Talk:Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program

message: "However, positive and negative gravity on a single spacecraft involves balanced forces within a structure, and would not result in acceleration."
''
Unless I misunderstood the explanation, both forces are not acting on the spaceship. As far as I can tell, what it says is that the positive gravity is acting on the 'brick' of negative matter while the negative gravity is acting on the spaceship. If this is true, then the forces are in fact unbalanced. However, I have no higher claim to physics education beyond highschool level, and it is entirely possible I'm wrong.
76.183.171.22 (talk) 22:11, 29 October 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Diametric Drive

message: Someone who knows more than me needs to fix this; vacuum fluctuations are not related to cosmic background radiation.AtomSmith 09:09, 20 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Differential Sail

message: It would be interesting if someone with more knowledge on the subject could clarify the section on the Disjunction Drive. Specifically:
The electromagnet is turned on briefly, then turned off, emitting a pulse of electromagnetic radiation in the process.
Electrical energy would be consumed to create this pulse. Some would appear as heat. Is the remaining energy transformed into a "pull" that propigates toward the iron?
The EMP in the above example carries significant momentum, which it transfers to the plate.
This would seem to say YES to my question.
Imagine two objects floating freely in space, not at a great distance from each other (so speed of light is not an issue), connected by a rope. If object A pulls object B, B will move toward A but A will also move toward B. Does the same thing occur when the "rope" is an EMP?
If so, put A and B a light year from each other and switch back to EMP instead of rope. Can't A "pull" itself toward B whether or not B exists?
The above "paradox" is what fields are all about.
Care to elaborate?
:To answer your original question, yes; the device will work even without the object B; if I understand your description correctly, the system is just a rocket with EM radiation as its propellant. Ben Standeven 21:46, 27 August 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Dysjunction drive

message: AFAIK, this program has been discontinued.  Does anyone have any information to share? ---CH 21:59, 24 December 2005 (UTC)
thread_title: Updated information?

message: I've added this link:
*
Some of that info should probably go on this page. Fresheneesz 08:26, 15 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: non-breakthroughs

message: "There is nothing in mainstream physics to suggest this is possible; indeed, from this description it is impossible to understand exactly what the idea behind this proposal is."  
This statement seems a bit unencyclopedic & odd.  Is the proposal as vague as this description?  
And the statement that the Diametric Drive "sounds suspiciously like perpetual motion pseudoscience" is fishy, too.  Is that the opinion of the author or someone else's opinion? Jordansc 20:21, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Disjunction Drive

message: It had a fact-check marker anyway, but I deleted text suggesting that a device that used a hypothetical negative mass to accelerate violates conservation of energy.  Energy is equal to 1/2 * mass * velocity^2.  Since this is proportional to mass, having negative mass implies negative energy; as the negative and positive masses accelerate, the negative mass gains negative energy at the same time the positive mass gains positive energy, for a net change in energy of zero.  Therefore conservation of energy is not violated.  Forward explained this in an article in Analog.
There are, however, other problems.  It's supposed to be impossible to distinguish acceleration from gravity.  However, if you put positive and negative masses in space in an elevator, accelerating the elevator would cause both of those objects to "fall" towards the bottom of the elevator, while in an actual gravitational field the positive mass object falls down and the negative mass object falls up.  Ken Arromdee 03:00, 26 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Deletion 

message: OK with the negative energy rising with speed, but not with the negative mass in an elevator, "the negative mass would fall towards the positive as does any mass toward any other" so no problem.I am french, and i'm affraid to not really understand "However, positive and negative gravity on a single spacecraft involves balanced forces within a structure, and would not result in acceleration.".Does it mean that with a bond between the two masses, there won't be any acceleration resulting? First I would say no, and then why?Klinfran (talk) 19:57, 18 November 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  react 

message: "Millis retired from NASA on February 3rd, 2010, and continues to pursue similar research under the nonprofit organization Tau Zero Foundation."
I'm looking at this on 1/31/2010 and it's mentioned in the past tense. Is this date accurate?
207.5.203.11 (talk) 03:01, 1 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Time travel? 

message: on the WikiProjects Physics importance scale ? I emphatically disagree & request a discussion on BPP's importance. If the BPP were properly funded over an extended period (instead of the $1.2 million over six years ??), the possibilities discovered might very well increase dramatically. It would profoundly alter every person's view of space exploration. And could there be a path that takes us to a new source of energy ? I think it would be arrogant for humanity to believe that every aspect of physics has been discovered and is known. PFSLAKES1 (talk) 23:25, 20 March 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: There's no pretense that physics is a completed endeavor. New discoveries are expected to be made, but there's no way to know ahead of time exactly what those discoveries will be. In the mean time, one must work with what resources one has at-hand. All of the proposals of the BPPP are predicated on one thing: that some empirically very successful principle of physics is wrong. This isn't a trivial thing. There's no way to calculate the odds of any particular physical law being usurped by future progress.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.223.130.32 (talk) 22:49, 16 February 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Low Importance . . . ? 

message: Why do the article name and first sentence disagree about the name?  Is it "Program" or "Project"?  Is the acronym BPPP or BPP? References please.  70.247.166.5 (talk) 02:29, 18 June 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: see here please :-> abstract@ grc.nasa.gov:From 1996-2002, NASA supported the Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Project to examine physics in the context of breakthrough spaceflight. In this paper To leap past the limitations of existing propulsion, the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion Physics (BPP) Project seeks further advancements in physics from which new propulsion methods can eventually be derived. Also here under Identifying Critical Issues and Unknowns p.2: This process was applied by the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Project. -> Project. --Advanceddeepspacepropeller (talk) 18:52, 1 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Title? 

message: I don't understand this edit: . The reverted edit, while clumsy, was grammatically correct, and the current text isn't even consistent. "in math"? "in mathematics"? Which one is it? I suggest the first simply be "The concept is expressed as" and the second "The bias drive and pitch drive is expressed qualitatively as". Jogar2 (talk) 13:09, 2 May 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Grammar 

message: In the equation for the diametric drive, what does x and y equal?
:V =  (-m) \begin{bmatrix}\frac {-G}{\sqrt{(x+d)^2 +y^2}} \end{bmatrix}   + ( + m) \begin{bmatrix}\frac {-G}{\sqrt{(x+d)^2 +y^2}} \end{bmatrix} 
where :
:x = ?
:y = ? -SGA314 (talk) 15:28, 27 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Diametric Drive: x & y equals what? 

message: It seems Hal Puthoff, one of the physicists who conducted the Parapsychology research at SRI and at Project Stargate with the CIA and Fundamental Fysiks Group back in the 1970s to 1990s was also involved with NASA on this project of theirs. According to the Parapsychological Association,
:Puthoff works closely with NASA’s Breakthrough Propulsion Physics initiative; is Chairman of the Science Advisory Board of Bigelow Aerospace, involved in the construction of inflatable modules for space applications; regularly serves various foundations, corporations, government agencies, the Executive Branch and Congress as consultant on leading-edge technologies and future technology trends; is a member and officer of several professional organizations; and is listed in American Men and Women of Science, Who's Who in Science and Engineering, and Who's Who in the World; and has been designated a Fetzer Fellow (1991).
http://archived.parapsych.org/members/h_puthoff.html
This seems corroborated by the fact that other scientists who worked on the Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program such as Eric Davis are currently involved at Hal Puthoff's Institute for Advanced Studies at Austin:
:Eric is currently employed as a Senior Research Physicist at the Institute for Advanced Studies at Austin. He is also the CEO/Chief Scientist of Warp Drive Metrics, and has provided contract services to the Air Force Research Laboratory, the Department of Defense, the Department of Energy, and the NASA Institute for Advanced Concepts. He was also a technical contributor and consultant to the NASA Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program.
:http://www.icarusinterstellar.org/team/eric-davis/
And note the page for the Institute for Advanced Studies, which lists both Puthoff and Davis as staff:
:Harold Puthoff Ph.D., CEO Physicist
:Dr. Puthoff is a theoretical and experimental physicist.  A graduate of Stanford University in 1967, he has published over forty technical papers in the areas of electron-beam devices, lasers and quantum zero-point-energy effects, and has patents issued in the laser, communications, and energy fields.
:Eric Davis Ph.D., Physicist
:Dr. Davis received his Ph.D. in astrophysics at the University of Arizona in 1991. His research specializations include breakthrough propulsion physics, general relativity and quantum field theories, the search for extraterrestrial intelligence, spacecraft exploration of the outer solar system, and space mission engineering.
:http://earthtech.org/staff/
Neuroscience325 (talk) 00:22, 29 April 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Hal Puthoff's involvement