WEBVTT 1 00:00:03.210 --> 00:00:05.110 Hi, I'm Dr. Erin Macdonald. 2 00:00:05.110 --> 00:00:06.610 I'm an astrophysicist 3 00:00:06.610 --> 00:00:08.820 and the Science Consultant for "Star Trek." 4 00:00:08.820 --> 00:00:11.410 So I'm kind of a rocket scientist by day, 5 00:00:11.410 --> 00:00:13.200 warp drive expert by night. 6 00:00:13.200 --> 00:00:15.050 And today we're gonna be talking about 7 00:00:15.050 --> 00:00:16.840 the science behind wormholes, 8 00:00:16.840 --> 00:00:19.183 which we see in "Star Trek" all the time. 9 00:00:22.940 --> 00:00:25.470 Now, in order to explain what a wormhole is, 10 00:00:25.470 --> 00:00:27.650 we have to think about that sheet of space time. 11 00:00:27.650 --> 00:00:29.650 If you've seen the bowling ball on the trampoline, 12 00:00:29.650 --> 00:00:31.860 thinking of our universe as a sheet. 13 00:00:31.860 --> 00:00:34.260 Now imagine instead of a trampoline, 14 00:00:34.260 --> 00:00:36.070 we maybe think about it like toilet paper. 15 00:00:36.070 --> 00:00:37.690 So let's crumble up the toilet paper, 16 00:00:37.690 --> 00:00:38.840 lay it all out. 17 00:00:38.840 --> 00:00:41.060 Now overall it looks flat but there might be parts 18 00:00:41.060 --> 00:00:42.370 where they're folded over each other, 19 00:00:42.370 --> 00:00:43.800 or there's bumps or ridges. 20 00:00:43.800 --> 00:00:45.880 And if you wanna travel through that universe, 21 00:00:45.880 --> 00:00:47.430 you have to travel on top and over 22 00:00:47.430 --> 00:00:49.170 every single bump and ridge. 23 00:00:49.170 --> 00:00:51.620 What a wormhole is is basically a shortcut, 24 00:00:51.620 --> 00:00:54.060 like a tunnel through that space time. 25 00:00:54.060 --> 00:00:56.370 If you were to take a part that's folded over 26 00:00:56.370 --> 00:00:58.160 and just punch straight through, 27 00:00:58.160 --> 00:01:00.420 that's effectively what a wormhole is. 28 00:01:00.420 --> 00:01:02.600 Now what a lot of people don't realize is that, 29 00:01:02.600 --> 00:01:04.830 not only do we see wormholes all the time in "Star Trek" 30 00:01:04.830 --> 00:01:08.250 but they are actually a theoretical physics thing. 31 00:01:08.250 --> 00:01:10.190 The whole math of this Einstein 32 00:01:10.190 --> 00:01:12.940 General Relativity sheet of space time, 33 00:01:12.940 --> 00:01:16.110 does allow for the geometry of wormholes. 34 00:01:16.110 --> 00:01:18.100 So kind of what's a little bit more 35 00:01:18.100 --> 00:01:19.890 about the science behind them? 36 00:01:19.890 --> 00:01:21.490 In theoretical physics, 37 00:01:21.490 --> 00:01:24.150 wormholes use Einstein's field equations 38 00:01:24.150 --> 00:01:25.640 for General Relativity, 39 00:01:25.640 --> 00:01:28.910 to create tunnels through space and time. 40 00:01:28.910 --> 00:01:30.500 Now these are also sometimes called 41 00:01:30.500 --> 00:01:32.350 Einstein-Rosen bridges. 42 00:01:32.350 --> 00:01:34.260 And they can theoretically exist, 43 00:01:34.260 --> 00:01:38.060 but make note, we haven't actually discovered any yet. 44 00:01:38.060 --> 00:01:40.100 So when we're looking at that sheet of space time, 45 00:01:40.100 --> 00:01:43.030 if you think about that area above or below that sheet, 46 00:01:43.030 --> 00:01:45.700 that's what we call in "Star Trek" subspace. 47 00:01:45.700 --> 00:01:49.390 So a wormhole will shortcut those distances in space time, 48 00:01:49.390 --> 00:01:51.140 through subspace. 49 00:01:51.140 --> 00:01:53.130 If you were to look at the geometry of it, 50 00:01:53.130 --> 00:01:54.100 how it's shaped, 51 00:01:54.100 --> 00:01:56.300 it does look like a black hole. 52 00:01:56.300 --> 00:01:59.430 And indeed in "Star Trek" the motion picture, "Voyager 6," 53 00:01:59.430 --> 00:02:01.840 fell through what they thought was a black hole, 54 00:02:01.840 --> 00:02:04.110 and it did actually end up being a wormhole 55 00:02:04.110 --> 00:02:05.880 that shortcutted the distance. 56 00:02:05.880 --> 00:02:08.280 Ended up throwing all the way across the galaxy. 57 00:02:11.080 --> 00:02:13.380 Now in "Star Trek," some of these wormholes 58 00:02:13.380 --> 00:02:15.400 can be naturally occurring. 59 00:02:15.400 --> 00:02:18.350 We've come across the Barzan Wormhole before. 60 00:02:18.350 --> 00:02:20.660 The issue with that was that it was stable on one end 61 00:02:20.660 --> 00:02:23.480 but where it ended up, kind of fluctuated. 62 00:02:23.480 --> 00:02:25.350 It was what we call unstable. 63 00:02:25.350 --> 00:02:27.730 A lot of the other naturally occurring wormholes 64 00:02:27.730 --> 00:02:29.120 that we've seen in "Star Trek," 65 00:02:29.120 --> 00:02:30.840 now these are ones that just exist 66 00:02:30.840 --> 00:02:33.110 and connect to points in space and time, 67 00:02:33.110 --> 00:02:36.030 we mostly see in the "Voyager" series. 68 00:02:36.030 --> 00:02:38.540 One episode to think of is called "Counterpoint" 69 00:02:38.540 --> 00:02:40.790 where they're traveling around trying to find 70 00:02:40.790 --> 00:02:42.880 where these wormholes are going to pop up. 71 00:02:42.880 --> 00:02:44.610 Another naturally occurring wormhole 72 00:02:44.610 --> 00:02:47.080 that we've seen was in TNG's "The Price," 73 00:02:47.080 --> 00:02:49.260 which flung Ferengis to the Delta Quadrant, 74 00:02:49.260 --> 00:02:51.010 and they popped up later in "Voyager." 75 00:02:51.010 --> 00:02:52.570 In that episode "Counterpoint," 76 00:02:52.570 --> 00:02:55.440 they know that wormholes are kind of a catch-all, 77 00:02:55.440 --> 00:02:57.610 and what they specifically are looking for 78 00:02:57.610 --> 00:02:59.390 in order to shortcut a distance, 79 00:02:59.390 --> 00:03:01.520 is what they call an Interspatial Flexure, 80 00:03:01.520 --> 00:03:03.040 but that's probably getting a little bit 81 00:03:03.040 --> 00:03:04.910 too technobabbly for us right now. 82 00:03:04.910 --> 00:03:07.490 Another thing we want to remember with wormholes 83 00:03:07.490 --> 00:03:10.060 is they not just shortcut distances, 84 00:03:10.060 --> 00:03:12.330 but they also shortcut time. 85 00:03:12.330 --> 00:03:14.830 This is something Picard discussed with Rasmussen, 86 00:03:14.830 --> 00:03:17.450 in the episode "A matter of time," 87 00:03:17.450 --> 00:03:18.820 where they talk about the dangers 88 00:03:18.820 --> 00:03:21.850 of actually using wormholes in order to time travel. 89 00:03:21.850 --> 00:03:24.230 This is also seen in a fantastic episode of "Voyager," 90 00:03:24.230 --> 00:03:25.620 called "Eye of the needle." 91 00:03:25.620 --> 00:03:27.860 They find a little wormhole, 92 00:03:27.860 --> 00:03:29.470 actually called a Harry Kim Wormhole, 93 00:03:29.470 --> 00:03:32.340 that connects the Delta Quadrant to the Alpha Quadrant. 94 00:03:32.340 --> 00:03:34.560 It's too small for a ship to pass through, 95 00:03:34.560 --> 00:03:35.720 but they start communicating 96 00:03:35.720 --> 00:03:37.450 with the Romulan on the other side, 97 00:03:37.450 --> 00:03:40.890 who's being kind of Romulany and doesn't quite trust them. 98 00:03:40.890 --> 00:03:42.280 And so they transport him. 99 00:03:42.280 --> 00:03:44.560 And while they're transporting him to the ship, 100 00:03:44.560 --> 00:03:47.410 they actually realized that there is a change, 101 00:03:47.410 --> 00:03:50.280 not just in the distance but in time itself. 102 00:03:50.280 --> 00:03:51.890 It's a fantastic episode, 103 00:03:51.890 --> 00:03:53.610 and we don't get to see that too much, 104 00:03:53.610 --> 00:03:57.030 how we use wormholes to also travel through time. 105 00:03:57.030 --> 00:03:59.660 Not only can wormholes be naturally occurring, 106 00:03:59.660 --> 00:04:00.740 like we've been discussing, 107 00:04:00.740 --> 00:04:03.380 but they can also be artificially created. 108 00:04:03.380 --> 00:04:05.180 These sort of things might be like 109 00:04:05.180 --> 00:04:07.480 the Borg transwarp conduit. 110 00:04:07.480 --> 00:04:09.810 They're basically just artificial wormholes 111 00:04:09.810 --> 00:04:12.130 that are connecting points in space and time, 112 00:04:12.130 --> 00:04:13.960 creating tunnels that you can travel through, 113 00:04:13.960 --> 00:04:15.210 which are wormholes. 114 00:04:15.210 --> 00:04:17.000 Another form of artificial wormholes 115 00:04:17.000 --> 00:04:18.050 are the MIDAS array, 116 00:04:18.050 --> 00:04:20.340 which we saw in Voyager's "Pathfinder," 117 00:04:20.340 --> 00:04:22.280 where they create a network to be able 118 00:04:22.280 --> 00:04:24.350 to communicate back to Earth, 119 00:04:24.350 --> 00:04:26.140 effectively using wormholes as well, 120 00:04:26.140 --> 00:04:28.930 but not big enough to be able to actually travel through. 121 00:04:28.930 --> 00:04:32.210 And then, of course, we can't not talk about the fact 122 00:04:32.210 --> 00:04:34.460 that there's an entire "Star Trek" series 123 00:04:34.460 --> 00:04:35.581 based around a wormhole. 124 00:04:35.581 --> 00:04:36.480 (laughing) 125 00:04:36.480 --> 00:04:38.860 In "Deep Space Nine," the Bajoran Wormhole, 126 00:04:38.860 --> 00:04:41.200 they mentioned that it's kind of an artificial wormhole, 127 00:04:41.200 --> 00:04:42.900 that the Prophets created this, 128 00:04:42.900 --> 00:04:45.220 that they made this massive wormhole. 129 00:04:45.220 --> 00:04:47.900 Now there's some debate whether it was naturally occurring, 130 00:04:47.900 --> 00:04:49.710 and just attributed to the Prophets, 131 00:04:49.710 --> 00:04:51.560 or if that was something that the Prophets 132 00:04:51.560 --> 00:04:53.180 artificially created. 133 00:04:53.180 --> 00:04:55.590 But overall, it's a wormhole that connects 134 00:04:55.590 --> 00:04:58.040 the Alpha Quadrant to the Gamma Quadrant. 135 00:04:58.040 --> 00:05:00.520 And there's an entire series based around that. 136 00:05:00.520 --> 00:05:03.000 Now all of this traveling through wormholes 137 00:05:03.000 --> 00:05:04.360 between space and time, 138 00:05:04.360 --> 00:05:07.320 does all get wrapped up together in "Star Trek Discovery" 139 00:05:07.320 --> 00:05:09.880 with the Red Angel and Project Daedalus. 140 00:05:09.880 --> 00:05:12.110 This is where you have all these pockets 141 00:05:12.110 --> 00:05:14.060 that are popping up where we see a Red Angel, 142 00:05:14.060 --> 00:05:16.110 at different points in time and space. 143 00:05:16.110 --> 00:05:18.160 And then we discover that it's actually 144 00:05:18.160 --> 00:05:20.070 a technology that allows you to build 145 00:05:20.070 --> 00:05:22.840 micro-wormholes when you're wearing this suit, 146 00:05:22.840 --> 00:05:25.430 to punch through and travel to a different point 147 00:05:25.430 --> 00:05:26.820 in space and time. 148 00:05:26.820 --> 00:05:29.130 And where we left off with Season two, 149 00:05:29.130 --> 00:05:31.220 is that the Red Angel creates a wormhole, 150 00:05:31.220 --> 00:05:33.260 and Discovery follows them through 151 00:05:33.260 --> 00:05:35.580 to another point in space and time. 152 00:05:35.580 --> 00:05:36.553 Stay tuned. 153 00:05:38.960 --> 00:05:39.840 What do you think? 154 00:05:39.840 --> 00:05:42.530 Are you like Picard when he's talking to Rasmussen 155 00:05:42.530 --> 00:05:45.200 about the dangers of using them for time travel? 156 00:05:45.200 --> 00:05:47.480 Are you afraid that you would be spaghetti-fied? 157 00:05:47.480 --> 00:05:49.650 Or if we see something that looks like a wormhole, 158 00:05:49.650 --> 00:05:52.440 would you just jump in and see where you ended up? 159 00:05:52.440 --> 00:05:53.273 Let us know!