Talk:Anti-gravity

Violation of First Law of Thermodynamics???

There are strong reasons to believe that no such substance can exist. Consider the results of placing such a substance under one-half of a wheel on a shaft. The side of the wheel under the substance would have no weight, while the other side would. This would cause the wheel to continually "fall" toward the side under the plate. This motion could be harnessed to produce power for free, a clear violation of the first law of thermodynamics.

How in the world did anyone come up with this? It only 'violates' the 1st Law if you exclude the gravitational field! Does a solar cell violate the 1st Law? No, it harneses a small fraction of an existing energy field and coverts that energy into a useable form. The same would be true here. The gravitation field exists, and the proposed device would just harness or draw away some of that energy. When the gravitational field ends, so does the antigravity effect. What a crock, not a violation. Cyberia1 (talk) 01:06, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

The only way to harness energy out of a gravitational field is to let something lose gravitational potential (ie height above the ground). In the situation described, the wheel's gravitational potential stays the same no matter how long the theoretical substance is beneath it. No potential energy has been lost, and so according to the 1st law of thermodynamics, no energy can be gained from the gravitational field. You cannot gain energy in one place without losing it somewhere else, and the only way to lose gravitational potential energy is to move closer to what's attracting you. The section you quoted is absolutely correct, and you are not. 205.175.225.22 (talk) 18:16, 3 April 2008 (UTC)

Cant the electric field be blocked in a similar way? Em3ryguy (talk) 01:58, 7 May 2008 (UTC)

Actually, I'm not so sure the article is right either. Have a look at this detailed analysis of the "wheel machine": http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/museum/gravshld.htm. It shows why it won't work even if a gravity shield were possible. mike4ty4 (talk) 08:40, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

This would not happen as described in the article. If you put such a device under half an object it would change the direction of the gravitational force so the object would fall to the side instead of falling straight down. If it was fixed on a shaft the force exerted on the shaft would be slightly to the side instead of straight down, it would not rotate. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.186.20.134 (talk) 10:46, 24 January 2009 (UTC)

Casmir Effect

After reading a bit on the subject and checking out the Casmir Effect article, I was wondering if we should put it in as a sort of anti-grav generator. IT isn't techjically anti-grave, but it can force things apart. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Cyberia1 (talk • contribs) 01:08, 9 February 2008 (UTC)

Moved from article page

I cut three rather obscure claims from the article, see below for rationale. --Pjacobi 20:28, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Anti-gravity in the context of non-mainstream physics

In the 1970s, an American scientist proposed using superfluid helium in a toroidal vessel to create gravity control.

Robert Distinti, an American engineer, has derived a simple formula that predicts anti-gravity effects when opposite charges are brought close enough. For macroscopic effects, this requires large charges and microscopic distances, but provides a theoretical explanation for the charged capacitor experiments.

In June 2005 F.S. Felber released a paper claiming that when a mass moves faster than $1/{\sqrt {3}}$ of the speed of light, general relativity predicts that a moving mass emits a beam of repulsive gravity both forward, and more weakly to the rear of the mass. This repulsive effect could easily be used to accelerate other masses, and the tidal forces are said to be weak. As of February 2006, the paper is still in review.

Several historical oversights need to be rectified in this section.Tcisco 06:03, 8 November 2006 (UTC)

Comment

It's easy to setup a web page stating rather bold claims about anti-gravity. It even was, and mostly still is, easy to inject such papers into preprint system. But unless these claims lead either to extraordinary public attention or to reactions from scientists, that's far below the threshold for including in an encyclopedia. IMHO and YMMV. --Pjacobi 20:28, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

The Distinti website is a cranky new electromagnetism type website, apparently with an anti-gravity or electric gravity [sic] tinge. A few quotes tell the tale:

• The new model of electromagnetic induction is claimed as superior to Faraday's law in every respect. It predicts things that Faraday can not.
• Introducing for license or sale a revolutionary new advancement in the design and function of...
• The World Leader in Electromagnetic Physics. By Robert J Distinti BS EE
• I've gone back to school to get my graduate degree -- thesis will be on New Electromagnetism.

Good luck, Robert :-/ As for the eprint, Felber appears to be blissfully unaware of the extensive literature on ultraboosts and has neglected to discuss the possibility that he has confused coordinate effects with physical effects, as indeed appears to be the case. IMHO, this has gotten much more press than it deserves, apparently because someone has been greatly overstating Felber's alleged achievements in various mass media venues, including the Wikipedia.---CH 22:28, 23 March 2006 (UTC)

Any relevance?

"Scientists funded by the European Space Agency have measured the gravitational equivalent of a magnetic field for the first time in a laboratory. Under certain special conditions the effect is much larger than expected from general relativity and could help physicists to make a significant step towards the long-sought-after quantum theory of gravity."

http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEM0L6OVGJE_index_0.html

http://esamultimedia.esa.int/docs/gsp/Experimental_Detection.pdf

There appear to be superficial similarities to Podkletnov's work. I do not have the knowledge to say whether this is at all interesting, related, or just another instance of bogus and/or pseudo- science

There is, however, a nice paragraph referring to Podkletnov's claims in the pdf:

"The reported results are very different from previous claims in the literature from Podkletnov claiming gravitational shielding effects above rotating superconductors 21,22 . As we have not observed any change in the vertical sensors (± 5 µg) above any superconductors during their phase transition and during rotation, our results even put new limits on any possible shielding effects (effect must be < 0.0005% compared to claims of up to 2% of weight change for samples above a rotating superconductor)."

WLD 17:07, 25 March 2006 (UTC)

Im afraid its not relevant, its refering to the gravitomagnetic force. - Zephyris _Talk 12:52, 27 February 2007 (UTC)

Destructive attitude of Wikipedians

Everyone should be able to participate in the debate. However, now the committed members express rejective, intolerant and malicious attitude towards some writers. They do not explain their point of view purely concentrating on the issues, but also imply that some people should not bother them with certain point of views. The critic of this page is a good example of this. Objectively, I'm not taking a position towards the claims of the counter arguments. I'm just pointing out the offensive style of the committed judges of the Wikipedia. You should also explain why you repeatedly erase links from that page. I have also copied my critisism to my user page of Improvements to Wikipedia

(unsigned comment by User:Teemu Ruskeepää)

Come again? What authors? What "judges"? What page? What links? ---CH 03:37, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

note for editors:Do not delete under pretenses of "Pseudoscience"

It must be at least docuented(what claims are), just tag it with pseudoscience or/and explanation of maintsream physics why it doesn't work. Deleting information is wrong.If we allow only right information on wiki, which must be documented by all academic sources,it will be a desert. A bunch of book summaries.This isn't wiki purpose,providing maximum knowledge on subject.Antigravity is pseudoscience(or at best fringe science) subject.Just talk about it like it is.NPOV isn't deleting Pseudoscience its allowing to present any information in NEUTRAL Manner.Just keep pseudosciece notices.

84.94.137.17 (talk · contribs) (aka the cable.012.net.il anon)

First, please consider registering and in any case sign your contribs. Second, current violations of WP:NPOV include several claims of form

according to [publication], blah blah blah

instead of

according to [[Robert Park]], a professor of [[Physics]] at the [[University of Maryland]] who writes a regular column on fringe science at [link to the website in question], {{quotation|whatever he said|Robert Park, [[Nature (journal)|Nature]] date}}.

See the difference? My point is that we need to provide enough information for the reader to figure out that a claim appearing on Robert Distinti's website does not carry the same weight as Prof. Park's comments in Nature. Third, the current version is absurdly slanted toward promotion of dubious fringe ideas in various ways, and this must be addressed.---CH 23:43, 24 May 2006 (UTC)

American Antigraverty is quite important in the schintific anti-graverty\alternitive energy scine, could we mention them more than just once at the bottem of the page?

American Antigraverty

American Antigraverty is quite an important anti-graverty\alternitive energy site, could we mention them more than just once at the bottem of the page? Alan2here 20:45, 8 October 2006 (UTC)

Antigravity

Antigravity, = gravifugal force

The bigest scientific and non-scientific paradox and problem in the last several centuries. Serious and honest scientist believe it is nosence. Nobody is capable to see that antigravity was discovered by Newton.

It is not an error. I am not talking about gravity, than rather about so called antigravity.

See data: http://www.geocities.com/agravity/ANTIGRAVITY.htm

Newton have seen that pendulum watches are going slower closer to the equator, and stated: it is caused by force arising from Earths rotation. This force decreases value of gravitational accveleration, and because of it the watches are going slower. Newton calculated value of that force, i.e. decreasing of gravity to cca 0,034m/sec2. Several centuries latter it was confirmed by gravimetrical meassurements. At the equator, bodies lose 0,34% of its weight. At the geo. lat. 45 degree only 0,17%.

The force decreasing the weight of bodies, i.e. gravitational force always has the same line and opposite direction of gravity.

But that force is not antigravity, than rather gravifugal force. This force is arising in all cases in which gravity has a function of centripetal force. In those cases I am using the term gravipetal force. Gravipetal and gravifugal - instead of too general: centripetal and centrifugal.

I believe so called and desired antigravity does not exist. Nature replaced it by gravifugal force. At the velocity 7,9km/sec. value of gravifugal force equals to that of gravity, i.e. gravipetal force, bodies totaly lose the weight and astronauts are levitating in their space-ships. By gravifugal force we are capable to do all we believed would be possible to do by so called antigravity. Why nobody can see it?

Instead of to draw the attention to that fact, many scientist and no-scientist try to discover something that was discovered long, long time ago, confirmed by numerous gravimetrical meassurements and astronautical experience.

For more see also

Gravifugal levitation and antigravity/

This theory, although plausible, is incorrect. The fault is in the extrapolation from a pendulum to a free disk - the supporting string of the pendulum is the route by which the force due to gravity is counteracted, the free disk does not have this connection and so the gravitational force is not counteracted. - Zephyris _Talk 00:51, 26 November 2006 (UTC)

I am not tallking about pendulum than rather about gravifugal force.

{{totallydisputed}}

I've upgraded the tag from {{POV}} to {{totallydisputed}}.

Let me first cite the reason of the {{POV}}-tagger (I didn't search far enough into the history to find did it):

in first half, the description of alleged "mainstream viewpoint" on "anti-gravity" are mischaracterized (please see talk page); in second half, unverified "electrogravity" claims are presented as verifiable fact

IMHO it's about the same only more so after the recent additions.

Einsteins GTR is well established and makes it crystal clear, that no gravity shielding or anti-gravity can be done. So you first have to disprove it. No serious attempts at disproving have been seen for decades.

Pjacobi 19:34, 16 November 2006 (UTC)

*Sorry I have rewritten this slightly to make it a little clearer - Lucien

I have to disagree with this, anti gravity may be mostly flaky pseudo-science, but GR is a theory that makes claims as outrageous as any in the 'pseudo-science' world. Besides you have to make the decision about whether you want Quantum Gravity or Relativity - you can’t have both.

Curved time spaces are a very nice idea and work as long as you don’t actually look at space, but unfortunately when we look at the distances between the stars or galaxies we see the universe at up to several thousand trillion times the speed of light - and guess what? no curvature. Relativity is a very good theory in many ways, tensor fields and dilation are a work of genius, but it is not a work of scripture. There are substantial holes in Relativities maths, people focus far to much on its complex heart and miss basic flaws in geometry and numeric algebra. Tensors are only half the solution and don’t explain how the 'zero point field' or 'aether' holds the universe together. (This was something Einstein admitted himself.) As it stands Relativity can be used to 'prove' the universe does not exist, so you have a choice. - Either the universe isn't actually 'real' or Relativity has a fault somewhere - I choose the universe. Guess what, if you go and read his work Einstein knew this himself, he couldn’t fix it so I don’t expect you or anyone else to.

As to the claims of formal science "well established" really only means 'still in use', and it only takes one thorn to pop the balloon. Trying to argue against these 'established' theories, I have found that logic rapidly becomes rigid propaganda and people find it very hard to even listen to anything that contradicts it.

By the way I'm not one of those who believes in gravity engines, I would love to make one but its just not that simple. The real problem with this article is that it doesn't give the scientific reasons WHY gravity is so difficult to interact with. The joke is that gravity engines can be made out of almost anything but the forces generated are so small (pico watts) that we have no way of measuring them.

Lucien86 06:55, 10 April 2007 (UTC), Lucien86 06:48, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Huh? What are you talking about? Dan Gluck 18:24, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

I don't see what you are talking about in the General relativity article. You seem to have good sources, including Einstein himself, so I hope you are working on the GR article to improve it with these very interesting claims. However, "when we look at the distances between the stars or galaxies we see the universe at up to several thousand trillion times the speed of light," seems totally meaningless to me and I have no idea what you are trying to say. -- Lilwik 07:21, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Sorry there's some pretty hard concepts to grasp, unfortunately this is still a work in progress and the description isn't really great. - I also realized that I am repeating myself, there is a much better version of the description dated today at the end of the "Jim Nobody" section, below. Lucien86 00:55, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Response to Edits

Thank you for the welcome and quick response. I have no problems with abstaining from incorporating UFO articles with this section. I removed the corresponding citations from the list of references after discovering your deletions. My goal was to provide a wealth of literature that evinces the existence of a nation-wide effort to develop gravity control propulsion that had continued for at least eleven years. The articles, books, and newspapers were free of retractions and denials. And, there were no indications of failure. It would not have taken eleven years to discover shortcomings in the gravitic segment of the Biefeld-Brown Effect. But, it would have taken eleven or more years to develop substances with high dielectric constants and/or invent high voltage, light-weight, power supplies. The engineers' success would not have necessitated flight for all. "G-cars" may be very expensive. If the flight characteristics of "G-cars" approximated those of documented UFO incidents, the Department of Defense would use them for covert operations and keep them from the public for as long as possible.

216.125.49.252 19:28, 17 November 2006 (UTC)

Have you plugged in numbers into both Musha's and Ivanov's equations. Ivanov seems to require higher potential differences to attain the same accelerations as Musha's equation. An interesting shortcoming of both expressions is their enability to account for the high correlations with lunar phases that were reported by Thomas Townsend Brown and Takaaki Musha. Tcisco 07:08, 23 November 2006 (UTC)

Error

"Gravity is a force that pulls the 4 or 8 dimensions together." This quote is presented in the context of general relativity. First, forces aren't really defined in GR in the conventional sense, and as a theory of gravity (unlike Newtonian gravity), GR doesn't have gravity acting as force. Rather, it changes the geometry of the spacetime, and an object simply continues to move on the geodesic. Secondly, the idea of gravity being a force holding together "4 or 8 dimensions" has no basis in classical GR or even orthodox quantum theories of gravity (M-theory or even quantum loop). This claim is just rubbish.

If several scientific journals give consideration and space to antigravity (and they do), Wikipedia should as well.

Pseudoscience Is Still Knowledge

No one should remove information from Wikipedia simply because they do not believe it is scientific. An Encyclopedia is not intended to be scientific, but to be a reference of human knowledge, which may vary in scope far beyond scientific topics to such subjects as philosophy, religion, or so called "psuedoscience." Moreover, Wikipedia should give all views equal measure, even if a view is unpopular. Simply because most physicists believe Anti-Gravity to be a load of crap doesn't mean it's a fact. Theories aren't facts, period. They are theories. Contemporary science has never claimed to answer all questions or to present its theories as facts, but rather to find rational explanations based on prior knowledge, and for all we know that prior knowledge isn't even correct; see Brain in a Jar. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.221.247.179 (talk) 20:48, 8 December 2006 (UTC).

Gary Stephenson: Considerable Works on Anti Gravity

Last night , I saw a documentry on 'abduction by aliens' on Discovery Channel in which there was a small description on the success in lifting a body with electromagnetic high voltage fields. The name of the scientist was Gary Stephenson. I found only this [[1] about it and a file [2] that explains it. 21st CenturyDRAGON 09:32, 5 January 2007 (UTC)

References

This article would be improved dramatically if one were to use the standard footnote referencing system. There are too many references that do not appear in the text, and I suggest adding a section called "cited references" and "further reading." As an innocent bystander, it appears as if a "proponent" of antigrav has just adding tons of references (many irrelevant) in order to quiet and/or confuse the other editors who are tying to make this a balanced and factual article.

Secondly, it would go a long ways toward improving NPOV if this article were to source (primarily) secondary sources. The majority of references are to primary sources or tertiary sources (such as news articles), and this makes it appear as if this topic is either original research, biassed. Wikipedia, as an encyclopedia (i.e., a tertiary source), and as such, it should be based primarily on secondary sources. Lunokhod 18:06, 27 January 2007 (UTC)

The open invitation to contribute by Wikipedia did not stipulate the incorporation of footnotes. Footnotes had not appeared in this article prior to my initial contributions. I simply maintained citation consistancy.

The invitation by Wikipedia to contribute had emphasized the use of references with the contributions. That was done. If they had been inspected, instead of being rejected for stereotypic rationale, you would have discovered an area of history that had been neglected. The references are numerous because the endeavor had been pursued with vigor.

None of the reference were irrelevant. They evinced a documented area of history that has been overlooked. Reports of meteors, tornadoes, ball lightning, transient lunar phenomenon, and Hessdalen phenomenon had been mocked by the scientific community. But, diligent skepticism manifested the reality of those phenomena. The diversity and quality of the references offset potential biases.

Some of your edits to the article evince a fascinating lack of knowledge about the history of general relativity. For example, your deletion of the statement that many Gravity Research Foundation essays have become papers in peer reviewed journals was irresponsible. Robert L. Forward was not the only essay winner to publish. The International Journal of Modern Physics D has featured selected papers from the Gravity Research Foundation essay competition. If the essays had lacked value, they would not have been incorporated with the collections of the Neils Bohr Library (Center for History of Physics Newsletter, 34(2), 10). Early references to the involvement of the aerospace companies with the gravity research projects had acknowledged the support of the Gravity Research Foundation. The statement about its essays was a method of displaying the integrity of its contributions.

With respect to neutrality, it should be noted that no claim to success or failure of those projects was cited in this article. Statements by whistleblowers proceeded and followed the period of open publicity about the gravity control propulsion projects. References to those writings were not needed to evince the existence of the movement.

I think you are attributing someone else's actions to me (in part). I haven't deleted any references, I am just in the process of turning them into standard hyperlinked footnote form (we could use hyperlinked harvard referencing if you prefer). As for the sententce I deleted that is mentioned above, I don't think that it is necessary to say that GFR essays have become peer-reviewed articles. If there is reason to cite these articles, then do so! Lunokhod 10:46, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Tcisco 07:30, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

Some have mocked the merits of the Gravity Research Foundation because its early years had been dedicated to searching for materials and theories that yielded shielding, insulation; and/or heat extraction from gravity. The incorporation of some of the Foundation essays in a peer reviewed journal and the achievements attained by some of the essay authors were used to attest to the academic integrity of the organization. Those attributes have been presented at physics history conferences. Tcisco 20:17, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

With respect to reference classifications, I can reorganize my segment of the contribution to manifest distinctions between the primary, secondary, and tertiary sources. And, it can be lengthened to evince neutrality by citing the euphoric and negative assessments of the gravity control propulsion projects. My initial goal had been to insert a brief report. Tcisco 20:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

Neutral point of view

There are many sentences in the text such as

Heim’s work had caused considerable excitement.

The notable paper on the Roy Kerr metric by Boyer and Lindquist (1967) was an example of one of the many ARL sponsored articles.

Most writers praised the effort.

In my opinion, these "factoids" should be removed for several reasons. First, they are not cited, so I have no idea as to whether they are true or not. Second, they are subjective: What is "notable"? Third, they are irrelevant for an encyclopedic article. But forth, and most importantly, these give the appearance that the text is not neutral: Events are placed in a positive or negative light, and in the case of this article, it is almost always in favor of anti-gravity being a valid concept worth studying. There are no counter examples, such as "While this publication generated considerable interest by X and Y, it was widely ignored by the physics community." Lunokhod 20:35, 29 January 2007 (UTC)

The purpose of my contributions to this article was to evince the existence of an extensive gravity control propulsion research movement that had transpired decades before the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Project. References that were available at the public libraries and various web sites were used for that purpose.

The excitement Heim had caused during the fifties and sixties was mentioned in the writings by Dröscher and Häuser (2002), von Ludwiger (2001), Sigma (1966), Talbert (1955a,d), and Weyl (1957, 1959b).

I do not know the strength of your background in general relativity, but the nineteen ARL Technical Reports had been written by P. Jordan, W. Kundt, J. Erhlers, P. Bergmann, A. Schild, R. Arnowit, P. Havas, H. Bondi, V. H'lavaty, R. Schiller, E. T. Newman, A. I. Janis, J. N. Goldberg, W. M. Fairbanks, W. O. Hamilton, M. Carmeli, and S. Malin. Over sixty papers sponsored by ARL were published in the Proceedings of the Royal Society of London, Physical Review, Jounral of Mathematical Physics, Physical Review Letters, Physical Review D, Review of Modern Physics, General Relativity and Gravitation, International Journal of Theorectical Physics, and Nuovo Cimento B. Explicit citation of all these references in an encyclopedia article is inappropriate. The example I gave was one that would have been recognized by graduate students in theoretical physics. I was exposed to those articles through an issue of Sky & Telescope. Papers in various peer reviewed works have acknowledged the contributions of the Department of Defense to the resurgence of general relativity. The death of many research projects beyond physics was caused by the amendement to the Defense Procurment Act (known as the Mansfeild Amendment). This is common knowledge in several scientific circles.

And, the gravity control propulsion projects did receive praise and criticism. Sir Arthur C. Clarke (1957), Nick Cook (2001), Intel (1956), Mallan (1958, 1959, 1961), Stine (1957), and Talbert (1955a,b,c,d,e,f) were among those who rendered praise. Cleaver (1957a,b), Stambler (1957), and Weyl (1957, 1959b) levelled harsh criticism against the movement.

The contribution was neutral and stemmed directly from an area of history that had been overlooked.

Tcisco 05:54, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

In my opinion, saying that the project received "praise" is not neutral, unless this was mentioned in a notable publication (one sentence in an article would probably not be good enough). I also think that the excitement would have to be shared by a large portion of the physics community, and not just a select subset of experts, in order to be worthy for an encyclopedic article. Perhaps this was the case. As written, however, these statements appear biassed. Lunokhod 10:51, 30 January 2007 (UTC)

The excitement was among the executives of the aerospace community and trustees of the Gravity Research Foundation. That excitement was described in terms of quotations from various industry leaders that appeared in prominent newspapers (Talbert), trade magazines (Cleaver, Cook, Intel, Mallan, and Stine), and a reputable popular magazine (Clarke). Other writers have used the term euphoric to describe the quotes of those executives and the tone of those articles. Cleaver's articles were very skeptical of the level of excitement he had encountered and expressed great doubt in the ability of those projects to cause a discovery that would yield a breakthrough in the theory of gravitation. Weyl was upset with the use of terminology that had appeared in the articles. The literature yields negligible evidence of awareness by the physics community. I have yet to see a single, peer reviewed physics journal that explicitly refers to the gravity control propulsion projects. A Science Digest article, from the mid-1960's, alluded to it. Tcisco 19:57, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

I'm trying to following the guidlines expounded in WP:FRINGE for this article. In particular, I think that this article is biased because it is trying to make this line of research sound more notable than it actually is (I could care less as to whether anti-grav is theoretically valid or not). I don't think that this deserves deletion based on non-notability grounds, but we should try to present the material in a balanced fashion. In my opinion, a biassed account of this reseach will only help to alienate the anti-grav community from the "mainstream" physics community. Lunokhod 20:33, 31 January 2007 (UTC)

The “Gravity Control Propulsion” section of this article does not violate the tenants of WP:FRINGE. Note that the "Gravity Control Propusion" section did not promote any theory of physics. Responses to Burkhard Heim's presentations were cited. There were several references with paragraphs of praise and a smaller number with paragraphs of criticism of the American gravity control projects. But, both the proponents and apponents had expressed faith in Heim's ideas - they may have disputed the value of America's gravity endeavor, but both had been impressed with Heim. Referring to the published conclusions about Heim did not violate Wikipedia's NPOV standard. The "Gravity Control Propulsion" section conveyed the notability that had been assigned by the editors of reputable publications that had served a major percentage of the United States population. Please note the names of newspapers, technical journals, and popular magazines given in the list of references - they were respected and had served several thousand readers. According to the media, the gravity control propulsion projects had received political, defense, financial, and academic support in the absence of any known theoretical breakthroughs, discoveries, and/or inventions! The literature, although from very reputable publishers, resembled hype that, at best, was based on science fiction. British articles stated that point of view with near disdain. The "Gravity Control Propulsion" section of the article complies with NPOV and News values standards of Wikipedia. Tcisco 19:01, 2 February 2007 (UTC)

I read somewhere that more money was spent on antigravity research than on conventional airplane research during this period. If that's true than this is definitely notable. people who have objections to the pov are really objecting to the facts that make anti-gravity research seem reasonable. Until science can explain gravity, there is no good reason to dismiss anti-gravity out of hand. Puddytang 22:08, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

The organizations and personalities described in the references were real. Burkhard Heim did perform documented theoretical work on force field propulsion; the Gravity Research Foundation was committed to nurturing non-propulsion, anti-gravity research prior to Roger Babson's death; Mallan's interview of Trimble about the rationale for creating the Research Institute of Advance Study has not been retracted; widely circulated media carried statements by theoretical physicists emphasizing the need to develop a unified field theory before pursuing gravity control propulsion research; and the numerous writings produced by the ARL of Wright-Patterson Air Force Base were consistent with their recommendations. The papers and commemorative gravity stone monuments corroborated the gravity control propulsion project stories that had appeared for a period of eleven years in the widely distributed, very reputable, American and British, publications. All of that activity contributed to the resurgence of general relativity. Tcisco 08:34, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

One minor thing about this, "more money" may have been spent on AG research than conventional aircraft in a certain period - but this does not tell you the whole truth. There was a huge program investigating all kinds of ultra-high energy research "more money was spent on this 'Anti-Gravity' program than on the Apollo program". But the small point is that we're talking about a very wide umbrella - I have three jokes for you. -

1. The same program covered something called 'nuclear weapons research' - a lot of their actual work involved nuclear weapons.

2. The 'Hoover' teleportation program. From what I heard a money pit to rival all, the idea was to teleport nuclear bombs directly to Moscow. The apocryphal notes say that they succeeded in site to site for objects up to a kilogram, before it all exploded - in a nuclear sized blast. Also called 'The Philadelphia Experiment'.

3. The umbrella itself was called The 'Psychic' Program, and involved investigation of 'psychic' machines. In reality it was all deepest brown - as in 'Brown Works' - brainwashing, black propaganda, spying, political control, you name it. Another layer of the onion says the whole thing was no more than a way of stealing money for the CIA, the FBI, the army, the NSA, etc. Lucien86 07:48, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Russian Scientist

There is an article somewhere on wikipedia about a russian scientist who made outrageous gravity-shielding claims, but I can't remember his name. Puddytang 22:09, 3 February 2007 (UTC)

I believe you are referring to Dr. Eugene Podkletnov. His serrendipitous discovery and observations were recorded in the prestigious peer-reviewed journal Physica C. Dr. Giovanni Modanese, a Von Humboldt Fellow at the Max-Planck-Institut für Physik, responded in Europhysics Letters by showing the shielding-like phenomena had no explanation in the standard gravity theories except in the non-perturbative Euclidean quantum theory. Dr. Unnikrishnan (1966) had argued the shape of the region encompassing the measured weight reductions could not be attributed to gravity shielding phenomenon. Subsequent reports by Podkletnov and Modanese were about the generation of an impulse beam of gravity-like force. Some of the disputes in this area have stemmed from failures to replicate Podkletnov's experiments.

• Unnikrishnan, C. S. (1966). Does a superconductor shield gravity? Physica C, 266, 133-137.

Tcisco 07:29, 4 February 2007 (UTC)

ANTI GRAV IN FICTION

It should be added to far more, star wars? star trek? The Matrix, the list is nearly endless, at least offer relevant links to machines of the sci-fi genre that have been conceived as a direct result of these theory's of anti grav devices.

H.G. Wells and cavorite

Newton's Law of Gravitation considered gravity to be a force between two objects, causing attraction in proportion to the objects' mass and in inverse proportion to the square of the distance between them. Under this interpretation, an object with negative mass would repel ordinary matter, and could be used to produce an anti-gravity effect. Alternatively, depending on the mechanism assumed to underlie the gravitational force, it may seem reasonable to postulate a material that shields against gravity or otherwise interferes with the force. A fictional example of such a material is cavorite, which is a major element in H. G. Wells' famous book The First Men in the Moon, although cavorite isn't consistent with even a Newtonian view of the universe—it causes violations of conservation laws. Neither negative-mass exotic matter nor gravity-screening material have been observed experimentally. While the potential existence of exotic matter is still debated, general relativity presents persuasive arguments against the existence of screening materials.

The work of Larry Niven

In several works of science-fiction by Larry Niven, there are spacecraft who make use of a "gravity lens", which, presumably, is not an anti-gravity device, but rather deflects gravitational attraction into a different direction. One work mentions that a gravity lens vehicle is incapable of gaining potential energy. (Archived) MegaHasher 20:20, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Split into two or three articles?

Good lord, this article is chock full to the brim with pseudo-science, pseudo-history, and conspiracy theory "supressed science" claims! Ever been to a UFO convention? There are always guys selling books or plans for their "anti-gravity" device that was (1) suppressed by the government/industry/aliens/men-in-black/whoever, (2) was lost during testing and cannot be replicated without more money, or (3) requires exotic materials (element 116, for example) that are nearly impossible to obtain. See for example David Hamel or the Philadelphia Experiment But the stories all disagree as to how the "anti-gravity" works!

I saw a nice article on anti-gravity in a science magazine (Discover, perhaps?) a year or two back, on serious scientific efforts to acheive anti-gravity. None of the efforts looked very promising, but the researchers were real honest-to-gosh scientists trying to push the boundaries of the possible. NONE of this real science is in this article!

I would propose splitting this into three articles, one called "Anti-Gravity" which would describe the phenomena as it appears in fiction and might appear in the real world. From this link to two new articles, titled, "Mainstream Anti-Gravity Research" (a very short article) and "Non-Mainstream Anti-Gravity Research" (which would be most of the bulk from the current article).

I don't want school children coming to this page and believing that mainstream scientists really think most of this stuff is true, or that mainstream historians believe that the supposed history of anti-gravity research is undisputed. The article states as fact that numerous successful anti-gravity experiments have been performed, which is absolutely NOT an undisputed claim. Farcast 22:04, 23 March 2007 (UTC) revised Farcast 22:48, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Much of this material was added recently by Tcisco (talk • contribs). I've given up on trying to maintain this article for the time being, though I'd support a split into "mainstream", "non-mainstream", and "historical" studies of antigravity (with Tcisco's pet project split off into yet another article off of the "historical" section, as it describes only one such effort). Here is the last version I was involved with. Consulting the history since then may also be useful (as I'm sure some of the edits made were valid). --Christopher Thomas 22:59, 23 March 2007 (UTC)

Yes the article is a terrible state by now. Much to wordy an very unimportant things. I'm not sure that splitting would be that usefull. It may create a permanant reservation for the crackpot stuff.

What I like about Tcisco's addition is the information about some "research flurry" in the 50s and 60s. I can't check the sources he gives, but assuming good faith I hope it is not all a carefully crafted hoax.

Of course I don't like the parts trying to suggest, that these activities succeeded but their results are kept secret by the usual suspects.

And all this modern crackpot research (space-mixing and the like§ is just non-notable pseudoscience, with a possible investment scam thrown in.

Pjacobi 18:03, 24 March 2007 (UTC)

I think that having cranky material grow in its own sub-article is preferable to having the entire anti-gravity article being dominated by cranky additions. Regarding the historical additions, while I agree that adding information about the government projects is extremely useful, I think it's vital to check the references, as it'll be a magnet for conspiracy theories. --Christopher Thomas 06:59, 25 March 2007 (UTC)

The material is fringe, neither false nor cranky. You have got to check on some of the references I have cited. They are obtainable. The newspaper article by Ansel Talbert is on the Internet and can be acquired through the libraries. I did not trust the Internet copy. My first copies of Talbert's series of article were obtained by the library in my suburb. The copies they obtained came from the University of Arkansas. I had to pay only six dollars for the first article in the series published by the New York Herald Tribune: a reputable secondary source. Another reputable secondary source with a comprehensive skeptical position was A. V. Cleaver's article in the Journal of British Interplanetary Society. Neither Talbert's nor Cleaver's articles claimed a breakthrough, they simply documented the early stages of an attempt to develop some sort of gravity control propulsion system. That historical fact may have been used as the foundation for various conpiracy theories, but its use, or misuse, does not alter its peculiar reality.

The historical section of this article does not list numerous successes. An unsubstantiated breakthrough was announced in the July 11, 1960 issue of Missiles and Rockets. I may have to go return to the library during a vacation day to search for an erratum. With respect to Thomas Townsend Brown's gravitator, the article cites the reports of successful replications by two Japanese and one Canadian team of experimenters and the theoretical discoveries of Boyko Ivanov. I have yet to encounter any rebuttals to their works. Other groups should try to replicate Musha's tests and Ivanov's analyses.

Keyhoe's articles may seem to be cranky, but Weyl's and Goldberg's papers can serve as a strong form of evidence for his position. A deduction that can be made from a careful study of the references is that the early pursuit of the gravity shielding portion of anti-gravity rapidly declined. Attempts to connect quantum mechanics with general relativity for the development of gravity control propulsion seemed to have received the highest priorities and funding. This transition in priority may have caused Babson to create grants for colleges that were willing to display his gravity stone monuments.

Reorganizing the material into two or three separate articles is a good idea. Gravity shielding and gravity control are distinctive components of anti-gravity that have different and extensive histories. Tcisco 03:07, 26 March 2007 (UTC)

This article needs a rewrite and should be broken into separate articles. It's an embarrassment right now. Diagrams of anti-gravity devices? Really? All of the science-fiction elements should be moved into their own article "Anti-gravity in Science Fiction." The whole "non-mainstream physics" section smells like propaganda for UFO theorists. I propose that be moved out as well into its own article. Section headings like "Tests, real anti-gravity" ... this is in opposition to what? Testing unreal anti-gravity? I feel like I'm reading the equal and opposite of conservapedia when I read this article. Smoopy31 23:04, 10 July 2007 (UTC)

Who is going to do the honors? Sub-categories of Anti-gravity should be created to facilitate the creation and management of rewrites of this and future articles. The following is a brief example of sub-categories and prospective articles that could stem from the Anti-gravity category:

Anti-gravity in science fiction (sub-category)

• Doc E. E. Smith's inertialess drive
• H. G. Wells' cavorite

Gravitational repulsion (sub-category)

• Sir Hermann Bondi’s negative gravitational mass
• Föppl’s negative mass

Gravity control propulsion experiments (sub-category)

• Doyle R. Buehler’s capacitor tests
• John Searl
• Podkletnov’s and Modanese’s impulse gravity generator
• Takaaki Mush’s capacitor tests
• Thomas Townsend Brown’s gravitators

Gravity control propulsion programs (sub-category)

• Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program
• Project greenglow
• The G-projects of the 1950s through 1970s

Gravity control propulsion theories (sub-category)

• Diametric drive
• Heim’s field theory
• Fontana’s high frequency gravitational wave rocket
• Modanese’s quantum vacuum fluctuations

Gravity modification experiments (sub-category)

• Eugene Podkletnov
• Ning Li (physicist)

Gravity modification theories (sub-category)

• Gravity shielding
• Mel Winfield

UFO reports evincing gravity control propulsion (sub-category)

• Maccabee’s analyses of high acceleration records
• Mansfield Ohio case
• Paul Hill’s assessment

Please note I did not include the Dean drive. I believe it belongs to a different category that could be called "bootstrap drives." Tcisco 06:37, 13 July 2007 (UTC)

I completed a draft for the restructuring of the historical section and have commenced the restructuring of the Reported Experiments section. I will try to expnad and transfer the paragraph about Tajmar's work to the Reported Experiments section. Tcisco 07:09, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

Jim Nobody

As a humble, non-academic I found the article interesting. Some of the comments remind me of when it was said "man will never fly", or that "an electic starter motor (for a car) was beyong the realm of electric engineering". Who knows what our decendants will have accomplished 500 years from now? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 196.207.40.213 (talk • contribs) on 16:40, 5 April 2007.

Unfortunately, assertions that "man will never fly" were not backed up by general relativity as oppositions to anti-gravity are. Those problems were ones of insufficient engineering knowledge: the laws of physics never prevented electric starter motors or human flight. Until general relativity is disproven, or at least found to remain incomplete, anti-gravity is literally impossible. Sloverlord 18:33, 13 April 2007 (UTC)

If negative mass actually did exist, then anti-gravity could exist and not violate GR -- I think. SunSw0rd 18:33, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

Yeah, and if the Moon were made of green cheese, then the astronauts on the Apollo project could have carried less food with them. (Sarcasm) JRSpriggs 06:42, 16 May 2007 (UTC)

Actually, while few believe that it exists, it is considered possible. A discussion may be found here, but do some searching on the term "negative mass" and you will find some physics discussion of this concept. Thus it is not, technically, in the same category as "green moon cheese" which is pure fantasy. Negative mass is theoretically possible but there is no extant evidence that it really exists. SunSw0rd 14:23, 21 May 2007 (UTC)

We know now that the laws of physics don't prevent flight, but when people were saying that man will never fly I bet it wasn't so clear. They might have thought that flying would actually require antigravity, in fact. Of course, the existence of birds must have seriously weakened that position and there is no parallel to weaken the case of those who reject antigravity, but it looks like it might be the same principle. -- Lilwik 06:07, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Even before the Wright brothers developed a workable airplane, it was clear that there was no obstacle in principle to manned flight. It was purely a technical problem — how to make a vehicle which could be controlled, generate enough power for a long enough period of time, and be light enough. Gliders, kites, balloons, toy helicopters, birds, bats, etc. existed. So it was obvious that flight was possible.

Negative mass and anti-gravity are quite different. JRSpriggs 09:45, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

There were people who thought flight was facilitated by Cavorite-like substances. For example, the hovering capabilities of hummingbirds was a mystery several years after the Wright brothers' achievement. Organic antigravity compounds were among the explanations offered. The Gravity Research Foundation acquired papers on such speculations during the life time of its founder, Roger W. Babson. Tcisco 17:34, 23 May 2007 (UTC)

I have rarely heard such arrogance. Proof that birds could fly was in no way proof that something larger could fly. Remember this was before aerodynamics were understood properly, or at all. The scientific model then was totally different to what it is now because real scientists weren’t so arrogant as to assume they knew everything and knew that any theory might collapse. As I said elsewhere here, which would you abandon - Quantum Gravity or Relativity? the two are pretty incompatible. Either you have gravitons or you have a curved space time, you don’t need both. - I don’t believe either is correct and am working on a third option that involves 'flat hyperspaces', transitions or 'frames', tachyons, and a very slightly modified Relativity. Relativity as it stands today has flaws so deep that I'm often amazed it has so much support, I note that most of the people who support it so vehemently aren’t actually Relativity scientists. Remember that photo of Einstein sticking his tongue out - to me he’s always sticking it out at the people who believe to much in his theory. Unquestioning loyalty to the party line, attacking heretics and suppressing their works, constant broadcasting of propaganda - that’s politics not science.

End rant - Lucien86 09:05, 8 October 2007 (UTC)

Without commenting on the level of this discussion (which I didn't read carefully), I must add two technical notes:

1. In fact the two incompatible things are general relativity (not special relativity!) and quantum mechanics, or the more general quantum field theory. Quantum gravity, which does not currently exist, is the theory which will hopefully reconcile the two. Thus it is automatically compatible with general relativity. More accurately, at large distances and low energy densities, general relativity should be a good approximation to quantum gravity.

2. Both special relativity and general relativity gave numerous predictions which turned out correct. Special relativity is a fundamental part of quantum electrodynamics, which is the scientific theory which is has been tested with success with highest accuracy. This is why these theories share a complete consensus by the scientific community. Of course general relativity should somehow be modified at extremely smaal scales in order to comply with quantum mechanics, and some think that also at extremely large scales as a substitute for assuming dark matter, but in medium scales it is quite accurate.Dan Gluck 18:39, 9 October 2007 (UTC)

Hi Dan, sorry to be unclear in what I said. There's nothing you said that I don't know. It is this 'total consensus' that is the problem for me, there’s nothing directly wrong with relativity - at least at the basic level. I'm well aware how many predictions in Relativity are correct. My problem was never with Special Relativity, but General Relativity makes assumptions about the general universe that require ftl - even if you label it as something like dimensional time. All the problems with General Relativity to me are in the shape of its ftl universe. Relativities tensor manifold is identical to my flat hyperspace but inside out. The very fact that Relativity allows things as ridiculous as wormholes should say that it has fatal flaws. Extend this weakness to its logical conclusion and Relativity predicts that the universe either does not exist or is very young. Sometimes I even wonder if Einstein wrote the whole thing as a joke. The irony is that if you allow a flat hyperspace its immediately obvious that Quantum physics disintegrates and collapses into a classical physics - this alone should tell anyone which is true, Sorry. Lucien86 00:30, 20 October 2007 (UTC)

Hi, as I said before my own work on this is continuing and I feel I sound overly critical of GR, as it stands I see it as incomplete but it is a remarkably accurate theory. The real truth is that with a little twiddling and tweaking GR can be extended into a central roll into actually mapping the Hyperspace (FTL) universe (and making new predictions). The same can be said of quantum, by solving and understanding its indeterminacy the mathematics behind it should only become stronger - again making new predictions.

One of the reasons this work is all so difficult is that it involves division by zero and other 'monstrosities' and they are why no-one has solved it all years ago. Behind all my own work is a special mathematical/logical model that lets me work with such things. - Which I actually wrote while trying to build a self-aware machine - my start point was in Strong AI. Lucien86 (talk) 03:39, 11 January 2009 (UTC)

Gravitomagnetism

Should gravitomagnetism be mentioned? At least it's a real scientific effect. -- 212.213.204.99 05:25, 10 April 2007 (UTC)

Very good question. The answer is yes. "Guidelines to Antigravity," by Robert L. Forward (1963), pesented gravitomagnetism as one of the candidates for a form of gravity control propulsion. He acknowledged the impracticability of using accelerated masses to generate what he called a prorational field and suggested the use of superconducting currents as substitutes for the accelerated masses. His paper is cited in the Anti-gravity article, but a summary of its was not included. Tajmar, Plesescu, Marhold, and de Matos have implemented Forward's suggestion with Cooper pairs in an accelerated, superconducting Niobium ring to generate a measurable gravitomagnetic field [3]. Many of us are waiting for an independent research team to successfully replicate their apparatus and obtain similar results. If an independent confirmation is attained, it will make it a real scientific effect that could be manipulated by laboratories. I will have to amend the article to accommodate your suggestion. Thank you. Tcisco 14:44, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

I have made a few corrections to gravitomagnetism and to some of its links. Dramatic astrophysical phenomena that evinces the reality of gravitomagnetism had not been cited in those articles. Including them helps to establish it as a valid theory. Tcisco 05:59, 21 April 2007 (UTC)

I intend to cite attempts to generate detectable gravitomagnetic, gravitoelectric, and gravitoelectromagnetic fields by Ning Li, Eugene Podkletnov, and Martin Tajmar's team in the restructured Reported Experiments section. Their attempts have been recorded in peer reviewed journals. Tcisco 07:26, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

The accelerating expansion of the universe

The accelerating expansion of the universe due to dark energy is an effect that causes a large-scale repulsive force. However, this is not gravitational in nature, and so is not anti-gravity.

The author of this article has figured out what dark energy is! Maybe they could lett the rest of us in on it? Puddytang 05:20, 11 April 2007 (UTC)

Really, I would love to know the answer to that. This article is inherently biased, but different parts are biased against different sides. Definitely needs a complete do-over.Cromdog 04:11, 20 April 2007 (UTC)

Correctly that is fair fight in science bit http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0208138 seems to prove now the Dark energy with an antigravity effect. Until now, nobody names it antigravity but the existence of gravitons and antigravitons, searching Google, seems to be a fact. Please help to stop disruptive manner e.g. by User:Duae Quartunciae, no physicist but daring to know everything better. Unclear why saying HERE nothing thanks 84.158.255.57 20:09, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

The article actually covers more than the dark energy notion, which can indeed be considered as a kind of anti-gravity. However, I have removed the demanded by GR phrase from the very first paragraph of the article, because that does not belong in the introduction. The notion of dark energy as anti-gravity — which I support — should be in its own section and not presumed from the start to be the only kind of anti-gravity under discussion. -- Duae Quartunciae (t|c) 22:56, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

By the way... there is a rather strange mention of me above. I think this may be bad feelings arising from discussions of the Fritz Zwicky biography. I've very little input into this article so far; apart from the small change relating to the phrase "demanded by GR", described in the previous paragraph. There are a number of changes from users at 84.158.*.* which are going to be an issue; not just with me. One problem is that they/he is not a native speaker of English, and will need a bit of help on matters of grammar and style. It will be really useful if you register a user name at wikipedia, and use that for your edits. Also, your removal of the "totally disputed" tag was dubious. Since it is at the head of the article anyway, I'm not replacing it. But the recent changes by 84.158.*.* are (Template:Wp-diff) The best thing is to avoid perceived personal issues, engage on the assumption that everyone is trying to improve the article in good faith, and just focus on the substance. -- Duae Quartunciae (t|c) 23:25, 19 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks User:Duae_Quartunciae, see [Our complaint at Jimbo Wales]

Thanks for your first partly positive reaction. Now other user(s) continued unfair disruption.

• UNFAIRNESS AGAINST DISSIDENTS (incl. you) was accused at the WIKI-founder where you must click SHOW in line "Introduction to alternate cosmology controversy and request for assistance" below [[4]].
• Why have I still no IDENTIFICATION (I hope to have in autumn)? I live too far from a city (at DSL-limit), since 3 years hoping to get promised but good working DSL. When I got it, it worked only during a summer sunshine period. After much rain the min. speed not worked. I want no more to regress to pay Internet in phone-minutes. Thus I work with our clubs PC but its HP was cracked last year, redirected to "sexy sites" provoking our big care - like dyn. IP. Sorry, but at my club(s) is published club's main meaning, seldom (only) my own.
• Since 2 months I personylly hope to get my own single private privilege or own but good DSL.
• Correct User:Duae_Quartunciae, with no "native English" we need help therein! In decades not only I had forgot my English.
• But we need no help in (Astro-)physics: If there is no vacancy time we have in 3 associated clubs more than 20 Drs. – 6 Drs. in physics and more than 20 physicians and engineers (like myself). Sometimes we had even contact with an >88 y.o. (some say even 90) formerly well-known (now got very angry) French Univ.-Prof. - While it seemed initially 75%, meanwhile less than 40% support mainstream.
• After a speech and discussions with John Dobson and the Prof. in 2006 we learned that in the whole world Big bang is less and less mainstream meaning, but well protected - see first line of our accusation: LINK [AN OPEN LETTER TO THE SCIENTIFIC COMMUNITY]: about 500 organizations, physicists and researchers meanwhile signed against Big-bang).
• Not reading our link was accused as incredibly unfair manner - by you as none-physicist was your meanest action with your cooperators. To revert but not to realize that only Fritz Zwicky's (!!!) Tired light declares - now even officially supported internationally since March 2007 (now also by NASA in http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0701132 the otherwise not declared Pioneer anomaly!

• Nevertheless you were partly right: "Our" Fritz Zwicky article was finally disturbed mainly by ourselves: Too many in our club finally had found more and more enthusiastically something for his rehabilitation - We say: too many cooks make a bad meal.

• Nevertheless you were partly right: "Our" Fritz Zwicky article was finally disturbed mainly by ourselves: Too many in our club finally had found more and more enthusiastically something for his rehabilitation and we say: too many cooks make a bad meal.

thanks by wfc-k 84.158.216.111 13:14, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Welcome to Wikipedia, Mr Kehler. This page is not a good place to talk about anything not immediately relevant to the article on Anti-gravity. I have written a longer welcome for you, at a subpage in my own user space. Please come there and read, and if you wish to leave me a message there you will be very welcome; as is anyone else. The page is: Welcome to Wikipedia, Mr Kehler. Let's leave this page here for its intended use, and carry more general discussion over in the page I have provided for you. Cheers —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 14:19, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

Proposed changes by wfck (84.158.*.*)

Before making changes that you know are controversial with other editors, you need to try and work for consensus here in the talk page first. There are also clear guidelines on content that you are not following. In particular: neutral point of view, no original research, verifiability and reliable sources.

Note that NONE of these guidelines are about the simple truth of a claim. You need verifiable reliable sources; not an argument in the talk page that your particular point of view is the correct one. Note that the guidelines explicitly note that arxiv itself is not a reliable source; and neither is another wikipedia. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 14:53, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I am going to call for some third party input. Mr Kehler continues to revert, and his edit comments imply that he does not need to discuss because other people don't know the facts of the matter. In fact, I believe his understanding of basic physics is fundamentally flawed in many ways. He should note that arxiv and wikiprojects are explicitly recognized as not being reliable sources. The particular arxiv article he has cited is badly flawed (a pioneer anomaly paper by a mathematician that fails to consider the impact of so called retarded photons on the observations of other planets which do not show anomalous accelerations) and of dubious relevance to this page; but we should NOT be discussing truth of such claims here at all. The issue is verifiabilty. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 23:33, 24 July 2007 (UTC)

I have done another revert; we all will need to watch out for three revert rule. I don't want an edit war; I want discussion to be engaged here. Here are some of my issues with Kehler's recent changes, that I just reverted. I fully appreciate that Kehler is honestly trying to help, and considers that his material is improving the article. In my view, almost all the changes make the article worse, and violate basic wikipedia guidelines.

• The sentence 'Critics have at least to realize that the US-Patent Office has to prove things seriously before granting a patent: one apparatus below describes a kind of a "gravity modifying generator" (U.S. Patent 3,626,605). is badly WP:POV. This is making an argument for the validity of the patented device. We should not make arguments; it violates the Wikipedia guidelines. This is a very BAD argument; because in fact the office does NOT have to prove things in a technical sense before granting a patent. But in wikipedia we should not be arguing for a point of view at all.
• The paragraph including By Einstein still as spooky named, now as reality found and by his own GR supported Quantum entanglement has been proved now. Can Anti-gravity exist as well? is incoherent as English. It is also hopelessly WP:POV.
• All the stuff about floating magnets is irrelevant. That is nothing to do with anti-gravity. It is simply other compensating forces, already explicitly identified in the lead as NOT being anti-gravity.
• The paragraph starting Documents shall inform about same or similar effects of anti-gravity. is the worst WP:POV yet! This is an encyclopedia; not an argument for the reality of anti-gravity.
• The article makes heavy use of arxiv sources. This is a very useful resource for a researcher, and I use them myself frequently. However, there is no review process involved; and so arxiv is explicitly identified in wikipedia guidelines as being NOT a reliable source. You must find published material, and you must not attempt to synthesize that into implications not explicit already in your source (no original research).

There's more; but the problem is that Kehler makes all these additions without any discussion, and indeed refuses to discuss on the basis that his critics don't actually know what is needed. You can't DO that. You MUST come and actually engage discussion about specific changes you would like to propose. Don't attempt a general complaint about bias against unconventional cosmology or about tired light or anything like that here. Indicate specifically what changes you propose, and try to get some consensus.

—Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 00:51, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

The phrase "The article makes heavy use of arxiv sources" in the above criticism is an over exaggeration. There are approximately a half dozen citations to arXiv references out of the pages of citations. Wikipedia does not prohibit the use of arXiv citations. Wikipedia states editors can use arXiv articles authored by recognized experts in the field. Both Giovanni Modanese and Boyko Ivanov had published papers in internationally renowned, peer reviewed, theoretical physics journals before writing the cited arXiv articles. And, both of them had been invited to serve as journal referees. Wikipedia encourages the use of caution and scrutiny whenever incorporating an arXiv reference.

I have added section titles to the historical portion of the article. Tcisco 04:56, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

Thanks, Tcisco; you're right. I take your point. Actually, arxiv is only a minor issue compared with the other problems. But certainly the comments indicate a very uncritical insistence that arxiv is intrinsically reliable. It isn't.

For example, one of the arxiv cites that has been used (and was not actually introduced by Kehler, I think) is gr/0602022, "Emergent Gravity and Torsion: String Theory Without String Theory, Why the Cosmic Dark Energy Is So Small" by Jack Sarfatti.

This is not a reliable source. The paper is apparently unpublished. Jack Sarfatti himself is well known and notorious. Follow the link. This unpublished paper cannot be cited as a reliable source, though it could be given in the context of "Jack Sarfatti says....". This history of Sarfatti's inclusion in the article is hard to follow. I'll comment more on that in a new section.

Another arxiv inclusion by Kehler WAS a reliable source. It was astro-ph/0208138, "Importance of Supernovae at z>1.5 to Probe Dark Energy" by Eric V. Linder and Dragan Huterer. In fact, this is already published and should be cited to Phys.Rev. D. However, its a poor choice for a reference on the particular topic; and the way it was used by Kehler was nonsensical. Kehler's invocation of this paper confused dark matter and dark energy, and actually added nothing at all, because the SAME issue was already in the article, with clearer English, more accurate terminology, and better references. The paragraph added by Kehler can be seen at Old section "Antigravity effect by dark matter". It should have been antigravity by dark energy (not dark matter), but this is already present in the article as it stands.

The fundamental problem is not merely uncritical repetition of arxiv. It is the refusal to actually engage and try for any consensus on controversial edits. The community would be able to manage the problems if Kehler showed any willingness to discuss his actual contributions to the article. But the attitude of Kehler to the wikipedia conventions and to the community of other editors is totally dismissive, and I'm fed up with it. I tried to get some constructive engagement, with ugly results. I'd still be willing to work with him, but he has to be willing to work with others and with consensus himself. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 14:20, 26 July 2007 (UTC)

My comment was not made in defense of Kehler's questionable citations. I was defending the arXiv articles I had cited in my segment of the contributions. The initial focus of this article was the theoretical and experimental attempts to manipulate and/or generate antigravitational phenomena. Arguments and evidence for astrophysically induced antigravitation should be presented in a different article. For example, reports of attempts to emulate or replicate negative gravitational matter would be suitable for this article, but initiatives to detect such materials should appear elsewhere. Tcisco 07:03, 27 July 2007 (UTC)

My fault... above I spoke of "the article" when I should have said "the additions by wfck that I have reverted". I have no concerns with the way arxiv is being used in the article as it stands. By contrast, wfck seems to be invoking arxiv as a kind of magic bullet. The stuff I reverted even had a section called Serious researches (ARXIV.ORG-links); a bizarre heading that focussed on his concerns with other editors rather than on the actual content of what was in that section. The sources he wanted were already in the article, and are still in the article now, as a much better presented brief comment headed Tajmar et al (2006). The revert I applied is 14:46, 24 July 2007. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 00:03, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

Material on fiction by Wells and Niven removed

In a curious edit by User:MegaHasher, (diff) the paragraphs on fiction by Wells and Niven were removed from the article, and transferred into this dicussion page without comment. The material now appears above, in section "#ANTI GRAV IN FICTION". Just flagging this. Was this what you really wanted to do? —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 20:45, 28 July 2007 (UTC)

If User:MegaHasher was trying to help split the article, he should have made a statement in the discussion section. Tcisco 05:04, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

Negative Mass

I have replaced a paragraph from this section because it claimed negative gravitational mass creates singularities. The proof published by Sir Hermann Bondi in 1957 yielded singularity free equations. The correct assessment has been placed in the first paragraph of this section. Tcisco 05:04, 29 July 2007 (UTC)

I executed an "undo" on a deletion of the referenced ZPF phrase. Compliance with the strong equivalence principle and incompatibility with a theory like ZPF was noted during the Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program. Tcisco 19:27, 31 July 2007 (UTC)

I think it is not true that masses of opposite signs violate energy conservation as the paragraph seems to suggest. Actually the equation there shows just this; the force caused by the mass 1 to the mass 2 and the force caused by the mass 2 to the mass 1 are antiparallel, so they repel each other. (Actually the formulas for the force of gravity are also wrong. There should be unit vectors where $r_{12}$ and $r_{21}$ appear.) This should also be clear by an analogy to the Coulomb law which is of the same form except for the constants and masses replaced by charges. Opposite charges obviously do not violate energy conservation, but they too repel each other. EDIT: Ah, now I got it. If the mass is negative, the mass accelerates to the opposite direction with respect to the force applied. But I think the energy conservation still isn't violated as the following person argues.

Negative mass also seems to suffer from problems similar to the gravity shield. Forward pointed out that a negative mass will fall toward "normal" matter as normal, while normal mass will fall away from the negative matter. Forward noted that two similar masses, one positive and one negative, placed near each other will therefore accelerate in the direction of the line between them, away from the negative mass. This is another apparent violation of conservation of energy.

Quite to the contrary! The negative mass acquires a negative kinetic energy, for if m < 0, then ½mv² < 0. If m₁ = −m₂, the two speeding masses have zero total kinetic energy. Therefore, energy is apparently conserved. I can't check it right now, but it seems unlikely that Forward would make such an elementary mistake. Anyway, the conclusion is wrong so I'm correcting it.
—Herbee 18:20, 15 November 2007 (UTC)

Resurrecting an old thread: m in kinetic energy refers to inertial mass, not gravitational mass. We don't know whether the hypothetical negative masses discussed would have positive or negative inertial mass (any Higgs expert there? ^^). No equation in physics establishes relationships among the two, even though we've always found m_i to be equal to m_g, but we're talking about m_g < 0 here, another never-encountered situation. Habbit (talk) 22:38, 30 June 2008 (UTC)

Reverse Casimir Effect

I just happened on this page while flicking through random articles. For what it's worth, New Scientist recently did a very interesting article on the subject, see http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn12429-three-ways-to-levitate-a-magic-carpet.htmls Pan narrans 20:48, 13 August 2007 (UTC)

Tajmar effect tested in New Zealand

I'd love for this to be real; it would be really cool.

But the reporting of attempts by Graham and his colleagues to measure the Tajmar effect reported no signal above experimental errors. I excited to see an apparent positive confirmation in the previous edits, but then I read the papers. Graham's group report no effects within experimental error. I have updated the main page accordingly.

The commentary in response by Tajmar's group is a bit weird. They put on a brave face; acknowledge the effect is small, but manage to pull out a small signal from the noise. It looks like wishful thinking; but I guess I can't say that in the article. The spurious "confirmation" claimed by Tajmar and colleagues is of the opposite sign to what they would have expected; and so they speculate some association with being on the other side of the Earth (New Zealand vs Europe). All in all, a null result reported for the experiment; and an implausible bit of reaching from the advocates for this alleged effect.

Disappointing for those who like a new surprise. Serious blow for the claims of Tajmar and colleagues. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 12:08, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Sorry to disappoint your disappointment, but there is a very good reason why the signal is appreciably weaker in Graham's group's experiment: they were measuring the far-field effect whereas Tajmar et al.'s detector was much nearer and so was measuring the near-field, where the signal was almost certainly, if present, appreciably stronger. Thus the field so far away maybe was 21 times weaker than up close: it's a wonder they saw teh echo they did in that case, and it speaks for the robustness of the effect. Many have been asking why the NZ group's setup was not a proper reproduction of the Austrian one - the answer is that the NZ group used what they had, which was not particularly close to the Tajmar setup. Shades of Cold fusion debacle: sloppy reproduction, claim a dud, set up a straw man and knock it down. Sickening. Hopefully the Berkeley and other groups will pay greater attention to detail in their replication attempt. --hughey 12:23, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Perhaps. But if you are going to cite the Graham group results, you should not cite them as supporting the effect. I disagree with your analysis. They are applying the proposed theory to a larger set up. Heck, even Tajmar's curious reporting acknowledges that the magnitude of the effect is much smaller; and in their conclusions, Tajmar et al acknowledge explicitly that their earlier theory proposed last year has been refuted. From the conclusion of Tajmar's latest paper: The high resolution gyro measurements rule out our previous theoretical model which predicted a coupling proportional to the material’s Cooper-pair and lattice mass density (Tajmar and de Matos, 2006b). (page 12). —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 12:44, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Here we go again. I have removed a spurious original research attempt to undermine the experimental refutation of Tajmar's 2006 model. The removed material made a distinction between "near field" and "far field" which does not appear in the citation provided. This is ridiculous! The new experiment is not an attempt to set up exactly the same conditions in every respect, but to give an independent test of a theoretical model proposed. Having a different configuration gives more insight; not less. The results by the Canterbury group are a perfectly valid test, and Tajmar has conceded that the theory they proposed in 2006 is now falsified by more sensitive measurements. Tajmar's own writings don't make any of the objections being brought up in the main page in a misguided attempt to defend Tajmar. On the contrary, Tajmar explicitly notes the advantages available with the Canterbury group set up, and frankly recognizes that their 2006 theory is refuted. That is the main conclusion of the Canterbury group. They applied that 2006 theory, derived conclusions, and falsified them.

Tajmar continue to defend the presence of a smaller effect; but they also admit the possibility that the effect does not exist and is some kind of systematic error. Continued tests, in a range of configurations and conditions, will be needed to sort this out, and denigrating one of these tests on a pile of spurious objections not actually in the literature is OR under the guidelines and scientifically vacuous. Sheesh. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 22:56, 21 August 2007 (UTC)

Then, somebody needs to edit the last paragraph at this link (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Tajmar)

Yes; I've been aware of that. Its on my todo list. If someone beats me to it, great. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 22:44, 27 August 2007 (UTC)

The NZ group did use lead as superconductor material, not Niobium. Niobium has a ρ*/ρ ratio that is high compared to other superconductors and tests from Tajmar with other superconductor materials like YBCO showed, that a high p*/p ratio might be important. Read his paper [5]. What p*/p ratio does lead have? --81.210.148.4 (talk) 04:39, 15 March 2008 (UTC)

Larry Leon Burks

Larry Leon Burks has twice added his own personal web page as an external reference. This cannot be included for multiple reasons. It is a private web page, and the material is not notable. Stop adding this material, Larry. It does not even come close to the requirements for inclusion in wikipedia. You should review WP:COI, WP:OR, WP:RS, WP:N, WP:FRINGE, WP:EL, and probably a few others as well. Apart from anything else here in wikipedia, you should get rid of whatever is putting those awful popups on your page. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 00:41, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Larry has now added his link once, and reverted to add it again twice. I have removed it three times. I can do no more for the time being, under the three revert rule. Larry, there is no way that link is going to remain for long. I am not reporting it as yet; but if another editor sees it, then they are likely to remove it as well, after which you need to be careful about the three revert rule. I have already given a warning to Larry Leon Burks (talk · contribs) on his talk page, and so I will proceed straight to a formal report after two more reverts from Larry. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 05:26, 26 August 2007 (UTC)

Reverting unsourced additions

I've just reverted an addition on "Gravitic Contention" which had no sourcing of any kind. Feel free to try again if there is some more information you can give. But in line with WP:RS, I have decided better no information than bad information.—Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 13:59, 1 September 2007

You are vandalizing. Check the references. The article did not misrepresent them. Tcisco 17:28, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Here is a diff of the edit I applied. There were no references or footnotes in the section I removed. There was no mention of "contention" anywhere else in the article.

The word vandalism has a very particular use. Just calling an edit you disagree with "vandalism" is not appropriate. It ferments bad feeling and degrades the atmosphere. I applied an edit in good faith that improved the article by removing unsourced and unreferenced assertions. If one of the articles in the massive list of references bears some connection with the removed paragraph, there was nothing to indicate this in the text. That means that the claims are not properly referenced, just like I said. All the claims need to be presented in such a way that the reader can reasonably figure out the basis for the claim. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 22:51, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Large purge

I've done a large revision of the article, drastically cutting back the sections on claimed anti-gravity devices per undue weight. They gave the article a serious POV and neutrality problem. Hopefully, the current version is acceptable. Note: If you want to add any large amount of the material back, you're going to need to justify it very well. See my user page. Michaelbusch 23:45, 10 September 2007 (UTC)

Major restoration executed via Undo command. None of the references cited in the article had been disputed. Citations were for technical papers, dissertations, thesis, peer reviewed journals, reputable newspapers, and recognized aerospace magazines. None of the articles between the fifties and seventies had generated retractions. Tcisco 17:23, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

A blanket revert isn't appropriate here. I ran through the article and removed material of dubious relevance, validity and importance. You haven't justified the re-add. Explain why the material needs to be there. Note: that something hasn't been retracted doesn't make it valid, and that something is valid isn't sufficient for inclusion in Wikipedia or in this article. See Wikipedia is not a collection of random information. Michaelbusch 18:35, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

A massive deletion has not been justified. All articles cited are from reputable publishers. None of them have generated retractions. Which reference is false? The talk section contains discussions for degenerating the article into several articles. You have not addressed the concerns raised in those discussions. Controversial topics demand numerous citations. Don't vandalize. Tcisco 21:13, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Tcisco, you seem to be missing my point. I'm not disputing the sources, although some of them are not reputable (e.g. the long citations of paranormal activists claiming US government coverup). I removed the material I did because it didn't meet Wikipedia:Notability/Wikipedia:Undue weight/WP:NPOV, wasn't relevant to this article, and/or was given excessive discussion. This was in response to User:Duae Quartunciae's statement above, and also User:Pjacobi's and User:Farcast's requests for the amount and discussion of pseudoscience to be cut down. This isn't vandalism. This is cutting down the word count to make the article understandable. Michaelbusch 22:36, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

(edit conflict)

Tcisco, don't use the v-word. It's not appropriate here. This is a good faith edit, which I think is reasonably well founded. That being said, however, I think the proper onus is on Michaelbusch to explain what material he removed and why. I say this as one who is inclined to think that the changes are an improvement. I appreciate that this is more work, but I think we need it on the table. I'm happy to help out a bit with this.

The ideal process in a situation like this is for everyone to recognize good faith attempts to improve the article. You can disagree on what is an improvement without throwing around accusations of vandalism.

This is an good situation for the BOLD, revert, discuss cycle. The idea is that when making changes, proceed as follows.

• First, be bold. This is good practice, and Michaelbuch's revision is an example of this. He saw a problem; and dealt with it.
• Second, revert. This is also good practice, and Tcisco's revert is an example of this. He disagreed with the fix, and flagged his disagreement by reverting.
• Third, discuss. Now that it has been established we have two perspectives, we can see that the original bold change is going to need to explain itself to achieve consensus.

The problem is that the editors involved have moved straight into an edit war, with three more reverts. Michaelbusch, I appreciate that you've done a power of work here; but I'm afraid that a part of that work is going to be explaining your changes in a bit more detail. The major onus is on you to defend your changes; not on Tcisco to defend the revert. This onus has nothing to do with what is more plausible or not. It is a simple consequence of the fact that you are proposing to initiate a major change. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 22:49, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Details of the proposed purge

In a major edit, this article was cut back from 49,102 bytes to 14,352 bytes. Changes can be reviewed in this diff.

Listing out the various changes in order, omitting some which seem pretty trivial, we have:

1. Removal of the disputed tag. (Based on remove of disputed material.)
2. Removal of a one sentence mention of Λ-CDM in the lead.
3. Removal of a phrase mentioning zero-point field in the section Negative mass?.
4. Removal of a section Accelerating cosmological expansion, which describes the dark energy as a kind of anti-gravity.
5. Removal of a paragraph from Tajmar et al (2006 & 2007), in which Tajmar responds to a failure to detect his purported effect.
6. Substantial rephrasing of Nation-wide anti-gravity initiatives.
7. Removed entirely the following subsections of Nation-wide anti-gravity initiatives:
   • Gravity shielding initiative removed.
   • Gravity control propulsion initiative removed.
   • Monitoring Soviet anti-gravity projects removed. (only one short sentence!)
   • Growth of the nation-wide initiative removed.
   • Resurgence of general relativity removed.
   • Recent gravity control propulsion initiatives removed second paragraph, on so-called Neo-Aetherics.
8. Section Reported experiments renamed to Alleged experiments, given a one sentence lead linking it to paranormal.
9. Subsections of the experiments section reduced as follows:
   • Thomas Townsend Brown's gravitator cut from six paragraphs to two.
   • Gravitoelectric coupling, removed a sentence explaining Li's justification for not releasing the device.
   • Gravity impulse generator removed. This section had been flagged as probable advertisement.
   • The enormous list of references was massively pruned.

I will followup with a comment on these changes. My first step is just to document what has changed. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 23:46, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Tcisco (talk · contribs) has revert portions of this purge. He has been reverting to a version 43,337 bytes long. Hence this is not just a blanket revert. He has apparently gone through the edits and decided what to dispute, I think.

For the sake of review, here is a diff from the original before the purge started, to the reversion reverted by Tcisco. diff original to Tcisco's revert

Also, here is a diff from the purged version to the reversion reverted by Tcisco. diff purged version to Tcisco's revert.

Going by these diffs, I guess Tcisco may be okay with removal of the following:

• The phrase mentioning zero-point field in the section Negative mass? is still removed.
• The section Accelerating cosmological expansion, which describes the dark energy as a kind of anti-gravity, is still removed.
• Monitoring Soviet anti-gravity projects still removed.
• Growth of the nation-wide initiative still removed.
• Resurgence of general relativity still removed.

—Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 00:39, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Duae Quartunciae, thank you for setting this up. Tcisco, do you accept the above to start with? Second, why are you so insistent on including large descriptions of the US funding in the 1950's-70's here? It isn't appropriate to have half the article be about historical side-notes, such as Brown's claims. It makes the article almost unintelligible, at least to me. That's what the outside articles are for. And to avoid edit-warring, I won't be editing the article for at least the next day. Michaelbusch 03:59, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Thanks Michael. I think this should be fairly easy to fix up, with a bit of patience and a bit more time. Having done so, whatever remains as the article becomes that much more stable. I am proposing to add some subsections here, for different parts of the proposed purge. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 04:19, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Your distinctions between a proposed and executed purges are interesting. Deleting numerous tertiary citations without substantive cause is fascinating. For example, the resurgence of the general relativity segment stemmed from a dissertation and presentations by internationally recognized physicists. The institutions that had caused and/or nurtured that renaissance had been established to either conduct gravity screening research or gravity control propulsion research. The general relativity renaissance is a significant event.

I have not neglected your questions and requests to compile justifications for the references. It will take some time to complete those tasks. I will be able to devote more effort to these since my son's wedding has been recently completed.

The references I had contributed do not support the removal of the majority of material that had appeared in this article. My contributions had summarized articles and reports that had been written by reputable authors and that had been disseminated by mainstream, respected publishers. Subsequently, the quality and reliability of the citations had satisfied Wikipedia's criteria. Many overlapping articles were included to comply with Wikipedia's demand for several article to boister the text of controversial issues. Those can be reduced to first citations of an issue and/or conclusion. Tcisco 04:52, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

With respect to Wikipedia:Notability, Wikipedia:Undue weight, and WP:NPOV rules, the Monitoring Soviet anti-gravity projects segment belongs in the article. National concerns were provoked by the New York Times' story about the Soviet's program. The results were a widely published investigative report by an astronautics historian and a defense study for the Air Force. Those are features of notability and diverse opinions for a significant portion of the population. Tcisco 03:17, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

With respect to the Resurgence of general relativity segment of the article, as summarized by the papers and dissertation by Kaiser and Jean Eisenstaedt’s section in Einstein and the History of General Relativity satisfy the Wikipedia:Notability and WP:NPOV rules. The minority classification of that group may not meet the Wikipedia:Undue weight rules. Tcisco 03:17, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

The Wikipedia:Undue weight justifications for restoring the national initiative segment of the article are given below in the section entitled "Application of the undue weight restrictions." The the Wikipedia:Notability and WP:NPOV requirements had been addressed above in this talk page during the course of other discussions. Tcisco 03:17, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

List of references

The original version of this article had an absolutely insane number of references. Wikipedia guidelines on citing external sources indicate that the References section should be for material actually used in the page. In this case, the References section was being used inappropriately as a kind of general purpose bibliography. Such material really belongs under "Further reading" or "External links".

In the External links guideline, the rule is as follows:

it is not Wikipedia's purpose to include a comprehensive list of external links related to each topic. No page should be linked from a Wikipedia article unless its inclusion is justified.

The list of references badly needed purging. If Tcisco wants to retain any of the purged references, he should give a justification for each one. Note the guideline section WP:EL#Important points to remember specifically notes that links should be kept to a minimum. —Duae Quartunciae (talk · cont) 04:19, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Justifications for several references had been explicitly cited in this Talk section several months ago. In particular, the three segments of this section entitled References; Neutral Point of View; and Split Into Three Articles had presented justifications for reputable, tertiary references. They were among the materials recently deleted without justification. Rationale for the deletions failed to exhibit any familiarity with the references. At the very least, those portions of the article that had been discussed and justified in this Talk section should be restored. Such actions would be in compliance with the Wikipedia guidelines. Tcisco 14:04, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Please link to the relevant parts of the talk page archive. Also, 'several' isn't the same as the huge bibliography. But you still haven't answered my question. Please explain it, clearly and concisely. Michaelbusch 17:19, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

References were cited to avoid plagiarism. Many statements in the article are not common knowledge. I can't defend the links I did not contribute. Tcisco 16:54, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

Justification for References – Project Existence Literature

Names of project sites and key personalities and the reported achievements had been deleted from the nation-wide anti-gravity initiatives section. Those features should be listed to support the claim that the initiative was comparable with the Manhattan Project.

This group of references evinces the existence and magnitude of the American gravity control research initiative. They were contemporaneous with the early period of those projects. Between them, they contain the names of all of the aerospace firms, military branches, research institutes, and universities that had declared they had been engaged in gravity propulsion research. They had presented quotations from theoretical physicists, corporate executives, and wealthy stakeholders who supported the projects. The majority of them indicated the projects had been classified. Material by Babson, Mallan, and Talbert described the beliefs and theoretical factors that had caused the initiative. Reports by Cleaver, Stambler, and Weyl represented the critical point of view. Weyl’s critical survey of theories closed with praises for Burkhard Heim’s work in Germany. Keyhoe’s section presented the UFO conspiracy theory point of view. Clarke’s article praised the capabilities of the talent that had been assembled by the Research Institute for Advance Study. Gravity Rand’s report indicated negative results for early tests of the parallel plate condensers. Gladych, the Gravity Research Group, Intel, and Stine described the features and positive results of the classified experimental research on parallel plate condensers that had been conducted by the aerospace companies. The article entitled “Force field research by Ryan shows promise” report positive results for a different type of gravity control propulsion system. The Aero Digest article indicated the Glenn L. Martin Company and the Defense Department had worked together to recruit physicists and engineers from Europe and America. The project sites, lines of experimental research, theoretical principles, company presidents, scientists, and policy makers should be named and their references cited.

• Anti-gravity studies booming, (1956, March). Aero Digest, 72(3), 6, 8.

• Babson, R. W. (1950). Actions and reactions – An autobiography of Roger W. Babson (Second revised edition). New York: Harper & Brothers Publishers, pp. 340-344.

• Clarke, A. C. (1957, December). The conquest of gravity, Holiday, 22(6), 62.

• Cleaver, A. V. (1957b, April-June). ‘Electro-gravitics’: What it is – or might be. Journal of the British Interplanetary Society, 16(2, issue 75), 84-94.

• Gladych, M. (1957, July). Spaceships that conquer gravity. Mechanix Illustrated, 53(7), 98-100, 174, 181.

• Gravity Rand Ltd (1956, December). The gravitics situation. In T. Valone (Ed.). (2001, January, 4th ed.) Electrogravitics systems: Reports on a new propulsion methodology (pp. 42-77). Washington, D.C: Integrity Research Institute. ISBN 0-9641070-0-7

• Gravity Research Group (1956, February). Electrogravitic systems: An examination of electrostatic motion, dynamic counterbary and barycentric control (Report GRG 013/56). London: Aviation Studies (International) Ltd. In T. Valone (Ed.). (2001, January, 4th ed.) Electrogravitics systems: Reports on a new propulsion methodology (pp. 11-41). Washington, D.C: Integrity Research Institute. ISBN 0-9641070-0-7

• Intel, (1956, May). Towards flight without stress or strain… or weight. Interavia, 11(5), 373-374.

• Keyhoe, Donald (1974, December). Aliens from Space - The Real Story of Unidentified Flying Objects (pp. 39-40). New York: The New American Library. LCCN 73-83597.

• Force field research by Ryan shows promise (1960, July 11). Missiles and Rockets, 7(2), 27.

• Mallan, L. (1958). Space satellites (How to book 364). Greenwich, CT: Fawcett Publications, pp. 9-10, 137, 139. LCCN 58-001060.

• Stambler, Erwin (May 1957). “Anti-gravity – fact or fancy?” Aviation Age, 27(5), 26-31.

• Stine, G. H. (1957, June). Conquest of space: anti-gravity: power of the future. Mechanix Illustrated, 53(6), 22-23.

• Talbert, A. E. (1955a, November 20). Conquest of gravity aim of top scientists in U.S., New York Herald-Tribune: Sunday, pp. 1 and 36.

• Talbert, A. E. (1955b, November 21). Space-ship marvel seen if gravity is outwitted, New York Herald-Tribune: Monday, pp. 1 and 6.

• Talbert, A. E. (1955c, November 22). New air dream-planes flying outside gravity, New York Herald-Tribune: Tuesday, pp. 6 and 10.

• Weyl, A. R. (1957, October). ‘Anti-gravity’. Aeronautics, 37(2), 80-86. (British Aviation Publications).

This second of group of recently published references evinced the existence and current notability of the nation-wide gravity control propulsion initiative that had commenced in the fifties.

• Cook, N. (2002). The hunt for zero point: Inside the classified world of antigravity technology. New York: Broadway Books. ISBN 0-7679-0627-6.

• Greer, S. M. (2001). Disclosure: Military and government witnesses reveal the greatest secrets in modern history. Crozet, VA: Crossing Point, Incorporated. ISBN 0-9673238-1-9.

Another group of reference justifications is being compiled. Tcisco 06:59, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

This may be a good point in time to implement some of the article split recommendations that had been discussed earlier by Farcast, Christopher Thomas, Pjacobi, and Smoopy31. The national initiative section of this article could be mildly expanded with corrections incorporating most of the references above and the historical elaboration could be continued in a new article. Tcisco 14:25, 24 September 2007 (UTC)

Tcisco: you still haven't justified why this material should be in this article. Providing more references doesn't change that. Michaelbusch 06:49, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Rationale for the references have been cited above.Tcisco 06:54, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

The references represent diverse points of view of American editors; British editors; astronautics and aviation historians; retired military officers; whistleblowers from defense departments; a famous science fiction writer; and aerospace engineers. Some of them praised the American gravity control propulsion initiatives while others harshly mocked it. All of the publishers are reputable with wide, if not international, distributions. This section of the article should not become an annotated bibliography. The recent edits and inclusion of the justified references were prepared to evince the existence of a classified, nation-wide gravity control propulsion program that lasted over two decades.

Michael Busch, your deletions were performed without making explicit comments about the justifications. If you feel a particular citation was inappropriate, please identify it and list its shortcomings. Tcisco 14:15, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

Tcisco: the entire rationale is Wikipedia:Undue Weight. The justifications you've provided have not addressed why so much coverage is necessary. I'm not disparaging your references. Michaelbusch 18:58, 25 September 2007 (UTC)

See the following section for the Wikipedia:Undue Weight rule justifications for the restoration of the references described above and those you had deleted earlier. Tcisco 14:04, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Application of the undue weight restrictions

The gravity control propulsion initiative texts and references were in compliance with the News values standards and undue weight restrictions of Wikipedia and should not have been deleted. According to Wikipedia policy: “Articles that compare views should not give minority views as much or as detailed a description as more popular views, and may not include tiny-minority views at all.” From the perspective of that rule, the physics community, back in the fifties and during the twenty-first century, has been a tiny-minority. The sentence “Unsurprisingly from the viewpoint of current physics, the US initiative led to no results” is an unreferenced opinion by a tiny minority. It violates the undue weight restrictions. Dr. Jean Eisenstaedt’s section in Einstein and the History of General Relativity indicated the period from 1925 through 1955 was a “low water mark” for studies of general relativity in both America and Europe. Dr. David Kaiser’s dissertation manifested the greatly diminished number of graduate level general relativity courses offered by university physics departments back then. I have yet to encounter a paper from the physics community that states those explicit projects had failed.

Statements explicitly addressing the gravity control propulsion projects, from prominent members of the physics community, have been published and supportive. Positive expressions for the projects have been made by Dr. Bryce DeWitt, Dr. Edward Teller, Dr. J. Robert Oppenheimer, Dr. John Wheeler, Dr. Vaclav Hlavaty, Dr. Stanley Deser, Dr. Richard Arnowitt, and Dr. Lucien A. A. Gerardin. Their statements were featured in publications for a much larger population. The New York Herald-Tribune, The Miami Herald, Holiday magazine, and True magazine published explicit accounts about the initiative for their broad base of subscribers. Press releases by industrial leaders stated their participation in gravity propulsion projects. The opinions the mass media had molded were much greater in number than the physics community. Subsequently, they must be represented in the article.

The next largest majority was the aerospace community. Their technical articles from the United States and Great Britain provided explicit information about the projects. The “flood of letters” to the editor of Interavia caused them to publish an additional article about gravity control propulsion research. The body of aerospace literature represents another majority that should be represented.

Conspiracy theories became popular after the Watergate scandal. Subsequently, the testimonies of whistleblowers from the ranks of government contractors became of interest to the general population. At the very least, the comments by Nick Cook and Dr. Steven Greer, about the anti-gravity research projects, must be represented in the article. Tcisco 04:29, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

The physics community is not 'a tiny minority'. They are the experts. Michaelbusch 04:34, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

Their expertise has not been an issue. Relative to the population of subscribers that the media had targetted for news about the gravity control propulsion projects, they are a tiny minority. Many aerospace engineers have earned doctorate degrees in physics. In terms of occupation, they constitute a body of experts larger than the physics community. With respect to the undue weight restrictions, the physics community is a small minority and the subset of relativists has always been a tiny minority. Tcisco 04:51, 26 September 2007 (UTC)

I do not understand how any of the above justifies the large inclusion. If you insist this must be on Wikipedia, spin it off into another article and link it. Michaelbusch 20:00, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

I recommend History of United States anti-gravity research. The Undue Weight consideration is most important for this article in that it makes it readable. Michaelbusch 20:05, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

You have failed to offer any arguments to my justifications, other than disatisfaction. My contributions have complied with the Wikipedia rules. You claim it is not readable. Maybe the word you should use is that it is objectionable in your sight. Tcisco 20:18, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

(undent) I have been going through the diffs trying to reconstruct what all of this is about, and I think I have a bit of an idea now. But to start with, this article is in terrible shape, period. Although I have comments about the section under discussion, I believe we need to take a serious look at the state of the article as a whole. It jumps around terribly from empirical claims to conventional effects and then back to other claims. This is not good. There are examples of little subtopics one or two paragraphs long being promoted to full sections. Lots of them! And now due to Tisco's last edit, it has two Nation-wide sections!

Now on to the topic at hand. Unless I am seriously misreading the topic, which is possible due to all the edits and rv's, then it seems it can be summed up into a single paragraph: some rich guy paid a lot of money to set up a fun research project and generated some papers. And some other guy said the aviation companies were doing it too. They vouch for each other. Is this important? No. Look, I agree that something about it should be in here, perhaps even more than what Michaelbusch has clipped it down to, but Tcisco's material is absolutely giving the topic too much weight.

Let me explain with an example. In the 1960s and 70s the cancer research community was absolutely convinced that cancer was caused by viruses. That's because they had demonstrated this with birds, where all known examples could be transmitted in this way. Funding across the entire "industry" was focussed on this, and they even declared a war on cancer. It was only a matter of time before the viruses were identified and vaccines would become available. Except that didn't happen, it turns out that very few human cancers are caused by viruses, and to date there has been only one such vaccine, produced almost 30 years after the major research effort ended.

Now, should this be mentioned in the article on cancer? Absolutely! Should it take up roughly a half of the article, as it used to here? Absolutely not! In a general article on the topic of cancer, it should get a few paragraphs, no more. Another article on the entire history of the virus theory is appropriate. In fact, I notice that there is no article on the war on cancer here, which is astonishing. I think I have my next topic!

So I am generally in agreement with Michaelbusch's thinking. Certainly a mention of the Gravity Research Foundation is appropriate, and I'd like to see some full articles on RAIS and ARL.

As an aside, I have undone Tisco's last edit -- NOT to remove it, but to invite him to put it into the section that was already there! Maury 02:54, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I can do that. The section was located roughly in the middle of the article. Tcisco 04:22, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I didn't create the RIAS article due to difficulties I had with trying to load photographs of it from the Glenn L. Martin Company. Tcisco 05:18, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Much better, thanks! Maury 12:27, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I was going to respond to the 3O request, but I see that you have already had some constructive outside input, so I have removed the listing. If the dispute reignites, feel free to relist it or drop me a line and I will chip in personally. Adrian M. H. 13:45, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Readability of the Article

Results of straw poll:

• 4 votes for spinning off History of United States anti-gravity research and reworking article.
• 1 vote for article as is.
• 2 votes for reorganize, without spinning off.

Based on this, I think we should proceed with a new article. Michaelbusch 23:58, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Michaelbusch what is your response to the proposed re-write that Maury has developed in his sand box? Tcisco 16:48, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Straw poll request:

Tcisco is insisting on including a large block of material in this article regarding US government funding of anti-gravity research in the 1950's-1970's. I contend that the existing article is far too verbose on the subject, rendering it unreadable and violating undue weight. I propose that the material should be removed from this article and either not included on Wikipedia or spun off to History of United States anti-gravity research. Both versions of the article can be seen in history. Please indicate your support or otherwise. Let's have this poll run for 48 hours. Michaelbusch 22:33, 27 September 2007 (UTC)

History section to be streamlined and material either spun off or removed

• Support - I concur with below statements for further overhaul. Michaelbusch 22:33, 27 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support in addition, other parts of the article should be merged and summarized Beast of traal T C _ 02:31, 28 September 2007 (UTC)Beast of traal
• Support, with it mostly spun off, and with both the summary and the full article vetted carefully for WP:V. This whole article needs an overhaul, but that's a separate issue.--Christopher Thomas 02:38, 28 September 2007 (UTC)
• Support. I also think other parts of the article should be merged and summarized. This article is way too large and detailed for such an insignificant failed idea. Dan Gluck 15:41, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

History section to be organized according to Tcisco's view

• Support - The reorganization of the entire article should follow the structure of the Manhattan Project article with diligent compliance with the Wikipedia rules. Tcisco 05:34, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Other (please explain)

• Reorganise, do not delete content - I think that having the history section so early in the article gives undue weight to that section, but the content of the section should be retained. It appears well referenced, and Wikipedia is not paper. It is certainly reasonable for Wikipedia to record that a significant group of people went off on a well-documented wild goose chase, presumably spending non-trivial amounts of tax-payers' money while doing so. WLD^talk|edits 07:18, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: Do see Maury's notes above. Michaelbusch 07:31, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

• Reorganize: I think the current length is about right, but I would really like to see some organization to it all. For argument's sake, consider this:

"Concepts" brief overview of the very different "types" of AG in scifi, collecting up many of the little sections in the article into one.

"In theory" (seems like the wrong title, but...) would describe conventional GR theory and why it "outlaws" AG. There's nothing in the article on this now, and it strikes me as rather important. We can then have subsections that describe other theoretical considerations (Heim?).

History would discuss all of the material that's brought us here, as subsections. We could also collect Brown into this section, and all of the superconductor claims.

Comments? Maury 12:27, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment: The reorganization should follow the current state of anti-gravity views. According to undue weight rule, the article should compare the popular views. With that maxim in mind, please consider the following assessment of the current state of anti-gravity:

Anti-gravity is a dream of flight without strain (i.e., flying without flapping). Its first appearance in science fiction was as cavorite in H. G. Wells’ book. A survey of the literature manifest a history of well funded attempts to make it a reality. The aerospace and defense communities do not seem to have developed an anti-gravity propulsion system. Reports of un-replicated breakthroughs have been published in peer reviewed journals and technical magazines. Conspiracy theorists and whistleblowers claim anti-gravity propulsion systems have been operational since the seventies. UFO researchers cite gravity control propulsion to explain the reported flight characteristic of anomalous aerial objects. Theoretical physics have provided controversial solutions that may yield gravity control propulsion. Research in anti-gravity propulsion has continued.

The above summary may not be in full compliance with the undue weight rule because it under represents the 24.6% of the United States population that believes in the extraterrestrial hypothesis. But, each sentence in the above paragraph can be referenced. Tcisco 15:31, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

(undent) re: "undue weight rule" -- it is vitally important to understand that undue weight means undue among experts. Those 24.6% of people that believe in extraterestrials count to exactly 0% in this case, a point that seems to have been overlooked in the discussion above. When I examine the references you have posted (in the diffs below) I believe its safe to say they fall into two groups, a series of articles by Talbert, and a selection of after-the-fact historical overviews. Compared to the libraries full of papers on GR and gravity in general, even these "well funded" (I see no numbers) projects are clearly a tiny minority, in the sense noted able. It's also important to note that you did say "current state of anti-gravity views", and the efforts in question here took place the better part of a century ago. I believe its safe to say that the "current state" is that these led to nothing. But as I have said, I still find it interesting and worth mentioning -- many of these were new to me until I read the diffs, and I enjoyed them. Maury 19:51, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you for the clarification. The wording in the "undue weight rule" should be amended to "undue among experts" to prevent similar misinterpretations. When I first read it, the number of people, not their expertise, who shared the same view seemed to be the determinant for minority status.

I believe your interpretation strengthens the case for retaining the summary of the legacies of the gravity control propulsion initiatives. In particular, the creation of the Research Institute for Advance Study (RIAS) by the Glenn L. Martin Company in November 1955. The birth of the Institute for Field Physics, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill by the Gravity Research Foundation in 1956. The commencement of the intense research program in general relativity and quantum dynamics at Wright Patterson Air Force Base in September 1956. The activities of those institutions contributed to the resurgence in general relativity. References by Jean Eisenstaedt established the low water mark prior to the initiatives and the works by David Kaiser illustrate the influence of the Gravity Research Foundation. Joshua Goldberg's paper summarizes the Air Force's impact. And, one of the most prominent international experts, Louis Witten, was among the first employed to work at RIAS. Lloyd Mallan's interview of George Tremble clearly indicates RIAS had been initially created to conduct gravity control propulsion research. Tcisco 22:42, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree. In fact I've made some progress on a complete re-write along these lines, and if you'll give me another day or two (I'm re-building my kitchen this week, so I don't have a lot of wiki-time) I'll have something that I can put up in my userspace that you can all comment on. Maury 12:51, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

• On hold: would someone mind posting some diffs? I want to be sure I understand this issue fully before voting. Maury 01:58, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

I have restored Thursday morning's version within its initial position. Tcisco 04:30, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Version with condensed history section: [[6]].

Version Tcisco would like: [[7]]. Michaelbusch 04:00, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

The restorations I prefer are described above in Details of the proposed purge. Justifications are presented there for retaining the segments of the article describing the history, news stories about Russia, and the Resurgence of general relativity. Other sections that had been deleted in the initial massive purge were verifications of T. T. Brown's 1928 observations by Takaaki Musha, Okamota, and Boyko Ivanov. The final form of the historical section of the article should indicate the number and type of project sites; stakeholders; official and leaked duration; secrecy; reports of effectiveness in reputable publications; and legacy (e.g.,spinoff of high level research facilities; relativity reniassance). Tcisco 05:12, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

For the record, Tcisco, are you planning on participating in the poll? Michaelbusch 05:13, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Thank you. I didn't know contending editors were allowed to vote. Tcisco 05:21, 28 September 2007 (UTC)

Proposed re-write

I had a little time this morning, so I've whipped up a new version of this page which you can read here. I have added a section in the intro explaining how modern physics appears to outlaw anti-gravity devices, which I believe is important. I have collected all the theoretical approaches into a single section, and the empirical devices into another. I have added several other examples of both that I was aware of that had not been previously included.

I have also toned down the Talbert references, for the reasons I have outlined above, and removed those that appear to be supported solely by "fringe" references (UFO journals and such). These are suitable for separate articles on the topic, but in this article I believe it simply distracts from the overview-like text I think we need to maintain here.

It still needs more refs -- I'd really like some help there. I've also put in a few placeholders for areas where some expansion is needed. For instance, I know that the original "national efforts" section mentioned another foundation being created (at a university?) but I can't find it in the diffs. Tcisco, if you can recall what I'm referring to here, could you add it in place of the "*"ed section (you'll see it). I'd also like to mention a few of the variety of gyroscopic devices that have been made over the years.

Anyway, let me know what you all think!

Maury 13:52, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the third paragraph of the intro needs work. General relativity does have antigravity solutions, as you mention in the "negative mass" section; saying that these are abnormal is begging the question. And I don't see how Newtonian gravity is so amenable to shielding; you can use the shield to build a perpetual motion device, as detailed in the "gravity shields" section. -- BenRG 17:39, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

BTW, I recall a recent "flap" in the anti-gravity field, but I can't recall the specifics. I believe it was first mentioned by a physicist from Chicago (IIRC), who built a device using a group of capacitors mounted on the end of a stack of piezos. The idea was that the piezos were charged up when they were being pushed, and discharged before being pulled back again. Does this ring any bells? Maury 14:04, 29 September 2007 (UTC)

Proposed concepts for the re-write

Thank you Maury for commencing the rewrite. I will try to post my suggestions in this talk-page for incoporation with your sand box draft.

I believe the following theoretical achievements, that have been released in reputable publications, should be represented in the re-write:

• General relativity (GR) supports polarized, propagated gravity-like impulses. Robert Forward used frame dragging GR solutions to show that large volumes of condensed matter, subjected to very high angular accelerations, could briefly produce negative and positve gravitational pulses. Astrophysical evidence for frame dragging has been its successful applications to explaining the features of relativistic jets without recourse to magnetohydrodynamics.

• Halpern and Laurent showed it was theoretically possible to stimulate the production of gravitons in a manner simular to the stimulated emission of photons by laser systems. Giorgio Fontana recommended research for developing space travel principles based on the analyses by Halpern and Laurent. Subsequently, The MITRE Corporation has supported a conference on high frequency gravitational waves.

• An established theoretical physicist, Boyko V. Ivanov, incorporated very conservative techniques in applying the Weyl-Majumda-Papatetrou solutions of GR to develop a proof that supports the Biefeld-Brown gravitator. Takaaki Musha reported positive test results for the Biefeld-Brown gravitator by two Japanese groups. Musha used an approximation technique to derive a formula. It resembles Ivanov's expression. Noriki Iwanaga presented an analyses of Musha's work at an American Institute of Physics (AIP) conference. Musha's most recent presentation was made at the International Academy of Astronautics.

• Giovanni Modanese did show in a very prestigious journal that it was theoretically possible for a superconductor to modify the gravitational cosmological constant to create a weak shielding effect.

The above may be considered to be fringe physics, but so is anti-gravity. Tcisco 05:47, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I don't think Wikipedia is the right place for such things. Even if any of these things turns out eventually to be true, and even if anti-gravity will be the major science of the 22th century (which I doubt), wikipedia is not the place to start. It should only deal with notable things, which are either well-established (such as general relativity) or things which may be nonsense but yet occupy the attention of many many researchers and have a central place in the physics community (such as string theory). All other things, such as anti-gravity, superluminosity , invisibility and time travel, should only be mentioned briefly. Dan Gluck 06:13, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I am offering the above for a brief set of statements. It is a set of descriptions with a little rationale. The actual wording could be reduced to a sentence for each. Please note that each of the above, with the exception of Modanese, were the products of rigorous applications of classical general relativity theory. Tcisco 06:30, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I think some of these are definitely useful. However I'm also worried about expanding the article too much. Perhaps we should consider a point-form article that works "in conjunction" with this one, similar to Timeline of Jet Power? Of course I generally don't like having to read two different articles, but this might be the only way to avoid the "laundry list" problem.

But, if I may, does anyone out there have any serious problems with the rewrite in its current form? I would argue that it is a much better article than what we have now, and as such I would like to see it -- or something similar -- in the page. BenRG, I have updated the second paragraph of the intro based on your comments, let me know what you think. Michaelbusch, do you have any comments?

Maury 13:44, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

Actually, maybe the best solution is a separate section on GR? This would first explain the "basic idea" of GR, which I think is valuable in understanding the topic. Subsections in this section would discuss some of the GR solutions mentioned above, as well as the negative mass subsection that's currently elsewhere. Does this sound doable? Maury 13:49, 30 September 2007 (UTC)

I think it is a sound suggestiong. Having classifications of types of gravity control propulsion research will be useful and satisfies many of the suggestions that have been registered in this talk page.

I am going to proceed with the development of the separate history articles for the American gravity control propulsion initiatives.

Maury, you have done an excellant job of arbitrating this edit war by restructuring Anti-gravity. Please replace the currrent article with the sand box draft. Further improvements could be performed in the normal manner. Tcisco 00:34, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Maury, I hope you do not object to the switch in the current location of footnote 6 for the Mansfield Amendment to the first sentence in the second history paragraph of the sand box draft. Its Goldberg's paper describing the features of the Air Force's research program. Tcisco 00:48, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Regarding the "Thomas Townsend Brown's gravitator" section in the sand box, you may want to re-consider the phrase "no one has managed to duplicate this feat." Reports of successful replications have not appeared in English peer reviewed journals. But, papers confirming Brown's gravitator have been presented before the American Institute of Physics (AIP) and the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) conferences. Ivanov has manifested the theoretical roots of Brown's gravitators in general relativity theory through three arXiv preprints. Although he has published several papers on more mainstream topics in general relativity, he has experienced considerable difficulty trying to get his more controversial work published. Versions of the Anti-gravity article before September 11, 2007 carried a summary of their work along with the references. Tcisco 14:38, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

My complaint about the intro is basically unchanged. Most of the second (formerly third) paragraph is opinion, not fact; I disagree with your opinion and I think most physicists would too. The difference between blocking magnetism and blocking gravity is that there's no magnetic charge, therefore there's no net magnetic flux across the boundary of any region of space, leaving no obvious reason why you couldn't confine a static magnetic field inside the region. There is a net gravitational flux across the boundary of any region that encloses some mass, so you can't prevent the gravitational field lines from escaping unless Gauss's law is wrong. What does "these geometrical solutions always solve to positive solutions" mean? What is a "positive solution"? Does "always" mean "always" or does it mean "except in the cases where it doesn't"? And how do you solve a solution? -- BenRG 16:57, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

Feel free to edit it as you wish. When you're done let me know so we can copy it over ASAP. The current article is in terrible shape, and even "less suckage" would be a major improvement. Maury 19:04, 1 October 2007 (UTC)

(undent) BenRG? Michaelbusch? Any final comments here? I'm going to copy over, so if you have any serious complaints, now is the time to address them. Go nuts on the article, I whipped it up while installing an oven so it's hardly surprising its less than perfect.

BTW Tcisco, I am highly suspect of the B-B ref you recently added. They used a spring scale to measure the weight of an oscillating object, which is absolutely no-no #1 in this field. The only way to be sure these things do anything is to seal them in a vacuum container hung from a string and see if they move then. This would be trivial to do with the experimental setup in question (a capacitor!) and the fact that they didn't attempt this makes me extremely suspect. To add to my concern, the quoted references are a joke -- a desk reference and various UFO enthusiasts?! This appears to be a crap experiment, and I strongly argue for its removal.

Maury 12:29, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

Maury, the B-B references I had recently added to the sand box draft were papers that had been presented to the International Academy of Astronautics (IAA) and the American Institute of Physics (AIP). The IAA was formed by the International Astronautical Federation during their eleventh congressional session in Stockholm, Sweden, in August 16, 1960, and had gained recognition by the United Nations in 1996. Neither the IAA nor the AIP have been regarded as a joke by the aerospace and physics communities. Their publications are reputable. Please note that neither paper in the citation, nor previous ones by Musha in other publications, state a spring balance had been used in the B-B experiments. Their schematics and descriptions use the term electronic balance without citing the product codes and names. The significant issue with the Japanese tests is the insulation. Improperly shield laboratories can adulterate the measurments. Neither recent nor earlier reports evince "crappie experiments." Tcisco 17:43, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

We will have to agree to disagree on this one I suspect. But I will be more specific. The IAA paper is a written as review article. It contains a total of eight references. Of these, one is a letter and thus not germane. Two are passing references to basic physics, and also not germane. The references taken from "Adventures Unlimited Press", "Electric Spacecraft Journal", "Infinite Energy" and "Integrity Research Institute" are unreviewed fringe magazines, largely UFO-related. . That leaves a total of three references that have any value, PhyRevA and and arViv, both by Hal Puthoff, who publishes Infinite Energy IIRC.

This is precisely the sort of one-off publications that Undue Weight is specifically included to eliminate. Does anyone build on this topic? Not that I can see. Does it have a single experiment run by the author? No. Does it consist of anything other than the mumblings of one person? It doesn't appear to. This is precisely what Undue Weight is about. Heck, I don't think this paper represents the majority view of the people he quotes -- certainly Brown himself never seemed to believe in his lifters after the 1940s. Anyone can write a paper, Undue Weight is about what other qualified people think about it. This references simply doesn not pass. Maury 21:45, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

I concur with Maury on this. Thank you for taking the time to go through the references in detail. Michaelbusch 22:00, 2 October 2007 (UTC)

I am not sure of which reference you are referring to. The one I added was footnote 10 in the sandbox draft. It cited a paper published by the IAA and another published by the AIP written by Takaaki Musha and Noriki Iwanaga, respectively. Neither one were in the format of a letter.

The AIP paper reviewed both the theoretical and experimental aspects of the experiments reported by Musha. The theoretical explanation and descriptions of the sets of electrostatic experiments performed by Musha’s team were in the Electric Spacecraft Journal and other articles that had been published in Japanese. Iwanaga pointed out the weaknesses of Musha’s theoretical explanation and suggested steps that should be taken to reduce potential sources of systemic errors in the experiments (corona discharges and ion wind).

The IAA paper clearly indicated it was a description of the experiments that had been conducted by the Honda R&D Institute group. They conducted tests of Musha’s claims with an improved experimental device. It had been assembled to mitigate corona discharges and ion wind components. The IAA paper presented a brief review of Ivanov’s independent derivation of the Biefeld-Brown effect from classical general relativity theory. Musha’s approximation incorporating a modulo Z set to one resembled Ivanov’s equation. The IAA paper was an attempt to strengthen Musha’s observations and had re-emphasized the electro dynamical variant of the Biefeld-Brown effect that had been recorded by the Okamoto’s team.

With respect to references, the IAA paper carried two arXiv preprints, not one. One was by Ivanov and the other by Haisch, Rueda, and Putthoff. Their credentials and the peer reviewed papers that had been written previously by those physicists were sound. Subsequently, their arXiv preprints should not be taken lightly. Tcisco 04:04, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Please do not overlook the fact that the IAA has presented Musha's work for the consideration of more than one thousand representatives of scientific communities from over twenty-nine countries. The Japanese teams had acquired enough credibility to merit international attention. The original gravitator concept of the Biefeld-Brown effect has not been disregarded by the physics communities. Tcisco 11:47, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

I do not overlook either of these issues, but the concerns still stand. Unreviewed overview articles backed up by references from UFO books are not suitable references. End of story. Seriously, Tcisco, how could you possibly think otherwise? Maury 12:44, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

No problem. I can delete footnote 10 from the sand box draft. Tcisco 13:54, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

(undent) Ok, and as I have not heard back from BenRG (I think he's off for a few days), I'll make an attempt to clean up the second intro para, and post it all later today! Maury 17:34, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

It's done! I finished the other articles I was working on, so I've pasted in. Enjoy. Oh and Tcisco, you might enjoy Convair KINGFISH (just a wild-ass guess). Maury 21:46, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Oh, I forgot to ask, are the references below included in appropriate places? Many of them seem suitable, and should be added if they're not there. Forward's stuff in particular; he tends to write very readable papers with explanations of the physics. Maury 21:50, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Thank you again for your immediate response to the straw poll and your yeoman's restructuring of the article. Later this evening, I will check on the conversion of footnotes from the sand box draft. Did you want the editorial reminder notes in the gyroscope section to remain? And, Maury, you may find the lenticular reentry vehicle article to be interesting. Tcisco 22:17, 3 October 2007 (UTC)

Oh, those notes... yes, please remove them! I would like to flesh them out though, there are a couple of famous gyroscope devices out there (notably the flying saucer one, who's name I can't recall). Maury 12:28, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Okay, I will remove the notes. I will double check my copy of Iwanaga's AIP paper for the assessment of the gyroscope experiments. I have forgotten the name of their team leader. I don't own any technical papers describing Serle's observations. Most of my literature about his claims would not be recognized by the physics community. Tcisco 14:12, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

(undent)Also, do we know "A. Talbert"s full name? I always hate using short forms in names, unless the person themselves used that form (like A. Y. Jackson). Maury 14:55, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Yes. Former Lieutenant Colonel Ansel Talbert has been described as the greatest aviation journalist of the 20th Century. He was the author of the series of anti-gravity articles in the New York Herald-Tribune and the Miami Herald. His titles were Military and Aviation Editor for the New York paper; Herald Special Writer for the other; and he had possessed extensive experience within the news media. Prior to the two series of articles, he had served as one of the interviewers for the CBS television program Longines Chronoscope in the Nation. Air Force General George C. Kenney, Senator Joseph R. McCarthy, Senator Frederick A. Seaton, and former vice president of the United States Henry A. Wallace were among the luminaries he had interviewed. Former Lieutenant Colonel Talbert had been in a position to receive sensitive information about new and/or classified projects. He was the right person to serve as the messenger. Talbert’s disclosures listed the “players” and resources and prudently withheld features of the research being pursued. Today's trivia. Tcisco 17:59, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Archive discussion?

Any concern about archiving the discussion above? Maury 12:29, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

None. Tcisco 14:15, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Interesting, notice the style of these posts? BUG! Maury 14:50, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

No, non bug, just a trailing tag. Fixed! Maury 14:55, 4 October 2007 (UTC)

Experimental evidence?

Randell Mills has published a new paper that purportedly describes experimental confirmation of his theory regarding the anti-gravitational effect of so-called hyperbolic electrons. The experimental setup seems fairly straight forward - create hyperbolic electrons by shooting a beam of free electrons of the correct energy through a perpendicular beam of neutral atoms (e.g. He, Ne, Ar, etc.). He then measures the upward (anti-gravitational) deflection of the electrons by the ratio of current densities at two grounded electrode plates, one above and one below the electron beam, both positioned about 100mm behind the atomic beam. He varies the electron energy and sees deflectional peaks that correspond, roughly, to quantum modes predicted by his theory. This seems like a pretty interesting phenomena - particularly because it should be easy to replicate if true. Anyone else think this is worth mentioning on the page? GenMan2000 01:06, 1 November 2007 (UTC)

No reference to laithwaite

Why ?

He seems to be the originaly source of all speculations about antigravity and gyroscopes.

He is not an unknown personality, since he is the inventor of the Maglev

Patent was emited by his gyron corporation

Russophobic bias?

The current article makes no mention of Podkletnov's name at all. This is regrettable, as "en.wikipedia.org" means en. as in english language, not en. as in english property of web! WASP cultural imperialism ruins the very nature of the Internet! 82.131.210.162 (talk) 18:50, 9 January 2008 (UTC)

Boyd Bushman's Very Specific Experiment on Gravity Reduction/Shielding/Anti-Gravity

Boyd Bushman was an employee for Lockheed Martin's Skunkworks division and has talked vaguely about their work in trying to build aircraft that used anti-gravity technology.

To my knowledge he has never explained anything specifically about how these craft work/might work because of his NDA's or so he claims.

He has however made a very explicit claim of one experiment he conducted while at Lockheed that I guess wasn't part of his work in their Skunkworks projects.

He claimed that he bought a pair of some of the most powerful rare earth magnets available. That they cost around $5000 for the pair. He claimed that he created a spiral into the magnets and screwed the magnets onto a metal screw. In laymens terms he took a screw and the magnets were like bolts that he tightened onto the screw. He needed to do this because he oriented the magnets so that their north poles were opposing each other. Below is a crappy text diagram to illustrate what I mean:

  |South Pole Magnet 1|

  |North Pole Magnet 1|

        |    |

  |North Pole Magnet 2|

  |South Pole Magnet 2|

He then placed this item inside a spherical object he had drilled out to hold the item and capped the end. He also had another spherical object identical to the one with the magnetic item.

He proceeded to drop both objects at the same time while observers were asked to record which object hit the ground first.

Trial after trial after trial the observers continually recorded one object hitting the ground slightly after the other one. The spherical object with the opposing magnets inside was the object that continually landed second.

This is a very easy experiment to test if incredibly powerful opposing magnetic fields decrease gravity in the objects around them. I believe this should be added to the article hopefully encouraging others with some expendable cash to throw away to repeat this experiment and help prove or disprove his results. I have done lots of searching on Google and have found pretty much no one discussing this experiment. Bob 72.209.12.250 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.209.12.250 (talk) 17:58, 24 January 2008 (UTC)

> I am going to add this entry to the article in 2 weeks if there are no objections. Bob 72.209.12.250

>> :I'm objecting. If there are no one discussing the experiment, we do not include it in the 'pedia. Read our policy/guideline at Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Reliable sources. --朝彦 (Asahiko) (talk) 18:03, 3 February 2008 (UTC)

>>> This is not original research, I did not come up with this experiment, I heard about it in a video interview with Boyd Bushman. It is on the record that Boyd Bushman worked for Lockheed Martin. It may not be possible to prove he worked for their Skunkworks division but that does not mean he is not a reliable source. It seems your main objection is the lack of discussion of the experiment. Which is the whole reason I wanted to post it on Wikipedia, to increase the discussion of it.

>>> As it stands no one has made peer reviewed demonstrable proof of anti-gravity technology or anti-gravity theories which kind of puts this whole page into question. I don't see why this entry should be excluded since it will be encouraging peer review, just like the other entries on this article.

>>> Your thoughts Asahiko? - Bob 72.209.12.250 19:27, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

No, we don't write Wikipedia articles to increase discussion on a topic. (We define "original research" pretty jargonistic here.) Wikipedia aims to be a non-interfering observer of human knowledge. If there aren't enough discussion going on already (and they must be verifiable, mind you), they don't belong here. However, if the contents you're planning to add is already published in reliable sources, go ahead and add them in, citing sources. --朝彦 (Asahiko) (talk) 01:45, 7 February 2008 (UTC)

Dear Asahiko et al, it seems that since gravity modification in the lab is a phenomena that remains to be proven, and is the subject of ongoing research and debate, an article on the subject must necessarily take on a journalistic bias or at best be a summary of research to date. You are not presenting a scientific paper but a description of the subject. In that context, I think that pretty much anything can be included so long as the entry/article is properly structured.

I have followed discussion of the subject on and off over the last ten years or so since the publication in the UK Sunday Telegraph of a story on Eugene Podkletnov's research in Finland. On the one hand the subject has since taken off again (excuse the pun) since Podlkletnov's research was publicized, but the Telegraph article almost drove P underground since his paper submitted to the British Journal of Physics was pulled in the light of the resulting sensationalist publicity. I agree in part with one of the commentators above that you cannot write an article on the subject without P and other theoreticians and researchers such as Giovanni Modanese and Ning Li being central to the subject, particularly with regard to the most recent research in the last decade. I am not from a scientific background and cannot comment on the theory behind the subject, but one point that strikes me in assessing P's work and subsequent attempts to repeat P's results is that he came from a materials science background and had an almost unique ability to fabricate large superconducting discs. My conclusion from following P'S story and attempts to repeat his findings in other labs is that almost nobody has recreated the superconducting disc, which is at the heart of the experiment, to the exact same specification. It's just a thought, but this could be one of the reasons why the subject has stalled ever since, although there were reports that Ning Li and her co workers were, after apparently being one of the few successful teams to repeat his experiment, preparing to exploit the effect commercially. Whatever happened to them? For that matter, whatever happened to Podkletnov and his disc?

If it's of any help I can probably dig up some of the less sensationalist material that I found over the years. One of a very few first hand journalistic reports on Podkletnov, resulting from a face to face interview with the man him-self, is to be found in Wired Magazine Issue 6.03 of March '98. The journalist, Charles Platt, embarks on something of a wild goose chase before he finally meets P, and there is a lot of copy given over to some rather colourful characters he meets along the way, however there is some good insight into the attitudes of respected scientists and researchers at that time, few of whom were willing to talk if their identities were revealed, as the subject was so controversial. This is certainly of interest in an historical context and the problems that scientists face when presenting or even discussing radical ideas. For the scientists amongst you who are involved in this particular debate I have the greatest of respect even if you are simply joining in to debunk the subject. Going anywhere near it takes courage. Good luck, and I look forward to reading Tcisco's article after it's revision. I will leave you with just one more thought: you scientists would presumably not be in this business if you really thought that everything that could be known about the universe was known. Then you would just be technicians! (with all due respect to technicians)Stravaigin (talk) 17:10, 10 February 2008 (UTC)

Antigravity and its effect on time-space

Are there any theories that exist where antigravity is looked at based upon its effect on time-space?

Here were my thoughts: In a gravitational field time-space is warped distances are expanded and time slows down.

What would be the opposite of gravity if looked at based on effects on time space. distances would compact and time speeds up.

The reason I am looking into this is for thoughts on the expansion of our universe and the red shift associated with it. The thought or theory is based on space-time only exists relative to gravitational fields. A lack of gravitational field or antigravitational field means that is beyond our "Universe". If the universe is expanding then that is because the net gravitational field is getting stronger.

--Tommac2

Replaced GR with general relativity throughout

I have replaced 'GR' with 'general relativity' throughout. The article on general relativity spells the words out in full, and I found the use of 'GR' here grating. -- Etimbo ( Talk) 17:31, 26 July 2008 (UTC)

Removed "Lagrangian Points"

I have removed the following paragraph from the section "Conventional effects that mimic anti-gravity effects":

• Multiple nearby gravity sources generate separate gravity fields. Thus, if an object is placed at a certain location between two sources (the so-called Lagrangian point, see picture), their gravity cancel out each other's. In this state, the object still experiences gravity, but from opposite directions with the same strength, so the resulting force is null.

It is not the gravity of the objects that cancels each other out, it is gravity *plus centrifugal forces*. The situation is very similar to a satellite staying in its orbit despite gravitation. --Lotharster --91.67.24.156 (talk) 13:11, 3 October 2008 (UTC)

Accelerating Objects Using Gravity

This is a general question to all Wikipedians: Using anti-gravity or some force of reversed gravity, would it be possible to accelerate a projectile to super speeds? I'm not talking about magnetic propulsion or anything of that sort, or a Gauss gun, but really taking an object, putting it in a chamber of some sort with Anti-Gravity or some sort of Zero-Gee space to make it reach higher speeds before going out and reacting to the Earth's gravity. You know, to make it faster. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.171.126.143 (talk) 03:29, 15 December 2008 (UTC)

Re: Tajmar effect tested in New Zealand

There is something amiss in what I have seen concerning this so-called testing of Tajmar's effect by the New Zealand group. For one thing, the discrepancy between the mass of Cooper pairs first measured in superconductors by Janet Tate et.al is a long-standing discrepancy. In New Scientist, 2006-11-11, Tate is quoted as saying The measurement has remained unexplained for the last 20 years. Whatever you may say about Tajmar's work, that discrepancy is still there and still remains unexplained. Moreover, at last check, the reported anomalies of the Gravity Probe B mission are also still unexplained. Thus, we still cannot rule out a gravito-magnetic effect.

Has anyone bothered to contact Tajmar directly? Because I did and this is what he tells me:

It's always the same problem that people just read abstracts only. The New Zealand group (Graham et al) tested my 2006 theory (which I already dismissed with my own experimental results) - not my experiment. They did not find any result with error bars two orders of magnitude above my signal strengths! If you read their paper they say in the last paragraph that their results can not confirm or refute my experimental claims but that they put limits on my old theoretical model.

So according to Tajmar, the New Zealand result is almost irrelevant. He also pointed me in the direction of a more recent paper (2008):

http://arxiv.org/abs/0806.2271v2

FYI, I would like to remind everyone: The astronomer William Wallace Campbell whose 1922 measurements of his observations of the Sun during a total eclipse in Australia would eventually confirm Einstein's predictions. However, before the said measurements, Campbell had made a preliminary set of measurements with inferior equipment during a solar eclipse of 1918 that did not confirm the results. He appeared at Cambridge and was about to refute Einstein's theory but Eddington had data, admittedly limited data, obtained from measurements precariously obtained during a solar eclipse in Africa that seem to confirm Einsein's bending of light.

Campbell decide to delay publication that would have refuted GRT, rather stating that yes, the Einstein theory is unsettled. In other words, Einstein's theory came very very close from being refuted before anybody invested in trying to vindicate it.

Imagine what would have happened had Campbell not been so conscientious?

Thus, I submit this section about the New Zealand group should be revised because it apparently does not really refute Tajmar's experimental findings and Tajmar has since discarded his theory. I would say the experimental result is unsettled NOT repudiated. I agree that Tajmar's experimental findings need to be vindicated and/or refuted by other groups, especially in America but this part of the web-site conveys the wrong and negative impression. Now. I could decide to be bold and make the changes myself but I would prefer not to enter a tug-of-war with the author(s) of this part of the web-site. I would like to get some feedback first But I submit that this part of the web-site conveys a premature conclusion and thus the wrong impression. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 171.71.55.135 (talk) 23:48, 18 December 2008 (UTC)

Anti-matter/gravity Question

The article states; "A longstanding question was whether or not these same equations applied to antimatter. The issue was considered solved in 1957 with the development of CPT symmetry, which demonstrated that antimatter follows the same laws of physics as "normal" matter, and therefore has positive energy content and also causes (and reacts to) gravity like normal matter." Has this been tested/verified experimentally? (David Kessler) 19:32, 12 March 2009 (UTC)