I know Uncle Cecil has written off Lazar as a kook, and I tend to believe that myself (though his stories are fun to read), but I was wondering if any of the theories he put up about interstellar travel (by focusing gravity to a point in the distance, then using gravity to bend space and bring that point to you) and the properties he attributed to element 115 actually hold any water? Is any of the stuff he claimed actually good science and theoretically possible, or just a bunch of hooey? I can post some of Lazars claims if that helps, or there is the Bob Lazar site http://www.boblazar.com that goes into his theories. Forgive me if this question belongs in Great Debates. I’m kinda nervous about posting, since my furshlugginer KFC question tanked so bad.
I hate to rain on your parade, but asking us to refute the entire body of works by such a prolific hooeyist is a bit silly.
But don’t let that stop you, the teeming millions might give it a shot. Btw, I’m getting ready to answer a question from Cecil’s Mailbag which is nearly identical to your KFC query here in GQ.
Nickrz
Short of being promoted to God, I have no idea how it would be possable to focus gravity, so right now I’m inclined to file this theory with Star Trek’s hyperdrive technology. As for element 115, I’m sure that only a few atoms of it have ever been made, and that most of its physical properties are unknown.
“I had a feeling that in Hell there would be mushrooms.” -The Secret of Monkey Island
I don’t think there’s ever been ANY element 115 made, at least not by people (lots of things are possible in the core of a star in the process of going supernova). The highest one I’m sure of is 106.
It’s actually not that difficult to make educated guesses about what element X will be like (provided you could ever find a stable isotope of it). The properties of germanium were predicted fairly accurately before the element itself was discovered and isolated.
The latest discovery of an element reported recently ( Read about it. interestingly enough, skips element 115 completely.
Tris
“…interestingly enough, skips element 115 completely.”
And you all question the conspiracy theory 
Nickrz,
I didn’t mean his whole body of hooey, I was really just interested in the two Lazar gems I mentioned in the OP: traveling by bending space and the properties of 115, and whether or not they held up when exposed to the cold light of science.
Awesome! I’ve been hearing stories about that island since I was a kid. Nice to hear that they actually reached it.
Short Answer: Bob Lazar’s “science” is pure fiction.
Longer Answer:
Two items here:
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As a point about human psychology, liars tend to provide more facts than necessary. You will note that nowhere else does antimatter play any importance in his dicussion which means it is extraneous and hence immediately makes me suspect.
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But assuming it is true he just says “antimatter” well, what antimatter? A positron? An anti-proton? An anti-hydrogen? An anti-115? It is important because that antiparticle will annhilate it’s counterpart.
Note to Bob Lazar, your story would be better served by removing references to antimatter.
Gravity by its very nature has a very long range (see Stephen Hawkings “Brief History of Time”). All atoms emit gravity beyond their perimeter. The force of a single one is of course very weak, but collectively they can become quite strong (although as forces go rather weak).
The amplify part is the real problem here. He is generating extra gravity out of nothing unless he mean redirecting the gravity virtual particle/wave. That is all very interesting except you can’t. Gravity virtual particles have no mass (which is why they have long range) therefore they are difficult to toy with. Even so the gravity virtual particle is that particle which exists between two pieces of matter. There is nothing really to redirect so therefore I am forced to conclude he literally means to amplify (i.e. increase the strength of the gravity by some factor) the gravity that is “heading” in the direction he is interested in. Again, gravity is a virtual particle/wave. I am not sure how exactly you would amplify it with introducing more matter. He mentions amplification of gravity repeatedly, and you would think that as such an important piece of his “science” he would discuss exactly how they do that.
It does? Thats news to me. In the sense that everything is directly tied to the creation of the universe this is true, but speaking in real terms this makes little sense.
Although that our star is pretty small it is irrelevent. The materials that made the Earth didn’t come from our star. They came from other supernovas (supernovi?). It isn’t like the Sun sits there churning out lead, iron, gold or anyother even moderately heavy element yet they are on Earth.
That is absolutely true! Except bending space does you little good because you still have to follow the curvature of space. Now if you could somehow now follow the curvature of space then you would be all set. He doesn’t say this nor does he suggest how such a thing would be possible. Of course, if you bent space enough so that point A and B were in the exact same spot then you would be all set too. Not sure how you would survive the black hole you would need to do this.
Possible in the strictest sense except that it is far more advanced then our understanding of gravity. Taken in consideration with the rest of his junk one can only consider this to be junk too, but I don’t have a counterproof to it.
What more could you expect from somebody who lets people kick him to the head?