That NASA Warp Drive? Yeah, It’s Still Poppycock
http://www.wired.com/2015/05/nasa-warp-drive-yeah-still-poppycock/
Now, the last time this idea popped up it made a bunch of noise, which eventually settled down because of some pretty (ahem) obvious flaws in Eagleworks’ experiments. The physicists hadn’t run the tests in a vacuum—essential for measuring a subtle thrust signal. And while they had tested the drive under multiple conditions, one of them was intentionally set up wrong. That setup produced the same thrust signatures as the other conditions, suggesting that the signals the physicists were seeing were all artifacts.
This time around, Eagleworks researchers said they had addressed one of those problems. “We have now confirmed that there is a thrust signature in a hard vacuum,” wrote Eagleworks member Paul March in a forum. It was that post—all the way back in February—that led to most of last week’s hullabaloo....
On top of that, there’s no way to be sure that the tests were run in a hard vacuum—because the only source of information is a post on an Internet forum. Not a peer-reviewed published result, not even a one-off conference proceeding. Let’s not do science like that, OK?
But... but... but, but, but...
It's worked so well for James Hansen.
The science is settled. The conservation of momentum is wrong.
You appear to be using a strawman argument, because no one has made any claims that an Em drive was “proven” to be an FTL drive or even any proven propulsion system at all. They are only claiming the Em drive appears to be producing some revolutionary results which still need further independent experimentation and peer reviews [note the plural] to confirm what they think the early experiments have shown. If the experimentation should confirm what they think they are seeing, such experimental results would open the door to a whole new line of research into physics which may or may not imply the possibility of a future FTL propulsion system. Of course, if you insist upon killing the research into such experimental results just because it is currently not yet subject to peer review and not yet grounded in known physics, it will not be possible to engineer such an Em propulsion system even if it really can exist and even if there is a reasonable yet currently unknown set of physical laws to explain it.
Mankind learned how to use electricity through stubborn experimentation long before mankind developed physical laws to explain what electricity is and how it works. If experimentation with the Em drive can be demonstrated to produce actual results, it too may then eventually spawn the development of physical laws to explain how those results can and do exist. If we turned our back on the Em drive, it may be like what would have happened if we refused to investigate and use electricity.
I have been trading messages with Paul March for the last eight years or so on another website called "Talk Polywell" (about Dr. Bussard's design for a fusion reactor) and I have quite a lot of confidence in his knowledge and ability as well as his honesty.
If he says he's getting a displacement of his balance (i.e. a "thrust signature") then I believe him. I also believe he has done every plausible thing to insure that it is not an artifact of some other effect, such as thermal, ion win, magnetic or static attraction/repulsion, etc.
I also have some background of this particular gizmo because i've been keeping up with it ever since New Scientist first brought it to my attention.
I will point out that Roger Shawyer developed his theory of how this thing works, *AFTER* he noticed the problems he had keeping station on microwave transmitting satellites. In other words, trying to address a real world phenomena with satellites drifting out of position is how he came to realize something was going on. Whether his explanation, or anyone else's explanation is valid, is beside the point. The effect appears to be real, and I don't really care if they can explain it in theory or not.
As Reagan said of Economists:
An economist is someone who sees something that works in practice and wonders if it would work in theory. ~ Ronald Wilson Reagan
I'm thinking the EM Drive is an example of a similar thing with scientists.