Soft SF writer wonders: How might a hot chick conjure a traversable wormhole?

[Shephardmoon]

I'm working on a sci-fi / noir / mystery novel for my thesis, and I've endowed my femme fatale heroine with the ability to conjure traversable wormholes.

It's important that she be able to do this without the aid of any machine or finite quantity of exotic matter that she would have to somehow carry around with her. The wormholes she makes can be traversed by spaceship or human body alike, and need no anchoring devices on either end.

I realize that this is pure fiction. However, I'd like to lend a subtle flavor of scientific validity to my narrative by at least attempting to describe a legitimate means for wormhole construction, even if this construction couldn't realistically be performed by a human brain.

One idea I had is that this woman could possesses a genetic mutation that gives her some sort of extrasensory ability. I read an interesting study "in which a group of subjects played a simple song on the piano (all of them inexperienced on the instrument) by imagining themselves doing so, and they were able to play as well as [another subject group] who had actually practiced" (http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1580438,00.html).

What's to say that a human couldn't somehow "imagine" a wormhole, and then make one? The process would have to (and should be) more complicated and interesting than my layman description, but that's why I'm here.

Ideas?

(Another thought I had has to do with an article I read about "super-seers," or women who have 4 cones in their eyes versus the average 3, and can thus see colors the rest of us can't. Maybe a similar ability would allow my heroine to "see" spacetime constituents and manipulate them? http://discovermagazine.com/2012/jul-aug/06-humans-with-super-human-vision)

 

[bcrowell]

As a physicist and a science fiction writer, I commend you for your desire to get the science at least partially right, but frankly this is just silly. Creating even a very small traversible wormhole would require two things: (1) access to exotic matter (basically matter with negative mass) in vast quantities (like the mass of Jupiter or something), and (2) the godlike ability to manipulate vast amounts of matter. By the way, even a very small wormhole, once created, would be an extremely dangerous relativistic object, much more dangerous than a nuclear bomb. If it was in the terrestrial environment, it would destroy its surroundings immediately, and then fall to the center of the earth, where it would start slowly consuming the planet.

The harder you try to dress this up like science, the worse it will work. Just say she has the ability and move on. As an example of something in this vein that works because it doesn't spell out the science, consider Heinlein's Stranger in a Strange Land, where Mike is simply stated to be able to rotate people and things into the fourth dimension.

 

[Shephardmoon]

bcrowell: Your advice to not "dress up" fiction as science makes sense-- the last thing I want to do is alienate readers by promising fascinating, realistic speculative science and then throwing them fantasy.

Needless to say, my story is still nascent, and while I'm trying to set up hard-and-fast rules for my universe and characters so that I can get on with the plot, I'm not closed to other ideas. The rough draft of this thesis is due in about a year, so I've got some time yet.

Do you know of any other examples of science fiction where wormholes have been handled/created by sentient beings, through any means?

 

[atyy]

Try googling around:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Penrose_process
http://www.nytimes.com/1987/04/14/s...universe-literally.html?pagewanted=all&src=pm
http://www.edge.org/documents/day2/day2_index.html
http://arxiv.org/abs/0809.0907

Also George Jones has recommended "The Physics of Stargates: Parallel Universes, Time Travel and the Enigma of Wormhole Physics" by Enrico Rodrigo.

An older book, which I recommend, is "Black Holes and Time Warps: Einstein's Outrageous Legacy" by Kip Thorne.

 

[pervect]

The possiblities for sexual gymnastics with a wormhole is something that I"ve yet to see explored in literature of any sort.

Especially if it's a short one, so you can stick your head - or whatever - through it.

 

[peterspencers]

I realize that this is pure fiction. However, I'd like to lend a subtle flavor of scientific validity to my narrative by at least attempting to describe a legitimate means for wormhole construction, even if this construction couldn't realistically be performed by a human brain.

There is a book called 'the field' by Lyn Mc Taggart. It explores some of the work done into human thought and intention, and the possibility that it orders the zero point field to create order from the randomness of the quantium world. I am sure many many physicists that know much much more than I do would recoil in disgust at my meer mention of her book ( as it claims to be non-fiction) but none-the-less, the ideas she explores would certainly grant your female character the powers you wish to endow her with.

 

[Shephardmoon]

Oooooh I'll have to look that one up. Thanks!

I'm not looking to prove any new science here-- but I think any reader would want a legitimate-sounding explanation of how she makes wormholes. Also, since part of the plot involves her training her love interest to do this, I sort of need to know how she does it... lol.

I've got a long way to go.

 

[Vanadium 50]

However, I'd like to lend a subtle flavor of scientific validity to my narrative by at least attempting to describe a legitimate means for wormhole construction

No you don't.

You don't hear Philip Marlowe or Sam Spade explaining how a gun, or a car or even a telephone works. Once you have your premise, you need to look forward and tell your story, and not look backward to decide if that was a sensible premise or not. That should be done before you start writing.