FP's experiments discussion

joshua cude had written:

"Hot fusion
You do realize that hot fusion doesn't work yet, right? Which makes it a sink of money, not a source. The decision makers -- the DOE in the US, or the government, by extension -- would like nothing better than to save the money they *spend* on hot fusion. And the same goes for everyone in the scientific community other than the hot fusion workers, because it would leave all the more money for other fields. Sure, the actual hot fusion researchers get their salaries from the research, but they are trained scientists and engineers. They could get the same salary just about anywhere else. No one is making a killing here. None of the people involved now are likely to be living by the time hot fusion turns a profit, if it ever does."

Quote from to which Longview

In peace time, research funding is directly related to and quite proportionate to public perception (simple mechanism involving media and Congress). In war time a similar relationship prevails, except that the public is largely excluded from the decision making.

Do you have some fundamental misunderstanding of economics and research? A "sink' of money from the standpoint of the taxpayer is a "source" of money from the standpoint of a researcher. Not too difficult, but perhaps such a fundamental misunderstanding is clouding your thinking in this area?

I assume from other's descriptions of your actual persona that you are aware of the inertia that can accompany a career in science today. That is a life of work in an area of NSF, NIH, DOE etc funding come with many perqs such as journal editorships, book authorships / editorships, national meeting keynote presentations, grant committee membership and so on. Sure a newly minted Ph.D. or successful post doc is ready to "move on" to other areas within the larger discipline (if there are not reputation traps laid). But that does not apply as easily the more successful and entrenched one becomes in their particular sub discipline. Exceptions: the very top folks, the National Academicians, the Nobel Laureates. They can move around on reputation alone, due in part to a possibly dubious notion of "brilliance'. But regardless of the notion, it is a system and it has worked, for example say in the Manhattan Project. But it is not perfect, take for example the Human Genome Project which stumbled along for a decade or so, and only gained momentum under the threat of a private and competing initiative by J. Craig Venter.

So Cude, where are you now? Can it be that you have nothing to say?

Best of health to you, if that is an issue.

Longview

Quote from Longview

So Cude, where are you now? Can it be that you have nothing to say?

Best of health to you, if that is an issue.

Does anyone here know what happened to Cude? Seems a bit odd that he vanished. Maybe Abd would have some perspective on Cude in this regard.

Somewhat like Thomas Clarke, Cude seemed never without a response. Or has Cude's troll funding by the Kochs or whoever been cancelled?

Quote from Longview

Does anyone here know what happened to Cude? Seems a bit odd that he vanished. Maybe Abd would have some perspective on Cude in this regard.

Somewhat like Thomas Clarke, Cude seemed never without a response. Or has Cude's troll funding by the Kochs or whoever been cancelled?

Cude and MY are trying to discourage Bob Greenyer. Cude does not like BGs zest for science and thinks this joy is obscene. BG is wasting much time with Cude but he will learn the folly in this diversion.

Where is this Bob Greenyer / Cude mixup supposed to be happening? I don't see it here at the LENR Forum.
Or do you mean the research results associated with Greenyer are defeating Cude?

Does not seem likely.... but let's see the details.

longview wrote:

Quote

Do you have some fundamental misunderstanding of economics and research? A "sink' of money from the standpoint of the taxpayer is a "source" of money from the standpoint of a researcher. Not too difficult, but perhaps such a fundamental misunderstanding is clouding your thinking in this area?

I acknowledged that the actual researchers were supported by research funding when I said, "Sure, the actual hot fusion researchers get their salaries from the research...", and you both quoted it, and attempted to respond to it, so I don't know what your problem is.

Yes, there are some who benefit from funding for hot fusion, but it is very unlike the fossil fuel industry, which actual produces wealth -- that is, they make a product that people want to buy. So, since cold fusion is a *net* sink of money -- it does not create wealth, an argument that cold fusion is suppressed because of hot-fusion self-interest is complete nonsense:

1. The people with the power in hot fusion -- the ones who make the decisions about disbursing the money -- would benefit immensely from cold fusion. These are the governments or their designated bodies -- the DOE in the US. The governments of Western governments (the ones supporting hot fusion research) would see only benefits from cold fusion -- economic, environmental, political, and strategic benefits.

2. The scientists consulted by funding agencies when they make these decisions, would also benefit from cold fusion. They are careful to avoid conflicts of interest, and so they consult people who would not receive the funds in question. And scientists not involved in hot fusion research would benefit if less money was wasted on the field, not to to mention the benefits every other human would reap from clean and abundant energy.

3. The most influential skeptics of cold fusion were not beneficiaries of hot fusion funding. This includes

- the slam dunk team of Nathan Lewis (a chemist) and Steven Koonin (a theoretical physicist) at Cal Tech, who deflated the excitement at the APS meeting a little more than a month after the announcement,

- Douglas Morrison, an experimental particle physicist and research director at CERN, who was initially effusive in his praise of the finding: "… I feel this subject will become so important to society that we must consider the broader implications as well as the scientific ones. Looking into a cloudy crystal ball, […] the present big power companies will be running down their oil and coal power stations while they are building deuterium separation plants and new power plants based on cold fusion. No new nuclear power stations will be built except for military needs….", but later became one of the more effective critics, attending the meetings, and writing a regular (critical) newsletter on the subject.

- the entire ERAB panel assembled by the DOE to examine the best evidence

- Glenn Seaborg, a nuclear chemist and scientific advisor to many presidents ... and others.

So, even if I agreed (and I don't) that hot fusion scientists would deliberately suppress new scientific knowledge and hire shills to argue in internet forums, to protect their own research funding, I certainly don't agree that that the small cadre of hot fusion scientists would have the power to sway the entire community. You didn't see scientists researching vacuum tubes suppressing semiconductor science, or x-ray scientists suppressing MRI research. Scientists object to bad science. That's all.

4. Scientists -- especially fusion scientists -- would know better than anyone that if cold fusion were a real phenomenon, it would eventually be vindicated. And it would have been expected a long time ago. Therefore, they would regard attempts to suppress it in the face of inevitable vindication as far worse for their career than pro-actively embracing it. They simply would not risk such humiliation unless they were all but certain that cold fusion was bogus, in which case, it was their responsibility to voice their opinion of it.

Quote

... inertia that can accompany a career in science today. That is a life of work in an area of NSF, NIH, DOE etc funding come with many perqs such as journal editorships, book authorships / editorships, national meeting keynote presentations, grant committee membership and so on. Sure a newly minted Ph.D. or successful post doc is ready to "move on" to other areas within the larger discipline (if there are not reputation traps laid). But that does not apply as easily the more successful and entrenched one becomes in their particular sub discipline.

This is nonsense. Most of the leaders in hot fusion research are academics, and academics often change fields. There is some inertia, but they have enough integrity not to dishonestly suppress new knowledge. The search for new knowledge is why they became scientists to begin with. And if cold fusion were real, there would be a lot of nuclear physics for these people to do. A lot of questions to answer, techniques to develop. It would be a completely different scale, but the intellectual shift would not be that large, and it would not affect the trajectory of their career that much. You are just grasping for excuses here.

@Cude

I don't think any "point" you put forward is even remotely convincing of anything other than your preconceived notions. A bit of a disappointment, really.

Mistakes made in promoting but particularly in evaluating cold fusion are many. The weight of expectation can, and often does, favor the status quo. Billions of dollars of funding research at risk also buys a lot of prejudicial treatment. That such prejudicial treatment [not necessarily conscious] can persist for decades once underway is not unusual--- particularly since hot fusion research continues with substantial funding. Such prejudice is seen widely in another area often thought to be governed by rational scientific investigation, perhaps more familiar to the average scientifically literate reader: pharmaceuticals. But at least in that area the problem is well enough recognized that there are more established and more convincing ways to re-examine the issues raised. In apparent breakthrough physics made by electrochemists or other "outsiders", it may be a lot more difficult and time consuming to "try the case" with sufficient fairness. The most that can be said for your blather is that it may delay proper evaluation. The truths, if there are any, will eventually out. The damage you may do is simply one of delay. However, "justice delayed is justice denied". Global climate change and misuse of valuable resources seem to be the main near term consequences of misappropriating investigatory funds in fusion physics. Failure to get interplanetary probes easily powered would seem another longer term consequence.

I would write of you in much more positive terms if you were to suggest ingenious or simple ways to test ('depose") the various ideas and preliminary evidences of CF / LENR. Currently you, Cude, appear as a simple dogmatist.

longview wrote:

Quote

The weight of expectation can, and often does, favor the status quo.

In science the status quo is based on evidence already accumulated and verified. Expectation *should* favor consistency with existing evidence. But when the evidence is strong (as in HTSC), status quo doesn't stand a chance. In cold fusion, the evidence is weak.

Quote

Billions of dollars of funding research at risk also buys a lot of prejudicial treatment.

Yes, in cold fusion's favor. Because people prefer *not* to spend money if they can get the same result at a fraction of the cost. That's how self-interest works.

Quote

That such prejudicial treatment [not necessarily conscious] can persist for decades once underway is not unusual

I don't know of another phenomenon that was greeted with such exceptional worldwide enthusiasm, widely studied, and then dismissed with near unanimity by the same people who had welcomed it, and then for it to be finally vindicated. If you can think of one, don't hold back.

Quote

--- particularly since hot fusion research continues with substantial funding.

Right. It continues to *cost* money. The people who have to support would benefit if cold fusion were real. Their prejudice is strongly in cold fusion's favor.

Quote

Such prejudice is seen widely in another area often thought to be governed by rational scientific investigation, perhaps more familiar to the average scientifically literate reader: pharmaceuticals.

Could you elaborate? Are they suppressing a cure for cancer? Was penicillin suppressed by people who received funding for burying people? Or are you complaining about evidence-based medicine suppressing homeopathy, because if so, then that certainly fits.

Quote

But at least in that area the problem is well enough recognized that there are more established and more convincing ways to re-examine the issues raised.

I disagree. Medicine is by its nature more difficult to evaluate. Especially compared to heat. That's why there are so many quacks pushing things like homeopathy, a therapy useless against objectively identifiable disease, but if you every have a vague sense of unease, your local homeopathist is the person for you.

Quote

In apparent breakthrough physics made by electrochemists or other "outsiders", it may be a lot more difficult and time consuming to "try the case" with sufficient fairness.

Bullshit. Did you read what Morrison's first reaction to cold fusion was. That was not atypical. Scientists everywhere were prepared to give P&F the benefit of the doubt, because they couldn't imagine anyone could get the identification of fusion or excess heat wrong.

And then they saw the evidence and nearly wretched.

Quote

The most that can be said for your blather is that it may delay proper evaluation. The truths, if there are any, will eventually out. The damage you may do is simply one of delay.

Of course, if it were real, there would be no stopping it, as I argued. And scientists would know this better than anyone, and would therefore not risk their reputation disputing it unless they were all but certain it was bogus.

But again you're arguing with generic free-thinker slogans, that any perpetual motion advocate might deploy with the same effectiveness -- none at all.

Promoting evidence-based science over pseudoscience has a strong legacy and helps to prevent funding and effort from being squandered on useless pursuits. Who knows what Pons might have accomplished if he hadn't destroyed his career by getting suckered in to cold fusion by his former mentor.

Quote from joshua cude

Promoting evidence-based science over pseudoscience has a strong legacy and helps to prevent funding and effort from being squandered on useless pursuits. Who knows what Pons might have accomplished if he hadn't destroyed his career by getting suckered in to cold fusion by his former mentor.

Mr. Cude might have missed some of the last years... Already in 1994 Arata (Japan) could replicate the Pons experiment. In the following years he published diverse papers which unmistakingly proved huge excess heat. Thus LENR is real since more than 20 years.
Unluckily some few US-based person (who understands the US politics knows about who I talk) decided to follow their own agenda. It is also common DARPA law, that no knew breakthrough science/technology should be public available. (This law was again enforced under pres. Reagen.)
The only “remaining fools” on earth were the Japanese & the Italian researchers. Both countries have a very good understanding how the mafia culture works...
One thing the Japanese published in 2014 (jccf15) was a dynamic hydrogen loadable reactor which already behaved very well.
JCCF16 happened last December. Contrary to other years the proceeding were hold back. This is a clear sign that they decided no longer to play an open game and possibly plan to market their own products.

To sum it up: I think Mr. Cude should stop his “Troll Mission” to black-Write the whole LENR field. LENR is already a thousand times more real that hot D-D D-T fusion ever will be on earth. Therefor the reputation trap will soon snap all the “blue sky dreamers” of hot fusion & fission. I see a lot of work for therapists.

Shane wrote:

Quote

Joshua conveniently fails to mention that there is a political component to mainstream science. He makes it sound so pristine, and above partisanship, greed, and jealousy.

You're mistaken. I admitted there is a political component, and that greed has an influence. I simply argued that in the case of cold fusion the political pressure and greed worked strongly in its favor.

That's obvious from any review of the way the world reacted to the press conference in 1989. Excitement and enthusiasm was nearly universal among scientists and lay people alike. Journals like Science and Nature held spots open for the big reveal, governments and industry were prepared to pump money into it, and some (like Utah and Japan and Italy and India and Toyota) did.

This is not the reaction of a world that opposes the very idea of cold fusion. And why would they? What's not to like about abundant, cheap, and clean energy, that would make countries self-sufficient when it comes to energy. The vast majority of humans, including most of the rich and powerful, would benefit immeasurably from cold fusion. The way greed and power works is that the greedy and powerful do what benefits them, and that would be to support cold fusion, if only it were real.

Quote

... history is replete with science being politicized. In some cases for the better, as with QM, where sharp, and in some cases acrimonious, "political" divisions actually honed the debate, advancing the emerging theories.

Where presumably you are using "political" very loosely to refer to differing theoretical camps, and not actual Politics. A competition of ideas is healthy, and I would not call it politicized.

Quote

But at times, as I believe will be the case with LENR/CF...for the worse.

I also believe this. Political pressures gave the field far too much attention and as a result, it represents a colossal waste of time and resources, and has provided fertile soil for what are almost certainly several investment frauds. If the phenomenon did not have such important implications relating to energy, it would never have got outside Utah.

Quote

One of the early skeptics turned believer, Dr. Miles, said "they gave it 40 days, then killed the field (LENR)".

Right, and what do you supposed happened in those 40 days? Do you think that scientists suddenly realized that "oops, I'm supposed to oppose new knowledge that is contrary to the status quo" or "Oh yeah, I forgot .. I'm supposed to hate clean and abundant energy"? Do you think that all these political and greedy scientists forgot about their self-interest for 40 days, and then suddenly remembered it? That's totally ridiculous.

Scientists' self-interest, whatever it is, did not change during those 40 days. The only thing that changed in those 40 days is that people got a chance to try a few things themselves, and more importantly they got a chance to examine the claimed evidence for cold fusion. And what they found was that P&F had made blatant errors in the measurement of radiation products, and that the measurements of excess heat were flaky at best. Whereas they started out thinking qualified scientists like P&F could not possibly be mistaken about something as easily identified as fusion (since at least the 30s) and heat (for centuries), and yet when they looked at the evidence it became clear that they were in fact capable of such errors. As a result Science and Nature did not accept their papers for publication, and they ended up publishing in J Electroanal. Chem., a journal that took another decade to realize it was all bogus, and they too stopped publishing in the field.

Quote

In other words, 40 days after the 1989 FP's announcement, the mainstream scientific establishment put an end to open dialogue of something so potentially revolutionary. Amazing! 40 days is all the time the leading scientific thought leaders of the time gave LENR, before making the political decision to make it poison, career suicide, for others to continue on with the research. They effectively ran it underground, and cut off the fresh new blood every new science needs to grow.

Forty days is 39 more than it deserved. If the evidence had been examined by peer review instead of press conference, it would not have got the attention it got, and would have probably died quietly as all whacky ideas unsupported by evidence do.

But of course, you exaggerate the death of the field, thereby contradicting all the advocates who claim legitimacy based on all the subsequent activity in the field.

The dialog did not end after 40 days. The ERAB panel continued to study the best evidence in great detail for another 5 months before making its recommendations. And the dozens of scientists who continued to work on it did not destroy their careers (except by choice in Pons' case), and publications continued at the rate of hundreds per year for a few years and then 50 per year for a decade. For a phenomenon P&F claimed to have discovered with just two or three people and $100k, it's inconceivable that dozens of scientists working on it for 27 years with $500M not only could not make progress, but can't even claim the same levels of heat in refereed literature that P&F claimed in 1989. It's a classic case of pathological science.

If I claimed to have invented a potion that cures all disease, and the evidence I presented was lousy, do you think I should get more than 40 days in the limelight just because it would be so potentially revolutionary? Don't you think I should have to present evidence that the scientific community would agree was compelling? P&F did not.

Quote

This isn't just some "conspiracy theory", as one only has to read the early (1989-1992) New York Times articles to come to the same conclusion. It is right there. Even those that killed LENR, are on record bragging about it. They had parties celebrating it's demise. T-shirts too. They applauded it's being laid to rest at conferences!

What's right there? The rejection of the unsupported claims? Why should they hide it? And why shouldn't they congratulate themselves for preventing even more waste on a subject they were all but sure was totally bogus? They did the world a service. Of course, some continued to pursue the subject anyway, but when the upside is so huge, and the bogosity is a little subtle, there will always be those who fall prey to wishful thinking, illusion, and confirmation bias, and who would, as Storms wrote, get "lured into believing that the Pons-Fleischmann effect would solve the world's energy problems and make us all rich."

Quote

Sheer madness, mob rule, and those were some of the leading intellects of the time. They made it political, and thereby won. But somehow Joshua ignores all that as he makes his case that LENR had a fair hearing, and that is the end of it.

You can win debates on social truths by making them political, but that doesn't work with observable phenomena. Imagine making flight political and claiming the Wrights couldn't fly even as they flew figure 8s above Paris. (People *did* claim the Wrights couldn't fly, and that lasted until their first openly public flight in 1908, and not 110 seconds longer. Funny how openly public cold fusion demos don't have the same effect, even 27 years later.)

Or making HTSC political even while superconductors at liquid nitrogen temperatures levitated by the Meisner effect. Total nonsense.

The idea that fusion or energy density a million times that of chemical, once achieved, is more difficult to prove, and could be suppressed by "making it political" is just a true believer paranoia.

Quote

To this day, all across the world, from Russia, to Italy, Sweden, India, and the US, the ramifications of CFs early politicization, has plagued the field and hampered it's development.

Whatever you call it, that was the intention. Likewise, the "politicization" of perpetual motion research has plagued the field and hampered its development. As well it should.

Quote

Contrary to what Joshua says, there are a lot of scientists praying LENR isn't real due their role in suppressing it.

In the same way, they are praying perpetual motion machines don't really work because of their role in suppressing them, and that homeopathy doesn't work, and dowsing doesn't work, and telekinesis doesn't work.

But the instinctive attitude toward cold fusion was on display in 1989. It was welcomed with enthusiasm. What scientists do not welcome is wild claims unsupported by evidence.

Quote from joshua cude

Right, and what do you supposed happened in those 40 days? Do you think that scientists suddenly realized that "oops, I'm supposed to oppose new knowledge that is contrary to the status quo" or "Oh yeah, I forgot .. I'm supposed to hate clean and abundant energy"? Do you think that all these political and greedy scientists forgot about their self-interest for 40 days, and then suddenly remembered it? That's totally ridiculous.

As I mentioned above, at that time (1991) it was law, that all physics publication had to be DARPA approved. In 1991 1/3 of all physics papers were hold back indefinitely. In the semiconductor field it was far more than 50%. US president Reagan ordered a shut mouth for the whole US science in behalf of the so called star-wars initiative (which was designed & screwed up by a few foolish people..)

Conclusion: The Pons-publication was more than high treason at least in the eyes of the above mentioned fools. I personally (1989) was astonished and questioned how they (Fleischman & Pons) managed it to make the story public. They fooled the whole administration!!

What we may learn: US Military & dark state services repeatedly managed to deprive the US of the most needed future technologies. Do they really believe that the rest of the world consists of no brainers? I personally did not publish many things until they were embedded in products. I guess its the same with Rossi & Arrata/Mizuno. They only plan to make money with the fools.

Quoting Longview: "Such prejudice is seen widely in another area often thought to be governed by rational scientific investigation, perhaps more familiar to the average scientifically literate reader: pharmaceuticals."

Quote from joshua cude

Could you elaborate? Are they suppressing a cure for cancer? Was penicillin suppressed by people who received funding for burying people? Or are you complaining about evidence-based medicine suppressing homeopathy, because if so, then that certainly fits.

Again quoting Longview: "But at least in that area the problem is well enough recognized that there are more established and more convincing ways to re-examine the issues raised."

Quote from joshua cude

I disagree. Medicine is by its nature more difficult to evaluate. Especially compared to heat. That's why there are so many quacks pushing things like homeopathy, a therapy useless against objectively identifiable disease, but if you every have a vague sense of unease, your local homeopathist is the person for you.

Longview responds: Since big Pharma has even more developed trolling mechanisms than big physics (much more untaxed profits to dedicate, for example) it would not be wise to open up a front there, although many come to mind such as decades of vituperative denial of the role of H. pylori in GI ulcers, or the decades of overuse of antibiotics, or grand promotion and defense of cox 2 inhibitors. To avoid the troll nets, here I will pick a biomedically relevant "suppression" that I am familiar with that is also related to medicine and health, but where the vested interests are not so strongly supported, and the risk of a firestorm of organized trolling is less likely.

As such an example, and there are many, take the role of trans fats as dietary risks for say uterine cancer or for cardiovascular disease. The initial findings related to that issue were brought out by Fred Kummerow in the early 1970s using animal models. Kummerow could not even get his work published as anything more than posters at meetings and occasional newspaper articles. The trans fat story went on to accumulate decades of epidemiological evidence, further experimental confirmation, to the scathing condemnation of "defenders of the faith" such as polymath (scientist, lawyer, MD, engineer and advocate extra-ordinary) Victor Herbert. Eventually, by the late 1990s the tide had finally turned, or maybe Herbert ran out of his stream of tendentious advocacy. Why was it so difficult to publish about trans fats? Apparently it threatened a prosperous and influential industry, that is the industry of synthetically hydrogenating fats. As often happens, that industry eventually found technological ways it felt worked around the trans-fat issues, and it now appears effectively justified their eventual coming to acceptance of the earlier evidence.

By now the dogma is the other way around, and a few brave souls are suggesting that perhaps trans fats weren't really the cause of the marked pathology seen in Kummerow's seminal experiments. Certainly there are abundant possibilities of confounds, such as minor components in vegetable fats, that under the conditions of catalytic hydrogenation (nickel or copper chromite types) might be converted into toxins previously unknown in nature.

Cude appears to think that telekinesis, dowsing and other wild ideas are in the same mold as CF / LENR. This shows something about Cude, but says nothing of the validity, or lack of CF. It is a positional parallel that, if true or widely accepted, would permanently relegate and prevent research from continuing. This "parallel" invoked by Cude may in fact be accepted in mainstream physics and may have been propagated to the lay public. The parallel in fact fails. First, there is nothing inherently impossible about LENR... the thermodynamics of nearly all proposed CF / LENR reactions are highly favorable, that is highly exothermic. Second, there are substantial evidences that CF / LENR works, with the admitted difficulty that all the variables are not yet fully understood. This does not resemble the evidences or lack for dowsing, telekinesis... that I am aware of. Admittedly, I don't follow those areas, and have no interest there-- perhaps Cude has some expertise there? From my cursory knowledge of dowsing, telekinesis and "submolecular dose" homeopathy the mechanisms are far from clear, the "need" may be dubious, the critical examination has been done by others for centuries now. That is not the case (yet) with CF / LENR.

[Let me here state that I have left out some of homeopathy, that is some "homeopathic" remedies use fully pharmaceutical doses, and in those cases often work quite well-- and could simply be characterized as "herbals". Such high dose homeopathics, which do not follow the classical "less is more" homeopathic model, appear to work well regardless of the convictions of the patient as to efficacy. I understand what Cude's allusion here is, and "submolecular" dose homeopathics are admittedly hard for me, as well, to accept. Of course submolecular homeopathic doses often "work" it appears due to what is surely a strong placebo effect--- or at least that is my supposition.]

But biomedical trolling is another story. We can hope that strong demonstration of working CF / LENR, where the exact pre-conditions are easily reproduced, will permanently bring research justly back to focus.

It is likely pointless to attempt to convince Cude by responding to each and every one of his dubious "points", or throwing in a few of his "bullshit" expletives where they may be richly deserved. But here are just a few:

Quote from joshua cude

They have *claimed* COPs much higher, and so has Rossi. Claiming something is not the same as demonstrating it. At the higher COPs, Swartz claims much less than a watt of excess power, and he doesn't use calorimetry to prove it. And by at least one account of someone who took up the offer to visit the experiment, all he was shown was a closed tupperware container with wires running in and out. Measuring isolated temperatures is not enough to make claims of heat, especially claims of such low heat.

OK, let's look at this: "less than a watt of excess power" has NO meaning unless the magnitude of the overall system is stated. Better to word it, " [a specific] percentage, or ratio of excess power." Suppose Swartz' device in this case was given 100 mW of input power, and showed something near 1.1 watts output. That is a COP of roughly 10 and just one watt of excess power.

In fact Swartz did show excess powers in ranges such as this. But he also showed that something akin to positive feedback raised the excess power such that the device became unstable above a COP of 6 or so. Not a surprise and a behavior that he wisely designated "optimal operating point" or OOP.

Quote from joshua cude

According to Storms, something like $500M has been spent on cold fusion research.

I don't recall reading that from Storms, but perhaps Cude can cite a source. I have seen the number $120 million worldwide. And I have repeatedly seen the statement that hot fusion has spent around 1000 times that amount of all CF / LENR research. Regardless of the exact magnitudes, it is surely a shameful ratio considering the poor results from HF say from 1955 to the present. Physicists have not only a deep theory crisis in their discipline, they have another pending crisis in credibility, even grave questions of morality. All likely to get worse as they continue to dissemble about fusion research...

Regarding patentability:

The issues with Rossi's rejected patent application do relate to patentability, but not justifiably to "perpetual motion". I don't have any problem rejecting perpetual motion, I do have a problem with ignorance of thermodynamics being used to reject (out of hand) some or any means of producing and extracting fusion energy without the necessity to use stellar energies of activation. And particularly when the justification involves the false categorization as "perpetual motion". Regardless of Cude's appraisal that said examiner "was well informed, technically educated, and articulate". Such qualities might have been needed, had there been appropriate disclosures by Rossi, but my point was that the examiner did not need any of those qualifications to reject the Rossi application I am familiar with. It was devoid of substantial disclosure.... that's it, case closed! Justly rejected! No need to (wrongly or stupidly) invoke perpetual motion. Even the failure to demonstrate operability there was not at issue.

By the way, if you want to see the kind of disclosure I applaud, be certain to read the Lipinski's Unified Gravity Corporation WIPO application:

http://unifiedgravity.com/reso…014189799-PAMPH-330-2.pdf

Lots of disclosure, after 20 or so pages what may well be dubious "theory". Over 50 pages of very detailed experimental setups and many pages of quantitative experimental results. COP there? "Q" of up to 7000--- with very low activation energies by the way... and extensive evidence that high input proton energies are very counter-productive-- which, if taken at face value, demolishes branching ratio arguments, IMHO.

"Old" Cude still tilting at "perpetual motion", and apparently is still thinking physics "at the edge" is really working well. I don't see any suggestion of simple experiments from the "open" mind of Cude (he appears to think CF / LENR cannot work on theory alone).

Longview wrote:

Quote

[trans fats example]

Far be it from me to deny that research can be influenced, pressured, or suppressed because of vested interests. Here, the tobacco interests suppressing research into the carcinogenic effects of smoking and second-hand smoke represent an undeniable example. The fossil fuel industry is similarly exerting its influence on climate change research.

Which is why I didn't disagree that the fossil fuel industry would be motivated to suppress cold fusion. The only arguments I presented with respect to fossil fuels were that it would not be effective to hire shills to argue in internet forums, and that they had not attempted to suppress research into fission or hot fusion power. I suspect that they regard such opposition as futile. Unlike cancer or climate change (or the effect of trans fats), unequivocal evidence for cold fusion is trivial to conceive.

But tobacco produced wealth, fossil fuels produce wealth, and trans fats were used by huge wealth producing organizations. Hot fusion research consumes wealth. That's the difference. That's why, on balance, self-interest and greed would be in cold fusion's favor and against hot fusion. Particularly since those who disburse the wealth would be the beneficiaries of cold fusion, if it were real.

Moreover, unlike the above examples, mainstream science initially welcomed cold fusion with unprecedented enthusiasm, demonstrating clearly where its sentiments lie.

Longview wrote:

Quote

Cude appears to think that telekinesis, dowsing and other wild ideas are in the same mold as CF / LENR.

No, you're mistaken. I realize that those other fields are more fringe than cold fusion, and that's the whole point. The idea is to compare it to a field that *you* agree is a fringe field, and that you agree deserves the negative stigma it has taken on.

The similarity that I exploit about these other fringe fields and cold fusion is that the generic arguments you make about new ideas and open minds are similarly deployed by advocates of all of them.

So, if you imagine someone using your exact argument in favor of perpetual motion, and you are unpersuaded by it, then you will begin to understand why it is unpersuasive to skeptics of cold fusion.

If you think cold fusion is more legitimate than perpetual motion, then argue its merits. Just saying we should be open-minded applies to perpetual motion as well.

Quote

This shows something about Cude, but says nothing of the validity, or lack of CF.

The whole point is that your generic slogans say nothing about the validity or lack thereof of CF.

Quote

First, there is nothing inherently impossible about LENR... the thermodynamics of nearly all proposed CF / LENR reactions are highly favorable, that is highly exothermic.

Obviously CF reactions are exothermic. That's not the objection. The objection is that there is no mechanism consistent with science as it is understood. As Hagelstein said, "such an effect is not consistent with condensed matter physics, and also not consistent with nuclear physics. In essence, it is impossible based on existing theory in these fields. There is no question as to whether this is true or not (it is true);"

In the same way, perpetual motion machines are inconsistent with theory as it is understood. But its proponents argue they have evidence that it works anyway. Experiment trumps theory, after all. Even Feynman, who was as contrarian as anyone when it came to free energy claims, nevertheless qualified the statement of the conservation of energy as an observation that has no been contradicted so far.

Of course, I agree that the conservation of energy is more deserving of confidence than the theory that predicts cold fusion should not happen.

What matters is that the experimental support for the generalization that suggests cold fusion should not happen is nevertheless extremely robust, making cold fusion an extraordinary claim, and therefore requiring extraordinary evidence at least as strong as the evidence that suggest it should not happen. But the evidence for it is not even ordinary, and is far more plausibly attributable to artifacts, errors, and confirmation bias.

But this is off point a little. The point of the perpetual motion comparison is to show the weakness in arguments that apply as well to it as to cold fusion. And that includes all generic slogans about free thinking.

Quote

Second, there are substantial evidences that CF / LENR works, with the admitted difficulty that all the variables are not yet fully understood. This does not resemble the evidences or lack for dowsing, telekinesis... that I am aware of. Admittedly, I don't follow those areas, and have no interest there-- perhaps Cude has some expertise there? From my cursory knowledge of dowsing, telekinesis and "submolecular dose" homeopathy the mechanisms are far from clear, the "need" may be dubious, the critical examination has been done by others for centuries now. That is not the case (yet) with CF / LENR.

If you argue the specific merits of cold fusion -- citing specific substantial evidence for it -- then I would never bring up perpetual motion or homeopathy.

But if you simply argue that you consider the evidence for it to be substantial, then I don't see the difference with other pseudosciences for which there are also advocates who argue that there is substantial supporting evidence. In the case of bigfoot, there are bona fide academics who make such claims.

Homeopathy is clearly rejected by established science, and yet has many apparently legitimate researchers. The arguments even sound similar to cold fusion. Check out this one from the guardian.co.uk (Rachel Roberts, Thurs, July 2010)

"By the end of 2009, 142 randomised control trials (the gold standard in medical research) comparing homeopathy with placebo or conventional treatment had been published in peer-reviewed journals – 74 were able to draw firm conclusions: 63 were positive for homeopathy and 11 were negative. Five major systematic reviews have also been carried out to analyse the balance of evidence from RCTs of homeopathy – four were positive (Kleijnen et al; Linde et al; Linde et al; Cucherat et al) and one was negative (Shang et al)."

You think that there is substantial evidence that CF works, but the prevailing view is that it does not work. Two expert panels enlisted by the DOE came to this judgement 15 years apart. As is common in pathological science, the claims become more modest as the experiments improve. The publication rate in the field continues its decline toward oblivion.

It is simply not conceivable that an energy density a million times higher than chemical claimed to be accessible in such simple experiments, could not be proven unequivocally.

The lack of substantial evidence that CF works is the reason the MFMP formed. Their goal is to *get* some substantial evidence, but so far, their evidence looks the same as everyone else's -- marginal, erratic, plausibly attributable to artifact.

Longview wrote:

Quote

OK, let's look at this: "less than a watt of excess power" has NO meaning unless the magnitude of the overall system is stated. Better to word it, " [a specific] percentage, or ratio of excess power." Suppose Swartz' device in this case was given 100 mW of input power, and showed something near 1.1 watts output. That is a COP of roughly 10 and just one watt of excess power.

Let me illustrate why this is nonsense with your favorite device: an analogy. Suppose Swartz's device produced 1 microwatt of output power with an input of 1 nanowatt. That would correspond to a COP of 1000. Would anyone take it seriously?

The absolute magnitude *is* relevant. Artifacts or calorimetry errors on the order of 1 watt are common, especially in experiments as crude as Swartz's, which do not use significant insulation, or serious calorimetry. And most of his claims are on the order of 100 mW. Presumably this is why his claims have not been published in the refereed literature.

Quote

me:

I don't recall reading that from Storms, but perhaps Cude can cite a source.

It's in his "A Student's Guide to Cold Fusion" published April 2012 -- see table 1. I expect it can be found at LENR-CANR.org.

Quote

And I have repeatedly seen the statement that hot fusion has spent around 1000 times that amount of all CF / LENR research. Regardless of the exact magnitudes, it is surely a shameful ratio considering the poor results from HF say from 1955 to the present. Physicists have not only a deep theory crisis in their discipline, they have another pending crisis in credibility, even grave questions of morality. All likely to get worse as they continue to dissemble about fusion research...

I see you are a hot fusion skeptopath. Just as Lord Kelvin and other curmudgeons said man would never fly, many skeptopaths (usually true believers in cold fusion) say hot fusion will never work, but I prefer to keep an open mind on the subject, considering the enormous upside if it can be made feasible. But that's just me. I hate to be pessimistic and dogmatic and dismiss things as impossible when (like flight was exemplified by birds) it's entirely consistent with well-understood science.

The evidence for fusion is unequivocal in both magnetic confinement and inertial confinement experiments. Even skeptics admit this. There is a real quantifiable figure-of-merit (the triple product of density, confinement time, and temperature) that is increasing at a rate comparable to Moore's law in electronics, and is getting very close to the Lawson criterion for ignition.

The feasibility of hot fusion power remains a risk, but the likelihood of success is estimated to be some 10^50 times higher than the likelihood of successful cold fusion power, and so a factor of 1000 in funding truly flatters cold fusion.

Longview wrote:

Quote

Regarding patentability:

The issues with Rossi's rejected patent application do relate to patentability, but not justifiably to "perpetual motion". I don't have any problem rejecting perpetual motion, I do have a problem with ignorance of thermodynamics being used to reject (out of hand) some or any means of producing and extracting fusion energy without the necessity to use stellar energies of activation. And particularly when the justification involves the false categorization as "perpetual motion".

You have simply not understood the argument.

1. Cold fusion patents are not rejected out of hand. They are simply required to prove operability. I should think an inventor would be delighted to provide such evidence if his device actually worked.

2. Thermodynamic arguments are not used to establish that cold fusion is contrary to established science. Nuclear physics -- the Coulomb barrier, branching ratios, reaction products -- are used.

3. Perpetual motion was not cited because they are similar phenomena. But both CF and PM are regarded as contrary to consensus science. The leading theorist in CF admits that it is impossible based on existing theory. So if you agree that perpetual motion patents should be rejected without proof of operability because it is contrary to consensus science, then if you are consistent, you should also agree that CF patents should be rejected without proof of operability for the same reason. *Your* view of the field is not relevant to the patent office. The *consensus* view is. Get it?

Quote

Regardless of Cude's appraisal that said examiner "was well informed, technically educated, and articulate". Such qualities might have been needed, had there been appropriate disclosures by Rossi, but my point was that the examiner did not need any of those qualifications to reject the Rossi application I am familiar with.

I got your point, but you seem to have lost the thread of this exchange. You said evidence of operability should not be determined by bureaucrats, and I argued that patent examiners were scientifically trained and therefore qualified to determine the operability of inventions, particularly inventions that simply claim heat. And to support the qualifications, I cited the report from the patent examiner who rejected Rossi's patent.

It doesn't matter that he didn't need to be qualified for that purpose. His report demonstrated that patent officers are suitably informed, educated, and articulate for the purpose of determining operability.

Shane wrote:

Quote

It is hard to believe anyone could possibly feel that 40 days was "too much time" to be spent considering LENR, as 1 day would have sufficed.

This is hard to believe only for a true believer. Many free energy claims pop up from time to time, like the Papp engine; and various perpetual motion claims -- some, like terawatt, with stellar boards of directors including former CIA and FBI directors, a program manager from the DOE, university directors and political heavyweights. Most of them are not even given a day of consideration from mainstream science. They are treated as farces, as they should be.

Quote

And that the carnival atmosphere that ensued was justified, but here you are doing just that!

The carnival atmosphere was initiated by the press conference, and furthered by outrageously wild speculation at the subsequent ACS meeting, and that was unjustified. The far less over-the-top skepticism that followed was a kind of response to that.

Quote

40 days...come on. For a possibly world changing technology introduced by one of the worlds finest Electrochemists?

Again, successful perpetual motion claims would be world changing too, and as I said, the the world would not give 40 days to a poorly supported claim of a new potion that cures all disease,which would also be world changing.

So, yes, the only reason this was given 40 days was because of Fleischmann's reputation. And in those 40 days, his credibility was exposed as totally unreliable, and this would have happened faster, except for their caginess.

In 40 days, they learned that the justification upon which P&F based the original research was completely invalid, that their analysis of the radiation was totally wrong, and that even the calorimetry, about which they were expected to have some expertise, was not credible. Their paper, when it came out was described as "unbelievably sloppy", "totally unacceptable", and not worthy of a pass if it were an undergraduate report. Scientists were shocked by the blatant errors, curious lack of important experimental detail, and other obvious deficiencies. The paper was followed soon after by two pages of errata -- a quarter the length of the paper itself -- with a complete replotting of the gamma spectrum, with a different shape and a change in the scale by a factor of 25.

And it's not about how long it took. Science would have been happy to wait years for definitive confirmation if there were a credible reason to do so. But the length of time it takes to find gaping holes in the evidence is determined not by the reputation of the scientist or by the effect on society, but by the quality of the evidence itself. And as it happens, it did not take very long at all to find the weaknesses in the claimed evidence for cold fusion.

Quote

Seems like any rational response would have offered much longer.

It may seem like that to you, but what do you know? Those who evaluated the evidence found it took less than 40 days to determine it was worthless, and even then the ERAB panel gave it another 5 months to determine the same thing. And the scientific mainstream accepted the critiques, and most scientists chose to dismiss it. Those who felt there might still be something there were free to keep looking, and many did, and many with substantial support from various organizations and governments, including the EPRI, Toyota, Japanese, Italian, and Indian governments.

And now it's not 40 days or 6 months, but 27 years later, and still the evidence has not improved.

Quote

Especially so, in that the H loading period alone could take much longer than that.

That has no bearing on the evaluation of the evidence presented by P&F. Furthermore, the believers did not hesitate to cite positive claims of cold fusion in those first 40 days, such as those from Huggins and the tritium claims from BARC in India, obtained within 2 weeks of the announcement. And of course, the ERAB panel continued its in depth examination of the evidence for another 5 months, and reached the same skeptical conclusion.

Quote

Even Melvin Miles failed repeatedly in the first year, and only after 1 year did things start popping...making him a life long LENR advocate.

But Melvin Miles reported those popping things, and they did not convince the rest of the world. Only in pseudoscience is it necessary for one to be present, presumably singing Kumbaya, to be convinced by the claimed results.

Quote

So 40 days was nothing. Almost a cruel joke, and indicative of the true intent of the leaders in their rush to bury this threat to funding elsewhere...ASAP.

That makes zero sense. First, because the more skeptical view adopted by much of mainstream science at the end of 40 days was completely different from the enthusiastic welcome from the same mainstream science 40 days earlier, but the threat to funding was not changed in any way. The thing that changed was that the evidence was examined and it did not stand up to scrutiny.

Second, the two scientists most responsible for changing the general sentiment toward cold fusion were young professors who had no connection to the hot fusion research programs whatsoever. And the ERAB panel that continued to examine cold fusion for the next 5 months represented an organization that stood to benefit enormously from *cold* fusion, if it were real.

Third, no scientist would ever think that a real phenomenon like cold fusion could be buried for very long, and its eventual vindication would be far worse for any scientist involved in its suppression than any imaginable effect on funding it might have. Therefore, no scientist would take such a risk without being all but certain that the field had no merit.

You're not being logical. You're trying desperately to rationalize your deluded devotion to this pseudoscience by blaming its 27 years of failure on the greed, corruption, and self-interest of all of mainstream science, when any rational analysis makes it obvious that self-interest would have a net benefit to the field, and is in fact the reason for the enthusiastic welcome it received in 1989.

Quote

Who knows what would have happened had the Physics hierarchy waited another year, or two, while encouraging research efforts instead of thwarting, before turning the lights out?

And who knows what would have happened if the Physics hierarchy encouraged research efforts into telekinesis or perpetual motion, instead of thwarting them.

It's a nonsense argument. The cold fusion sentiment turned negative, and given the obvious predilection in its favor, that is most plausibly attributed to the judgement that the science had no merit.

And in spite of the general sentiment, research did continue, but even with more than 1000 times the funding P&F used to claim the effect, the evidence did not improve. That pretty much vindicates the judgement many reached in the first 40 days.