What's New Friday February 15, 2008

WHAT’S NEW   Robert L. Park   Friday, 15 Feb 08,   Washington, DC

1.  PERPETUUM MOBILE: THIS YEAR LIKE EVERY YEAR.
I probably missed a few, but I estimate that every year I see about five 
perpetual motion machine claims.  You may recall Steorn, the Dublin 
company that assembled a jury of scientists to evaluate its 2006 claim of 
generating free energy from "rotating magnets" 
http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN06/wn082506.html.  In 2007 the company 
went belly-up.  The first one this year is the Perepiteia invented by 
Thane Heins of Almonte, Ontario, who fits the mold perfectly.  The 46-year 
old Heins is not scientist; he dropped out of an electronics program, but 
earned a chef’s diploma.  The secret?  "Rotating magnets."  His wife took 
the children and left over his obsession with Perepiteia.  "I have mild 
dyslexia and don’t do well in math," Heins told the Toronto Star, "so I 
don’t do well in school."  But wait, two weeks ago an MIT Electrical 
Engineering Professor, Marcus Zahn agreed to view a demonstration.  Heins 
held a permanent magnet a few centimeters from an induction motor - and it 
speeded up.  Wow!  The Toronto Star contacted Zahn, who said it surprised 
him.  WN is trying to reach Zahn.

2.  MISSILE DEFENSE: INVENTION OF THE HYDRAZINE BOMB.
First the public was assured that the danger from a school bus sized "spy 
satellite" expected to make an uncontrolled reentry is "very small."  Now 
we learn the President has ordered the Navy to shoot it down with a 
missile interceptor because it’s carrying a tank of dangerous hydrazine.  
How dangerous is hydrazine?  "If you inhale a lot of it, it could in fact 
be deadly," an official said, which is true of most fuels.  It’s a 
standard low-power propellant used in spacecraft maneuvering thrusters.  
Perhaps the most serious consequence of shooting the satellite down is the 
space debris it would generate.  When China used an interceptor to shoot 
down an obsolete weather satellite it littered low-Earth orbit with more 
than 100,000 fragments, and the Bush Administration expressed outrage.  In 
any case, the probability of it hitting a populated area is slight, and 
speculation has focused on the "real" reasons for wanting to shoot it 
down.    
 
3. GUNS: YET ANOTHER UNIVERSITY SHOOTING RAMPAGE.  
Before the Super-Tuesday primaries I got a dozen emails telling me "a vote 
for Huckabee is a vote for the Second Amendment."   I don’t care how much 
fun people get out of blowing away cottontail rabbits and mourning doves, 
this is the 21st Century and it’s time to start controlling the 
availability of hand guns and assault weapons. 

4.  NCCAM: JOSEPHINE BRIGGS NAMED DIRECTOR.
The second Director of the National Center for Complementary and 
Alternative Medicine, she replaces Stephen Straus who died last year 
http://bobpark.physics.umd.edu/WN07/wn060707.html and is expected to 
continue his policy of rigorous science.  Asked by Science if anything 
that works had come out of CAM, she paused and replied that, "the tai chi 
for shingles was very nice."

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND.
Opinions are the author's and not necessarily shared by the
University of Maryland, but they should be.
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