Cambridge University Professor Huw Price on the ‘Reputation Trap’ of Cold Fusion (Update: Response in Popular Mechanics)

Frank,

Quote from frankwtu

Had I accepted the challenge that Thomas set for me I think I would have fallen right in, that would have been me dispatched!!

I can't comment on any challenges Tom might have laid out for you. But I think there are many traps in this field. There are companies in which one could sink a lot of money, which would disappear forever, doing nobody any good. There are inventors and researchers who are going down a blind alley, guided by theories that are varying degrees of wrong, or perhaps "not even wrong," in some cases. There are a large number of papers or theories that may appear to someone new to the topic to be legitimate or impressive, but upon further investigation are no good. Many LENR watchers, including some who voice strong opinions in favor of LENR, are no doubt confused. This subject is surely a minefield. Are there scammers everywhere? I doubt it. Perhaps there are a few. I get the impression that most people seeking funding are sincere on some level. But that does not make those who are confused any less so.

Despite all of this, I'm persuaded there are anomalies worth investigating and that are being effectively investigated. In the present state of affairs, with the very low signal-to-noise ratio in the field in general, it could possibly take some time to become acquainted with various pitfalls and some of the more promising avenues of investigation.

Eric

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What volumes does the absence of the signal-to-noise ratio for the 4 OOM claim speak? What if they had to cut out 10 pages of similarly important information in order to meet the word or page count requirement? Perhaps they would have a ready answer to the suggestion that they didn't look closely at this question. Or maybe they wouldn't.

(1) This primary and direct evidence of their claim would surely be put in the first paper.
(2) If not it would, being more important, certainly be published quickly and referenced in subsequent papers
(3) Data for this direct evidence is much simpler, requiring fewer pages, than what is presented.

You don't have a leg to stand on here. The absence says this is a bust observation, something that when reproduced, or controlled, went away.

Eric
Thanks for your advice which I value.

First I ask is there an anomaly, yes I think that has been proven. Second can that anomaly be harnessed to do useful work, maybe, I don't think that has been proven at all. Third, if the anomaly can be harnessed to do useful work, can it be commercialised.

Of course I am uncertain as to the nature of the 'anomoly' and I think it is right to have these discussions which I think are very productive.

Tom

I value a great deal what you say and I am aware that the discourse is essential. If I have appeared disrespectful in any way I apologise for that, my interest in this thread is to explore the damaging effects of the psychological warfare which appears to be a characteristic of the 'reputation trap' which Huw Price claims frustrates progress by alienating main stream scientists. Some contributors clearly 'muddy the waters' (please excuse the juxtaposition) but others who might be considered 'sceptic's' or perhaps 'debunkers' have an important role to play in the discovery process to encourage greater clarity and detail to be exercised by the claimants.

I tend to loose concentration when contributors attack each others person rather than what they are saying.

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So you have looked at the paper Thomas and only have questions. For me I don't have the skill to answer your questions. But to answer a question with a question which seems to highlight this, does seem to suggest that you are willing to re direct the critique to examine the questioner rather than the paper. Somewhere on this forum I received some very valuable advice which proposed 'ad homs do your case no good' An ad hominem (Latin for "to the man" or "to the person"[1]), short for argumentum ad hominem, is an attack on an argument made by attacking the character, motive, or other attribute of the person making the argument, rather than attacking the argument directly.

In this case while I agree replying with questions can be as you say i think it is fair. It is less time-consuming for me to highlight issues as questions than to give a complete exposition. And whomever was making claims that this paper did say something important should be able to substantiate them. But, don't worry, when time permits I'll come back to those questions myself.

Consider the following:
Believer - there is lots of evidence for LENR, for example A,B,C
Skeptic: OK - I've looked at A. How do you show X,Y,Z?
Believer: hey - its not fair - you are asking me questions! And anyway it is your job, as skeptic, to show me why A,B,C don't show what I think they show!

I think the reverse - it is the job of anyone claiming LENR exists and wanting to be taken seriously to show this.

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(1) what is the (Bayesian network) proposition that is found 90%, or based on later work 99% true? I need this precisely in terms of the network inputs, with for each an explanation of how it is determined from a given paper (hint - everything is boolean).

(2) Does the "F-P" effect as defined in this paper imply LENR?

(3) Why are Bayesian networks not much to do with Bayesian probability theory? (Hint - you'll need some googling for this one if you don't know, but should find a good explanation).

Quote from Thomas Clarke

I think the reverse - it is the job of anyone claiming LENR exists and wanting to be taken seriously to show this.

Thanks for that. Perhaps I should put my cards on the table. I am not claiming LENR exists I merely acknowledge 'anomalies' are apparent, as I know you do. What I am interested in is the 'discovery' process and learning from people like yourself without entering into some sort of contest and certainly not using tactics like 'ad homs', 'character assignation' and particularly avoiding any association with so called 'reputation traps'

So, if you are able to help me understand the nature of the 'anomalies' discussed on this forum, whether (if they exist) they can be harnessed to do useful work and eventually commercialised I would be grateful.

If that is not the aim of some participants then I can only speculate that 'discovery' is the last thing on their mind, even worse it appears some have the single minded aim of destroying the reputation of those engaged in the process of discovery, why is that?

At this point I would like to express my thanks to Eric and to people (i.e. Axil, AlainCo etc) like him who do present a balanced representation of ideas, considering dispassionately other opinions and progressing the 'discovery' process.

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At this point I would like to express my thanks to Eric and to people (i.e. Axil, AlainCo etc) like him who do present a balanced representation of ideas, considering dispassionately other opinions and progressing the 'discovery' process.

Well, I'd like to thank AlainCo for very properly allowing uncensored discussion here. And it is fun discussing these things. But we must just agree to disagree if you view Alain or Axil as balanced on this issue.

I've said here earlier, and I think it easily gets forgotten, that any specific argument will inevitably be interpreted according to prior expectations. Believers who reckon from judging lots of other evidence that LENR is more or less proven, or at least quite likely, will take one view. Those like me who start with the (true) prior that LENR as a physical hypothesis is extraordinary, and highly unlikely, and who look with critical appraisal at the literature, will take another view.

The probability that LENR is "likely" rather than near probability 1 or 0 is actually very low. Why is that? Because it starts of as very close to zero, in absence of evidence. Evidence enough to move it to say 0.1, but not enough to move it to 0.9, is highly unlikely. So if you are thinking - "well - I'm balanced because my judgement is it is maybe 50% likely to be real" - then your process of truning evidence into probabilities probably does not accord with reality.

As humans, we tend to sit on the fence when the situation is too complex to understand, so we stay uncommitted. That is fine, but if the evidence has that nature, then the default ( LENR is extraordinary and therefore probability near zero) should hold. That, however, is not the way the human mind works.

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If that is not the aim of some participants then I can only speculate that 'discovery' is the last thing on their mind, even worse it appears some have the single minded aim of destroying the reputation of those engaged in the process of discovery, why is that?

With respect I think internet forums are generally not about discovery, but having fun, at best exchanging ideas and knowledge, it usual worst having fixed arguments enjoyed by both sides but going nowhere.

MFMP is perhaps an exception to that. But, as you can see, they have to think up stunts etc to raise much needed funds because "discovery" for them has not discovered anything except some interesting calorimetry errors. (Well, an expert would probably view these as obvious and ones that only an amateur would make, but MFMP are amateurs as are nearly all people commenting on or doing LENR).

Quote from Thomas Clarke

(1) This primary and direct evidence of their claim would surely be put in the first paper.

By "first paper," do you have in mind the 2009 paper, where the claim is made? I agree that it would be nice to have more detail. I disagree that the absence of more detail is an indication that the claim is bust. I'm a little surprised that anyone would be led to that conclusion in this particular case.

Quote from Thomas Clarke

(2) If not it would, being more important, certainly be published quickly and referenced in subsequent papers

What are the "subsequent papers," here, in relation to the 2009 paper?

Quote from Thomas Clarke

(3) Data for this direct evidence is much simpler, requiring fewer pages, than what is presented.

Ok. As readers of the 2009 paper, we'd like more substantiation of the 4 OOM claim in the paper, rather than relying on peer review. That is a reasonable request. Pending such a development, are we to conclude that the 4 OOM claim is false or baseless?

Quote from Thomas Clarke

You don't have a leg to stand on here. The absence says this is a bust observation, something that when reproduced, or controlled, went away.

Is this what you conclude from that detail? Such a suggestion strains credibility. Perhaps you're just using dramatic overemphasis to enforce your hunch, which is conjecture.

Quote from H-G Branzell

Where there are Students there should be Teachers. So where are they? Your main interest seems to be to quarrel with each other about things of little or no importance

My hope is to get some details to better understand why one should conclude that the claim of a four-order of magnitude difference in pits reported by Mosier-Boss et al. when D2O is used instead of H2O is bust. That claim suggests a strong signal in a set of experiments whose overall findings, if true, potentially call into question one of the main criticisms against LENR. Perhaps you're not interested in this particular thread or topic. You can safely ignore my posts, and I will not mind.

Quote from H-G Branzell

What a waste of perfectly good words. I think that we should introduce a word tax, like one cent per syllable. The revenues from this tax could be used to support research in systems for sustainable energy.

I am working hard here to collect points so I can advance to the next Level. For this I need for a Teacher to take a look at my homework that I left upstairs and then put a grade on my report card.

Thank you for your kind cooperation.

Again, you are free to ignore my posts if they are not of interest to you. Or, if that is too difficult, you can seek out another forum to spend your time on. Either is fine.

H-G Branzell

Yes, there seems to be a lot of discussion which appears to have wandered off topic a little. I suggest you take the link below which is written by a qualified Professor, in my opinion a very good teacher, read it and come back and see how we all fair in your estimation with the hypothesis offered by Huw Price. You may wish to give each of us 'points' to indicate how well we have kept to the subject matter of the post. See what you think. I am willing to mark your critique accordingly.
https://aeon.co/essays/why-do-…ossibility-of-cold-fusion

Best regards
Frank (qualified teacher)

Quote from H-G Branzell

The problem with CR-39 detectors is that they react not only to particles. They should not be your first choice of detector.

Suitable controls would be sufficient to rule out to a high degree of confidence anything other than energetic particles. Mosier-Boss et al. claim to have carried out a number of controls. Did they carry out sufficient controls? Perhaps they did, and perhaps they did not.

Mosier-Boss et al. use CR-39, with its limitations, in order to get around the fact that what is being measured takes place in a small electrochemical cell. Perhaps CR-39 is not ideal in this case -- this would be a question that goes beyond my knowledge of the technology, and I suspect yours as well. Mosier-Boss et al. appear to believe that it's adequate. Was it acceptable for them to proceed this way, despite any limitations with CR-39, and are the results sound? Beyond any elementary errors, this is a question for specialists.

Quote from H-G Branzell

But I did help you to undersand the "micro explosions", didn't I?

Yes -- you brought up some excellent points, and modified my understanding of what the IR thermography and the graphs that go along with it were saying. There is at least one clear way that they should tighten up their IR thermography to put to rest the doubts you raised, by using a camera with a greater range. In addition, correlation with the piezoelectric impulses would be great. Was I successful in helping you to understand why, despite your helpful clarifications, those might still be micro-explosions?

Quote from H-G Branzell

Perhaps I should send a charming email to Pamela (no not Anderson) and convince her that the white spots are no sparks.
Maybe that can make her change her mind about nuclear reactions so you can change yours, if you don't mind.

Yes -- please do! Perhaps you'll persuade them that their conclusions are incorrect, or perhaps you'll help everyone to understand that they're producing bad science. Pending that, we're each left to our own best judgment of what is likely. Here we've got two levels of calling into question experiments such as theirs:

• we've provided a plausible alternative that explains the totality of observations;
• we've proven that what was proposed in (1) best describes the observations they're reporting (i.e., we've debunked their claims).

As far as I can tell, we haven't yet gotten to (1), yet.

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My hope is to get some details to better understand why one should conclude that the claim of a four-order of magnitude difference in pits reported by Mosier-Boss et al. when D2O is used instead of H2O is bust.

The claim was clearly anecdotal:

• no quantified evidence, or photos
• no fully specified conditions
• no controls

And as H-G says CR-39 is a very indiscrimate detection mechanism, no time resolution, many things (including just chemical exposure) that can cause tracks.

So it is worthless and they must sure have known that or it would have been their headline. It is really just common sense + understanding how science papers work. In a (good) paper nothing is asserted. Every statement has evidence to back it up - a reference, or experimental data, or an argument made, or some maths done.

Quote from Thomas Clarke

The claim was clearly anecdotal:
no quantified evidence, or photos
no fully specified conditions
no controls

Would you have us conclude that because no quantified evidence or photos were provided, and that the conditions were not fully specified, and the controls were not reported, that they had no rigorous basis for claiming that four-orders of magnitude fewer pits were observed with H2O than with D2O? What information do they have, and what steps did they follow to arrive at this conclusion? Do we care?

Quote from Thomas Clarke

And as H-G says CR-39 is a very indiscrimate detection mechanism, no time resolution, many things (including just chemical exposure) that can cause tracks.

Yes -- I get the impression from reading Wikipedia that it is indiscriminate. It clearly has no time resolution, because it is integrating. It is possible that chemical exposure will cause tracks; this is certainly a potential source of error that people have mentioned.

To the charge that it is indiscriminate: true. But during the time of the experiments, pits were seen, which, with proper controls, give pretty good evidence of energetic particles. So perhaps the evidence is not as high-fidelity as we would like. That does not mean we can set it aside. If their controls were adequate, there are energetic particles being emitted in their electrochemical cells that we're going to have to deal with as an experimental fact, whether we like it or not. And this fact will have been brought into the world using plain-old CR-39, deficiencies and all.

To the charge that chemical exposure can cause tracks, Mosier-Boss et al. claim to have controlled for that. Were their controls adequate? Perhaps they were, and perhaps they were not.

Quote from Thomas Clarke

So it is worthless and they must sure have known that or it would have been their headline.

This is a bit of a non-sequitor in two ways. First, we might suspect that the 4 OOM claim was not worthless, for they felt it important enough to include in the article and get it through peer review. Second, a claim is not worthless for not being placed in the headline.

Just wanted to mention as an aside that above you would not only have us understand that the 4 OOM claim is worthless, but that Mosier-Boss et al. believed it to be worthless. This is certainly one conjecture. Another conjecture is that Mosier-Boss et al. thought that the claim was a good one and that it could be substantiated, so they included it in the paper.

Quote from Thomas Clarke

It is really just common sense + understanding how science papers work. In a (good) paper nothing is asserted. Every statement has evidence to back it up - a reference, or experimental data, or an argument made, or some maths done.

In the paper recently mentioned in this forum in Nature Communications, "Giant phonon anomaly associated with superconducting fluctuations in the pseudogap phase of cuprates," the authors refer to supplementary notes and figures in several places. Perhaps these notes and figures were provided in response to reviewers who requested clarification; we can perhaps infer that the policy of Nature Communications is to make this kind of supplementary information available online. Are we to conclude that we have enough information at this point to know that Mosier-Boss et al. would not be able to produce a set of supplementary information to back up their 4 OOM claim? Are we to conclude that because they made an assertion that was not backed up by a supplementary note that their paper is not a good one?

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Would you have us conclude that because no quantified evidence or photos were provided, and that the conditions were not fully specified, and the controls were not reported, that they had no rigorous basis for claiming that four-orders of magnitude fewer pits were observed with H2O than with D2O? What information do they have, and what steps did they follow to arrive at this conclusion? Do we care?

I'm not saying they did not make this observation, if honest, as is highly likely, they did. I'm saying it is worthless in that no useful conclusions can be drawn from it. Without the missing data we don't know what caused this - there are any number of possibles.

We also have strong meta-evidence that this observation was not reproducible and therefore has experimental error as its cause, or that its cause is just not interesting. If it were reproducible and interesting it would be stronger evidence than that presented to back up the take home conclusion. No scientist would just forget to include their strongest evidence. Of course, it would need careful records, controls, etc, and those would need to show that it was not D contamination with tritium or any of the other boring ways in which this thing could happen.

"In this communication, the use of CR-39 to detect charged particles in the Pd/D co-deposition experiment is demonstrated. In these experiments, pits are observed in a CR-39 detector that has been in contact with a cathodi- cally polarized Pd/D substrate. Evidence is presented that show that these pits are tracks caused by the emission of charged particles and that these tracks are not due to either radioactive contamination; or from the electrolysis of heavy water; or from or Cl2. chemical reaction with D2 , O2 or Cl2"

http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/MosierBossuseofcrinp.pdf

TC (as in ThermoCouple) is the most common probe for LENR, TC suites you TC! Anyway I think Rossi is right about at least one thing: the unbelievers will not accept LENR/Cold fusion until there are products on the market to experience. If that ever happens (my extension, but at least I am open minded, not closing doors without fact first).