"TIME TRAVEL" Device Or Not?

Hi.

I found this (it's really old, 1990(!)):

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It claims to be a "temporal flux generator" and a "flux capacitor" that can work with a car (remind anybody of anything?). Now, I don't believe these claims, at all. I just can't see how this thing would possibly create time travel.

But what I'm curious about is, what WOULD a circuit like that described in the article _actually_ do? Would it generate any unusual electric field (that's why I'm posting to sci.physics and sci.electronics.design), perhaps that could affect the brain in some way (that's why I'm posting to sci.psychology.misc)? Someone there described TVs commanding them to "laugh off", explode, and reassemble, call 911 again and again, etc. etc. etc. That's not a time travel device. What I'm curious about is, could the fields generated by this device perhaps, say, trigger some sort of psych. "episode"?

Reply to
mike3
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"That energy is 1215.9 microfarads" ????????????? A capacitor (or inductor or resistor or *any* combination thereof) IS NOT and CANNOT be "energy". Now ANY chunk of matter is energy by way of E=M*C*C - just ignore the fact that conversion is totally unrealistic.

***** Lessee....electric field in the capacitor and another in the piezoelectric transducer; static after a short buildup from zero. Yawn.
Reply to
Robert Baer

In message , dated Sat, 19 Aug 2006, mike3 writes

It's an Internet legend.

It might produce a pulse of high-level sound from the piezo, before it disintegrated.

The account of the episode is quite typical of the symptoms of mania. It wasn't triggered by the device, whose construction itself was prompted by the early stages of the manic episode.

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Reply to
John Woodgate

It does essentially nothing. Depending on the kind of piezo transducer used, it may click, buzz, or squeal. Apart from the piezo noisemaker, the circuit is quite similar to the power supply of almost any kind of electronic equipment. Batteries charging capacitors are extremely common and do not have any noticeable effect on equipment or organisms in their vicinity.

Maybe somebody heard of "flux capacitors" (fictitious) on Star Trek, or wherever it was, and thought an ordinary capacitor must be the same thing.

As for the discourse about the TV giving commands, etc., it sounds like an episode of schizophrenia or mania or a mix of the two.

Reply to
mc

It was in the plot line of "Back To The Future".

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Reply to
Michael A. Terrell

Oh, so it couldn't have triggered the psych. episode in any way? That just happened around the same time, right? See, I was thinking about these experiments someone did to see whether or not "alien abductions" could be produced by EM fields. They applied electrodes to the head, sent in an electric signal, and the subject had a response -- overwhelming fear, sense of presence, blinking lights, etc. So, I was wondering if the fields from this device might not have done something. Or would the fields be too weak? Could it have just been a coincidence, the guy's psych. disorder triggered at the same time the device was used, or could the device have had any effect? Maybe not immediately, but from prolonged "use"?

Reply to
mike4ty4

...

Right. Apart from making a noise (not a very unusual noise), it could not have had any effect on the "victim" through any known mechanism. It does not produce a strong field. It is a type of circuit that is already very common in the human environment, basically just a capacitor charging.

There isn't any field to speak of.

The other thing he *could* do is burn out both potentiometers if he set them just right, because if you set them both to zero resistance and close the switch, you get a short circuit. If they're *almost* but not quite set to zero, they might burn out.

But this is *not* a device for generating strong fields of any type.

Reply to
mc

In message , dated Sun, 20 Aug 2006, snipped-for-privacy@yahoo.com writes

Yes, far too weak.

Not exactly a coincidence; I think his actions in making it were prompted by the incipient manic episode.

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Reply to
John Woodgate

Oh, so the device came after/during the psych. episode and not the other way around. Maybe he saw the charging circuits in electronics devices (he did say he built himself an "electroshock" machine) and then, deluded, thought they could be used for "time travel" if modified a bit (hence the piezo)...

Reply to
mike3

keelynet :)

don't expect sound science from there.

Bye. Jasen

Reply to
jasen

Maybe, but Persinger has done a lot of work with patterned mag fields and shown an effect even when they are considerably less than the geomagnetic strength.

Dirk

Reply to
Dirk Bruere at NeoPax

Reference?

Anyhow, this device is not an electromagnet. Once the capacitor charges, very little current flows at all in this device.

Reply to
mc

that

believe

It brings back too vivid memories of a crap 1980's movie!

described

Not in any way that the believer in such a device would notice!

reassemble,

this

It works the other way: the fringe sciences - and cults in general - attract people with "episodes". Isn't Tom Cruise just out looking for a job BTW??

Reply to
Frithiof Andreas Jensen

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