QuoteThe strange thing is that the knowledge is all over the web, serious papers by serious scientists. But it gains little traction sadly.
Assuming these papers would lead to something other than laboratory curiosities, such as muon-catalyzed fusion is arguably considered, how can this be? Someone must want low cost, clean and safe power enough to make sense of all this work if in fact it makes sense, wouldn't you think?
Someone must want low cost, clean and safe power enough to make sense of all this work if in fact it makes sense, wouldn't you think?
You would indeed.
Assuming these papers would lead to something other than laboratory curiosities, such as muon-catalyzed fusion is arguably considered, how can this be? Someone must want low cost, clean and safe power enough to make sense of all this work if in fact it makes sense, wouldn't you think?
They are outside of the established paradigm so 99% of scientists and engineers won't consider them. Mainstream science is a cult that excludes funamentally different thought. Also, the remaining 1% get slapped, mocked, and attacked by the main stream when they start to stray away from the accepted dogma. Most of them fall right back into line. Only perhaps .01% are willing to risk their careers, pensions, and sometimes their lives to pursue non-mainstream technologies. A good example is T.H. Moray who was basically using EVOs to produce vast quantities of power from discharge tubes with doped mixures of semiconductors and radioactive elements. He and many others have faced horrible suppression. It is much easier to stick to making a slightly more efficent computer chip than develop a revolutionary energy technology.
You could still get eminent domaine in to the stone age, what fun!
QuoteThey are outside of the established paradigm so 99% of scientists and engineers won't consider them.
What does that mean, please? It's not that hard to tell that some (perhaps black box) equipment makes excess heat. One wouldn't have to accept any paradigm, would one?
QuoteMainstream science is a cult that excludes funamentally different thought
You may want to consider these articles about discovery in the last century. Surely some of these required "different thought."
http://discovermagazine.com/20…t-science-trends-30-years
http://theconversation.com/fiv…ed-the-modern-world-42452
https://www.theatlantic.com/ma…vations-list/309536/#list
Seriously, look over those accomplishments and tell me science excludes different thinking. And while you're at it, why would it matter? There are plenty of entrepreneurs, investors, and consumers who don't know or care about "mainstream science." They simply want things that work and they would be expected to give meritorious claims, including those for cold fusion, fair consideration.
QuoteOnly perhaps .01% are willing to risk their careers, pensions,
There are more than 7 million research scientists world-wide (as per quora and UNESCO). Do you have anything in the way of actual data to support that wild generalization?
@snoopy accidential discovery of penicillin. Vaccination in 18th century - surely science knew about anti-bodies or Chinese knew that gunpowder explodes due to avalanche oxydation reaction.
@snoopy and while it is a good thing that many researchers don't care about what mainstream says, the bureaucrats and investors do.
That leaves pioneers financially starved.
snoopy,
I think LENR is a different case that has to be judged on it's very special set of circumstances. Almost immediately it was attacked, mocked, trivialized and stigmatized causing it to go underground. Many of those that soldiered on anyway lost their careers and reputations. Lots of literature to back that up. It effectively became the black sheep of the science family, and all the baggage that comes with that.
If this thing ever takes off, there will be a lot of explaining to do from mainstream. Of course, LENR supporters have been waiting for that a long time now and still no end in sight.
Shane D. Why would we listen to hundreds of explanation then? They are already looking at every opportunity to ride the lenr wave proposing this and that.
I wish we were capable of a serious house cleaning and major reset of education curriculums. So kids don't have to waste lives reverting flow of time and compressing space.
Display MoreHi woodworker, (and THHuxleynew),
Are you guys teaming up officially now?
I read most of your posts. And true, chances are that if you say a lot of different things you up your chances on being right once in a while (i think the anti-Rossiites have used the saying "a broken clock is right two times a day" a few times).
Bottom line of your thoughts were that Rossi did not stand a chance. You used a lot of words to say that numerous times and you were dead wrong. Full stop.
IH Fanboy, Torkel and one or two others were the only ones who predicted things accurately.
Some examples (that will not help ito sway anybody's opinion) attached.
Cheers,
JB
We Cat, I had the pleasure of reading WWs posts at the time. You are reductive. In fact, I think your simplification here may be what allows you still to hold views about the Rossi-IH affair which most people would not (you may correct me if I'm wrong).
WW was not saying that right would win. He was saying it was obvious from the evidence that Rossi was a liar, and that given that evidence he would not be believed. We will never know what would have happened, since Rossi aborted the trial before he had to give testimony. Some have speculated that Rossi would have been in danger of charges of perjury over the sworn heat exchanger evidence he gave (which has various issues, but is central to his claim that his device worked as Penon's report indicates). it is a shame we did not get to test this.
However, WW did not from that come to the naive conclusion that IH would win the case in any way financially satisfactory to them. Juries can get to dislike both sides when each side is calling the other one a liar, regardless of what a sober reading of facts would indicate.
You can see that it is not a simple Rossi right or wrong choice. Things seldom are. Rossi can have many admirable characteristics... and still be Rossi. If you push things into this black or white mould you are in danger yourself of making poor judgements.
Seriously, look over those accomplishments and tell me science excludes different thinking.
There are countless examples of "science" excluding different thinking. This is what prompted Max Planck to write that progress in science occurs "funeral by funeral." He explained: “A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.”
I have mentioned famous examples of rejection. They include things like the airplane, the laser and the MRI.
I put the word science in quotes above because it is not science that excludes so much as individual scientists who do. They do this because rejecting novelty is human nature, and scientists are ordinary people with such foibles despite their training. See Peter Hagelstein's essay here, in the section, "Science as an imperfect human endeavor:"
http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/Hagelsteinontheoryan.pdf
Many scientists not very good at science, just as many programmers write spaghetti code, and many surgeons kill their patients. A surprising number of scientists reject the scientific method, such as the late John Huizenga, who boldly asserted that when an experiments conflicts with theory, the experiment must be wrong, even when he could not point to any reason.
One of the absurd claims made with regard to this notion is that science never makes mistakes; that in the end it always gets the right answer and it never rejects a true finding, so no valuable discovery is ever lost. Since many claims have been lost and then rediscovered decades later this is obviously incorrect. More to the point, this claim is not falsifiable. If a true discovery is lost to history we would not know about it. Because it is lost. The logic of this resembles the old joke about the teacher who says, "everyone who is absent today please raise your hand."
In other technical disciplines such as programming, people forget important techniques all the time. The notion that science does not make mistakes is pernicious. It is dangerous. Imagine the chaos and destruction that would ensue if people went around thinking: "doctors never make mistakes" or "bank computer programmers never make mistakes" or "airplane mechanics never make mistakes."
Selected from an old Guardian UK newspaper article...
· Brain power: Scientists at the Institute for Animal Health in Edinburgh secured a £200,000 government grant to find out whether BSE has jumped the "species barrier" from cows into sheep. An inquiry is now under way after it was found that scientists had been mistakenly testing cattle brains instead of sheep brains for five years.
· Scientific Watergate: The US National Institutes of Health investigatory panel found the immunologist Thereza Imanishi-Kari had fabricated data in a 1986 research paper authored with the Nobel prize winner David Baltimore. The findings claimed in the paper promised a breakthrough for genetic modification of the immune system.
· Hubble Space Telescope: Nasa scientists launched the Hubble telescope to create a lens 10 to 20 times more powerful than those based on earth. A gross design error in the main mirror was discovered immediately after launch in April 1990. Hundreds of millions of pounds were needed for the astronaut repair of the mirror.
· N-rays: A French physicist, René Blondlot, claimed to have discovered a new type of radiation, shortly after Roentgen had discovered X-rays. American physicist Robert Wood, however, revealed that N-rays were little more than a delusion. Wood removed the prism from the N-ray detection device, without which the machine couldn't work. Yet, Blondlot's assistant still claimed he found N-rays.
· Academic standards: Cyril Burt, the 1960s guru of British psychology, produced research into the intelligence of identical twins which, among other findings, led to the assertions that academic standards were falling. Years later the statistics were found to be "too perfect" and it was discovered the twins - and even the researcher alleged to have carried out the work - never existed.
· Piltdown man: In 1913 an ape's jaw with a canine tooth worn down like a human's was uncovered at a site near Piltdown. British paleoanthropologists came to accept the idea that the fossil remains belonged to a single creature who had a human cranium and an ape's jaw - offering the missing link between apes and humans in the evolutionary chain. In 1953, Piltdown 'man' was exposed as a forgery. The skull was modern and the teeth on the ape's jaw had been filed down.
· Alchemy: - Sir Isaac Newton - the scientist who single-handedly created the foundations of modern day physics had a little known obsession with alchemy, and was convinced for much of his life that he would be able to change base metals into gold. Such a discovery would have helped with his later job as master of the mint, but never materialised.
Jed "funeral by funeral."
my fear is that LENR will die "funeral by funeral" as most of the "real" researchers in the field die. Unfortunately, most of the best original cold fusion researchers where those old and established in their fields and we are losing them. It is/was not a field for young scientists since it would ruin their careers.
This is what prompted Max Planck to write that progress in science occurs "funeral by funeral." He explained: “A new scientific truth does not triumph by convincing its opponents and making them see the light, but rather because its opponents eventually die, and a new generation grows up that is familiar with it.”
Quantified : Does Science Advance One Funeral at a Time?
Jed "funeral by funeral."
my fear is that LENR will die "funeral by funeral" as most of the "real" researchers in the field die.
Yup. The funeral tally is heading the wrong way.
I have been worried about this for a long time. I am more worried than ever! See:
The funeral problem does not just occur in science. It happens in technology, business, the arts and so on. I think that if an immortality pill was developed (or we reach the singularity) that will stifle progress in every field. We might go back to the long stasis of the European Middle Ages or the Edo period in Japan.
The influence of James Watt in his last decades is a famous example from technology. No one contributed more to steam engines, but in the end his stature held back progress. He did not trust high-pressure cylinders. He had such influence, others did not make them. So, only large, heavy unwieldy engines were built. After he died, Young Turk engineers began building high pressure engines, which were smaller and more powerful per pound. This led to things like railroad locomotives.
The public still worried about high pressure engines. For good reason: they were dangerous! You couldn't have a railroad without them. But you could have ships. Steamships up to around 1840 had astounding low pressure engines. The engines were gigantic, but very unlikely to explode.
It was not so much the engines Jed, it was the boilers.
It was not so much the engines Jed, it was the boilers.
Yes, but a low pressure cylinder meant the boiler was also low pressure.
We need another Nikola Tesla who isn't scared to challenge the establishment, isn't bound by the theories of others, and seeks to put his inventions to use.
Display MoreWe Cat, I had the pleasure of reading WWs posts at the time. You are reductive. In fact, I think your simplification here may be what allows you still to hold views about the Rossi-IH affair which most people would not (you may correct me if I'm wrong).
WW was not saying that right would win. He was saying it was obvious from the evidence that Rossi was a liar, and that given that evidence he would not be believed. We will never know what would have happened, since Rossi aborted the trial before he had to give testimony. Some have speculated that Rossi would have been in danger of charges of perjury over the sworn heat exchanger evidence he gave (which has various issues, but is central to his claim that his device worked as Penon's report indicates). it is a shame we did not get to test this.
However, WW did not from that come to the naive conclusion that IH would win the case in any way financially satisfactory to them. Juries can get to dislike both sides when each side is calling the other one a liar, regardless of what a sober reading of facts would indicate.
You can see that it is not a simple Rossi right or wrong choice. Things seldom are. Rossi can have many admirable characteristics... and still be Rossi. If you push things into this black or white mould you are in danger yourself of making poor judgements.
Thanks for the kind words to all who defended my posts. I guess that I have largely become accustomed to people who like to pick and choose which parts of a post they want to cite and ignore the rest. Reminds me, at the risk of crossing some posting redlines, of persons who cite the Second Amendment to the Constitution to support the conclusion that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed" and somehow forget the first clause which reads "A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free State."
Edited to delete repetitive pastes from Word.
