http://slate.msn.com/?id=2072733

Great article

 

good idea, but I would rather see research money go towards more critical matters, like freeing ourselves of our reliance on fossil fuels, or solving the distrubition problem.

research on stuff like this and faster than light travel (which was achieved some time ago, but couldn't be applied to anything) should take a backseat to the important stuff.

reminds me of an old joke...
Realizing that there was no gravity in space, NASA engineers strove to design a fountain pen that could write reliabily upsidedown as well as right side up. In the end, it cost over 1 million.
The Russians used a pencil.

 

I must disagree, there's a big difference between researching faster-than-light travel and anti-gravity. Anti-gravity has zillions of very very useful applications right here on the surface of the earth in our daily lives. One of which does exactly what you wish for, freeing ourselves from our reliance on fossil fuels. For example, if cars could lighten themselves with anti-gravity, then our puny electric motors of today's hybrid vehicles would be all we'd need to push ourselves around. No worries, though, hybrids are catching on, fuel cell vehicles are right around the corner, and heck I've even had the experience of filling up the tank of a Natural Gas civic. WHoosh!

(Good joke though. I even have one of those pens somewhere! hehe)

 

Hmm... this smacks of cold fusion type phony science. I'm from
Missouri when it comes to stuff like this.

 

For the record one of the reasons people do not believe in anti gravity is that if you could achieve it you could place it on one side of a balanced wheel the wheel would start to turn because one side is lighter then the other. Hook a generator up to the wheel and you have free power forever. So if indeed anti gravity exists it does exactly what you say is more important.

 

I see, and that leads to the question: "What about the laws of energy conservation?"

If anti-grav is possible, then it would mean that the laws of energy conservation aren't complete, or it means that gravity itself is a form of energy that eventually runs out!! Either way, we'd have a ton of re-evaluation of all physics as we know it.

 

No, it just means that your anti gravity device would require a constant energy input. It's no different from attracting objects with an electromagnet for example. The energy gained from the wheel would be less than or equal to the energy consumed by the anti-gravity generator.

There is actually some evidence that magnetic fields can affect gravity. It's early days but measurements of the universal gravitational constant in different parts of the world don't agree and some have suggested it's because the magnetic field of the Earth is different at different latitudes. Spinning superconducting discs could sure do some weird things with magnetism.....

I don't think the uses are as great as claimed, partly because of the energy conservation requirements and partly because we're talking about a reduction in weight, not inertial mass. A car would be just as hard to accelerate but would handle worse (less grip). Sure it would go up hills easier but who wants that really?

 

[QUOTE]Originally posted by naishou
[B]I don't think the uses are as great as claimed, partly because of the energy conservation requirements and partly because we're talking about a reduction in weight, not inertial mass.

 

This board sure does have some educated people (or at least it seems that way).

Spinning superconducting discs definitely interest me, especially considering in 10 years, no company has made one to spin at 5K RPM.

I'd love to see what would happen when that spinning disc was brought near a magnet.

I have this "toy" called "Levitron". It's like one of those physics toys. Basically, you spin a top and if you weight it perfectly and spin it, it will stay perfectly centered atop the magnet (so long as it's spinning) in the air. It's amazing to look at.