The many-worlds theory does not require predestination. That's just silly solipsism. The simple fact that you made another choice in another universe in no way invalidates the fact that you made the choice you did in this one, and in fact from that moment of division the other guy ceased to be "you". In the many-worlds interpretation, there's a world out there where, for instance, on one fall evening in 1987 a young airman stationed in Nebraska sent the young boy interrupting his arcade games back to his mother, instead of taking him back there and sitting with him. He never wound up marrying her, nor discovering years later that she had borderline personality disorder. And at the moment he made that choice that fateful night, he ceased to be "me" in any meaningful sense. His experiences from that point on were so dramatically different, all we share in common is a name and a genetic sequence.
In neither case, however, was the choice "predestined" - and each of us has made multiple choices since that have spun off other "me"s. Just because other versions of me made free-willed choices that varied from mine doesn't make any of them "predestined".
As for multiple universes with variant physical laws, I recommend Heinlein's novel The Number of the Beast. The protagonists found that the sheaf of universes can be described as consisting of four-dimensional universes, with three spatial axes and one temporal axis, in a superspace of six total dimensions. Further, any of the axes (x, y, z, t, tau, teh) could be used as either spatial or temporal - ours uses x, y, and z for space, and t for time, but translate axes and you could be in one that uses x, tau, and teh for space and z for time. The experience of the traveler would be the same. The Burroughs-Carter Continua Device was thus theoretically able to access 6^6^6 universes (hence the title); however, they found that once you translate far enough across a given sheaf of universes, the physical laws start to vary to the point that life cannot be supported. The total number of life-bearing universes would probably be more like 6^6, or 46,656 - more than enough, in my personal opinion.
(Then they found that each living universe was created by "fictons", the quanta of fiction, generated by another universe; the more of the group who had read a given fiction, the more likely they'd run across that universe. Barsoom was one of the early ones they hit. Later, they wound up in Oz, where the Good Witch outfitted their car with restrooms and a food supply that attached magically. Eventually, they were picked up by the starship Dora - fortunately, one of the protagonists read a lot of Heinlein, although she regarded him as hopelessly self-indulgent, so she recognized Lazarus Long's ship.)
I came up with a pretty decent theory for how Star Trek timelines work a while back. It's a variation on the many worlds theory positing that the multiverse is like a rope of infinite length.
The strands of a rope are in slightly different positions and sometimes fray or knot, but if you pull on a rope, the strands all move in basically the same direction. These strands are created by probabilistic outcomes, with some outcomes being more likely than others, hence there are more similar timelines than there are different ones.
The frays, incidentally, are caused by major time travel incursions, hence why there's a Temporal Prime Directive: such incursions can literally damage time and cause entire timelines to self-erase if not corrected (which is what happened to the canon version of ENT in my 'verse, because of all the mucking about with the TCW). If you can get to "close enough" as in "The City on the Edge of Forever" and "Past Tense", the inertia of time (the pull of the rope) will do the rest.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Where is there predetermination with an infinite number of universes? Since there is an infinite number of universes, then every possible outcome will be achieved due to probability. So if I am confronted by a choice between Coke and Pepsi, 40% of the time I will choose Coke, 40% of the time I will choose Pepsi, 19.9999% of the time I will choose to walk away, and 0.0001% of the time I will make some weird choice. Of course some outcomes are not possible due to our fundamental character. For example, I will not decide to go on a crime spree and every version of me with the same fundamental character will not do it as well. However, there are some versions of me with a different fundamental character that would go on a crime spree.
Not because of an infinite number of universes--because of all universes being present at the beginning. If all universes existed at the beginning, and they are all unique, that implies that events have been "mapped out" at the beginning, which requires predestination.
Or are you thinking of this in terms of an time starting with infinite number of "blank" universes that unfold freely? They're not permutations of one another, they are completely independent even if they follow the same path?
some are fine possibilities that they might want to overwrite, like the founding of New Romulus
Why? The destruction of Romulus is a canon event, there's probably fallout from that in any hypothetical ST series set in the future from NEM. That would likely include a new Romulan state of some sort.
We are assuming that the destruction of Romulus occurred in the Prime Universe and not some other parallel universe. So until the hypothetical ST series is created that proves that Romulus is destroyed or isn't destroyed, then both possibilities are equally valid. The destruction of Romulus is a canon event, but we don't know which universe it happened in since we only have a few minutes in what is assumed to be the Prime Universe.
Using a sacrificial parallel universe would protect the Prime Universe from being rewritten assuming that changing the past changes the future like we have been led to believe for decades as far as Star Trek is concerned. Time travel in Star Trek 2009 works exactly like in every other instance of time travel in Star Trek. There is no need to use excuses like branching timelines or dimensional travel to a parallel universe that looks like the 23rd Century. So instead of Old Spock and Nero coming from the Prime Universe, they came from the unaltered Kelvin Universe where Kelvin Kirk got to know his father.
"Parallels" set the idea of branching timelines into canon, long before the KT movies. Going by the evidence presented in that TNG episode, there is a timeline that has a fully-intact Romulus.
I don't think that should be the "Prime" timeline, though. I don't like retconning the Kelvin Timeline out of existence, and if you remove its tie to the Prime timeline (namely, Prime Spock), you're undercutting its legitimacy.
Parallels had nothing to do with branching timelines. A branching timeline would be where I decide to drink Coke instead of Pepsi so there would be a new universe created where I drink Pepsi instead of Coke. Parallels deals with an infinite number of realities so that any possible outcome will happen. So there is an infinite number of Star Trek universes, an infinite number of Star Wars Universes, an infinite number of Game of Thrones universes, etc.
Troi: What do you mean, quantum realities? Data: For any event, there is an infinite number of possible outcomes. Our choices determine which outcome will follow. But there is a theory in quantum physics that all possibilities that can or could happen do happen in alternate quantum realities. For instance, in a different quantum reality, Captain Riker may have chosen to sit at the other end of the table. While in another reality, the Captain may be standing. Beverly: So at this moment, there are an infinite number of Enterprises... and an infinite number of Doctor Crushers having this discussion. Data: Yes. Although on some of those Enterprises, there may not be a Doctor Crusher...
The problem with the branching timeline theory is that it violates the law of conservation of energy since every time a choice is made, a completely new universe has to be created. With there being an infinite number of realities that were created during the Big Bang, then it doesn't require a new universe to be created every time a choice is made since all possible outcomes happen. So in one parallel universe, I drink Coke and in another parallel universe I drink Pepsi and everything else in those parallel universes are completely identical.
You do realize they're essentially two ways of describing the same phenomenon, though? None of the branches are being created on the fly, they're all there to begin with.
But if all the branches existed to begin with, that implies predetermination, which conflicts with basic observations of physics. If all events are predetermined, then we can no longer state cause and effect. Under such a system, all events happen because they were predestined to happen--objects cannot longer influence one another. For example, if I pick up a pencil and then let it fall to the floor, I could not say that it fell to the floor because of the Earth's gravitational pull. That would imply that the Earth can influence the behavior of the pencil--that it can change the outcome of events--which is impossible if events are predetermined.
But if objects cannot influence each other, why does everything that we observe behave as if they can? The shape, size, composition, and movements of planets are all consistent with gravity; water demonstrates properties consistent with the electromagnetic force of polar molecules; light can be emitted, bent, and delivers energy when it hits something. Basically, if all events are predetermined, there's no reason for physics to make sense, because our system of physics runs entirely on objects exerting influence over one another.
Now, it's possible that amidst an infinite sea of universes guided by random, predetermined events, we just happen to exist in one where things appear to make sense. We're dealing with infinity, after all. But why does it always make sense? I can be completely certain that if I let go of that pencil, it will fall to the floor. It won't fly to the ceiling, or turn around and jab me in the eye, or just disappear. Total physical anarchy makes life impossible, but a few anomalies here and there aren't fatal. Nobody's going to die if grains of sand disappear now and again, or the rocks suddenly turn pitch black for a while. Even if chunks of creature's bodies randomly exploded every once in a while, that wouldn't be enough to prevent life as a whole from thriving. It's way, way more likely that we would live in a universe where things mostly make sense than one where things always make sense but have no underlying causation.
But we always see the universe behave in a predictable manner. We don't see grains of sand disappear, or rocks turn pitch black, and my pencil certainly isn't going to stab me in the eye. Taken in aggregate, humans have made billions of billions of observations about the physical world (so have animals, but they can't report their findings), and they all point to a system of physics that behaves in a logical, predictable way that is consistent with objects exerting influence over one another. But that's impossible in a system that runs on predetermined events
Therefore, it is incredibly unlikely (even by the standards of infinity) that we live in a universe that's moving on a predetermined path. There is a mountain of evidence that points to a system that is incompatible with predetermination, and no evidence against that system. The odds that a predetermined system just happened to shake out such that everything in the whole universe behaves in apparent contradiction to that predetermined system are so ludicrously slim that they're not even worth considering. The most logical conclusion is that events are not predetermined, so having all timelines present at the start of the universe doesn't make sense.
Causality and predetermination aren't mutually conflicted, though. You're implying that predetermination requires complete randomness - this is not the case. (Well, somewhere out in the multiverse there probably are universes where things flatly refuse to make sense, but let's focus on our small corner of it for the time being.)
First we get the laws of physics and their associated physical constants. These govern how everything else works - establish a set of boundaries from which everything else is formed. For every set of physical laws and every set of starting conditions, there will be a vast set of universes following from that set - every possible outcome of every possible event will be mapped, forming a structure that we might more intuitively interpret as branching timelines. (Hence my initial comment.)
The thing is, we don't know which branch we're in. We can't know (among other reasons, there's the fact that such knowledge would be self-invalidating) - we can, however, make educated guesses such as starkaos' probability assessment above. The universe around us is predictable because we have gained an (admittedly limited) understanding of the laws and structures that were formed in that "first moment", of the various ways in which things can work. In a sense, we're managing to narrow down the list of branches we might be located on, and assess how many of those branches contain a certain event (be it microscopic or macroscopic).
The problem is that physics is based entirely on objects exerting influence over each other. But how can an object change another object if events are predetermined? It's logically impossible for events to be predetermined and for objects to alter the outcome of events--the two are direct contradictions. As such, the laws of physics require freedom to alter the course of events in order to function. Otherwise, they just don't work.
Where is there predetermination with an infinite number of universes? Since there is an infinite number of universes, then every possible outcome will be achieved due to probability. So if I am confronted by a choice between Coke and Pepsi, 40% of the time I will choose Coke, 40% of the time I will choose Pepsi, 19.9999% of the time I will choose to walk away, and 0.0001% of the time I will make some weird choice. Of course some outcomes are not possible due to our fundamental character. For example, I will not decide to go on a crime spree and every version of me with the same fundamental character will not do it as well. However, there are some versions of me with a different fundamental character that would go on a crime spree.
Not because of an infinite number of universes--because of all universes being present at the beginning. If all universes existed at the beginning, and they are all unique, that implies that events have been "mapped out" at the beginning, which requires predestination.
Or are you thinking of this in terms of an time starting with infinite number of "blank" universes that unfold freely? They're not permutations of one another, they are completely independent even if they follow the same path?
Infinite number of "blank" universes that unfold freely. If there is an infinite number of universes, then by sheer probability, any universe will be created. There might be a set of laws that govern every universe which limit the types of universes that were created and is separate from the laws that govern each universe, but we would have to escape our universe to determine if those laws exist. For example, the barriers between each universe might be impenetrable so demons from a dimension that looks like Hell invading our universe is impossible or the laws governing every universe make time travel impossible.
If everything has to be "mapped out" at the beginning, then predestination requires the existence of an entity that could be classified as God.
Huh. I hadn't thought of that one.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
Well, it is kinda the only look at Star Trek feature's. Unless we count the book universe. Which from what I read seems actually worse in the overall storyline than STO is. STO's individual missions have simple stories with not enough depth or twists, and tend to have equally simplistic antagonists and protagonists. But the broad strokes I think are pretty neat. I don't quite buy the whole Klingon/Federation war storyline, but the Iconian War storyline seems much stronger than what I hear about the Destiny novels and the like.
Star Trek Online Advancement: You start with lowbie gear, you end with Lobi gear.
The many-worlds theory does not require predestination. That's just silly solipsism. The simple fact that you made another choice in another universe in no way invalidates the fact that you made the choice you did in this one, and in fact from that moment of division the other guy ceased to be "you".
Well you're describing a multiverse that splits at each possible outcome. I was addressing the idea of a multiverse where all possible universes already existed at the start of time, which implied that they were somehow "mapped out." However, the thought of an infinite number of "blank" universes that can unfold freely and are independent of one another (as opposed to being variations of one another) had not occured to me.
The whole article is like a large joke, i don't mean that it's terrible but rather funny. Someone complaining that we are getting a prequel for Trek and the article writer mentions that STO is the only lifeline forwards, full of mass murdering admirals where exploration is irrelivent so long as some poor sod is the target of phasers and torpeodes. Where starfleet the Empire and the Romulans are full of alien ships with very alien boff layouts and doff layouts and the job of starfleet captain is to explore, research and seek out races peacefully, where conflict should be the last resort.
It was most likely written by an STO player...Anyone can write an io9 article, after all.
On the parallels debate: the way I always understood Data's explanation was essentially this:
Everytime a decision is made, there's another reality where we made the other decision. You can call it a parallel reality or an alternative reality; it's a matter of perspective.
For example: if you made the decision to turn right at a T-Junction, it would create another timeline identical to our own where you turned left. The quantum reality theory also means that there would be at least one (but likely an uncountable number) where you turned left, but where timelines diverged at an earlier point: i.e. where events were already different but you still ended up at that crossroads, at that time, with that same choice.
It's not a question of predestination or anything: it's two sides of the same phenomenon. Parallel universes and branching timelines are both triggered by 'divergences' from an existing timeline. However, it's worth noting that 'Parallels' does itself contradict established Star Trek time travel laws, though you can argue that the effect of 'correcting' divergences such as in 'First Contact' and 'City on the Edge of Forever' is just to 'recreate' the Prime Timeline branching off that divergent reality. This would of course require that the Guardian of Forever was trans dimensional, existing and aware across multiple realities as a single entity, but I digress.
On the parallels debate: the way I always understood Data's explanation was essentially this:
Everytime a decision is made, there's another reality where we made the other decision. You can call it a parallel reality or an alternative reality; it's a matter of perspective.
For example: if you made the decision to turn right at a T-Junction, it would create another timeline identical to our own where you turned left. The quantum reality theory also means that there would be at least one (but likely an uncountable number) where you turned left, but where timelines diverged at an earlier point: i.e. where events were already different but you still ended up at that crossroads, at that time, with that same choice.
It's not a question of predestination or anything: it's two sides of the same phenomenon. Parallel universes and branching timelines are both triggered by 'divergences' from an existing timeline. However, it's worth noting that 'Parallels' does itself contradict established Star Trek time travel laws, though you can argue that the effect of 'correcting' divergences such as in 'First Contact' and 'City on the Edge of Forever' is just to 'recreate' the Prime Timeline branching off that divergent reality. This would of course require that the Guardian of Forever was trans dimensional, existing and aware across multiple realities as a single entity, but I digress.
The main reason why I hate this idea is it violates the law of conservation of energy. Every time a decision is made, a new universe has to be created as a result. If an infinite number of universe was created from the Big Bang, then there is an unique universe for every decision that is ever made. So there is the current universe where I turned right and there is a parallel universe that has existed since the Big Bang that is completely identical to the current universe except I turned left.
There is nothing in the Parallels episode that states each reality originated from an existing timeline.
this may have escaped your notice, but star trek does not obey the laws of reality
because in reality, event horizons are not solid things you can punch a hole through, supernovae don't go faster than light, and apparently DNA isn't something that you can alter to the extent that it erases major genetic markers of an alien species in a matter of days/weeks
A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch." "We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Passion and Serenity are one.
I gain power by understanding both.
In the chaos of their battle, I bring order.
I am a shadow, darkness born from light.
The Force is united within me.
this may have escaped your notice, but star trek does not obey the laws of reality
because in reality, event horizons are not solid things you can punch a hole through, supernovae don't go faster than light, and apparently DNA isn't something that you can alter to the extent that it erases major genetic markers of an alien species in a matter of days/weeks
Are you sure about that? We have never encountered an event horizon and only have seen its influence on other objects. We have no way to determine if a portion of supernovae travel faster than light. Would we even be able to detect something travelling faster than light if our technology is only good for detecting something that is travelling at the speed of light or less?
Our understanding of DNA is still in its infancy so it is possible that eventually we can alter DNA however we want.
Just because something is impossible now doesn't mean it will be impossible in the future. Our history is full of instances where we accomplished something that was previously considered to be impossible like travelling to the other side of the world in a few hours or travelling to the moon.
this may have escaped your notice, but star trek does not obey the laws of reality
because in reality, event horizons are not solid things you can punch a hole through, supernovae don't go faster than light, and apparently DNA isn't something that you can alter to the extent that it erases major genetic markers of an alien species in a matter of days/weeks
Are you sure about that? We have never encountered an event horizon and only have seen its influence on other objects. We have no way to determine if a portion of supernovae travel faster than light. Would we even be able to detect something travelling faster than light if our technology is only good for detecting something that is travelling at the speed of light or less?
Our understanding of DNA is still in its infancy so it is possible that eventually we can alter DNA however we want.
Just because something is impossible now doesn't mean it will be impossible in the future. Our history is full of instances where we accomplished something that was previously considered to be impossible like travelling to the other side of the world in a few hours or travelling to the moon.
Ha ha. No.
An event horizon is not an object, period. It is a distance from a massive object, defined by the object's mass, after which the force of gravity is strong enough that massless particles, which always travel at the same speed, c, are bent back on themselves to return to the point of origin. As Chuck Sonnenburg put it, saying you can put a hole in the event horizon to escape is like saying you can put a hole in the distance you can travel on a tank of gas and give your car infinite range.
The above includes gravity waves (thanks for the correction). As massless items, they travel at the speed of light, period (which by the way forced David Weber to come up with some technobabble explanation for how gravity produced by spaceship drives can be detected from across a star system in real time). We now have the technology to measure gravity waves. Particles with mass, meanwhile, cannot achieve the speed of light, period.
Changing an organism's DNA won't alter chemicals that have already been produced by the organism's body.
The "impossibilities" you speak of never violated the observable and provable laws of physics, they were only engineering problems we didn't have the technology to achieve, what physicist Michio Kaku refers to as Class I Impossibilities. For example, powered flight: some said it was impossible but we saw birds doing it all the time. For reference, Class II is something that is mathematically possible but (probably) cannot exist in the real world. Class III, including perpetual motiom machines, is completely impossible as it violates physics.
Post edited by starswordc on
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Correction: We can measure gravitational waves, which appear to be ripples in space-time. (And yes, they do propagate at c, the speed of light in a vacuum.) Gravitons are still hypothetical particles, for which we have no evidence. (In fact, graviton theory was dealt a blow by the confirmation of the existence of the Higgs boson, which renders the graviton unnecessary to explain mass.)
However, it is a fact that an event horizon is not a thing; it is a place. Can you punch a hole in a shadow, and escape into sunlight? Can you open a pathway through gravity, and jump clear of Earth's surface under your own power? No more can you crack an event horizon. Conceptually, it's ridiculous.
Correction: We can measure gravitational waves, which appear to be ripples in space-time. (And yes, they do propagate at c, the speed of light in a vacuum.) Gravitons are still hypothetical particles, for which we have no evidence. (In fact, graviton theory was dealt a blow by the confirmation of the existence of the Higgs boson, which renders the graviton unnecessary to explain mass.)
However, it is a fact that an event horizon is not a thing; it is a place. Can you punch a hole in a shadow, and escape into sunlight? Can you open a pathway through gravity, and jump clear of Earth's surface under your own power? No more can you crack an event horizon. Conceptually, it's ridiculous.
Event horizons are a theoretical existence. Since we can't observe the Event Horizon, then we can't determine if there is more to it than simply a distance or place where anything that enters it can't be observed from outside. So it might be possible to punch a hole through an event horizon depending on what the event horizon is.
Star Trek deals with going faster than light all the time so while our understanding of Black Holes is that the gravitational pull is so great that light can't escape. However, a ship travelling faster than light can overcome the gravitational pull. Of course, this requires the physics inside the event horizon to be the same as the rest of reality which is impossible to prove. So until we know what an event horizon is, there is no way to prove one way or another if we can crack open an event horizon. Humans in 2017 can't, but humans in 20017 might be able to.
Starkaos. What an "event horizon" is, is the point beyond which the escape velocity of a hypermass is greater than the velocity of light. It's called an "event horizon" because if any events occur on the other side of one, we can't observe them. What it is definitely not is a physical thing, an object. Calling it "just theoretical" is the sort of nonsense someone completely unfamiliar with how science works might say.
Since it's not physical, there's no such thing as a "crack" in one, any more than you can have a "crack" in your shadow, or a "crack" in the idea of eternity. And while it might be possible for a vehicle traveling in excess of the speed of light to escape, it would be by simply moving through that point, not by "cracking" it - there is not a thing there to crack, it's a velocity.
(And since an event horizon can only exist around a hypermass, such as a gravitational singularity, one must also explain how the ship in question fails to be torn apart by tidal stresses. The scientific term for what happens actually is "spaghettification".)
It's our name for a distance at which something happens. That is it's definition. There can't be anything unknown about that as it wouldn'tbe what we're describing.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
I think what he's saying is that because we have no way of observing what exists inside the event horizon, there may be some thus far unknown phenomenon inside the event horizon that you can interact with in a way that might be described as "punching a hole."
Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
I think what he's saying is that because we have no way of observing what exists inside the event horizon, there may be some thus far unknown phenomenon inside the event horizon that you can interact with in a way that might be described as "punching a hole."
Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
Exactly. A black hole consists of the gravitational singularity and the event horizon. There is the theoretical concept of naked singularities where the gravitational singularity doesn't have an event horizon. So if the gravitational singularity is the center of the black hole and the event horizon is the boundary of spacetime that surrounds the black hole at a specific distance, then what is the region between the gravitational singularity and the event horizon and what laws govern that region? There is just too much about black holes that we don't know since we can't currently observe beyond the event horizon.
If we could send tachyons through a black hole and detect them on the other side of the black hole, then we could have some understanding of what happens within a black hole. Based on the velocity of the tachyons. we could determine if the diameter of the black hole is equivalent to our perception of the diameter of the black hole. If it takes less than a second for the tachyons to pass through the black hole, then we know that it is the same size as we expect. If it takes hours or days, then black holes are bigger on the inside or some other weird phenomenon is happening. There might be an entire universe within each black hole for all we know.
I think what he's saying is that because we have no way of observing what exists inside the event horizon, there may be some thus far unknown phenomenon inside the event horizon that you can interact with in a way that might be described as "punching a hole."
Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
Exactly. A black hole consists of the gravitational singularity and the event horizon. There is the theoretical concept of naked singularities where the gravitational singularity doesn't have an event horizon. So if the gravitational singularity is the center of the black hole and the event horizon is the boundary of spacetime that surrounds the black hole at a specific distance, then what is the region between the gravitational singularity and the event horizon and what laws govern that region? There is just too much about black holes that we don't know since we can't currently observe beyond the event horizon.
If we could send tachyons through a black hole and detect them on the other side of the black hole, then we could have some understanding of what happens within a black hole. Based on the velocity of the tachyons. we could determine if the diameter of the black hole is equivalent to our perception of the diameter of the black hole. If it takes less than a second for the tachyons to pass through the black hole, then we know that it is the same size as we expect. If it takes hours or days, then black holes are bigger on the inside or some other weird phenomenon is happening. There might be an entire universe within each black hole for all we know.
Absolutely none of that is related in anyway to the fact that a event horizon is not a physical thing you can punch a hole in.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
I think what he's saying is that because we have no way of observing what exists inside the event horizon, there may be some thus far unknown phenomenon inside the event horizon that you can interact with in a way that might be described as "punching a hole."
Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
Exactly. A black hole consists of the gravitational singularity and the event horizon. There is the theoretical concept of naked singularities where the gravitational singularity doesn't have an event horizon. So if the gravitational singularity is the center of the black hole and the event horizon is the boundary of spacetime that surrounds the black hole at a specific distance, then what is the region between the gravitational singularity and the event horizon and what laws govern that region? There is just too much about black holes that we don't know since we can't currently observe beyond the event horizon.
If we could send tachyons through a black hole and detect them on the other side of the black hole, then we could have some understanding of what happens within a black hole. Based on the velocity of the tachyons. we could determine if the diameter of the black hole is equivalent to our perception of the diameter of the black hole. If it takes less than a second for the tachyons to pass through the black hole, then we know that it is the same size as we expect. If it takes hours or days, then black holes are bigger on the inside or some other weird phenomenon is happening. There might be an entire universe within each black hole for all we know.
Absolutely none of that is related in anyway to the fact that a event horizon is not a physical thing you can punch a hole in.
Have you ever seen an event horizon? We only have a theory about what an event horizon is so whether it is possible to punch a hole through an event horizon is not something we would be able to figure out until we truly understand black holes and have the right advanced technology.
Our understanding of the event horizon is the maximum distance from the gravitational singularity where the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity is so massive that light can't escape. So either a ship that can overcome the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity or ship that is immune to gravitational pull can escape a black hole and pass through the event horizon provided that the physical laws that operate the ship is the same as the physical laws inside the event horizon. If someone could manipulate the gravitational energy within the black hole, then they can punch a hole through the event horizon. Someone could even create a tunnel from the event horizon to the gravitational singularity by having a bunch of devices that nullifies gravitational energy within a certain area. Such devices are impossible to build in 2017, but they might be possible in 20017. Just because it is a Class II or Class III impossibility now doesn't mean it is impossible in the future due to having a far better understanding of the universe. Faster than light travel is a Class II or Class III impossibility now depending on how mathematically sound the Alcubierre warp drive is, but it might be a reality in the future.
I think what he's saying is that because we have no way of observing what exists inside the event horizon, there may be some thus far unknown phenomenon inside the event horizon that you can interact with in a way that might be described as "punching a hole."
Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
Exactly. A black hole consists of the gravitational singularity and the event horizon. There is the theoretical concept of naked singularities where the gravitational singularity doesn't have an event horizon. So if the gravitational singularity is the center of the black hole and the event horizon is the boundary of spacetime that surrounds the black hole at a specific distance, then what is the region between the gravitational singularity and the event horizon and what laws govern that region? There is just too much about black holes that we don't know since we can't currently observe beyond the event horizon.
If we could send tachyons through a black hole and detect them on the other side of the black hole, then we could have some understanding of what happens within a black hole. Based on the velocity of the tachyons. we could determine if the diameter of the black hole is equivalent to our perception of the diameter of the black hole. If it takes less than a second for the tachyons to pass through the black hole, then we know that it is the same size as we expect. If it takes hours or days, then black holes are bigger on the inside or some other weird phenomenon is happening. There might be an entire universe within each black hole for all we know.
Absolutely none of that is related in anyway to the fact that a event horizon is not a physical thing you can punch a hole in.
Have you ever seen an event horizon? We only have a theory about what an event horizon is so whether it is possible to punch a hole through an event horizon is not something we would be able to figure out until we truly understand black holes and have the right advanced technology.
What do you mean 'seen'? Do you mean observed? Because the thing about black holes is... their black, and the thing about space... it's also black.
And NO. For the last time, an event horizon is what we call the point where something cannot escape the black hole, if it differs from that then it's not a event horizon. If you can punch a whole in it it's not a mathematical distance, it a physical thing. This has been spelt out explicitly, it is identical in concept to the maximum range a car can go on a one tank of fuel. Once that fuel runs out that is the 'event horizon', you can't punch a whole in the maximum capacity of a now empty petrol tank.
Stop pretending something is not what it is just so you can pretend Star Trek works on real physics. It does not and Alternate Timelines do not violate the laws of conservation in that universe, get over it.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though. JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
FTL is listed in Class II in Michio Kaku's book: All the various serious theories, from wormholes to the Alcubierre-White drive are mathematically possible but realistically impossible.
Wormholes could work, but you have to A, survive passing through a black hole at both ends, and B, have some way to hold open an aperture between them that, according to the math, would crash closed on itself the instant it formed because of the force of gravity.
The Alcubierre-White drive requires the generation of large quantities of matter with negative mass (we'd basically need to discover eezo). There's also a "hyperspace lanes" interpretation that requires masses to be placed along the path of travel that themselves are already traveling faster than light, so no go there, either.
There's also current math that suggests there is no other side to an event horizon. That is, matter that passes through it simply ceases to exist. In other words:
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
FTL is listed in Class II in Michio Kaku's book: All the various serious theories, from wormholes to the Alcubierre-White drive are mathematically possible but realistically impossible.
Wormholes could work, but you have to A, survive passing through a black hole at both ends, and B, have some way to hold open an aperture between them that, according to the math, would crash closed on itself the instant it formed because of the force of gravity.
The Alcubierre-White drive requires the generation of large quantities of matter with negative mass (we'd basically need to discover eezo). There's also a "hyperspace lanes" interpretation that requires masses to be placed along the path of travel that themselves are already traveling faster than light, so no go there, either.
There's also current math that suggests there is no other side to an event horizon. That is, matter that passes through it simply ceases to exist. In other words:
And before those theories were created, FTL was a Class III impossibility. It is possible for something to go from a Class III impossibility to a Class II impossibility to a Class I impossibility and finally to reality. You might be right about there being no other side of an event horizon since we can't observe beyond the event horizon.
Although, that picture certainly proves that you can punch a hole through non-solid objects.
I think what he's saying is that because we have no way of observing what exists inside the event horizon, there may be some thus far unknown phenomenon inside the event horizon that you can interact with in a way that might be described as "punching a hole."
Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
Exactly. A black hole consists of the gravitational singularity and the event horizon. There is the theoretical concept of naked singularities where the gravitational singularity doesn't have an event horizon. So if the gravitational singularity is the center of the black hole and the event horizon is the boundary of spacetime that surrounds the black hole at a specific distance, then what is the region between the gravitational singularity and the event horizon and what laws govern that region? There is just too much about black holes that we don't know since we can't currently observe beyond the event horizon.
If we could send tachyons through a black hole and detect them on the other side of the black hole, then we could have some understanding of what happens within a black hole. Based on the velocity of the tachyons. we could determine if the diameter of the black hole is equivalent to our perception of the diameter of the black hole. If it takes less than a second for the tachyons to pass through the black hole, then we know that it is the same size as we expect. If it takes hours or days, then black holes are bigger on the inside or some other weird phenomenon is happening. There might be an entire universe within each black hole for all we know.
Absolutely none of that is related in anyway to the fact that a event horizon is not a physical thing you can punch a hole in.
Have you ever seen an event horizon? We only have a theory about what an event horizon is so whether it is possible to punch a hole through an event horizon is not something we would be able to figure out until we truly understand black holes and have the right advanced technology.
And NO. For the last time, an event horizon is what we call the point where something cannot escape the black hole, if it differs from that then it's not a event horizon. If you can punch a whole in it it's not a mathematical distance, it a physical thing. This has been spelt out explicitly, it is identical in concept to the maximum range a car can go on a one tank of fuel. Once that fuel runs out that is the 'event horizon', you can't punch a whole in the maximum capacity of a now empty petrol tank.
Stop pretending something is not what it is just so you can pretend Star Trek works on real physics. It does not and Alternate Timelines do not violate the laws of conservation in that universe, get over it.
Our understanding of the event horizon is the maximum distance from the gravitational singularity where the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity is so massive that light can't escape. So if we have a tachyon travelling at 1.0000001c, then it can escape from the event horizon, but not a distance that is slightly closer to the gravitational singularity. The faster the tachyon is going, the closer it can get to the gravitational singularity and still be able to escape. So if you have a ship that can travel faster than light or nullify the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity on your ship, then you can escape from a black hole. Of course, this requires the physics beyond the event horizon is the same as the physics of the rest of the universe.
When have I ever tried to pretend Star Trek works on real physics? I have always believed that our current understanding of the universe can drastically change like what Einstein's theory of relativity did to Newton's Laws. As I have constantly stated, something that is impossible now is not necessarily impossible in the future due to having a far better understanding of the universe. There might be some future theoretical physicist that disproves Einstein's theory of relativity like Einstein's theory of relativity did with Newton's laws. Newton's laws still work at slow velocities, but not when dealing with velocities close to the speed of light.
So how does branching timelines obey the laws of conservation? If each decision we make creates a new universe, then that is a violation of the laws of conservation. If there is an infinite number of blank universes created as a result of the Big Bang where there is a parallel universe for each outcome of each decision we make, then there is no violation due to each universe existing for billions of years and not universes that have existed for only a few years.
I think some of the problem here is that some of you are looking at it like a boundary layer (certainly the writers of Voyager were), rather than understanding what an event horizon is.
in simple terms, the "Event horizon" is that point at which you don't come back. it's the tipping point between "Oh **** that was scary" (Nose of your car is through the guardrail with the wheels off the road and a drop into puget sound) and "My car is on the bottom of puget sound".
in simple terms, it's the distance beyond which, you can't escape the gravitation of the hypermass. That's all it is. It's not a wall, or a boundary layer (though it might look like one with the close-passes and orbital slingshotting of debris and particles), it's the spot where here you die. where no achieveable velocity will get you out, and you couldn't think fast enough to work the control to GET you out.
you've already fallen into the sound, get it?
Of course, this requires that there is no technology like FTL or gravity manipulation to escape. The point of no return for NASA is different from the point of no return for 24th Century Starfleet. Although, I would say that the point of no return for NASA is inside the accretion disk instead of the event horizon due to the temporal dilation effects.
Star, you're still thinking of an event horizon as a physical object, an actual wall of some sort that can be punctured. It's really more of a mathematical abstraction, defined by the application of physical laws. You can't make a hole in the speed of sound, you can't find a crack in the square-cube law, and you can't punch a new opening in an event horizon.
Patrick's analogy was, I thought, quite clear. The VOY episode we're criticizing here would be, in those terms, like crashing through the guardrail, finding yourself suddenly at the bottom of the Sound, then driving your car through a crack in gravity to wind up back on the bridge you just fell off of (probably the older side of the Narrows Bridge, that's a pretty scary crossing). It doesn't work that way.
Star, you're still thinking of an event horizon as a physical object, an actual wall of some sort that can be punctured. It's really more of a mathematical abstraction, defined by the application of physical laws. You can't make a hole in the speed of sound, you can't find a crack in the square-cube law, and you can't punch a new opening in an event horizon.
Patrick's analogy was, I thought, quite clear. The VOY episode we're criticizing here would be, in those terms, like crashing through the guardrail, finding yourself suddenly at the bottom of the Sound, then driving your car through a crack in gravity to wind up back on the bridge you just fell off of (probably the older side of the Narrows Bridge, that's a pretty scary crossing). It doesn't work that way.
I actually think the event horizon is more like the boundary between Earth's atmosphere and outer space than a physical object. Earth's atmosphere gets thinner and thinner until it reaches a certain particle density. The event horizon is simply the point where anything going at the speed of light is trapped by the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity.
Any particle that travels faster than the speed of light can get closer to the gravitational singularity without being trapped. Since the event horizon is the boundary where we can no longer observe events, then using a particle that can travel 10c would change the definition of the event horizon since we would be able to observe events beyond the event horizon. Where we would likely need a particle going at infinite velocity to reach gravitational singularity and be able to escape assuming that gravitational singularities have infinite density.
In order to create a hole in the event horizon, it is necessary to make an area of space within the event horizon where the gravitational pull from the gravitational singularity is weak enough that light can escape. So a device that can nullify gravitational energy would create a hole in an event horizon even though the event horizon is not a physical object. As I stated before in a previous post, such devices could make it possible to create a tunnel from the event horizon to the gravitational singularity.
Another benefit of these devices would be an extremely easy method of launching objects into space. Just launch the object from some high mountain and in a few seconds, Earth would be hundreds of kilometers away without the object moving. Of course, this is dependent on whether it is possible to nullify the gravitational pull.
Okay, I give up. That's not how gravity works, but you're so bloody determined to try to prove some undereducated keyboard jockey in the VOY writer's room correct that the basic structure of the universe is unimportant to you. Have it your way.
Dr. Miranda Jones: I understand, Mr. Spock. The glory of creation is in its infinite diversity.
Mr. Spock: And the ways our differences combine, to create meaning and beauty.
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In neither case, however, was the choice "predestined" - and each of us has made multiple choices since that have spun off other "me"s. Just because other versions of me made free-willed choices that varied from mine doesn't make any of them "predestined".
As for multiple universes with variant physical laws, I recommend Heinlein's novel The Number of the Beast. The protagonists found that the sheaf of universes can be described as consisting of four-dimensional universes, with three spatial axes and one temporal axis, in a superspace of six total dimensions. Further, any of the axes (x, y, z, t, tau, teh) could be used as either spatial or temporal - ours uses x, y, and z for space, and t for time, but translate axes and you could be in one that uses x, tau, and teh for space and z for time. The experience of the traveler would be the same. The Burroughs-Carter Continua Device was thus theoretically able to access 6^6^6 universes (hence the title); however, they found that once you translate far enough across a given sheaf of universes, the physical laws start to vary to the point that life cannot be supported. The total number of life-bearing universes would probably be more like 6^6, or 46,656 - more than enough, in my personal opinion.
(Then they found that each living universe was created by "fictons", the quanta of fiction, generated by another universe; the more of the group who had read a given fiction, the more likely they'd run across that universe. Barsoom was one of the early ones they hit. Later, they wound up in Oz, where the Good Witch outfitted their car with restrooms and a food supply that attached magically. Eventually, they were picked up by the starship Dora - fortunately, one of the protagonists read a lot of Heinlein, although she regarded him as hopelessly self-indulgent, so she recognized Lazarus Long's ship.)
The strands of a rope are in slightly different positions and sometimes fray or knot, but if you pull on a rope, the strands all move in basically the same direction. These strands are created by probabilistic outcomes, with some outcomes being more likely than others, hence there are more similar timelines than there are different ones.
The frays, incidentally, are caused by major time travel incursions, hence why there's a Temporal Prime Directive: such incursions can literally damage time and cause entire timelines to self-erase if not corrected (which is what happened to the canon version of ENT in my 'verse, because of all the mucking about with the TCW). If you can get to "close enough" as in "The City on the Edge of Forever" and "Past Tense", the inertia of time (the pull of the rope) will do the rest.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
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Huh. I hadn't thought of that one.
Infinite possibilities have implications that could not be completely understood if you turned this entire universe into a giant supercomputer.
And I do need to read that book some time.
It was most likely written by an STO player...Anyone can write an io9 article, after all.
Everytime a decision is made, there's another reality where we made the other decision. You can call it a parallel reality or an alternative reality; it's a matter of perspective.
For example: if you made the decision to turn right at a T-Junction, it would create another timeline identical to our own where you turned left. The quantum reality theory also means that there would be at least one (but likely an uncountable number) where you turned left, but where timelines diverged at an earlier point: i.e. where events were already different but you still ended up at that crossroads, at that time, with that same choice.
It's not a question of predestination or anything: it's two sides of the same phenomenon. Parallel universes and branching timelines are both triggered by 'divergences' from an existing timeline. However, it's worth noting that 'Parallels' does itself contradict established Star Trek time travel laws, though you can argue that the effect of 'correcting' divergences such as in 'First Contact' and 'City on the Edge of Forever' is just to 'recreate' the Prime Timeline branching off that divergent reality. This would of course require that the Guardian of Forever was trans dimensional, existing and aware across multiple realities as a single entity, but I digress.
Trials of Blood and Fire
Moving On Parts 1-3 - Part 4
In Cold Blood
The main reason why I hate this idea is it violates the law of conservation of energy. Every time a decision is made, a new universe has to be created as a result. If an infinite number of universe was created from the Big Bang, then there is an unique universe for every decision that is ever made. So there is the current universe where I turned right and there is a parallel universe that has existed since the Big Bang that is completely identical to the current universe except I turned left.
There is nothing in the Parallels episode that states each reality originated from an existing timeline.
because in reality, event horizons are not solid things you can punch a hole through, supernovae don't go faster than light, and apparently DNA isn't something that you can alter to the extent that it erases major genetic markers of an alien species in a matter of days/weeks
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A normie goes "Oh, what's this?"
An otaku goes "UwU, what's this?"
A furry goes "OwO, what's this?"
A werewolf goes "Awoo, what's this?"
"It's nothing personal, I just don't feel like I've gotten to know a person until I've sniffed their crotch."
"We said 'no' to Mr. Curiosity. We're not home. Curiosity is not welcome, it is not to be invited in. Curiosity...is bad. It gets you in trouble, it gets you killed, and more importantly...it makes you poor!"
Are you sure about that? We have never encountered an event horizon and only have seen its influence on other objects. We have no way to determine if a portion of supernovae travel faster than light. Would we even be able to detect something travelling faster than light if our technology is only good for detecting something that is travelling at the speed of light or less?
Our understanding of DNA is still in its infancy so it is possible that eventually we can alter DNA however we want.
Just because something is impossible now doesn't mean it will be impossible in the future. Our history is full of instances where we accomplished something that was previously considered to be impossible like travelling to the other side of the world in a few hours or travelling to the moon.
The "impossibilities" you speak of never violated the observable and provable laws of physics, they were only engineering problems we didn't have the technology to achieve, what physicist Michio Kaku refers to as Class I Impossibilities. For example, powered flight: some said it was impossible but we saw birds doing it all the time. For reference, Class II is something that is mathematically possible but (probably) cannot exist in the real world. Class III, including perpetual motiom machines, is completely impossible as it violates physics.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
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However, it is a fact that an event horizon is not a thing; it is a place. Can you punch a hole in a shadow, and escape into sunlight? Can you open a pathway through gravity, and jump clear of Earth's surface under your own power? No more can you crack an event horizon. Conceptually, it's ridiculous.
Event horizons are a theoretical existence. Since we can't observe the Event Horizon, then we can't determine if there is more to it than simply a distance or place where anything that enters it can't be observed from outside. So it might be possible to punch a hole through an event horizon depending on what the event horizon is.
Star Trek deals with going faster than light all the time so while our understanding of Black Holes is that the gravitational pull is so great that light can't escape. However, a ship travelling faster than light can overcome the gravitational pull. Of course, this requires the physics inside the event horizon to be the same as the rest of reality which is impossible to prove. So until we know what an event horizon is, there is no way to prove one way or another if we can crack open an event horizon. Humans in 2017 can't, but humans in 20017 might be able to.
Since it's not physical, there's no such thing as a "crack" in one, any more than you can have a "crack" in your shadow, or a "crack" in the idea of eternity. And while it might be possible for a vehicle traveling in excess of the speed of light to escape, it would be by simply moving through that point, not by "cracking" it - there is not a thing there to crack, it's a velocity.
(And since an event horizon can only exist around a hypermass, such as a gravitational singularity, one must also explain how the ship in question fails to be torn apart by tidal stresses. The scientific term for what happens actually is "spaghettification".)
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
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Now such a phenomenon would not be the event horizon, and I can't imagine a phenomenon what you could punch a hole through in order to escape a gravity well (keeping in mind that I'm not a physicist), but I think that's the general idea of starkaos's post.
Exactly. A black hole consists of the gravitational singularity and the event horizon. There is the theoretical concept of naked singularities where the gravitational singularity doesn't have an event horizon. So if the gravitational singularity is the center of the black hole and the event horizon is the boundary of spacetime that surrounds the black hole at a specific distance, then what is the region between the gravitational singularity and the event horizon and what laws govern that region? There is just too much about black holes that we don't know since we can't currently observe beyond the event horizon.
If we could send tachyons through a black hole and detect them on the other side of the black hole, then we could have some understanding of what happens within a black hole. Based on the velocity of the tachyons. we could determine if the diameter of the black hole is equivalent to our perception of the diameter of the black hole. If it takes less than a second for the tachyons to pass through the black hole, then we know that it is the same size as we expect. If it takes hours or days, then black holes are bigger on the inside or some other weird phenomenon is happening. There might be an entire universe within each black hole for all we know.
Absolutely none of that is related in anyway to the fact that a event horizon is not a physical thing you can punch a hole in.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
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Have you ever seen an event horizon? We only have a theory about what an event horizon is so whether it is possible to punch a hole through an event horizon is not something we would be able to figure out until we truly understand black holes and have the right advanced technology.
Our understanding of the event horizon is the maximum distance from the gravitational singularity where the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity is so massive that light can't escape. So either a ship that can overcome the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity or ship that is immune to gravitational pull can escape a black hole and pass through the event horizon provided that the physical laws that operate the ship is the same as the physical laws inside the event horizon. If someone could manipulate the gravitational energy within the black hole, then they can punch a hole through the event horizon. Someone could even create a tunnel from the event horizon to the gravitational singularity by having a bunch of devices that nullifies gravitational energy within a certain area. Such devices are impossible to build in 2017, but they might be possible in 20017. Just because it is a Class II or Class III impossibility now doesn't mean it is impossible in the future due to having a far better understanding of the universe. Faster than light travel is a Class II or Class III impossibility now depending on how mathematically sound the Alcubierre warp drive is, but it might be a reality in the future.
What do you mean 'seen'? Do you mean observed? Because the thing about black holes is... their black, and the thing about space... it's also black.
And NO. For the last time, an event horizon is what we call the point where something cannot escape the black hole, if it differs from that then it's not a event horizon. If you can punch a whole in it it's not a mathematical distance, it a physical thing. This has been spelt out explicitly, it is identical in concept to the maximum range a car can go on a one tank of fuel. Once that fuel runs out that is the 'event horizon', you can't punch a whole in the maximum capacity of a now empty petrol tank.
Stop pretending something is not what it is just so you can pretend Star Trek works on real physics. It does not and Alternate Timelines do not violate the laws of conservation in that universe, get over it.
Norway and Yeager dammit... I still want my Typhoon and Jupiter though.
JJ Trek The Kelvin Timeline is just Trek and it's fully canon... get over it. But I still prefer TAR.
#TASforSTO
'...I can tell you that we're not in the military and that we intend no harm to the whales.' Kirk: The Voyage Home
'Starfleet is not a military organisation. Its purpose is exploration.' Picard: Peak Performance
'This is clearly a military operation. Is that what we are now? Because I thought we were explorers!' Scotty: Into Darkness
'...The Federation. Starfleet. We're not a military agency.' Scotty: Beyond
'I'm not a soldier anymore. I'm an engineer.' Miles O'Brien: Empok Nor
'...Starfleet could use you... It's a peacekeeping and humanitarian armada...' Admiral Pike: Star Trek
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There's also current math that suggests there is no other side to an event horizon. That is, matter that passes through it simply ceases to exist. In other words:
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
And before those theories were created, FTL was a Class III impossibility. It is possible for something to go from a Class III impossibility to a Class II impossibility to a Class I impossibility and finally to reality. You might be right about there being no other side of an event horizon since we can't observe beyond the event horizon.
Although, that picture certainly proves that you can punch a hole through non-solid objects.
Our understanding of the event horizon is the maximum distance from the gravitational singularity where the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity is so massive that light can't escape. So if we have a tachyon travelling at 1.0000001c, then it can escape from the event horizon, but not a distance that is slightly closer to the gravitational singularity. The faster the tachyon is going, the closer it can get to the gravitational singularity and still be able to escape. So if you have a ship that can travel faster than light or nullify the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity on your ship, then you can escape from a black hole. Of course, this requires the physics beyond the event horizon is the same as the physics of the rest of the universe.
When have I ever tried to pretend Star Trek works on real physics? I have always believed that our current understanding of the universe can drastically change like what Einstein's theory of relativity did to Newton's Laws. As I have constantly stated, something that is impossible now is not necessarily impossible in the future due to having a far better understanding of the universe. There might be some future theoretical physicist that disproves Einstein's theory of relativity like Einstein's theory of relativity did with Newton's laws. Newton's laws still work at slow velocities, but not when dealing with velocities close to the speed of light.
So how does branching timelines obey the laws of conservation? If each decision we make creates a new universe, then that is a violation of the laws of conservation. If there is an infinite number of blank universes created as a result of the Big Bang where there is a parallel universe for each outcome of each decision we make, then there is no violation due to each universe existing for billions of years and not universes that have existed for only a few years.
Of course, this requires that there is no technology like FTL or gravity manipulation to escape. The point of no return for NASA is different from the point of no return for 24th Century Starfleet. Although, I would say that the point of no return for NASA is inside the accretion disk instead of the event horizon due to the temporal dilation effects.
Patrick's analogy was, I thought, quite clear. The VOY episode we're criticizing here would be, in those terms, like crashing through the guardrail, finding yourself suddenly at the bottom of the Sound, then driving your car through a crack in gravity to wind up back on the bridge you just fell off of (probably the older side of the Narrows Bridge, that's a pretty scary crossing). It doesn't work that way.
I actually think the event horizon is more like the boundary between Earth's atmosphere and outer space than a physical object. Earth's atmosphere gets thinner and thinner until it reaches a certain particle density. The event horizon is simply the point where anything going at the speed of light is trapped by the gravitational pull of the gravitational singularity.
Any particle that travels faster than the speed of light can get closer to the gravitational singularity without being trapped. Since the event horizon is the boundary where we can no longer observe events, then using a particle that can travel 10c would change the definition of the event horizon since we would be able to observe events beyond the event horizon. Where we would likely need a particle going at infinite velocity to reach gravitational singularity and be able to escape assuming that gravitational singularities have infinite density.
In order to create a hole in the event horizon, it is necessary to make an area of space within the event horizon where the gravitational pull from the gravitational singularity is weak enough that light can escape. So a device that can nullify gravitational energy would create a hole in an event horizon even though the event horizon is not a physical object. As I stated before in a previous post, such devices could make it possible to create a tunnel from the event horizon to the gravitational singularity.
Another benefit of these devices would be an extremely easy method of launching objects into space. Just launch the object from some high mountain and in a few seconds, Earth would be hundreds of kilometers away without the object moving. Of course, this is dependent on whether it is possible to nullify the gravitational pull.
Mr. Spock: And the ways our differences combine, to create meaning and beauty.
-Star Trek: Is There in Truth No Beauty? (1968)
Not sure. Riker's beard alone defies the laws of reality.
Trials of Blood and Fire
Moving On Parts 1-3 - Part 4
In Cold Blood