Through The Wormhole: Can We Travel Faster Than Light?

Through The Wormhole: Can We Travel Faster Than Light?

7.85
12345678910
Ratings: 7.85/10 from 87 users.

Through The Wormhole: Can We Travel Faster Than Light?Prior to the day in 1947 when test pilot Charles E. Chuck Yeager broke the sound barrier for the first time, people argued it wasn't possible for a plane to fly that fast. So, perhaps we shouldn't be deterred by the part of Einstein's special theory of relativity that seemingly bars traveling at speeds faster than light.

That said, cracking the light-speed barrier is vastly more complicated than going faster than sound. The aircraft that Yeager used to break Mach 1, for example, didn't have to change form. But according to Einstein, an object that attains light speed would be converted to energy itself.

Nevertheless, as some physicists point out, there are nuances of Einsteinian physics that might permit faster-than-light travel. While an object can't exceed the speed of light in space-time, space-time itself can be warped and distorted, as if it were a stretched-out bed sheet.

If a spaceship could harness something really powerful - like a bunch of super-dense matter from a neutron star - it might be possible to warp space-time enough to briefly pull two distant points together, the way that the edges of the bed sheet would come together if you dropped a heavy weight in the middle. Such warps in space-time - which are known as wormholes - in theory may occur naturally in some places, and a spaceship might be able to exploit them to travel enormous distances extremely quickly. List of all episodes here: Through The Wormhole.

More great documentaries

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

160 Comments
Newest
Oldest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
Rodney Kawecki
Rodney Kawecki
8 years ago

Such a hole spins a centerized tunnel in the center of it. - is a myth. The hole woukld have to exist all the way through and a vortex has a closed end getting smaller and smaller to it. This is why Quanta Physics believes BH to be closed....no more working...

Rodney Kawecki
Rodney Kawecki
9 years ago

FTL travel means time travel says Albert Einstein...

The Universe is round like a balloon. Its diameter is 93 billion light years across measuring as a balloon 229,000 mil light years. A ship travels in any direction will travel rite back to the place it launched. A ship traveling at the speed of light can accelerate up to close to 450,000 miles a second if it had the engine capacity to do it. This does not violate relativity – it’s based on the universe’s length as a balloon (450,000 miles a second) which allows it. Space is warp not the celestial matter in it that doesn't change. But a ships speed can zoom to close that 2.7 light speed. Space is warp meaning that it was stretched, curved, bent and blown up creating a dark black hole that releases pressure from somewhere in the cosmos dark matter element. Matter survived without diminishing and lays on top of the warp space. What makes the matter in the universe to expand is the pressure from the hole in it. Space has been warp and as consisting as a empty expanding vacuum has a zero point vacuum ground density but since it doesn't consist as a close compartment as relativity insist it does – means that there exist no real limit to a ship velocity traveling on this expanding bubble. The galaxies orbit spreading at 2.7 miles a second per second away from each other at the edge of the universe. Physicists think that faster than light speeds in such a condition would illustrate a un-balance in the galactic orbitration speed meaning that the distance because of the expansion and its speed between galaxies is too much. We measure the distance between the galaxies and think how much they spread a part at 450,000 miles a second each second as way fast and way far a part. Its all happening at the edge of the universe. The room between celestial sphere at the edge is the oldest area of the balloon. As the balloon gets bigger and bigger more and more room is available making the velocity the sphere’s orbitrate giving them the velocity under the open pressurizing realm more freedom. We don’t feel this change in the realm pressure because we reside in its grip but we can measure it from a distance. The space it resides in – is warp from the beginning but retains as a emptyness. The speed a ship can travel through this warp ship can be measured a sum Quanta Physics Theory by this author Rod Kawecki has deciphered. We have measured the the speed between the galaxies and the velocity they expand at at the universe’s edge and divide that distance and separation velocity by the speed of light which equals 278,000 miles a second..divide this sum by the speed of light equals 2.7 thousand miles a second. This is how we decipher the available universal speed limit in the equation sum’s. Albert Einstein deciphered the universal speed limit saying it was the speed of light because light measures at both levels a mass scale and a non mass scale which fits well with measuring particle masses but does nothing for the universe’s speed limit. He deciphered these barriers with gravity and assume empty space as static electricity. He also assumed his speed limit with a close universe compartment or as a bubble that has limited realm equilibrium of space. And its not – we reside outside the balloon or bubble surface. Reading The Quanta Physics theory you can discover the equations that prove this and why. Einstein also considered the zero point vacuum energy of open space possibly by adding a zero to his light made of ship. He never looked at squaring the velocity as in his equations but others have like Star Trek engine propulsion possibilities. The difference between general relativity and special relativity using time travel as a barrier traveling pass light speed you will time travel – is beyond the real truth. I have written five books using these deciphered changes found in relativity and my sixth will include the realm of the universe as I have mentioned in short length here but more are shown. All my books decipher as theory with faster than light hypothesis deciphered equations and explain the differences and why. I think we have to acknowledge a new beginning in a commercial space environment future from earth. I always wondered if god made a cat animal heaven like us – what you think.

A compartment is like a closed box - everything in it is subject to the environment in the box. New evidence in physics show we live outside this balloon - in a space environment that measures free and openly. All lifelike things all come to rest at some time even particles .. we reside on the blink of infinite enlightenment and have the ability to travel free of closed compartment limitations......

awful_truth
awful_truth
9 years ago

If there is anything to be learned from the Apollo missions, it is that we have access to only 1 earth type planet, and although we may someday venture to other planets in the solar system, everything else we see in the sky has a high probability of being unattainable. That in itself should be a big enough motivator for us to look after the planet we inhabit now. Since the vast majority of people are far more motivated by short term pleasure, it is far more likely we will end in an evolutionary cul-de-sac before we achieve the highly improbable. A great documentary to ground everyone back on earth, check it out.

Harvey Ammons
Harvey Ammons
10 years ago

Relative we can go faster than light. Stuff can but when it goes faster, we have no way to observe it.

Teemu Kielinen
Teemu Kielinen
11 years ago

If we could move faster than light, wouldn't that break the causality, right? And if we moved almost at the speed of light, wouldn't even the largest distances feel like an instant (twin paradox)? What I'm trying to ask is, does light have a "speed" only in the eyes of a stationary observer? In a way that the speed would be only a limit of "the fabric of the cosmos" - really there wouldn't be a "speed": any distance would seem instantaneous if travelling at the speed of light. Of course it would be a one-way time machine :)

But then again universe is already sort of breaking the speed of light (it's roughly 14 billion years old but we can observe it much farther than that).

My head hurts.

Keira_tori
Keira_tori
11 years ago

change the video to public so that we can watch it every one is allowed to watch the video

Cam
Cam
11 years ago

This one's down- it says "This video is private."

Avery Waggoner
Avery Waggoner
12 years ago

hey i dont think its possible to move space like as your getting faster and faster to the speed of light the more mass you have so you would gett bigger and bigger and if your ship stayed in one spot in space and still travel its not possible beause the force that the ship is giving is 0 newtons right and the force that it is giving is 0 then the force you get back is 0 newtons and if there is no force there is no acceleration on the ship so the ship would stay still as to space would not move either

Engineer Ishrat Hussain Mohamm
Engineer Ishrat Hussain Mohamm
12 years ago

why any thing can not travel faster than light?, the answer is that the speed of expansion of space time continum is the speed of light, the space is travelling with this speed, the time is also travelling with this speed, the universe is expanding with this speed, and this is the speed of energy, the energy travels in this speed, and only energy can travel with this speed, and thing which is not energy can not travel with this speed, the particles which have mass can not travel with the speed of light unless they become energy.

JudgeJRS
JudgeJRS
12 years ago

There was a girl named Miss Bright
Who could travel faster than the speed of light
She took one day in an Einsteinian way
and came back on the previous night.

Judge John R. Stewart

thedilema
thedilema
12 years ago

There's one experiment that I don't get...?
Not sure if it's in this doc...
The one where they try and catch neutrinos, by setting there experiment far beneath the earths surface for example in mines.. They apparently do this because the neutrinos have to travel through a great deal of matter so they can be detected. This is probably stupid.. but if they were to carry out the same experiment at night in winter for example, on the earths axis wouldn't the neutrinos have to travel through the same amount of matter or if not more...??

Ricardo Rodrigues
Ricardo Rodrigues
12 years ago

Einstein commented on quantum theory... specifically regarding the uncertainty principle: "God doesn't play dice" .... it's actually his most famous expression ... up there with ... "the apple is only red when you look at it"... he eventually admitted defeat... if you had mention Heisenberg...

Brendan Hamlin
Brendan Hamlin
12 years ago

we may not have calculated correctly when it comes down to the neutrinos, but IF they are going faster then light, then what does this mean? my guess is that if something as nearly 0 mass, then it can go faster then light, or if it weighs lets say a negative amount, such as -1 pound, what would that mean? well lets just assume that its putting weight on everything else instead, it repels gravity, then something may not work properly around it at all. thus E=MC^2 could mean something totally different. we have created anti particals, so why not negative mass? now i realize this doesn't seem even close to possible. But that's because we don't know everything. IF we knew everything we could say whether or not this was even worth it.

Ingo Nettersheim
Ingo Nettersheim
12 years ago

This week they claim in Geneve that they let nutrinos travel faster than light!

Mark Oakley
Mark Oakley
12 years ago

hang on even if we could travel faster then light we would first have to develop shields and a mega computer that can navigate at the speed of light. A speck of dust at the speed of sound can kill a human not to mention damage craft

Alexander
Alexander
12 years ago

no we can not!
another thing -we can't even travel as fast as light!
yet another thing - we can't even travel nearly as fast as light!
conclusion: we are NOT going anywhere 'cause it would take us 10 000 year to travel just to the NEAREST star (only 4 l years) with current technology, and there are not many stars in at least 100 l years radius... so i suggest we start to EVOLVE and embrace our mother earth, 'couse it would take a lot more than 10% of our brains to even start thinking about going into universe (outside the solar sys)

agun
agun
12 years ago

I can imagine a unicorn. Can man make me a unicorn?

thedilema
thedilema
12 years ago

gravitons and neotrinos are massless and so have no relative mass which means these particles can travel parallel to the velocity of light travelling in a vaccun FACT!

Clifford William Thomas
Clifford William Thomas
12 years ago

Doesn't the very nature of gravity negate the argument that nothing can travel faster than light? Think about it, gravity is the only thing that has enough speed to escape a black holes grasp, it's the very nature of a black hole.

Atheist13
Atheist13
12 years ago

Wow! Perhaps the most intriguing and mind warping episode yet. The program deals more with getting round the speed of light barrier rather than actually exceeding it. That Science is working hard on this seemingly insurmountable problem gives me great hope that we can explore the universe in greater strides than the tiny steps we currently take in the backyard of our pale blue dot. Straight after watching I caught the latest episode of the BBC’s brilliant Science program Horizon called “Seeing Stars” which deals with how we capture and see light. Hopefully Vlatko will have it here soon, don’t miss it.

anuragawasthi
anuragawasthi
12 years ago

Excellent doc but no mention of teleportation

Guest
Guest
12 years ago

Just for the other film-music lovers out there: About halfway through pt 2 of this one, Zimmer/Shea "quote" the main title sequence prelude from the '84 version of the film 'Dune,' which I thought was pretty cool, considering the subject matter. The note-values are shortened, it's buried a little bit in the orchestration, and he only does it twice, but it's definitely there, and I'm convinced it was intentional and not an accident.

drusta
drusta
12 years ago

Ontop of his speed? I doubt it, because light does not gain speed by any means of further acceleration, not even gravity. Otherwise light around planets and stars would travel faster.

drusta
drusta
12 years ago

@psychrealm11

I guess you both are attracted to the black hole by the same amount, however as the light already travels faster, it might get into the black hole quicker. It's the same as if you get attracted by another massive object (jupiter?), light would still travel faster, at the speed of light. How ever, who knows how particles will act behind the event horizon. =/

psychorealm11
psychorealm11
12 years ago

This may sound like a dumb question: If you are at the event horizon of a black hole and both you and light get captured by the black hole at the same time do you both get pulled at the same speed?

DeeJay Pickles
DeeJay Pickles
12 years ago

im disappointed by the fact nothing can travel at the speed of sound, it is an upper limit to our universe that we can never aspire beyond except in fiction.

slamminvinyl
slamminvinyl
12 years ago

Want to know why nothing can travel faster than light?

Light has the largest velocity (and cannot be beaten) because it has no mass. This is crucial because to make mass accelerate it requires an increasing force which is then counter-acted (every action has a reaction) to equilibrium (forces equalling each other which creates a constant velocity or speed). As the mass travels faster, it takes increasingly more energy (or force) to make the mass accelerate. With a non-mass, such as light, no force is needed for acceleration and no force is therefore counter-acting which means that there is no slowing mechanism that stops light going 'full speed'.

This is why nothing can travel faster than the speed of light..
the mention of the speed of sound is pointless and misleading - it is a completely different mechanism with very different physics.

Source: Physics A-Level

Primaryorange
Primaryorange
12 years ago

That test @ 12 minutes with the two plates to test negative energy... I wonder if its also taking into account the fact that 2 objects that close will also cause gravitational effects on eachother, and pull eachother together.
Just like how each of us ever so slightly pull the earth to our feet, as the earth pulls us to it.

I like entertaining the idea of negative energy. I just hope hes measuring the correct forces.

His Forever
His Forever
12 years ago

I think this was my favorite wormhole episode. I'll watch it again later. Question: How did we determine that light was the fastest thing in the universe? I MISSED that part.

Djukanovic
Djukanovic
12 years ago

Anyone else notice in this series that Morgan Freeman was such a troublemaker when he was a kid?

Achems_Razor
Achems_Razor
12 years ago

Great stuff as usual, cosmic strings a bit new to me, I do not know if there where different speed limits of light, inflation to me is the expanding of space itself which is not breaking any laws of physics, that is why the far galaxies are moving away faster than the speed of light.

So taking that in consideration and the speed of light and because the universe is not static in our linear time frame, in an expanding universe the objects that emitted the light has continued to recede during the billions of light years the light was in transit.

Therefore the furthest galaxies are 41 billion light years away by now, even though the age of the universe is 13.75 billion years old, give or take 0.11 billion years. The diameter of the observable universe is approx. 82 billion light years across.

Atom Colideer
Atom Colideer
12 years ago

omg im so loving the wormhole series

KsDevil
KsDevil
12 years ago

I'd like to see those light speed highways mapped to see what pattern might emerge. Perhaps those highways are signs of something else.

blaxparx
blaxparx
12 years ago

You people must not keep up on the latest happenings in science. A week or
two ago a team if Chinese scientists proved that can nothing travel faster
than the speed of light. So this whole documentary is now worthless.

Sieben Stern
Sieben Stern
12 years ago

O_O was jean Roddenberry right?

this is amazing - humanity needs to stop everything and work on this!

Thomas Tadashi Tadleigh Tibet
Thomas Tadashi Tadleigh Tibet
12 years ago

Great knowledgeable series, I'm following wd joy! :)

AlTheIrish
AlTheIrish
12 years ago

I'v been an avid fan of this site for years and have always enjoyed reading the coments before I watch the doc to get a good gauge of what it is like but have never felt the need to coment myself until now! C_and_N + Azilda please save you coments for your hippy circles, some1 please back me up on this

Sion88
Sion88
12 years ago

Indeed. Once I had an ant farm but them fellas didn't grow s***. I said: "Come on, how about some celery?! You guys don't farm! Plus, if I tore your legs of you would look like snowmen."

His Forever
His Forever
12 years ago

Yes, we can. Angels can; souls can; we just have to find out how the spiritual aspect of reality can do so.

Guest
Guest
12 years ago

i wonder what the wormhole series agenda is.
az

Guest
Guest
12 years ago

i am out of here!
Good Byes
az