The Playground

    @axil, my reasoning was mentioning an effect, the method applies as well to what you suggest unless the effect is strong and well above noise levels, and even then
    it is sound methodology in order to prove a result to do things blindly and randomized.

    @stefan


    I agree with all you are saying, and I use those methods myself when applicable. The problem for the CFers is the lack of funding though, as you also noted. What I would do today is review all the work done previously, which was done under the "it must be nuclear" viewpoint, from the point of view of "what mundane, everyday chemistry was happening?". The large number of reports of observed excess heat indicate to me that there *is* something going on, but the inability to gain reproducibility means to me that they are looking at the wrong variables as potential control variables. They need to stop, back up, and go down the 'normal chemistry' road for awhile. They might find some interesting new things (but probably not nearly as important as a new, free, cheap source of energy).

    Quote from stefan

    @axil, my reasoning was mentioning an effect, the method applies as well to what you suggest unless the effect is strong and well above noise levels, and even then
    it is sound methodology in order to prove a result to do things blindly and randomized.


    The experiment is setup with identical inputs to a dummy reactor and a fueled reactor with the same measurements done to each. Sub atomic particle(muons) count levels is the point of comparison.

    Quote from kirkshanahan

    @stefan


    I agree with all you are saying, and I use those methods myself when applicable. The problem for the CFers is the lack of funding though, as you also noted. What I would do today is review all the work done previously, which was done under the "it must be nuclear" viewpoint, from the point of view of "what mundane, everyday chemistry was happening?". The large number of reports of observed excess heat indicate to me that there *is* something going on, but the inability to gain reproducibility means to me that they are looking at the wrong variables as potential control variables. They need to stop, back up, and go down the 'normal chemistry' road for awhile. They might find some interesting new things (but probably not nearly as important as a new, free, cheap source of energy).


    Direct production of electrons is a more desirable output of a reactor than heat. Look to generate electrons. Has anyone quantified the power content contained in the visable and UV light output produced in the DogBone style reactor? Why is infrared the only measure of power output?

    Quote from kirkshanahan

    @axil


    Building a better leprechaun detector might help too...


    Has CERN detected leprechaun particles? Is that what they are now calling the 750 MeV particle prospect? If so, this new particle should also be searched for. If leprechaun particles are now in the standard model, then they are important too. I though the naming convention for supersymmetric particles was just an "s" prefix on the current particle zoo.

    @kirkshanahan


    I think that base things on all the current works and use that as a proof of an effect is difficult. The current critique and hindering of funding is that the effect is small not according to the error bands
    of the experiment but there might be some unknown artifact that together with a publication bias causes weak signals that shows up. It is not a stupid idea to go through the history but only to sieve
    out some experiments for a project done with all the bangs and whizzle to prove that there is an effect chemical or not. With some academic recognition of a good proof there should be better odds
    to continue optimizing the effect and improve exactly as you say. Of cause if there have been done experiments that meet this standard of proof we can use that but I doubt that
    we have results of that magnitude in our knowledgebase (am I wrong?).

    The equivalence between sub atomic and atomic particles has already been determined by Lief Holmlid. For a COP of 2, 12 billion neutral particles were produced. Detecting those billions of neutral particles seems like less of a job to do than detecting a COP of 2.

    In Sweden, in the summers we have a radio program where a mix of swedes that have accomplish something, in well anything get's an hour or so of radio
    time to talk about their lives their work or well anything they want and play their faviorite music. A couple of summers ago there was a researcher on that
    program that was a delight to listen to as he explain all the hurdles he had to overcome in order to actually prove a controvertional fact in physcologi. It was
    a huge study conducted in Sweden (we are one of the most registred people on earth) a study of the correlation of phsycological problems with the relatives
    performance. The result is that probably there is a gene in those families that both creates creative and productive people and at the same time can cause
    mental illness in certain individuals in these families with an unlucky coctail. The effort demanded actually a tremendous effort of scientific excellence in statistics
    and survey technique in order to get accepted. And still when every issue had been addressed the publication was delayed because one of the most influental
    reviewers didn't like the result it seamed e.g. there was no objective objection but still it was not published. But the next try resulted in a quite recognized
    publication. In all with a great effort and good methodology and keep on fighting mountains can be pushed.


    Oh , I almost forgot, the music he played was fantastic quite in my taste :)

    • Official Post

    About blank test and problem of isotopic effects between PdD and PdH experiments, this is not the only way to make blank.


    One kind of blank test is when the electrode does not work, when the electrode get "killed" and best when it is "restored" like what Edmund Storms is doing.
    The dependence on metalurgy detail, like the one observed by ENEA ins recent experiments, show also that the parameters is not calorimetry artifact, but metallurgy.


    see experiments of this vein:
    https://mospace.umsystem.edu/x…rochemical.pdf?sequence=1
    there are similar from NRL

    @stefan


    The idea that the reported excess heat signals are 'small' is a recent development. Personally I think it is a cop-out on the part of the CFers since they used to be fine with the signals until I showed that a 780 mW signal could be 'noise'. Note that none of them admits that though. McKubre has said that the effects are too small to do anything useful with, so perhaps that is the genesis of the comment. But Storms shows points in his plot of number of events with such-and-such excess heat that appear around 45W for example. However, the stronger results tend to be less documented...


    What we have today is a collection of many reports of excess heat which agree with none of the others in detail. Many of those reports are difficult to criticize in terms indicating they are totally messed up. En masse they are probably enough to claim that there is an effect, but that's all. More work is needed aimed at developing control, so that one can produce a given signal in a given situation (i.e reproducible). So far they haven't achieved that in the F&P type of experimental setup, and they have been very quiet the last few years. Most public attention has been on the Rossi stuff, but Rossi is an 'inventor' who is uninterested in good science, so we get a lot of anecdotal stories but little that is scientifically satisfactory.


    There may be enough info in the existing data to suggest good control variables, but I can't say one way or the other. The requirements arising from the CCS and its proposed mechanism could likely be answered by researchers just revealing what they have in their notebooks, but for some reason they never do. Until they are willing to more thoroughly examine the 'mundane' explanation(s), nothing will change in the field.

    @Alain


    Yes, in fact that's what you have to do. Forget swapping D for H or vice versa. Instead postulate a controlling factor and try to set it at different values in separate experiments. If you know what is going on, you will be able to do that easily. (Note that a null result experiment is not necessarily a blank. A blank is often assumed to deliberately have a key ingredient missing.) The intent is to extract a quantitative relationship that gives accurate predictions.


    Edmund is well aware of the inactivation and activation of electrodes. The problem is he thinks he is modifying a 'special nuclear environment', which means he does not accept my mundane explanation for how you get apparent excess heat signals when none is really present. His experiments from 2000 that I reanalyzed represent some of the best controlled experiments to date. However, it seems he abandoned them because they used Pt (not Pd) as the anode (as well as the cathode), and Pt doesn't hydride (i.e. load up with H to a H/M ratio > some number like .2 or .5. That led to conflicts with those who think CF requires > .7 loading (such as M. McKubre). What Ed's work shows it that it is clearly a surface effect. So, codeposited dendritic Pd and 'nano'-Pd would be a favored material due to high S/V ratio, which is what people have found by trial-and-error.


    Metallurgical details are only of import via how they affect the surface in my mundane explanation. You do have to form and active surface, since the largest block of data is where no excess heat was observed. Appropriate metallurgy can foster or hinder that. Loading Pd to >.7 produces maximizes stress relief mechanisms that produce irregular or rough surfaces. I think this all leads to a picture where contaminants collect on the surface and organize into those active areas.


    (Remember the Rossi stuff is not the F&P configuration...)

    @kirkshanahan


    What one should do is of cause to experiment like a controlled madman and shake the system in a controled manner
    varying everything that one can think of and messure the effect in the manner of Design of Experiments. That is the fastest
    route, demands tons of effort and experimnets etc. one need to search for better effect variables at the same time meaning that
    you need good instrumentation and skill. But this demands funding and the gordian knot appears.

    Yay! Joshua Cude!!! We attracted Kirk Shanahan and now Joshua. Kirk is a scientist, risking his reputation on what he writes. Joshua is an internet troll, who has honed and studied cold fusion for years, first showing up just as a certain Wikipedia editor was banned for aggressive "anti-woo" activity. Joshua knows a great deal about cold fusion, which is unusual in a pseudoskeptic. He is not a skeptic, because he repeats arguments in new fora that were presented elsewhere, and thoroughly answered, as if those answers did not exist. So it is deja vu all over again, a colossal waste of time. I won't do that here. Too much work for too little value. Joshua can come up with arguments that sound absolutely great if you don't actually study them in depth. So what does he have here? He raised this issue before, in several fora. I've responded before, but as first salve from him, here is a courtesy response. If anyone is tempted to believe Joshua, ask me privately, I'm easy to find, because I'm a real person with a real name and a reputation on the line. Joshua -- his real name -- is? Be careful about trusting the anonymous. Check everything, and not shallowly, but in depth, because he will come up with arguments rooted on quick impressions.

    Quote from joshua cude

    Lomax wrote:



    The Rossi fan base at one point in 2011 included you, when you said "I'm willing to bet a significant chunk of my net worth on Rossi being real..." I take that as an indictment of your judgement.

    Joshua has brought this up many times. Here was what I wrote:
    https://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-[email protected]/msg47327.html at the end of a long post replying to Joshua Cude, May 27, 2011, I wrote:

    I never did figure out a way to make money on that "bet." And that position was transient. As mentioned, I started with "fraud," then, seeing certain reports, like Kullander and Essen (In March), I backed up. The odds had shifted. Then, I continued to study the reports and found gigantic loopholes. I eventually settled on a hypothesis that Rossi was deliberately creating inconclusive demonstrations. I was never part of the "fan base," but that statement that Joshua quotes out of context represents the high water mark for that tide. And it looks like there were people with access to high expertise, a year later, making an $11.5 million bet on the same horse. By then, I'd not have encouraged that. However, I also understand it, and, politically, this may have been necessary to clear the decks. As long as everything was inconclusive, and Rossi was very successfully arranging that. the field was in a stranglehold. One way or the other.


    Here, Cude quoted, as before, out of context. My actual statement shows how tentative it was. Like, on one day, my sense of the odds went that way. I don't remember how long that lasted, this was over five years ago. I think it was very rapidly, though, that I was pointing out that a humidity meter could not be used to measure steam quality and I was pointing to the possibility of overflow water and the reasons why this would be, not merely something that would happen accidentally, but necessary in the design.


    Joshua's purpose is to toss mud, because how gullible I might have been five years ago (not very!) is completely irrelevant. I was relatively new to the field and the Rossi announcement was recent. This was classic Joshua Cude trolling.


    Quote

    Lomax wrote:



    Especially not if they don't try, which for the most part, they don't. Just as no one tries to publish skeptical papers on phlogiston.

    Again, plausible argument, right? Except nobody is publishing positive papers on phlogiston so of course nobody would be publishing negative. Cold fusion papers are being regularly published. Reviews are being published, 20 since 2005 in mainstream peer-reviewed journals, and not counting the reviews in the February 2015 issue of Current Science (out of 34 papers, many are reviews). Yes, Cude is correct in this sense. "For the most part, they don't." But what is the other part? I was not talking about "most scientists. I was talking about those who shoot off their mouth in internet fora, like Joshua Cude. Kirk Shanahan did get a Letter published, good for him. He also placed more work on the internet. I may argue with his content, but at least he is actually addressing issues and then his arguments can be examined. Joshua Cude?


    Or has, perhaps, Joshua P. Schroeder, astrophysics PhD candidate at last known position, well-known Wikipedia pseudoskeptic, published anything? After all, Joshua Cude could not be published. Scientific journals do not publish papers by anonymous authors unwilling to put their reputation on the line. But maybe he could contact Joshua Schroeder and persuade him to write something. Joshua Schroeder was also knowledgeable about cold fusion.


    For good reason.
    (continued)

    (continued)

    Quote

    But this criticism also applies to one of your favorite experiments -- the correlation of heat and helium in palladium deuteride experiments.

    No, it doesn't. Rather, one can create a resemblance by selective presentation of fact, at which Cude is expert.

    Quote

    Since Miles (more than 20 years ago), no replication has been published in any serious journal under peer review.

    Cude is referring to experimental reports, and not to reviews. Yes. Miles published, and there was a critique by Jones. SRI confirmed the Miles work, but SRI reports are not published in journals, they are written for customers, consultation being SRI's business, and papers are subject to internal review. Customers will base millions of dollars in investments, or more, on SRI reports. Scientifically, they are higher than average in quality, it's not that difficult to get weak papers through peer review unless it is in a hot field with high controversy. The Miles work was ultimately an extensive experimental series. Replications have not been journal-published, they are mostly conference reports. The writer of a review considers all this, as do the reviewers of the review, and reviews are secondary source, considered of higher quality (certainly for Wikipedia purposes) than primary sources like experimental papers.


    I am very aware of the weakness of the situation with heat/helium confirmation; however ... scientifically, it was confirmed, that's fact. Then there are reputational and technical issues and that is why I suggested replication with increased precision, to create another occasion for a paper of high interest, and this was proposed in a peer-reviewed review of my own, in Current Science, that special issue last year. And it's been taken up, so we are going to see people with high expertise, experience, and access to resources, doing more precise heat/helium work, at at least two institutions, Texas Tech and ENEA in Italy.


    Quote

    And it's not that refereed publication represents definitive proof, but if there were any merit, it should at least be able to clear that modest hurdle.

    Joshua knows perfectly well the difficulties cold fusion work encountered as to publication, and this has all been convered in detail by the sociologists of science. The heat/helium work was all ten years old or more. No way to get that published directly.


    The argument Cude presents here is old, regurgitated, repetitive. It has almost nothing to do with science, but is about appearances and accusations and creating impressions. Definitely, there is a problem with journal publication, but ... papers are being published on cold fusion in journals, and have been all along, but the extreme skeptical position almost entirely disappeared, which is just a fact, that Cude then attempts to explain away, not with fact, but with speculation. And, I asserted, it is probably not for lack of trying (which was speculation). Cude doesn't actually deny that, he attempts to twist the statement to mean something it did not mean.


    He presents his own idea (i.e., that cold fusion work is like belief in phlogiston) when there never was a definitive showing that the primary cold fusion reports were artifact. The physics community mostly considered the matter closed, without going through that detail, scientific experiment identifying artifact, showing that there was no reason to suspect this new effect.


    Yes, Pons and Flieschmann reported low levels of neutrons, a mistake. But that was a detail hastily added to their work and we now know -- essentially no neutrons -- and no high-energy gammas, either. The PF work was about anomalous heat. The paper of McKubre on the state of the science in that Current Science issue should also be read. McKubre is conservative and careful.


    But no surprise if Cude finds some dirt to toss.


    The Current Science special section -- you can read the PDFs.


    The reality debate is over in the journals, unless, say, Nature or Science decide to break their embargo. Then we might see some back-and-forth. I am hoping to see the Texas Tech work in Nature. Because this is not speculative work, it is confirming what is already confirmed by multiple independent groups, I expect results are likely to be conclusive, with better precision than ever before attained.


    Now, what does Cude think about that research proposal? Any suggestions for possible artifact to be checked? Does Cude care about science or about winning arguments? I'm not holding my breath. I asked him this question before an he didn't answer, I think, but ... hope springs eternal.

    I took my own advice and went outside for a while. It seems like the playground has cleaned up a bit.
    We* all want a new energy source that is safe. That said I am not in the loop again.
    So some questions please:
    1. Has Thomas C. still forsaken us?
    2. From my precursory view, has ME356 met with MFMP? Or is he now underground?
    If so why/how claims by him/them are still being taken seriously?
    3. If possible on claims, when a claim is made can we get a reference URL that is outside of a pay wall?
    I try to track down and read anything that provides clarification for lack of a better
    word. I see lots so reference URLs. And say keep it up.


    /*well I think so we all want a clean technology.

    Thanks Alan S.! I appreciate it.
    ----------------------------------------------------
    On a non-related note.


    I think it's disingenuous to say that there is no funding now. Maybe inadequate is fair, but with SKINR and others entities I see funding. Not as much as hot fusion. As an LENR advocate I see funding. Why IH has not tossed MFMP some stipend bewilders me but we have someone here that speaks for them.

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