[mhking]

I know it's kind of geekish, but if it ever works, it'll be pretty cool.

[Post Toasties]

Damn! Now, what did I do with my perpetual motion machine?

[OHelix]

Anyone want to comment on the Townsand-Biefield effect?

[F16Fighter]

I'm still waiting for the Jetsons-style flying back-pack.

[jlogajan]

It has been known for hundreds of years that like-charges have repulsive forces. The video of the "lifter" is just an conductive surface connected to the "table" conductive suface through wires. Apply a charge to the unit and they will seperate by mutual repulsion. Nothing new here. Sorry.

[isthisnickcool]

I've seen these videos before. I'd like to see one of them "fly" about 30 feet above and away from the "base" they are connected to. That would make this more interesting.

[fporretto]

This is hard to accept at face value. These things levitate over any surface? Or just specially prepared ones, perhaps ferromagnetic ones that carry a few million Gauss of field?

Some years ago, Analog reported on a maverick who'd developed a device that appeared to violate Newton's Third Law. It would thrust against any surface you put it in contact with, yet remain motionless even though it was unbound, mounted on rollers, and sat on a smooth surface. That's the sort of thing that could rewrite all of physics, if you think about it. But the "inventor" would give no details of theory or construction, and after that one report in Analog, it was never heard of again.

Tinfoil suiters immediately conclude "conspiracy." Physicists -- I'm one, by education -- immedately conclude "hoax."

Freedom, Wealth, and Peace,
Francis W. Porretto
Visit The Palace Of Reason: http://palaceofreason.com

[Junior]

A flying fig leaf bump.

[pabianice]

>>Scientists at NASA's Breakthrough Propulsion Physics project are researching theories that at first glance would seem to be hanging even further off the bleeding edge of rationality than the lifter. Current projects include possible methods of manipulating space-time -- that's time travel in lay terms.

If time travel had been developed, wouldn't travelers from the future already have traveled back to our time to give us the technology that will be developed...uh...will have to have been developed in the past-future...uh...will have been brought forward by the...uh...ow! My head hurts...

[Timesink]

Note that this article isn't from Wired magazine, but from Wired News, which has had no direct relation to the magazine for some years now, and has been known to be just a touch sensationalistic at times, though generally reliable.

And whatever these things are doing, they aren't "resisting Earth's gravitational forces" any more than airplanes and birds do. Anti-gravity devices are impossible under the laws of physics, specifically the First Law of Thermodynamics.

[dead]

"All major scientific breakthroughs were scoffed at when they first debuted,"

All completely useless technologies were also laughed at when they first debuted.

[Post Toasties]

I've just invented a revolutionary device for looking through walls!

I'm thinking of calling it (get ready) a window.

[OHelix]

Check out the work of Townsand Brown with Einstein's freind and colleage Dr. Biefeld on anti-gravitation.

[gilor]

I predict this will disappear, just like the 4 Million MPG carburetor and the battery that never needs charging and the flask that never runs out of wine and and.....

[isthisnickcool]

There is a guy in Texas that has a flying saucer that hovers over his work bench. He built that for fun. One of the many other things he built uses special magnets and creates energy from them. With no other power source. I know people that have seen it. Smart people. It scared the poop out of them.

[chaosagent]

Sorry, this is nothing new. It was first demonstrated by Alexander de Seversky, the famous aircraft designer back in the late 60's - early 70's.

There was an article about it in, I believe, the old Mechanix Illustrated.

It works on the same principle as those ionic fans you see advertised.

I remember that de Seversky was using 30,000 volts at 30 mils (90 watts) as a power source.

He had a metal wire and balsa frame about 18 inches square that looked like a small bed springs. Arranged on top of the frame were a number of these little arrowhead looking wires. The arrowheads were negatively charged and the frame was positively charged. As the charges moved from negative to positive, they dragged air molecules along with them.

It is mentioned in the following text found at the following link:

Prophet

Besides his role as a military prophet, de Seversky continued his activity as a technological inventor and innovator. In line with the emphasis on pollution, he invented a wet-type electrostatic precipitator for attaching air pollution. This added to the list of new developments he previously pioneered, which included the cantilever-skin stressed aircraft wing structure, flight refueling, trailing-edge wing-flaps, and the "Ionocraft", a heavier-than-air levitation device depending on ionic emission, which was built and demonstrated.

[Ernest_at_the_Beach]

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