weird, but not proven

[kunkmiester]

We have several things on here that fit here, with varying degrees of "fitting." The three big ones so far have been:

LENR. Too many anomalous results to throw it out, but no real proof of what's really happening.

Mach effect. Several sound experiments have shown it IIRC, and the theory is pretty sound in my layman's opinion. Problem is not enough people have replicated it.

EM drive. No real theory, but plenty of experiments done, of varying quality. Less likely than others to work out positive, but with a few national labs reporting positive results, it'll be a while before getting something solid to go farther on.

I just thought I'd see if I could spark some conversation on some others. Anyone know of anything else it'd be fun to poke around at? While weird stuff is a fair interest of mine, being a sci-fi world builder, most of what I've been interested in is either definitely not working, or superseded. I thought it might be interesting to have a thread for some of the smaller things, not as big of debates as the ones we've had perhaps, but perhaps some interesting things.

[TDPerk]

EM drive. No real theory,

It has a real theory now. In short, that photons have quantized inertia, and the differing end plated sizes exploit this to prevent otherwise equivalent momentum photon bounces from have the equivalent effect.

Theory was pubbed last week.

[hanelyp]

For Mach effect and EM drive I'm not impressed by the experimental quality, even by the bigger boys. The reported signals are small, and factors exist which make noise difficult to eliminate.

Has LENR had =ANY= independent replication or public description of method?

[ScottL]

I'm with Hanelyp on all of this. There has been no accepted evidence of any of these effects to date. The lack of description, replication, and observation is a huge problem. Obviously they all suffer from their own unique issues, however; they all share the poor experimentation level by today's standards.

LENR = Suffers from lack of replication and low measurement, it is entirely possible that any measurement is an artifact of noise. No one described experiment has been replicated and is consistently reproducible which has resulted in various theories. You've also got a bit of theory spaghetti going on as well as out-right fraud (Rossi) negatively affected any research and credibility.

Mach Effects = Suffers from the same as LENR. The thrust is small and nobody is replicating it to success (largely because nobody is replicating it in general). On the positive side it doesn't have a bunch of unqualified individuals throwing theory spaghetti at the wall to see what sticks.

emDrive = Suffers, yet again, from the same things as above. The thrust is too small, no two experimental builds are the same, and no replication is being done. Furthermore, the originator (Shawyer) refuses to fully describe his "thruster" to anyone, so all builds to-date are based on speculation. This one is plagued by theory spaghetti.

Bottom line is that all these ideas are firmly stuck in a place where significant funding is not warranted. If and when any of them shows significant measurement based on a well described experiment which can be consistently replicated, that will change. Until that time, these are collectively what I would describe as "meh" scientific claims.

[ladajo]

I think there is some replication of LENR, but it is debatable for noise level, and methodologies.
I saw something recently that was essentially a Lit. Review of LENR work, and more or less focused on reputable researchers.

I will try to find it again.

[Diogenes]

EM drive. No real theory,

It has a real theory now. In short, that photons have quantized inertia, and the differing end plated sizes exploit this to prevent otherwise equivalent momentum photon bounces from have the equivalent effect.

Theory was pubbed last week.

Yes, I saw that. Unfortunately it requires some assumptions that haven't yet been established, but still, very interesting.


It reminds me of what Reagan said about Economists and Capitalism. (And I paraphrase.)


Capitalism works so well in practice, that Economists are now trying to figure out if it works in theory.

[Diogenes]

EM drive. No real theory, but plenty of experiments done, of varying quality. Less likely than others to work out positive, but with a few national labs reporting positive results, it'll be a while before getting something solid to go farther on.

I wish to remind everyone of how EM drive supposedly came to be. I say "supposedly" because we have Shawyer's word that this is how it happened. I am personally willing to give what he says consideration because it just seems strange that he would make this stuff up at that point in his career.

If I remember correctly, he claims he got the idea from the problems he was having with station-keeping some satellites under his maintenance. He said that he always had to apply thrust in the same direction relative to the satellite, and it was always to offset the direction the transmitters were aimed at.


He began to wonder if somehow the transmitters were giving him some sort of constant thrust, and the more he looked at the problem, the more it seemed to him as if they were. It wasn't much, but it appeared to be constant.


If his claims about these satellite station keeping problems are accurate, the thing may have already been established by experiment with real world conditions. On the other hand, if there was anything to this, you would think other satellite companies would have noticed it by now too.



I think the acid test is to launch a cube sat, and see what happens when it's EM-Drive is turned on. If it moves, then we can consider the device proven, and if it doesn't, then everyone can quit wasting time with it.

[ScottL]

I think there is some replication of LENR, but it is debatable for noise level, and methodologies.
I saw something recently that was essentially a Lit. Review of LENR work, and more or less focused on reputable researchers.

I will try to find it again.

My problem with these experiments are that no two experiments are alike. Of course I could be wrong, but most of my readings have shown vastly different approaches which means not replication. I'd gladly accept reading anything that states otherwise.

[ScottL]

I think the acid test is to launch a cube sat, and see what happens when it's EM-Drive is turned on. If it moves, then we can consider the device proven, and if it doesn't, then everyone can quit wasting time with it.

Quoted the part I have issue with currently. As far as I know, most cube sats are 3cm x 3cm so you wouldn't have enough space to place the required power supply, amplifier, and frustum you would need to generate (if any of the theories are correct) enough thrust to be detectable. I could be wrong on the size, but that was what I read last. It seems like a waste of money when one, based on claimed theories, should be able to scale the thrust up enough to show within reason.

[kunkmiester]

Some cube sats are bigger, I think they top out around a foot, but I have no clue how much those cost to launch. The hackaday project mentioned in the other thread was to make a smaller one that could fit in one. If Shawyer is right, it shouldn't be too hard to poll the techs in other satellite companies and see what they say about it. The thrust corrections and radio power levels should be telling, since you would have consistent trends if he's right.

As mentioned, we have three things on here that have some problem which makes it interesting enough to actually discuss as science, but isn't proven. There is enough noise about them that you can't just throw them out completely yet, but most of us are "wait and see." To expand:

Until a consistent set of experiments is done, LENR is just "weird." As mentioned, far too much inconsistency between testers, so no apples-to-apples comparison can be made.

Mach effect as I understand has a decent theory, though not mainstream. It doesn't violate physics as described, and Woodward and a few others have been working hard to set up solid experiments, but there are very few replications worth looking at.

EM drive just recently got a theory, but I've heard doubts about it. Several national labs have said there's something there, but it's not out of the woods yet. Not sure what to think of it right now.

I was curious if anyone else knew of anything else on this level. Past magnetic generators, but not quite theory of relativity sound.

[JoeP]

I'd like to add Dark Matter to the list. No doubt many will object since the effects of what we call Dark Matter are observed to hold galaxies together. But the absence of any direct analysis of this stuff and the lack of theory as to what it is makes it weird, not proven to my mind.

[williatw]

I'd like to add Dark Matter to the list. No doubt many will object since the effects of what we call Dark Matter are observed to hold galaxies together. But the absence of any direct analysis of this stuff and the lack of theory as to what it is makes it weird, not proven to my mind.

Or the even more mysterious Dark Energy; you know the stuff that allegedly makes up about 70% of the Universe and explains why the Universes' expansion is not only not slowing down because of gravitational breaking, but is actually accelerating. Or String Theory; the supposedly mathematically beautiful "theory" that is sadly lacking in experimental proof.

[KitemanSA]

Or the even more mysterious Dark Energy; you know the stuff that allegedly makes up about 70% of the Universe and explains why the Universes' expansion is not only not slowing down because of gravitational breaking, but is actually accelerating.

How large a discrepancy between the positive and negative charge balance would be needed to explain that expansion?

I've always kind of pictured our universe to be the 3 dimensional surface of a 4D bubble in the cosmic soup. The bubble oscillates, growing and contracting but is also rising thru a pressure gradient. As a result, the soup pressure is diminishing as we rise through it and the radius of the bubble is oscillating around a growing average. The point being, at some time, the bubble will reach the surface and pop. Whooo boy, the end of the universe is near! {rolls eyes}