In the spirit of many great philathropists, I hereby offer my own endowment: I will buy lunch for anyone who can reliably demonstrate a free energy device. However, I'm not real worried about having to pay out, since, as Heinlein observed, "There ain't no such thing as a free lunch", and free energy follows right behind.
Perhaps Heinlein's maxim could be extended as: There ain't no such thing as a free lunch, and anyone who tells you different is selling something. In the case of the moon, that something is expensive drinks, in the case of free energy, it's an "Investment Opportunity".
The inspiration for his entry comes from a friend sending me the Nullgrav website. This isn't anything new really, you'll find similar sites all over the web, promising you infinite energy and perpetual motion and telling you how stupid the science establishment is for not believing them. It is slightly more interesting in that it is located in L'anse, MI (a tiny town in the Upper Penninsula that I know quite well), but mostly it's the same as the rest. When you've gotten used to seeing these sites (and the glossy magazines and pamphlets that came before the web) you start to get jaded, and forget how easily people can be taken in. So here's the quick report: It's a crock, and will always be a crock. You want some proof? Here's the easy answer... They've been saying this crap for over 20 years now, but we all still have to put gas in the car. The 20 year figure only refers to "gyroscopic free energy devices", other perpetual motion schemes have been going for centuries.
Most of the site seems to be based on the work of this knucklehead, who, like all science knuckleheads takes Nikola Tesla as his inspiration. This isn't a knock on Tesla, but he does seem to attract crackpots as followers.
Knucklehead A (Bruce DePalma) had a conventional physics education at MIT. Of course, if you look closely at the resume he provides, it is fishy. He clearly states that he got his undergraduate degree in physics from MIT, and that he went on to graduate study in engineering and physics, but specifically avoids saying that he ever graduated. Some of the neat revelations you can get by delving into the site are his experience of realizing all at once that all the conventional laws of physics are wrong (this happened the first time he smoked pot), and his responding to a critic of his theories by saying that the natural disasters in the world represent God's anger at the skeptics.
His profile is not especially rare in this field. I first got into this when I was about 12, with a Discover Magazine article on Joe Newman. He made a pretty big scene in the mid-eighties talking about his free energy machine. Like most of these inventors, he refused to let anyone test it, and it was always "almost ready". He's still telling the same story now, almost 20 years later.
I'm a skeptic by nature, but I stay as open-minded as possible. But it's important to recognize the signs of pseudoscience. Many have done a better job than I can of describing those methods, but I'll offer a quick list.
1) If it looks too good to be true, it probably is.
2) If the science establishment/government/oil companies are fighting to suppress the truth, and that's why they can't show you it working, it's BS.
3) If no one can offer any justification for how it works except other websites and Free Energy journals, then there isn't any good justification.
4) If the new invention will revolutionize the world and change modern science, beware.
One of the most interesting new things I found in looking at this site is the focus on the X-Prize. Some of these people are just delusional, they want to believe that they can create a machine to revolutionize the world, and all the evidence in the world won't convince them otherwise. But the majority are in it to make easy cash on big promises. So using a high-profile science prize as your bait is pretty clever. If you haven't heard about the X-Prize, check it out. That is real new science, and it kicks ass. The idea is to offer a prize ($10M) for the first civilian (privately funded) space travel. There are rigid limits to what has to be accomplished, but it can be done in any way the inventors want. There are some really cool designs, using really interesting technology. If we are ever to achieve real space travel, it will come from private enterprise, not bureaucratic behemoths like NASA.
Related Links of Interest:
One of my favorite X-Prize designs
Skeptic Site on Dennis Lee and another, tied for the most famous of the free energy crowd with Joe Newman.
I also intend to do another more researched piece on Tesla.
It's funny you should write about free energy today. I was watching Tech TV today. I hardly ever watch Tech TV, but there wasn't anything else to watch. Anyway, on the tv show "Invent This" there was this guy who claimed to have made a Free-Energy Fuel Cell. http://www.techtv.com/inventthis/inventors/story/0,24330,3614187,00.html
He looks like a wacko, but it was neat to watch. He makes these little batteries by crushing up rocks with a specific crystal structure, and then charges them. They're supposed to hold a charge forever. The thing that he made did power one of those little flashlight light bulbs. You'd have to see that show for a better explanation. I was only half listening because I was knitting at the time.
Do you like it when people post comments?
Yeah, that is actually one of the biggest problems fighting free energy, is its regularly given time in otherwise respectable forums like "Discover" and "TechTV". I'm not in favor of silencing different opinions, but presenting fraud as fact is irresponsible, especially from a science or technology news source.
Also:
I love it when people post comments.
What??!
No free energy. GAAAAAHHHH. My hopes. My dreams. My free lunch....
Wait a sec. I don't believe in that crap. You know, it might be more believable if they told me that this free energy flows in between us and created by small cellular entities that exist in all living things to one degree or another. Someday one will be born that has a high concentration and all will be righted. Of course to be followed by crappy dialogue. That might just work.
Yeah, actually that's pretty close to what they do say, althought they fall back on dark energy (the dark side?) These devices are fueled by "zero-point energy" which is the energy that exists in the fabric of space, but is undetectable and unmeasurable. So nobody knows what it is, or how to measure it or find it, but if you build a machine with lots of magnets and glue you can tap into it.
I think that new ideas are cool, no matter where they come from. Although the process of Science is different than religion, I feel that the two are often confused by Scientists. Pseudoscience is an interesting topic.
Sometimes things just work. Take this example: Native Americans using certain herbs and plants to help people. They didn't need modern Science to tell them which chemical structures in the plants allowed them to be effective. One might argue that they did use a form of "trial and error" science to find out how the plants worked in the first place, but that is another discussion.
However, I don't plan on throwing any money at these people anytime soon. Perhaps if they can produce "free energy," then they can do it with no budget. :)
Also, it's too bad Big George had to resort to mitochondria as an explanation for the Force. Once again, another disucssion.
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