
Scientist Behind Navy's “UFO Patents” Filed One for a Compact Fusion Reactor - tomohawk
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/30256/scientist-behind-the-navys-ufo-patents-has-now-filed-one-for-a-compact-fusion-reactor
======
pontifier
As someone with a fusion startup, and a recently issued fusion patent I read
the actual patent to see what I could learn.

In my opinion, the patent does not describe anything useful. There are no
descriptions of the shape of the magnetic field this device is intended to
produce, and is about as useful as saying "Aim a bunch of magnets toward the
center. It'll work, trust me."

~~~
bdowling
This is an application, not a patent.

To your point, the examiner may object to the claims because the application
fails the enablement requirement. Enablement means that the disclosure enables
a person of ordinary skill in the art to make and use the invention without
undue experimentation. Even if a patent does issue and you're sued for
infringement, one of your arguments might be that the patent shouldn't have
issued because it isn't enabling.

------
monocasa
Check out this dude's patents:

[https://patents.google.com/?inventor=salvatore+pais&oq=salva...](https://patents.google.com/?inventor=salvatore+pais&oq=salvatore+pais)

Laser augmented turbojet propulsion system

Craft Using an Inertial Mass Reduction Device

Electromagnetic field generator and method to generate an electromagnetic
field

Plasma Compression Fusion Device

High frequency gravitational wave generator

Piezoelectricity-induced Room Temperature Superconductor

~~~
deepnotderp
Just going off the titles, at least 1, 4 and 6 are possibly not bs.

Laser augmented combustion is a thing, compression fusion like general fusion
or first light fusion is a thing and if you use piezoelectricity to induce
pressure, then at very high pressures some materials become superconductors
near room temperature

~~~
rasz
Patenting potentially workable ideas using vague nonsense solutions in hopes
on profiting if/when someone else makes them workable is pretty BS.

~~~
nvrspyx
IANAL and I know next to nothing about patents, but is that possible if the
patents are assigned to the US Navy? I mean, I'm sure it's _possible_ , but is
the Navy known for profit-driven patent trolling?

~~~
credit_guy
Could this be the weaponization of the Bullshit Asymmetry Principle [1]?

    
    
       "The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than to produce it."
    

It costs you nothing to put out some vague non-sense out there, but you force
your adversaries to spend a disproportionate amount of intelligence resources
to refute that.

[1]
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit#Bullshit_asymmetry_pr...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bullshit#Bullshit_asymmetry_principle)

------
conjectures
Love the idea that if an opposing power developed force fields + compact
fusion reactors, that the last line of defence would be patent law.

~~~
RandallBrown
There's a book called Year Zero, by Rob Reid about our first contact with
aliens.

It turns out that humans are the only species in the universe capable of
creating good music and as soon as other races detected our radio waves, they
started listening to and reproducing our music.

Eventually, the radio waves with our licensing information reach them and
every alien race realizes they've been committing copyright infringement on an
absolutely massive scale.

Chaos and hijinks ensue.

~~~
Can_Not
The only realistic scenario I can think of for "aliens can't make good music"
is that they're so lame they value the importance of out-of-jurisdiction
copyright laws.

------
goodcanadian
Once upon a time, you had to have a working example of an invention in order
to be granted a patent . . .

~~~
Gustomaximus
Also wasn't there a rule if someone comes up with the same idea independently
the patent was invalid?

We really need to rethink the patent system.

------
gfodor
Last week Rogan had Capt Fravor who was one of the alleged witnesses to the
"tictac" video that the pentagon confirmed the legitimacy of 2 years ago.
Worth watching if you're into this kind of thing.

[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eco2s3-0zsQ](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Eco2s3-0zsQ)

~~~
not_real_acct
> Last week Rogan had Capt Fravor who was one of the alleged witnesses to the
> "tictac" video that the pentagon confirmed the legitimacy of 2 years ago.
> Worth watching if you're into this kind of thing.

On Rogan's forum, I posted an explanation of how these Navy "UFOs" work. I've
included a history of their progress and citations:

[https://old.reddit.com/r/JoeRogan/comments/dfehjt/an_explana...](https://old.reddit.com/r/JoeRogan/comments/dfehjt/an_explanation_of_the_tic_tac_ufo/)

~~~
istorical
Did your post get deleted? Anyone have a screengrab?

~~~
noodle_face_
You can always try Removeddit. Just replace reddit in the URL with removeddit,
like so:

[https://removeddit.com/r/JoeRogan/comments/dfehjt/an_explana...](https://removeddit.com/r/JoeRogan/comments/dfehjt/an_explanation_of_the_tic_tac_ufo/)

------
Nihilartikel
As a critical lay-person, I think these patents are baloney. It rings like
sci-fi physics charlatan keyword salad and puts forth no plausible
verification or discussion of implementation. That's boring. What's
interesting is what the Navy is playing at with this. Are they thumbing their
nose at Russia's nuclear rocketry program, implying "we might, like, have UFOs
or something.. I can't say". Is that really a geopolitical move that the USA
is executing?

------
samch
I have witnessed, firsthand at a major research university, a DoD-funded
patent application get pulled back under a secrecy order. It was never made
public and all subsequent filings were halted.

If the IP described here is legitimate in terms of having any practical use or
viability, it wouldn’t be published.

[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_Secrecy_Act?wprov=sf...](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Invention_Secrecy_Act?wprov=sfti1)

------
yters
If someone has such super technology, why patent it so people can easily steal
the idea with a google search? Why not keep it secret and use it to fuel a
giddy ride to the top of the power hierarchy?

~~~
not_real_acct
Exopolitics wrote the following, which I agree with:

 _" Given what we know about secret space programs developed by the US Navy
and Air Force respectively, electromagnetic propulsion systems have been used
for decades in several crafts that operate both in space and underwater. The
reason why Dr. Pais chose not to mark the patent applications secret was that
senior Navy officials have decided the time had come for the disclosure of
advanced electromagnetic propulsion technologies that were already in
operation, rather than merely innovative proposals for future development as
suggested in the patent application."_

~~~
arthurcolle
What secret space programs?

~~~
not_real_acct
> What secret space programs?

Personally, I believe that the "UFO" seen by the Navy pilot Commander David
Fravor was a Navy craft. I don't think it was extraterrestrial in origin.

Hence, "secret space programs."

~~~
arthurcolle
That wasn't really in space, but ok. Do you think he knows what was going on
during the sighting? Or do you think he is reporting the truth to the best of
his capability?

------
lvs
When you are in an arms race, it is important to keep your adversary busy.

------
maxharris
What penalties does anyone at the Navy face if this isn't real?

~~~
ceejayoz
None, zip, zilch, nada, zero.

If it were real, it'd be a national security secret of the sort people go to
jail forever for revealing, not a patent.

~~~
maxharris
I did some searching, and apparently lying about this is punishable with up to
5 years imprisonment:
[https://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep-9015-appx-l....](https://www.uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/mpep-9015-appx-l.html#d0e307411)

~~~
ceejayoz
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qualified_immunity)

Depressingly powerful. For example:

[https://reason.com/2019/09/20/court-rules-fresno-police-
accu...](https://reason.com/2019/09/20/court-rules-fresno-police-accused-of-
stealing-over-225000-protected-by-qualified-immunity-and-cant-be-sued-fourth-
amendment/)

> The U.S. Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals has ruled that Fresno police
> officers accused of stealing more than $225,000 while executing a search
> warrant are protected by qualified immunity and thus cannot be sued over the
> incident.

~~~
maxharris
Hmm, that's important to consider! So I'll continue fence-sitting on this one.
Maybe it's real, maybe it's not.

------
rolph
"If it can be achieved, nuclear fusion would be a massive improvement over
fission in that it produces much lower levels of radioactive waste and
greenhouse gases, does not require enriched nuclear material that could be
used to produce weapons"

thermonuclear weapons are fusion yield devices using fission to ignite a
fusion fuel. a fusion bomb, or other such weapon is probably closer to
production than fusion derived power generation generation.

~~~
bob1029
I think it would be better to phrase this as:

Thermonuclear weapons are fusion yield devices using the energetic fission
products to confine and compress a fusion fuel so that it can burn.

As soon as the radiation pressure drops below a critical threshold, the fusion
reaction ceases immediately. The fusion reaction cannot sustain on its own
without this incredible amount of force being applied to it continuously.

This is why we still have not produced commercially-viable pure-fusion power
plants. It may still be possible, but if you consider the forces and energies
required to create a single-shot weapon that burns its fuel only for fractions
of a second, you might start to appreciate the challenge that engineers and
scientists have undertaken with the objective of continuously providing fusion
power.

~~~
rolph
have a look at nuclear isomers, the big direction is to create a device that
may arbitrarily, [as in switchon/switch off] stimulate fusion and emit the
yield in a unidirectional manner, multiple times before refueling. basically a
high energy neutron flux beam weapon.

~~~
bob1029
I do believe pulsed fusion energy is a much better approach to start with. We
already have the ability to generate small amounts of pure fusion energy in
highly-energetic laboratory experiments. If you could place a pulsed reactor
in some thermal mediator (e.g. water), you could have a device that produces
apparently continuous thermal energy.

A single 1 megaton thermonuclear weapon can produce the equivalent of around
1100 gigawatts of power for an entire hour. If we could find a way to capture
even a fraction of this, you could power a LOT of things for quite some time.
Now, obviously I am not advocating actually doing this with fission devices,
but having some sort of "extremely temporary" reactor design could be viable
considering the amount of energy each unit could produce, even if each only
works 1 time.

~~~
rolph
this is where nuclear isomers are hoped to fit in. the big hope is that fusion
can be switched on or off, like a flashlight.

------
newnewpdro
Do any of these patents explain how they're converting the fusion-generated
heat into giga/terawatts of electricity?

Am I expected to believe there's a turbine propelled by steam conventionally
generating that much electricity powering the alleged tic-tac craft?

Or do the patents describe a purely direct thermoelectric conversion method
capable of sustaining such power levels in such a small space at fusion
temperatures?

From where I'm sitting, at this moment, this all seems like an elaborate
disinformation campaign to both prop up morale of the domestic masses
believing the USA has magic China doesn't, while trying to instill FUD in the
enemy.

~~~
krapp
>From where I'm sitting, at this moment, this all seems like an elaborate
disinformation campaign to both prop up morale of the domestic masses
believing the USA has magic China doesn't, while trying to instill FUD in the
enemy.

Maybe... I could actually _buy_ that the military has some kind of top secret
fusion technology, but this being a disinformation campaign doesn't make a lot
of sense. This story doesn't really prop up domestic morale - the masses for
the most part don't know about this, nor do they care (that notwithstanding
the fraction who already believe the Area 51/UFO stuff anyway.) And I would
expect China or any modern country to be capable of differentiating between a
description of legitimate science and magical woo-woo nonsense.

My personal take on this is that there is legitimate, purely terrestrial but
advanced technology at work here, but still nothing involving anti-gravity or
anything ridiculous like that. I'm assuming people's pop-cultural bias towards
UFO conspiracy theories are causing people to jump the gun.

But even then it's weird. It's weird any way you look at it, unless the whole
thing is a hoax from top to bottom.

------
mikorym
Wait, what, there are people with "fusion startups"? I was under the
impression that nuclear fusion is not yet feasible.

~~~
trianglem
Based on my limited understanding, fusion is possible. Just not fusion that
generates more energy than it consumes.

~~~
mikorym
A small caveat. /s

------
maxharris
If _is_ real, I'm incredibly excited!

~~~
phs318u
You just triggered some intense deja vu. I had the exact same response after
Pons and Fleischman's press conference back in the day.

The lure of the magic-bullet/deus-ex-Machina, (that one device that will solve
pretty much everything!), can be pretty intoxicating.

~~~
maxharris
If it _isn 't_ real, I hope that the people that filed this spend some time in
jail...

~~~
nomel
I don’t know about the legalities of this, so my question is, why?

~~~
maxharris
I'm a taxpayer.

If they've produced technology that can revolutionize our lives, they have a
responsibility to tell us about it. (We paid for it, after all!)

And if they're hoaxing, they have no right to spend taxpayer money on hoaxes,
or to file false patents. (And there's no active war going on that would give
them the legal right to make stuff up to confuse an enemy state.)

~~~
nomel
Can a psyops campaign not be used as a deterrent? Does it require an active
war to be legal?

------
Chrisomally
Have a look on line at the Nazi Bell, which supposedly was the unsuccessful
product of reverse engineering of alien technology. The operation principal is
the same. The US may have obtained the bell at the close of WWII. This device
is so advanced that it seems impossible to have come from current human
technology.

~~~
AnimalMuppet
Have a bit more critical look at the Nazi Bell. It is probably a hoax.

------
expectsomuch
Immediately thinking of the recently declassified ‘UFO’ videos... prototypes?

------
teddyh
Patents are national. Is this also patented in the EU, or could EU use this
supposed technology completely free?

(Of course, in all likelyhood this is all a lot of nothing.)

