Anti-Gravity Device Patented

October_30th writes "According to the United States Patent Office website, Boris Volfson has recently patented a "Space vehicle propelled by the pressure of inflationary vacuum state", which is essentially an anti-gravity propulsion device." The validity of this patent remains to be seen, but the general consensus of the physics community seems to be that it is complete malarky.

Comments

In Context...

[lurch84]

When you look how absurd some of the intellectual property or business model patents have been recently, it was only a matter of time before the patent office started issuing absurd patents for (non-existant) physical products.

/me rushes off to get patent for inertial dampening

Re:In Context...

[dbIII]

the guy in from of me is carrying papers describing tractor beams

Already been done - it's part of a tractor chassis.

The real question

[ThatGeek]

The real question is how can I, as an inventor, patent my time machine?

I mean, anyone can just go back in time with my intention and claim my patent!! WTF??

Re:The real question

[Lifewish]

I mean, anyone can just go back in time with my intention and claim my patent!! WTF??

Or John Titor could claim prior art.

See what the GP means? They're at it already!!!

Nonsense...

[moviepig.com]

It's well-known that the only true anti-gravity device is a (Score:5, Funny)

I'll tell you...

[complete malarky]

...what I keep telling the scientists, this device has nothing to do with me!

Vaporware of the Millenium

[Anonymous Coward]

Just like the patents for my cold fusion device and perpetual motion machine, plus convenient hair dryer.

What does this have to do with my "Rights Online"?

[Digital Pizza]

How is this related to my rights, especially online?

If it's "complete malarky" then nobody has anything to worry about, but if the guy were to actually make something out of this then doesn't he deserve the patent?

This should probably have been put in the "Funny" category, if anything.

What the other side has to say

[Anonymous Coward]

Since the "normal" scientific will dismiss this off the bat as usual, what does the "underground" scientific community, which tries to deal with this type of phenomena, have say about it? (Yes it does exist, break out the tin-foil hats etc..)

Well even they agree that the patent examiners have been duped and it would never fly. For a interesting compilation of discussions going within the community have a look at this article.

Though real science aside, it would be very cool if it worked.

Re:What about...

[Boronx]

If an infinite improbability drive were possible, wouldn't it have already brought itself into existence?

Star Trek Anyone?

[Zebra_X]

If you read the patent text he's basically describing the warp drive from star trek.

"whereby providing for the gravitational imbalance such that the lowered pressure of inflationary vacuum state is pulling said space vehicle forward in modified spacetime."

interesting i guess.

in normal fashion both slashdot and the reporting news outlet have got it all wrong. it's not a perpetual motion machine - becuase it requires input of a nuclear reactor to make it "go". It's no more a perpetual motion machine than a space probe launched from earth.

nor is this "anti gravity". the patent describes a device that will "modify" space time such that an area of "low pressure vacuum" and "high pressure vacuum" are created. the low pressure area is infront of the ship and the high pressure is behind the ship. the ship travels forward because it's caught in the middle. i guess.

not a physics major.

Re:Star Trek Anyone?

[DavidTC]

You know, that raises another interesting question besides 'How'd he patent something in violation of physics?

Namely, how'd he patent something that'd been clearly explained in various 'Physics of Star Trek' books over the last decade?

Of course, Star Trek didn't invent the idea of bending space to go FTL. It's just the best known for a 'warp drive'.

There are basically only four basic ways to go faster than light that stand up to any physics scrutiny at all: Hyperspace(1), going into another dimension where C is higher or space is smaller; bending our space, via wormholes(2) or making space in front of you smaller and behind you bigger(3); and teleportation, by swapping out two chunks of spacetime(4), or by making all the particles in your body appear elsewhere via quantum teleportation(5); quantum entanglement, which doesn't actually move anything FTL, it destroys it in one place and instantly recreates it elsewhere(6) (This is actually what people are talking about when they speak of quantum teleportation)

Any of these might require you changing form, like to energy, first, but I'm talking about the actual 'FTL' part.

Those are really the only ways we've ever come up with. I'm sure we'll invent more forms of the ways, but anyone with a basic grounding physics could come up with the ones we have. Allowing someone to patent a form of the second is idiotic.

1) B5
2) Andromeda. Stargate, after turning you into energy. Note that Stargate also has (1) for ships
3) Star Trek (ST beaming, incidentally, is not FTL)
4) The new Battlestar Galactica
5) This one is Not Bloody Likely and hence nothing uses it. Quantum teleportation happens at the scale of electrons tunneling through atoms, not people leaping across lightyears.
6) The 'teleporter' in Andromeda's episode 'Banks of the Lethe'. Ironically only works in one region of space so functions more as a time machine than as an FTL drive.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

One the plus side...

[kreyg]

...by the time anyone actually invents one, the patent will have expired.

Jabberwocky!

[The Amazing Fish Boy]

We all know that the only real anti-gravity device is a (Score:5, Insightful)

I'm all for it

[Kuukai]

If some guy in Indiana wants to pay hundreds of dollars to patent stuff that (regardless of being real physics or not) can't possibly be implemented before the patent expires, I'm all for it. That means that if/when technology finally catches up it'll be public domain. He should go ahead and slip in a broad patent on near-light travel, and something about wormholes. To tell the truth, I feel the same way about gene patents. If they want to patent them all, let them. As many incredible advances as have been made in genetics, I somehow feel they'll be much more useful in twenty years. The goverment is too dumb to figure out what's obvious and what's not, so if we just patent [i]everything[/i] now and check back in twenty years, the problem will be solved.

I have an idea that actually works

[sznupi]

Fact 1: cats always fall on four feet
Fact 2: bread slice always falls with the butter side down

So...put a bread with butter on top of a cat, and throw it through the window.

Antigravity device ready.

Re:I have an idea that actually works

[saifatlast]

I just tried that, and it totally doesn't work. My cat's dead now thanks to you. DEAD!! I'm suing you for emotional anguish!

Re:I have an idea that actually works

[LiquidCoooled]

You should have let Schrodinger look after it for you.

Re:I have an idea that actually works

[Alien Being]

"...suing you for emotional anguish!"

Judge: Oh, I thought it was a dog. Case dismissed.

Re:I have an idea that actually works

[pugugly]

If you hadn't looked, that cat might still be alive!

Pug

Re:I have an idea that actually works

[I Like Pudding]

The cat-bread entity would land feet-first and butter-side down simultaneously at infinity. You obviously didn't throw hard enough.

Doesn't a physical patent need a working prototype

[rdean400]

Since when is it good practice for any Patent Office to issue patents based on conjecture? There should be a valid working prototype before any patent is issued. Software patents are bad enough, but speculative patents are total b.s.

Re:What does this have to do with my "Rights Onlin

[slashname3]

Like a lot of the patents that have been granted, this will just keep antigravity out of the general publics hands for a very long time. Just like that 100 mile per gallon carburator.

And it just goes to show that if you have the money you can get ANYTHING patented.

Re:Patent Nonsense--Everyone's Rights are Eroded

[Ruie]

There is one more thing to worry about - the particular patent abounds with junk terms like "vacuum pressure".

This is bad, because inventor was supposed to disclose the invention to obtain a patent and this implies using established terminology to describe it.

Allowing a patent with made up terms is equivalent to allowing wildcards "I patent a thing * that does * and is useful" - the owner of the patent can try to define these terms as legal opportunity presents itself.

Re:Doesn't a physical patent need a working protot

[darkmeridian]

The PTO does not require a working prototype because it does not want all the patents to belong to huge corporations. Pretend you create a nuclear fission reactor that's table-sized. (You're like the second coming of Albert Einstein or something.) If the PTO required a prototype, you would have to find someone with a lot of cash to build the prototype to submit to the PTO. The corporation might steal your idea and take the prototype to the PTO by itself.

So while this lack of a requirement looks ridiculous in this example, there may be other more realistic places where it has protected the small inventor.