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Perpetual Energy Machine Getting Lots of Attention

Many users have written to tell us about a magnetic machine promising "infinite clean energy". Engadget has the first picture of the device and is reporting that the announcement (along with a short video) of this supposed device will be released later tonight. "CEO Sean McCarthy tells SilconRepublic how it works. Namely, the time variance in magnetic fields allows the Orbo platform to 'consistently produce power, going against the law of conservation of energy which states that energy cannot be created or destroyed.' He goes on to say 'It's too good to be true but it is true. It will have such an impact on everything we do. The only analogy I can give is if you had absolute proof that God wasn't real.'" In my experience if something seems too good to be true it generally is. I wouldn't get your hopes up.

19 of 965 comments (clear)

  1. Sure. by GWLlosa · · Score: 5, Funny

    I hear there's gonna be a demo on the Brooklyn Bridge. It just so happens I have purchased a deed to said bridge. Where's my cut?

  2. Lisa, get in here! by TrekkieGod · · Score: 5, Funny

    In this house we obey the laws of thermodynamics!

    --

    Warning: Opinions known to be heavily biased.

  3. Mr. Madison... by going_the_2Rpi_way · · Score: 5, Funny

    What you've just said is one of the most insanely idiotic things I have ever heard. At no point in your rambling, incoherent response were you even close to anything that could be considered a rational thought. Everyone in this room is now dumber for having listened to it. I award you no points, and may God have mercy on your soul

    1. Re:Mr. Madison... by hotdiggitydawg · · Score: 4, Funny

      CoE is, in a sense, a consequence of time. As opposed to the Orbo, which is simply a waste of it...
  4. Not the only game in town by PacoTaco · · Score: 4, Funny

    Unfortunately no one is interested in my machine that produces infinite dirty energy. :(

    1. Re:Not the only game in town by adrianmonk · · Score: 4, Funny

      Unfortunately no one is interested in my machine that produces infinite dirty energy. :(

      Is your machine called "the internet"?

  5. Re:As they say... by whopub · · Score: 5, Funny

    I don't know about perpetual energy, but I've been working on perpetual lethargy for years. I wish I could publish a paper on it, but that would ruin years of research.

  6. do we want to end up like Mars? by Dster76 · · Score: 4, Funny

    everyone knows that by creating Orbos, the natives of Mars lost their magnetosphere and ensured their civilization's premature demise.

    (fake science makes for fun ingredients for science fiction!)

  7. Re:Not really perpetual motion, though. by Tatarize · · Score: 5, Funny

    Well, really, it would seem that the Earth's magnetic field is probably too weak to really provide much power. However, if this individual managed to convert sunlight (very energy rich) into electric power... that would be amazingly useful and would have near limitless potential.

    --

    It is no longer uncommon to be uncommon.
  8. Re:As they say... by DrLov3 · · Score: 5, Funny

    Homer : Lisa, in this house we respect the laws of thermo-dynamics, go to your room!

  9. Finally, "Free As In Speech" Energy! by pdbaby · · Score: 5, Funny

    People like you make me so mad! You and your perpetual energy smear campaign. Thermodynamics thermoshamammics. For Too long we've been governed by the laws of physics. Energy wants to be free (as in speech), man!

    --
    Global symbol "$deity" requires explicit package name at line 2. - If only $scripture started "use strict;"
    1. Re:Finally, "Free As In Speech" Energy! by Walt+Dismal · · Score: 4, Funny

      I have perfected a process to turn useless comments in Slashdot into energy! All I need are a few investors in this wonderful Web 2.0 opportunity. Please email me at mrbogo@ponzischeme.com

  10. The Future by alexgieg · · Score: 5, Funny

    I know how the story unfolds. The device will work, by extracting magnetic energy from Earths own magnetic field. In a few years, Steorn will be one of the hugest and most profitable companies in the world, causing oil consumption to almost stop.

    Steorn's main geomagnetic extraction complex will, over time, develop into a city, and then into a gigantic megalopolis, which people will call simply "Steorn". The Steorn megalopolis will be circle-shaped, powered by eight gigantic Orbo generators (also delimiters of the city's eight sectors), and divided into two vertical levels, the lower scum one, where low wage workers live, and the high one, were executives, rich people etc. live and work.

    Over time, a quasi-religious movement will develop affirming that Steorn's consumption of geomagnetic energy is actually causing Earth to die, and the most fanatic among these will form an eco-terrorist movement dedicated to the destruction of all Orbo generators. The funny thing is: this movement will be actually correct! Worse: not only will Steorn be in fact slowly destroying the world, but they will have also developed advanced genetics research on an alien found years before, using these discoveries to genetically enhance their own self-defense troops.

    The history of our future proceeds in many details, but I'll make it short. Suffice it to say that one of these troops will discover all about his increased abilities, the alien, the Orbo generators destroying Earth, and will decide to accelerate the process, by causing a meteor to strike Earth. Earth itself, in a move indicating some kind of self-awareness, will fight back by redirecting its own geomagnetic field against the meteor, destroying it. The collateral effect of this, however, will be a magnetic induced disease over humanity, who will slowly start to die. A cure will be found, but not before much damage happens.

    Due to all of this, the world will realize they must stop using geomagnetism as a source of energy, turn off all Orbo generators, and finally turn back to that old means of power generation left behind decades ago: petroleum. So much, in fact, that even the former leader of the anti-Orbo eco-terrorist group will become one of the earliest investors in oil extraction and oil-based energy production.

    Then history will repeat itself.

    --
    Conservatism: (n.) love of the existing evils. Liberalism: (n.) desire to substitute new evils for the existing ones.
    1. Re:The Future by Zak3056 · · Score: 5, Funny

      At some point in all of the above, man will discover magic--and promptly stop using it when he discovers that it takes the form of ten-minute-long animations that cannot be skipped.

      (by the way, when do the Chocobos become involved?)

      --
      What part of "shall not be infringed" is so hard to understand?
  11. Re:Flawed... even down to the analogy. God? by Pogue+Mahone · · Score: 5, Funny
    God is real unless explicitly declared as integer.

    Sorry --- old Fortran joke.

    (For the youngsters out there: in "traditional" Fortran, variables didn't need to be explicitly declared. Those starting with the letters i to n were integers. The rest were reals.)

    --
    Every bloody emperor has his hand up history's skirt [Peter Hammill/VdGG]
  12. Re:Flawed... even down to the analogy. God? by ceoyoyo · · Score: 4, Funny

    Silly Fortran. Try an untyped language. Then God is whatever you first assign to it. Why, God could be a string!

    Actually, I hear there are people who think believing in strings is equivalent to believing in a god.

  13. Re:Flawed... even down to the analogy. God? by Dachannien · · Score: 5, Funny

    Man: Hey, aren't you a string?
    String: No, I'm a frayed knot.

    *ducks*

  14. Re:Power from the Moon's Gravity: by Kj0n · · Score: 4, Funny

    I don't think tidal power really qualifies as a clean power source. Of course, now it seems there is an abundance of 'free' power, but in 50 years, when we have taken too much, the moon will crash into the earth.

    The same is true for harnassing power from the earth's magnetic field: there certainly will be side effects when too much power is taken.

  15. Re:Power from the Moon's Gravity: by fbjon · · Score: 4, Funny

    Just make the generators out of rubber duckies.

    --
    True confidence comes not from realising you are as good as your peers, but that your peers are as bad as you are.