Calculating the speed of subspace communication

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theta_pinch
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Calculating the speed of subspace communication

Post by theta_pinch » Fri Apr 11, 2014 9:57 pm

Here is a precise calculation of subspace communication speed from TNG: Where no one has gone before.

PICARD: That's not possible. Data, what distance have we travelled?
DATA: Two million seven hundred thousand light years.
PICARD: I can't accept that.
DATA: You must, sir. Our comparisons show it to be completely accurate.
LAFORGE: And I calculate that at maximum warp, sir it would take over three hundred years to get home.

Captain's log, stardate 41263.2. This will be a rather unusual log entry, assuming Starfleet ever receives it. As I have already informed my crew, a phenomenal surge of power during a warp speed experiment has sent our starship hurtling out of our own galaxy, past another, taking us over two million seven hundred thousand light years in a few minutes.

[Bridge]

LAFORGE: Message on this has been transmitted to Starfleet, sir.
DATA: Which, traveling subspace, they should receive in fifty-one years, ten months nine weeks, sixteen days

2,700,000 light years x 365 is 985,500,000 light days

51 years 10 months 9 weeks and 16 days is 18998.368 days

So: 985,500,000/18998.368=51872.87666xC

Note: this is without subspace relays; speeds with relays are far higher.

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2046
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Re: Calculating the speed of subspace communication

Post by 2046 » Sun Apr 13, 2014 4:18 pm

I'm gonna have to watch that m'self . . . "fifty-one years, ten months nine weeks, sixteen days" is really weird.

16 days = 2 weeks, 2 days
9 weeks = 2 months, 1 week (give or take)

So, by my reckoning, it's 51 years, 10 months, then add 2 months, 3 weeks, and 2 days.

Wouldn't that be 52 years, 3 weeks, and 2 days?

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