Posts by Alan Smith

Very readable new paper (actually a 50 page book extract) from Huw Price on arxiv, covering the social/political/scientific pressures arounf LENR under the heading:-

https://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/2201/2201.03776.pdf

Risk and Scientific Reputation: Lessons from Cold Fusion

Huw Price1 University of Bonn and Trinity College, Cambridge UK

ABSTRACT

Many scientists have expressed concerns about potential catastrophic risks associated

with new technologies. But expressing concern is one thing, identifying serious candidates another.

Such risks are likely to be novel, rare, and difficult to study; data will be scarce, making speculation

necessary. Scientists who raise such concerns may face disapproval not only as doomsayers, but

also for their unconventional views. Yet the costs of false negatives in these cases – of wrongly

dismissing warnings about catastrophic risks – are by definition very high. For these reasons,

aspects of the methodology and culture of science, such as its attitude to epistemic risk and to

unconventional views, are relevant to the challenges of managing extreme technological risks. In

this piece I discuss these issues with reference to a real-world example that shares many of the

same features, that of so-called ‘cold fusion’.

COVID prompts global surge in biolabs

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, plans are afoot to build more than 40 high-level biosafety laboratories around the world, including in India, the Philippines and Singapore. Investments in biosafety labs often follow major epidemics, but some scientists worry about the huge cost of maintaining biosafety-level-3 (BSL-3) and BSL-4 facilities. Others fear the risks posed by these labs, such as the possibility of creating dangerous pathogens or of microorganisms escaping. But researchers in the countries that plan to build these laboratories say they are needed, especially to strengthen the response to emerging threats. “In this light, the critical element of any preparedness programme is lab preparedness,” said Bharati Pawar, India’s minister for health and family welfare.

Nature | 6 min read

Dear Colleagues,

following the recent IWAHLM15 Workshop, I am sending the reference about the document uploaded yesterday on ResearchGate:

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/364311862_Further_results_using_SIMPLE_procedures_to_activate_surface-modified_Constant_wires_for_AHE_production

DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.14014.36160

* Obviously, share further the document as You like, in accordance with the Open-Science approach of the EU project CleanHME.

Please, Alan, upload the information on LENR-Forum.

BTW, I hope that our document will be enough understandable.

My best,

Francesco Celani

Quote from axil

The current will produce a spark that will induce a nanoplasmonic reaction on the surface of the cathode that will produce a polariton condensate which is a superconductor.

A nanoscopic region on the surface os a cathode might be superconducting, but that doesn't make the cathode superconducting. We are talking science here.

Quote from quuti

The basic idea is that the Kathode in a electrolysis cell is superconducting.

Hello!

That is a very bold statement. Why should that be the case?

The above may be of interest to some- I get their free papers on the metal markets,

I think the paper linked above should be of interest to Rob

Quote from Paradigmnoia

The economy of the deal is that you get nothing

Fitting all your plug sockets with these devices will certainly reduce your electricity use, especially if you epoxy them in place.

Quote from JedRothwell

Anyone can see how to test Shanahan's hypothesis. It has been tested many times.

I knew how I would do it Jed, but the point was I wanted him to set out the parameters and the method. Me devising and performing an experiment according to my ideas just leaves him wriggle room.

Quote from Curbina

On the other hand, the experiments with thermometry instead of calorimetry have always provided calibration curves that are precisely designed to determine the energy required to achieve a given temperature and reveal if the active cells change that.

That was what Russ George and I were doing in my lab. We were using PID thermostats at constant voltage, we could accurately compare the 'heater power on' time for matched reactors, all of which were calibrated in advance with previous (failed so 'dummy') fuel tubes . This would often show a very clear difference between control and a working test. It is a simple and cheap method, which we never made any great claims for, since we were more interested in the Gamma emissions. But it worked pretty well - however, very few people trust thermometry..

Quote from Stevenson

Your multitude of experiments for example, in my view are actual explorative experiments, not just "replications". Needless to say, in any cases exploratory research need to starts from simple replication...

Of course. I think any experimenter would start with a simple replication and if that worked progress to more elaborate tests. My ppt presentation at IWAHLM was about encouraging those with access to students to let them replicate using safe and inexpensive methods.

I asked Shanahan several times (in this forum) to describe to me an experiment which confirmed his speculations so I could perform it. He always evaded the question or claimed he had already done so (which he had not). He's a member here btw, but not present much lately.

Quote from THHuxleynew

You could do this my way and recommend a suitable "replicable and certain" experiment? Then it might not get deleted.

I would not attempt to patronise Florian by giving him homework.

Quote from THHuxleynew

This thread is to discuss - in the light of ICCF24 - what is the status of type 2 LENR? It has never been that popular in the past - every since F&P experiments did not show the expected high energy products from deuterium fusion. It is accepted that, for whatever reason, most LENR experiments are type 1. (A notable exception would be the CR-39 alpha track stuff).

Many 'hot and dry' LENR systems will produce energetic radiation at temperatures which are in the great scheme of things trivial when compared to the temperature requirements for hot fusion. I offered some references for this before, which you didn't much like. Cooler 'wet' systems seem to cause LENR within the bulk metal (Storms argues for this) or as a surface effect (McKubre, Szpak, et al)

I see absolutely no reason why there should not be 2 or even more different mechanisms for LENR to occur, possibly more. After all we have reports of LENR type transmutations and energy release in plasmas, in liquids, in solids and in powders. Science likes reductionist theories because it makes events more comprehensible, but just possibly Nature is a lot bigger than we realise. Each new fundamental scientific discovery we make suggests that this is the case.

Quote from bayak

We should also not forget that we need to twist the flow a little, so the guide blades should be fixed in the cone.

The flow will be turbulent after entering the 10cm pipe, guide vanes or not, since above Mach1 air does not behave as an ideal gas - nothing like it in fact. I think you will find this very clearly written document (A PhD thesis) which is a feasibility study for building a tiny supersonic/hypersonic wind tunnel 40mm x1mm throat size at the University of Arkensaw. If nothing else the somewhat specialised math might be useful.

Quote from THHuxleynew

I find this very difficult to believe - I'd like to hear their side of it.

There was a long chain of (essentially private) emails from many prominent LENR researchers around the time that the Google team paper was published in Nature expressing incredulity at the fact they did not seek advice. The only exception (from memory) was Ed Storms, who discussed Seebeck calorimetry systems with them, but even he didn't feel the Google team had done enough due diligence before starting their experiments. An apologist for Google (I am not going to name names) said that the reason they didn't seek support is that (I paraphrase) ' they wanted to avoid adopting any preconceptions as to what to do, or how to do it.'

Quote from Shane D.

According to Hagelstein at ICCF24, all of Google's 400 replication attempts were on the Parkhomov experiment. I think that revelation came in the Q&A of the "Panel Discussion" hosted by Matt Trevithick, which has since been edited out.

That is correct, I could hardly believe my ears.

We keep THH for target practice, and he's pretty good in that role. Target theory was a big topic in radiobiology when I was a white-coated bottle washer. THH is a modern exemplar of a moving target, but we do like him so be nice.

Quote from THHuxleynew

I will be censored for saying - like ascoli

Ascoli was never censored for anything remotely to do with science. He was asked to refrain from being boring. obsessive, and never listening to any other voices than the ones in his head. He was so far from being censored several special threads were created to discuss foamgate - just to stop him presenting his one and only topic in all the others.

So to say he was censored in completely wrong, he was censured (gently) chided (moderately) and eventually we all got bored with it and we asked him to stop. That's it - we regard foamgate as a dead topic entirely devoid of interest, a nonsensical s/n ratio destroyer and completely irrelevant to the hundreds of experiments that preceded it and followed it, and the experiments that are still going on now.

As for you, regularly offering to leave is a bit wimpy isn't it? You know you like it here so don't make with the snowflake stuff. We cover your back (as we do with all those who deserve it) pretty well, so enjoy it while we are spared.

Hi Rob.

And here's another influential sceptic suggesting nobody could repeat F&P's work...reposted from the sceptics thread. such things are common. The video should start at the right part btw - the rest is only moderately interesting.