A blog about axions, warp drive, and thoughts on science and technology by Erik W. Lentz. This blog is meant to contribute to promoting an interest in science.
Hello all, As I have mentioned in previous posts, a major hurdle for autonomous FLT travel is the horizon problem. But what is a horizon? Is it some single well-defined concept or a catch-all term for many phenomena? In this post, I present some thoughts on horizons in general relativity theory and their implications for FTL travel using warp drives. A horizon is a limit to the region that can be…
Hello All, In this post I log some thoughts on another proposed challenge to superluminal warp drives: acceleration of the soliton past the speed of light. In their paper published earlier this year, Bobrick and Martire ( Introducing Physical Warp Drives ) state on page 17 of their pre-print that one cannot accelerate a subluminal warp drive to superluminal speeds for similar reasons as why one…
Hello All, I have received dozens of emails in the past months asking me for what essentially amounts to a warp drive course curriculum. This post contains a list of background reading I would recommend for those interested in studying and researching warp drives. Many technical topics have contributed to my research in this area so far, but I will narrow my selection to those that were the most…
Hello All, I was on The Judgement Call Podcast with Torsten Jacobi recently. The recording can be found on the podcast website ( https://judgmentcallpodcast.com/2021/06/94-erik-lentz-how-to-build-an-actual-warp-drive/ ) and YouTube ( https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZYBD5z_LDSQ ). We touched on a number of topics, including faster than light space travel, extra dimensions, the simulation…
Hello all, I was pointed to a paper that appeared on the arXiv yesterday ( https://arxiv.org/abs/2105.03079v1 ). I am glad to see people taking a close look into my paper ( https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6382/abe692 , and the latest arXiv version https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.07125v2 ) and the other recent papers on the topic of warp drives ( https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6382/abdf6e ,…
Hello all, An article about my warp drive paper came out recently, and I wanted to share it here. The article provides some further commentary made by other physicists about my paper, so it gives a better sense for where the topic stands among physicists. I was interviewed for this article and thought it was well done. Here you go:…
Hello all, I have received quite a few requests by email, interview, reddit, social media, and even this blog for a response to the paper "Introducing Physical Warp Drives" (IPWD) by Alexey Bobrick and Gianni Martire (https://doi.org/10.1088/1361-6382/abdf6e). There has also some confusion about the difference between the papers. This paper came out very near to my own 'warp drive' paper…
Hello all, As mentioned in an earlier post, on March 9 there was some activity on /r/science on the press release for my warp drive paper ( https://www.reddit.com/r/science/comments/m1gyyi/breaking_the_warp_barrier_for_fasterthanlight/ ). Several questions came up that I thought required some follow-up. So instead of outing myself on Reddit, I will address here those questions that I can answer…
Hello all, I wanted to write a short post to acknowledge the first online article I found to talk about my hyper-fast soliton work. Back in November, long before the press release while my manuscript was still under peer review, Dr. John Cramer wrote a perspective on my paper in his long-standing science column "The Alternate View" in Analog: Science Fiction and Fact Magazine . John also happens…
Hello all, As mentioned earlier, I was invited a few months ago by a colleague at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott to give a live talk about my work. This is my alma mater, and I am happy to "be back", even if it is just virtually. Here is a summary of my upcoming talk: Solitons in space–time capable of transporting time-like observers at superluminal speeds have long been tied to…
Hey all, Exciting morning for me: I found out that my warp drive paper was the top subject on the /r/science subreddit at one point today (for the published version that requires a subscription to access go here: https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1361-6382/abe692/meta or for a draft version on the arXiv go here: https://arxiv.org/abs/2006.07125v2 ) . Reddit link (top one) Here is the main…
Hello all, This first post is made on the date of this blog's creation. More posts are soon to follow, including Upcoming online talk to be given on 18 March 2021 at 3pm Eastern Daylight Time (please check the YouTube page for your local time) for the Science Speaker Series at the Jim and Linda Lee Planetarium : https://youtu.be/6O8ji46VBK0 Upcoming paper "Breaking the warp barrier: Hyper-fast…