Hairway to Stephen Hawking
September 12, 2009 9:19 PM   Subscribe

Teen from Nepal invents cheap solar panel using hair. His hero is Thomas Edison. He is grateful he was allowed to go to school. He was originally inspired after reading a book by physicist Stephen Hawking, which discussed ways of creating static energy from hair.
posted by Brian B. (17 comments total)

This post was deleted for the following reason: looks like a hoax in a tabloid -- mathowie



 
A pretty thorough debunking has already been done. If this works at all, it's in a way that needs some substantial explanation because attempts to replicate it have failed utterly.
posted by jedicus at 9:23 PM on September 12, 2009


I thought "bullshit" the minute I saw this, and a little poking around the web shows that lots of agreement with my POV. As noted, the panel illustrated couldn't possibly produce the juice shown even if it was converting all of the solar energy falling on it into electricity, let alone as constructed.
posted by maxwelton at 9:25 PM on September 12, 2009


Perpetual motion!
posted by sonic meat machine at 9:25 PM on September 12, 2009


OK, so without looking at it first ...

The components include balloons and shag carpeting?
posted by krinklyfig at 9:29 PM on September 12, 2009


Half a kilo of hair can be bought for only 16p in Nepal and lasts a few months
I don't quite know what to do with this information.
posted by Partial Law at 9:36 PM on September 12, 2009 [2 favorites]


I like these inventors who will try one body part or another until they find a solution. Sweat... no. Dandruff... no. Hair... YES!
posted by twoleftfeet at 9:39 PM on September 12, 2009


I don't quite know what to do with this information.

First you get the hair, then you get the power...
posted by Durn Bronzefist at 9:49 PM on September 12, 2009 [2 favorites]


This is nonsense, of course. The credulity is mindboggling. One would think that upon realizing that he did not understand the material, the journalist would seek out someone who does. But no, apparently.
posted by mr_roboto at 9:50 PM on September 12, 2009


Fun fact: Thomas Edison was the true inventor of the Nepalese solar-powered merkin.
posted by dr_dank at 9:51 PM on September 12, 2009 [1 favorite]


But if they were mass-produced, Milan says they could be sold for less than half that price, which could make them a quarter of the price of those already on the market.

Is there a sufficiently large supply of human hair to make mass production possible?
posted by Chocolate Pickle at 9:55 PM on September 12, 2009


Darn. That would have been cool, had it, you know, worked.
posted by Michael Roberts at 9:56 PM on September 12, 2009


This is just begging for a Sampson joke, but I can't come up with one.
posted by brundlefly at 9:57 PM on September 12, 2009


When the article mentioned "Thomas Eddison", I became suspicious of their commitment to fact-checking.
posted by BitterOldPunk at 10:00 PM on September 12, 2009


Violating laws of thermodynamics is a perfectly legitimate deletion justification. I'm just putting that out there.

I suppose, strictly speaking this doesn't really violate conservation of energy. Although if you assume that this is true, you'd still need to extract the melanin, which would almost certainly violate the 2nd law.
posted by spiderskull at 10:02 PM on September 12, 2009 [1 favorite]


I don't quite know what to do with this information.

Damn, man. Why you gotta be so square? Everyone knows that Nepalese hair is some of the best on the planet.
posted by loquacious at 10:02 PM on September 12, 2009


Violating laws of thermodynamics is a perfectly legitimate deletion justification.

No. Claiming to violate the laws of thermodynamics and then failing to do so is justification for deletion.

If someone out there actually does it I better see a post about it.
posted by loquacious at 10:05 PM on September 12, 2009 [2 favorites]


Combined with "a form of fusion", the machines had found all the power they would ever need.
posted by Durn Bronzefist at 10:11 PM on September 12, 2009 [2 favorites]


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