Aiming Wormholes

[Maquise]

Based on current theories, if one possessed the means to construct and stabilize artificial wormholes, how would one go about determining or influencing where the other end was?

[Lvl 2 Expert]

Based on current theories, if one possessed the means to construct and stabilize artificial wormholes, how would one go about determining or influencing where the other end was?

I'm honestly not sure if there is any commonly accepted current theory on this.

If we're talking writing semi-hard science fiction, I think there are at least two good options:

1 You start the construction of a wormhole on both ends, these ends will find each other, they basically both keep squirming around "behind" space until they find something to connect to. In this case worm holes might for instance consist of circular black holes, which can be artificially created from stars of at least 3-4 solar masses. You're probably not going to accidentally end up connecting to someone else who just happened to be making a wormhole in the same general area of space at the same time. Additionally half formed wormholes might be unstable, which is why civilizations don't search for other civilizations by always leaving half a wormhole open and "searching".

2 Both ends have to be created together, in the same time and place. You then need to move at least one of the ends at slower than light speeds to make the wormhole worth anything as a wormhole. If you move only one end though the twin paradox could kick in, and you can travel forward in time by stepping into the one that stayed at home, or backwards by entering the one that moved. It's not that much of a problem if these holes are far apart, you can't actually benefit from the time travel because every message you send towards the "late" point will take longer to arrive than the amount of time you win by traveling through the hole. But if that end makes a nice long lap through space and then comes back to near the other portal, that's a time machine. So that's problematic if you want to keep it hard sci-fi without regular time travel.

[Bohandas]

I'm honestly not sure if there is any commonly accepted current theory on this.

Or at least not as to aiming them specifically. Wormholes in general come out of relativity theory

[Craft (Cheese)]

2 Both ends have to be created together, in the same time and place. You then need to move at least one of the ends at slower than light speeds to make the wormhole worth anything as a wormhole. If you move only one end though the twin paradox could kick in, and you can travel forward in time by stepping into the one that stayed at home, or backwards by entering the one that moved. It's not that much of a problem if these holes are far apart, you can't actually benefit from the time travel because every message you send towards the "late" point will take longer to arrive than the amount of time you win by traveling through the hole. But if that end makes a nice long lap through space and then comes back to near the other portal, that's a time machine. So that's problematic if you want to keep it hard sci-fi without regular time travel.

This is probably the way it would have to work, assuming wormholes are possible at all and aren't ruled out by whatever theory of quantum gravity turns out to be right (which is extremely likely imo, nature abhors CTCs). One way you can deal with this as a sci-fi author is to make up some principle that causes wormholes to collapse if you create a pair of wormholes (or a network of them) that allows for backwards time travel.

[Radar]

This is probably the way it would have to work, assuming wormholes are possible at all and aren't ruled out by whatever theory of quantum gravity turns out to be right (which is extremely likely imo, nature abhors CTCs). One way you can deal with this as a sci-fi author is to make up some principle that causes wormholes to collapse if you create a pair of wormholes (or a network of them) that allows for backwards time travel.

And there would not be all that much making up in it, since it is still under heavy debate with strong arguments that a bakward time travel would result in a collapse due to a single photon doing loops through the wormhole. Unless there were some new developments I am not aware of.

[Bohandas]

And there would not be all that much making up in it, since it is still under heavy debate with strong arguments that a bakward time travel would result in a collapse due to a single photon doing loops through the wormhole. Unless there were some new developments I am not aware of.

What about the concept of a Roman Ring, wherein the two ends of the wormhole are kept massively distant from each other but close to another wormhole connecting the same two spaces

[Radar]

What about the concept of a Roman Ring, wherein the two ends of the wormhole are kept massively distant from each other but close to another wormhole connecting the same two spaces

I am no expert in general relativity, but if it could work as a time machine, then there is a possible loop solution for a single photon. So my intuition would be that if a single wormhole becomes unstable with that, then a chain of them would so as well. The details are above my level of understanding though, so keep that in mind.