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.
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.