The Limits of Movement, Planck, Einstein, and Howling Coyote Options

[FrankTrollman]

OK, as we know the Movement power allows a critter to increase or decrease a target's apparent speed by a multiple (or divisor) of the critter's Magic attribute. Once the power has been turned on, visual contact need not be maintained (which is great news fort the rest of the thought experiments). While it is maintained the additional speed does not cause untoward effects to the target other than getting to its destination sooner or later - a person's limbs don't get torn off from th sudden rush of speed, a car doesn't burn through fuel at some horrendous rate, and a bullet does not hit its target any harder (just sooner).

And that's great for velocities much greater than zero and much smaller than the speed of light. But let's consider the fact that physics is constrained by a minimum speed and a maximum speed. Magic is, as far as I know not so constrained. Nevertheless, I am forced to ask what precisely happens when you make such an attempt?

Let's say that you have something that's moving extraordinarily fast. Say, half the speed of light. Now, with a mere Force 3 Earth Spirit you can use Movement to about 50% more than the speed of light. Or can you? At the speeds that Shadowrun normally is played at, special relativity isn't called for at all. Instead, we consider velocities to simply add like they do in a classical Newtonian world. But at very high speeds, that's an invalid assumption (at least for non-magical movement). The particle accelerated to three times its velocity would have a speed well less than the speed of light.

So that brings us to the question:

• When Movement doubles, triples, or dodecuples a target's speed, is that merely creating a time dilation sufficient to get it to its destination in a time consistent with having that many times the energy, or is it creating a physics-defying time dilation sufficient to get the target to its destination in a fraction of the time, speed of light be damned?

Of course we likewise have problems at the low end as well. If an object is already as close to absolute zero as it is possible to be, can you use Movement to make its effective speed even less? What happens when those precious Planck Times click by and the object hasn't gotten to the next interval of Planck Space?

-Frank

[Thomas]

[odinson]

It's magic. It breaks the laws of physics. You don't have to worry about going 50% over the speed of light or how it's not possible because magic just throws all that other scientific mumbo jumbo out the window.

[mfb]

well, you kinda do have to worry about it when it happens. speeding an object up past light speed or down so low that Planck Times start coming into play are unlikely to happen... but like Frank said, you don't need to reach those extremes to start obviously violating physics--speeding up a bullet with Movement doesn't increase its energy on impact, for instance. sure, "it's magic" is why that happens--but "it's magic" doesn't explain the ramifications of such an impossible occurrence.

[Solomon Greene]

Somewhere, there's a term paper for MMIT&T in this post.

[hyzmarca]

I believe that this question can only be solved by determining the relationship between quantum physics, the physical constants, magical operations, and metaphysical Platonic Forms.

Earthdawn metaphysics shows us that the universe is a tapestry of interconnected metaphysical Platonic Forms called Patterns made of Karma through which mana can flow.

All physical laws and constants are derived from these metaphysical Patterns. The speed of light is among those laws.

The nature of magic is such that it cannot be used to directly alter the flow of time or the shape of space, though objects created by magic can.

I take this to mean that the Movement cannot cause time-dilation or bending of space.

But the important thing to remember about Movement is that it alters the terrain around the target rather than the target itself, which is why it is only effective in terrain that the Movement user "controls".

Remember that the speed of light in a vacuum is only one value of the speed of light. In other substances, such as water, light moves slower.

The speed is light in a vacuum divided by the speed of light in a material is that material's refractive index. The speed of light in a vacuum divided by material's refractive index is the velocity of light in that material. c/n=v
There exist some materials at some temperatures that have refractive indexes less than 1. The speed of light in these materials is greater than c, though this is an impractical parlor trick that cannot be used to transmit information faster than light.

Let us assume that the current energy state of the vacuum is not the only energy state that the vacuum can have. Let us also assume that the basic physical constants of the universe are related to the energy state of the quantum foam, in the same way that the refractive index of a material is related to its energy state.

Now, if one were to alter the state of the quantum foam, either through the abuse of zero-point energy or by temporarily altering its metaphysical Pattern through the application of mana, one might alter many physical constants, including the speed of light in a vacuum.


Let us assume that there exists a single photon and a single spirit for force 6 with astral senses of such fidelity that it can "see" photons using astral sight and sharp enough that it can "see" this photon clearly several for several lightseconds. As the photon leaves the atmosphere, the spirit uses Movement on it. The Movement Power channels mana into the quantum foam around the photon in such a way that c itself is multiplied six times in the space around the photon and only the space around the photon, which causes the photon to move six times faster without any sort of time dilation. To the outside world in all frames of reference the photon appears to be traveling at 6c.

[Draconis]

uh.......cheeseburger?

[odinson]

[virgileso]

From what I'm aware, the slowing down aspect of movement affects only the gross displacement of macroscopic objects, and doesn't make items colder, so its interaction with Plank's Constant should be nonexistant; unless you're trying to move and observe an object moving at speeds on the Plank scale, and thus the thermal energy from the scientist in the other room might knock the object to the side.

As for trying to exceed the speed of light...breaking the speed of light creates effects that breaks causality (information in one frame of reference is received before the original frame of reference actually transmits the information). And since magic can't break/bend certain laws, I'd consider causality to be in the same boat as the rule against teleportation, and just have that movement increasing spirit hit a proverbial 'wall' in attempting to break the light barrier.

[Rotbart van Dain...]

Only to an observer external to the system.

Planck units are not minimal steps - they are just a one unit system defined by natural constants.
Which in turn means that if those natural constants change, no-one will notice it: If both mesurement and reference change alike, the quantity is still the same.

But if that phenomen is limited, there will be external and internal observers.
And as those affected by movement don't notices a significant factor in flow of time between each other, it looks like movement does not touch natural constants.

[Red]

Shadowrun, if you draw from the Earthdawn universe, is at its roots a symbolic universe. For everyday life when symbols aren't in play physics are fine. But there are times when magic or patterns are involved that the universe simply operates in a more literary manner.

I'd say that a target at 1/2 the speed of light with F3 movement simply gets there 50% faster than light. One could say that it never really goes faster than light no more than it would become more difficult to steer at such a speed. It is just simply /there/ faster.

[Blade]

In France, we've got an acronym for such cases: TGCM ("Ta Gueule C'est Magique !"= "Shut Up It's Magic!").
I mean, magic can make food appear: creating mass/matter out of nothing. Magic can make dragons fly by flapping wings, which would be physically impossible. Magic can make people run fast without being tired, breaking the legs, etc. You can even suddenly slow down the target without it suffering the effect of the deceleration.

What's happening physically? I guess that trying to run test will return unusable data, just like when trying to analyze the composition of orichalcum. A scientific might explain it by stating that the universe's constants are changed by magic but it won't be more valid than any other explanation someone might come up with.

[Ol' Scratch]

[Wakshaani]

Don't forget that lightspeed isn't an absolute. Not only is it slower in water, for example, but we've chilled light to slow it down so much that a person could walk faster than the beam was going.

Plus, we found Tachyons, which go faster than light at base speed.

Who knows what else is out there and we just haven't found it, yet?

[DireRadiant]

Mass X Velocity we learned in 1st or second grade, it got beaten into us... all that fancy thunder and lightning and food and life stuff wasn't till later, so we don't worry about it so much since it never really became anything more then magical to begin with.

But that mass x velocity, we can measure that result with every time your hand got hit with that ruler, a spit wad smacked in the back of the head, or the chalk duster hit your nose. It's hard to change that experience.

[Aaron]

It's easy enough. Just stop thinking of the added positional change granted by Movement as velocity.

[Aaron]

[PlatonicPimp]

Except that by observation of the movement power, M is a multiple, and that would imply that pre-awakening M=1.

It's a but of a conundrum it is, because it's been specifically stated that magic cannot warp time or space. This means that either the movement power specifically increases velocity, or it violates the basic rules of magic. If it increases velocity, howeever, there are all kinds of physics questions that pop up, the least of which is increasing kenetic energy.

In other words, it's either teleportation, or it's an effective force multiplier. The first violates the laws of magic. The second causes all kinds of headaches.

[hyzmarca]

This, of course, brings up the complete and total useless of a Force 1 spirit with Movement.

[FrankTrollman]

[Big D]

I. Love. This. Thread.

[mfb]

[Aaron]

[neko128]

[eidolon]

You won't see me doing it. That's as plausible to me as trying to wrap magic up in our physics, and I like it a lot better thematically.