On the Problem of Light Speed - 09 February 2026

On Sunday, February 8, 2026, at 03:53:43 PM MST, Torquemada wrote:

Yo! Steve,

You know I've been hard on your fantasies about human life being seeded from Earth out into the cosmos. Never happen in our solar system because no other planet is remotely habitable. At the same time, it's impossible to break the speed of light speed limit to go further out. Nearest star 4 light years away - 100,000 years based on current limits of propulsion technology.

However, there might actually be a way - at least theoretically - for your envisioned forays out among the stars to be realized someday. Not by exceeding the cosmic speed limit - the speed of light - but by creating "warp bubbles" that would compress spacetime and render distant objects far closer - without any of the problems associated with near speed of light travel.

Math does not allow breaking the light speed limit - which would require an object with mass going at the speed of light to be powered by infinite energy - a mathematical impossibility - but the math does allow for the compression of spacetime.

For now, it's just a mathematical possibility, with the requisite technology just a distant dream.

But, hey, everything good starts with a dream, right?

Search for the following on YouTube:

"Scientists finally introduce a new way to travel ten times faster than light!"

Best,

Torq

09 February 2026

Torquemada,

Science fiction has always had to contrive a solution to problem of light speed and the impossible distances involved notwithstanding.

"Star Trek" - Warp Speed
"Dune" - Folding space by the spice saturated space navigators.
"Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy" - Infinite Improbability Field.
"Ender's Game" - the "ansible" for instantaneous communication across any distance.

Maybe the hypothesis you put forward in your email will lead to an answer.

Meanwhile, absent an answer for this problem, a Musk step to the moon or Mars is a step in the right direction. Hedging humanity's risky bet can be improved with a moon or a Mars interim alternative.

I believe you can't understand our world today sans an understanding of Elon Musk. Read this: "Elon Musk" by Walter Isaacson | Stephen DeWitt Taylor

There is something providential about what Musk is accomplishing. DJT is also a near-providential figure. Each, when viewed in the context of preservation of human consciousness, gets it. Musk understands the science. Trump gets the liberty thing, now greatly under threat.

I am amazed about how things we attributed to God when we were young are now on the point of realization by man. Remember this scripture?

Matthew 10:29-31 King James Version
29 Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father.
30 But the very hairs of your head are all numbered.
31 Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.

Read this novel (scroll), where technology is not so far off that the above will be soon realized. Soon man will have the capacity to know where every sparrow falls... every day. Does man, then, become God?

"Rollback" by Michael C. Grumley | Stephen DeWitt Taylor

SDT

PS. I've answered your lunch invites but don't get a response. Would love to catch up over some unlimited minestrone soup at Olive Gardon.