"Better than Most in the Field"

Iranian student Mohammad Mansouryar wants to lead a world wide revolution in physics, but is anyone listening?

RELATED ARTICLE: Starstream Research Interviews Mohammad Mansouryar

BY GARY S BEKKUM

October 2, 2006

(STARpod.org) -- On Saturday, July 1st, 2006, I received the following request from physicist Jack Sarfatti, in San Francisco:

"Hey Gary what's the name of that kid from Tehran you told me about a year ago or so? I forgot his name. Are you still in touch with him? Does he have a web page?"

In a follow up email Sarfatti explained that "the reason I asked is that a member of the USG [United States Government] asked me my opinion on the above work by Mohammad Mansouryar..." When asked, "Can he push the state of the art and is this work technically competent?" Sarfatti had replied, "It's better than most in the field."

Someone in the government had been checking around asking about Mansouryar and wanted to know more about his research. Obviously Mohammad was someone Starstream Research needed to keep an eye on. In fact I had already alerted Sarfatti to Mansouryar in November of 2004, when I discovered a paper he had posted at the physics archive at www.arXiv.org about the generation of 'exotic matter' from the physics of the quantum vacuum.

In January of 2006, Tim Ventura, of American Antigravity, published an excellent interview with Mohammad Mansouryar, who is known to his friends as Mammad. Mammad discussed with Ventura his interests in the kind of spacetime physics he calls "distance reduction," achieved in his theory by synthesizing subluminal warp drive with worm hole theory. Mammad was described as a young visionary, and according to Ventura's interview, he was born on November 22, 1983, in Karaj, Iran.

Not long after the inquiry from Sarfatti, numerous phone messages from Iran were left on the Starstream Research voice mail. It was quickly apparent that Mammad was a very persistent young man. A flurry of emails from Mammad accompanied the phone messages, requesting that I write a story about his research interests in worm holes and warp drives.

Mammad lamented, "Those [previous] stories haven't aggravated my situation in Iran, but surely have not been enough intriguing for the related authorities in America! They've driven me to the conclusion that more serious actions are needed to shake them and if not worked, forget your country ... Maybe if the American guy's 'in the defense and intelligence community' would understand the importance of my plan as the biggest possible 'Spacetime Threat Assessment Report,' I would have been in the States before it's TOO late."

All of this was happening during a very sensitive time, when the United States was challenging Iran's leadership over the development of nuclear technology. According to Tim Ventura, Mammad had been selected to learn 'atomic' physics and had studied at the University for three and a half years. Starstream Research was simultaneously on the periphery of another 'official' investigation involving alleged forgery and possible counter-intelligence operations within the United States. One of our contributing associates commented, "I think you might be in over your head on this one ... drop him would be my advice."

Sarfatti, who is not exactly known for his conservative nature and carefully considered opinion, offered another take on Mammad's possible motivations:

"He could be an Iranian agent." I took note of the fact that Sarfatti had also forwarded this opinion to a contact at the Defense Intelligence Agency.

In fact what had motivated Mammad was a behind the scenes debate over a paper he had submitted to STAIF-2007.

STAIF, the Space Technology and Applications International Forum, features a section on future exotic propulsion technology, including theoretical explorations of warp drives and worm holes, with an eye towards potential ground-breaking experiments.

Mammad was adamant about his desire to come to the United States, and to seek out financial backing to conduct experiments. I wrote to a well-placed contact of Starstream Research, a person I suspected was required to report any unusual contacts with foreign nationals:

"My sense is that Mammad is suffering from that future 'vision' thing and sees two paths laid out before him ... I would appreciate a response from you on this issue. Mammad has been calling me from Iran almost every day for the last week."

Mammad had emailed, "I only have two ways: becoming the next Dr. Abdolghadir Khan and selling my expertise to this damn regime to threaten the civilized people, or leaving here for testing other chances."

I pointed out that the American physicist, Dr. Hal Puthoff, had previously confirmed to Starstream Research that the exotic physics Mammad intended to pursue had the potential of producing new kinds of weapons of mass destruction, a bitter side-effect that the propulsion community had apparently swept under the rug.

Our contact responded, "Is this guy real, in your mind this time? Does he have good data other than Theoretical Physics? Designs? Patents? If so ... by all means report to [redacted] straightaway ... Importantly, [redacted] ... like you and me and Hal ... are not interested in working on anything that is yet another weapon. Especially a weapon that can kill lots of civilians. For any reason whatsoever. Now, working on trying to figure out IF such a program exists is another story."

In the interview with Ventura, Mammad had claimed that "I am ready to perform the preliminary tests in a suitable lab, and I estimate the necessary budget for that experimental phase shouldn't exceed more than $10 million dollars."

Meanwhile Mammad had supplied me with an email from Dr. Eric Davis, an associate of Hal Puthoff. Davis had recently achieved his ten minutes of fame as the author of a controversial paper on teleportation funded by the USAF. Davis addressed his analysis of Mammad's paper to STAIF's Paul Murad at the United States Department of Defense, and a couple of scientific advisors. Davis had been particularly critical of Mammad's submission, noting that "Mansouryar's paper, posted in its entirety last year on arXiv.org, is not original material and should be rejected."

In response to Davis' criticism, Murad forwarded the comments to Mammad, noting that "if you have any new ideas to offset this reviewer's claims, I would be very interested in seeing this."

Mammad addressed various technical issues brought up by Davis, writing "Eventually I thank all you guys who care about such conversations, and I hope the fruit of our scientific efforts on FTL [faster than light] travels would be in favor of all humanity."

Dr. Eric Davis responded to our inquiry about STAIF and Mammad's paper, offering his expert opinion that in spite of what he described as numerous 'technical errors,' Mammad's work was "well laid-out and thought out."

Strangely Davis also wrote back to us that "Mansouryar still does not provide his employment or university affiliation in his communications or paper submissions to professional conferences ... He also does not provide his DOB [date of birth] so we don't know how old he is. He continues to keep his background a complete mystery."

Davis' comments were unusual given that Tim Ventura had provided answers to these questions in the on-line interview at American Antigravity back in January. One of Ventura's associates at American Antigravity is Paul Murad, and we found it hard to believe that Davis had been left in the dark about Mansouryar's background.

Mammad provided us with additional background information, stating that his father works for the Agricultural Department and his mother is an educational advisor in psychology. He is the eldest of three brothers.

Frustrated by the red tape associated with his outreach to the west, he wrote of his "... plan to present my ideas to regimes which are the potentially enemies of the west ... to motivate to work on my theory, is fearing of using it in a war ..." Later he clarified this remark stating, "By the term 'regimes which are the potential enemies of the west,' I didn't mean only Iran ... giving my genius to China, and Russia could be a good choice. I have nothing to loose and the love to work on wormhole physics, can draw me behind of the forbidden walls of the China or the cold deserts of Russia."

Mammad also provided us with copies of replies he had received from DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, the U.S. Department of Energy, NASA and others.

"I love propulsion methods ONLY based on distance reduction, and not anything else."

Mammad wrote to us that his STAIF-2007 paper "presented six ways" to create negative energy, "the only obstacle of creating a worm hole."

"It is clear if I'd come there [United States] and my dreams [could] be realized, I'd become an effective guy and surely rich."

On September 28th, 2006, I received the following confirmation from Paul Murad:

"Gary: His paper has been accepted at STAIF. All he has to do are minor corrections."

Starstream Research Interviews Mohammad Mansouryar

Copyright (c) 2006 Gary S. Bekkum and Starstream Research. All rights reserved.