I take this with a pound of salt. No, more. As any competent scientist will gladly explain, if it were possible to shield something from the effects of gravity than the most fundamental and rigorously tested laws of physics would have to be completely rewritten. As Ockham taught us six hundred years ago, all things being equal, the simplest answer tends to be correct. Scenario: A Russian scientist claims to have invented an antigravity device, but has failed on two seperate occasions to substantiate this with any credible evidence. Whats simpler: he's a crackpot, or the B2 floats? As a point of reference, NASA tried to replicate the experiment (which involves placing a weight in an electromagnetic field and checking for measurable weight loss) with no effect..

I've a sense of Deja Vu about this, I just finished having a similar discussion on another forum. It is worth reading Nick Cooks little book on Zero Point. It does cause one to stretch their belief systems.

I'll believe it when I see it. Anti-gravity is very possible theoretically, but our understanding of gravity at the quantum level is very poor -- gravity is the weakest force and the graviton is far too small and weak to be detected or directly, intentionally manipulated with present technology. Which means that to create a device or process to control gravity, we'd have to just stumble onto it. It would be like testing exotic plants to see if they happen to be the cure for cancer. If some russian scientist has discovered anti-gravity, it has to be by accident -- why would passing something through a magnetic field lower its gravity? It's possible that it's true, but no one will be able to tell you why...

According the laws of the conservation of energy (i forget which of the 3) anti-gravity is the natural opposite of gravity as every action has an equal and opposite reaction. This is how rockets get into space, pistons move with the explosion of fuel, etc. Gravity is not exactly weak, the power of the strong and weak electromagnetic forces are extremely limited in range, look at all that orbits the sun. "gravity wells", depressions in the fabric of space-time caused by any celestial body with mass are possible starting points to make artificial wormholes. Our solar system is a giant gravity well caused by the sun and punctuated with smaler wells created by each planet, moon, etc. anti-gravity simply has to be found and will be at least as elusive as gravitons themselves. At any rate, floating anything larger and more practial than a magnet will require alot of power. A big fission reactor ain't gonna cut it.

"According the laws of the conservation of energy (i forget which of the 3) anti-gravity is the natural opposite of gravity as every action has an equal and opposite reaction. This is how rockets get into space, pistons move with the explosion of fuel, etc." Anti-gravity is not the natural opposite of "gravity." Your refering to Newtonian laws of motion, which have ansolutely nothing to do with either gravity nor thermodynamics. The first law of thermodynamics states that energy can be neither created nor destroyed, and the second law of thermodynamics states that in all energy transfers, the potential energy in the second state will always be less than the energy potential in teh first state. This is called entropy. Rockets are not "anti-gravity" devices. They must defeat the force of grabity, by pushing against it with a force greater than 10m/s^2. They do not make this force mahically disappear. The best example of a how an anti-gravity device should function is a magnet. A positive polar device repels a negative polar device, without there being an energy transfer in the system (that is, they don't push on eachother in the newtonian sense). This is why magnets don't wear out if left to push on one another indefinitely (as they should, according to entropy). If, thats a big if, the same properties could be discovered for gravitational forces, you would be able to achieve orbits without fuels, or explosive forces, etc. If it was an "electro-anti-gravity device", you'd have to power the machine, obviously. But the gravity-defeating "push" itself would be an energyless system..

that's some magnetic field you're creating, ligting a spacecraft, 30+ Km into space.... any idea what a tremendous amount of energy this would take? Think terrawatts.....or more Even if you'd get this done, than well, you're gonna have a LOT of side effects.

This should be renamed Gravity Ignoring. People would find it easier to 'get' then. No gravity means no energy required to move a mass 'up', just to accelerate it.

antigravity In 1996 a Finnish researcher reported that a disk placed over rapidly spinning super -conducter lost 2% of its mass, inexplicibly, and in opposition to one of Einsteins law. A paper was presented to a respected british physics journal, but was later withdrawn, due to irregulaties and withdrawel of one of the authors. Subsequently, the researcher was suspended from the institute. Recently, NASA and Boeing have both denied that they are researching anti-gravity, but admit to attempting to duplicate the Finn's experiment, with his help. The researcher himself has apparently refrained from introducing his research to pop-science, which must have been difficult, given the financial consequences of his suspension. I find it interesting that his career has recovered 6 years later. Normally, when a reputation is damaged so publicly, it is difficult for the researcher to regain professional respect. Remember the two blokes who claimed to have discovered cold fusion? No? Me neither. So what is this about? If Einsteins law is disproved, there go the foundations of modern physics. And _that_ could be interesting!

The other possibility we need to look at here is that something HAS been discovered/created, and, typical with such far-reaching technologies, the government is slow to release the information for whatever security protocols. We need to see the overall implications this could have on the world: "normal" aircraft construction could well be rendered obsolete, with international unemployment consequences. There would exist the possibility that, depending on generator size and powerplant requirements, massive aerial vessels could be created, encouraging a new arms race. And what happens when one of those 50,000 ton airborne behemoths has a gravity-control failure and crashes into a city, or into a water supply with its nuclear core? There could be a large number of reasons this technology is being denied. And certainly we need to consider the possibilities that it is either wholly untrue, or the government sees the true ramifications of the technology if it did go public..

I dont think conspiricy theories hold water, in general. At present, its a abnormal result in an experiment: Thats all. it needs to be explained completly, but until then, we're talking about weight being reduced by tiny amounts. If it is not explained, then boeing could miss out on the business opportunity of a life time, for the cost of what? Allowing a researcher to rehabilitate his carear, if he's able? cheap at that price. Its more likely, that there no reports since there are no conculsive results yet.