Farm Studio's Italian documentary about 'Orffyreus' on youtube gets almost as many hits in one week as my seven websites get in a month!

I was pleased to be contacted by one of the three other people interviewed on the Italian documentary about Orffyreus.  I look forward to some exchanges of views, and my recent experience in Rome has shown me  what friendly, open-minded people the Italians are.  In fact I have seen a distinct swing towards Italians buying copies of my books since the documentary aired on RAI 2 on Monday 12th March, and it certainly shows that the film has attracted more attention in one week than all my years of publishing information about Johann Bessler (Orffyreus) on a number of web sites, radio interviews and magazine articles.

Some years ago a radio interviewer described my efforts as like 'a voice crying in the wilderness', and went on to compare my attempts to persuade the world that Bessler was genuine, to Galileo, because when he stated that the sun was the centre of the solar system, he too, was a voice crying in the wilderness. Most people thought he was crazy or evil, or possibly both. I hasten to add that I am not to be compared in any way with Galileo nor the original subject of the quote - and I don't think I'm crazy or evil.....I admit I have sometimes felt as though I was banging my head against a wall but I never considered giving up.  

But it does go to show the advantages of putting the subject out on TV, the potential audience is vast and if they decide to produce the same film with English and other language subtitles the whole world will come to learn about Bessler and his gravity wheel.  In my opinion the more who know about Bessler, the better the chances are that someone will succeed in reproducing Bessler's wheel and everyone will benefit.

JC

Sir Isaac Newton misrepresented by the false Frank Edwards attribution.

A lot of people have repeated what they believe to be a famous Newton quote, "Sir Isac Newton once observed that the seekers after perpetual motion are trying to get something from nothing."  Now I have always been suspicious of the authenticity of this attribution for three reasons, firstly, it doesn't fit with Newton's early notes about the potential for a gravity-enabled perpetual motion machine, see my blog on Monday, 12 March 2012.  I spent a lifetime researching documents relating to Bessler and in particular, anything connected with professor Gravesande's letter to Newton on the subject of Bessler's wheel.  In all the years I looked I found just one reference to perpetual motion as a potential machine and I have commented on that in the above blog.  There is absolutely no documentary evidence that Newton said anything else about the subject either in writing or as a reported conversation.

Secondly the language is completely un-Newtonesqe.  By that I mean the language phrasing and style is entirely unlike anthing that Newton is quoted as saying elsewhere.  Here are some well-known examples of his words:-

"I do not know what I may appear to the world; but to myself I seem to have been only like a boy playing on the seashore, and diverting myself in now and then finding a smoother pebble or a prettier shell than ordinary, whilst the great ocean of truth lay all undiscovered before me."

"If I have seen further than certain other men it is by standing upon the shoulders of giants."

"I keep the subject of my inquiry constantly before me, and wait till the first dawning opens gradually, by little and little, into a full and clear light."

"If I have ever made any valuable discoveries, it has been owing more to patient attention, than to any other talent."

There are dozens of websites providing examples of Newtons words, and these prove the point.

Thirdly, the first time I came across the quote was in Frank Edward's book, "Strangest of All", in which he recounts the legend of Bessler's wheel, with one or two additional inventions of his own.  Because recently this quote has resurfaced I decided once and for all to either verify it as genuine or prove that it is nothing more than a piece of artistic license - Artistic licence is a colloquial term, sometimes euphemism, used to denote the distortion of fact, alteration of the conventions of grammar or language, or rewording of pre-existing text made by an artist to improve a piece of art. [thanks to wikipedia]. 

We already know that Frank Edwards invented the story about Karl seeing pegs in Bessler's wheel and rushing away to write down a description of what he saw, so it is perfectly reasonable to attribute the quote he ascribes to Newton as in fact another of his own creations.

In order to check out my theory I have searched through many, many web sites looking for every Newton quote available, and there is nothing remotely similar to the one being discussed.  I have also sought other sources for the quote but everyone is almost word for word the same as the one in Frank Edward's book and none of the ones I have seen pre-date Edward's - in most cases the quotation is prefixed with the words, 'Sir Isaac Newton once observed....' a perfect match to Edward's words -  or 'Newton is reputed to have said...'

There is no such quotation mentioned in the earlier book on Bessler, R.T.Gould's book, 'Oddities', yet this compendium of legends is replicated in its entirety in Frank Edward's version, and obviously formed the basis for his book.

It seems that before there was Coast to Coast AM with Art Bell and George Noory, there was Frank Edwards of the Mutual Network, with one of the earliest late night national radio talk shows exploring mysterious topics. He called his program, "Stranger than Science," and covered everything from Bigfoot to UFOs. If the story lacked impact then I guess a little poetic license could  spice it up.

I was fascinated to discover how widespread this quotation has become, thanks largely to the internet.  Even the arch-critic of perpetual motionists, Donald Simanek, [see http://www.lhup.edu/~dsimanek/home.htm] uses it.  

If you put the whole sentence, "Sir Isaac Newton once observed that the seekers after perpetual motion are trying to get something from nothing." in inverted commas into google you get nothing, if you remove the words (or the quote marks) Sir Isaac Newton once observed that, you get about 217 pages, but if you put Sir Isaac Newton's quotes you get 223,000 pages!  The 217 are merely copies which originated in Frank Edwards book.

It may be that Edward's was confusing Leonardo da Vinci's comment, "Oh, ye seekers after perpetual motion, how many vain chimeras have you pursued? Go and take your place with the alchemists!", but it is not the same thing at all and hardly of equal literary value.

JC

Sir Isaac Newton's Perpetual Motion machine.

This is in the interests of trying to correct misleading information relating to Bessler/Orffyreus

Since posting information about Floriano's website at www.orffyreus.it, I've received a number of emails questioning the sketch which, according to him, was done by professor Willem 's Gravesande, and sent to Sir Isaac Newton.  This sketch was actually drawn by Sir Isaac himself. about 24 years before Gravesande was born!  In my first book about Bessler (Perpetual Motion, An Ancient Mystery Solved?) I included the drawing, shown below, because it indicated that Newton considered that a perpetual motion machine could be possible when interacting with gravity.

I wrote that, 'It is a little known fact that in his early notebooks under the heading "Quaestiones"[sic] Newton speculates that gravity (heaviness) is caused by the descent of a subtle matter which strikes all bodies and carries them down. "Whither ye rays of gravity may bee stopped by reflecting or refracting ye, if so a perpetual motion may bee made one of these two ways." Adjacent to these words, Newton added two sketches of perpetual motion powered by the "flux of the gravitational stream".

In full he wrote,

"Try whither the weight of a body may be altered by heate or cold, by dilatation or condensition, beating , poudering, transfering to severall places or severall heights or placing a hot or heavy body over it or under it or by magnetisme whither leade or its dust spread abroade, whither a plate flat ways or edg ways in heaviest, whither the rays of gravity may bee stopped by refecting or refracting them, if so a perpetuall motion may bee made one of these two ways.

The gravity of bodys is as their solidity, because all body{s} descend equall spaces in equal {times} consideration being had to the Resistance of the aire &c"

Now people may well have come to the conclusion that such machines are impossible but it seemed to me then and I remain convinced of it,  that if Newton himself considered it possible and actually drew his  ideas on paper why should subsequent thinkers dismiss it?

In the lower half of the above drawing, Newton also shows his thoughts on using magnets too.

 "Atraction Magneticall

1 The motion of any magneticall ray may bee knowne by attracting a needle in a corke on water.

2 Whither a magneticall pendulum is perpendicular to the Horizon or not, & whither iron is heaviest when impregnated, or when the north pole or southpole is upmost. Coroll. A perpetuall motion .

3 Whither magneticall rays will blow a candle move a red hot copper or iron needle, or passe through a red hot plate of copper or iron

4 A perpetuall motion .

5 Whither a loadestone will not turne around a red hot iron fashioned like wind mill sailes as the wind doth them. Perhaps cold iron may reflect the magn: rays with that pole which shuns the lodestone."

He never published an opinion later on whether he believed such devices were possible or not.

For the modern rendering of Newton's Quaestions" notebook see  http://www.newtonproject.sussex.ac.uk/view/texts/normalized/THEM00092

JC

More Orffyrean related websites

I often get sent ideas and details of other websites which might be of interest to me and recently I received two more.

This email came from a long time correspondent in Italy, who incidentally gave my name to the Italian documentary makers, so thanks for that Floriano, and he has just published a website with his own take on Bessler's wheel.  In it he says that he has decided not to go for a long explanation but preferred to keep it simple to gain and keep people's attention.  This seems to me to a good idea, as I am currently writing an explanation of how I believe Bessler's wheel worked and had intended to publish it either on the occasion of the 300th year since Bessler's first exhibition, or when and if someone else published definitive proof that their wheel works.

I now think I might publish a shorter version at the same time.

Floriano has a web site at www.orffyreus.it and it has some interesting ideas, none of which I must hastily admit, bear any resemblance to mine.  Take a look and see what you think.

On the subject of other websites with an Orffyrean connection, there is also one at www.oldrichnos.com which contains some of the most beautiful drawings on it, other than yours John Worton!  The website has been around a while but is till worth a look and is often added to.

JC