Whoa......lotsa philosophical content.
Universe: Was it always here, or was it created?
Energy: Always from within the "known universe" (which is kinda oxymoronic), or from a "zero point"?
Method: "Natural" vs. magnet or gravity (which I thought were pretty natural)?
These things I don't know, and while they are interesting to ponder, I really don't care.
I'm not really caring that much about the first as it is not a thing that I can experience or ever really know until there is FTL (faster than light) travel that would allow travel and distance measurement of the core and/or edges (if available, since another theory is that the universe is infinite) and maybe meet those that made it the way it is out there.
The 2nd question I don't care about much because it's almost a question of semantics as it is philosophy.
Any new energy that is not fully experimented with, tested, and understood would seem to come from no where or be "magic" until it has fulfilled those criteria.
Fire only came from lightning or magma before the creation of spark or understanding of friction was accomplished.
So call it Ether, Aether, Orgone, ZPE, or a fifth form of matter (assuming plasma as the fourth) that was not previously able to be sensed or measured, it doesn't matter.
Discovery of almost all the known energy types had to go from just being, to being explained, measured and
harnessed. We're still trying to understand those we know about better too (the case for magnets and gravity).
The 3rd philosophical question I don't care that much about either in
EDITone way, but do very much in another.
EDITI don't care because we need to change the effect our energy policies are having on our environment and it doesn't matter if something needs samarium cobalt mags, or the shoulder strap from a Victoria's Secret 34B wunderbra to work, as long as it does and changes our energy dependence effects.
Where the idea and proof comes from doesn't matter much either (although credit where it is due is very nice).
All it takes for the ticket from crackpot to genius is a replicated working device (that people know about and use), so it (a solution) might come from any corner.
People playing with magnets or watching weights rise and fall are on the same natural quest man has always been on, the quest for better understanding of his environment and how to manipulate it (or its effects).
They might see something others have not (which I thought was how science progressed).
EDITI just hope that it's discovered soon.
EDITOne thing I do wonder about is when a new energy source is discovered, if it's commercialization and use will have other environmental effect that we won't see for years that will probably effect life negatively and we'll have to fight tooth and nail against (somewhat like our present situation with oil and coal) before we realize and try to correct it.
Since it's historically proven and all that we (humans) have that propensity.
But I guess that's kinda philosophical too.