Posted on 09/09/2007 7:53:44 AM PDT by grundle
For obvious reasons, scientists long have thought that salt water couldn't be burned.
So when an Erie man announced he'd ignited salt water with the radio-frequency generator he'd invented, some thought it a was a hoax.
John Kanzius, a Washington County native, tried to desalinate seawater with a generator he developed to treat cancer, and it caused a flash in the test tube.
Within days, he had the salt water in the test tube burning like a candle, as long as it was exposed to radio frequencies.
His discovery has spawned scientific interest in using the world's most abundant substance as clean fuel, among other uses.
Rustum Roy, a Penn State University chemist, held a demonstration last week at the university's Materials Research Laboratory in State College, to confirm what he'd witnessed weeks before in an Erie lab.
"It's true, it works," Dr. Roy said. "Everyone told me, 'Rustum, don't be fooled. He put electrodes in there.' "
But there are no electrodes and no gimmicks, he said.
Dr. Roy said the salt water isn't burning per se, despite appearances. The radio frequency actually weakens bonds holding together the constituents of salt water -- sodium chloride, hydrogen and oxygen -- and releases the hydrogen, which, once ignited, burns continuously when exposed to the RF energy field. Mr. Kanzius said an independent source measured the flame's temperature, which exceeds 3,000 degrees Fahrenheit, reflecting an enormous energy output.
As such, Dr. Roy, a founding member of the Materials Research Laboratory and expert in water structure, said Mr. Kanzius' discovery represents "the most remarkable in water science in 100 years."
But researching its potential will take time and money, he said. One immediate question is energy efficiency: The energy the RF generator uses vs. the energy output from burning hydrogen.
(Excerpt) Read more at post-gazette.com ...
Agreed, it makes it possible to take energy that is impractical to move from, say, an equatorial area, and convert it to hydrogen which might be easier to transport. I can imagine that tidal or geothermal energy could be employed to do this in offshore power plants.
Exciting the water with RF in order to break down the water molecule is a losing game; you will never get more out than you put in. Now if somebody would be able to produce neutrons from this experiment I would say they have something. Until then; show me the flux.
Over the centuries people have thought they knew what the ‘underlying laws’ were a number of times. The fact is those understandings were not static. I have no reason to think that the understandings we have today will remian static. To claim that we do know all there is, is as silly today as it would have been at any other time. We simply don’t know all there is to know. From time to time we find new loopholes, or discoveries that throw things we though were static on their head.
For that reason, I don’t discount something until there has been adequate investigation. At some point, much of what we understand today was considered hearasy. Why couldn’t what we think of today fall into that category when future discoveries are made? Why do you close that door? I acknowledge that you aren’t the only person to adopt this trait, so I’m not trying to say you’re in the ether zone. Far from it. I just don’t think that’s a particular good position to be in.
At other points in history, folks have thought they had made all the discoveries in a particular area of science, only to find that they weren’t even close.
Some of your examples are fairly lucid, but others are downright comical. I think you realize that.
At one point it was herasy to think we would break the sound barrier. There are other things we take for granted today, that were considered impossible.
When you went to the Nigerian example, you shot yourself in the credibility. Looks like it was fatal, but there still may be hope.
Thanks for the comments.
http://nick2.wordpress.com/2007/06/01/saltwater-into-fire/
Here’s more info on it and vids too. Notice it is not a normal flame. THere is something going on here besides ordinary combustion of hydrogen.
You're welcome. I wish I could have clued you in on the "dubya" scam as well. But, I was duped by that one.
bttt
I would imagine that due to the difficulty in moving hydrogen gas, it might be easier (certainly safer) to pump the salt water.
Good place to bump this thread. I thought I was the only one who remembered Keeley net.
Just because you're too invested in your lack of knowledge to understand the example doesn't make the example wrong. In fact your saying this shows just how little understanding of physics and chemistry (and nigerian frauds) you have. This thing is EXACTLY analogous to a Nigerian fraud. First they guy throws out the bait. There will be some simple souls (generally those same people who believe that the gas industry buys the patents on "100 mpg carburetors" and supresses them) who will think that this is a chance to make big bucks on a previously undiscovered physical phenomenon. SO the guy will need some money to get some basic equipment. There will be an impressively complex gadget (not really big because this will take too much of the money that he gets). Then that won't be quite enough so he'll need a bit more, and a bit more, and a bit more, and then he will be 80% on the way to getting it commercialized, and he'll need some more money and the "investors" (suckers) will have thrown in enough money so that they will want it to succeed so they'll give him some more. And then sooner or later the suckers will catch on and stop giving him money and the guy disappears a step ahead of the lawsuits - taking the money with him.
Hell why am I telling you this. I guess it was a mistake to treat you as a rational being, since all you did was make a smart ass remark about my example. I've argued this same point with uninformed egalitarians before, and they always fall back on the same bullsh!t about science saying bumblebees can fly etc. and "over the centuries knowledge has changed" bullcrap etc. But what it really boils down to is their egos will not let them recognize that someone else is better informed than they are. One common pattern for all of these arguments is that they cling to their ignorance with a surprising ferocity. Keep it. Treasure your ignorance. Stay as arrogant and as uninformed as you want.
Tell you what, put your money where your mouth is and invest in this "invention" and when you come back in a year or two rich I will humbly apologize for being wrong. Or when this guy "just needs a little more capital to get it working" give it to him. See what happens.
Stupid. A local HS chemistry or physics or physical science teacher could list 110 things that make this impossible. But the MSM “gleefully” writes it up - and puts the “skeptics” (as they do AGW “deniers” and energy company flaks) label on its critics!
ping
yes...that ENERGY has to be made. offsetting the energy created...
Worse than that: The very act of converting the RF energy (from electricity!) requires a significant LOSS of net energy (from conversion, from heat losses, from electrical resistance, from transmission losses, from signal losses, etc.) so you require significantly MORE electricity INTO the RF generator than you get RF OUT of the generator. This is 115% to 125% of the output RF. Sometimes more.
Then add the electrical transmission losses from the power plant to the site, at the power plant, and the thermodynamic conversion losses from INPUT heat energy at the power plant to OUTPUT electrical energy at the power plant: Even the most efficient power plant is only 43% some-odd efficient: worse now that pollution requires increase energy needed, increase losses.
We are all probably saturated with this thread now, but as an aside, last evening on Prime Time News, I saw Dr. Jarvik, the inventor of the artificial heart, on an ad, pimping statin drugs.
?
Radio Frequency (RF waves) ARE the same energy as the electro-magnetic energy that created them ! (Different frequency, of course). RF waves are CREATED from electricity in the microwave “horn” or airport tower radar transmitter or airplane radio transmitter or CB radio or commercial radio transmission tower and transmitter or cell phone transmitter. The only difference is in the amount of energy transmitted.
ALL of these transmitters have (significant) losses changing the input electrical power into RF energy. (Try running your cell phone for a few days without recharging it: the total energy in your cell phone is ALL the energy available in the device: If you hook up that cell phone battery to a 120 volt inverter/converter and plug in your microwave and refrigerator, you can heat your lunch and serve your buddies a cold six pack. For a short time, at least.)
You can't even do that because the battery's internal resistance would keep the current down to a level where the big appliances just wouldn't work.
>> You can say it is the same theory but RF waves and electricity are not the same.
?
I didn’t say that - it was part of a post a post that I quoted. But I believe the gentleman’s point was that the electromagnetic radiation for the separation of elements is different than passing an electric current through a substance.
I agree with many of you about being a skeptic, but a closed mind atrophies. I remember reading “The Structure of Scientific Revolutions” by Thomas Kuhn in my Grad program. It’s required reading in most Grad programs no matter what the field of study. Kuhn addresses exactly what is taking place in this forum. Most people, especially the more academically educated, will be naysayers to new ideas in any body of science. Usually someone outside the scientific specialty develops an idea. All the so called experts attack it. Gradually as a new generation of scientists accept the new idea a paradigm shift takes place and it replaces the old “theories.”
This was especially true of Emanual Velikovsky’s theories about rapid change in our environment when he wrote “Ages in Chaos” back in the 1950’s. Many scientists wrote books against his theories. Today his theories are generally accepted as true. (Al Gore needs to read his books)
Much of this has to do with the methodology the scientific human brain uses to further knowledge. Logic is linear in nature and makes it dificult to think outside the box. While logic never should be abandoned, the creative aspect of the right brain should be kept open to allow for different perspectives of view. This is what made the Einsteins and the Da Vincis.
Just my two bits.
>>I agree with many of you about being a skeptic, but a closed mind atrophies<<
It depends on what you are being skeptical about.
If people are saying that research to see if the extra cost can be minimized so that hydrogen can be used as a fuel since it burns cleanly while the electricity it will cost is not so suitable for cars - they then that is too skeptical. Hydrogen research is a reasonable field and it will cost more energy than it produces but if that cost can be minimized then it may still be useful.
But, if people are being skeptical that someone is going to mechanically violate conservation of energy then that is justifiable skepticism. There is no point in wasting time or money evaluating that kind of claim.
Not so. Try Wegener's Continental Drift as an actual example. Denied even in the 50s.
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