Re: tests in Germany, China and at NASA have corroborated
I gather that groups repeating the experiment are indeed being rather careful about claiming that the effect is true.
The problem with something as 'unlikely' as this is that it's very hard to prove that all sources of experimental error have been identified and accounted for, especially when the claimed effect is small. For example, this thing involves electrical currents, which produce magnetic fields, which in turn will interact with the earth's own magnetic field, etc. etc. There's plenty of room for this being bogus.
However, the groups that have repeated it aren't stupid, and they will have tried their damndest to account for all the stray effects taking place in their experimental set ups. Either we're left with stray effects influencing the experiment that haven't been thought of (a deeply unsatisfactory situation for any hardened experimentalist) or we're left with a real effect that the theoreticians are struggling to explain (an equally unsatisfactory situation).
An in-deep-space experiment would be the only way to adequately prove the effect is real. Which would cost rather than anyone is prepared to spend until there is a convincing theoretical basis for its operation. If there is one.
It would be very cool if it turns out to be true. And hope, as has often been stated, is what drives us onwards!
Biting the hand that feeds IT
