Star Trek impulse drive has been developed

[PaulS]

Will be able to get to the moon in 4 days, Mars in 70 days, Pluto in 18 months or Alpha Centauri in 100 years. Brit inventor developed it 15 years ago, was ridiculed by the scientific community, the joke is on them.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/sci...orks-and-could-get-to-Moon-in-four-hours.html

 

[Jim Logajan]

Hmm.., we'll see.

Smells like cold fusion to me.

http://io9.com/no-german-scientists-have-not-confirmed-the-impossibl-1720573809

<edit> Looks like I'm not the only one with this line of thought.

“I noted in [the study’s] conclusion paragraphs that [Tajmar’s] apparatus was producing hundreds of micro-Newtons of thrust when it got very hot and that his measuring instrumentation is not very accurate when the apparatus becomes hot,” Davis told io9. “He also stated that he was still recording thrust signals even after the electrical power was turned off which is a huge key clue that his thrust measurements are all systematic artifact false positive thrust signals.”

Hmmm. Heat. As in hot tea. Yes, I believe I've seen this plot before:

"Then, one day, a student who had been left to sweep up after a particularly unsuccessful party found himself reasoning in this way: If, he thought to himself, such a machine is a virtual impossibility, it must have finite improbability. So all I have to do in order to make one is to work out how exactly improbable it is, feed that figure into the finite improbability generator, give it a fresh cup of really hot tea... and turn it on!
He did this and was rather startled when he managed to create the long sought after golden Infinite Improbability generator. He was even more startled when just after he was awarded the Galactic Institute's Prize for Extreme Cleverness he was lynched by a rampaging mob of respectable physicists who had realized that one thing they couldn't stand was a smart-***"

Fortunately the Germans would appear to have nothing to fear from rampaging physicists.

 

[Jim Logajan]

Yes, that too. There are 4.4 million micro newtons in one pound-force.

Must take forever to count them!