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Scientist Behind Navy's “UFO Patents” Filed One for a Compact Fusion Reactor
- maxharris 7y agoWhat penalties does anyone at the Navy face if this isn't real?
- ceejayoz 7y agoNone, zip, zilch, nada, zero. If it were real, it'd be a national security secret of the sort people go to jail forever for revealing, not a patent.
- abcpassword 7y agoParents can be marked confidential. There is a special process for filing patents surrounding national security.
- maxharris 7y agoI did some searching, and apparently lying about this is punishable with up to 5 years imprisonment: https://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep-9015-appx-l.html#d0e307411 https://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep-9015-appx-l....
- ceejayoz 7y agohttps://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity Depressingly powerful. For example: https://reason.com/2019/09/20/court-rules-fresno-police-accused-of-stealing-over-225000-protected-by-qualified-immunity-and-cant-be-sued-fourth-amendment/ https://reason.com/2019/09/20/court-rules-fresno-police-accu... > The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that Fresno police officers accused of stealing more than $225,000 while executing a search warrant are protected by qualified immunity and thus cannot be sued over the incident.
- maxharris 7y agoHmm, that's important to consider! So I'll continue fence-sitting on this one. Maybe it's real, maybe it's not.
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- maxharris 7y agoIf is real, I'm incredibly excited!
- phs318u 7y agoYou just triggered some intense deja vu. I had the exact same response after Pons and Fleischman's press conference back in the day. The lure of the magic-bullet/deus-ex-Machina, (that one device that will solve pretty much everything!), can be pretty intoxicating.
- maxharris 7y agoIf it isn't real, I hope that the people that filed this spend some time in jail...
- nomel 7y agoI don’t know about the legalities of this, so my question is, why?
- maxharris 7y agoI'm a taxpayer. If they've produced technology that can revolutionize our lives, they have a responsibility to tell us about it. (We paid for it, after all!) And if they're hoaxing, they have no right to spend taxpayer money on hoaxes, or to file false patents. (And there's no active war going on that would give them the legal right to make stuff up to confuse an enemy state.)
- nomel 7y agoCan a psyops campaign not be used as a deterrent? Does it require an active war to be legal?
- expectsomuch 7y agoImmediately thinking of the recently declassified ‘UFO’ videos... prototypes?
- rolph 7y ago"If it can be achieved, nuclear fusion would be a massive improvement over fission in that it produces much lower levels of radioactive waste and greenhouse gases, does not require enriched nuclear material that could be used to produce weapons" thermonuclear weapons are fusion yield devices using fission to ignite a fusion fuel. a fusion bomb, or other such weapon is probably closer to production than fusion derived power generation generation.
- goodcanadian 7y agoThermonuclear weapons have existed longer than I have been alive. It would appear that the first one was tested in 1952: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermonuclear_weapon#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermonuclear_weapon#History
- rolph 7y agospacetime can be warped out of a normal geodesic and provide propulsion or other energetic beaming. approximately 2 milligrams of mass in a plank volume will produce singularity, but a singularity weapon is not the goal, its the directed warping of spacetime that is being sought out for now.
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- bob1029 7y agoI think it would be better to phrase this as: Thermonuclear weapons are fusion yield devices using the energetic fission products to confine and compress a fusion fuel so that it can burn. As soon as the radiation pressure drops below a critical threshold, the fusion reaction ceases immediately. The fusion reaction cannot sustain on its own without this incredible amount of force being applied to it continuously. This is why we still have not produced commercially-viable pure-fusion power plants. It may still be possible, but if you consider the forces and energies required to create a single-shot weapon that burns its fuel only for fractions of a second, you might start to appreciate the challenge that engineers and scientists have undertaken with the objective of continuously providing fusion power.
- teddyh 7y agoPatents are national. Is this also patented in the EU, or could EU use this supposed technology completely free? (Of course, in all likelyhood this is all a lot of nothing.)
- gfodor 7y agoLast week Rogan had Capt Fravor who was one of the alleged witnesses to the "tictac" video that the pentagon confirmed the legitimacy of 2 years ago. Worth watching if you're into this kind of thing. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eco2s3-0zsQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eco2s3-0zsQ
- not_real_acct 7y ago> Last week Rogan had Capt Fravor who was one of the alleged witnesses to the "tictac" video that the pentagon confirmed the legitimacy of 2 years ago. Worth watching if you're into this kind of thing. On Rogan's forum, I posted an explanation of how these Navy "UFOs" work. I've included a history of their progress and citations: https://old.reddit.com/r/JoeRogan/comments/dfehjt/an_explanation_of_the_tic_tac_ufo/ https://old.reddit.com/r/JoeRogan/comments/dfehjt/an_explana...
- runjake 7y agoI'm not going to refute your post, as I can't think of anything more plausible. But, I will mention that flying a Navy aircraft dangerously close to other military aircraft -- especially between aircraft in formation is aside from being highly-dangerous, is highly-frowned upon, and highly unprofessional. I don't see US military flight crews taking this risk, even if they are piloting "black" aircraft. I don't see this scenario happening (without an accompanying court martial). Citation: Served in military in this area. FWIW, I have no better idea of what's going on than the rest of you, other than: 1. The possibility it's a government-manufactured hoax in order to misinform somebody for some reason, or... 2. A multi-spectral (visual/IR/radar) spoofing of some sort, which would mean the US could test things on live crews without actual danger to the crews.
- penagwin 7y agoI was thinking the same thing. The only other thought was they were testing to see if our own procedures could detect the craft? But then I would have expected the crews who saw it to be quickly hushed - not publicly talking about it.
- monocasa 7y agoCheck out this dude's patents: https://patents.google.com/?inventor=salvatore+pais&oq=salvatore+pais https://patents.google.com/?inventor=salvatore+pais&oq=salva... Laser augmented turbojet propulsion system Craft Using an Inertial Mass Reduction Device Electromagnetic field generator and method to generate an electromagnetic field Plasma Compression Fusion Device High frequency gravitational wave generator Piezoelectricity-induced Room Temperature Superconductor
- deepnotderp 7y agoJust going off the titles, at least 1, 4 and 6 are possibly not bs. Laser augmented combustion is a thing, compression fusion like general fusion or first light fusion is a thing and if you use piezoelectricity to induce pressure, then at very high pressures some materials become superconductors near room temperature
- monocasa 7y ago5 looks a whole like an EmDrive too.
- rasz 7y agoPatenting potentially workable ideas using vague nonsense solutions in hopes on profiting if/when someone else makes them workable is pretty BS.
- nvrspyx 7y agoIANAL and I know next to nothing about patents, but is that possible if the patents are assigned to the US Navy? I mean, I'm sure it's possible, but is the Navy known for profit-driven patent trolling?
- credit_guy 7y agoCould this be the weaponization of the Bullshit Asymmetry Principle [1]? "The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it." It costs you nothing to put out some vague non-sense out there, but you force your adversaries to spend a disproportionate amount of intelligence resources to refute that. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit#Bullshit_asymmetry_principle https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit#Bullshit_asymmetry_pr...
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- goodcanadian 7y agoOnce upon a time, you had to have a working example of an invention in order to be granted a patent . . .
- Gustomaximus 7y agoAlso wasn't there a rule if someone comes up with the same idea independently the patent was invalid? We really need to rethink the patent system.
- conjectures 7y agoLove the idea that if an opposing power developed force fields + compact fusion reactors, that the last line of defence would be patent law.
- rripken 7y agoI would read that if it was a novel. Picturing legal thriller blended with scifi. Maybe some military/political drama thrown in. Grisham/Clancy/Crichton
- conjectures 7y agoWith energy bolts hammering at her heels on every step, our plucky lawyer dived through the doors of the high court. Slamming the injunction docs into the outstretched arms of a waiting clerk she yelled at the shimmering blue spheres on the other side of the window, "You've been served."
- RandallBrown 7y agoThere's a book called Year Zero, by Rob Reid about our first contact with aliens. It turns out that humans are the only species in the universe capable of creating good music and as soon as other races detected our radio waves, they started listening to and reproducing our music. Eventually, the radio waves with our licensing information reach them and every alien race realizes they've been committing copyright infringement on an absolutely massive scale. Chaos and hijinks ensue.
- Can_Not 7y agoThe only realistic scenario I can think of for "aliens can't make good music" is that they're so lame they value the importance of out-of-jurisdiction copyright laws.
- yters 7y agoIf someone has such super technology, why patent it so people can easily steal the idea with a google search? Why not keep it secret and use it to fuel a giddy ride to the top of the power hierarchy?
- not_real_acct 7y agoExopolitics wrote the following, which I agree with: "Given what we know about secret space programs developed by the US Navy and Air Force respectively, electromagnetic propulsion systems have been used for decades in several crafts that operate both in space and underwater. The reason why Dr. Pais chose not to mark the patent applications secret was that senior Navy officials have decided the time had come for the disclosure of advanced electromagnetic propulsion technologies that were already in operation, rather than merely innovative proposals for future development as suggested in the patent application."
- arthurcolle 7y agoWhat secret space programs?
- rasz 7y agoMoon base we took from Nazis.
- arthurcolle 7y agoReally interesting theory! If your descendents 50,000 years from now could read this comment, do you think it would reflect positively on your persona?
- not_real_acct 7y ago> What secret space programs? Personally, I believe that the "UFO" seen by the Navy pilot Commander David Fravor was a Navy craft. I don't think it was extraterrestrial in origin. Hence, "secret space programs."
- lvs 7y agoWhen you are in an arms race, it is important to keep your adversary busy.
- pontifier 7y agoAs someone with a fusion startup, and a recently issued fusion patent I read the actual patent to see what I could learn. In my opinion, the patent does not describe anything useful. There are no descriptions of the shape of the magnetic field this device is intended to produce, and is about as useful as saying "Aim a bunch of magnets toward the center. It'll work, trust me."
- bdowling 7y agoThis is an application, not a patent. To your point, the examiner may object to the claims because the application fails the enablement requirement. Enablement means that the disclosure enables a person of ordinary skill in the art to make and use the invention without undue experimentation. Even if a patent does issue and you're sued for infringement, one of your arguments might be that the patent shouldn't have issued because it isn't enabling.
- newnewpdro 7y agoDo any of these patents explain how they're converting the fusion-generated heat into giga/terawatts of electricity? Am I expected to believe there's a turbine propelled by steam conventionally generating that much electricity powering the alleged tic-tac craft? Or do the patents describe a purely direct thermoelectric conversion method capable of sustaining such power levels in such a small space at fusion temperatures? From where I'm sitting, at this moment, this all seems like an elaborate disinformation campaign to both prop up morale of the domestic masses believing the USA has magic China doesn't, while trying to instill FUD in the enemy.
- krapp 7y ago>From where I'm sitting, at this moment, this all seems like an elaborate disinformation campaign to both prop up morale of the domestic masses believing the USA has magic China doesn't, while trying to instill FUD in the enemy. Maybe... I could actually buy that the military has some kind of top secret fusion technology, but this being a disinformation campaign doesn't make a lot of sense. This story doesn't really prop up domestic morale - the masses for the most part don't know about this, nor do they care (that notwithstanding the fraction who already believe the Area 51/UFO stuff anyway.) And I would expect China or any modern country to be capable of differentiating between a description of legitimate science and magical woo-woo nonsense. My personal take on this is that there is legitimate, purely terrestrial but advanced technology at work here, but still nothing involving anti-gravity or anything ridiculous like that. I'm assuming people's pop-cultural bias towards UFO conspiracy theories are causing people to jump the gun. But even then it's weird. It's weird any way you look at it, unless the whole thing is a hoax from top to bottom.
- Nihilartikel 7y agoAs a critical lay-person, I think these patents are baloney. It rings like sci-fi physics charlatan keyword salad and puts forth no plausible verification or discussion of implementation. That's boring. What's interesting is what the Navy is playing at with this. Are they thumbing their nose at Russia's nuclear rocketry program, implying "we might, like, have UFOs or something.. I can't say". Is that really a geopolitical move that the USA is executing?
- samch 7y agoI have witnessed, firsthand at a major research university, a DoD-funded patent application get pulled back under a secrecy order. It was never made public and all subsequent filings were halted. If the IP described here is legitimate in terms of having any practical use or viability, it wouldn’t be published. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_Secrecy_Act?wprov=sfti1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_Secrecy_Act?wprov=sf...
- mikorym 7y agoWait, what, there are people with "fusion startups"? I was under the impression that nuclear fusion is not yet feasible.
- Chrisomally 7y agoHave a look on line at the Nazi Bell, which supposedly was the unsuccessful product of reverse engineering of alien technology. The operation principal is the same. The US may have obtained the bell at the close of WWII. This device is so advanced that it seems impossible to have come from current human technology.
- AnimalMuppet 7y agoHave a bit more critical look at the Nazi Bell. It is probably a hoax.