An Open Conversation With RANDOMBIT0: Constructive Comments Appreciated -- Cynical Remarks Frowned Upon

We disagree on the issue of Songsheng and Parkhomov's systems self sustaining. And, I assume, that you disagree with me on the results of the two other Russian teams that have issued reports. I don't want to argue these issues at this time. I'm more than happy to agree to disagree with you.

Self sustaining is an integral, fundamental aspect of the Rossi Effect. If it is real (using the term if to be diplomatic since you think it's likely not and I think it most definitely is) then Andrea Rossi has claimed repeatedly from his earliest patent papers to Fluid Heater, hundreds of times on the JONP, in personal correspondence, and orally in interviews that the reaction -- once triggered -- can self sustain without input for hours before needing to be reinvigorated. I think Dr. Levi saw this effect in his 18 hour test when the control box only input about a hundred watts and the output spiked sometimes up to 130kW. I also think Songsheng and others have seen this -- although you disagree with me.

But we are in agreement with one thing: if self sustain is to be proven it needs to be for a significant period of time and capable of being cycled repeatedly. A few minutes of self sustain isn't hard proof. My thinking is that a half hour at a high temperature of lets say over 1000C (of course the math would have to be performed factoring in the figures for each test) would rule out chemical energies in most reactors utilizing only a gram of fuel. If this can be induced repeatedly several times over several hours or a day, the evidence becomes conclusive.

I'm determined to do what I can as an armchair researcher to see this effect replicated repeatedly in a convincing manner that can then be characterized and performed by other parties.

Quote from JedRothwell

Rossi wrote:
they made multiple patent applications ( without my authotization ) with their chief engineer as the co-inventor

This is a typical Rossi statement. No one needs permission to file a patent application.

This piece of business was a demonstration that Annesser simply filed what Rossi wanted him to file. This patent was specifically about the Lugano technology, the device for which Rossi has claimed and acknowledged was made by IH. If anyone made a new contribution to that, and a patent is filed, and this person is not shown as a co-inventor, it could be possible that the patent could be invalidated. "Co-inventor" does not mean that the person was somehow "equal" or even "important," but if there is any feature in the patent that came from this person, that was possibly new or necessary, the would prudently be shown.

Further, the "harm" from such an inclusion would only be to some imagination of reputation. Rossi believes that he owns the technology, all of it, it is his, and his name should be on it, period. Yet others can and will improve on it, if such is possible. And they will patent those improvements, and those patents, in themselves, are not "infringing." If his technology, validly patented, is used in a product, then there might be infringement, unless the user has a license. In this case, there was no conflict. Rossi was explicitly listed as a co-inventor, and would lose no rights that he had not already sold.

So Rossi was being hysterical-reactive, which is his personality.

The judge dismissed Rossi's claim on this. The reason given was that the complaint was more of a patent infringement complaint rather than a breach of contract complaint. That was enough for the judge, and the judge did not consider other defects, such as there being no harm in asserting a co-inventor for that particular patent. It should be understood that the judge, at that point, was obligated to consider all of the Rossi allegations as true, unless they were clearly contradicted by Rossi's own exhibits, in which case the judge might possible not take a complaint straight.

Quote from MrSelfSustain

I don't think the replication by even three top notch scientists would instantly break through the barriers of psudoskepticism and doubt set in place by the scientific community.

The "barrier" is an information cascade. This is not a specific thing, it is a general condition created as such are created. To think of it as a thing set in place probably imagines a conspiracy that did not exist. Rather, individuals, and sometimes with organizational influence, took their own actions, expressed their own opinions, and then this went as information cascades go. Humans hear or read stuff and accept it if they assign credence to the speaker or writer. It comes to be considered fact, and if this spreads and becomes established, that is an information cascade. The "social physics" of it is well-understood. It is actually functional, usually. That is, we cannot each investigate every claim. What is dysfunctional is when what is only an information cascade becomes established as if it were scientifically established, through controlled experiment or other direct evidence, when it becomes "fact," to be reported in newspaper articles, etc.

There is an obvious example with cold fusion: "Nobody was able to replicate." I've seen that stated in newspaper articles, they get it from their files and it has been said over and over. It was true, maybe, for a very short time in 1989. It then became, for a little longer "arguably true," i.e., confirmation reports could be dismissed on this or that ground. Yet that statement became, probably by 1991, highly misleading, one would need to quibble about it. For example, Miles actually demonstrated that the FP heat effect was real and nuclear in nature. That was a clear confirmation of the basic Pons and Fleischmann claim. He was using the FP approach, but not the exact cell design. So not an "exact replication," and as naively defined, there aren't any. These experiments vary, individually, and greatly. But there are other, more powerful, ways to look at experimental data, specifically correlation, which is the norm in medical research, because individual variations in people lead to highly varied responses to medication.

An information cascade is established in the minds of thousands or more, maybe millions or more. Such cannot disappear instantly, except by an event that is massively publicized and clear. However, this actually does not matter. What matters is funding and what can be presented to decision-makers about this.

Both DoE reviews concluded that more research was desirable. That the DoE did not fund any significant research was a political problem, they did not follow the recommendations of their own panels. It is possible that APS lobbying was involved, the APS representative in Washington was Park. Park himself is a scientist, and it is enlightening to actually review the history of his apparent opposition to cold fusion. It is not such a black and white morality play as we have often imagined. We might be able to reach Park, though I'm not sure how functional he is by now.

My stand is that we created the rejection cascade, not "them." That is not proposed as "truth," but as an empowering stand, because what we created, we can create anew, differently.

Collectively, we lost scientific rigor, we lost the skepticism that is mandatory in genuine scientific process. That is not to say that every researcher did this. The cold fusion community, however, never developed social structures that could penetrate, more than a little, the rejection cascade, which is massive. We are faced with entrenched skepticism, and it is often pseudoskepticism, that's obvious, but I have never seen a pseudoskeptic turn around and say, "Ooops! That was pseudoskepticism, thanks for reminding me!" And this is all normal for humans. We need to start dealing with the real community, not what we think it should be.

So how do we address this? SS, you want to overwhelm it with irrefutable NiH evidence, so strong that it cannot be denied, but we don't have that evidence. You think we do, but your claims are not accepted even within the dedicated LENR community. Rather, the community, generally, is saying that such might be possible, and that NiH should be investigated; however, results so far are not confirmed any more than very generally, which more or less matches the very early state of PdD cold fusion, before the ash was identified and confirmed.

You started out with a description of a "proof experiment," i.e., a sustained self-powered reaction, maintaining high temperature and energy release without input power. Indeed, that would be extremely strong evidence, and of the kind that pseudoskeptics have long demanded. Then you say that a single such event would be enough. No, it would not, because any single event can *always* be denied.

You have said that you would want to develop this yourself. Great! However, you also think this is not possible for you. I came to the same conclusion with regard to NiH claims. I was not going to set up these experiments in my apartment. I still might set up a SPAWAR neutron experiment, I have all the materials and it is not a dangerous experiment. But I have found something more important to work on.

You could work on it too. It would start by becoming thoroughly informed, and by developing your skills as a *skeptic.* Not pseudoskeptic and not believer. You do not need to abandon belief, but it is essential to recognize it and distinguish it from scientific process.

You have:

Quote

I respect that you want to see repeated tests to verify these claims. However, I think the Parkhomov testing (at least his earliest system due to all the control runs and active runs he performed), ...

I stopped studying Parkhomov at some point, but it was after he had published his "control runs." You have obviously looked at Parkhomov through rose-colored glasses. Parkhomov did not approach this as a scientist, working on technology of world importance. He approached it more or less as a hobby, a curiosity. His control experiments were not under identical conditions, and he drew unwarranted conclusions from them. This is all obvious if you actually study the Parkhomov work, seeking to understand what he did and how he did it and what results he obtained. You will not understand it from a cursory reading.

As I wrote, I was very impressed by Parkhomov at first, and one could say that I "wanted" it to be real. But when I actually studied it, I could not sustain that as a fact, but only as a possibility that he had found something.

From the original experiment, the only evidence for "self-sustain" was the period after the heater burned out, as shown by a "catch" in the temperature, which started to decline rapidly, but then arrested for seven minutes, as I recall. There is evidence in his temperature record that the thermocouple was already malfunctioning before that. His method of measuring evaporated water was crude and subject to substantial imprecision.

(If the heater was failing due to alumina container breakup, this could also affect the thermocouple, easily.)

And after that, each experiment was different. He changed the insulation, which was sloppy in the first experiment (probably impossible to duplicate exactly). He continued to report substantial COP, but with far better insulation, that COP represented much less actual heat. Essentially, as his precision increased, his results were starting to disappear.

Now, I saw a recent report from him that looks much better. What does it show? How about you actually study it? Write about it! Then read and consider criticism! You will learn, and what you learn could make you far more valuable than as a simple cheerleader. You will learn discrimination and if you can learn to speak to skeptics, with power and effectiveness, you could make a real difference.

Quote from Alan Smith

This (elite science) approach is fast becoming a very old fashioned view I'm afraid. If the bankers won't fund it, the Unis are scared of it (oh yes many are!) and 'big oil' wants it - but delivered to a timetable it likes then 'we the people' will have to do it for ourselves.

That "old fashioned view" still attracts funding, and this will remain. Human society, after all.

There is plenty of room for "open science," i.e, the MFMP approach, and it remains quite possible that some amateur researcher somewhere will find something that can then be replicated. SRI replicated Case. Unfortunately, there were problems with the Case catalyst so this did not go very far, but it shows the possibility. I was not proposing the "three reputable researchers" possibility as the only way, merely as something that would work.

I am not, however, proposing pie in the sky. What I described is happening, it has been adequately funded, reputable researchers are involved, there will likely be at least two research groups involved, and a joint publication could, my opinion, break the Nature barrier. If not, that will be news all by itself, assuming that the work turns out as likely from prior confirmed work. This approach was defined by me as one highly likely to succeed, not some speculative idea as, for example, attempting to develop self-sustained excess heat. That could also be done, outside of Rossi claims, but hasn't been done more than by Pons and Fleischmann in France, in their HAD work not thoroughly and carefully described and published, and only vaguely confirmed, so far.

I predict that when that work, now under way, is published, the rejection cascade will begin to more visibly fall apart. It is already weak, as shown by funding appearing for LENR, some of this with IH at the helm, some independent of them.

People get ready, there is a train a-coming.

Quote from MrSelfSustain

My thinking is that a half hour at a high temperature of lets say over 1000C (of course the math would have to be performed factoring in the figures for each test) would rule out chemical energies in most reactors utilizing only a gram of fuel. If this can be induced repeatedly several times over several hours or a day, the evidence becomes conclusive.

Yes. There are a few caveats. The Songsheng Jiang work used thermocouples above their rated temperature, where service life will be short. If they were exposed to a hydrogen atmosphere, this would also accelerate failure. When a thermocouple fails, it can give erratic and unpredictable readings. It might possibly return to function for a while, but it is utterly unreliable. I spent many hours studying the Songsheng Jiang work, probably mostly writing for the CMNS list. (Most of my writing has not been made public.) There were many defects in the original Songsheng report. In the middle of the test, he changed the environment, apparently turning on a fan to cool the full experiment, which was starting to get quite hot. At about that same time, just about immediately, his anomalous results started to appear and one of the thermocouples blatantly failed.

I am recommending that you study those experiments far more thoroughly, and then pay close attention to critique. On the CMNS list, there are many experts and what I write about thermocouples was consensus there.

What you describe as the conditions of a definitive experiment hasn't happened yet. That's been my point.

I consider LENR research to be of very high importance for the future of humanity, and to create what is needed will probably take massive funding. Look at the history! Hundreds of millions of dollars have not been enough!

However, most of the work done with all that money spent was not adequately focused on basic science, but was an attempt to "improve" the experiments. More Heat!

Rather, what was needed, my analysis, is nailing down the basics, so that there is a solid foundation on which to build. The first and most obvious, to me, known result was the heat/helium correlation, which cuts through and connects what is otherwise largely anecdotal and thus vulnerable to continued critique along the lines of Garwin's "they must be making some mistake." Accumulated circumstantial evidence weakens that argument, but cannot actually demolish it.

Correlation can do this, and, my opinion, already has, but if someone disagrees, well, I have noticed some pseudoskeptics, even, agreeing, and genuine skeptics always agree.

Yes! More basic research, carefully done with increased precision. Great idea!

This is how consensus can be created even in the presence of high conflict.

Randombit0,

I'd really like to read your thoughts on the topics being discussed.

Quote from JedRothwell

IH Fanboy wrote:

That is unlikely. I think one group knows him and his work well.

There is a tendency among those with strong opinions to present those opinions as "the only reasonable conclusion." "Reasonable" is, in fact, subjective, or easily can be. This habit denies the right of others to their own independent views. It's offensive. I object to it, on all sides. There can be many reasonable opinions, almost always, when there are matters of controversy. When there is clear evidence, sure, we -- the public -- might generally make conclusions about "reasonableness," but when there is no clear evidence, and replication failure is never clear evidence, merely circumstantial and even sometimes weak, claiming "only reasonable conclusion," in either direction, is offensive.

IHFB was correct here to note the possibility of replication failure from some uncontrolled variable. Indeed, there is a way in which this is likely, there is an uncontrolled variable. A true negative confirmation actually creates the original findings and then shows how they were artifact, through controlled experiment. My guess is that this was not done. And, in fact, if they saw XP, they may have immediately fixed the "problem" and not reported that work. My sense is that the function and power of negative replication that actually does replicate "wrong" results has largely been missed. But I don't know details.

Quite simply, though, the original claim that "he made a mistake"may be unwarranted, even if we can -- and have -- speculated on what that mistake might have been and even if this has not been proven wrong. I am pushing for education in genuine scientific process, that is not based on wishful thinking or premature conclusions, conclusions that might confirm our preconceptions or our desire for quick answers. Some things we may never figure out, there may remain certain mysteries forever. And that's life. What is amazing is what we can do anyway.

I think I see "mistakes" in Songsheng Jiang's work. As an example, in the middle of his experiment, he turned on a fan, cooling the outside of his experiment, and it clearly affected what was happening. He altered the heat flow. At the same time, as I recall, he greatly increased the hydrogen pressure. He was varying more than one variable at a time. Not a great idea, likely to generate confusion, and it probably did. That is in addition to using thermocouples not suitable for his experimental conditions, that failed, but still drawing overblown conclusions from the possibly defective data, and a few other errors.

He did not apparently have experience with LENR research. These kinds of errors are common at the beginning. The depth of the problem and the possible artifacts are not appreciated, the researcher may not be familiar with the history. I love it that people are looking, but I urge high caution. There are countless misleading appearances. LENR research is littered with "corpses."

Quote

IH Fanboy wrote:

Yes, it was meaningful data before the malfunction. It showed no excess heat.

The heat after death is clearly an artifact of the broken TC. The other, intact TC shows nothing.

You need to avoid wishful thinking.

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I spent a lot of time going over that data in detail. Days. I'd need to read back, because memory can be defective, but, generally, Jed's observation matches what I recall of mine. Genuine excess heat normally manifests in certain ways, and what Songsheng Jiang found did not look like it. There was a general check from the outer two thermocouples, which did not fail (the inner two failed). That shows that XP, if it existed, was relatively small, but this was somewhat confused by Songsheng altering the cooling with the fan. Basic rule: if you change conditions, it's a new experiment. This was just before apparent XP showed up, so control (the ability to compare with former conditions) was lost. The experiment may have been getting hotter, overall, than he anticipated, so he decided he'd better cool it. This kind of stuff happens when you do a first experiment. Most people don't report their first experiment for exactly this reason! They wait until they find decent conditions. Essentially, that fan could have been on from the beginning, no harm. Don't change the conditions, or if you are going to change, make one change at a time and give plenty of time for conditions to settle.

It's obvious from the data. He was fiddling with input power, hydrogen pressure, and then the cooling. This was exploratory work, it's fine and even laudable, but reporting it because it looks like you found something important, when you have not yet attempted to nail it down, probably a bad idea unless you have CAVEAT written all over it. We see the damage from comments here. Some people think that this was a Rossi confirmation, when it wasn't.

Quote from AlainCo

Abd Ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:

This is a general problem for example with Occam razor .
What is the simplest ? If you ask to a lasy guy, to a granny, or to a method engineer, you don't have the same answer to "how to screw a bolt".

I failed on such estimation for Rossi, and Defkalion, estimating "they could not be that stupid", and "it would be suicidal".

Occam's Razor is often represented as some kind of proof, but it is highly subjective. Rather, it is, properly, a heuristic, a guide for decision-making in the presence of incomplete information. I.e., in life.

The "he would have to be crazy" thinking normally works, but, applied without caution, it can fail spectacularly. After all, what if he's actually crazy?

"Well, he doesn't seem crazy to me!" Really? This represents a lack of experience of high-functioning crazies! What, indeed, is "crazy"? Really, what it means is that behavior may be unpredictable through "rational" expectation from our imagination of what would be important to the person, and how they would think. More deeply, apparently crazy behavior is coming from hidden sources, not what is openly visible and acknowledged, It is not actually random, but to predict it requires far deeper understanding, and may still be not much more than a guess.

On the topic here, there are people (or a person with various names) presenting some ideas that seem wildly off, arguing with a series of what seem to me to be relatively normal people, including some skeptics, but the arguments are about something that is not itself fringe, i.e., about how an IR camera works and how to use it for measuring the temperature of materials. Something easily determined by anyone who cares to do the research and reflect on what has been presented.

It should not depend -- at all -- on our opinion about the "Rossi effect." Our understanding of the camera and how it would be used can be independent. If the Lugano test did not have the claimed COP, that does not prove the reality or unreality of the "Rossi effect" either way, it would merely deprecate one piece of evidence, the result of a single test, and we know that devices can fail tests, and that this is possible even if the devices work at other times. And certainly Rossi has admitted that or acknowledged that, and even used the possibility in the matter of the Hydro Fusion test. He either deliberately caused it to fail, per his email to Darden, or -- more likely, my opinion, based on the Mats Lewan account -- made a huge error in measuring input power, a remarkable one, given that this was 2012 and "he'd have to be crazy" not to know better.

Randombit0 has not yet replied here. He is fully welcome to do so, this is an open forum, and his position and point of view is not banned. If I don't like it, I can downvote and I can block so that I don't waste my time. Most users here don't block anyone.

"He'd have to be crazy" to think that the arguments would be accepted by anyone who cares enough to check them. However, that expectation, that the person cares about being accepted or not, has no application with those who are anonymous and who can simply disappear. It even fails with a few who are not anonymous, but obsessed in some way.

Quote from sigmoidal

IH Fanboy wrote:

IH FB:
FWIW, the patent office didn't just tell Jed that, it turns out they told the whole world:
uspto.gov/web/offices/pac/mpep/consolidated_rules.pdf

Excerpt:
§ 1.45 Joint inventors.
(a) Joint inventors must apply for a patent jointly and each must make the required oath or declaration:neither of them alone, nor less than the entire number, can apply for a patent for an invention invented by them jointly, except as provided in §1.47.

(Note: para 1.47 requires that the applicant provide documented evidence that a co-inventor refused to participate in the application or that reasonable attempts failed when contacting the missing co-inventor)
(apologies regarding formatting - I can't seem to get the block-quotes to work)

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Last first: If you select parts of a post, a black bubble "Quote Selection" should appear above the selection. If you press this, then Reply to the post, the post should be properly quoted for you as one large quote. The first quote tag will include a link to the source post. You can create a pair of quotation tags by pressing the quotation button. It is the first in the last four buttons presented above the edit menu. You can also manually create the quote and unquote tags. You can have multiple quotations in your Quotes cache, it is accessed by a gray button in the lower right corner of the display, and you can use or delete those quotes from that.

Now, the USPTO regulations. Section 1.45 as quoted above is obsolete, it was changed September 16, 2012. There are two sections 1.45 in the regulations, the one quoted, which is titled "1.45 (pre-AIA) Joint inventors." and the section before it, titled, "1.45 Application for patent by joint inventors."

Here is the new Section 1.45: (page 64 of the PDF, https://www.uspto.gov/web/offi…ep/consolidated_rules.pdf)

Quote

(a) Joint inventors must apply for a patent jointly, and each must make an inventor’s oath or declaration as required by § 1.63, except as provided for in § 1.64. If a joint inventor refuses to join in an application for patent or cannot be found or reached after diligent effort, the other joint inventor or inventors may make the application for patent on behalf of themselves and the omitted inventor. See § 1.64 concerning the execution of a substitute statement by the other joint inventor or inventors in lieu of an oath or declaration.
(b) Inventors may apply for a patent jointly even though:
(1) They did not physically work together or at the same time;
(2) Each inventor did not make the same type or amount of contribution; or
(3) Each inventor did not make a contribution to the subject matter of every claim of the application.
(c) If multiple inventors are named in a nonprovisional application, each named inventor must have made a contribution, individually or jointly, to the subject matter of at least one claim of the application and the application will be considered to be a joint application under 35 U.S.C. 116. If multiple inventors are named in a provisional application, each named inventor must have made a contribution, individually or jointly, to the subject matter disclosed in the provisional application and the provisional application will be considered to be a joint application under 35 U.S.C. 116.

Section 1.64 gives procedural details. For the purpose here, yes, under the condition stated above, a patent application may be filed with a co-inventor who refuses to sign or fails to sign after an effort has been made.

Now, consider Rossi's public reaction to this application. Would he sign it? I think not! So then they had the right to file without that signature. If they erred in the process, the patent examiner would presumably notice this and reject the application. If the application was defective, the patent could be void, even if this is not discovered until later. Rossi's complaint was just plain silly and probably contrary to the Agreement. By February, 2016, matters had deteriorated sufficiently that Rossi and Darden were communicating through their lawyers, Jones Day and Annesser, with Rossi apparently not cooperating on patent issues any more.

At a few points, there were Rossi actions that might have triggered a major IH bailout. The Rossi email admitting the attempted use of a legal technicality to get out of his agreement with Hydro Fusion (which would not have been in conflict with the later Agreement), where he actually bragged about deception and pretense, would have been a red flag, but IH had already decided to hold their nose and go ahead. When Rossi refused to allow independent experts to be present at the Validation, they could certainly have rejected validation and could have demanded a total refund, though recovering the $1.5 million might have been difficult. (They had the right to refuse consent to the ERV, but it was obvious what the result of that would have been. No agreement, bye-bye, and here is your $1.5 million back, almost certainly. At that point the Plant had not been delivered.

Then there was the refusal to allow the Murray visit in May, 2015. This is sometimes misrepresented on Planet Rossi. This was not merely a refusal to allow him into the "customer area." It was the refusal of a visit to the plant, and, in fact, to any visits of new staff and new visitors, pending the completion of the "test." Darden and Vaughn were still "welcome" to visit, but ... no experts! And no more customers, apparently. There was an apparent exception in August, when Darden and Vaugh, together, visited, with two representatives from Woodford. The Terms Sheet agreement setting up the Doral installation was blatantly violated.

On Planet Rossi, it is claimed that Woodford invested after that second visit. No. The investment was in May after the first visit. I'll grant, it's a complicated story and it's difficult to keep all the pieces straight. I read this stuff over and over and I still miss things on occasion. But I also often give sources, which seem to make no impression, the same old same old still gets repeated.

We do not know for sure that the Woodford people were actually admitted, but with Darden and Vaughn both there, Rossi might not have had the cheek to refuse. He also might not feel nearly as threatened as by Murray, an actual engineer.

Still, I think, IH continued to pay West and Fabiani. We now have, thanks to Rossi's hearing request on discovery, evidence that IH did object in early December, 2015, to the idea that Doral was a "Guaranteed Performance Test," and that Penon was "ERV." It is possible that they objected earlier, we don't know yet. The relationship had clearly gone south by then. And, of course, Rossi lied about that on his blog in early March, 2016.

In April, 2016, he strongly misrepresented the history, claiming that IH only objected when payment was due. No. It was well before that, more than three months before.

Rossi lies or is insane, it has become irrefutable, I suspect.

My usual disclaimer: Rossi has not Answered the counter-complaint, where he could introduce Exhibits showing a different story, if he has documentary evidence. If he has no documentary evidence, he can still claim that IH documents are fake or taken out of context, and his case might survive for a while. However, in discovery, whatever he presents will be under oath, under penalty of perjury. He'd better be careful! (But we may not see all that soon, if ever.)