As I mentioned yesterday, Hollywood screenwriter working on a TV pilot about physics trying to get the details right.

Here is my new, improved question. What empirical evidence is there that tachyons do not exist? I understand that objects with mass cannot accelerate to (much less past) c. So anything capable of FTL travel would have to be massless or very strange. But is there any astronomical evidence that allows us to conclude that superluminal travel does not happen in nature?

Like is there some specific phenomenon we would expect to see in the sky if non-free, interacting tachyons existed, and we're not seeing it? Or is the objection entirely mathematical?

As I mentioned yesterday, Hollywood screenwriter working on a TV pilot about physics trying to get the details right.

What empirical evidence is there that tachyons do not exist? I understand that objects with mass cannot accelerate to (much less past) $c$. So anything capable of FTL travel would have to be massless or very strange. But is there any astronomical evidence that allows us to conclude that superluminal travel does not happen in nature?

Like is there some specific phenomenon we would expect to see in the sky if non-free, interacting tachyons existed, and we're not seeing it? Or is the objection entirely mathematical?

As I mentioned yesterday, Hollywood screenwriter working on a TV pilot about physics trying to get the details right.

Here is my new, improved question. What empirical evidence is there that tachyons do not exist? I understand that objects with mass cannot accelerate to (much less past) c. So anything capable of FTL travel would have to be massless or very strange. But is there any astronomical evidence that allows us to conclude that superluminal travel does not happen in nature?

Like is there some specific phenomenon we would expect to see in the sky if tachyons existed, and we're not seeing it? Or is the objection entirely mathematical?

As I mentioned yesterday, Hollywood screenwriter working on a TV pilot about physics trying to get the details right.

Here is my new, improved question. What empirical evidence is there that tachyons do not exist? I understand that objects with mass cannot accelerate to (much less past) c. So anything capable of FTL travel would have to be massless or very strange. But is there any astronomical evidence that allows us to conclude that superluminal travel does not happen in nature?

Like is there some specific phenomenon we would expect to see in the sky if non-free, interacting tachyons existed, and we're not seeing it? Or is the objection entirely mathematical?

I am a Hollywood screenwriter working on a television pilot about an astronomer who receives messages from the future. (Sort of like CONTACT but freakier, scarier, and much, much bloodier.) I'm looking for a little bit of advanced physics help.

The general idea is the astronomer discovers a strange "artifact" in some publicly available data from a highly advanced sensor array of some sort (maybe a radio telescope, maybe LIGO, I don't know). The artifact turns out to be an encrypted message from the future. At first, these messages are innocuous - sports scores, stock tips, etc. But pretty soon the messages are telling him to commit crimes and murder people. (Like I said. Contact, but bloodier.)

So here's my question. Let's say that in the year 2067, a highly advanced alien race decides to send a message back in time 50 years to Earth in 2017. How could they send such a signal so that it could be detected by 2017 technology? I understand this isn't possible under mainstream physics, but let's assume mainstream physics is wrong. Hypothetically, how could it happen?

As I mentioned yesterday, Hollywood screenwriter working on a TV pilot about physics trying to get the details right.

Here is my new, improved question. What empirical evidence is there that tachyons do not exist? I understand that objects with mass cannot accelerate to (much less past) c. So anything capable of FTL travel would have to be massless or very strange. But is there any astronomical evidence that allows us to conclude that superluminal travel does not happen in nature?

Like is there some specific phenomenon we would expect to see in the sky if tachyons existed, and we're not seeing it? Or is the objection entirely mathematical?