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From: EVAN@SU-CSLI.ARPA
Newsgroups: net.sf-lovers
Subject: re: FTL Travel
Message-ID: <2702@topaz.ARPA>
Date: Sat, 13-Jul-85 15:26:47 EDT
Article-I.D.: topaz.2702
Posted: Sat Jul 13 15:26:47 1985
Date-Received: Mon, 15-Jul-85 02:21:16 EDT
Sender: daemon@topaz.ARPA
Organization: Rutgers Univ., New Brunswick, N.J.
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From: Evan Kirshenbaum 

>Actually, according to Special Relativity, faster-than-light travel
>is just plain impossible.  All the sqrt(v^2 / c^2) terms turn
>imaginary...

I'm sure this shows a shocking naivitee on the subject of relativistic
physics, but this argument never made much sense to me.  So what if
the multiplier turns imaginary.  Imaginary numbers have rights too.
Besides, since everything on the ship would have an imaginary mass,
their ratios would still be real.  I've always been surprised that
physicists would throw up their hands at this and say "it's
impossible" rather than finding out just what the consequences of
having imaginary mass, velocity and time would be

Evan Kirshenbaum
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