Whoa! New type of space drive discovered

[disappoint]

What was wrong with his statement? "Significant" doesn't mean "majority." A constantly-accelerating drive would be able to go pretty damn fast. I think there'd have to be a really long-lasting power supply though.

I don't know what everybody is so excited about. So far the experiment shows no more thrust than the control. The thrust would be tiny if there even is any. Multiplying that thrust by adding more thrusters would increase mass, which would decrease acceleration. It's a non-starter.

 

[Markbnj]

I don't know what everybody is so excited about. So far the experiment shows no more thrust than the control. The thrust would be tiny if there even is any. Multiplying that thrust by adding more thrusters would increase mass, which would decrease acceleration. It's a non-starter.

Did you read the Wired paper? The "control" was misunderstood. Nobody is saying it's real yet, and nobody understands the physics that would explain it, but what the piece made clear is that a) the original stories were written on an abstract that left a lot out; and b) the NASA guys weren't just flinging shit around.

Also, that was a dick reply, imo.

 

[tynopik]

well, that didn't last long

https://***********/starts-with-a-bang/how-to-fool-the-world-with-bad-science-7a9318dd1ae6

(asterisks are medium dot com)

there was a “true” version and a “null” version of the EmDrive that were both tested at this facility, with the anticipation that the true version would produce this thrust and that the null version wouldn’t. But both versions produced the same thrust.

Did NASA Validate an “Impossible” Space Drive? In a Word, No.

 

[Paratus]

Are you joking or smoking? What do you do at NASA? Sweep the floors?

Since I haven't emphasized it enough:

IF IT CONTINUES TO CHECK OUT an electrically powered thruster that doesn't require propellant will provide thrust as long as it has power.

Nuclear reactors can provide power for YEARS without refueling. If I remember correctly an aircraft carrier can run for 7 years before refueling.

So let's assume the less conservative 4N/kW with a 2MW nuclear reactor and a 90metric ton vehicle from their paper accelerating for 7 years straight, ignoring gravity and relativity to get a ballpark speed.

F=MA

8000N/90MT = .088m/s^2

v=AT
V=.088m/s^2 * 7 years

V= 19.6 million m/s or 0.065454 speed of light in vacuum


So 6.5% the speed of light.

If you accelerated the entire way ~30years.

Do you now understand the excitement behind this drive? We could get anywhere in the solar system in less than a year.

I'm not saying it works yet. There is still not a good theory for what's happening, and the efficiency still needs to come way up. I'd personally save the Star Trek cosplay until it's successfully tested on orbit, but the potential here is huge.

 

[Paratus]

well, that didn't last long

https://***********/starts-with-a-bang/how-to-fool-the-world-with-bad-science-7a9318dd1ae6

(asterisks are medium dot com)





Did NASA Validate an “Impossible” Space Drive? In a Word, No.

Read the paper or the Wired link:

2. Thrust was also measured from the 'Null Drive', doesn't that mean the experiment failed?

Lots of commenters jumped on this, assuming incorrectly that this was a control test and that thrust was measured when there was no drive.

In fact, the 'Null Drive' was a modified version of the Cannae Drive, a flying-saucer-shaped device with slots engraved in one face only. The underlying theory is that the slots create a force imbalance in resonating microwaves; the 'Null Drive' was unslotted, but still produced thrust when filled with microwaves. This may challenge the theory -- it is probably no coincidence that Cannae inventor Guido Fetta is patenting a new version which works differently -- but not the results.

The true 'null test' was when a load was used with no resonant cavity, and as expected this produced no thrust:

"Finally, a 50 ohm RF resistive load was used in place of the test article to verify no significant systemic effects that would cause apparent or real torsion pendulum displacements. The RF load was energised twice at an amplifier output power of approximately 28 watts and no significant pendulum arm displacements were observed."

Equally significantly, reversing the orientation of the drive reversed the thrust.

 

[Fritzo]

well, that didn't last long

https://***********/starts-with-a-bang/how-to-fool-the-world-with-bad-science-7a9318dd1ae6

(asterisks are medium dot com)





Did NASA Validate an “Impossible” Space Drive? In a Word, No.

The original story dumbed down the reporting leading to misinformation. See the new Wired Q&A.

 

[disappoint]

Since I haven't emphasized it enough:

IF IT CONTINUES TO CHECK OUT an electrically powered thruster that doesn't require propellant will provide thrust as long as it has power.

Continues to check out? The problem is that it didn't check out to begin with. Come on, you're smarter than this.

 

[tynopik]

Read the paper or the Wired link:

I read the wired link

that explanation is BS

and did you see their other line?

The Nasa work builds on previous results by Roger Shawyer in Britain and Prof Yang Juan at Northwestern Polytechnical University in Xi'an as well as Guido Fetta's work at Cannae. This is more of a confirmation.

ROFLMAO

serious i want to punch the stupid out of the article writer

All of the people listed are quacks. Getting more quacks together doesn't 'confirm' anything.

 

[SMOGZINN]

All of the people listed are quacks. Getting more quacks together doesn't 'confirm' anything.

I'm very conservative about these sort of things. I believe that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. But, I also accept that if those extraordinary claims provide that extraordinary evidence then we must accept them.

So, Roger Shawyer and Prof Yang Juan might be considered quacks, but that is just because we find their claims to be too extraordinary to be believed. We have been given the first evidence that maybe they are not quacks by a team of physicists in Houston. A Team that is most definitely not quacks. This is evidence, but not quite enough to be considered extraordinary evidence. Now JPL is going to test this, if that test turns out positive then we will have something and it will be time for universities around the globe to start testing this thing. That will finally provide the extraordinary evidence we need.

 

[tynopik]

We have been given the first evidence that maybe they are not quacks by a team of physicists in Houston. A Team that is most definitely not quacks.

i guess you didn't read the discover piece . . .

 

[SMOGZINN]

i guess you didn't read the discover piece . . .

You mean the opinion piece that states that it didn't even bother to read the article in question? The same opinion piece that call into question if Harold White, a scientist with 2 Masters degrees in engineering, and a Ph.D in physics, who works at the Eagleworks Laboratory, in the Johnson Space Center, in Houston, in what most would consider the very heart of NASA, and who's salary is paid by NASA, can really be considered a NASA scientist?

Yes, I read that blog post. I tend to believe NASA over a guy who's only real education is listed as a Bachelors of Arts in History (his Ph.D in journalism is honorary.)

 

[tynopik]

Yes, I read that blog post. I tend to believe NASA over a guy who's only real education is listed as a Bachelors of Arts in History (his Ph.D in journalism is honorary.)

How convenient of you to leave out the whole exchange with Sean Carroll about 'quantum vacuum virtual plasma'

try again

 

[SMOGZINN]

How convenient of you to leave out the whole exchange with Sean Carroll about 'quantum vacuum virtual plasma'

try again

The NASA paper made it quite clear that they have no idea how this thing works, if indeed it does, and that any suggestions they make are flat out guesses, and that this would be a never before theorized process. The NASA scientists are primarily engineers so I won't really blame them for know knowing the details of quantum mechanics as well as an expert in this field.
The question being tested was not HOW does this work, only DOES it.

 

[tynopik]

The NASA paper made it quite clear that they have no idea how this thing works, if indeed it does, and that any suggestions they make are flat out guesses, and that this would be a never before theorized process.

Yet they seem eager to attach a pseudo-science name to it.

The NASA scientists are primarily engineers so I won't really blame them for know knowing the details of quantum mechanics as well as an expert in this field.

If you don't know, then say I DON'T KNOW instead of trying to come up with pseudoscience gobbedlygook

It reeks of poor judgment and attention seeking, which then calls into question this part:

The question being tested was not HOW does this work, only DOES it.

They're acting more like publicity hounds than proper scientists.

- The paper did not undergo peer review
- Their explanation invokes non-existent gibberish but sounds cool
- They make claims that reach too far (We couldn't figure it out, therefore the explanation MUST BE beyond our current understanding of physics. It couldn't possibly be that we missed something.)

It's one thing to say we tested this and that to eliminate these causes, but it's the height of arrogance to make the leap that therefore everything we know is wrong. It reminds me of the Pioneer anomaly where the probe's trajectory couldn't be explained by any known forces. OMG! New physics!

Then they went back and studied it more carefully, and, surprise, surprise, they missed stuff the first time around and no new physics were called for after all.

 

[Markbnj]

They're acting more like publicity hounds than proper scientists.

They published a paper, with an abstract, on an experiment they did. I'm not a scientist so I won't comment on the peer-review aspects, but that hardly makes them publicity hounds. The media picked it up and distorted it into click-bait, which is what they do. The basic division here seems to be between people who absolutely think this is a Pons-Fleischmann deal, and those who think the NASA work added a slight bit of credibility to what is, after all, a very unlikely and astounding development. It will probably not pan out, but it doesn't make you look all insider smart and knowledgeable when you dismiss the NASA engineers as hucksters collaborating in some sort of charade. They're competent guys who tried to do a careful experiment and got an unexpected result. That's all. Or are they to be condemned for even thinking it worth the effort? Good thing that attitude is not more prevalent, or we'd be living in a much different world.

 

[Paratus]

Continues to check out? The problem is that it didn't check out to begin with. Come on, you're smarter than this.

What "it" didn't checkout? The Cannae thruster with slots that produced thrust? The Null Cannae thruster without slots that produced thrust? The EM drive thruster that produced thrust? Or the 50ohm rf control load that didn't produce thrust?


The facts are:

• The 3 test devices produced measurable thrust
• When reversed all 3 devices produced measurable thrust in the opposite direction
• The 50ohm RF load produced no thrust
• Thrust was recorded as soon as the power was applied - not likely caused by thermal convection
• The results require verification by other centers

If the 3 test articles had produced no measurable thrust like the 50ohm rf control I would agree that it's bullshit but they did produce thrust.

The null thruster was designed to validate the investors hypothesis about how the thruster actually functions. His hypothesis appears to be wrong.

So that's the situation. Interesting results, no proven theory, just hypotheses, and more and better testing required.

 

[tynopik]

They published a paper, with an abstract, on an experiment they did. I'm not a scientist so I won't comment on the peer-review aspects, but that hardly makes them publicity hounds.

They 'published' at a VANITY PUBLISHER

do you get it yet?

Something of this magnitude should have gone through a proper peer-review journal.

The fact that it didn't raises all sorts of red flags.

If they were confident in their results, they would have submitted it to Science or Nature

 

[Phoenix86]

Yet they seem eager to attach a pseudo-science name to it.

If you don't know, then say I DON'T KNOW instead of trying to come up with pseudoscience gobbedlygook

It reeks of poor judgment and attention seeking, which then calls into question this part:

They're acting more like publicity hounds than proper scientists.

Uhh, the NASA guys didn't try to explain it. They basically said we don't know how it works. From the wired article:

"None of these explanations has gone unchallenged by theoreticians, and it might be fair to say that there is no accepted explanation as to how a close system of resonating microwaves can produce a thrust. There is no accepted theoretical explanation of how high-temperature superconductors work either, but because the effect has been replicated so many times, nobody doubts that it happens."

edit: here's the line from the original article.
"But the Nasa team has avoided trying to explain its results in favour of simply reporting what it found: "This paper will not address the physics of the quantum vacuum plasma thruster, but instead will describe the test integration, test operations, and the results obtained from the test campaign."

But of course they are going theorize about it. What the fuck do you think science is all about? Hey, why did this apple fall from the tree? I don't know, but it does so let's just stop there.

Peer review will happen, do you seriously doubt that it will?

Almost everyone is saying "this is interesting and profound if true".

 

[Paratus]

Yet they seem eager to attach a pseudo-science name to it.





If you don't know, then say I DON'T KNOW instead of trying to come up with pseudoscience gobbedlygook

It reeks of poor judgment and attention seeking, which then calls into question this part:




They're acting more like publicity hounds than proper scientists.

- The paper did not undergo peer review
- Their explanation invokes non-existent gibberish but sounds cool
- They make claims that reach too far (We couldn't figure it out, therefore the explanation MUST BE beyond our current understanding of physics. It couldn't possibly be that we missed something.)

It's one thing to say we tested this and that to eliminate these causes, but it's the height of arrogance to make the leap that therefore everything we know is wrong. It reminds me of the Pioneer anomaly where the probe's trajectory couldn't be explained by any known forces. OMG! New physics!

Then they went back and studied it more carefully, and, surprise, surprise, they missed stuff the first time around and no new physics were called for after all.

As Mark said, this was not pushed to any news agency, the press found it and ran with it. Like they did with the pioneer anomaly.

This is a conference paper, not a peer reviewed publication. Do you know the difference? They are talking at this conference about the experiment and data obtained. Scientist who actually have some idea about what's going on can then poke at their experimental process or provide other hypothesis to test.

 

[Paratus]

They 'published' at a VANITY PUBLISHER

do you get it yet?

Something of this magnitude should have gone through a proper peer-review journal.

The fact that it didn't raises all sorts of red flags.

If they were confident in their results, they would have submitted it to Science or Nature

WTF are you babling about.

The abstract came from NASA servers and the paper was published at an industry conference.
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20140006052
http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2014-4029


Seriously, the abstract was out months ago and linked from wiki.

Looks like the online media got you pretty good.

 

[tynopik]

Uhh, the NASA guys didn't try to explain it. They basically said we don't know how it works.

let me quote from the abstract written by the authors themselves

therefore is potentially demonstrating an interaction with the quantum vacuum virtual plasma

is that or is that not attempting to explain it?

edit: here's the line from the original article.
"But the Nasa team has avoided trying to explain its results in favour of simply reporting what it found: "This paper will not address the physics of the quantum vacuum plasma thruster, but instead will describe the test integration, test operations, and the results obtained from the test campaign."

Why would they call it that if they didn't think it interacted with 'quantum vacuum virtual plasma'?

But of course they are going theorize about it. What the fuck do you think science is all about?

but wait, you just said they didn't try to explain it. Make up your mind.

Peer review will happen, do you seriously doubt that it will?

Peer review should have happened FIRST.

Momentous discoveries don't show up in vanity publishers first. The prestige of a real journal is too much for most scientists to pass over.

The only reason to avoid such a process is lack of confidence in their findings.

Which in turn should give us lack of confidence in their findings.

 

[tynopik]

WTF are you babling about.

The abstract came from NASA servers and the paper was published at an industry conference.
http://ntrs.nasa.gov/search.jsp?R=20140006052
http://arc.aiaa.org/doi/abs/10.2514/6.2014-4029


Seriously, the abstract was out months ago and linked from wiki.

Looks like the online media got you pretty good.

And?

how does that not make AIAA a vanity publisher?

They have no standards whatsoever to get published (excuse me, they have formatting standards, so the papers at least look good)

 

[Fritzo]

I'm very conservative about these sort of things. I believe that extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. But, I also accept that if those extraordinary claims provide that extraordinary evidence then we must accept them.

So, Roger Shawyer and Prof Yang Juan might be considered quacks, but that is just because we find their claims to be too extraordinary to be believed. We have been given the first evidence that maybe they are not quacks by a team of physicists in Houston. A Team that is most definitely not quacks. This is evidence, but not quite enough to be considered extraordinary evidence. Now JPL is going to test this, if that test turns out positive then we will have something and it will be time for universities around the globe to start testing this thing. That will finally provide the extraordinary evidence we need.

I err on the side of caution on these matters to, but I'm in the same boat as you (which is why I posted the original article). The fact that this is going through very precise testing and is still producing results means it's moving from "another cold fusion debacle" to "this might actually be something..."

Even if the test proves to be flawed, there is something unknown happening here and I'm interested to see what it is.

 

[Paratus]

let me quote from the abstract written by the authors themselves



is that or is that not attempting to explain it?



Why would they call it that if they didn't think it interacted with 'quantum vacuum virtual plasma'?



but wait, you just said they didn't try to explain it. Make up your mind.



Peer review should have happened FIRST.

Momentous discoveries don't show up in vanity publishers first. The prestige of a real journal is too much for most scientists to pass over.

The only reason to avoid such a process is lack of confidence in their findings.

Which in turn should give us lack of confidence in their findings.

Just to be clear here
While they have to ability to test these devices they shouldn't present any results to other researchers, ask for inputs from other researchers in a formal setting, or tell anyone at all until they can write a paper that is ready for peer review.

 

[tynopik]

Just to be clear here
While they have to ability to test these devices they shouldn't present any results to other researchers, ask for inputs from other researchers in a formal setting, or tell anyone at all until they can write a paper that is ready for peer review.

They can do all those things.

Asking for consults, advice, verification, that's all good.

But a paper is supposed to represent the final, verified results of your research.

Because once papers are published, they're out there forever. No retraction or refutation will remove bad copies from all libraries in the world.

That's why papers are peer-reviewed, to ensure we don't have garbage cluttering up the scientific landscape.

And that's why real scientists never* publish in a vanity journal


*pointless caveats, blah blah blah