In that way it does not. You can move a boat wirh a fan if you use it to blow the air away from the boat to create thrust like a plane. If you direct the fan onto the sail the force of the forward motion will be canceled out by the backwards thrust (if the sail has 100% efficiency which it does not)

[–] [email protected] 3 points 11 months ago* (last edited 11 months ago)

Blowing a fan into the sail does work; but it's nowhere near as efficient as normal airboats. You're not gonna move very fast, and it takes a helluva lot of force just to go like 1/16 the speed you could if you just point the fan behind you.

The magnet thing might work the same way; but you'd need a super powerful magnet. Like probably an electromagnet. And at that point, an electric engine is just a more efficient use of the energy.