Talk:Dean drive

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Davis mechanics proposes [1] a critical time lag in momentum transfer for real physical systems. Implications of this theory [2] and the theory itself have been ignored by the scientific mainstream, a not infrequent reaction to unpopular ideas throughout history.

The problem here is that rather than entering the scientific arena and being rigorously tested, such orphan science often gets hijacked by the purveyors of hokum. Even a good idea can become so tainted that no reputable scientist will risk being tarred with the same brush and any kind of peer review becomes impossible.

The resulting breakdown of the peer review process so central to scientific endeavour undermines the quality of mainstream science because only "safe" ideas are considered. Anything not properly sanctified by peer review is irretrievably lost and classified as pseudophysics,pseudoscience and the like. [User: I] 2115:01, 28 September 2005 (UTC)

Category of pseudophysics at end of article. Link to pseudophysics page refers reader to pseudoscience as a related topic giving the impression (perhaps unintended) that ALL aspects of the Dean Drive have NO basis in real physics. Certainly this is not the case since witnesses state that the thing was a real device and therefore had to act in accordance with the laws of physics, whether imperfectly understood or not. [User: I] 22:15, 27 September 2005 (UTC)

Can you provide a citation? The text of the article seems to imply otherwise. Salsb 20:47, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

I have seen video of this ... a group of researchers have demonstrated this device ... it works ...

Thomas Valone IIRC was the presenter at a "breakthrough technology / free energy confrence) ... there is a video of a canoe in a pool at a university ... the device is in the canoe ... and it propels the vessel forward ... rotary into linear directional forces ....

J. D. Redding 11:09, 10 March 2006 (UTC) (not to mention the various patents that exist on this technology ... can you provide a citation that _really_ debunks the real physics? )

I'll see what I can dig up. The terms Davis mechanics and G. Harry Stine are related. Stine wrote a final summary article in the 1980's about his experiences attempting to prove/disprove/reproduce the Dean drive. In that article he remarks that the device he saw didn't look much like the patent drawings. He also remarks that he never got to hang it as a pendulum, which is a truer test that bathroom scales.

Davis did present a paper on the 4th law of motion. It was given verbally, and only the abstract is in the proceedings. At this date I don't recall the journal/conference -- I did find it once, but it's useless. Henry Troup 20:54, 25 July 2005 (UTC)

• Dean's first name -- isn't it possible to put his full name into the article?

I remember reading the original articles in Astounding and it must have been mentioned then. I also recall an Astounding cover in which a U.S. submarine was shown orbiting above the Earth -- according to what Campbell wrote inside, I vaguely recall, if the U.S. would only take the Dean device seriously, they could almost instantly put a big model inside a submarine and thereby sent it into orbit. Thereby leaping ahead of the Russians, who had only fairly recently launched Sputnik. Geez, that anyone could ever have taken this guy seriously... Hayford Peirce 00:52, 26 July 2005 (UTC)

I think the cover picture actually showed the sub orbiting Mars - could be wrong Agingjb 21:50, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

Hmm, you could well be right. I probably haven't seen the cover in 45 years or so. I'd love to see it again, however. It would be a great addition to this article. Hayford Peirce 21:56, 26 January 2006 (UTC)

This looks like it: http://www.efanzines.com/JTE/set60/01060.jpg Agingjb 16:25, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

Contents 1 Electromagnetic tether 2 Testing 3 Unsourced addition 4 Comments on Unsourced Addition 5 Modest revision 6 Cleanup needed 7 Objectivity needed 8 Dynamically tuned gyroscope 9 Cautionary Statement to Students 10 Patent's Suck!

[edit] Electromagnetic tether

"One type of reactionless drive has already been built and demonstrated, the electromagnetic tether." [3]. -- The electromagnetic tether as described in the linked article obviously doesn't challenge any basic current understanding of physics. (It is a reactionless drive as the term is used, but it's obviously interacting with the Earth's magnetic field.) On the other hand, I'm not perfectly clear on just what the interactions involved actually are. Can somebody please clarify this? (And I don't know whether there's a Wikipedia article on this somewhere under a different name -- if so can we make a redirect?) Thanks -- 08 November 2005

It's 2 different concepts ... this is a "rotary into linear" drive ... the other is a "amp-volt"drive ... J. D. Redding 11:13, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

There is lots of information available on the Web regarding the theoretical underpinnings of electromagnetic tethers, including links in the main article itself. One thing you should know, Electromagnetic tethers ARE NOT reactionless drives, per-se. The momentum transfer is done electromagnetically between the earth and the tether, By strict definition such a momentum coupling can not be reactionless - which is why it works. The problem here is as much with the language as it is with the science. [User: I] 23:40 18 February, 2006

[edit] Testing

It might be nice to add a few words saying that most alleged reactionless drives employing rotating unbalanced weights seem to work when placed on a surface, or hung on a rope, because they can scoot themselves along by "slip and stick friction," employing the fact that the coefficient of stationary friction is greater than the coefficient of sliding friction. When you hang such devices from a ballistic pendulum, where they can't get any traction, they show no net acceleration in any particular direction.

There is newfound interest in reactionless drives based on observations that either Mach's Principle or rotating superconductors may permit shielding of inertial mass, but I think everyone agrees that mechanical reactionless drives are a dead end, and as was observed in the article, if you build the device described in Dean's patent, it doesn't work. Hermitian 22:15, 9 January 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Unsourced addition

I just moved this from the Dean drive page:

What many people were unaware of was that Dean had, in 1948 discovered and licensed to the United States Government, through the newley formed US Navy Office of Naval Research (ONR), the worlds first Stellar Spatial Inertial Gyroscope. The worlds only mechanical non-precessing planetary gyroscopic system, with all related devices to support and report is movements through unique "pick-offs" to an analog computing system. Under contract with the Navy, Dean briefed Dr. Charles Stark Draper of the MIT Instrumentation Laboratory.

Dean's contract was extremely unique, and made provisions for Dean to recalim his device, if it was ever found to be used in the public sector. Dean could "buy back" his device, plus all improvements made by the military, for the exact sum of $1 dollar. The same ammount for which Dean licensed the device to The Office of naval Researc (ONR). Alas, Due to the "Top Secret" nature of the contract, Draper was ultimately credited with the "discovery" and later anointed "the Father of Inertial Navigation". While Draper never made the claim himself, It vexed Dean that Draper never made it right either. Dean fought the government for return of his device, when he discovered outside government contrators had started using his device in the public domain, without his consent He was repeatedly threatend, as well as warned by the Navy that he would "disappear" should he continue the fight. Several prominent names at the labs, as well as one who would later become Secretaty of Defense, placed their own names on patents that Dean was enjoined form participation in.

Later on, after his introduction of the Dean Space Drive System, many who attempted to do business with him, found him to be very cautious, and some would call paranoid....any wonder?

[edit] Comments on Unsourced Addition

A couple things: First, this needs to be sourced. It's a pretty big claim. Second, assuming the material can be vetted, we need to decide if it belongs in the Dean Drive article or an article about Dean himself. Finally, once the first two are answered, this needs some real cleaning up. I'm exercising a 'shoot first, ask questions later' approach to this as the editor who added it was anonymous. - CHAIRBOY (☎) 07:58, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

I am very concerned about this tendency towards surpression. This is how the so-called "scientific skeptic" operates. While this unsourced addition may well be suspect, so is the "shoot first, ask questions later" attitude. It is one thing to demand attribution. It is quite another to surpress information just because the individual doing the surpressing happens to disagree with what has been written. [User: I] 23:40 18 February, 2006

[edit] Modest revision

Happened across a version of this article which was extremely uncritical of a highly dubious idea, and badly written/organized in addition to being scientifically inaccurate. I tried to correct the worst mistatements and to slighly improve the organization, but if anyone cares, further improvement is possible. ---CH 04:05, 4 February 2006 (UTC)

highly dubious idea? It's been proven to work in experiments (a canoe in a pool was driven forward with this device ... and, no, there was nothing paddling ... only the device in the canoe converting it's rotating masses into a linear force ... )! How is that highly dubious? J. D. Redding

You did good. While you may have gone a tad overboard, tending towards surpression, the resulting article is much better and more tightly organized. I agree that the thing needed fixing - and still does. Thanks for taking the time to do it. [User: I] 23:40 18 February 2006

YMMV on that ... especially if it's overly critical (it's been proven to work in experiments). The article does need a cleanup bad though ... J. D. Redding

Could you provide source citations for those experiments? (And their interpretation?) BTW the interaction between a canoe and the water around it is nonlinear, so I don't see why this proves anything... you can drive a canoe forward without paddling by jumping around in it just right... why would anyone choose this form of demonstration? Dpbsmith (talk) 13:53, 10 March 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cleanup needed

This article continues to drift toward crankiness. It should clearly state that there is no reason whatever to expect that anything like the "Dean Drive" is even physically possible, yet the tone of the article is beginning to suggest that such a thing already exists (but presumably is being kept secret at Area 51, etc.) ---CH 10:06, 22 May 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Objectivity needed

The tone of criticism regarding this article is beginning to suggest that outright suppression of subjects like this one is a good thing. Perhaps a blank page might be better. While we're at it, why not start burning the books we don't like as well.

This subject is not interesting for its scientific content. It is clearly deficient in that regard. It is, however, an intriguing historical episode and as such has a human interest element. More objective commentary is desirable and while the skeptic has a duty to point out the facts, surpression of material merely because one happens to disagree with it is not compatible with the long history of Western culture.

[edit] Dynamically tuned gyroscope

An anon using IP 199.46.199.231 (talk • contribs) (the raytheon.com anon) added a red link to the internal links section. Raytheon anon, can you explain? Are you also User:Engineer Bob, by any chance? ---CH 21:17, 4 June 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Cautionary Statement to Students

I had been monitoring this article for bad edits, but I am leaving the WP and am now abandoning it to its fate.

Just wanted to provide notice that I am only responsible (in part) for the last version I edited; see User:Hillman/Archive. I emphatically do not vouch for anything you might see in more recent versions. Given the past history of this article, I have reason to believe that at least some future versions are likely to present slanted information, misinformation, or disinformation.

Good luck in your search for information, regardless!---CH 23:17, 30 June 2006 (UTC)

COMMENTARY:

Speaking of "slanted information, misinformation, or disinformation", User:Hillman|CH has a very pronounced tendency to surpress information and to engage in character assassination while attempting to maintain the appearance of a neutral editor. Any deviation from the "party line" in mainstream science is intolerable to this overly skeptical individual.

Just look at the way he wrote his comment above. The implication is that anything he didn't write is rubbish - and inversely, anything he had a hand in is gospel. While it is true that there is a lot of bad information, not everything is wrong.

Students should maintain a healthy skepticism not only in regard to pages like this one, but should also learn to recognize pathological skeptics who are intolerant of new ideas. Those who would deny any possibility that some "far out" ideas might have validity are not supported by the history of scientific and technical advance.

Such skeptics heaped scorn on the idea that the East coast of South America seemed to fit the West coast of Africa implying that they might once have been joined. Only after evidence supporting plate tectonics became overwhelming were the skeptics silenced. The same thing happened with meteor impact extinction events and the vector theory of stomach ulcers.

Supporters of these ideas were not just criticized but had their reputations damaged and their knowledge and credibility impugned in some very ugly incidents before they were vindicated. This is the dirty little secret of science. The one step in the scientific method that nobody talks about is the pathology of excess skepticism and personal criticism that has nothing to do with the science.

Good luck in your research..... and remember - today's wild ideas may well be tomorrow's established facts. [User:I]

[edit] Patent's Suck!

This 'Dean Drive' thing either doesn't work or these Dean fellas are worse than the RIAA when it comes to intellectual property tyranny!

If somebody makes one of these, put full notes and everything on the web and on Emule (P2P) too (to prevent nationalization / militarization) on a copyleft license (Design Science License - DSL is best for science work; GPL, CC-by-sa are copyleft too). You can still charge money for non-copyleft compliant usage. This is how MySQL works - dual copyleft/commercial licensing. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by GreatInca (talk • contribs) 19:44, 8 January 2007 (UTC).