Where are the replications performed by 3rd party experts?
Everyone who did cold fusion started out as a 3rd party expert. None of them believed it was possible until they tried it and confirmed it. That's what they told me, anyway.
Rossi vs. Darden aftermath discussions
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Direct communication with the authors of a technical report from someone external to the team responsible for the measurements can be considered as a serious interference in the work when this communication happens before the publication of results.
Wow! In that case I have interfered with hundreds of experiments in my role as copy editor.
But, don't you worry. This was after the test. I and others made suggestions about the first draft of the paper.
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Do you expect me to write a full-blown review of crackpot science? Here? Why would I do that?
Plus, I have offered several specific reasons why I think Shanahan is wrong. No one has addressed them as far as I know. The main ones are:
1. Researchers have often moved the location of the heat in the cell from one location to another, with a calibration heater. This has not had a measurable effect on the calibration constant. If it did, they would know something is wrong.
2. The heat corresponds to the use of Pd-D. Not Pd-H, Pt-D or Pt-H. I do not see how the choice of cathode material and electrolyte can cause the Shanahan effect.
3. The heat is controlled by various well-known factors shown in McKubre's equation such as loading and temperature. Again, I do not see how these control factors could correspond to the Shanahan effect. (The control factors are not good enough to allow a commercial reactor, but no one disputes they are real.)
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Dewey Weaver said: "Speaking of - does anybody know why Fulvs (Fabiani) is no longer listed on the Uppsala website?"
Probably because mission accomplished, and that soon the Swedes will report the successful replication of their own Lugano, although I could be wrong on that.
Maybe, maybe not
My guess is that it was an administrative glitch that he showed up in the first place (or more like the normal admin routines). And when it got unwanted attention http://www.sifferkoll.se/siffe…er-at-uppsala-university/ (probably questions from random "operatives") they corrected it and made special routines for him. But, he's there alright ... working ... -
I have not heard this rumor. But let me point out that I know of several cathodes going back to the early 1990s that were both Pd and Ni. Usually Pd plated onto Ni, or a multi-layer sandwich. So it might be both. Pd has been plated onto various substrates or alloyed with Ag and other metals. So if you hear a confused rumor that seems to imply both Pd and Ni, it might be both.
Pure Pd does not works well as far as I know.
People (a.k.a. researchers) are working on this (Pd & W) Jed. I am sure of it. Just trust me on this. I would not say it otherwise. No point.
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I am sure of it. Just trust me on this.
Whenever I see this expression I know that I will never hear anything concrete about it from that particular person.
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Catching up...
Shanahan never listens. He makes the same mistakes again and again.
No. I definitely listen and learn. What I don't accept however, I don't incorporate into my thinking, and the idea that Marwan, et al, addressed the issues I raised falls in that category, for good and sufficient reasons, which I have repeatedly outlined and which you repeatedly fail to understand. Every time I point this out to you, you ignore me in true 'true believer' fashion.
To take just one example. Marwan et al point out correctly that CCS becomes irrelevant when you have very low loss calorimetry.
Not correct THH. The calorimeter Storms used to generate the data I reanalyzed was over 98% efficient, i.e., the calibration constants made only minor corrections to the direct measurement. I believe that what you are saying (or should be) is that if you compute the magnitude of the expected excess heat signal given a %recombination at the electrode, the result should be limited to some maximum value. That is completely true and is the basis of my comments that CF authors need to go back to their old data where they claim excess heats and check this. What they then find will direct future commentary.
I'm interesting in looking to see which datasets could be explained by CCS/ATER, or even CCS/?
Lots of luck. I know of two cases where the raw data was supplied. The Storms data and the McKubre data (which has the 'infamous' M4 run data). The McKubre data is difficult to come by since it is in an EPRI report, and that report was only distributed to EPRI members. As well, it has no calibration data in it, unlike Storms data, so one can't check the CCS problem. I asked McK twice for the equations and constants and he refused to give them to me because he claimed he was too busy to look them up. Then I tried a 'Hail Mary' move and asked a group of people on an email distribution if any of them knew. McK was on that list (so I didn't have to separately cc him) and took offense at this, called me a 'grandstander', and broke off all contact. But that was when the Storms data became available, so I moved on. Other than that there are almost no cases where even the calibration equations (with constants) are given, one exception being the Seebeck calorimeter equation I commented on in this forum recently. A 1-3% change in 1 cal constant produced a significant apparent excess heat signal there.
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More catching up...
JedRothwell wrote: Also, as you know, I believe your theories cannot be tested or falsified,
kirkshanahan wrote: And as you know and unethically fail to report, I have proposed, in this very forum as well as elsewhere, tests of my theories. (Note added...see below for another restatement of one of them...)
JedRothwell wrote: What an absurd statement! When and where have I "failed to report" your theories??
As all can see, I was addressing your false assertion that my CCS/ATER proposal is untestable. I replied I have posted tests that in fact are obvious to anyone who cares to carefully consider my proposal, but since the CFers don't, I have to spoon-feed them, which I have done here and elsewhere to no apparent avail. Your comment is deliberately misleading.
Normally, I ask the author to publish a paper in a proceedings or journal before I upload it. I will make an exception for you because you have published in journals already. That's good enough. My standards are flexible. I have a few original papers not published elsewhere. They are listed with "LENR-CANR" as the publisher. Just above, I offered to make an exception for THHuxleynew. If he wants to write a critique of Marwan, I'll upload it, even if it is not published elsewhere.
I have already a) got the original manuscript of my 1st paper on this subject in the lenr-canr database (since 2000) and have referenced it many times now, and b) published the rebuttal I was not allowed to publish in J. Envir. Mon. as a whitepaper that is already freely available on the Internet, and I have posted that link. As usual, Jed refuses to acknowledge anything I do or say, preferring to use unsupported ad hominem attacks instead.
If you feel so strongly about it, just post your papers here. End of story
See comment immediately above... For my rebuttals to Flesischmann, Szpak, Mosier-Boss and Miles and to Storms, see my published papers in Thermochimica Acta. (Use Google Scholar to get the refs, or look at my prior posts for the them)
Their recovery rates are very high. Meaning their heat unaccounted for is very low -- which is not the case with every calorimeter. People like McKubre, Miles and the ENEA got 300% to 500% excess over input, with calorimeters that recover 95% to 98% of the heat.
You keep missing the point. The point is that in a VERY HIGH RECOVERY RATE calorimeter, a 780mW 'signal' could easily be a 780mW ERROR. ALL CF AUTHORS NEED TO ACCURATELY EVALUATE THEIR ERRORS WHICH NONE HAVE DONE TO DATE.
Particularly in lieu of the CCS problem.
Do they have to rebut every single argument that pops into Shanahan's head?
Only the ones I publish, which they haven't done. (You are using a misdirection tactic here by implying I have placed an onerous burden on the CFers. I haven't.)
He -- or anyone -- can come up with objection after objection until the cows come home
Another misdirection tactic as noted immediately above. I haven't done that. Stop talking about non-existent hypotheticals, you sound like Hoffman.
Plus, I have offered several specific reasons why I think Shanahan is wrong. No one has addressed them as far as I know. The main ones are:
1. Researchers have often moved the location of the heat in the cell from one location to another, with a calibration heater. This has not had a measurable effect on the calibration constant. If it did, they would know something is wrong.Single calibration, or Joule, heaters do not have the capability to simulate an altered heat distribution. As I have posted in this forum, one potential test of the CCS is to replace the electrode-electrolyte-electrode current path with a second heater. Since the first is already in the electrolyte, the replacement heater should have leads long enough to allow it to be placed in the gas space of the cell without any other redesign required to burden the CF researcher. Now, a nominal heat partition can be set up to simulate calibration with an inactive electrode, and subsequently, that distribution can be easily altered to simulate more heat being produced in the electrolyte with a concurrent decrease in gas space heater current. My guess is that would show a CCS.
Further, Storms published his results showing that calibration by Joule heater gave a slightly different result from calibration with electrolysis current and an inactive electrode, and that electrolytic calibration gave different results at different times. I noted this in my 1st paper. I believe Miles' publications show similar effects. These differences are of the same size as the change I needed to zero out that 780 mW excess heat signal, so your statement above is just wrong anyway.
2. The heat corresponds to the use of Pd-D. Not Pd-H, Pt-D or Pt-H. I do not see how the choice of cathode material and electrolyte can cause the Shanahan effect.
That's because you choose not to. To a chemist, the differences in the systems you just delineated are huge. So it is expected that they would show different results.
3. The heat is controlled by various well-known factors shown in McKubre's equation such as loading and temperature. Again, I do not see how these control factors could correspond to the Shanahan effect. (The control factors are not good enough to allow a commercial reactor, but no one disputes they are real.)
McK's work focuses only on Pd, which has the extenuating conditions of swelling withdislocation loop punching and possibly superabundant vacancies forming causing surface alterations. This will differ between H and D, as is well known, Pt does not hydride, so these effects are not relevant. Ni is very difficult to hydride and it is unlikely it will have significant loading and thus no significant surface alteration from that cause. IOW, the effect depends on the specific chemistry present. Surprise, surprise ...
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Not correct THH. The calorimeter Storms used to generate the data I reanalyzed was over 98% efficient, i.e., the calibration constants made only minor corrections to the direct measurement. I believe that what you are saying (or should be) is that if you compute the magnitude of the expected excess heat signal given a %recombination at the electrode, the result should be limited to some maximum value. That is completely true and is the basis of my comments that CF authors need to go back to their old data where they claim excess heats and check this. What they then find will direct future commentary.
OK, so maybe I don't understand that. CCS/ATER will merely redistribute heat that is in the budget anyway (unless we have an open cell and emissions of H2 and O2 are specifically marked). In a mass flow calorimeter all this can do is alter effective efficiency upwards.
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kirk-
"See comment immediately above... For my rebuttals to Flesischmann, Szpak, Mosier-Boss and Miles and to Storms, see my published papers in Thermochimica Acta. (Use Google Scholar to get the refs, or look at my prior posts for the them)"
If you do not list your references yourself, do not be surprised that no on else will reference them.
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kirk-
"See comment immediately above... For my rebuttals to Flesischmann, Szpak, Mosier-Boss and Miles and to Storms, see my published papers in Thermochimica Acta. (Use Google Scholar to get the refs, or look at my prior posts for the them)"
If you do not list your references yourself, do not be surprised that no on else will reference them. -
OK, so maybe I don't understand that. CCS/ATER will merely redistribute heat that is in the budget anyway (unless we have an open cell and emissions of H2 and O2 are specifically marked). In a mass flow calorimeter all this can do is alter effective efficiency upwards.
You are correct. But what people fail to realize is that such a minor change can produce signals that most CFers treat as real evidence of actual excess heat. But in fact all they are doing is mis-stating what the error bars are on excess heat because they don't include all sources of variation in their determination.
Added: Also, you are probably referring to the fact that the more heat that is lost, the larger the apparent excess energy signal can be. That is true also.
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Has any of us read the article and can summarize?
Dispute between inventor and Raleigh investor over nuclear reaction device ends
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014 by Andrea Rossi who gradually brought it to the power level requested by us. Rossi later intervened to switch off the dummy, and in the following subsequent operations on the E-Cat: charge insertion, reactor startup, reactor shutdown and powder charge extraction. Throughout the test, no further intervention or interference on his part occurred; moreover, all phases of the test were monitored directly by the collaboration."
That, and the fact that Rossi was involved in designing and choosing the major portions of the measurement method, makes in a NON-independent measurement.
QuoteAs for his interventions, it seems that they are limited to essential things, according to the Professors, who agreed to make that kind of test and signed the article. I think they would never have done it if they had felt themselves at the mercy of Rossi
yeah, well with the benefit of hindsight, they were entirely at the mercy of Rossi who bamboozled and flummoxed them without mercy.
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I advise you not to do that. Don't imagine that you know more about calorimetry than someone like McKubre. You don't.
An unbecoming appeal to authority- a classic logical fallacy. I don't know about McKubre's education and experience with calorimetry. I do know that isoperibolic calorimetry is inherently suspect because it relies on one or a few point temperature measurements, at least classically. As for McKubre, I know he is immensely gullible (or very hypocritical) because he attends to obvious schlock like the Papp story. And IIRC, he was into several other scams as they developed-- maybe Steorn but I don't recall for sure which. Plus his lecture style is insufferably pompous but that is a matter of taste, I suppose.
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Lots of luck. I know of two cases where the raw data was supplied. The Storms data and the McKubre data (which has the 'infamous' M4 run data). The McKubre data is difficult to come by since it is in an EPRI report, and that report was only distributed to EPRI members. As well, it has no calibration data in it, unlike Storms data, so one can't check the CCS problem. I asked McK twice for the equations and constants and he refused to give them to me because he claimed he was too busy to look them up. Then I tried a 'Hail Mary' move and asked a group of people on an email distribution if any of them knew. McK was on that list (so I didn't have to separately cc him) and took offense at this, called me a 'grandstander', and broke off all contact. But that was when the Storms data became available, so I moved on. Other than that there are almost no cases where even the calibration equations (with constants) are given, one exception being the Seebeck calorimeter equation I commented on in this forum recently. A 1-3% change in 1 cal constant produced a significant apparent excess heat signal there.
This sort of argument is why I make my usually misunderstood remarks that I don't care for small results. Nobody, especially not Shanahan, would argue with a self-heating device, for example, which used NO electrical heater after the reaction was established.
QuoteSingle calibration, or Joule, heaters do not have the capability to simulate an altered heat distribution. As I have posted in this forum, one potential test of the CCS is to replace the electrode-electrolyte-electrode current path with a second heater. Since the first is already in the electrolyte, the replacement heater should have leads long enough to allow it to be placed in the gas space of the cell without any other redesign required to burden the CF researcher. Now, a nominal heat partition can be set up to simulate calibration with an inactive electrode, and subsequently, that distribution can be easily altered to simulate more heat being produced in the electrolyte with a concurrent decrease in gas space heater current. My guess is that would show a CCS.
Further, Storms published his results showing that calibration by Joule heater gave a slightly different result from calibration with electrolysis current and an inactive electrode, and that electrolytic calibration gave different results at different times. I noted this in my 1st paper. I believe Miles' publications show similar effects. These differences are of the same size as the change I needed to zero out that 780 mW excess heat signal, so your statement above is just wrong anyway.
This was all news to me and I have performed/participated in quite a bit of Seebeck effect calorimetry. But it makes sense. The type calorimetry I was involved in used animal subjects which make plenty of heat and most notably do not require an electrical heater! Also, I was peripherally involved in using Seebeck effect calorimeters for characterizing various mixes of cement. Again, large signals and no input heat. I never heard of Shanahan's concerns until I read them here but they do make sense... to me anyway. And Kirk, rereading the paper you cited earlier about the method, I do see that there is no math higher than algebra I do understand it.
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An unbecoming appeal to authority- a classic logical fallacy.
Jed does that all the time. That's why I refer to him categorizing people as 'heroes' or 'villains' Heros always do right and tell the truth (or determine it) while villains always lie.
I don't know about McKubre's education and experience with calorimetry.
He has a PhD from U. of Southampton in England I believe. It was the school Fleischmann was associated with and McK may have been one of his students, not sure. He was an electrochemist I think. At least those are my recollections.
Added: I should have mentioned that the U. of S. was considered a top school for electrochemists at the time in large part due to Fleischmann's influence.
He did a lot of CF calorimetry for EPRI and some others, including building them. He used some unique calibration techniques that he wouldn't share with me. I guess that makes him an expert.
And IIRC, he was into several other scams as they developed-- maybe Steorn but I don't recall for sure.
Don't know about Steorn. But he did 'replicate' work by Y. Ararta and Les Case. He collaborated with Dr. Brian Oliver (formerly of Mound but at Pacific Northwest National Lab at the time) and Prof. W. Brian Clarke (deceased) of McMaster U. for He analyses. Interestingly enough, the results weren't what he expected. McK submitted 4 samples to 'the Brians' from Arata replications for 4He analyses. One was supposed to be a control as I recall. They found evidence of air contamination in all of them. Brian Clarke also detected 3He in one (or more? - the memory fades). McK jumped up and published that, but not the 4He results. Brian Clarke had to do that separately. McK always claimed the Brians had messed up the analyses, which I think is amusing. You go to the world experts on trace He measurements, and they find air in your samples, so you blame them and soldier on... especially if you can selectively publish positive results (the 3He stuff). Makes us 'pathological' skeptics wonder about them...
Brian Clarke also tried to separately replicate the case results with no success. He published that too, but as with all negative result, it is easy to say "he did it wrong", especially since he used lead vessels, not steel.
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An unbecoming appeal to authority- a classic logical fallacy.
No, it is not. You do not understand the definition of "appeal to authority." It is more properly called "a fallacious appeal to authority." Definition:
"Using an authority as evidence in your argument when the authority is not really an authority on the facts relevant to the argument. As the audience, allowing an irrelevant authority to add credibility to the claim being made."
https://www.logicallyfallaciou…es/21/Appeal-to-Authority
Since McKubre really is an authority on calorimetry, my assertion is not a logical fallacy.
People often confuse the meaning of "appeal to authority." Like you, they think that any reference to person who is claimed to be an authority is a logical fallacy. That is absurd. If I were to cite Bockris as an authority on electrochemistry, quoting his textbook, it would be ridiculous to claim that cannot be accepted because it is some sort of logical fallacy. His textbook is widely regarded as the most authoritative source of information in the field.
I don't know about McKubre's education and experience with calorimetry.
I do know about his education and experience with calorimetry. Since I know this, and you don't, you should either learn about him or defer to my judgement. You have no business disagreeing with me when you have no information on the topic at hand.
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@ JedRothwell,
Wow! In that case I have interfered with hundreds of experiments in my role as copy editor.
This is not what I intended. Interferences happen when the contacts with external people take place between the setup of the test and the first issuing of its report, as happened in the January 2011 demo.
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But, don't you worry. This was after the test. I and others made suggestions about the first draft of the paper.
I am not worrying. I'm instead relieved seeing that you recovered your memory of the January 2011 facts.
So, you are confirming now that you had contacts with the members of the measuring team before the issuing of the calorimetric report, and that you and others did make suggestions about that paper. That fits what Krivit wrote about the genesis of the Levi's calorimetric report (1).
But the big problem is that it was impossible for whoever contributed in any way to that report not to be aware of the inconsistencies of the data used for calculating the astonishingly huge excess heat reported in that document. You, and the others, did actively contribute to the preparation of the calorimetric report, therefore it's really difficult to understand which members of this sort of "extended Ecat team" are responsible for the fake data disseminated worldwide by that report.
(1) http://newenergytimes.com/v2/n…6/3625rf-melichmacy.shtml
