FAster than light train travel

[citronut]

a friend email this to me

Super luminal train gate revealed


Editor’s Note: Here at EDN, we are privileged to hear from those at the cutting edge of innovation. Below you will find an email sent in as example that we thought we’d share. Enjoy!

Dear EDN,

It is almost April the first, which makes this an excellent time to share some really exciting developments from the world of physics.

I know that the typical electrical engineer is not supposed to be interested in physics and deep physics and metaphysics; he’s too busy trying to keep his bridge from falling down. But that is just a stereotype. We really love this stuff. We ought to. Solid state electronics is almost pure quantum mechanics. There is some relativity news too. There is a lot to talk about, but I’m going to stick with the stuff of which I have firsthand knowledge.

Let’s cover relativity first. I wish to reveal to the world, the super luminal (faster than the speed of light) train gate. A train entering the gate is propelled forward at many times the speed of light. Now, this is big physics. It’s bigger than the Texas super collider was going to be. In fact, it’s bigger than Texas.

Although it works on a small scale also, it isn’t truly useful until you do it on the large scale. People have done this with very brief pulses, but who cares if your text arrives a few femtoseconds sooner. We are going to do this with a train, a very long train. I figure that a train that is about 600 kilometers long is just about right. It is long, but it is also feasible.

To explain this, I am going to need some very precise definitions.

A train is composed of one or more units.
A unit is an engine or a car. Each unit is about 10 meters long. The first unit must be an engine. Cars and engines can be anywhere else in the train. In fact, if the train is 600 km long, it will practically require some engines at intervals within the train.
The position of a unit (this is important) is its middle (halfway between its front and its back).
The position of a train (this is even more important) is halfway between its first unit and its last unit. So, the position of a 600 km train is about 300 km behind the first unit.

The train gate itself is pretty low-tech. It is a huge cleaver operated by explosives. It is so powerful that it can cut right through the coupling between units in less than 100 microseconds. I have to rebuild it every time I use it, but that’s OK because I only need it to work once. For convenience, the position of the gate is always X = 0.

Here's how it works. The train starts through the gate. As soon as the first unit (remember, it is always an engine) goes through the gate, the cleaver operates. The output train of one engine proceeds normally and the rest of the input train is discarded.

In less than 100 microseconds, the position of the output train advances ahead of the input train by 300 km. That is a speed of 3,000,000 km/sec which is about 10 times the speed of light.

Now, it may seem extravagant to discard a 600 km train, but as all students of physics know, if you can exceed the speed of light, you can get tomorrow’s Wall Street Journal and make a killing in the stock market. All I need are some wealthy investors who would like to quintuple their investment in a mere 24 hours. It’s risk-free.

The physics is absolutely compelling. It’s OK if you don’t understand it. Physics works whether you understand it or not.

But enough practical science. All you need to know is not to worry about the train gate. We are not going to suck all the capital out of the economy. We will just take enough to make us rich beyond our dreams and means. You won’t notice a thing.

[dnsey]

Reminds me of a quandry involving a train and a fly.
The train is travelling at 100 mph, let's say due North.
The fly is travelling at, say, 10 mph due South.
The fly hits the train windscreen, and instantly reverses direction (or its component parts do, anyway).
At the point in time when its velocity changes, the fly is in contact with the train.
In changing velocity, the fly must pass through the state v=0, which must therefore also be the train's velocity at that time.
Ergo, the fly must instantaneously stop the train!
(If you're thinking that the windscreen flexes, replace it with 6-inch armour plate)