Captain Kirk’s starship leaves Earth for Planet X at the same time Marvin the Martian’s starship leaves Planet X for Earth. Each ship travels at a constant velocity, but one is faster than the other. After meeting and passing, Kirk requires 22.5 hours to reach Planet X, while Marvin requires only 10 hours to reach Earth. Exactly what total time did each starship require for its interplanetary journey? Assume stationary planets.

Credit for this problem goes to Cliff Pickover

A brief consideration of Special Relativity.

Assuming planet X is in our solar system, the spaceship velocities would have to be on the order of .003 times the speed of light (plus or minus an order of magnitude)  which I doubt would change the calculations much.

If the planet were orbiting a different star, the nearest being 4 light years away, then the speeds would have to be 70,000 times the speed of light.  I don't thing the Enterprise could go that fast.  So, clearly no intergalactic planetary travel is going on here.

Posted by Larry on 2005-05-20 17:03:28