The warp drive and antigravity

Abstract

The warp drive envisioned by Alcubierre that can move a spaceship faster than light can, with modification, levitate it as if it were lighter than light, even allow it to go below a black hole's horizon and return unscathed. Wormhole-like versions of the author's `drainhole' (1973) might provide the drive, in the form of a by-pass of the spaceship composed of a multitude of tiny topological tunnels. The by-pass would divert the gravitational `ether' into a sink covering part of the spaceship's hull, connected by the tunnels to a source covering the remainder of the hull, to produce an ether flow like that of a river that disappears underground only to spring forth at a point downstream. This diversion would effectively shield the spaceship from external gravity.