Something that is impossible is by definition never possible. If someone figures it out, it wasn't impossible was it?

Therefore, something that was truly impossible 100 years ago should still be impossible today.

Note that this doesn't include things people simply SAY are impossible because people are frequently WRONG.

Mike - "impossible" is an opinion based on fact and conjecture. Sometimes it has a strong bend towards empirical evidence and other times towards feasibility but it is an opinion nonetheless.

Snowy comes out and says that smart guys think that "No intelligent person would have thought anything we have today been IMPOSSIBLE 100 years ago. Maybe the person on the street, but not any educated person."

Nope - Snowy is wrong in that opinion. And yes, opinions can be wrong. Mental hospitals are filled with patients who have opinions that are plain wrong. I’m not saying Snowy is nuts but I think that he is wrong. Many highly educated folks think or thought many things were not possible, improbable or impossible. They have been proven wrong.

BTW Snowbud – Lord Kelvin would take exception to being called “a minor figure in science”. He was a man of immense hubris and rightfully so. His work has shaped our modern understanding of mechanics and physics. To say he was minor suggests he was insignificant. That statement reduces anything that you may contribute to this discussion as less than credible.

Again, Snowcreature – you have been schooled!

People use the term "impossible" pretty loosely.

what's considered impossible today?

Believe me, if you were to ask a colonial settler if men would be on the moon or orbitting in a space station.

I promise you, NO human at that time was considering that as possible.

KT

Snowman also assumes that the "smart guys" 100 ago could even comprehend the tech that we consider common place. Try explaining computers and operating system (Windows) to Einstein or Newton. They probably could understand it given enough time and someone explaining it but with the knowledge they had up to that point......

There is a big, make that BIG difference between understanding that electrons could be used to send information and the practical application of that knowledge.

"Lousy laws of physics."
Homer Simpson.

Conservation of energy is not an opinion.

I do not think Einstein would have had any problem with understanding anything we have today. Actually we are still sorting out and trying to understand what he had to say. Semiconductors-- just read any real scientific book on semiconductor physics and you will see Einstein’s name mentioned frequently. EG in 1905 Einstein reinforced certain concepts about photons E=Hv. The Einstein relation D=kTu/q is used to compute the reverse saturation current of a pn junction diode.

How about English patent 13,170 issued on September 22, 1904. RADAR in other words.

Math for a lot of computers and present day stuff was being worked out in the 1600's and even earlier.

Joseph Fourier (1768-1830) almost all modern systems, yes even car engines, depend on the math he developed.. Any post grad engineering course is usually a study based on Fouriers series.

Maxwell wasn't born yesterday.

The theory for a large amount of present day technology was developed at least 100 years ago. Newton was a real powerhouse of science. Leonardo Da Vinci also had some up to date ideas, more than a couple of years ago.

As to windows, it set back computers 30 years or more, is not logical, based on any kind of "real" operating system, like VMS.

Lord Kelvin was english, what more can I say.

I think you could say "I was taught something by someone I thought I was better than". Someone who could never teach me anything, "AS I KNOW IT ALL"!!! That is how you come across.

C'mon snowperson, do you really think you know it all?

You don't have to be a know it all, to know something. Like I stated and anyone grounded in science would say---Conservation of energy is not an opinion.

All these so called great discoveries, the ones that run on water, violate this fundamental law, not theory, but LAW of science..

A Law of science is usually clear to anyone that studies science. A law of science usually clobbers non beleivers over the head, until they beleive. If they still do not beleive, they are usually dead, cause mother nature is truly a B..it.ch.

I know the sun seems to come up from the east, it appears to set to the west. Yet, I quest to learn more. I studied Psychology and Geology while in college, that does not mean squat if I am beyond accepting more. Scientists and engineers follow physics, as they should. All is not known, nor will it be.
As I learn everyday in processes I operate, I accept I scratch the surface. Others may look to me to teach them, I still learn from the newbies (many times is what not to do, sometimes I learn from new prospectives). I see highly educated idiots often.
Conservation of energy is not an opinion. I accept that, but we still need more...

schooled...

schooled in what????

The laws of science are not set in stone. They are discovered by man, with the tools they have to prove them at the time. Quantum effects that happen at the nanoscale sometimes contradict the laws of the macroscopic world. Think about the duality wave-particle of the photons for instance. Photons were proven to be both, which is a dificult concept to really grasp for the human mind.
Cold fusion also does happen with water under certain conditions. I have friends who have measured 150% excess heat for the electrolysis of heavy water.

Interesting movie here:

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-3333992194168790800

Aurel

The guy was actually the commissioner of the United States Patent Office, Charles Duell, back in 1899. Here are a few more gems...


"That’s an amazing invention, but who would ever want to use one of them?" ... President Rutherford B. Hayes in 1876, after Alexander Graham Bell demonstrated the telephone to him at the White House.

"There is no likelihood man can ever tap the power of the atom," ... Robert Milken, Nobel Prize winner in physics, 1923

"Heavier-than-air flying machines are impossible," ... Lord Kelvin, President Royal Society, 1895

"Who the hell wants to watch movies with sound?" president of Warner Brothers Studios, Harry Warner, sometime around 1918.

Ya, I guess these guys are bogus as well?


BTW...schooled ...

It is very clear that hydrogen, to be practical for transportation, must be generated onboard. Then all you have to do is fill your tank with water.
Of course, you would want to recover more energy than you put in to split the water. There are several ways to do this:

-Photoelectrolysis solar cells: A modified TiO2 Graetzel solar cell with a front WO2 electrode can directly split water from sunlight, generating electricity and hydrogen. I may even get a contract to work on this pretty soon...

-Electrolysis with over unity yields: several inventors claim to have achieved this. In this case, the free lunch would be coming from cold fusion trigered by special alloys on the electrodes, or AC currents. This is clearly the most interesting field, although many scientists will not touch this by fear of ruining their reputation. And Pons and Fleichman set a very bad example of publishing something that nobody could reproduce, and that was later on deemed as bogus. It pretty much killed that field as mainstream serious research. But it does not mean that nobody is still working on it...

Aurel

Agreed. But TANSTAAFL. The "excess" energy still has to come from somewhere. Cold fusion, if it can be made to work, will revolutionize enery production. I'm not holding my breath.

There is also no doubt that the oil-weapons conglomerate will do anything they can to prevent such disruptive technology to reach maturity, as it would be the end of their power:

http://pesn.com/2006/06/02/9500276_Water_fuel_experimenter_threatened/

Aurel

has anyone ever heard of the Joe cell:

http://www.joecell.com.au/

With a Joe cell, you can modify your car to run on implosion of water. The instructions say that you must significantly advance your timing, since it will suck the cylinders rather than push them. Hehe...

Aurel

From www.joecell.com Even after the internal components explode???

I have a bridge in Brooklyn NY I would like to sell to you. Its suckers that think like this that make the future for cons look very good.
Quantum physics does not violate the most basic law of physics, ie conservation of energy, in fact understanding conservation of energy is required to understand quantum physics. Relativistic effects, particle/wave theory, micro effects all follow the same laws of physics. Newtonian physics is simply a special case of more general physics. Understanding comes hard because of the math. People get lost in the math and forget what they are dealing with in reality. Confusion over particle vs wave theory was a lack of understanding. Two different kinds of math describe the same thing. Both were correct. No laws of physics were violated as the process was better understood.

Cold fusion may be possible, but if it does happen, it will follow the law of conservation of energy. Anyone proposing something that does not is a CON or an idiot. Thats a fact.

Snowman, you tend to call everyone an idiot quite easily. You must have some serious accademic credentials to do so. Can I learn a little more about that? Where did you study, how long did you study, what papers have you written, what patents have you received, what conferences you have attended...Really, I am curious...

Aurel