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Anti-Gravity Research Confirmed
Anotherone was among a large number of people over the last few days who've written in about research that BAe seems to be funding on Project Greenglow, an anti-gravity project.
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The article may imply that they are wasting money because they don't know what they are doing, but it also states flat out that anti-gravity would violate laws of physics, and that the higher ups have puny brains when it comes to physics.
Take a look at the sci.skeptic FAQ where all this nonsense is harshly treated. The relevant section of the FAQ is section 8.8 - almost at the bottom of the page.
You can probably find other mirrors of the FAQ.
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
You're also betraying a lack of grounding in the scientific method. Not to be harsh here, but the anti-gravity bogosity doesn't go against just the theories that are accepted in the year 2000, it also goes against the FACT that gravity works on objects with mass.
:-)
Only someone with a really poor understanding of physics would believe the old canard that a gyroscope (even a supercold superconduction gyroscope) would lose weight.
1) mass is important, weight is not. When I am jumping, I also lose ALL of my weight momentarily, but none of my mass. Too bad for the jumping diet program...
2) since the guy is measuring weight, then only a dork would accept the claim and start funding an anti-grav program. Why not fund a maglev program instead? It's a much more likely explanation of what's happening.
3) I don't know if this particular thing is fact right now but Einstein's theories predict that a gyroscope actually gets MORE massive and therefore heavier when it spins really fast. Where's the theoretical work that tries to explain this in light of the dubious experiment?
Methinks you're a bit too credulous. The proper attitude to take is to first be skeptical, giving no benefits of doubt. That's a hell of a fish story the guy is telling, and I want to see that fish for myself.
I am completely justfied in proclaiming at this point that the experiments are CRAP and they should be completely IGNORED. Of course, real evidence would change the situation quite a bit!
If tits were wings it'd be flying around.
The same goes for vice versa.
The whole point is to eschew assumptions, to identify our assumptions and challenge them. The process shares this feature with the practice of debugging your own code. Without the ability to challenge our assumptions and beliefs, we might as well let theologans and politicians do our science.
I can see the fnords!
Nothing is truly impossible. The farther we get into Quantum physics the more we discover that we really don't know how it all works. Physics _as we know it_ may not allow for such things, but we are not really sure how things fit together.
I really love Bob Park - "One can only conclude that at the higher levels of these organisations there are people who don't have a very sound grounding in fundamental physics."
I know that he feels it's a long shot, but how many things have been discovered in the last 100 years that were solidly felt to be impossible. Progress is made by stepping away from your blinders and trying new things, looking in directions that you didn't even comprehend existed.
Just because your only knowledge of me is bits on a screen does not quantifiably prove that I do not exist. I may, I may not, but you can not prove that I do not exist because of a lack of evidence or perception.
chris
-- I need more coffee. It's Monday. There is no such thing as enough coffee on a Monday.
This story reminds me of an occassion when Richard Feynman was giving an informal talk at the Esalen Institute, a new-agey institute on the California coast between Los Angeles and San Francisco that he was known to frequent.
He was explaining the properties of matter (comparing atoms vibrating in a lattice to band members marching in step), when a guy from the audience interrupted and starting asking about antigravity devices.
Feynman, in his typical blunt manner, said something to the effect of, "Fella, what you are talking about is impossible. It violates fundamental principles of physics. What _is_ a great antigravity device is that seat under your butt."
Science, like Nature, must also be tamed, with a view turned towards its preservation.
Then, of course, you get a bunch of money types whose eyes are glittering with the thought of all those dollars they'll get "if it works" and are thus blind to the fact that this is almost certainly a crock of shit. Reminds me of all that telepathy research both the US and USSR engaged in during the cold war.
These guys need to look at history. I can't recall a single new technology that appeared like this. New technology almost invariably comes only after the underlying physics has been well worked out. For example, we are only now starting to create technologies using quantum effects, which have been part of standard physics for over half a century.
The cake is a pie
Speak for yourself when you say "our lifetimes." Given the rapid advances in biotech and medicine, the Human Genome Project, nanotech, etc., some of us alive today may very well be living for over 100 years.
As for gravity shielding, more power to 'em. Skeptics can eat my shorts. Scientific skepticism is often based on logical fallacies, like discrediting scientists (if Adolf Hitler authored the laws of thermodynamics, would they be any less valid?), or claiming the "null hypothesis" - which is a sham! There is no null, relative to hypotheses. If I claim "XYZ" without experimentation or evidence, anyone who claims "not XYZ" without experimentation or evidence is equally unscientific. To those of you who argue there's no evidence gravity shielding is possible: go ahead and prove that it's impossible! I would argue that Podkletnov's experiments ARE evidence in favor of it, until such time as they are debunked.
A prime example of the null hypothesis gone bad: There are a number of people in the US who believe that giving young children the massive multiple innoculations that most of them get these days can lead to autism. There are many cases of autism manifesting shortly after such innoculations. Congress held hearings into this subject, and the Surgeon General and a bunch of medical "experts" sat there and claimed there was no link. Why did they claim this? Simply because NO ONE HAD BOTHERED TO DO ANY SERIOUS RESEARCH ON IT. In other words, to the scientific establishment, not researching something is proof that it doesn't exist.
That kind of "science" reminds me of Douglas Adams' Hideous Bugblatter Beast of Traal, a man-eating carnivore which will not attack you if you have a towel over your head, because if you can't see it, it thinks it can't see you.
In the article Bob Park says about Bae "One can only conclude..there are people who don't have a very solid grounding in fundamental physics".
Well sounds like he doesn't have a very good grounding in fundamentals of the scientific method. Repeat after me "the map is not the territory". There are no fundamental laws of physics. The laws of physics are just best fit theorems that happen to fit the available data. As soon as someone demonstrates a reliably reproducible experiment that goes against those laws then those laws have to be revised. Does he honsestly think that we know all of physics and that there is nothing left to learn?
Now I nothing about Dr Yevgeny Podkletnov's experiments, maybe he is a loon, but if no other scientists has tried to reproduce the experiments then you can't just ignore them.
You actually described Special Relativity (which also includes "things going fast look slow"); General Relativity is about funny stuff like non-Euclidean space and unaccelerated objects following geodesics in a warped space-time. It's highly counter-intuitive, mostly because our intuition is shaped by experience with a world where velocities are 0.00001% of c, the radius of curvature of space-time is on the order of a light-year, and other conditions where the deviations from a Newtonian model are so small as to be extremely difficult to measure. If we lived on a neutron star (read Dragon's Egg), our physics would have been more sophisticated from the outset.
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Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
For those with the knee-jerk reaction: "This is garbage. Anybody knows that 99% of crackpot theories are crackpot theories whether suits like them or not." Please look at the other outcomes than a total revolutionary change to how we see physics (although I suppose there is a decent chance that we are due).
The thing to actually look for in this sort of research is what might actually come out of it. Ideally from the funders' point of view, they will get a working antigravity system. Other, more probable outcomes are greatly enhanced knowledge about existing gravity repulsion techniques. Research like this often leads to side applications that affect people's everyday lives in vastly different ways than was ever thought of in the research. I can't remember what plastic was originally intended to be used for, but I don't think they intended to use it for darn near everything like it is used today. Similarly, how many experiments for space technology are better known for their applications on Earth? Let's wait and see what actually comes out of this research before we declare it useless or make plans for designing our new hovercars.
Note: Since it is military research, there is always a probability of a long delay before it hits the private sector, whatever the results are.
B. Elgin
B. Elgin
"Read at your own risk; feel free to ignore."
You're confusing science and engineering, I think. "Science" is basically a method of discovering (or "uncovering") information about the universe; "engineering" is the application of that information for human use. And don't forget that part of NASA's mission is to do the research and low-level work which will enable private industry to apply new technologies too expensive for them to develop from scratch (although NASA sometimes forgets this themselves, it would appear!).
As far as "barely launch[ing] probes properly to Mars," the problem with the last two spacecraft would seem to have been more in the management of the missions, not in the hardware -- even the Polar Lander would have worked if the testing was done properly. This isn't a failure of science, or even of engineering... it's a failure of oversight.
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Politics is about making compromises. Religion isn't. --Michael Horton
Well, I tried it and it just didn't work.
The first time, the cat noticably hovered (at least to my biased eyes) for at least a few microseconds, but then the buttered toast slid around to the top of the cat and the cat landed as normal.
I tightened the strap, which lengthed the amount of time the cat hovered but also deepened (if that's a word) the depth of my scratches. However, the effect of the tightening quickly approached an asymtoptic maximum that had to be at least 3 or 4 milliseconds of "hover time" (again, to my biased eyes).
Unfortunately, I think the Universe tries to prevent this violation of its laws in much the same way the Universe prevents FTL travel via wormholes as described by Hawking (who proposes that vacuum fluctuations will shut down any wormhole that might violate causality)... further tightening of the strap... well... we gave the cat a nice burial, thank goodness the ASPCA wasn't there. The universe was brutal to that poor little cat... I can still hear his screams in my dreams at night...
At the time, there were things they didn't know about the universe. Knowing those things makes all the difference.
When I was in highschool, they took us to the University physics labs, and a professor took a petri dish with a checker-sized magnet in it, then placed a small cylindrical semi-conductor on top of the magnet. Then, she poured liquid nitrogen into the petri dish, and the semi-conductor levitated, and floated where it was.
After seeing that, I don't think I'll ever be able to say something is impossible again. I hope they have fun trying.
ARRRGH!!!
There, now that's out of my system. The experiments done on superconductors are not being done by people that are white-haired mad scientists. There are even a number of _published_ theories from respected scientists as to how a gravity shielding effect might be demonstrated - and they were even done before the superconducting magnet experiment.
I'm not at home, so I can't get the references offhand, but I know several of them appeared in an issue of Popular Science in 1998 or 1999. This research is ongoing.
People that pronounce "that's wrong because" REALLY piss me off. That's not the scientific method. You make a theory to explain some effect - then design an experiment to prove or disprove this theory. You don't just proclaim all people that are researching said theory are crackpots. IMHO, that makes _you_ sound like an ignorant fool. It would make much more sense to question their theory and wait for an intellligent answer!
It is safe to assume that for any major company to make any kind of announcement like this, and get lots of funding, something was demonstrated to someone somewhere. But, NOBODY HERE KNOWS, so why assume that people who have spent their lives researching topics you're to lazy to properly even get definitions for correct are crazy?
And for the cold fusion people, FOR THE RECORD, there have been many reproductions of the experiment, and something does seem to happen. Unfortunately, it's not prediictable or sustainable. The unfortunate attitudes of the public at large and misinformed and ignorant media have effectively killed research into these areas - because you must be crazy to question the status quo.
Think before you speak, people. The scientific method is not about passing judgement, and there just isn't enough infomation here to go one way or the other.
Kudos!
..don't panic
We don't have a theory here, remember. What we have is one wierd result that has not yet been replicated. Try and replicate it perhaps, but spend real money on it? That's idiocy.
There is a difference between understanding the side-effects of a technology ("Why does cold pizza taste good?") and understanding the basis for a technology ("how do you cook a pizza?"). If you wanted to use these results to explain some other odd results somewhere else, yeah, that might make sense. But to say "We're gonna build us an anti-gravity machine" at this stage is pure idiocy.
This isn't about scientific conservatism. This is about demanding proof, and reproducability. Unfortunately, with the press the way it is and with moneyed fools too eager to jump in, we seem to get fooled a lot lately. But I suppose it is more fun dreaming of instant free energy than worrying about boring theory.
The cake is a pie
... the theory that if you tape buttered toast onto the back of a cat and drop the resultant combination, you will get antigravity?
;)
http://harridanic.com
I like the one on quantum vacuum energy. That's a prediction of standard quantum electrodynamics, and historically, QED is always right, even when it makes wierd predictions. Every time standard quantum theory predicted something wierd, experimental work found the theory correct, and things like quantum cryptography and quantum computing emerged.
Also, remember that we still don't understand gravity at the quantum level. Some of the NASA work involves experiments which might provide some added insight in that area. One clear, reproducible non-Newtonian result in the quantum gravity area would provide direction for the gravity theorists, who currently are mostly using what vague data can be gleaned from cosmology.
It might be that true anti-gravity one day may be possible, although nothing currently indicate it, but if so it will be because of breakthrough in basic science, not because of any project with an anti-gravity gadget as its goal.
Your point is good and you deserve your positive moderation, but...
/. Now, I'm not an expert on the subject but I do know that the others are either outright scams or were heard out. Wilhelm Reich never really had his day. In fact, the U.S. Government seized his books and papers and burned them back in 1957. Clearly a First Amendment issue, which is a favorite topic around here.
failures and cranks: phrenology, mediums as masters of the fourth dimension, any number of numerological schemes, orgone energy
Ouch. Orgone energy does not, IMHO, deserve to be put in that lineup. Especially here on
Granted, this is a poor argument for orgone energy, but it is my understanding that very few have recreated Reich's experiments before declaring him a crank or a failure. Peer review wasn't possible because nobody would take the time to hear him out. The same thing has happened in gravity research in the past (the exact reference eludes me) and we have adequate reason be concerned that the scientific community may be too ready to cry 'crank'.
For more information (including an interesting discussion about arguments), read this excerpt from Wilhelm Reich in Hell by Robert Anton Wilson
Here's a link to Eugine's paper that created quite a ruckuss in 1996.
Also, here's a 1998 Wired article that gives a good deal of background about Podkletnov, and why his paper was so badly recieved. It does meander a bit. I'd recommend skipping the boring parts where the writer recounts his visit with some other nut who thought he could duplicate Podkletnov's experiment. It is funny though, and it does show a lot about how a bad scientific method can produce erroneous results.
Enjoy!
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Epitaph
I found a better copy of Podkletnov's paper on the Los Alamos National Laboratory's e-print archive server. It's available in a bunch of formats, including PostScript, PDF, ASCII, and DVI. The previous link I posted didn't have the diagrams included with his paper.
It's better to actually read the paper and draw your own conclusions than to simply listen to what other people think about it and accept their views.
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Epitaph
I agree, this type of research, IMHO, is definitely not frivolous, but for another reason... Serendipity. Even if anti-gravity is impossible the research will lead to other, unintended discoveries. Part of the search for anti-gravity is the search for the graviton. No one has ever seen a graviton, measured the strength of a graviton, or observed the effect of a graviton's movement. By approaching the problem from a different angle you may uncover unknown properties of physics. During their experiments they may uncover certain properties of physics that could revolutionize the world. They may have to develop equipment that is completely new. These ideas may give somebody else an idea for a practical invention that benefits all of man kind.
These same ideas can be applied to the trip to the moon. What did we directly get from going to the moon? A couple of moon rocks! Was it worth while for just a couple of moon rocks? IMHO, NO! But what we did get was numerous advances in computers and software. We got such things as Teflon and tang and many other things that I cannot think of right now.
Anyway any type of valid research is always more valuable than anyone can measure. Who knows what will come of it or who the research will inspire that will give us concrete results? The value is more than we can afford not to invest in.
If at first you don't succeed, skydiving is not for you.
- Someone providing some money to tinker at the margins, making sure that the "fringe" stuff is experimental error. (This is likely if the people at the top have a clue.)
- Someone convinced that the "fringe" stuff is real, and throwing money at studies to prove as much. (This is likely if the people at the top watch "X Files".)
It'll probably take time for the news media to sort out exactly who's behind this and why, assuming they're interested in actually going in-depth as opposed to a "gosh-wow" news item to play to the UFO cultists. What would be really interesting would be some studies of electron-beam repulsion of incoming supersonic airstreams; anything which can propagate a pressure wave faster than sound (as an electron beam could do) could reduce shockwaves and their consequent drag. I saw something about this once, with a note that the research had been suppressed. Well, it's time to unwrap it.--
Time is Nature's way of keeping everything from happening at once... the bitch.
I know there is a fondness for the underdog, bringing down the close-minded orthodoxy and opening up a brave new dawn, etc, etc, but I would remind everybody that the reason the scientific community is sceptical of far out claims is because most of the time they're right to be. We remember the triumphs of paradigm busting: Gallileo, Mandlebrot, Einstein. For very good reasons we forget the failures and cranks: phrenology, mediums as masters of the fourth dimension, any number of numerological schemes, orgone energy, etc, etc, etc, etc.
Just because part of the military-industrial complex is funding it is no seal of authority either; remember all the reports of the Cold War intelligence services - on both sides - funding psychic distance viewing?
All greenglow has are some unpeer-reviewed reports and some highly criticised publications. Measuring weight reduction of a superconducting spinning disk, especially with the magnitudes of loss suggested, is not a difficult experiment. The fact that theses results have not been duplicated, despite the fact that superconductors are common materials these days in most university physics departments should raise the flag of sceptisism for everybody: Extreme claims require extreme evidence
"Just once, I'd like to meet an alien menace that wasn't immune to bullets." -- The Brigadier, Dr. Who
I suggest you read this article at Wired.
What was proposed is not anti-gravity (though astrophysicists are now thinking that this may be a common occurrence). It is gravity shielding. When a correspondent at British Sunday Telegraph received the already-accepted page proofs for the article submitted to the respected Journal of Physics-D, he wrote an article for his newspaper using the word anti-gravity, rather than gravity-shielding.
There was an instant firestorm of ridicule about how anti-gravity was impossible, etc, etc. Podkletnov was let go from his university, his paper was dropped from the journal before it was printed, and he retreated out of the country.
What many people forget is that, "in 1990, a senior scientist at the University of Alabama named Douglas Torr started writing papers with a Chinese woman physicist named Ning Li, predicting that superconductors could affect the force of gravity. This was before Eugene Podkletnov made his observations in Tampere, so naturally Li and Torr were delighted when they heard that Podkletnov had accidentally validated their predictions."
The trick is that Podkletnov was using a very odd combination of materials in his ceramics. This creates an extremely brittle disc that is difficult to spin at high speeds. This guy is an expert in his field, and few have been able to create super-conducting ceramic magnets in this ratio that don't break up at the necessary RPM.
A quick excerpt from the link: True, Podkletnov wasn't a physicist - but he did have a doctorate (in materials science) and he knew how to do careful lab work. When he wrote up his results, his papers were accepted for publication in some sober physics journals, and at least one theoretical physicist - an Italian named Giovanni Modanese - became intrigued. Modanese didn't dismiss the whole idea of gravity shielding, because on the subatomic level, we simply don't know how gravity functions. "What we are lacking today," according to Modanese, "is a knowledge of the microscopic or 'quantum' aspects of gravity, comparable to the good microscopic knowledge we have of electromagnetic or nuclear forces. In this sense, the microscopic origin of the gravitational force is still unknown." At the Max Planck Institute in Munich, he developed a theory to explain the shielding phenomenon.
Oh, and before you go equating this to cold fusion, and saying that it is/was totally bogus, read this article. Read it through to the end, and you will find the interesting results of the experiment, regarding cold fusion.
You should never, never doubt what nobody is sure about.
You quitting proves that the karma kap worked. The most annoying of the whores shut up. --CmdrTaco