The tectonic plates of energy policy just moved!

[Paul Mobbs]

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Sorry, didn't intend to reply but, to coin the punchline in that horrible ad 
for gender-bending beauty chemicals, I really "think you're worth it"...

On Thursday 11 November 2010 23:05:00 Mr Zouk wrote:
> Ok, so you've given me verbal diahreah now, where is the evidence of what

Sorry, it was my bread-making day. Every fortnight I make eight loaves of 
wonderful "own-made" bread and spend the intervening period catching up on 
email and paperwork.


> Obviously you can't get your facts straight, you either believe free energy
> exists and is in abundance or you don't. 

It doesn't exist, and that's a fact not a belief (see below).


> where is the evidence of what
> you talk about? 
> the actual evidence?

You're sitting in front of it! Reach out and touch its plastics, feel the heat 
from its inner workings; you're surrounded by it. It's called modern 
technology!

The proof you want is in your hands -- the equations that allow us to model, 
design and build the systems that comprise computers and the Internet operate 
are wholly in compliance the Laws of Thermodynamics. As such their operation 
excludes the possibility of free energy given that, if the interactions free 
energy advocates describe are so simple, these interactions would occur on a 
regular and unpredictable basis.

If the Laws of Thermodynamics did not operate as modern science outlines then 
the equations used to create the systems you are using to send these messages 
- -- from the electrical circuits in the computer, to the radio communications 
links within telecommunications systems, to the orbiting satellites bouncing 
communications around the globe -- would fail to work consistently. 
Conservation (First Law), and the arrow of time implicit in the movement of 
energy under the Second Law, are both predictable and universal, otherwise 
there would be unforeseen losses or gains in the system that would destabilise 
the system. From Ohms Law, to the dielectric effect, to the movement of 
electrons and holes in semiconductors, to Plank's Constant, conservation and 
entropy are what makes our "modern world" predictable, understandable, and 
which in turn allows us to engineer it to perform certain tasks.

Most importantly, I don't need to "believe" in the Laws of Thermodynamics. I 
know, through direct experience (because I've studied them as part of 
developing my "lifestyle plan" as well as my professional work), that the 
devices around me -- from my wood stove to my laptop -- operate clearly in 
accordance with the Laws of Thermodynamics. In my engineering design work I 
routinely use these equations to select components for electrical circuits, 
size bolts and bars for making metal enclosures, and of course sizing and 
installing energy storage and supply systems (both thermal and electric).

In contrast I would state that I have to "believe" that free energy is a 
deception, for whatever motivation to may attribute to this social phenomena, 
because it does not accord to the natural processes that we can demonstrate 
happening all around us. Then again, no leading string theorists (string 
theory is the only potential saviour of the free energy meme) will call their 
work "fact" either because there is no empirical evidence to support it. 
Whilst it's not impossible that new ways could be found to extract energy from 
the four fundamental forces, there is no evidence to suppose that assemblages 
of magnets and coils are able to tap into some unknown source of energy. What 
you cite, especially the videos and web site you list, is a selective, 
partisan and often twisted reading of existing scientific research in order to 
make certain claims -- and in turn these claims legitimate your wider 
political and social anomie.
 

The future must, because of the restrictions these same Laws allow us to 
project, involve a process where the human species renegotiates its 
relationship to the biosphere -- the material flows that support human society 
today cannot be maintained, even at their present rate, for more than another 
decade or two. That's primarily all about food, and in particular the role of 
agriculture and its relationship to the capacity of the Earth to provide our 
needs sustainably. Without a constantly increasing energy and mineral resource 
supply, the present growth economy paradigm will implode; it, and the wealth 
it creates, will over the next few decades cease to exist and we'll have to 
find a new way to meet our needs. This process implicitly involves examining 
land rights and the individuals access to land in order to secure the 
necessities of life (and when I say "necessities" I don't mean cars or plasma 
TVs! -- I mean serving our basic biological and social needs as living beings, 
not the grandiose dreams of technology fetishists).


Finally, let's say hypothetically that you are completely correct. Let's say 
that free energy did exist; what would that mean for society?

It would mean that the industrial processes of human society would create EVEN 
MORE damage to the Earth's biosphere; in the process ensuring that the crash 
of the human species is even more dramatic when it finally arrives as other 
critical (non-energy) resources peak and decline in availability/production. 
As a parallel example, think of the Green Revolution; all that Norman 
Borlaug's new dwarf/fertiliser heavy crops really achieved was to add an extra 
2 billion people to the planet's human population -- just at the time that the 
phosphate rock, and the oil and gas used to produce nitrogen, are beginning to 
experience production problems. Due to all that extra food that the Green 
Revolution produced population growth is now once again outstripping the 
growth in food supply.

Quite simply, if free energy were a reality then we'd get more of what we have 
today -- more corporate power, and more and a greater disparity in wealth 
accumulation. It wouldn't be the energy utopia you indicate. 

Many of the free energy people I've come across also seem to believe that the 
Twin Towers were not destroyed by aircraft, but by the US government. Six 
months BEFORE 11/9, a US TV show called 'The Lone Gunmen' (an offshoot of 'The 
X-files') premièred with a pilot episode in which the plot involved a secret 
arm of the US government flying an aircraft into the World Trade Centre in 
order to justify action to restrict the freedom of its citizens (which, of 
course, the intrepid group of hackers managed to avert at the last moment). 
Co-incidentally, in episode 4 in that series ( "Water for Octane"), the group 
go in search of a car that runs on water, and when they find it they destroy 
it! Why? Because, as stated in the conclusion to the plot of that episode, if 
cars ran on water than the world would be even more messed up than it is 
today. I've always argued with the free energy+11/9 believers that if the 
writers of that series could, in terms of the 11/9 conspiracy, be so correct 
in the first programme, why can't their take on 'free energy' devices be true 
as well?


You clearly have a lot of hostility towards anyone who doesn't share your 
belief in the supernatural -- which, more than anything, is what much of what 
free energy represents (e.g. George Green of "Project Camelot" often invokes 
"God" as the source of the energy... so what are you plugging into?, God's 
extension lead?). More importantly you wrap your belief within conspiracy 
theories about money and political suppression without any evidence that these 
are taking place. The state can't even keep its own secrets or prevent the 
public's personal data being lost -- how do you expect them to mount a complex 
conspiracy?

Whilst we're on the subject of authoritarian states coercing their public, if 
you really believe that you can get more energy out of a device than you put 
in, can we take it that you accord with Orwell's thesis, and "Big Brother's" 
demand, that "2+2=5"?

Seriously, you ask us to take you as an honest broker of information, *who in 
reality are you?* You imply that I'm some stooge of the Illuminati even though 
my origins, and track record, are wholly traceable: I use my real name in 
correspondence; I provide my traceable virtual and real-world contact details; 
what's more you can Google me an get a lengthy account of my past activities, 
and if you want to get really geeky you can resolve my digitally signed emails 
against my digital signature on my web site to prove they originate from me, 
and check with the domain registry that the web site containing my work is 
operated by me too.

In contrast you throw your polemics from an anonymous email address, using a 
name that, when Googled, only turns up a "white african" person posting on the 
BNP message boards and a Yahoo Group that promotes a "London Party and 
Cultural Guide to African, Brazilian, Latin American and Caribbean Events 
Activities".

So, who are you Mr Zouk?; and who funds your work? Give us your track record, 
and evidence of your research.

What I think I can appreciate is that you are very fearful that modern society 
isn't all it's cracked up to be. That's very positive; you, like many others, 
feel in your gut that the present economic system is deeply flawed. But in your 
rejection of ecological restrictions on human development you're grasping at 
straws that will not solve the problems you perceive to exist. If anything, 
they would, if they were true, make our situation a whole lot worse. 


P.

- -- 

"We are not for names, nor men, nor titles of Government,
nor are we for this party nor against the other but we are
for justice and mercy and truth and peace and true freedom,
that these may be exalted in our nation, and that goodness,
righteousness, meekness, temperance, peace and unity with
God, and with one another, that these things may abound."
(Edward Burrough, 1659 - from 'Quaker Faith and Practice')

Paul's book, "Energy Beyond Oil", is out now!
For details see http://www.fraw.org.uk/ebo/

Read my message board, "Ecolonomics", at:
http://www.fraw.org.uk/mei/ecolonomics/

Paul Mobbs, Mobbs' Environmental Investigations
3 Grosvenor Road, Banbury OX16 5HN, England
tel./fax (+44/0)1295 261864
email - mobbsey at gn.apc.org
website - http://www.fraw.org.uk/mei/index.shtml
public key - http://www.fraw.org.uk/mei/mobbsey-2010.asc
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