5 ms·

I wonder what it would be like to be the Nth generation of guys-that-left-in-2016 finally arriving and be greeted by the descendants of the FTL guys that arrive

I wonder what it would be like to be the Nth generation of guys-that-left-in-2016 finally arriving and be greeted by the descendants of the FTL guys that arrived 800 years before you.

zrail 10y ago
This is the plot of at least one Star Trek: Enterprise episode.
- Grishnakh 10y ago
  Which one? I Netflix'ed my way through that whole show a couple years ago and didn't see any like that. It does sound a little bit like "Space Seed" from TOS though, except I don't remember that ship having a particular destination. There was another TOS episode where they find a stray asteroid that turns out to actually be a generation ship inside. And there was some TNG episode where they find a ship with some 20th-century Earthers in cryogenic storage because they had just died of medical ailments. But I don't remember any ENT episodes like this, just some talk about "slow" Earth ships traveling at only Warp 1.5 or so, so that people lived their whole lives on them while on long-term trading missions (their helmsman came from one of these ships).
- blakeyrat 10y ago
  ... are you sure? There's one episode where they visit a colony established decades previous by a warp 1 or warp 2 ship, but they don't beat the colonists to the planet.
- MeetTheCryo 10y ago
  I'm pretty sure you're wrong and it was an episode of 'The Next Generation, although I've no idea what the title of the episode was... [0] [0] I've watched the episode only once (I'm not a Trekkie :) ), but if I remember correctly a synopsis of the plot was that decades (at least...) ago an automated ship containing Klingons in cryogenic suspension was launched to colonise a distant planet; in the time following the launch of that ship, the Federation reached and colonised that planet using faster ships, unaware that the Klingon ship was on the way... The crew of the Enterprise [D] has to try to figure out how to stop the Klingon ship from introducing the Federation colonists on the planet to the magic of orbital bombardment (a casus belli) without destroying the Klingon ship (a casus belli).
  - InclinedPlane 10y ago
    I think you're mixing up some details of that episode. The closest episode I can think of that matches that is "The Ensigns of Command", which involves a colony of humans that were isolated and underdeveloped due to interference from the planet's radiation. The colony was on a planet that technically belonged to the "Sheliak", a mysterious race the Federation had limited contact with, but who had decided to begin colonizing the planet and gave the Federation a short time span to remove the humans before they would eradicate them.
    - MeetTheCryo 10y ago
      I looked it up, and the title of the episode was "The Emissary" [S2E20] (although, yes, either I remembered a few details incorrectly or the Wikipedia synopsis of the plot is incomplete).
ygjb-dupe 10y ago
no shortage of fiction covering that scenario...
raverbashing 10y ago
Well, they can stop at the spaceship on their way back and then... I don't know
gnaritas 10y ago
Since we're pretty sure FTL is pure fiction and not possible in reality, that likely won't be an issue. Just because we don't know everything, doesn't mean we don't know anything.
- stincity 10y ago
  Pretty sure? I'm pretty sure we don't know near enough to make any type of guess on that.
  - gnaritas 10y ago
    Your mistaken, and this opinion is what the second sentence was for; just because we don't know everything doesn't mean we don't know anything. FTL is likely not physically possible. That's not to say it's impossible, just that it's not likely given the vast number of things we do know about physics.
- dbingham 10y ago
  We are, by no means, sure of that. There are numerous theoretical possibilities that fit current theory. Not least of which is the Alcubierre Drive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive
  - nsxwolf 10y ago
    Are there really numerous possibilities? I know about Alcubierre, what are the others?
    - adrianm 10y ago
      Alcubierre's drive is a solution to Einstein's field equations which simply means the math checks out in theory for warp drive. The resulting practical problem is that the energy requirements necessary for the solution are far greater than what we can feasibly achieve now or in the future (exotic matter's existence notwithstanding). But the fact that a physicist was able to derive this metric (energy requirements aside) is significant. Given the history of science, I would not discount the possibility that someone else will come along in the future with another solution which lowers the energy requirements to something feasible. But we can't predict this. But isn't it amazing that the math checks out at all? I find it inspiring...
Bluestrike2 10y ago
Maybe you'd get a nice little tech upgrade when you got there. And I'd hope that we'd at least develop some form of suspended animation to make things bearable.
- naravara 10y ago
  To be honest, assuming, you get there safely I'd rather be in suspected animation on the slow ship than the fast one. I'd get all the heroism and send-offs of a pioneer, I'd have my name etched on a monument somewhere, I'd have the thrill of exploring something totally new. All that, except when I arrive all the brutal, dangerous, boring work of establishing a self-sufficient biome will already be done and I can jump immediately into the "boldly go where no one has gone before" part.
loader 10y ago
They'd just get picked up along the way.

I wonder what it would be like to be the Nth generation of guys-that-left-in-2016 finally arriving and be greeted by the descendants of the FTL guys that arrived 800 years before you.

zrail 10y ago

This is the plot of at least one Star Trek: Enterprise episode.

Grishnakh 10y ago
Which one? I Netflix'ed my way through that whole show a couple years ago and didn't see any like that. It does sound a little bit like "Space Seed" from TOS though, except I don't remember that ship having a particular destination. There was another TOS episode where they find a stray asteroid that turns out to actually be a generation ship inside. And there was some TNG episode where they find a ship with some 20th-century Earthers in cryogenic storage because they had just died of medical ailments. But I don't remember any ENT episodes like this, just some talk about "slow" Earth ships traveling at only Warp 1.5 or so, so that people lived their whole lives on them while on long-term trading missions (their helmsman came from one of these ships).
blakeyrat 10y ago
... are you sure? There's one episode where they visit a colony established decades previous by a warp 1 or warp 2 ship, but they don't beat the colonists to the planet.
MeetTheCryo 10y ago
I'm pretty sure you're wrong and it was an episode of 'The Next Generation, although I've no idea what the title of the episode was... [0] [0] I've watched the episode only once (I'm not a Trekkie :) ), but if I remember correctly a synopsis of the plot was that decades (at least...) ago an automated ship containing Klingons in cryogenic suspension was launched to colonise a distant planet; in the time following the launch of that ship, the Federation reached and colonised that planet using faster ships, unaware that the Klingon ship was on the way... The crew of the Enterprise [D] has to try to figure out how to stop the Klingon ship from introducing the Federation colonists on the planet to the magic of orbital bombardment (a casus belli) without destroying the Klingon ship (a casus belli).
- InclinedPlane 10y ago
  I think you're mixing up some details of that episode. The closest episode I can think of that matches that is "The Ensigns of Command", which involves a colony of humans that were isolated and underdeveloped due to interference from the planet's radiation. The colony was on a planet that technically belonged to the "Sheliak", a mysterious race the Federation had limited contact with, but who had decided to begin colonizing the planet and gave the Federation a short time span to remove the humans before they would eradicate them.
  - MeetTheCryo 10y ago
    I looked it up, and the title of the episode was "The Emissary" [S2E20] (although, yes, either I remembered a few details incorrectly or the Wikipedia synopsis of the plot is incomplete).

ygjb-dupe 10y ago

no shortage of fiction covering that scenario...

raverbashing 10y ago

Well, they can stop at the spaceship on their way back and then... I don't know

gnaritas 10y ago

Since we're pretty sure FTL is pure fiction and not possible in reality, that likely won't be an issue. Just because we don't know everything, doesn't mean we don't know anything.

stincity 10y ago
Pretty sure? I'm pretty sure we don't know near enough to make any type of guess on that.
- gnaritas 10y ago
  Your mistaken, and this opinion is what the second sentence was for; just because we don't know everything doesn't mean we don't know anything. FTL is likely not physically possible. That's not to say it's impossible, just that it's not likely given the vast number of things we do know about physics.
dbingham 10y ago
We are, by no means, sure of that. There are numerous theoretical possibilities that fit current theory. Not least of which is the Alcubierre Drive: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alcubierre_drive
- nsxwolf 10y ago
  Are there really numerous possibilities? I know about Alcubierre, what are the others?
  - adrianm 10y ago
    Alcubierre's drive is a solution to Einstein's field equations which simply means the math checks out in theory for warp drive. The resulting practical problem is that the energy requirements necessary for the solution are far greater than what we can feasibly achieve now or in the future (exotic matter's existence notwithstanding). But the fact that a physicist was able to derive this metric (energy requirements aside) is significant. Given the history of science, I would not discount the possibility that someone else will come along in the future with another solution which lowers the energy requirements to something feasible. But we can't predict this. But isn't it amazing that the math checks out at all? I find it inspiring...

Bluestrike2 10y ago

Maybe you'd get a nice little tech upgrade when you got there. And I'd hope that we'd at least develop some form of suspended animation to make things bearable.

naravara 10y ago
To be honest, assuming, you get there safely I'd rather be in suspected animation on the slow ship than the fast one. I'd get all the heroism and send-offs of a pioneer, I'd have my name etched on a monument somewhere, I'd have the thrill of exploring something totally new. All that, except when I arrive all the brutal, dangerous, boring work of establishing a self-sufficient biome will already be done and I can jump immediately into the "boldly go where no one has gone before" part.

loader 10y ago

They'd just get picked up along the way.