I’m editing someone else’s sci-fi story, and the author refers to the starship travelling at “warp speed.” Now, I’m sooo not a science or even science fiction expert. (So why am I responsible for a sci-fi book? Well, it’s a gimmicky romance with a sci-fi theme developed by a small publisher whom I work for.) However, as a fan of Star Trek and having done my own rudimentary research, I suspect that the term “warp speed” began with the Trek universe and isn’t a legit scientific term.
That is: of course faster-than-light speed is a real concept, albeit theoretical, but calling it “warp speed” seems to have begun with Roddenberry. Is this correct?
I know it’s a phrase we use now in a generic sense, as in, “dang that driver’s going at warp speed!” But a book developing its own set of rules and terms needs something either truly generic (like “faster-than-light”) or unique. And alas, it’s apparently up to me to come up with the term.
Just so I know, are there any other terms that I should avoid? Like, Star Wars used “hyperspeed,” I think. The only other one I can think of is “slipstream” from Andromeda. Well, unless you count the “Holly Hop Drive” from Red Dwarf. As I said, my sci-fi knowledge is fairly limited. Is “lightspeed” generic enough, or is that from some other universe?
Please help! My deadline’s tonight, so I need an answer … in lightspeed, I guess.
I’ve read hundreds of sf books before ST:TOS came out, and I recall none talking about warp speed. Hyperspace (like in Asimov stories) or maybe subspace has been common. Space warps and using some other dimension to go ftl was also common, but never a warp drive or warp speed to the best of my knowledge.
Does the guy have an explanation for ftl travel, or is that not necessary in a romance?
I think hyper-drive is fairly generic. Or, give it the name of the supposed inventor, like the Minschkoff drive or something. That would be safe.
ETA: lightspeed is very bad. since you want to go faster than lightspeed. It’s from Star Wars anyway.
Oh that’s an awesome link, Aesiron, thank you! Superluminal appeals to me, but … well, my experience with the publisher tells me she’s gonna balk at a word as hifalutin’ as ‘luminal’. (Her opinion of her readers is not very high.) Hmm, what about ‘superlux drive’?
Voyager, your info is extremely useful. I trust a guy with your screenname implicitly.
No, the science in this book is very much brushed over, which disappoints me to a degree – I like that stuff, if it’s not too woolly. The book’s really almost a parody; well, parody is the wrong word, as it’s not intended to be especially humorous, but what I mean is, the sci-fi is really just a gimmick. They publish romances in different high concept genres (western, gothic, bodice-ripper, time travel, sword-n-sworcery, etc.) and they’re not especially serious. For this one, the publisher peppered in some “alien” and “futuristic” terms and descriptions to liven things up. For example, they’ve renamed ‘elevator’ in the space ship to ‘liftotron’ and gave a character three arms and so on.
Mine’s not to reason why, mine’s but to copy edit and think of England. But I’m a stickler and in good conscience I can’t use something that’s specific to an existing fictional universe.
I definitely like the idea of naming the drive after an inventor. Dollars to doughnuts, though, the publisher will balk at that too, saying that the audience will wonder who Mischkoff really is. Le sigh.
I agree with Voyager about “warp factor” and “warp speed”. That usage seems to be original with Star Trek, although a lot of people have picked it up now. I suspect that Roddenbery might have been influenced by the marine term “warping a ship”, meaning to change its course:
I’m LOLing, literally, Terrifel. I wish I were kidding about that name. On the plus side, the term getes a total of one hit on Google, so I know it’s original.
Thanks for the confirmation about the warp drive’s proprietary nature, guys. I think I will go with superlux – it sounds appropriately “oooOOOoohh, future, man!” while actually making lexicographical sense. Still, not sure it works for “superlux speed” itself. I’ll probably stick to the basic “faster-than-light” term, unless anyone has any other brainstorms or caveats.
Okay I checked the Oxford Dictionary of Science Fiction and the cites they offer:
warp - 1946 in Fredric Brown’s Placet Is Crazy Place. There are earlier uses of “space warp” but this is the first reference to it as a means of propulsion.
warp drive - 1949 from Fredric Brown again in Gateway to Darkness.
I always assumed it arose from talk about warpage of spacetime. The OED seems to back me up on this. (“space warp” in science fiction dating to 1936 and arising in the manner I described)
Am I the only person who thinks it would be very unlikely to be a problem, especially in a one-off light work?
I mean, it’s not like you’re calling the main rival race the Cardassians or some such nonsense. The Great Bird of the Galaxy surely would be flattered, & Paramount’s lawyers probably don’t even know if “warp speed” is original to Trek. And I expect that it has been used somewhere other than Trek in the last 40 years, without repercussion.
Don’t worry; we’re the only ones smart, dashing, and ruggedly handsome enough to break out the reference books.
And for those curious on the digression time warp is attributed to Robert Moore Williams who used it in his 1938 story Flight of the Dawn Star. He used it in contrast to a “space warp”.
