NASA and bad science

[arcticpenguin]

Is NASA doing a little too much thinking outside the box? Are they letting their standards slip?

Three examples:

http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?threadid=23164&highlight=NASA
A claim that NASA has been granted a patent on "lifter" technology. Is this a misinterpretation, or has NASA been taken in by anti-gravity pseudoscience?

http://www.randi.org/vbulletin/showthread.php?threadid=22656&highlight=NASA
"NASA scientists" may have tested a "breatharian", a man who claims to survive without eating food.

http://www.aps.org/WN/WN03/wn051603.html
Another (now former) NASA scientist involved in anti-gravity, this time Podkletnov gravity shields.

 

[Yahweh]

After reading those articles I'm beginning to think that Star Trek might infact be science fiction...

 

[rwald]

Well, the lifter technology is just ion wind; for more, see this thread.

And as for the breatharian's claim, NASA denies having tested the guy (and you may have noticed that none of the stories mention any direct quotes from NASA.) More about it at this thread.

I haven't heard about the last one, though.

 

[SquishyDave]

This article explains they took a patent on the lifters so they could test it. They did test it in a vacuum and it was ion wind, but hey, someone had to test it, and making a vaccum good enough to make sure it was ion wind isn't easy. It's all in the article.

 

[Goshawk]

Ning Li isn't a "former NASA scientist"--she had some kind of private contract to do research into anti-gravity for NASA. Hey, NASA has no way of knowing what works and what doesn't until someone actually goes out there and experiments.

But while it's definitely pushing the edge of the physics envelope, still it's not exactly totally Woo-Wooville.

http://www.space.com/businesstechnology/technology/anti_grav_000928.html

http://www.discover.com/science_news/astronomy/lighter.html

http://popularmechanics.com/science/research/1999/10/taming_gravity/print.phtml

 

[arcticpenguin]

And as for the breatharian's claim, NASA denies having tested the guy (and you may have noticed that none of the stories mention any direct quotes from NASA.) More about it at this thread.

Hmmm... In Bob Park's column he stated

NASA scientists reportedly verified that Manek survived on water and sunlight for 130 days. The NASA Public Affairs Office confirmed to WN that the claim is true.

 

[arcticpenguin]

Hmmm... In Bob Park's column he stated

Randi comments on this in todays Swift, although he doesn't name names.