Spooky action at a distance is... really fast.

[Alondro]

I remembered this from a while back.

Wormholes or Warp Speed?

So, some form of communication occurs between the linked particle pairs which has a minimum speed of 10,000 times the speed of light!

Supposedly, there is no violation of relativity, as information must travel through a classical information channel to violate the principle.  But from my recent reading into the whole phenomenon and new experiments in which entire chemical molecules have been entangled, this is really nitpicking to avoid having to reject what has been so long-held as factual.

It's possible to convey information via this system with two large groups of entangled particle pairs.  One group represents '1' and the other '0'.  The groups are split and the pairs then taken, say, across the universe.  So, then you have these numerous '1' and '0' particles, with their sibling particles on the other side of the universe.  Now, perhaps information channeling through a mere single pair is not possible, but using this effect to 'trick' the universe into violating itself is!  All you have to do is measure a particle from the '1' group, then another '1' or a '0'... and the corresponding entangled particles in the far-flung groups will show a response in its '1' and '0' groups.  It may not convey any 'classical' information, but what you are in fact transmitting is a pattern of '1' and '0' responses that will be replicated precisely and possibly instantaneously (since no maximum speed of the effect is known, if there is a maximum limit at all).  Thus, through information that the universe considers random, we transmit a hidden pattern of information that the universe doesn't recognize, since it is an abstract concept that only an intelligence can translate as data!

Thus, we have bent the rules without breaking them and achieved faster than light information communication without actually doing so!

[Paladin Sheppard]

Heh believe this or not Alondro, but Bioware used this little technology in their game Mass Effect 2. Not the tech itself mind you just the theory, which is explained very clearly I might add.

[GabrielsThoughts]

I'm not sure I'm understanding the information correctly, being that I am more a philosopher than a scientist. the nutshell of the argument is based on the rotation of the earth and some photon experiments that I can barely understand in the sense of  the energy of electrons spinning up or down changes the color of the energy burn...

speed of light  is not the highest threshold of speed, but four times the speed of light is the limit. I'm going to just assume four times the speed of light is warp one.

[Shachza]

Imagine it this way.  The linked particles essentially form a guitar string that can be stretched an infinite distance.  The person at one end plucks the string, and the person at the other end hears the note.  No matter how far away person 2 is from person 1.  And the effect is instantaneous.

You need a lot of these things to transmit simple messages like "Hello, how are you."  But the cost would be worth it to be able to send that message instantly to someone on the other side of the galaxy (100,000 light years away).

[techmaster-glitch]

...Not that I know anything about it, but isn't all this the String Theory? (as in, it's been around for awhile...?)

[GabrielsThoughts]

All I understand about string theory relates to multiple dimensions existing wrapped around and parallel to one another... supposedly even the number of actual dimensions cannot actually be accurately accounted for as the equation seems to work with multiple solutions and has since become "M" theory based on a documentary I saw on the discovery channel a few years back. Personally I like the What the bleep: down the rabbit hole explanations of multiple possibilities.

[superluser]

Actually, since entanglement is supposed to be simultaneous, I'd be surprised if it weren't instantaneous.  If we can show that entanglement has a speed, there will be some very significant implications.

I'm not sure I'm understanding the information correctly, being that I am more a philosopher than a scientist. the nutshell of the argument is based on the rotation of the earth and some photon experiments that I can barely understand

It sounds like you're talking about the Michelson-Morley experiment, which was indeed an interesting experiment.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, there was a theory that light was composed of particles and that these particles moved through a medium called the luminiferous æther.  Contrary to popular belief, this does not appear to have been accepted as a physical principle, but rather one theory that many (most?) scientists thought would eventually prove to be true, like string theory.  For those of you in Computer Science, it would be like teaching that P !=NP because most theorists think that's the case.  James Clerk Maxwell showed that the speed of light might be related to the permittivity and permeability of free space, and thus that it could be an electromagnetic wave like electricity and magnetism, and since the permeability and permittivity seemed to be constants, that would imply that the speed of light would be a constant.

If the Earth is orbiting the sun, the luminiferous æther, being similar to the water that carries water waves or the air that carries sound waves, should be moving in relation to us.  When we're on one side of the sun moving towards the æther, the light that it's carrying should be moving 214,000 km/h faster that when we're on the other side moving away.  Michelson/Morley set up an experiment that disproved this.

in the sense of  the energy of electrons spinning up or down changes the color of the energy burn...

Spin is a complicated concept that gets its name from the physical property of angular momentum, which it behaves like in equations, but that's not the same thing as electrons spinning up.

...Not that I know anything about it, but isn't all this the String Theory? (as in, it's been around for awhile...?)

Imagine it this way.  The linked particles essentially form a guitar string that can be stretched an infinite distance.  The person at one end plucks the string, and the person at the other end hears the note.  No matter how far away person 2 is from person 1.  And the effect is instantaneous.

If string theory proves to be true, this may be a decent way to visualize it, but remember that a guitar string will transmit sound waves at the speed of sound in a guitar string, which would be even less than the speed of light in a guitar string.

I once had string theory described to me as not really physics but mid 21st-century math that was discovered in the mid-20th century before we had any use for it.  We don't know what string theory means or even if it's valid (aside from the bits that simply provide different ways of looking at the same equations), but it looks tantalizingly like it could be revolutionary.

Quantum entanglement predates string theory (Einstein named it spooky-action-at-a-distance because it contradicted relativity), and there are people who believe in the many-worlds interpretation (multiple dimensions) who do not believe in string theory, as well as string theorists who do not believe the many-worlds interpretation.

[Shachza]

Imagine it this way.  The linked particles essentially form a guitar string that can be stretched an infinite distance.  The person at one end plucks the string, and the person at the other end hears the note.  No matter how far away person 2 is from person 1.  And the effect is instantaneous.

If string theory proves to be true, this may be a decent way to visualize it, but remember that a guitar string will transmit sound waves at the speed of sound in a guitar string, which would be even less than the speed of light in a guitar string.

Well yeah, that's why I specified that the effect was instantaneous regardless of distance.

[Reese Tora]

speed of light  is not the highest threshold of speed, but four times the speed of light is the limit. I'm going to just assume four times the speed of light is warp one.

I'm not exactly a trek geek, but I am pretty sure warp factors do not work that way... I believe warp is supposed to be how much space is bent, and could be considered a speed multiplier and is measured on a logarithmic scale. In other words, you don't go faster, you make the distance you travel shorter, and the warp factor is related to just how much shorter you are making your trip. (and also gets around the fact that, at a significant fraction of the speed of light, the random space dust and hydrogen molecules in your path would rip any conventional space craft to shreds)

The idea of the speed of light being the maximum speed is based on the fact that as you accelerate, your mass increases. the closer you get to the speed of light, the higher your mass, and the more energy it takes to speed up.  theory says that, upon reaching the speed of light, you would have infinite mass, and therefore it requires infinite energy to reach that speed.  The reason light can move at that speed is because it has no mass.  I bet all sorts of rules get broken beyond the event horizon of a black hole, and it's a pity we can't observe the rule breaking that is probably going on.

[RobbieThe1st]

Perhaps I'm missing something, but why aren't there attempts currently ongoing to -use- this? Like Alondro said, it would seem to be possible to use these to transmit/receive binary data - why am I not seeing experiments involving a few of these, some circuits and a lot of distance? And, once you can have two devices that can accurately transceiver data between each other... why not go one step further, and set up a simple PC network converter on each end?
If these pairs can really transmit at near infinite speeds... Just think: ultra-low-latency, high-speed Internet to -anywhere- on the globe... or off it!

[Alondro]

Perhaps I'm missing something, but why aren't there attempts currently ongoing to -use- this? Like Alondro said, it would seem to be possible to use these to transmit/receive binary data - why am I not seeing experiments involving a few of these, some circuits and a lot of distance? And, once you can have two devices that can accurately transceiver data between each other... why not go one step further, and set up a simple PC network converter on each end?
If these pairs can really transmit at near infinite speeds... Just think: ultra-low-latency, high-speed Internet to -anywhere- on the globe... or off it!

Well, currently it takes a lot of money and a particle accelerator to entangle particles.  Plus, there's no means at this point to store a whole lot of them.  Right now we're at the level of entanglement that Ben Franklin was with electricity.  We've proved it and have some guesses of how it could be used, but the technology is still too primitive. 

Plus, the gigantic groups of entangled particles you'd need to transmit enough data to make it worth while would take decades just to produce enough for a single system.  And then systems would have to be made to measure the activity of all the particles in those groups.  So, though it's possible to do this type of communication, it's not at all practical.

And, down the line, we might discover means of communicating with only a single pair of entangled particles if it turns out the entanglement can survive some form of quantum nudging without breaking down.  Right now, our methods of measuring entanglement might be akin to trying to type out Morse Code on a telegraph using a wreaking ball, flooding the system with so much energy that one measurement shatters the connection, which likely uses a miniscule amount of energy and instead is made up mainly of whatever the bizzarre properties are that cause entanglement in the first place. 

Some have suggested that entanglement has to do with waveform properties, and that the pair act as a single particle with a waveform connecting them that can stretch infinitely.  As to how that connection can act instantaneously over such distances... nobody knows.  BUT, there is a suspicion among a few who dare that it could mean that not only is our concept of time wrong, but our concept of space as well.  Or, it could be the same situation as between Newtonian physics and relativity.  The qualities are acting upon a different scale of matter and energy.  Entanglement may be the only easily visualized effect of a whole level of reality we have not yet perceived, one which touched upon aspects of other theories but belongs to something totally different.

Communicating with entanglement might involve a type of very delicate quantum tweaking that we currently aren't capable of.

[ShadesFox]

There are commercial systems available using this available.  Mostly cryptographic key distribution.  Its real value isn't the speed, rather it is the fact that you can tell if the key was tampered with.  It is also kind of useless, key distribution with conventional systems is much easier/cheaper and really not that much less secure.  Key distribution was never a problem anyways.

[Alondro]

There are commercial systems available using this available.  Mostly cryptographic key distribution.  Its real value isn't the speed, rather it is the fact that you can tell if the key was tampered with.  It is also kind of useless, key distribution with conventional systems is much easier/cheaper and really not that much less secure.  Key distribution was never a problem anyways.

Well, those don't use the exact principle I'm suggesting.  You would use my system to actually transmit the codes from a person with one group of particles to another with the sibling particles.  That tranmission would be essentially un-hackable, because to tap into the information, you'd need a third group of entangled particles to the other two groups, thus the only way it could be hacked is if a corporate spy involved in the particle entangling made an extra group of identically entangled particles.

But it is the sort of thing I'd expect this level of entanglement communication to be used for in the infant stages; short pieces of data that require a super-high level of security.

[Shachza]

I think the biggest problem before the widespread developing of this technology is that there is little reason to do it where we are now.  And I mean physical location.  Its real benefit is seen on the galatic scale, allowing for instantaneous communication.  We already have that here on earth, why make a more complicated system that does what we already can do?

Once space travel catches up, I'm sure we'll see some really fast advances in this.  (Funny to think that communication capability has now outpaced our ability to travel to other places.)

[Alondro]

I don't know that the advances will be fast.  It all depends on if entanglement can withstand some gentle prodding and make a signal of some sort without breaking down.  Then, if you can send an entire message with just a few pairs of entangled particles, development will occurr very fast indeed.

However, if it is simply impossible to use a pair of entangled particles more than once, then the only way to use it is to entangle billions or even trillions of pairs of particles ahead of a ship's departure so that it can send messages once it reaches its destination.

In the latter case, save for space probes and perhaps experimental FTL ships which will require a fast mode of communication for basic instructions and to send images of its location, it would be a totally impractical form of communication, unless  means are found to entangle vast numbers of particles at once.  Even so, once the ship runs out of entangled particles, communication will cease. 

Now, if there is a way to entangles lots of particles, say, millions of simple atoms like hydrogen, all at once, then you can create a very large pool of entangled particles for the ship, making at least that form practical for space exploration.  With this sort of multi-quantum entanglement you could produce enough entangled particles for a terabyte or so of communication within a reasonable amount of time while the ship is being built.  Keeping images low-res, and instructions brief and basic, the shp far out among the stars could have enough communication capacity for a good year of high-volume data.