Jake Young is a 
An Irish company has thrown down the gauntlet to the worldwide scientific community to test a technology it has developed that it claims produces free energy.The company, Steorn, says its discovery is based on the interaction of magnetic fields and allows the production of clean, free and constant energy -- a concept that challenges one of the basic rules of physics.
It claims the technology can be used to supply energy for virtually all devices, from mobile phones to cars.
Steorn issued its challenge through an advertisement in the Economist magazine this week quoting Ireland's Nobel prize-winning author George Bernard Shaw who said that "all great truths begin as blasphemies".
Sean McCarthy, Steorn's chief executive officer, said they had issued the challenge for 12 physicists to rigorously test the technology so it can be developed.
"What we have developed is a way to construct magnetic fields so that when you travel round the magnetic fields, starting and stopping at the same position, you have gained energy," McCarthy said.
"The energy isn't being converted from any other source such as the energy within the magnet. It's literally created. Once the technology operates it provides a constant stream of clean energy," he told Ireland's RTE radio. (Emphasis mine.)
And we all live in a world filled with elves and fairies.
Hat-tip: Slashdot.
Comments
My dad, as an engineering consultant for a major Texas university, had to deal with a lot of perpetual-motion-machine-type goofballs. They would ask him for university funding to pursue the patent, and he would have to tell them he was under strict orders not to recommend any funding for technology not already tested sufficiently to meet standards.
All I can see when I look at this is a creative bid for free testing of their perpetual motion project. Kind of like Tom Sawyer and the fence. Know what I mean.
Posted by: speedwell | August 22, 2006 11:47 AM
ok. let's see now.
F = qv x B.
Power = F.v
F is perpendicular to v because of the cross product.
so F.v = |F| |v| cos 90 = 0.
So their device should produce a staggering 0 watts.
Most likely they've made some bonehead error like neglecting the power factor.
Posted by: andy.s | August 22, 2006 11:51 AM
The most recent sciency sounding BS to support "free energy" devices has been "zero point energy". I predict a shift to claims that such devices work on dark matter.
Posted by: somnilista, FCD | August 22, 2006 1:04 PM
That sounds a lot like how generators work. The difficulty is the traveling round.
Posted by: rehana | August 22, 2006 1:52 PM
I saw their challenge in The Economist and checked out their web site. After a bit of examination, I found that their description looks much like the "overunity" engines I read about back in the mid-90s when looking up Fortean technologies.
Some comments on Steorn's web site pointed out that some of the graphics they used bore a strong resemblance to some used in Halo, and that this whole thing is a bizarre promotion for a video game.
Posted by: Max Kaehn | August 22, 2006 2:11 PM
1) are their offices still plugged into the grid?
2) how much are they offering in consultancy fees? 1000 euros per day, for a 5 day minimum sounds about right. Small price for a big discovery.
Posted by: Steinn Sigurdsson | August 22, 2006 2:22 PM
My thoughts exactly! It's quite well known indeed that circular travel through a magnetic field "gains" energy. In fact, it's the principle behind every dynamo (and electric motor!) on the planet!
I suppose they're claiming to have found a way to configure the magnetic fields such that, once started, "you" (What YOU?!? I presume they mean a rotor of some kind, but, notably, they don't specify.) continue indefinitely without additional application of force, generating net power output at the same time. I'm envisioning some kind of poly-polyphase system here.
But, I'm entirely certain that this is a complete load of crap and they have nothing at all. Else, why all the drama of the secret tests by "scientists" who they're recruiting from The Economist -- scientists who in all likelihood will be extensively quoted in Steorn's future marketing, but never, ever named. Presuming the "viral campaign" hypothesis doesn't turn out to be correct, that is.
Posted by: Joshua | August 22, 2006 3:02 PM
Assuming they haven't bumped into some fantastic way to violate conservation of mass-energy, as well as thermodynamics, its either
;a joke, an investment scam, or an advertising stunt.
But, actually I think they probably have cracked free energy, by
tapping into a non-ending legal morass once the scam is exposed. Free Energy from layers!
somnilista, Why tap Dark matter, when we have the even more mysterious dark energy?
Posted by: bigTom | August 22, 2006 4:01 PM