Razor blades, Däniken and pyramids

Originally posted by redbadger
I never shave being a Badger

But a beaver would be different.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Theoretically possible. Remember, no matter how powerful a rocket is, it will NEVER get to the speed of light. What DOES happen is communications becomes less and less data intensive so if you are at say 0.9999999 c, then communications would be more or less in morse code. But you would be alive for a 500 light year trip out in space. Of course, coming back ...[text shortened]... ki/Flatland

That's what you would be, basically being converted into a two dimensional being.

"https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flatland"

Excellent recommendation. Here is the book:

http://www.geom.uiuc.edu/~banchoff/Flatland/

Communication theoretically possible: yes.

In real-time (as I was referring to): I don't think so. As in your example, it takes too much time to send signals when travelling far.

Furthermore, I think all dimensions shrink equally, so no pancake but just smaller. Or is it direction-specific for some reason?

Thanks.

Originally posted by vandervelde
http://www.messagetoeagle.com/interviewdaniken.php#.VXqyCVKupgA

Still, there is something undeniable charming [I had to open dictionaries to check these words] in Dänikens's thesis and whole show, it's a spirit of middle-class obsession with "popular articles" with a kind of East European naivity.

It's still possible his theories are correct too. Many overzealous theorist are either fooled by or become charlatans. 🙂

Originally posted by Shallow Blue
As for razor blades: proof, please. For now I find the theory that you shave less on holidays more believable.

Well, really I can't prove but to offer my own experience.
Last time I was on 14 days trip, I took used baled frome suitcase to shave at home (didn't want to open a new one, and hos - 4-5 times used - still lasts.

If I open a new one (which didn't "travel"😉 I can waste it after 3 shavings.

I opened a new one now in Amsterdam, adn expet it to last all 13 dazs trip (I have only that one), and after, when I get back to Belgrade, I hope it will give me at least 3 nice shavings.

Originally posted by sonhouse
Not even that. More like a few microseconds. Get close to c and it is a different story, like going 0.9c you will live about 2 1/2 times longer, also takes about 2 years to get to Alpha Centauri instead of 4.3 years at the speed of light. Of course if you do that trip and turn around and come back, you will be about 5 years younger than your twin brother be ...[text shortened]... ght, but time sped up for you and so you on your own clock are going 7 times the speed of light.

So we have to distinguish between the time flow for the unmoved observer and the moved person.

c is the speed of light, so for the unmoved observer it takes you longer to reach any target than light. For you it is more difficult as you pointed out. The problem is of course acceleration to this kind of speed. If we assume that 6.4g is about the maximum a body would withstand for prolongued times (g-force at the Apollo flight) how long would it take to reach 0.9 c? and where would you be on your journey to Alpha centauri?

Then to turn around you have to fly a curve with the same maximum force. What would be the radius of such a curve and where would the trajectory put you relative to alpha centauri and earth (you can assume both to be fixed)?

Edit: source for g-forces: https://web.archive.org/web/20140819225557/http://csel.eng.ohio-state.edu/voshell/gforce.pdf

dOriginally posted by Ponderable
So we have to distinguish between the time flow for the unmoved observer and the moved person.

c is the speed of light, so for the unmoved observer it takes you longer to reach any target than light. For you it is more difficult as you pointed out. The problem is of course acceleration to this kind of speed. If we assume that 6.4g is about the maximum ...[text shortened]... es: https://web.archive.org/web/20140819225557/http://csel.eng.ohio-state.edu/voshell/gforce.pdf

well, you can figure 1 g gets you close to c in about 1 year so 6 g's would do the job in about 2 months, while humans can take 6 or 9 g's for a few seconds you would have to have special protection to last anything like 2 months at that level. You would have to be perpendicular to the acceleration for one thing or you would not be able to get blood from your legs back to your heart so you would be in some kind of cushioned cocoon probably with those devices that squish your legs to help blood flow. TWO g's would be hard to take for long periods of time, that would be 6 months to c. Of course that means 6 months to get CLOSE to c.

Here is a link that helps show all this:

http://math.ucr.edu/home/baez/physics/Relativity/SR/rocket.html

It says you can get to Andromeda galaxy in 12 of your years if you accelerate continuously at 1 g, but there and back, 2 or 3 million years pass by on Earth.

Tvochess; the squishing IS direction dependent, you get shorter but not skinnier, so in fact you become a pancake and at c you would become a moving 2 dimensional slice of the universe. Of course you can't get to c so that is just the imaginary end of that process.

At 0.999c if your spacecraft was 1000 feet long and say 50 feet wide, it would be squished to a length of about 50 feet long but still 50 feet wide. You would feel no different however, if you were say 2000 mm long (about 6 foot 7 inch) you would be about 100 mm high now, or about 4 inches but so would everything around you so if you measured yourself you would still think you are 2 meters high because your ruler has also shrunk by a factor of 20 or so.

I was thinking about that and conclude the people in the spacecraft would have a weird view, if they had a 6 foot ruler and faced it up and down with respect to the motion of the craft, it would be 4 inches long, but if you turned it sideways it would go back up to 6 foot long. That must be disconcerting. It seems an effect that would be readily visible since it is only one dimension that is shrinking!