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Can Superconductors Block Gravitational Fields?

Posted by chrisd on Mon Jun 10, 2002 09:57 PM
from the lose-weight-fast-with-no-dieting dept.
Science
jswitte writes "Raymond Chiao, of the University of California at Berkel, believes that superconductors can convert electromagnetic radiation into gravitational radiation. His full paper can be found here. His theory is based on the idea that superconductors might be able to block the so-called 'gravitomagnetic' field just as they block the electomagnetic field in the famous Meissner effect allowing superconductors to levitate in magnetic fields. He claims that when he 'adds the gravitomagnetic field to the standard quantum equations for superconductivity, he confirms not only the gravitational Meissner-like effect but also a coupling between the two breeds of magnetic field. An ordinary magnetic field sets electrons in motion near the surface of a superconductor. Those electrons carry mass, and so their motion generates a gravitomagnetic field.'"
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  • If this works you won't be able to create antigravity fields. Antigravity would require canceling out the very powerful static gravitoelctric field and superconductors have no effect on these fields.
    • If this works you won't be able to create antigravity fields.

      Not that this wouldn't prevent the usual research into military applications. I wonder how much force is generated, how much enhancement of force is created per megawatt?

      Insert visions of UFOs with terrawat gravity generators, using this as a weapon to nuetralize gravity at an area of the surface below them. Enemy troops go drifting off into vaccuum or fall from a substantial height back to the ground.

      NB the weather effects as well, of all of that atmosphere going up an anti gravity shaft, creating a storm.

  • I'll believe it when I see it. (Score:4, Insightful)

    by Cyberdeck (15901) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:07PM (#3677111)
    Extrordinary claims need extrordinary proof. Build the device and demonstrate that it works. Publish the specs. Have other people who are not associated at all with you build these devices. If they confirm the results then the claim can be made relatively authoritatively.

    If it doesn't happen then that's also fine, it means that a hypothesis was shown to be not an accurate model of how the universe works.

    The method described is science in action, the way it is supposed to work.


    Of course if this does work then they are going to have some surprises when they enable those underground superconductive power cables in, IIRC, downtown Chicago. (Detroit? Somebody help me out here, please?)

    -C

    • Re:I'll believe it when I see it. (Score:5, Informative)

      by aallan (68633) <aa@NoSpaM.astro.ex.ac.uk> on Tuesday June 11 2002, @07:03AM (#3678360)

      ...the method described is science in action, the way it is supposed to work.

      No, actually this isn't how things work these days. Science has become so specialised that there are very, very, few people that can do both theoretically and experiemental work at the cutting edge.

      Most of us have a fairly good knowledge of a very small corner of one field, a slightly less good knowledge of the entire field, and an educated layman's knowledge of the rest of our discipline. Outside of our own discipline our knowledge is fairly scanty, most physicist's knowledge of chemisty for instance is probably no better than your average layman.

      It's just not possible to keep up with everything even in your own field anymore.

      The characteristic of bogus (or "junk") science is theories that give predictions that are untestable, or theories that predict things that have already been proved experimentally to be untrue.

      While I haven't read the paper, not alot of point as I'm not a quatumn physicist, and my knowledge of quatumn field theory is fairly basic, this guy seems to have made predictions which are provable. This is good science. Whether he is right or wrong is imaterial (to the scientific process), his theory is interesting enough that some experimentalist will pick this up and run with and then we'll find out whether the theory is correct (or not).

      Just because he hasn't provided extrordinary proof, doesn't mean that he's doing bad science.

      Al.

      • Re:I'll believe it when I see it. (Score:4, Insightful)

        by gorilla (36491) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @09:45AM (#3679164)
        Because some claims are trivial, and we can't spend enough time to validate every claim at the level required to validate the extrordianary ones. If I claim that I've found a fossil of a new species of dinosaur, then that can be validated simply by publishing a description of the fossil. If I claim that I've found a living dinosaur, then I'm going to have to do a little more than just write about it.
  • Maybe they'll go back and rename the school correctly. Berkel. It is to laugh!

    As for the theory, it doesn't seem plausible, but physics is full of implausible concepts that work out in real life. Since gravity is a manifestation of a warpage of space-time, does this also mean that he is claiming superconductors are equivalent to gravity wells?

    No doubt that the symmetry between Maxwell's equations and Einstein's equations is stark, but does this also mean that they are equivalent in meaning and applicability? Though the article puts a dig into superstring theory at the end, isn't it exactly this type of theory that is needed to unify such disparate theories as gravity and electromagnetism? If there is a symmetry there, wouldn't it make sense that the two equations would derive from a common principle?

    My elementary physics is no match for the mathematics in the paper.

    • Re:Mmm... Time machine (Score:5, Informative)

      by sconeu (64226) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:29PM (#3677223) Homepage Journal
      No doubt that the symmetry between Maxwell's equations and Einstein's equations is stark, but does this also mean that they are equivalent in meaning and applicability?

      If superstring theory is correct, then they've been known to be equivalent since the 1920s. The Kaluza-Klein equations show that in a 5-dimensional space-time (4xspace + 1xtime) or higher, Einstein's equations and Maxwell's equations both come out. See Kaku's Hyperspace [amazon.com] for more info.
    • Since gravity is a manifestation of a warpage of space-time, does this also mean that he is claiming superconductors are equivalent to gravity wells?

      Cause or effect?

      Does mass produce gravity that produces a distortion in space-time..

      or is it a distortion in space-time that produces the illusion of the gravity associated with a mass?

      Can we exceed the speed of light? Of course we can -- just combine the theories of Einstein with the observations of Gallileo...

      Einstein tells us that the mass of an object increases infinitely as we approach the speed of light. This has been taken by most to mean that accelerating a mass beyond the speed of light would therefore require infinite energy.

      But hang on -- Gallileo correctly determined that the acceleration of an object when acted on by a gravitational field is independent of its mass (air resistance not withstanding).

      So -- if we use an external gravitational field to accelerate an object, the fact that it will gain infinite mass is irrelevant -- because it will maintain the same acceleration regardless.

      Hence -- black holes and their immense gravitational pull are our secret to faster-than-light travel.

      Now if I could just hitch one up to my mountain bike I'd be away :-)
    • Maybe they'll go back and rename the school correctly. Berkel. It is to laugh!

      Surely. Isn't it properly spelled "Berzerkely?" ;-)

      As for the theory, it doesn't seem plausible, but physics is full of implausible concepts that work out in real life.

      True enough. Yet the more implausible they seem, the more I suspect them of being over-convoluted theories that just _happen_ to match the results. Some things that seem implausible from a macro (visible, Newtonian) point of view are believable, but a lot of the quantum-level theories are just guesswork, as far as I'm concerned. Physicists must publish _something_ to keep their jobs, and that's what I think drives too much of the recent scientific theorizing. Publish something! That's their bread and butter. And they can write up for grants to pursue Big Physics research... and jobs. For example, fusion research is all simply a massive boondoggle.

      Since gravity is a manifestation of a warpage of space-time, does this also mean that he is claiming superconductors are equivalent to gravity wells?

      Another interpretation is that the space-time warp of gravity is a big illusion... that gravity isn't about mass but about energy (and mass and energy are related, thus the illusion). Thus the photons which have no mass _do_ have its analog... energy, and thats what gravity acts upon to bend the path. There _must_ be a consistent explanation for both macro and quantum level interactions, and until we find it, we'll not be intellectually fit to travel into the cosmos. We've got time (depending on when the next major comet intersects Earth's orbit at the wrong moment), but we do really need to figure everything out before our time runs out for us here.

      No doubt that the symmetry between Maxwell's equations and Einstein's equations is stark, but does this also mean that they are equivalent in meaning and applicability?

      My intuition tells me that such mathematical symmetries are trying to tell us something, but we just haven't figured it all out well enough - yet. We need free thinkers in the physical sciences, but... the entire structure of academia is built to enforce conformity. Some few people survive it and think "outside the box" as it were (Feynmann comes to mind), but the majority are just buried in conformity. The best thing the politicians could do to advance science would be to grant all science graduate students Associate level pay with no obligations to serve their tenured colleagues, but maintaining their freedom to consult and even collaborate with them whenever they find it helpful. This would accelerate big science in a way that would make the last decades seem a backwater.

      Though the article puts a dig into superstring theory at the end, isn't it exactly this type of theory that is needed to unify such disparate theories as gravity and electromagnetism? If there is a symmetry there, wouldn't it make sense that the two equations would derive from a common principle?

      Yes. Superstring theories (there are several that are trying to agree, convolutedly) are all so very complex that they're ultimately not very credible. Sorry! (To a generation of theoretical physicists.) The Universe _must_ have some simple rules (Einstein would agree with this, I am sure), but you haven't figured them out, so far. Complex systems are the products of insufficient mentality in both science and large-scale software systems. The bottom line for me is that I'm not convinced that they're not just playing with irrelevant and really fantastic math that will never work right. When they go outside five dimensions (3 space, 1 time, 1 energy), I lose interest. Or maybe six (vector/spin). But you maybe will get my drift... ten, twelve, fourteen dimensions? Give it up already!

      My elementary physics is no match for the mathematics in the paper.

      Mine too. ;-) But my scientific intuition is not satisfied by the embarrassing worldwide failure to integrate General Relativity with the Standard Model of Quantum Theory. It's an intellectual debacle that the so-called "best minds" of science haven't been able to work this out for going on a century here. It's also a shame that kids aren't going into science. Can we rehabilitate the Red Menace to get our politicians and educators back in gear here? That worked real well in the 50s and 60s, but raghead terrorists won't cut it.

      • I call bullshit (Score:5, Insightful)

        by denshi (173594) <toddg@math.utexas.edu> on Tuesday June 11 2002, @03:29AM (#3678010) Homepage Journal
        Yet the more implausible they seem, the more I suspect them of being over-convoluted theories that just _happen_ to match the results. Some things that seem implausible from a macro (visible, Newtonian) point of view are believable, but a lot of the quantum-level theories are just guesswork, as far as I'm concerned.
        And yet, they're not guesswork. They are powerful predictive models that have enabled the construction of devices such as the one you are typing garbage into.
        Physicists must publish _something_ to keep their jobs, and that's what I think drives too much of the recent scientific theorizing.
        Every competent university physicist could easily double their salaries by going into industry. Not everyone in the world is as cynical and trite as yourself.

        Yes, academic credentialism is driven by publishing. So? How does that translate into your assumption that all the 'recent theorizing' is bunk? Publishing is hard work. You don't just make up crap and watch is magically traverse the gauntlet of peer review.

        For example, fusion research is all simply a massive boondoggle.
        Oh, right, because there's no such thing as fusion. That's why we know it's a boondoggle. Oh wait. It seems fusion is actually a common physical process! Maybe we should look into it. If, you know, that's all right with you.
        Another interpretation is that the space-time warp of gravity is a big illusion... that gravity isn't about mass but about energy (and mass and energy are related, thus the illusion). Thus the photons which have no mass _do_ have its analog... energy, and thats what gravity acts upon to bend the path.
        Work up the math, develop a consistent theory with provable axioms, then we'll talk. This isn't consultancy, s390, this is science. Golf, blowjobs, and 'intuition' won't cut it. Oh, and physics on LSD went out 20 years ago.

        Have you actually *read* the General Theory of Relativity? Go get Wheeler's "Gravitation". It deals with your confused theory, and much more besides, all coherently.

        We need free thinkers in the physical sciences, but... the entire structure of academia is built to enforce conformity. Some few people survive it and think "outside the box" as it were (Feynmann comes to mind), but the majority are just buried in conformity.
        There are things to be said in favor of conformity. Science was created in a time of mystics and frauds. Actually having to prove what you claim was a big jump, and conformity is a natural side-effect of that. On the other hand, there is too much conformity in the university environment these days, but for that the blame can be laid at the doors of the administration. Nationwide, administration staff has doubled relative to student&faculty populations. All the bone-headed management theories that the private sector spent the last decade or two working through have trickled into the Uni, and all the 'free thinkers' fear for their jobs. Tenure, the great bulwark of high-performance original thinkers, is on the way out.
        The bottom line for me is that I'm not convinced that they're not just playing with irrelevant and really fantastic math that will never work right. When they go outside five dimensions (3 space, 1 time, 1 energy), I lose interest.
        Work through the math, get back to us.
        But my scientific intuition is not satisfied by the embarrassing worldwide failure to integrate General Relativity with the Standard Model of Quantum Theory. It's an intellectual debacle that the so-called "best minds" of science haven't been able to work this out for going on a century here.
        Perhaps if your 'scientific intuition' was better grounded in, say, math and science, then you wouldn't troll with this garbage. Oh, we broke the Standard Model 3 years ago. Better update your notes.

  • Sorry, no anti-grav (Score:3, Informative)

    by sequence_man (97765) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:08PM (#3677115) Homepage
    All he is exccluding are gravity-waves. These are different then the basic curvature of space that generates gravity itself. Basically they are little ripples that float on top of the curvature. So blocking them won't levitate us.

    • Re:Sorry, no anti-grav (Score:4, Informative)

      by beanyk (230597) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:52PM (#3677312)
      All he is exccluding are gravity-waves. These are different then the basic curvature of space that generates gravity itself.


      If you mean "gravitational waves", then no, they are *not* different from the curvature of space. It's exactly the same stuff, though gravitational waves passing close to the Earth are probably very weak.So yes, they look like ripples on our pretty flat curvature, but they're just smaller-scale, generally weak curvature perturbations on a much more uniform background curvature.

      As an aside, the term "gravity wave" is usually taken to mean "wave formed by a process where gravity is significant", like some types of water wave. Not actually what's been talked about here.

      • Sidebar says no anti-grav (Score:5, Informative)

        by Wraithlyn (133796) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @02:10AM (#3677871)
        If you click the sidebar link [sciam.com] at the bottom, there is a paragraph that reads:

        "Even if Chiao's contraption works, it wouldn't allow the generation of antigravity fields, as Russian materials scientist Eugene Podkletnov, then at Tampere University of Technology in Finland, controversially claimed to have observed in 1992 (see link [sciam.com] ). Antigravity requires canceling out a powerful, static gravitoelectric field, yet superconductors have no effect on such fields."

  • This has been around. (Score:3, Informative)

    by Max Threshold (540114) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:09PM (#3677122)
    Isn't this just a new take on the Podkletnov effect [inetarena.com]?

    • Re:This has been around. (Score:4, Informative)

      by Vireo (190514) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:54PM (#3677319)
      Isn't this just a new take on the Podkletnov effect?

      Excerpt of the article in the paper version of SciAm:

      (...) Even if Chiao's contraption works, it wouldn't allow the generation of antigravity fields, as Russian materials scientist Eugene Podkletnov, then at Tampere University of Technology in Finland, controversially claimed to have observed in 1992. (...)


  • Sigh...cynicism kills! (Score:3, Insightful)

    by DaBjork (575727) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:13PM (#3677150)
    Firstly, Fuel cells ARE 8th grade chem, they are just 2H + O = H2O. Secondly, astrophysicists have been theorizing antigravitation as a solution to the "dark matter" problem for quite sometime. Don't get me wrong, I am all for a healthy dose of cynicism, but in order to progress we need to take an open mind. This is not that far out of the realm of possibility. Point to the error in the theory if you feel this person is wrong. Then your point will stand on it's own.
  • Note that the Scientific American article is very cautious: they state the implications if it's true. While, if true, this is a breakthrough on the level of relativity or quantum mechanics, one should take this with a large grain of salt. Plenty of other "revolutionary" theories haven't managed to pan out.
  • This was also in wired about 5 years ago, you can find it here [wired.com].
  • If a superconductor will float in a static magnetic field, why won't it weigh less in a static gravitational field? If it did, they wouldn't have to go throug elaborate tests to verify the theory.

    • Re:Why don't superconductors weigh less? (Score:5, Informative)

      by dragons_flight (515217) on Monday June 10 2002, @11:58PM (#3677558) Homepage
      Ordinary gravitational attraction is dominated by "gravito-electric" force, or in normal language the force generated by stationary masses. In everyday concerns the Earth is the only mass that matters and it is stationary to a good approximation for nearly everything humans do.

      The paper talks solely in terms of affecting "gravito-magnetic" forces, which are those exhibited by moving masses (and generally only significant among masses moving at an appreciable fraction of the speed of light). Simply put there just isn't enough gravito-magnetic force in every day life to notice any change. If there were an appreciable gravito-magnetic force in ordinary everyday gravity then yes you could test it, though I'm not clear how to expect it to react.

      To put things another way, Newton described gravity purely in gravito-electric terms and most of us will never notice the more complex gravitiational interactions that Einstein discovered and this physicist cares about.
        • It's been a long time since I did this (1988), but in my senior year of high school a couple friends and I made a superconductor with our physics teacher. With it we successfully reproduced magnetic levitation [gsu.edu] via the Meissner Effect [gsu.edu]: "If a small magnet is brought near a superconductor, it will be repelled becaused induced supercurrents will produce mirror images of each pole. If a small permanent magnet is placed above a superconductor, it can be levitated by this repulsive force."

          Thus, the superconductor is not affecting the gravitational field. It is in a sense becoming a magnet itself, producing an exact-opposite magnetic field. This new field simply repels the magnet, producing levitation. By far the coolest effect was spinning/flipping the magnet over the superconductor and having it remain levitated, as the superconductor's magnetic field was always a mirror of the magnet's.

          Now, in this I am not talking about the article or paper (I just started reading it). I'm simply talking about the magnetic field that is induced in a superconductor by magnets. My only experience and knowledge of the subject was the experiment in high school.

  • I'm surprised he doesn't have any references to the Podkletnov and Woodward [inetarena.com] effects.

    In any case, I'm not sure I believe any of this, but I think it's good that there are people thinking outside the mainstream.

      • This is science, not a sandbox brawl. You don't get to pick and choose who you cite based on who you don't like. Podkletnov's experimental results are published, peer reviewed, and seem related. If Chiao is aware of them (and he must be), he has an obligation to cite them. If he thinks Podkletnov's results have no bearing on the effects predicted by his own theory, he can explain so in his citation. If he thinks there are fundamental flaws with Pokletnov's experimental setup, he can explain them.

        Personally, I think both are crackpots. But if crackpots publish scientific papers, they still should follow the rules of academic conduct, because the rules of academic conduct ultimately are what helps us sort out the real crackpots from the forward thinkers.

  • I might add after perusing the comments a little about superconductors. First off, liquid nitrogen is not a magic and impossible to find substance. it is cheap and easy to acquire as far as gasses go. Secondly, the city of Chicago has been using superconductors in their power grid for around 2 years. Supposedly the main line carries something on the order of 10s of thousands of amps (I belive 16,000 but I am not sure). Just for scale, you be hard pressed to find a house with any plugs rated above 20 amps, the nuclear structure lab I work at has some lines with 50 amps, but none higher.
  • ...somebody claims this. IIRC, someone in the early 80s had claimed to have done this (with "Radio Shack" parts) - I wish I remember where I read this - and of course there's Podkletnov [inetarena.com], though the jury's still out on whether it was a hoax or not [parascope.com]. Mind you, NASA has its own programme researching this...I'd be curious to hear their take on the issue.

  • Where do we donate to erect a statute of him in Montana [imdb.com]?

    BTW, I've noticed a disturbing trend of really smart people != me ...

  • Wait for the experimental test (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Animats (122034) on Monday June 10 2002, @10:32PM (#3677234) Homepage
    The key point here is that the theory predicts that the conversion of microwaves to gravity waves will be reasonably efficient. So this is testable, and is being tested. There should be a definitive result this year.

    Nobel prize material if it works. Footnote in Physical Review Letters if it doesn't.

    • The key point here is that the theory predicts that the conversion of microwaves to gravity waves will be reasonably efficient. So this is testable, and is being tested.

      How? Are they actually *detecting* gravity waves?

      • Re:Wait for the experimental test (Score:5, Interesting)

        by Wocko (27778) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @01:16AM (#3677750)
        It is based on the fact that not only should gravity waves convert to microwaves, but that the inverse should be true.

        So, if you imagine the following experiment:

        Inside a Faraday cage, place a superconductor and a microwave source.

        Inside another Faraday cage, place a superconductor and a microwave detector.

        From inside the first Faraday cage, fire the microwave source at the superconductor. The theory predicts that a gravitation wave will be emitted.

        Aim the (suspected) emitted gravitation wave at the second superconductor (inside the second Faraday cage).

        Detect any microwave radiation after the gravitation wave has been converted by the second superconductor.

        The Faraday cages block electromagnetic radiation so they ensure that no microwaves can leak from the emitter to the detector, and therefore gravitation waves must be the culprit.

  • podkletnov (Score:2, Informative)

    by prell (584580)
    this observation was made years back by a scientist named podkletnov in Europe (hey, I said it was a while ago ;-). He used a super-cooled YBCO (yttrium boron carbon oxygen I believe) superconductor and was able to "reduce the mass of" (ie affect the gravitational effect on) objects. They actually ran an article in wired on him way back when (96-98 sometime). The "gravity society" had a website at www.gravity.org, but currently I cant reach it.

  • not yet antigravity (Score:2, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward
    First of all, he's talking about blocking "gravitomagnetic" fields, which if I understand correctly you get from moving masses. So the static gravitational effect from e.g. the Earth isn't blocked.


    If what he claims is true then first of all he has invented a great new way to emit and detect gravitational waves. It would be awesome for astronomy, useful for submarine communication (and maybe detection), and probably many other things. However, it's not immediately obvious that we're talking "antigravity" here, so don't get too excited.

    Also keep in mind that 99+ times out of 100 these sorts of claims are completely bogus and a waste of time. Just sit tight and wait for rebuttals or confirmation to appear on the LLNL server.

  • A few posters, and Scientific American itself, are skeptical of these claims. This is reasonable, because they are so dramatic.

    If Dr. Chiao is worried about his reputation, or getting published, or arguing with critics, I have some free advice: discover first, publicise second.

    The article claims "By the time the theory is vetted, though, Chiao will probably have conducted his experiment and settled the question." Wonderful! Wait a few months to actually do the experiment, then publicise it. His reputation will be safe, everyone will want to publish it, and critics can try the experiment themselves. He will probably be able to complete it faster because he won't have all these clueless reporters asking him questions.

    But you have to discover it first.

    • Re:Free Advice for Fringe Physicists (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Saoshyant (584551) on Monday June 10 2002, @11:11PM (#3677392)
      Chiao has published the paper describing the theory, complete with mathematical arguments that "seem to be correct." Now, he's moving on to perform the experiments that will either verify or refute the theory. This is the way it's done! Black Holes were nothing more than a theory with mathematical arguments that "seem(ed) to be correct", until CHANDRA started supplying experimental evidence. General Relativity was a theory with mathermatical aruments that "seem(ed) to be correct", until we managed to observe light bending around the mass of the sun. There's nothing wrong with publishing a theory that has yet to be proven; many theoretical physiscists never participate in experimentation. They publish theories.

  • I had a friend once . . . (Score:3, Interesting)

    by Ezubaric (464724) on Monday June 10 2002, @11:03PM (#3677355) Homepage

    I had a friend who was working on this for a while. He kept building larger and larger metal units, cooling them down more and more, trying to get a rotating disk to speed up in a very, very, strong (par. magnetic field). If it sped up, then this was a reduction in the moment of inertia, and a decreased effective mass.

    After two years of working on it, he gave up. He did get a measurable increase, but it was too little to be more than measurement error.
  • Just because a theory sounds nice and fits well with other known theories (electro magnetism) does not mean it is true.

    There is plenty of moving mass in the universe. Has anyone measured a gravitomagnetic effect?

    i havent heard of it.

  • Remember Eugene Podkletnov? (Score:5, Informative)

    by Byteme (6617) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @01:09AM (#3677734) Homepage
    ...and his anti-gravity machine? This looks somewhat similar...

    Dr. Podkletnov was discounted as a hoax by many sources (cited that rising gases from the coolant, air flow from spinning or magnetism influenced his results), his university ejected him and now he has retreated to a hermetic existence.

    Here is a story on Wired [wired.com] for your reading pleasure.

    Much more to look if you search Google [google.com].

  • I've reproduced the experiment (Score:5, Funny)

    by NewtonsLaw (409638) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @01:27AM (#3677782)
    I've just finished my own version of the experiment.

    I took a tin pie tray and stuck it in the freezer for a couple of hours.

    Then I rummaged through the attic and found that old turntable that used to scratch all my Barry Manilow LPs back in the '70s.

    After running an extension lead from the socket on the kitchen bench over to the freezer, I stuck the plate on the turntable, set it to 78RPMs and let her rip.

    The inital results were somewhat disappointing. Several spiders and a rodent that was either a very large mouse or a small rat ran out the back of the turntable and disappeared into a bag of frozen mince -- but the pie tray didn't lift up an inch.

    Not to be discouraged, I figured that perhaps the reduced gravitational field only appeared above the pie tray -- so I grabbed the cat (which just happened to be passing by at the time) and pressed its warm little bottom onto the frozen pie tray.

    I guess it was a little cold for him because he didn't half get excited -- or maybe I should have taken that spindle out of the center of the turntable first -- oh well.

    Anyway, after a bit of hissing, growling and some bleeding (my blood not his), the cat eventually settled down enough for me to release him.

    He sat their with a glazed look in his eyes and once again I flicked the switch to 78 RPMs.

    Horray -- Success!

    The cat lept several feet into the air, schrieking, hissing, wailing and spinning wildly at what I figured was probably 78RPMs.

    But alas, the effect was short lived.

    No sooner had this levitated feline lifted into the air than he crashed back down onto the rotating pie tray.

    Ah, what the hell -- I slammed down the freezer lid and sat down in front of the TV with a beer.

    I'll go back later and see whether he's settled down. Maybe tomorrow.

    Anyway -- it looks as if there is some effect there but measuring it requires the use of protective garments and probably a more cooperative cat.

    Now there's some guy called Schrodinger at the door asking whether the cat in my freezer is dead but telling me not to open the lid.

    What the hell's going on there I wonder?

  • Scientific American Settles it... (Score:3, Interesting)

    by i1984 (530580) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @03:04AM (#3677963)
    When I first glanced at this thread I figured this was just another crank story like the time machine or the previous anti-gravity superconductor, but then I saw it was in Scientific American I knew that if it wasn't crank science, it was at least probably being blown out of proportion, sensationalized, and/or taken out of context.

    Perhaps that's a bit too harsh, but Scientific American has come down in the world quite a bit since the late eighties or early nineties. As I recall, they got a new editor many years ago and he was hell bent on dumbing the magazine down, fluffing it up with low-attention-theshold filler, and generally reducing it to a level of depth, insight, and relevance typical of USA Today or Omni Magazine. He suceeded, and many of the science professionals I knew cancelled their subscriptions shortly thereafter.

    This subject strikes me as the researcher noting to himself "oh, hey...if I make some interesting assumptions, I get this cool effect popping out. And I might as well test it since it's so easy to test." Or an April Fools joke*. Which falls short of us dismissing the idea out of hand, but does suggest it doesn't deserve much media coverage -- at least until any positive results are verified. In other words, it was just sensationalist enough to get Scientific American's attention (they dig this kind of stuff), but not so far to the side of quackery that it has (yet) been featured in the Fortean Times [217.206.205.129].

    * By the way, the paper missed April Fools day by four days; the date is stamped April 5, 2002. There's also a second date stamp of April 11, 2002. (A slightly earlier date stamp would have cleared things up pretty quickly!)

  • Far Side (Score:3, Insightful)

    by N8F8 (4562) on Tuesday June 11 2002, @07:45AM (#3678477)
    I'll not pretend to grok the paper entirely, but a casual read remids me of a classic Far Side cartoon where a bunch of scientists are standing around a chalkboard. On the board is one of the scientist's Grand Unifid Theory. Smack dab in the middle of the equation is the phrase "And then a miracle happens".

    This paper reads the same way... "When A is time-independent, this equation has the same form as the time independent Schrodinger equation for a particle (i.e., a Cooper pair) with mass m2eff and a charge e2 with an energy eigenvalue except that there is an extra nonlinear term whose coefcient is given by the coefcient x, which arises at a microscopic level from the Coulomb interactions between Cooper pairs [16]. The values of these two phenomenological parameters must be determined by experiment."

    But then again, what do I know?

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