Antigravity: Nasa Conspiracy or Military secret.

Great Debates
1

Check this out. Non-conclusive, huh? I love the way these guys blow millions to billions and never get what they said they would (in this case: an answer). They usually do this for a hell of alot more than what they said it would cost. “Ooops sorry, our balance wasn’t good enough. Give us a few more million and we’ll try again.”

I’m guessing one of two things is going on:

A. We have figured out some sort of anti-grav scheme, and it remains top secret.

and/or

B. A nice chunk of Nasa’s budget goes to the military black-ops and much of this is just filler to explain the losses of millions and billions.

I may be wrong, but that’s what my gut tells me. These cost overruns are getting ridiculous. If it’s not a conspiracy, Nasa is one of the worst budgeting agencies in the history of such things and should be totally re-worked.

DaLovin’ Dj

2

$600,000 isn’t “millions to billions,” that’s pocket change. Since NASA exists to further space exploration, and such a discovery could potentially aid that effort, IMHO it’s their job to explore these possibilities. If anything, if they really wanted to get serious about it, half a mil ain’t nearly enough.

IANAPhysicist, however.

Esprix

3

Maybe they spent it on spy satellites for the Russians. :rolleyes:

Not every avenue of research produces useful results or the desired results, you know. You might remember a couple of Mars probes that, um, broke. And high-tech research isn’t cheap, especially when dealing with esoteric effects like this.

It isn’t like they made this research up out of whole cloth, either. Doing a quick Google search on Podkletnov’s name led me first to this message on a Cornell message board (You remember Cornell? Where Carl Sagan taught?), mentioning that a NASA group has alreadi published a paper on this type of research, in 1997.

Following the link in that message, we find all sorts of papers, both off and on the Web, on this same type of thing. I’d need a physicist of engineer to comment on the feasability/usefulness/whatever of this research, but researchers are clearly publishing in peer-reviewed journals, so it isn’t something NASA made up just for your linked story.

I’m sure there might be a case to be made regarding NASA’s budgeting process, but, once again, do you have any evidence, or are we just speculatin’?

4

If they have to do it twice, that’s 1.2 million. Plus, I was also talking about all the overruns they consistently encounter in other projects. I know that it’s tricky, but they go way to far. The ISS is going to end up being 5 or 6 times more expensive then they planned.

Hmmmm. Either they are using the money for “secret” stuff, they are getting robbed by the contractors, or they are the most incompetant bunch of accountants I’ve ever had the misfortune to hear about.

DaLovin’ Dj

5

On the face of it there is nothing wrong with experimental science. A lot of things we have today would seem utterly ludicrous to scientists just a century ago.

That said one would hope that science would be funded for baby steps built on existing knowledge and not for some pie-in-the-sky project hoping for an enormous leap at one go.

Certainly an antigravity machine would be incredibly useful. That said the article linked in the OP does a good job of explaining why such a thing is virtually unthinkable given today’s technology and level of understanding.

About the only thing going for the researchers in this case was trying to verify and potentially exploit some findings by an earlier researcher. That is normal and good science although had the previous researcher really felt he was hot on the trail of an antigravity device one would think more people would have taken notice by now (it would be insanely valuable). Frankly this one sounds along the same lines as cold fusion. A neat idea but not really worth your time or money.

The only other thing I can think of that might justify such research is that often discoveries appear that are completely unrelated to whatever it is you’re after in the first place. It is possible that their use of superconductors might provide some serendipitous result that would be useful.

I’ll grant I’m reaching a bit here and in general I agree that NASA or whoever is spending taxpayer money would be a little more careful in what they choose to fund. If you want to invent a Star Trek transporter or other piece of sci-fi stuff that’s just fine by me. Just use your own money to do it.

6

Or it could just be that the scientists involved underestimated the amount of work it would require to get a conclusive result, you know. Happens all the time. If we know what we would get ahead of time, we wouldn’t have to bother actually doing it, but unforeseen complications crop up all the time.

7

Whack-a-mole, while it may be pie-in-the-sky, it’s not necessarily an “enormous leap.” Read the links that PLD provided. There’s some good stuff there.

I think to compare semi- and superconductor gravitational research to cold fusion is disingenuous and unfair.

8

pldennison:

Again, I’m not a spy or in the millitary. They don’t share classified secrets with me. I’m just using a little skepticism. I can’t believe they can run over as often as they do by as much as they do on accident. So if it’s not on accident, then “Why would they do it?” is my next question. I can only come up with the answers in the OP. At the very least a change is needed. At the very most it’s a giant military conspiracy.

That’s where the thought process comes from. If you think that it’s not worth discussing because it lacks defintive proof, fine, see ya later. I do think it’s worth discussing,

I never said they did. As a matter of fact, I’m leaning towards the fact that there is something to all this research. And if it was successful? I bet they’d keep a lid on it as long as they could. I think that what’s happened. Big discovery kept secret for national security. But I accept it’s not the only possibility. . .

g8rguy:

It happens too much for me to buy this. I think it’s either incompetence or a conspiracy to hide some top secret gear.

DaLovin’ Dj

9

Can you please provide some cites on these overruns? We generally like cites on these sorts of things in Great Debates.

[Simpsons]It’s not that I don’t trust you to provide accurate information out of your head, but . . . I can’t think of a way to finish that sentence.[/Simpsons]

Here is NASA’a FY 2001 budget request. You let me know where the overruns are.

Given NASA’s recent “faster, cheaper, better” philosophy for manned and unmanned spaceflight, and their propensity for dropping unmanned missions from the schedule if they appear too expensive or to provide too little return on investment, I really am curious. They’ve scrapped four planetary exploration missions in the last two years, and shut down other unmanned craft that have achieved their mission objectives, rather than keep paying for them and use them beyond their mission parameters. There are always “pure science” projects coming under the axe because of budget concerns.

Please, provide some cites.

Considering that a cost-effective means of generating a “gravity shield,” or providing superconductor-induced antigravity, would probably make NASA’s launch budget a fraction of what it is now, this is a pretty silly observation.

Ah, conspiracy theorists. Is there anything more entertaining?

10

Sorry, it doesn’t have to be either one. Basic research of any kind is not free, even if much of the work involved is mental. And $600,000 over the course of 5 years is peanuts in terms of research funding.

Let me give you an example of a past proposal budget of mine, which involved running computer simulations of a past climate. The overhead rate (indirect cost) was adjusted downward in an effort to save money for this proposal:
[ul]
[li] Partial salary support for principal investigators (3 people at their appropriate rates) - $136,267[/li][li] Partial salary support for a graduate student - $18,450[/li][li] Partial salary for secretarial support - $10,512[/li][li] Fringe benefits on the above salaries - $37,952[/li][li] Computer workstation & data storage fees - $12,500[/li][li] Travel expenses for 2 of the PI’s to attend 2 annual conferences pre year of the project (to report on research progress) - $16,440[/li][li] Materials and supplies - $3,000[/li][li] Publication costs (especially high because of the need for color printing of some figures) - $9,000[/li][li] Indirect costs based on the above items - $60,664[/li][li] Partial tuition support for graduate student (no overhead charged) - $16,800[/li]
Total proposal budget - $321,585
[/ul]

That budget was for partial funding of several people over the course of three years. If we had requested full funding for everyone, our budget would have easily topped $500,000. If NASA spent $600K over 5 years, you’re essentially looking at full-time salary for 1 or 1.5 engineers plus equipment and overhead costs. Does that really sound like a huge expenditure of money?

You’ve got to keep in mind as well that deciding you want to do X, and actually getting to X, is rarely as simple or straightforward as you might hope. In the real world, complications arise all the time, and needing more time than you thought to accomplish your goals is commonplace. If every research goal were so simple, we’d have colonies on every conceivable body of the solar system, no one would be afflicated with incurable diseases, etc.

11

Or “afflicted” with spelling problems.

[sub]preview, dammit, preview![/sub]

12

Does anyone know how often these projects are actually “sympathetic” research for other projects which are underfunded?

For example, a gravity shield might be barking at the moon, but (and I’m making this up as I go along) a magnetic field generator which is part of the gravity shield test might have applications toward fusion research. The projects are run in parallel in order to keep costs for both projects low, but the fusion program benefits from the research and possibly even the construction associated from the gravity project.

I ask this because I see it being done in other, non-scientific projects that I work with, and I’m wondering if the scientists have caught on.

13

Sofa King - Because the competition for research funds IS so fierce, most scientists will write proposals for what they think is fundable, and piggyback as much “non-fundable” science (real cutting edge, speculative projects, or maybe not-so-sexy but important data-collecting grunt work) as possible. In fact, I think if someone didn’t try to do that, they’d be looked on with envy (i.e., they must have all the money they need for everything they want) or else just plain stupid (how could you not wring out as many results/ideas as possible from the money you did get?). So the realities of funding make an impact even on those locked away in ivory towers. :wink:

In the case of this anti-gravity project, I’m not so sure this was the approach. Lots of technology has been produced incidentally as a result of NASA research projects (see this link), but the main idea has to sell itself, else the project just won’t fly with the decision makers. As wacky as antigravity sounds, NASA is committed to exploring, at least to some extent, ideas that sound frivolous or sci-fi now but may have important practical applications or theoretical implications for things we might want to do decades, or even centuries into the future. For example, here’s a link to the summary of a conference held last year on the terraforming of Mars - and you can be sure there are projects funded right now that are designed to explore concepts and methods of terraforming.

By the way, in case you think NASA-funded scientists might be lonely pioneers in looking that far ahead, may I recommend a little reading with a perhaps not-so-surprising angle:

“Legal aspects of planetary protection for Mars missions,” by P.M. Sterns and L.I. Tennen (Sterns and Tennen Attorneys and Counselors at Law), in Advanced Space Research, vol. 15, p. 281-284, 1995.

:smiley:

14

Heh. Thanks for the skinny, Fillet. I don’t know whether to be comforted or concerned at the prospect of space-lawyers.

15

From the article linked to in the OP:

Hoo boy.

Yes, physicists believe that the four major forces in the universe – the strong nuclear force, the electromagnetic force, the weak nuclear force, and the gravitational force – are all “connected.” However, they also believe that this unification of forces doesn’t happen at particle energies less than, oh, about 10[sup]38[/sup] electron-Volts. The only circumstance under which such particle energies are thought to be possible is within a few trillionths of a second after the Big Bang.

The notion that you can gain any access to “unified” gravitational/electromagnetic forces by spinning a superconductor in a magnetic field is, well, ludicrous.

16

As a project and contracts manager for a company that does federal government work… I can tell you that overruns are quite common.

Here’s a look at a reason, and one of the procurement processes: when the government wants work done, they must advertise it - usually Commerce Business Daily, or via some public method that lets industry know what’s being asked. Interested companies will ask for the RFP - the Request for Proposal.

The RFP details precisely what work the government wants accomplished: run a LAN, build a ship, manage a warehouse. Each interested company responds to the RFP with a proposal, explaining how they would do the work - who they would hire, what tools, processes, and procedures they would use, where they have done similar work successfully before, and how much this all would cost the government.

The feds then evaluate each proposal, making sure that it is minimally complaint – that is, it promises to do at least what they asked for. One evaluation factor is always cost – that is, how much will this company charge us? Since you’re competing with others, you have to keep your cost proposal low, lest someone else win – but you can’t go so low that you’d lose money on the project.

When the contract is awarded, then, there is typically no margin for error downwards. The costs have already been cut to the bone. There is plenty of room for negotiation upwards, though - after all, now that you have been awarded the contract, the government is loathe to fire you and start over, especially if you’re half-way through the work.

So what often happens in federal contractors is a very heightened vigilance on any minor changes requested by the government - any excuse, in other words, to say, “Hey, now you’re asking for something that wasn’t in the RFP - that’s gonna cost you more.”

Sometimes that’s a legitimate gripe - the government will discover it needs more, or different, work than ithe RFP specificed. Other times, it’s more absurd: “Yes, we agreed to produce reports, but you never said you wanted them printed. Here’s the disk - if you want paper copies, we’ll have to ask for a modification to the contract.”

And every modification can be an “overrun.” That’s just the way it is.

  • Rick
17

I’m tripping over that $600K figure over five years. A few posts have indicated that this is “peanuts”, but I would go farther and say it’s damn strange. Figure the average NASA engineer makes about $120K a year, then $600K only covers the salary for a single engineer. It doesn’t even cover the cost of a decent workstation with appropriate simulation tools… I’d say NASA wasn’t too serious about this project… Maybe the janitor was the project lead?

18

Yeah, but I doubt they paid a full salary to anyone. I can’t imagine anyone working on this project full time. This sounds like something people would do on the side, while they are taking a break from their real job. Heck, that figure might not have any salary, it might all be other stuff with people donating/ignoring their hours on it. But yeah, salaries are the single biggest expense item…if you can find a way to avoid paying salaries then you’re golden.