Paul's blog

For centuries countless people have searched for the holy grail of physics: The perpetuum mobile: A device that would go on and on forever, without the need for external energy. Or even more interestingly: a device that would actually produce more energy than what is put into it. Wouldn’t that be nice? Free energy!

So far, however, such devices have never been constructed and shown to work as promised.

And there is a very plausible reason for that unfortunate failure: such a device would have to violate one or both of two VERY basic laws of nature. It would either break the first law of thermodynamics (conservation of energy), the second law of thermodynamics (entropy never decreases) or both.

It’s not my intention to go into the physics side of all this. Nor will I go over the long history of failed attempts. I just like to focus on the latest folks who are making claims of being able to produce free energy.

And I also will make a prediction or two.

The folks I’m referring to is the company Steorn (link), their ‘free (and clean and continuous) energy’ technology is called ‘Orbo’, they are based in Ireland and their spokesman and CEO is Sean McCarthy.

How are these folks different from all those that have claimed the same and failed miserably?

Quite frankly: Not that much.

The only obvious difference I can see, is that these folks seem to be very good at marketing! They have a very professional web site, have some ‘convincing’ (well…) stories to tell, they REALLY seem to be serious about getting ‘name and brand recognition’, are engaging in discussions in forums, engage the scientific community and generally seem very eager to tell everyone in this world about their ‘claim’: their name is all over the Internet.

All of which will probably raise a bunch of red flags and trigger some alarm bells for folks who have been following the ‘free energy’ clubs around the world: the “Investment Scam’ light will flash as a warning and reminder of previous claims.

Then what are the similarities with previous claims?

Quite a few, but just let me mention the single most obvious one:

THEY CAN’T DEMONSTRATE A WORKING DEVICE!

Another one would be their claim: “BUT WE WILL HAVE A WORKING DEVICE REAL SOON NOW!”

Think about it! You have this great idea! You discovered something that all physicists, to this day, have overlooked (the temporal variance of of magnetic viscosity, in Steorn’s case) and you realize you could build a ‘free energy’ machine with it. What would you do? Would you withdraw in your garage and build a proof of concept and then take this working prototype to investors to help you turn this into a commercial success? Or would you go to investors FIRST, telling them you WILL BE able to build this, but first you need a bunch of money? I can tell you what would I would do, and I can also tell you how I would react as an inversor if you tried to get some money out of me with this ‘device’.

But anyway, Steorn is going to demonstrate this device .. *drum roll* .. this July!

This world will never be the same!

Unless, … some of my predictions come true!

The simplest prediction of course is “No demonstration of a working ‘free energy’ device will take place in July 2007”.

Of course, as Sean McCarthy already has admitted: “.. It is simply a question of money ..” (link), not showing anything wouldn’t be good for those streams of investor money.

So they already came up with the obvious cop-out:

Q: What progress do you have with the continuous motion testing?
A: We have made huge progress on this – we expect to be demoing this version in July. …I would say 80-90% of the way.

80-90%? 

Let me give an example here: Suppose I claim to have a ‘free energy’ device. Let me be VERY modest here, and claim 101% efficiency. The device will demostrate this by dropping a ball from 10 feet. Without any added energy from outside, you will see the bouncing ball reach a height of 10.01 feet!

However, I’m still working on refinements and I’m not quite there yet (I need more money!). So I’ll demonstrate to you (in July 2007) my device as it is now. I will already announce that what you will see is that the dropped ball will bounce to 80 – 90% of its original height! Impressive right? I’m REALLY getting there.. ALMOST there, just a few more percentage points! Please hand me your money.. I really need to finish this! And hey, you just SAW I’m ALMOST there…

Needless to say that a device that ALMOST produces free energy, is NOT a ‘free energy’ device. There are of course cases where ‘almost’ can be impressive or desireable (I wish I ALMOST was a billionaire!), but this is a case where ‘almost’ doesn’t get any points.

It’s probably not easy to find investors for this: most of those interested have their money tied up in premium swamp land in Florida and the Brooklyn Bridge!

Here’s another prediction: I will make this company’s claim known to James Randi, whose JREF organization (link) offers ONE MILLION BUCKS to anyone who can … well … put simply … break laws of nature. I’m sure he’ll agree these folks qualify …

My prediction: The JREF will get to keep their money!

And yet another prediction: before too long this device will show up in the Museum of Unworkable Devices (link)!

Notes:

1. Thanks to my dear friend Leo W. for bringing this to me attention.

2. “A device that would go on and on forever, without the need for external energy”: Of course, ANYTHING goes on and on forever when in motion and no other force acts on it! (Newton made that very clear!): I’m talking here about a machine whose internal ‘motions’ keep going on without addition of energy from outside!

3. This site lists quite a few attempts by folks who didn’t let their thinking be clouded by knowledge of the laws of nature: link.

4. And here’s an interesting link in case you yourself think you can get rich off of the free energy craze: link.

5. Steorn’s announcement: See Sean McCarthy explain (?) it all: link.

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