Superluminality and ISC (continued)

Tachyons

Overview:

A tachyon is an hypothetical subatomic particle which is said to
always travels faster-than-light (FTL).

Predicted by implications of Einstein's theory of Special Relativity
(SR) [the details of which will be explain in the next post], the
tachyon possesses reversed causality compared to ordinary particles.
That is, a tachyon has "negative time" relative to normal time, as
viewed from a standard frame of reference. And its rest-mass would
be seen as both negative and imaginary, compared to that of particles
having real masses (protons, electrons, etc.).

Experimentally, to date, there is no "proof" for the existence of
tachyons, but there are profound theoretical indications that they
exist, and such convincing circumstantial evidence in favor of them
that the possibility that they do exist must be taken seriously.

Using tachyonic analogs of real particles to obtain approximations
for other properties of tachyons, it seems logical to conclude that
there would be two distinct kinds of tachyons; those that do not
travel at infinite speed (but travel between lightspeed and infinite-
speed), and those that actually do travel at infinite speed.

With respect to the first case, the existence of tachyons with
restrictions on their speed is not technically forbidden by any
theoretical physics or pure mathematical consideration, and is not
beyond the scope of experimentation (given a sufficiently advanced
technology). But testing the other case, to see if infinite-speed
tachyons exist, is not experimentally feasible, because there is no
way to justify the existence of an infinte-speed tachyon (at the
present time) without resorting to metaphysical arguments - which
prevents us from designing actual experimental equipment that can be
used to detect such particles.

We must, as a result, predict that only non-infinite tachyons need be
considered for explaining any possible natural phenomena of interest
to physicists at this time, because only non-infinite tachyons are
theoretically available for possible experimental investigation.

In either case, a tachyon must be described as having a rest-mass
that is both negative and imaginary, mathematically (assuming that
real mass is positive, by comparison). This means that the energy
and/or momentum of a tachyon can also be negative and/or imaginary,
since calculations used to obtain those quantities involve the mass,
which is defined in terms of the rest-mass. (Lerner, 1246)

Here is how a tachyon appears to work, in simple terms.

Imagine, for a moment, that we have a magic gun which shoots
imaginary bullets that can travel faster-than-light. That is, the
bullets are tachyonic. But we also have a normal gun that we now use
to shoot a small hole in a relatively thin, wooden board which any
normal bullet can easily and completely penetrate.

Because of impact and friction and other considerations, a normal
bullet will impart some of its forward momentum to the wood as it
makes a hole in the board, so that a measeureable amount of force is
imparted to the board in the direction of the bullet's momentum. A
tachyonic bullet, however, would impart its corresponding force in
the opposite direction to its direction of travel, should we next
shoot an identical board with the magic gun. Tachyons all pull
rather than push as they pass through ordinary objects. And it also
appears to a sublight observer (assuming we can somehow "see" a
tachyonic object) as if the tachyonic bullet came from infinity and
landed in the barrel of the magic gun at the instant the trigger is
pulled - as if a video of the normal event was run in reverse
(although a hole would still be made in the board).

In other words, it is clear that the radiation pressure of point-like
limited-speed tachyons would result in a force directed towards their
source (due to the tachyon's reversed causality), in analogy to the
outward radiation pressure of real massive particles emitted from a
radiactive source, which is always directed away from the source.

Another implication of the reversed causality of a tachyon is that it
could experience an increase in velocity as it loses momentum; quite
the opposite of the normal situation, where a real mass ordinarily
loses velocity as it loses momentum.

As for the possible point-like nature of some tachyons, this is not
inconsistent with quantum physics, nor even string theory (depending
on the distance scale used), because the particle is hypothetical to
begin with, and we are free to imagine any type of tachon we wish.
We could, if desired, restrict ourselves to discussing only exact
tachyonic analogs of "known" particles, but there is no valid reason
to assume that other kinds of tachyons could not also exist.


More to come.