*UPDATE* Another Perpetual Motion Machine? MIT Professor Stumped....

Analog

Lifer
Jan 7, 2002
12,755
3
0
UPDATE:
Earlier this month the Toronto Star published a story on Ottawa-area inventor Thane Heins, who has figured out a way to tap the mysterious energy in a magnetic field to create a more efficient electric motor ? and in his view, possibly much more.

The story was the most read and emailed story on the Toronto Star website for most of the following week, and ranked as one of the most popular stories of the past year.

Links on top-rated blogs, such as Gizmodo.com and Wired.com, and discussion sites, such as Slashdot. org, drew international attention to Heins' invention and the phenomenon behind it.

Videos of Heins demonstrating his technology were promptly posted on YouTube and have been viewed more than 275,000 times in less than three weeks.

On technology and science blogs around the world the discussion continues, and many are attempting to replicate Heins' demonstration.

Never, in seven years as a reporter at the Star, have so many emails flooded my inbox in response to a story. It was a mixed batch of praise, healthy skepticism and unrestrained criticism (see "Reader" page B2).

Simply put, what Heins has done is figure out a way to redirect a magnetic field that, according to the law of conservation, is supposed to slow down an electric motor.

By redirecting the field to the heart of the motor, he causes the motor to dramatically accelerate without any increase of external power. In fact, power input decreases.

In one setup, where the motor is coupled to a generator, Heins appears to have created a positive feedback loop that makes the motor accelerate faster as more electrical load is added to the generator.

Since the story appeared, Heins has welcomed many people to observe demonstrations of his invention at the University of Ottawa. So far, most have walked away impressed or, at the very least, unable to explain the phenomenon.

Offers of investment and partnerships are cautiously trickling in. But Heins himself is being prudent. The CBC, CTV and Discovery Channel are onto the story.

Last week, Dr. Riadh Habash, the University of Ottawa professor working with Heins, was invited by NASA-Goddard Space Flight Center in Maryland to do a demonstration.

NASA scientist Erik Clark, when contacted by the Star, was understandably cagey. "I am not qualified to speak on the stance, real or imagined, of either NASA or GSFC NASA on this topic," he wrote by email.

Interesting nonetheless ? and while Habash is unable to go, Heins hopes to go in his place. It's a visit, if it happens, to follow up on. As for MIT professor Markus Zahn, who in the original story was quoted as seeing an "unusual phenomena" that he couldn't explain?

Bombarded with email and phone calls, he wasn't immediately available after the demonstration on Jan. 28. The Star did eventually get him on the phone and, as expected, he was upset at being mentioned in an article that hinted at perpetual motion.

"It's just not true," he said. "We had discussed the fact that if he (Heins) called it perpetual motion that I wouldn't want anything to do with it."

Asked what it was then, he mentioned the "hysteresis" theory ? and how it increases motor efficiency ? but he couldn't say for sure. "It's not my obligation to try to explain it to everybody else ... He might have something that's useful."

In a tersely worded letter to Heins, he concluded: "Any talk of perpetual motion, over unity efficiency, etc. discredits you, now me, and your ideas.

"I would not want to go to NASA or anywhere else to help promote your invention until basic testing and measurements are done so that the cause of the shaft speed up due to a permanent magnet is understood and that the foolishness is stopped of hinting that your motor violates fundamental laws of physics."


The letter ends with five words. "Best of luck to you."
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/306532

http://www.canada.com/ottawaci...4d3c-8763-d96564794cae


Thane Heins Generator (Video) Part 1: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=00RZNW1Z

Thane Heins Generator (Video) Part 2: http://www.megaupload.com/?d=2C3V1JXI
--------------------------------------
Thane Heins is nervous and hopeful. It's Jan. 24, a Thursday afternoon, and in four days the Ottawa-area native will travel to Boston where he'll demonstrate an invention that appears ? though he doesn't dare say it ? to operate as a perpetual motion machine.

The audience, esteemed Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Markus Zahn, could either deflate Heins' heretical claims or add momentum to a 20-year obsession that has broken up his marriage and lost him custody of his two young daughters.

Zahn is a leading expert on electromagnetic and electronic systems. In a rare move for any reputable academic, he has agreed to give Heins' creation an open-minded look rather than greet it with outright dismissal.

It's a pivotal moment. The invention, at its very least, could moderately improve the efficiency of induction motors, used in everything from electric cars to ceiling fans. At best it means a way of tapping the mysterious powers of electromagnetic fields to produce more work out of less effort, seemingly creating electricity from nothing.

Such an unbelievable invention would challenge the laws of physics, a no-no in the rigid world of serious science. Imagine a battery system in an all-electric car that can be recharged almost exclusively by braking and accelerating, or what Heins calls "regenerative acceleration."

No charging from the grid. No assistance from gasoline. No cost of fuelling up. No way, say the skeptics.

"It sounds too good to be true," concedes Heins, who formed a company in 2005 called Potential Difference Inc. to develop and market his invention. "We get dismissed pretty quickly sometimes."

It's for this reason the 46-year-old inventor has learned to walk on thin ice when dealing with academics and engineers, who he must win over to be taken seriously. Credibility, after all, can't be invented. It must be earned. "I have to be humble. If you say the wrong thing at the wrong time, you can lose support."

The creation in question is a new kind of generator called the Perepiteia (read related story "Holy crap, this is really scary"), which in Greek theatre means an action that has the opposite effect of what its doer intended. Heins torques up the definition to mean "a sudden reversal of fortune that's a windfall for humanity."

Deep down, Heins has high hopes. But he also realizes that merely using those controversial words ? "perpetual motion" ? usually brands a person as batty. In 2006, an Irish company called Steorn placed an advertisement in The Economist calling on all the world's scientists to validate its magnet-based "free energy" technology.

Steorn was met with intense skepticism and accused of being a scam or hoax. Seventeen months later the company has failed, despite worldwide attention, to prove anything under scrutiny. Well-educated people, from Leonardo da Vinci to Harvard-trained engineer Bruce De Palma (older brother of film director Brian De Palma), have made similar claims of perpetual motion only to be slammed down by the mainstream scientific community.

Heins has an even greater uphill battle. He isn't an engineer. He doesn't have a graduate degrees in physics. He never even finished his electronics program at Heritage College in Gatineau, Quebec. "I have mild dyslexia and don't do well in math, so I didn't do very well in school," he says.

What he does have is a chef's diploma, and spent time as chef at the Canadian Museum of Civilization before launching his own restaurant in Renfrew called the Old Town Hall Tea Room. He has also had political ambitions. In 1999 he ran unsuccessfully as a candidate for the Green Party of Ontario, deciding a year later to run as an independent in the federal election.

Today, Heins is focused on showing his invention to anybody willing to see it, in hopes that somebody smarter than him will give it credibility. His long-time friend, Kim Cunningham, manager of communications and government relations at the Ottawa Centre for Research and Innovation (OCRI) is working part-time with Potential Difference to help get the message out.

Together, they have demonstrated the Perepiteia to a number of labs and universities across North America, including the University of Virginia, Michigan State University, the University of Toronto and Queens University.

"It's generally always the same reaction," says Heins. "There's a bit of a scramble on the part of the observer to put what they're seeing into some sort of context with what they know. They can't explain it. They don't know what it is."

He'd be happy if somebody did, even if the news was bad. His wife has kicked him out. He doesn't earn an income. He can't pay child support. The certainty would be welcome. "I've tried to quit many times, and thought if I could just be a normal guy I would have a normal life ... But I had this idea and I believe it works."

Others want to believe ? or at least help out. Cunningham, whose brother is general manager at Angus Glen Golf Club, introduced Heins to the club's president, Kevin Thistle. For two years Thistle has acted as angel investor, providing start-up capital needed to incorporate Potential Difference, file patents and continue research.

Cunningham's boss, OCRI president Jeffrey Dale, helped open doors at the University of Ottawa and make introductions to its dean of engineering. As a result, Heins teamed up last fall with Riadh Habash, a professor at the university's school of information technology and engineering.

"Dr. Habash has essentially rolled out the red carpet," says Heins, explaining that he now has access to a university lab and all the equipment he needs to test and simulate his generator.

In an interview with the Toronto Star, Habash was cautious but matter-of-fact with what he's seen so far. "It accelerates, but when it comes to an explanation, there is no backing theory for it. That's why we're consulting MIT. But at this time we can't support any claim."

In the meantime, Heins has been on a letter-writing campaign to raise money for his mission. He's written former U.S. vice-president Al Gore, Virgin Group founder and billionaire Richard Branson and John Doerr at venture capital powerhouse Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers. He's also tried to contact entrepreneur Elon Musk, chairman of electric car upstart Tesla Motors, and the "ReCharge IT" project run by Google's philanthropic arm.

So far no bites, though there have been nibbles. Heins has had discussions with a well-known investor in Oregon, known to many as the "godfather of start-ups," who is apparently flirting with the idea of investing in Potential Difference. "We got the impression ... he's not necessarily interested in making a tonne of money, he just wants to see us succeed."

Just before the big day at MIT, the Star spoke with professor Markus Zahn about what he expected to observe.

"It's hard for me to give an opinion," said Zahn, who admitted he was excited to see the demonstration. "I don't believe it will violate the laws of physics. You're not going to get more energy out than you put in."

He said it's easy for people to set up their tests wrong and misinterpret what they see. "You've got to look closely."

It's now Jan. 28 ? D Day. Heins has modified his test so the effects observed are difficult to deny. He holds a permanent magnet a few centimetres away from the driveshaft of an electric motor, and the magnetic field it creates causes the motor to accelerate. It went well.

Contacted by phone a few hours after the test, Zahn is genuinely stumped ? and surprised. He said the magnet shouldn't cause acceleration. "It's an unusual phenomena I wouldn't have predicted in advance. But I saw it. It's real. Now I'm just trying to figure it out."

There's no talk of perpetual motion. No whisper of broken scientific laws or free energy. Zahn would never go there ? at least not yet. But he does see the potential for making electric motors more efficient, and this itself is no small feat.

"To my mind this is unexpected and new, and it's worth exploring all the possible advantages once you're convinced it's a real effect," he added. "There are an infinite number of induction machines in people's homes and everywhere around the world. If you could make them more efficient, cumulatively, it could make a big difference."

Driving home ? he can't afford to fly ? Heins is exhausted but encouraged. He says Zahn will, and must, evaluate what he saw on his own terms and time. What's preventing the engineer from grasping it right away, he says, is his education, his scientific training.

Step by step, Heins is making progress, but where it will all lead remains uncertain.
http://www.thestar.com/Business/article/300042
---------

It all began back in 1985, when Thane Heins, having studied electronics at Heritage College in Gatineau, Quebec, started thinking about how magnets could be used to improve power generators.



But it wasn't until after the 9/11 attacks that he started seriously experimenting in his basement, motivated by the desire to reduce our dependence on oil and the countries that back terrorism.

Heins tinkered away, making what seemed like good progress, until one day in early 2006 he stumbled on to something strange. As part of a test, he had connected the driveshaft of an electric motor to a steel rotor with small round magnets lining its outer edges. The idea was that as the rotor spun, the magnets would pass by a wire coil placed just in front of them to generate electrical energy ? in other words, it would operate like a simple generator.

The voltage was there, but to get current he had to attach an electrical load to the coil ? like a light bulb ? or simply overload it, which would cause it to slow down and eventually stop. Heins did the latter, but instead of stopping, the rotor started to rapidly accelerate.

"The magnets started flying off and hitting the wall, and I had to duck for cover," says Heins, surprised because he was using a weak motor. "It was like, holy crap, this is really scary."

By overloading the generator, the current should have caused the coil to build up a large electromagnetic field. This field typically creates an effect called "Back EMF," described as Lenz's law in physics, which would act to repel the approaching magnets on the rotor and slow down the motor until it stopped. Some call it the law of diminishing returns, or a law of conservation.

"Lenz's law is essentially magnetic friction, which is a form of resistance not unlike the wind resistance your car experiences when driving down the highway," explains Heins. More friction means more power is necessary to maintain a constant speed.

Instead, the opposite happened. Somehow the magnetic friction had turned into a magnetic boost. Back to the car analogy, it's like the wind moving from the front to the back of the vehicle.

Days later, Heins realized what had happened: The steel rotor and driveshaft had conducted the magnetic resistance away from the coil and back into the heart of the electric motor. Since such motors work on the principle of converting electrical energy into motion by creating rotating magnetic fields, he figured the Back EMF was boosting those fields, causing acceleration.

But how could this be? It would create a positive feedback loop. As the motor accelerated faster it would create a larger electromagnetic field on the generator coil, causing the motor to go faster, and so on and so on. Heins confirmed his theory by replacing part of the driveshaft with plastic pipe that wouldn't conduct the magnetic field. There was no acceleration.

"What I can say with full confidence is that our system violates the law of conservation of energy," he says.

"Now, is that perpetual motion? Will it end up being that?"
http://www.thestar.com/Article/300041
 

jagec

Lifer
Apr 30, 2004
24,442
6
81
I'd have to see it from a more reputable source to believe it. It would be cool if this effect does indeed improve the efficiency of electrical motors, but to claim that it violates the law of conservation of energy is a bit much.
 

Jeff7

Lifer
Jan 4, 2001
41,599
19
81
Originally posted by: jagec
I'd have to see it from a more reputable source to believe it. It would be cool if this effect does indeed improve the efficiency of electrical motors, but to claim that it violates the law of conservation of energy is a bit much.
Especially since the design is so simple, this would have been done already, by engineers in industry, and it would be in use all over the place by now.
And, he says it violates the law of conservation of energy. You can't do that, plain and simple, Convert, yes, either between energy types, or between matter and energy, but it won't just come from nothing.

Thus it would be appropriate to officially declare it "shens."
 

PottedMeat

Lifer
Apr 17, 2002
12,365
475
126
i don't understand his explanation.

there can't be any ( or maybe negligible ) magnetic coupling between the shaft of the motor and the generator. how does that 'assist' the induction motor? assuming the induced field in the generator followed through the shaft through the ferrous material to the induction motor, how does the field parallel to the windings help?

 

GagHalfrunt

Lifer
Apr 19, 2001
25,297
2,000
126
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: jagec
I'd have to see it from a more reputable source to believe it. It would be cool if this effect does indeed improve the efficiency of electrical motors, but to claim that it violates the law of conservation of energy is a bit much.
Especially since the design is so simple, this would have been done already, by engineers in industry, and it would be in use all over the place by now.
And, he says it violates the law of conservation of energy. You can't do that, plain and simple, Convert, yes, either between energy types, or between matter and energy, but it won't just come from nothing.

Thus it would be appropriate to officially declare it "shens."

Mankind will never fly
Mankind will never break the sound barrier
Mankind will never split the atom
Quantum Mechanics are impossible by all previously known laws of physics
yada yada yada


The fact that we don't *think* it's possible doesn't mean it's not possible. It just means that we don't completely understand what we're doing. Laws of science get rewritten all the time when later on we finally figure out that the "laws" were wrong all along.
 

jagec

Lifer
Apr 30, 2004
24,442
6
81
Originally posted by: GagHalfrunt
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: jagec
I'd have to see it from a more reputable source to believe it. It would be cool if this effect does indeed improve the efficiency of electrical motors, but to claim that it violates the law of conservation of energy is a bit much.
Especially since the design is so simple, this would have been done already, by engineers in industry, and it would be in use all over the place by now.
And, he says it violates the law of conservation of energy. You can't do that, plain and simple, Convert, yes, either between energy types, or between matter and energy, but it won't just come from nothing.

Thus it would be appropriate to officially declare it "shens."

Mankind will never fly
Mankind will never break the sound barrier
Mankind will never split the atom
Quantum Mechanics are impossible by all previously known laws of physics
yada yada yada


The fact that we don't *think* it's possible doesn't mean it's not possible. It just means that we don't completely understand what we're doing. Laws of science get rewritten all the time when later on we finally figure out that the "laws" were wrong all along.

That's not true. Newtonian mechanics weren't proven "wrong" by relativity, and relativity wasn't proven "wrong" by quantum mechanics--these theories just showed that our previous understanding broke down in special cases. When things aren't moving near the speed of light, and aren't being modeled at the level of the atom, classical physics still works perfectly.

As such, a device such as the one described in the article might well take advantage of some phenomenon that we don't fully understand yet, but it does NOT create energy out of thin air with no repercussions. Maybe the magnets are slowly getting demagnetized, maybe the resistivity of the electric motor goes down and it starts drawing more current to produce the acceleration, who knows...but every single branch of science, and every kind of physics, agrees that energy isn't "free". Now it could well be that someone invents a device that produces "free" energy for all practical purposes--say it siphons it off of some distant sun through a bizarre coupling phenomenon--but the energy itself isn't created, merely channeled.
 

91TTZ

Lifer
Jan 31, 2005
14,374
1
0
Originally posted by: GagHalfrunt
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: jagec
I'd have to see it from a more reputable source to believe it. It would be cool if this effect does indeed improve the efficiency of electrical motors, but to claim that it violates the law of conservation of energy is a bit much.
Especially since the design is so simple, this would have been done already, by engineers in industry, and it would be in use all over the place by now.
And, he says it violates the law of conservation of energy. You can't do that, plain and simple, Convert, yes, either between energy types, or between matter and energy, but it won't just come from nothing.

Thus it would be appropriate to officially declare it "shens."

Mankind will never fly
Mankind will never break the sound barrier
Mankind will never split the atom
Quantum Mechanics are impossible by all previously known laws of physics
yada yada yada


The fact that we don't *think* it's possible doesn't mean it's not possible. It just means that we don't completely understand what we're doing. Laws of science get rewritten all the time when later on we finally figure out that the "laws" were wrong all along.

None of those things were claimed by credible scientists. They knew those things were possible, that's why they developed them.

Surely nobody would have claimed that mankind could never fly when they see birds and insects flying around all the time.
 

Minjin

Platinum Member
Jan 18, 2003
2,208
1
81
If you can't extracting energy from the system, its not a perpetual motion machine. There's a reason why all these crackpots use flywheels and magnets. Because those are the best ways to store energy temporarily. It doesn't take much of a power source to keep them going for a very long period of time. But again, if you're not extracting energy from the system, its all meaningless.
 

ja1484

Platinum Member
Dec 31, 2007
2,438
2
0
Originally posted by: jagec
Now it could well be that someone invents a device that produces "free" energy for all practical purposes--say it siphons it off of some distant sun through a bizarre coupling phenomenon--but the energy itself isn't created, merely channeled.


Frankly, if it turns out to be something like that, I'm OK with it.


Originally posted by: Minjin
If you can't extracting energy from the system, its not a perpetual motion machine. There's a reason why all these crackpots use flywheels and magnets. Because those are the best ways to store energy temporarily. It doesn't take much of a power source to keep them going for a very long period of time. But again, if you're not extracting energy from the system, its all meaningless.



<---- extremely not a physicist but...

His claim is that his Doohickey accelerates under load. Wouldn't a system under load require additional energy to maintain a constant level of operation or increase it? In other words, isn't operating/accelerating in the presence of a load with no real known input of energy considered extracting energy from the system?
 

Jeff7

Lifer
Jan 4, 2001
41,599
19
81
Originally posted by: ja1484
Originally posted by: jagec
Now it could well be that someone invents a device that produces "free" energy for all practical purposes--say it siphons it off of some distant sun through a bizarre coupling phenomenon--but the energy itself isn't created, merely channeled.


Frankly, if it turns out to be something like that, I'm OK with it.
Well sure, it's fine. But don't go claiming, "I violated the laws of the universe in my basement." ;)


Originally posted by: GagHalfrunt
Mankind will never fly
Mankind will never break the sound barrier
Mankind will never split the atom
Quantum Mechanics are impossible by all previously known laws of physics
yada yada yada


The fact that we don't *think* it's possible doesn't mean it's not possible. It just means that we don't completely understand what we're doing. Laws of science get rewritten all the time when later on we finally figure out that the "laws" were wrong all along.
Law of conservation of energy sure does hold up awfully well, time after time again.;)
I don't see law of conservation of energy as ever being broken. Maybe some day we'll get energy from "nothing" - but it might just be some form of energy pent up in spacetime itself. Again - law of conservation holds, we'd just be converting it from one form to another.
Nuclear reactions show mass -> energy conversion. After energy is released, the mass of the products is slightly less than that of the reactants. Where did that mass disappear to? It was converted into energy. Energy was not created, it was just in a different form, tightly bound a form we see as matter.

Laws generally don't get rewritten. Theories are what are more likely to face revisions.
 

ja1484

Platinum Member
Dec 31, 2007
2,438
2
0
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: ja1484
Originally posted by: jagec
Now it could well be that someone invents a device that produces "free" energy for all practical purposes--say it siphons it off of some distant sun through a bizarre coupling phenomenon--but the energy itself isn't created, merely channeled.


Frankly, if it turns out to be something like that, I'm OK with it.
Well sure, it's fine. But don't go claiming, "I violated the laws of the universe in my basement." ;)

Frankly (again), if that turns out to be the case, I don't think he's going to give half a shit about being technically correct about "how it works", because he just solved all the world's energy problems, a great majority of its political problems, gave the Third World a license to develop to Western standards within a couple decades, and is soon to be the richest person in the world and a nobel prize winner.

You'll pardon me if I don't take the same interest in exactly what's being converted from where as you do. I doubt he would either.
 

TruePaige

Diamond Member
Oct 22, 2006
9,878
2
0
Any of you who believe he made a Perpetual Motion Machine may be interested in some Swamp Land I have in Florida...
 

KingGheedora

Diamond Member
Jun 24, 2006
3,248
1
81
"Excuse me, Heins, but did you forget to put a minus sign right there?"
"What? Where? Shit, yeah. Oh shit. Wait... uhhhh.... www.... what the-- shit . Fucking shit. GOD. I'm sorry I wasted all your fucking time. FUCK!"
 

NanoStuff

Banned
Mar 23, 2006
2,981
1
0
Originally posted by: her209
Originally posted by: Tizyler
Originally posted by: her209
Is this it?

http://ie.youtube.com/watch?v=ogLeKTlLy5E
Yeah, he has a bunch of vid's posted.

Interesting to read the comments.
He keeps talking about "back EMF". What the hell is "back EMF"?

1. Electromagnetic Field
2. Electromotive Force
3. Electromotive Feedback

He's probably referring to the latter. This is something that's used in active studio monitors to compensate for transducer resonance. Extra movement of the voice coil across the magnet can be detected and compensated (phase shifted) because it changes the voltage that's expected from the source signal.

How this is supposed to create energy I do not know, I didn't read the article and I suspect I won't. This 'back EMF' does generate some energy, but more energy is required in the first place in order to get some of it returned in such a manner.
 

prism

Senior member
Oct 23, 2004
995
0
0
"The audience, esteemed Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Markus Zahn, could either deflate Heins' heretical claims or add momentum to a 20-year obsession that has broken up his marriage and lost him custody of his two young daughters."

/fail

...although I bet his ex-wife will be upset if he becomes a blahzillionaire...
 

OS

Lifer
Oct 11, 1999
15,581
1
76
i watched some of the videos but it's impossible to say what's happening.

if he was for real, he could build a car size one, plug it into the grid and have the electric company pay him.
 

MmmSkyscraper

Diamond Member
Jul 6, 2004
9,475
1
76
Originally posted by: KingGheedora
"Excuse me, Heins, but did you forget to put a minus sign right there?"
"What? Where? Shit, yeah. Oh shit. Wait... uhhhh.... www.... what the-- shit . Fucking shit. GOD. I'm sorry I wasted all your fucking time. FUCK!"

:laugh:
 

OS

Lifer
Oct 11, 1999
15,581
1
76
Originally posted by: James3shin
If it can stump a MIT Professor, I'm down with it.

enron stumped some big name professors too, atleast for a while
 

destrekor

Lifer
Nov 18, 2005
28,799
359
126
Originally posted by: jagec
Originally posted by: GagHalfrunt
Originally posted by: Jeff7
Originally posted by: jagec
I'd have to see it from a more reputable source to believe it. It would be cool if this effect does indeed improve the efficiency of electrical motors, but to claim that it violates the law of conservation of energy is a bit much.
Especially since the design is so simple, this would have been done already, by engineers in industry, and it would be in use all over the place by now.
And, he says it violates the law of conservation of energy. You can't do that, plain and simple, Convert, yes, either between energy types, or between matter and energy, but it won't just come from nothing.

Thus it would be appropriate to officially declare it "shens."

Mankind will never fly
Mankind will never break the sound barrier
Mankind will never split the atom
Quantum Mechanics are impossible by all previously known laws of physics
yada yada yada


The fact that we don't *think* it's possible doesn't mean it's not possible. It just means that we don't completely understand what we're doing. Laws of science get rewritten all the time when later on we finally figure out that the "laws" were wrong all along.

That's not true. Newtonian mechanics weren't proven "wrong" by relativity, and relativity wasn't proven "wrong" by quantum mechanics--these theories just showed that our previous understanding broke down in special cases. When things aren't moving near the speed of light, and aren't being modeled at the level of the atom, classical physics still works perfectly.

As such, a device such as the one described in the article might well take advantage of some phenomenon that we don't fully understand yet, but it does NOT create energy out of thin air with no repercussions. Maybe the magnets are slowly getting demagnetized, maybe the resistivity of the electric motor goes down and it starts drawing more current to produce the acceleration, who knows...but every single branch of science, and every kind of physics, agrees that energy isn't "free". Now it could well be that someone invents a device that produces "free" energy for all practical purposes--say it siphons it off of some distant sun through a bizarre coupling phenomenon--but the energy itself isn't created, merely channeled.

I've always thought magnetic fields will eventually be a great source of energy, just getting over the magnetic friction would be the biggest hurdle. Magnetic fields contain a lot of potential energy, especially that friction generated by them...
but magnets also have the innate ability to repel. So, if we can find a way to overcome apparent friction (needed: a constant energy to propel some magnets), and capture the energy available in the magnetic fields... and if one can somehow capture enough energy then it could power itself and leave a little trickle of extra energy, meaning a large enough scale amped up in speed could produce a good amount of energy that is perceived as free.

free energy though? Well, isn't it safe to say magnetic fields are a great source of potential energy, when imagining magnetic friction and other things (I understand the concepts, but don't know the details in these fields.. I'm only working towards a BA after all :p). I'm not too sure about magnetization and demagnetization.. but can't magnets be re-magnetized? If not... wouldn't this be similar to nuclear then, if the first statement of this paragraph holds true? Lots of potential energy waiting to be captured... but depletes over time. But aren't magnets easy to produce? I'm sure a little payment into such energy creation won't be so bad. Magnets aren't terribly expensive, are they? And if they can help us create energy, like with nuclear materials... than that ain't so bad.

And worst thing to come of this discovery could very well be a way to create a more efficient and viable all-electric car motor.

Here's to hoping this is true. Stumping an MIT professor with such a device just makes it all the better. :) And yes, due to his personal history and struggles.. I'm less likely to call shens on this whole ordeal.