A Conversation with Eric Davis - American Antigravity

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wanted to pursue this area professionally as a full-time career. But he said eventhen that industry and government was not fully funding this area of research forthe long-term.In 1989 I met with Bob at an AIAA conference and told him I had turned in myPh.D. dissertation and was waiting for my doctoral oral defense to be scheduled,and that I expected to soon be graduated and available for employment. He gaveme more bad news. There were no industry jobs left where I could do BPPresearch because of corporate retrenchment across the U.S. due to the beginningrecession and the fall of the Berlin Wall and communism in Russia created amove to cut down the DoD budget.So my potential career got derailed. I couldn't do postdoc work in myastrophysics discipline because that too was being affected by decisions in thefirst Bush Administration to cut down NASA spending on space exploration, ofwhich I was a part during my graduate work. With space science research fundingbeing cut, there were no forseeable postdoc positions available in areas I wasexperienced to work in.So I had to resort to teaching jobs at community colleges and universities to getby. In the mid-1990s I ended up traveling around Asia while working for the U.S.Air Force under contract through the University of Maryland.After my stint in Asia with the AF, I was recruited for a new job in Las Vegasworking as a research physicist at the National Inst. for Discovery Science. It isthere where I was first introduced to Dr. Hal Puthoff who served on the NIDSScience Advisory Board. However, it was because of my association with BobForward that I first became aware of Hal's scholarly physics journal publicationson ZPE research while I was in grad school since Bob was following Hal's workand reported on it in one of his later Air Force studies.Before I finished grad school, I got on the bandwagon of the 1985-89 researchdone and papers published by Kip Thorne and his students on traversablewormholes and time machines. In the 1990s when I was in S.Korea working for the Air Force and U.S. Forces Korea, I continued my researchinto that subject and later linked up with a black hole astrophysicist at KunsanNational University. Then things in the physics community really began to heatup when Paul J. Nahin's book "Time Machines", Matt Visser's book "LorentzianWormholes" and Kip Thorne's book "Black Holes & Time Warps" were published.These showed that wormholes, space warps and time machines had become amainstream cottage industry of research in physics. I began to hope that thebreathrough propulsion physics field would then take off and get the seriouslong-term funding it deserved.In 1997 the NASA-LeRC (now known as the John Glenn Research Center) andNASA-JPL began the official BPP program following the publication of thesebooks, and Hal was invited by the program manager at NASA-LeRC (Marc Millis)to join the effort. Hal liked my preliminary work on traversable wormholesbecause I showed him that aspects of the quantum vacuum zero-point energy canAmerican Antigravity.Com Page 4 of 8
provide the special mass-energy field needed to generate a space warp ortraversable wormhole. So he and Marc Millis brought me into the NASA BPPprogram. Bob Forward, Al Holt, Frank Mead (Advanced Concepts Office at AFRL,Edwards AFB, CA), and Dave Froning were also among those involved. So from1997 to the present Hal and I and our colleagues have been working together onbreakthrough propulsion physics in one form or another.It was during my early years at NIDS that Hal took over as my BPP mentorbecause Bob Forward's involvement in the BPP field was winding down as he wasshifting his interests into other directions like writing science fiction novels,getting his space tethers business off the ground, and getting ready for fullretirement.Even though the NASA BPP program ended up losing funding, Hal and Icontinue to work together on our favorite BPP topics, and we also continue tocollaborate with Frank Mead, Al Holt, Dave Froning, and others who are in ourcircle.I was laid-off from my job at NIDS in Spring 2002 along with the other principalstaff and science advisory board members, so I went into business for myself as acontractor/consultant to the Air Force Research Lab's Advanced Concepts Office(working for Dr. Frank Mead) at Edwards AFB, CA.In the summer of 2001 Frank Mead approached me to do advanced conceptscontract work for him because Bob Forward was no longer available to do BPPresearch studies for AFRL. So in the fall of 2001 I formed my company WarpDrive Metrics (but did not register it as a business in Las Vegas). My first AFRLcontract (the Teleportation Physics Study) began in February 2002, four monthsbefore I learned that Bigelow was going to begin the massive lay-offs at NIDS. Mysecond AFRL contract (Ball Lightning Study) begin in April 2002 and endedJanuary 2003, and that report was published in May 2003. I still have two othercontracts that I completed, and publication of those contract reports is pending.I'm wrapping up a fifth contract now, but it is an editorial re-write of someoneelse's final report.AFRL advanced concepts program funding was severely cut in FY04 because ofmajor reshuffling of Air Force research priorities, so I was forced to find otheremployment. Last fall I was offered, and I accepted, a job offer to work for Hal atEarthTech Int'l/IASA. I moved to Austin, TX last November to start my new job.AAG: A few months ago, the Air Force commissioned you to write a report onteleportation. I've read it cover to cover, and it looks like a blueprint for a real-lifeStarGate technology. Can you tell us anything about your findings?Davis: The Teleportation Physics Study contract was officially commissionedin February 2002. It ended in July 2003, and the report was finally published bythe Air Force in Aug. 2004.American Antigravity.Com Page 5 of 8
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A Conversation with Eric Davis - American Antigravity

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