Quantum leap in physics?

[G2099]

Within months, company officials say, they will offer critical information and possibly even a prototype of an energy generating device that functions according to the principles that BlackLight's founder, Randell Mills, says he has discovered.

With enough financial and marketing support, the energy could be available for use worldwide in just a few years, BlackLight researchers say.

"This technology could eliminate gasoline altogether," said Mills of his radical theory. "I think it will have extraordinary impact."

http://www.nj.com/news/times/index.ssf?/base/news-0/1136192775314670.xml&coll=5&thispage=1#continue

[Tommy_J]

1. I wouldn't hold my breath...

Ever notice how some breakthroughs are always just months away? Blacklight has been saying that for years.

[C_U_L8R]

3. But it would be sweet

to see all those oil rats be
thrust out of business
(and government)

[DS1]

17. They'd buy the rights and patents and lock them up forever

before being put out of business

[TallahasseeGrannie]

2. Just months away

along with the number two guy in Al Queda..

and the first successful diet pill.

Wait, wait, wait. I'm getting too old to wait!

[thefool_wa]

10. TG you crack me up

always with witty repartee, most excellent.

I am no grannie and I am getting too old to wait, I mean its 2K6, where's my f***ing flying car!

[TallahasseeGrannie]

13. Yeah, and how about that

particle transfer thing and the replicator? And a vat full of extra organs? We need to get on the stick!

[longship]

15. I want my house cleaning robot.

And NO. I do not mean one of those vacuum cleaner robots that you get to trip over any time you want to walk in the living room.

[ThomWV]

4. The Wheel That Never Stops Spinning

And other perpetual motion machines.

No power in, no power out.

Its not hard to understand.

[Redstone]

5. Uh-huh. Just like cold fusion, Isn't it?

And we all know how well THAT turned out, don't we?

Feh.

Redstone

[wtmusic]

8. "With enough financial and marketing support"

press-release-ese for "looking for investors". Caveat emptor.

[Ezlivin]

6. Cargo Cultists

If we wait for these guys to succeed, then we are no different that the cargo cults that sprung up on Pacific islands during WWII.

PT Barnum would be proud of these guys and all the others that will undoubtedly appear in the next few years as Peak Oil hits.

[xchrom]

7. i will then throw off my disguise as a gay human

i am in fact a gay alien -- and i will steal the device and return to venus.

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

9. If it does work, we'll never know.

It'll be discredited and/or supressed, and the designer will be accidented.

They should have kept their mouths shut until they had a working prototype to show, along with an airtight peer review report.

[HereSince1628]

11. For how many years now has Blacklight been months away

from this breakthrough?

I'm pretty sure I read this same line in 2004.

[baldguy]

12. The oil companies will just supress it.

Just like they did with the electric car and the IC engine that runs on tap water.

[muriel_volestrangler]

16. Those aren't the same things

There are electric cars; there aren't IC engines running on tap water. So it's a bit difficult for oil companies to suppress this in a similar way to two completely different things. You have to choose one of them.

[OldCurmudgeon]

14. just another example...

just another example of "faith based" R&D, following along the ancient path pioneered by the alchemists, who sometimes managed to turn bullshit into gold.

Really, these guys need to hook up with the IDiots; I hear they have a large supply of gullible supporters that just love irreducibly complex doubletalk.

[buddysmellgood]

18. What a bunch of crap. If "hydrinos" are already producing power as the

article claims, then the company would have all the money it needs. It could sell power for a while, then scale up and sell some more. Why doesn't this guy publish in the journal Science? If these hydrinos are real, others should be able to duplicate the effect. The reason is that this is all crap and a scam to bilk investors.

[longship]

19. Questionable claims.

I am always skeptical of scientific claims which are promoted like this. If the science for this so-called breakthrough is robust it should be able to stand up to academic peer review. This looks very much like moonshine to get funding

One worrisome thing is the article talks about quantum mechanics and Maxwell's equations in the same context. James Clerk Maxwell worked out the unification of electricity, magnetism, and light, but his equations were classical physics, not quantum mechanics. It took Einstein with the photoelectric effect, Bohr with his hydrogen atom model, Pauli with his exclusion principle, Heisenberg with his uncertainty principle, and Feynman with QED to define the quantum behavior of atoms.

I suspect that this *is* junk science because the realm of energy levels in the hydrogen atom is definitely within the quantum realm. These levels were already worked out by Bohr before 1920. For this guy to claim that Bohr's model is wrong using a classical theory (as opposed to a quantum one) flags this as moonshine. Plus, the Pauli exclusion principle would seem to negate his claim for a lower state.

I have a suggestion for this guy. Submit your findings to academic peer review and see how it stands. I predict that he wouldn't even get published.