Well at least there is a theoretical model for an FTL drive the Alcubierre drive( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive ) proposed in 1994. At present it has so many reasons we can’t do it (several different flavors of unobtainium, VERY large energies that even Antimatter would struggle to provide, and a likelihood that you can’t really steer the darned thing once you start it) that it is practically unachievable. Depending how all this dark matter/dark energy stuff falls out (and that is beginning to look pretty dodgy) things may get far better or far worse.
That said an antimatter drive (even a pulse antimatter drive, essentially an Orion drive using small matter antimatter/matter explosions) would be a godsend for reaching Mars the Asteroids or any other celestial body outside the Earth/Moon pair. Currently a Hohmann Orbit (minimum energy) to Mars runs 8-9 months of time and the window is only open every two years (26 months I think). At .01 G (a centi-G engine) this takes 64-112 days i.e. 2-4 months and position only affects time. At .1g (a deci-G engine) this drops to 36-76 HOURS (i.e. 1-3 days). The first matches early trips from Europe to the New World (e.g. the Mayflower took 70 days) which were ultimately commercially viable and establishing colonies was possible. The second is like rail trips across the US at rail’s peak in the 40’s and 50’s. That totally changes the relationship between Earth and the colonies.
Ad Astra per Aspera!!!
Your lead in reminds me of the subject of time travel. Current physics seem to agree that time travel is theoretically possible but the engineering would require energies, both negative (whatever that means) and positive and processes FAR beyond anything even on our most distant horizon.
I say that’s okay but I note that if the past is reachable only given futuristic engineering, the past (and all time) must exist in some real sense. I find that horrifying and comforting at the same time.
I think the Negative energy is one of the phlogiston like items the Alcubierre drive would need just like the Einstein-Rosen bridge time machine. I suspect that the relationship is that the drive would manipulate space-time and the Einstein-Rosen bridge must do the same to get time travel. That said these kinds of physics are way beyond my pay grade and Special and General Relativity have always given me a touch of the Heebie-Jeebies.
Tom and Treg:
As science fiction enthusiasts isn’t it enjoyable that these theoretical conjectures allow us to imagine humans traversing time and space to a spectacular degree. And who knows? Jules Verne had his astronauts shot out of a cannon. The reality was much more complicated but even more exciting than the pure speculation of Verne’s day. Each era has to take a stab at understanding the universe based on its own limited version of the facts.
Jules Verne wasn’t much of a mathematician because the math to determine G loading necessary to generate escape velocity (about 37,000 fps) given a barrel of given length is basic. And the answer in in the 1,000’s of G’s would result in the protagonist being reduced to a red goo.
Poor old Jules was probably about as in the dark with respect to rocketry as we are about FTL and time travel. But maybe imagination and wonder are the first steps toward learning about something new.