is the same thing as saying 0:16:16.320 --> 0:16:19.400 they're moving fast relative to you. So, for example, if 0:16:19.440 --> 0:16:22.560 you look out the back window of the Enterprise, you're 0:16:22.600 --> 0:16:25.520 moving faster than the speed of light. Number one, all 0:16:25.520 --> 0:16:28.560 of the light from those stars is really really red shifted. 0:16:28.640 --> 0:16:31.080 It's red shifted so far that you wouldn't be able 0:16:31.080 --> 0:16:34.040 to see it like our sun amids light in the 0:16:34.120 --> 0:16:36.400 visual spectrum. But if you're moving away from the Sun 0:16:36.560 --> 0:16:39.480 super duper fast, then its light is going to be 0:16:39.480 --> 0:16:42.320 red shifted so far that you'd need like a special 0:16:42.360 --> 0:16:44.560 infrared camera to even pick it up. 0:16:44.720 --> 0:16:48.600 I see, yeah, because our eyes can only detect certain wavelengths, 0:16:48.640 --> 0:16:53.000 like if something's too I guess wide of a wavelength 0:16:53.120 --> 0:16:55.120 or too short of a wavelength, we are not going 0:16:55.120 --> 0:16:55.920 to be able to see it. 0:16:56.480 --> 0:16:57.520 Yeah exactly. 0:16:57.720 --> 0:17:01.960 And in addition, you're now moving faster than those photons somehow, right, 0:17:01.960 --> 0:17:05.280 we suspended physics, and so you're out running the photons, 0:17:05.480 --> 0:17:07.040 so you're not going to be able to see anything 0:17:07.160 --> 0:17:07.639 behind you. 0:17:08.640 --> 0:17:09.840 Yeah exactly. 0:17:10.400 --> 0:17:12.840 So it's like I'm trying to throw a baseball at you, 0:17:12.880 --> 0:17:14.840 but you're in your ferrari and you're going much faster, 0:17:14.960 --> 0:17:16.639 Like my baseball is not going to get to you. 0:17:17.320 --> 0:17:19.080 So you're just not going to see anything out the 0:17:19.080 --> 0:17:22.200 back window. If you're actually moving faster than the speed 0:17:22.200 --> 0:17:24.760 of light. But then what about your front window? Right, 0:17:24.800 --> 0:17:27.520 you're moving towards all these stars faster than the speed 0:17:27.560 --> 0:17:27.880 of light. 0:17:28.000 --> 0:17:29.000 What should you see? 0:17:29.440 --> 0:17:29.680 Right? 0:17:29.920 --> 0:17:33.080 This is actually also quite counterintuitive what you would actually see. 0:17:33.480 --> 0:17:37.760 And instead of imagining ourselves moving towards the stars, imagine 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:40.399 the equivalent scenario of the star moving towards us. Because 0:17:40.560 --> 0:17:43.440 in our universe velocity is relative, it doesn't really matter 0:17:43.480 --> 0:17:44.080 who's moving. 0:17:44.119 --> 0:17:45.280 It's actually the same thing. 0:17:45.840 --> 0:17:47.560 Think about what it would look like if a star 0:17:47.680 --> 0:17:50.000 is moving towards you faster than the speed of. 0:17:49.960 --> 0:17:52.520 Light scary, you actually be very scary. 0:17:54.200 --> 0:17:54.400 Now. 0:17:54.560 --> 0:17:57.600 That means that the star is moving faster than the 0:17:57.680 --> 0:18:01.000 light that it emits, right, right, So it's like leaving 0:18:01.040 --> 0:18:04.679 the light behind, which means again you can't see it, 0:18:05.119 --> 0:18:07.760 right because you arrive at the star before the light 0:18:07.800 --> 0:18:09.919 that it emitted along the way it gets to you. 0:18:10.320 --> 0:18:12.159 Ah my brain. 0:18:13.000 --> 0:18:14.280 Yeah right. 0:18:14.320 --> 0:18:16.679 And so imagine the star is far away, it emits 0:18:16.720 --> 0:18:20.040 a photon, but the star gets to you before the photon, right, 0:18:20.040 --> 0:18:22.359 So you don't see that photon until the star has 0:18:22.400 --> 0:18:25.360 already passed you. So what happens is as the star 0:18:25.480 --> 0:18:28.359 passes you, that's when you see it, and you actually 0:18:28.359 --> 0:18:30.959 see it twice. You still go past you, and now 0:18:30.960 --> 0:18:33.680 it's emitting photons as it goes past you, and those 0:18:33.680 --> 0:18:36.639 photons are coming towards you, and you also start to 0:18:36.640 --> 0:18:39.560 receive the photons that it emitted while it was on 0:18:39.640 --> 0:18:42.640 its way to you. Those now start arriving, but they 0:18:42.760 --> 0:18:46.440 arrive in reverse order, right, because the images it's sent 0:18:46.600 --> 0:18:50.399 later arrived before the images it's sent earlier when it 0:18:50.440 --> 0:18:51.200 was further away. 0:18:51.400 --> 0:18:54.119 Oh yeah, Because you are moving so fast that you 0:18:54.160 --> 0:18:59.400 will approach the star and have those close by photons 0:19:00.280 --> 0:19:04.520 you faster than the ones that hit you from when 0:19:04.520 --> 0:19:09.359 the star was further away. Yeah, that's wild. You'd see 0:19:09.359 --> 0:19:13.520 like an after image of the star before from before. 0:19:13.520 --> 0:19:15.919 Yes, exactly, So you'd see nothing, and then when the 0:19:15.920 --> 0:19:18.840 star passes you, you'd suddenly see two stars. 0:19:18.680 --> 0:19:20.960 One going behind you and one going ahead of you. 0:19:21.080 --> 0:19:24.159 It would look like going backwards in time, right, you 0:19:24.160 --> 0:19:25.720 would see it in reverse order. 0:19:26.200 --> 0:19:27.320 Very bizarre effect. 0:19:27.440 --> 0:19:30.359 And I've never seen this displayed in science fiction. I 0:19:30.359 --> 0:19:33.119 would love to see somebody actually make this work. If 0:19:33.160 --> 0:19:36.080 you were writing a new show about people with warp drives, 0:19:36.400 --> 0:19:38.360 email me and I will help you get this right. 0:19:38.520 --> 0:19:40.119