Simply doing ‘the impossible’

Antigravity’ is one of those science fiction staples that just won’t go away. Wouldn’t it be fascina-ting (not to mention useful) if we could control this particular fundamental force that surrou-nds us, allowing us to lighten a heavy object, anchor a light one, propel a vehicle, or waft through the air as on the ten-drils of a dream. 

But of course that’s impossi-ble. We can’t do that. Good people have been laughed out of offices and boardrooms and probably tenure meetings for suggesting it. 

Now, I don’t have the magic answer to unifying the field theory and building my own antigravity belt (much as I’d like one–with a backup built-in, please). But I’ve always main-tained that if a large organiza-tion (a government, a university research lab, a military contra-ctor, etc) were to give a team of brilliant researchers ‘incon-trovertible proof’ that ‘The enemy of the day’ (pick one) had already created (for exa-mple) antigravity, and they then provided those researchers with essentially unlimited funds and (most importantly) a shield from bureaucratic controls, that the researchers would in good time figure out a way to ‘replicate’ what they believed had already been done – by infact creating antigravity for the first time!

Which is why I’m so intri-gued with a July 29 report from Jane’s Aerospace brought to our attention by reader Bob Lee, which describes that Boeing,“...has now admitted it is working on experimental anti-gravity projects that could overturn a century of conventional aerospace propulsion technology, if the science underpinning them can be engineered into hardware... 

If gravity modification is real, it will alter the entire aerospace business.”

To put it mildly.

Unfortunately, as with most technologies, such a develop-ment could also usher in a new type of weapon–imagine a ‘gravity beam’ (an ‘impulse gravity generator’) that could accelerate a target with 1,000 Gs in an instant–most things within it, or hit by it, would turn to strawberry jam.

Why now?

What’s bringing these sci. fi. considerations to light at this time, and involving the likes of Boeing, is that Russian scientist Dr Evgeny Podkletnov claims to have created reproducible antigravity propulsion devices, more formally called ‘prope-llentless propulsion’, in both Russia and in Finland. He is said to have demonstrated that a four-inch diameter beam can repel an object a half-mile away and could extend its effect out to 125 miles. He also claims that he has reduced the weight of an object by two percent. But–he indicates that his work is being stymied by ‘officialdom’.

NASA, it seems (to their cre-dit), apparently took Podkle-tnov’s work seriously enough in the mid-’90s to attempt to replicate his work. But they failed, owing to the lack of Dr Podkletnov’s guidance.

(They’re trying again, at the Marshall Space Flight Center.). More recently, it turns out that Boeing, BAE Systems and Lockheed Martin have each independently contacted
Dr Podkletnov and they admit that ‘classified activities in gravity modification may exist’. Even CNN’s MoneyLine is commen-ting on this as I write. 

Although it may have no bearing on Dr Podkletnov’s technique, in my research I did run across what is apparently a little-known hobbyist impleme-ntation of either ‘antigravity’, or an as-yet unexplained field-effect propulsion technology that is demonstrated by devices called ‘lifters’. These are extre-mely lightweight balsa and tin foil frames that (apparently) happily lift their own weight and a bit more, when energized by a high voltage, microamp power supply. 

Wishful Sci Fi?

OK, this does seem a bit like science fiction, but remember that stranger things have sprung from garages–like the personal computer you’re reading this on (thank you, Steve and Steve of Apple, and early pre-PC companies like South West Technical Products, Altair, Atari, MSI, and the like). If you have any personal expe-rience with lifter technology, let me know. 

I take no stand yet on the veracity of Dr Podkletnov’s or the ‘lifter’ technology claims, but I am very glad that some organizations with the where-withal to validate (or not) these claims are now taking them seriously enough to explore. Because I for one won’t be surprised when (not if) I (even-tually) read that ‘antigravity’ has been confirmed. 

It won’t necessarily come out of Dr Podkletnov’s work or from the ‘lifters’ (although of course it might). But because gravity is such a pervasive force in (and beyond) our world, and because history teaches us that we first learn how to identify, and later to control the forces around us, I expect gravity to (eventually) fall (or would that be rise?) at our command.

Wouldn’t it be something, if we’re closer than we think?

Again, Don’t Blink!

Jeffrey R. Harrow