From: Michael S. Lorrey (retroman@turbont.net)
Date: Sun Jun 11 2000 - 19:04:42 MDT
hal@finney.org wrote:
>
> Mike writes:
> > Essentially, Cramer has maintained that under Mach's Principle, a
> > asymmetric centrifuge such as mine would not cause a surplus bias in
> > centripetal force on a time averaged basis, EXCEPT in the even that the
> > masses withing the centrifuge changed mass through the cycle as they
> > sped up. I.E. if the masses are cycling in the 80-99% of light speed
> > range, their mass increases as they increase in speed, so there will be
> > a thrust produced in this case.
>
> Actually, modern interpretations of special relativity don't accept the
> notion that mass increases with velocity. Rather, relativistic momentum
> increases nonlinearly with velocity. If you define a "relativistic
> mass" as momentum / velocity, you do get the result that this "mass"
> increases with speed. But it is generally considered simpler to say
> that momentum is not proportional to velocity and mass is constant.
And it is momentum which is the important factor here.
>
> Whichever formulation is used, conservation of momentum is the relevant
> law. Your device is claimed to violate conservation of momentum, even
> though each individual part observes this conservation law. This is
> plainly impossible based on current physics.
I never said it violates conservation of momentum. My claim is that the
input energy is expended in a single direction, it uses more energy than
it produces in thrust, so there is no violation.
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