Re: AND THEN, JUST TRANSPLANT THE BRAIN... was Re: Headless frogs

Michael Lorrey (retroman@together.net)
Thu, 23 Oct 1997 19:00:53 -0400


=- deluxe -= wrote:
>
> I appologize if my thoughts seem contradictory. Sometimes, I can confuse
> even myself. (-;
> Perhaps what I was trying to say is that there very well may be a way to
> have much shorter development cycles than one may expect. Anyone care to
> guess? My guess would be if we could increase the growth rate, we'd
> probably have to slow it down as well.

Well, if you look at that aging disease that a few rare kids have, if
that sort of disorder can be turned on and off in anyone, then you could
do some sort of rapid development, but I would think that the product of
such things would tend to be on the short side.
>
> Speaking of cold fusion fairies, does anyone here know about free energy,
> over-unity field theory or any other progressive engery theories? I heard
> Bryan O'Leary speaking about this subject on the radio and his impression
> seemed to be that there were already working models of these systems in
> India and Japan.

There have been several, supported by some large corps over in Japan.
The most convincing evidence that fusion is involved was an experiment
involving heavy water and dissolved potassium salts. Apparently, the
test module produced excess calcium that could only be explained by
fusion of the deuterium with potassium (with an accompanying consistent
level of heat produced). There is also an outfit in Dallas claiming to
be producing hot water heaters using the same catalytic method as Pons &
Fleischman, but they can't claim that it's cold fusion because the
patent office has banned the use of the phrase (nice to see in our
office of innovation, eh?). Their drawings include a reactor about the
size of a shotgun shell, filled with pellets of the electrode materials,
produced by a proprietary method.

Whether it works or not I don't know. I'm also interested in hearing
whats up in this field.
>
> What say you? It seems that the best ideas i've heard about transportation
> involve some thoughtful combination of a free-energy system and
> anti-gravity. Could a vehicle which repels mass to stay afloat ever get
> into a head-on collision with another similar vehicle?
>
> Jeff Taylor, whipping boy.

The most recent non resident whipping boy, Arthur C. Clarke, was a big
proponent of air cushion vehicles, forecasting their replacement of
automobiles within 50 years (date of original projection: sometime in
the 50's). Of course this never happened, partly because they are: a) so
noisy b)so energy hungry and c) being frictionless meant that poor
maneuveribility in the event of uneven terrain or wind made them
unusable as a major transport form. Me thinks that for all purpose daily
transportation, anti gravity will not become feasible, except possibly
for mass transportation. Traffic is bad enough, imagine millions of cars
careening about like discs on an air hockey board.

Any feasible anti gravity technology would be most useful in aircraft
and spacecraft. Now, replacing cars with personal antigravity propelled
aircraft is somehting else entirely. With smart navigation technologies,
using all of that volume in the air is a much smarter way to go about
it. Of course, if there is an accident, expect to die, unless airbag
technology is heavily used, in a manner like the Mars Pathfinder landing
method. Bounce, bounce, bounce...

-- 
TANSTAAFL!!!
			Michael Lorrey
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mailto:retroman@together.net	Inventor of the Lorrey Drive
MikeySoft: Graphic Design/Animation/Publishing/Engineering
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How many fnords did you see before breakfast today?