Talk: Warp factor/archive

Talk:Time warp factor

if this article is currently correct, perhaps it should be redirected? Tyrant 17:18, 27 Jan 2005 (CET)Tyrant

Even though it's been over three years, I support a merge.--31dot 20:22, 2 June 2008 (UTC)

I support a merge, as well. --From Andoria with Love 04:47, 11 June 2008 (UTC)

Re-envisioned warp scale

An interesting postulate regarding the refactoring of the warp scale relates to the "failure" of the Excelsior-class transwarp drive experiments. I believe it was Ex Astris that proposed this. The idea was that the transwarp experiment of the Excelsior series did not in fact fail (as stated only in expanded literature), but rather that it succeeded. "Transwarp" did not, at this time, denote the familiar transwarp we associate with the Borg in the 24th century, but rather a new implimentation of warp drive that resulted in refactoring the warp scale as well. Personally, I find this proposition rather clean, and would strongly suggest that it be added to this entry. --McC 17:05, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

Nowhere on-screen was it said to have succeeded or failed, making the above unnecessary speculation. --Gvsualan 17:13, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

True, but it seems rather ludicrous to say that the project failed utterly because someone sabotaged it. That particular test failed. *shrug* --McC 17:43, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

Both explaination are speculations. I prefer the one from Ex Astris, because it seems strange to assume that, even if the project failed, the technology still hasn't been developped 90 years later.

After all, transwarp could simply mean "faster than any warp drive we know" and sulu's transwarp engine could be a casual warp drive in TNG era. --rami

Warp Factor Formula above Warp 9.9

For Warp 9.9 and above, the following formula seems to hold (matches the values on the TNG chart, and the asymptotic nature of the revised warp scale):

$WF^{(3.3+((-log_{10}(10-WF)+1) \times (-log_{10}(10-WF)/2) \times 0.2))}$

Where WF=Warp Factor

resulting in

• 9.9: 3052.9745297119534
• 9.99: 7912.348436907865
• 9.9999: 199515.65683439485

HaganeNoKokoro 07:13, 7 Sep 2005 (UTC)

I simply could not resist this...

Regardless if that formula is accurate or not, why express it in such a convoluted manner? Here is the same formula, after simplification, although I did not know how to make it appear as a proper equation

V = W ^ (3.3-lg(10/(10-W))*lg(10-W)*0.1), where:

lg denotes logarithm base 10

V= Velocity, in C

W= Warp factor

---Obbas

Warp 13 in "All good things"

couldn't this figure be simply a joke? Q is very playful. --Rami

Actually, it is widely believed that another recalibration of the warp scale was produced following advancements in warp technology which wither necessitated, or simply made the third nacelle on the Enterprise a more efficient design change. --Matt (Contact me at zatnikitelman@gmail.com)

Modern Warp equation

I have an equation that will calculate any warp velocity from 1 to almost 10 and I would lke to post it here. I have checked it with the warp velocity chart in the Star Trek Encyclopedia and it fits well. The problem is that I did not create it and I do not know who created it in the first place. A number of years ago, I was searching online for it and just happened upon it. I remember the site was set up by a college student studying math and he had a calculator on the site along with the equation. I began to use it to figure out all sorts of warp factor numbers. When I noticed on this and other Trek sites that this information was missing, I felt that keeping this piece of information to myself was not right. So, I guess what I need to know is, without a proper rreference for this equation, can it be posted here? -- Lontos Adjke 02:18, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

That was this one that you'd previously put onto the warp factor page I presume:

speed = (WF^((10/3)*(1+(0.20467*EXP(-0.0058*(LOG(10^4*(10-WF)))^5))* (1+(1/3)*(2*COS(10*PI()*LOG(8/(10*(10-WF)))-1)*(EXP-49.369*(LOG(8/(10* (10-WF))))^4))))*(1+(1.88269/PI())*(PI()/2-ATAN((10^WF)*LOG(2000* (10-WF )))))))) *c

-- Sulfur 02:24, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

For the record, that was removed as it was not canon, having never been seen or heard of in an episode or film. Interesting, though. Can't understand it, but interesting. --From Andoria with Love 03:25, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Sulfer is correct, that is the equation. I have been using it for about seven years now and I still do not fully understand it. Currently, it is the only equation that I know of that can calculate all warp speeds. I would hope that even tough it is not canon, that it could be displayed and used. I have to admit, the guy who came up with this must have been a genius. Even though it is long and cumbersome to put into a spreadsheet, it is interesting to graph out and figure out how fast known vessels go. --Lontos Adjke 18:52, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

Well, it's displayed here, so anyone who sees this can use it if they wish. If you want, you can also bring it up in one of the talk pages centering on warp drive or the warp scale and it might get added to an article as background information. However, as background info is normally reserved for trivia relating to the backstage proceedings of a subject, it is just as likely it can't be added. But you can bring it up if you wish. (Actually, having said that, it might be best to just continue the discussion here... but the choice, ultimately, is up to you.) --From Andoria with Love 19:05, 19 May 2006 (UTC)

that's weird because i encountered another equation for warp factor

$V = Wf ^ ((10 / 3) + (Abs((Wf - 9) > 0) * A * (-Log(10 - Wf)) ^ n))$

Where: A = 0.03684678, n = 1.791275, Wf=Warp Factor.

– The preceding unsigned comment was added by Beowulf99 (talk • contribs).

Source (concurrent discussion)

What is the source of this:

To calculate speed in terms of c in the Revised Cochrane scale, the formula is: speed = (WF^((10/3)*(1+(0.20467*EXP(-0.0058*(LOG(10^4*(10-WF)))^5))* (1+(1/3)*(2*COS(10*PI()*LOG(8/(10*(10-WF)))-1)*(EXP(-49.369*(LOG(8/(10* (10-WF))))^4))))*(1+(1.88269/PI())*(PI()/2-ATAN((10^WF)*LOG(2000* (10-WF )))))))) *c. Warp 1 is equivalent to c (as it did in the 22nd/23rd century scales); Warp 6 is approximately 392*c. This equation will work for all values 1>=WF>10.

I really doubt that equation is from a canon source. Jaz ^talk 03:28, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Looks like someone fell on his pocket calculator... several times. :) -- Cid Highwind 08:00, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Looks more as if someone without true knowledge of mathematics entered the given datapoints into some calculation program to interpolate them. However it can only be one graph to interpolate the data points, add another pair of data and you will receive a different result. Btw. I just found that the formula might be taken from a link given in rec.arts.startrek.tech -- Kobi 15:47, 18 May 2006 (UTC)

Math

The math code isn't working for some reason – there's no calculation. --From Andoria with Love 20:48, 1 August 2006 (UTC)

I'm not sure I understand what you mean. For that matter, I'm not seeing how the given formula even works.

$\sqrt[3]{v/c}$

• v is the speed of the signal or starship
• c = 3.0x108 m/s (the speed of light)

To clarify my confusion, I have fairly competent math skills but I can't figure out, using this formula, how Warp 6 = 216c, by simply plugging the numbers in for the variables. Could this be clarified both here and in the article? --Alan del Beccio 23:37, 1 November 2006 (UTC)

Hmm... The formula is just missing a "wf=". If both v and c are given in m/s, then v/c will simply be the "lightspeed-factor", in your example 216. 216^(1/3) gives 6. Anyhow. I'd still say this needs to be moved to a background section - it simply wasn't used on the show... -- Cid Highwind 08:48, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Transwarp

A recent anon entry states: Advancements in warp technology could mean that stating a speed of Warp 9.9997 would be much more cumbersome than Warp 13. This seems like speculation to me, especially since I don't recall warp 9.9997 ever being mentioned in Trek. - Enzo Aquarius 15:50, 16 August 2006 (UTC)

Merge

I suggest to merge the following articles with this one:

warp factor scale (22nd and 23rd centuries)

Reason: This article describes non-canon background information that would better be located in a background section of a "canon" article.

Warp factor scale (24th century)

Reason: As above

Warp 10

This article only makes sense in combination with knowledge from the other three articles. Thus, might as well be a section of one of those, not a separate article.

For a suggestion for the resulting merged article, see "Warp factor/temp" (WIP). -- Cid Highwind 12:10, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Sounds good to me. I would recommend keeping those as redirects, but you were probably already planning to do that. Support. --OuroborosCobra ^talk 13:32, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Support,Merge,Make it so! though i still contest that evidence points to ENT using the TNG scale.... --Six of Six _{Talk Ω} 13:39, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

Yes, I would keep the remaining redirects, at least temporarily. We might decide to delete the first two as non-canon later, but that's not really necessary. Although there are still some issues with the temp page, I would like to address those later, after the merge. If you think that something should be changed/rephrased, just go ahead :) -- Cid Highwind 16:03, 3 November 2006 (UTC)

Merge complete. See [1] for all changes done to the merged article content (mostly: background info moved to background section; removed tables with information solely derived from background info). -- Cid Highwind 10:22, 6 November 2006 (UTC)

From Talk:Warp factor scale (22nd and 23rd centuries)

"Neptune and back in six minutes"

Remember, it wasn't until quite a while in to the series that the Enterprise actually tried to go to warp 5, so warp 4.6 would probably have been the sensible, safe upper limit. Alex Peckover 08:39, Aug 12, 2004 (CEST)

I agree, but I would like to know how canon this info is. If it is never confirmed on screen, perhaps we should add {{metatrek}} to the article. -- Redge | Talk 17:43, 12 Aug 2004 (CEST)

Not Confirmed

This scale was never mentioned on screen. There are two potential references available: The Making of Star Trek and the 1977 Star Trek II Writer/Director guide. Both explicity adopt the "warp factor cubed" approach. Whitfield's book was semi-co-authored by Gene Roddenberry in 1968. Gene was part of the production staff and so that book has as much reference value as the Star Trek Encyclopedia - a Restricted Validity Resource for Memory Alpha canon reference purposes. So while this article needs to cite its source and carry a non-canon legend, it should be able to stay. The Star Trek II Writers Guide was created for an aborted series and has no reference value for this site - though it can be cited for bits of interest. However, it was never called the Cochrane scale; that appears an invention of the original author of the article. I will make the appropriate changes to the article, but I have no clue how to change the title to remove the "Cochrane Scale" bit. I would like the thing retitled to "Warp Factor Chart - 23rd Century". Aholland 21:33, 14 March 2006 (UTC)

Call me crazy, but I could have sworn this had been referred to as the "Cochrane scale" at some point in time in Trek. I could be wrong, in which case there should be no reason this can't be moved to "Warp factor chart (23rd century scale)" to match the recently-moved Warp factor chart (24th century scale). Anybody have anything on the term "Cochrane scale", or shall we commence with the move? --From Andoria with Love 02:41, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Okay - you're crazy!  :) I don't think anyone has anything on the "Cochrane scale", so let's move away - if you would please. Aholland 02:40, 28 March 2006 (UTC)

A gentle reminder to move this when there's time. Thanks. Aholland 21:13, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

I coulda sworn I did move this already. Hmmm... --From Andoria with Love 09:11, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

I moved it, but I just remember the same scale was used in the 22nd century. To quote Scott Bakula: Oh, boy... --From Andoria with Love 09:17, 6 June 2006 (UTC)

Id actualy recomend that this be called the "TOS Scale" and the 24th century one be renamed "Post TNG Scale", since most evidence actualy points to Enterprise (NX-01) useing TNG scale. (I point to the "Neptune and back in six minutes" comment) --Sdamon 14:55, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

As articles and their names are from an in-universe perspective, they cannot contain out-of-universe terms like "TOS" or "TNG". --From Andoria with Love 15:04, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

With that in mind, it is also apparent that the scale in use in the 22nd century is disputed. There is evidence to either scale in the first episode alone. Perhaps a modification of the title or a note commenting on the possible descrepency? --Sdamon 13:26, 17 October 2006 (PDT)

To be honest, I think the two "warp scale" pages should simply be merged to "Warp factor scale", and individual "background formulae" be moved to two separate background sections of the merged page. Warp speeds are very inconsistent on-screen, so that it might even be possible that both scales are actually the same with a factor two, or any one of a myriad of other theories. All those differences as well as their exact calculations are "background" info, which shouldn't be a reason to create two separate articles. -- Cid Highwind 21:01, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Personally, I don't see a reason why info on both can't be placed on one article, at least if there has been some form of contradiction as to which one was being used at what time. Then again, for all we know, the 22nd century scale may be different than both the 23rd/24th century scales. --From Andoria with Love 21:04, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

Merge suggestion

Discuss here: Talk:Warp factor. -- Cid Highwind 12:15, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

From Talk:Warp factor scale (24th century)

...A more complex formula?

Should this formula even appear in this article? It is just DITL-speculation approximating a "pretty picture" (as noted elsewhere) that isn't even canon in the strictest sense. We still haven't decided if we want to allow all TNGTM data - and even if we do, it should probably be noted.

Also, the formula is incomplete - definitions for a, n, f1 and f2 are missing. -- Cid Highwind 16:46, 22 Apr 2004 (CEST)

Now removed from article:

For speeds greater than WF 9, a more complex formula applies.

V/c = WF^{[{(10/3)+a*(-Ln(10-WF))^n}+f1*((WF-9)^5)+f2*((WF-9)^11)]} [2]

-- Cid Highwind 13:36, 23 May 2004 (CEST)

What's (* c)? Also, in "Caretaker", Janeway says it would take over seventy years to reach the Federation, which is 70,000 lightyears away. But, according to the chart and Voyager's max speed of warp 9.975, wouldn't it take less time? Or did I miss something?-B-101

(*c) means times the speed of light; Voyager's way home would take less time IF (a) they were able to maintain this speed for X years (instead of stopping at every second planet ;) ) AND (b) Warp 9.975 really was that speed that is given in the article... (BTW, could you please sign your comments (use 4 tildes: ~~~~). Perhaps you could also log in to have your username displayed instead of just the IP. Thanks.) -- Cid Highwind 15:01, 1 Jul 2004 (CEST)

In the series, they usualy maintained about warp 8, which puts them at about exactly 70 years out. --Sdamon 15:00, 17 October 2006 (UTC)

TOS-Federation

In the "Cochrane scale" there are 1000ly for the size of federation space in TOS I think the article mean either 1.000ly for TOS-VFP or 10.000ly for TNG-VFP!

But 10.000ly for TOS should be incorrect.(P.S.:I appologize for my bad english ;)) --84.182.237.90 22:12, 27 Aug 2005 (UTC)

Formula

Is the mathematical formula posted at the bottom of the article an official formula or just speculation? --From Andoria with Love 16:44, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

As reported by Michael Okuda there is no formula for values above 9. He just used pencil and paper to draw something he believed to be plausible and guessed the values. -- Kobi - (Talk) 19:53, 19 January 2006 (UTC)

The removed content is the following:

The mathematical expression:

WARP FACTORS (0, 1) = f(x)

WARP FACTORS (1, 10] = g(x)

f(x) = xc

g(x) = ((9^x)/(10-x))c

Appears to give fairly show-consistent readings, with warp 5 making a voyage of 70 000LY take approximately 60 years, however, the values on this scale at high warp velocities could lead to dispute.

Warp 9 would, on this scale, make a journey across the Federation (15 000LY) take approximately 23 minutes. This explains the great rapidity with which our heroes are capable of crossing the width and breadth of the Federation, and the seemingly negligible lag of any subspace communications (apparently subspace signals have an unboosted velocity of warp 9.9999, a speed of 1 045 795 050 000 000km/s (one quadrillion forty-five trillion fifty billion kilometers per second) (a journey across the entire Federation would take two minutes and fifteen seconds)) even at vast distances, however, it does not explain why Voyager did not simply sprint home at warp 9 and shorten their journey from 60 years to one hour and forty-five minutes.

This is, however, the first formula I have seen presented which mathematically forces the velocity of warp 10 to be equal to positive infinity:

If you replace x with 10, you will obtain the following formula:

((9^10)/(10-10))c

This yields the answer:

(∞)c

Charts

http://geocities.com/denis_conruyt/img/warp6wj.jpg

I found this on the web. If someone desire to complete the page with the extra infos, go for it! Because, I lack of time to do it. The site where it goes from seems to have disappeared. Conruyt 08:04, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

Well, the chart was stored on "star trek in sound and vision" which took it from the star trek fact files. Why should we use it? -- Kobi - (Talk) 12:59, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

because I like the right column which gives an indication of power comsumption. I explain myself: Im looking for the info "how much fuel..ups! ;) dilithium cristals do we need to go to Andromeda?" I've done some googles and there is no way to find how much time we could sustain warp x except in there, or x cristals to go to x destination. Im a RPG player/master and I need the info Conruyt 14:40, 20 January 2006 (UTC)

I really doubt the Federation could be 10,000 light-years across, as if so it would take 52 years to go from one side of the Federation to another even at warp 9.6, and logistically it would be almost impossible to politically co-ordinate planets which are so wide apart. Furthermore, if the Federation were really 10,000 light-years across, then it would take almost half a life time for people on deep space stations (such as Deep Space Nine) to reach Earth, which is clearly not the case according to actual Star Trek TV episodes.

Another article I've read states that the "10,000 light-years" figure actually refers to 10,000 square-lightyears, or just 100 light-years across. Such a figure I think is much more logical. A starship at warp 9.2 can cross such a Federation in just 20 days. - cyl

The math is incorrect for warp factor 9.99, in fact a lot of the math is off by a order of magnitude, ie 10,000 light years at the speed of light should take 10,000 years not 100,000. so all of those numbers are off by a factor of 10... all that trouble to make a chart, and it's wrong....

Revisions

I made some revisions along the lines of Warp factor chart (Cochrane scale). Can someone change the title of this article to "Warp Factor Chart, 24th Century" and the other to "Warp Factor Chart, 23rd Century" please? I *sob* don't know how. Aholland 01:17, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

I agree, referring to something as TNG style does not fit in with our in-universe perspective. I'll go ahead and move it. I don't know about the 23rd century scale though, I have to look into it. --From Andoria with Love 02:28, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Would anybody be against moving this to "Warp factor scale (24th century)", as the article describes the scale and only uses the chart to describe the measurements of the scale? --From Andoria with Love 02:54, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Anywhere you think makes sense is fine by me.  :) Aholland 04:03, 16 March 2006 (UTC)

Are there any objections to this move at all? Any? --From Andoria with Love 04:52, 18 March 2006 (UTC)

Merge suggestion

Discuss here: Talk:Warp factor. -- Cid Highwind 12:16, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

From Talk:Warp factor

I think I may have figured out at least one reason which could account for Warp 10 having those unwanted hyper-evolution effects.

Warp propels object through a local spacetime distortion which prevents those nasty time dilations that Einstein was so generous to introduce us to. In theory, Warp 10 is infinite velocity, which is being everywhere in the universe at once. That has been established (although infinite speed would probably be a better term, as velocity indicates a specific direction which is simply not true if you occupy all points in the universe at once, implying that you occupy all vectors as well).

The keyword above is "local". If you can see both Jupiter and the Jupiter-II at the same time, then you aren't local, buddy. This could lead one travelling at infinite speed to experience time dilation.

"But Mr. Zeromaru, time slows down the faster you go. Why did Mr. Paris and Capin Janeway evolve really fast? Shouldn't they have seen the entire universe go by in the blink of an eye?"

Why, yes, Billy, if they were going at the speed of light. But they aren't. An object that speeds up to the speed of light will experience time slower. But after it surpasses the mass-energy barrier, what's to say that it will continue to feel like it is stopped? Perhaps, just perhaps, as it continues to accelerate, time will speed up again, reach a point where it's mass and energy return to the level that it is at extreme sublight speeds, but retain it's speed. So, as your speed approaches inifinty, then the passage of time will, as well. The rest of the universe will stop.

Of course, then one would say that they would simply grow old and die, rot away, and eventually enough time would pass so that every atom in their body decomposed into Hydrogen-0, as (to my knowledge) every element has an eventual half-life. After infinite time, this half-life HAS to be reached.

This is where you need to be a spiritual person. Their being is connected to the rest of the universe. Which means that their minds continue to exist along with the rest of the universe, but simultaneously see it stopped. I know this may be something hard to wrap your mind around, but remember that this article is about being everywhere in the universe at once. The entire idea of Warp 10 creates not only a Einsteinian and Cochranian impossibility, but a metaphysical one as well. You know something is hard when it's metaphysically impossible.

As a sidenote, this is meant to explain why Paris and Janeway evolved in the first place. Not why they evolved into those... things...

Another sidenote, I realize that I used the infiniteness of mass, energy, and speed back and forth between Eisteinian Physics and Cochranian Physics in ways that I shouldnt've. I predicted an object returning to a previous level of mass-energy at a faster-than-light speed. According to Einsteinian Physics, such a speed can't be reached because mass would become infinite, and the energy required to move the mass would also become infinite. In contrast, according to Cochranian Physics, reaching such a speed disregards mass, so energy doesn't have the asymptotic nature that it did before. But, like I said. Warp 10 cannot be local, so both Einstein and Cochrane could be right here.

Yet another sidenote, I use Einsteinian and Cochranian Physics a lot here. Einsteinian is a common term referring to those laws of physics laid out of Einstein. Cochranian is, of course, referring to Zefram Cochrane, since he built the Human Warp Drive, though I have no idea if he also laid the groundwork for the Physics involved. -- Zeromaru said a mouthful at 7:25PM EST on 2005-2-18

Memory Alpha is not a site for personal commentary. --Gvsualan 00:40, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

My apologies, I was under the impression that the "Talk" pages were for discussion about the particular topic. As well, as far as I'm aware, discussion pages usually involve personal opinion, usually in informal speech. Now, if I had put this on the article itself, I would've been far more formal. --Zeromaru 12:50PM EST on 2005-2-19

Yes for discussions, not editorials. --Gvsualan 18:38, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

Not to throw a red herring into the mix, but "evolution" never took place in this episode. Some might consider it hair-splitting, but it's a fundamental misunderstanding prevalent among people today that evolution is an event rather than a process that occurs over time in response to environmental necessities (natural selection). What happened in "Threshold" was, at best, rampant individual genetic mutation. --McC 17:56, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

I beg to differ - I mean, yes they are mutations, but it was said to be natural and therefore evolution. Pulled straight from the episode, according to the EMH:

"The mutations observed are natural; the changes in Paris's DNA are consistent with the evolutionary development of the Human genotype observed over the past four million years. The only difference between natural evolution and what happened to Paris was that his changes took place over a 24-hour period. Somehow, travelling at infinite velocity accelerated the natural Human evolutionary process by millions of years. It's possible that Paris represents a future stage in Human development." --Gvsualan 18:38, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

"Natural mutations" do not constitute evolution. It's an enormous brainbug (and the misunderstanding of evolution is one reason why Creatonists have unfathomably gained the foothold they have) that is prevalent among even learned individuals. However, evolution is defined as "Change in the genetic composition of a population during successive generations, as a result of natural selection acting on the genetic variation among individuals, and resulting in the development of new species" (emphasis mine, from Dictionary.com. Wikipedia's article on evolution is also well-written and informative. As noted by a number of individuals, the biological science behind "Threshold" is simply deplorable. "The mutations observed are natural" itself does not make sense, as genetic mutation is at once a natural and artificial process, responding to environmental stimuli. "Consistent with the evolutionary development of the Human genotype" is an interesting statement, excepting that it doesn't account for the fact that the Human genotype has changed in the way it has as a response to specific environmental stimuli. There's no (unless someone forgot to tell me...) discernable pattern to the changes. The final nail in the coffin is "the only difference between natural evolution and what happened..." The only difference? That difference nullifies the idea that "natural evolution" took place at all! I think the EMH was experiencing a computer glitch as a result of Voyager's stretched power reserved ;) --McC 18:59, 19 Feb 2005 (GMT)

Again, I apologize. I used "evolution" rather loosely. Evolution does take several generations and changes in environment. Paris and Janeway were one generation (well, two :P), and such an omnipresence would result in evolution into a non-corporeal being, anyway (not some lizard-like being). I would propose "natural metamorphssis" for Paris' transformation (think catepillar into butterfly). It's just that no Human has ever lived long enough for such a natural metamorphisis. --Zeromaru 18:20, 22 Feb 2005 (GMT)

Yeah, metamorphosis is a more accurate term, I suppose. I still agree with Sternbach, though. ;) -- McC 01:20, 23 Feb 2005 (GMT)

other warp 10 violations

Didn't they break the warp 10 barrier in "where no one has gone before"? w/ the traveller, and Wes and Kazinsky (sp?) 70.177.68.209 23:53, 18 Dec 2005 (UTC)

That's what I thought, as well, although I could be wrong. If we're right, though, that's just another reason "Threshold" should be considered non-canon outside of Memory Alpha. --From Andoria with Love 04:04, 19 Dec 2005 (UTC)

Geordi does say "we're passing warp 10" in the episode with the traveler, but if Warp 10 is infinity, then they obviously didn't actually pass Warp 10. Perhaps the helm controls were just confused... if they really did leave our galaxy, figuring out their position would be difficult without any local stars to fix on. PrognosisNegative 00:50, 21 September 2006 (UTC)

If we assume warp 10 to be infinite speed as seems to be commonly accepted, it's a big jump to that from 'very very fast indeed'. As far as I understand it, if spacetime is curved then infinite speed must result in the traveller being everywhere - and everywhen - at once. Since the Enterprise obviously wasn't everywhere at once, it must have been going very very fast, as opposed to infinitely fast. (Actually, Tom's shuttle obviously wasn't everywhere at once, since it didn't intersect the Voyager bridge.) Despite 'Threshold' suggesting that you'd accelerate through 9.97, 9.98, 9.99, and then bingo, you're at warp 10, I think it's more likely you'd end up climbing through more and more decimal places as you continued to push up the speed: 9.99999999991 is still an awful long way from 10, with that in mind. Infintely far away, in fact. Warp 10 isn't just a matter of acceleration. - Mostinius 23:55, 18 October 2006 (UTC)

Merge suggestion

Discuss here: Talk:Warp factor. -- Cid Highwind 12:16, 2 November 2006 (UTC)

removed text

I removed the following speculative text:

Another possibility is that there has always only been one warp scale. That would mean that the Star Trek: Voyager episode "Threshold" was in error. After all, even some members of the Paramount staff said that they discount the events of that episode because of its scientific flaws. Then again, one could still argue and say that Gene Roddenberry himself created the revised Cochrane scale, which established that warp 10 was infinite speed.

-- Renegade54 19:20, 11 June 2007 (UTC)

Forum:TOS equivalent of warp 10 on the TNG scale?

Does anyone know what the TOS scale equivalent of warp ten on the TNG scale would be? – The preceding unsigned comment was added by 71.50.3.85.

There is none stated in canon, and as far as I remember the generally accepted equation for the TOS scale was not asymptotic, so there isn't likely to be one. --OuroborosCobra ^talk 23:54, 30 July 2007 (UTC)

It's hard to explain unless you know about types of graphs and curves. The TNG warp scale is a curve that reaches infinity as the Warp Factor approaches 10. So the limit of whatever function it is (if it is one) is infinity as x approaches 10 (little bit of calculus there). With the TOS scale, I believe the factor of c (speed of light) was the Warp Factor, cubed. So Warp 3 would be 3³c, or 27 times the speed of light. Therefore, Warp 10 on the TNG scale wouldn't exist technically on the TOS scale...theoretically it would be Warp Infinity. :P - TerranRich 18:22, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

...and practically, all this is really unknown. A TOS-scale that has infinite speed at Warp Factor 20, 30, 100, ... would match all given data points just as well as the "cubed" formula. See Warp factor for pretty much all information there really is. :) -- Cid Highwind 19:21, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

Fanon stuff

Someone added some non-canon information to the page. I've moved it here, and will bring the image up for deletion in a moment. Enjoy.

In 24th century warp theory, a warp factor of 10 corresponds to an infinite velocity. Note that this doesn't necessarily mean a vessel traveling at warp 10 would occupy all points in the universe simultaneously, just that it could. An infinite velocity means that to an observer outside the craft, the vehicle would arrive at it's destination at the exact same instant it left. As this is a finite distance traveled, it is conceivable that it would still only require a finite amount of energy in a universe where faster than light (FTL) travel is possible. A vehicle traveling an infinite velocity would only occupy all points in the universe if it had an infinite supply of energy (assuming the universe is not finite) and it's pilot flew it through all points in the universe before throttling back.

Travel faster than Warp 10 would mean traveling faster than an infinite velocity. Since an infinite velocity means that, to an outside observer, you arrive at the exact same instant you left, traveling faster than infinite velocity means the outside observer would see you arrive at your destination before you left your point of origin. Because it is a different frame of reference, those inside the craft don't necessarily experience time in reverse, and can experience a normal flow of time. However, to your outside observer, the craft would appear to have a strange behavior indeed.

Because you appear to arrive before you leave, the vehicle would seem to travel backwards from the destination to the point of origin. Add to that the fact that once you "arrive" at your destination, you remain there and conduct your business, our observer would see you suddenly appear at your destination (before you leave), and at the instant you appear, separate into two copies. While one copy of your vessel would remain at your destination (in your frame of reference inside, you would have just arrived), the other copy instantly begins traveling backwards to your point of origin (in your frame of reference inside, you would consider yourself in transit but your flow of time would be backwards compared to the outside observer). Also consider that because you would remain at your point of origin up until you leave, the copy traveling backwards towards your point of origin would travel to the exact point in space as the copy of you who hasn't left yet, and as soon as they overlap, both copies would disappear.

Star Trek IV?

In Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home as they approach warp 10 during the slingshot maneuver, Sulu calls out speed in fractions (warp 9.8, warp 9.9). The ship (and crew) are under severe stress. I'm not an expert, so someone else should decide whether to add the reference. -- Spazquest 06:00, 2 December 2007 (UTC)