Pass-By Destination

Passing-By Destination

The theory of relativity sets a severe limit to our ability to explore the galaxy in space ships. As an object approaches the speed of light, more and more energy is needed to maintain its acceleration, with the result that to reach the speed of light, an infinite amount of energy would be required. It seems that the speed of light is an absolute barrier which cannot be reached or surpassed by massive objects. Given that our galaxy is about 80,000 light years across, there seems little hope for us to get very far in galactic terms. Science fiction writers might make use of worm holes or warp drives to overcome this restriction, but it is not clear that such things can ever be made to work in reality. Another way to get around the problem may be to use the relativistic effects of time dilation and length contraction to cover large distances within a reasonable time span for those aboard a space ship. When a rocket accelerates at 1g (g=9.81 m/s2), its crew experiences the equivalent of a gravitational field with the same strength as that on Earth. If this acceleration could be maintained for long enough, the crew would eventually reap the benefits of the relativistic effects that increase the effective rate of travel.