RE: starship-design: Re: FTL travel

["L. Parker" <lparker@cacaphony.net>]

> Steve VanDevender wrote: (and Ben)
> L. Parker writes:

[clip]

> I can't say that I like _Six Not-So-Easy Pieces_ better than
> _Spacetime
> Physics_, but some of the explanations Feynman uses are quite clever.
> The lecture series Feynman gave was done in the early 1960s and the
> presentation of relativity was conventional for the time, meaning that
> it uses "relativistic mass" instead of invariant mass, and I think
> Feynman initially oversimplifies the presentation of relativity ("all
> you need is to replace 'mass' with 'relativistic mass'").
> However, his
> explanation of the fundamental concepts of general relativity
> is really
> nifty, and he does provide some material that I think is a good
> transition between the old-style presentation of relativity and the
> newer, geometric interpretation used in Taylor and Wheeler.

My problem isn't mathematical or even philosophical as in Curtis' case. I
can do differentials, and integrals with ease, matrix algebra and discrete
logic don't bother me a bit. My problem is I simply don't "get" it. The
intuitive leap that everyone keeps talking about, just doesn't happen. I can
follow the math, I just don't _believe_ it.

Actually the geometric interpretation was somewhat easier to understand.
When I get a little more time on my hands (ha ha), I intend to get Steve,
Timothy and Zenon to help me out here....


Lee