Posts by Ascoli65

Thank you, Dr. Storms, for your reply. I appreciate your attention, even if I didn't find any answer to my specific questions. You are more focused on future developments, that's understandable. Anyway your preprint contains 64 references, most of them refers to old experiments which provide the basis for future researches, so I think, it's also useful to reexamine this old achievements in order to avoid the same mistakes, if any.

Quote from Storms

The problem is no longer replication. I can make the effect work any time I want. The problem is control. Because the active sites are made by an uncontrolled random process, the amount of power is not predictable.

The F&P experiment, cited as [36] in your preprint, featured 4 cells, which behaved exactly in the same way: one after the other, the water contents in each cell boiled off, as temperature approached and reached the boiling point. This doesn't seem to be due to an uncontrolled random process. At paragraph 9 of your preprint, you attributed a certain importance to the effect of the temperature increase. So, what do you think about that specific F&P experiment? What is, in your opinion, the real cause of such impressive common behavior of the 4 cells?

Quote from Storms

Anyone who has a question can contact me at [email protected].

Thank you, Sir, for your willingness to answer my questions.

If you don't mind, I'd prefer a public conversation, but I can't do it in this thread. So I asked you my questions in "The perpetual “is LENR even real” argument thread.": RE: The perpetual “is LENR even real” argument thread.

I hope it doesn't make a big difference to you.

Quote from Storms

Until an experiment is reproducible more-or-less at will, producing more-or-less the same results (including magnitude and timing) more-or-less every time then we cannot know that it is real and fully under our control."

Being real and being under total control are two entirely different requirements. They should not even be discussed in the same sentence. Cold fusion is real. However, it will not be under total control until it is understood. Unless a person is helping to obtain this understanding, their comments are useless.

Well, Ed, yours is a legitimate opinion. However the quoted sentence appears in a slide presented by McKubre at ICCF23, as you can see here: RE: What should we do next ? - A relevant question from Matt Trevithick

In the same slide, McKubre also mentions the original Pons Fleischmann experiment replicated by Lonchamp. This is the famous "4 cells boil-off" experiment carried out in spring 1992 at IMRA Europe and presented at ICCF3 in Nagoya in October. It was also described in the so called "Simplicity Paper" published by F&P in 1993 on PLA, which you included in the Bibliography of your draft paper at number [36].

You mentioned that reference at the beginning of this paragraph:

Quote

9. Effect of Temperature

The increased temperature was known since 1990 to increase power production.[36] Since then, this effect has been studied in greater detail.[35, 37-40] Of importance, most of the samples I have studied made no detectable power at room temperature yet would produce significant power when heated. Perhaps more success would have been reported if the samples had been simply heated.

I would like to ask you if you have deeply examined the results claimed in this F&P paper, and if you agree with McKubre in considering this F&P experiment the only one which has been exactly replicated.

Thanks.

Quote from Alan Smith

@Ascoli. Please no more on F&P here. Right now we are discussing Ed Storms work, you have a dedicated thread you can post in regarding foamy issues.

You know what foam is btw? Structurally weak and fill of holes.

Ok, Alan. Thanks for the dedicated thread. Feel free to move my comments there, if you wish. I don't want to disturb or to be OT, here.

Anyway, Dr.Storm mentions the controversial F&P experiment at the beginning of paragraph 9 (Effect of Temperature) of his draft paper, which is under discussion here. How can I interact with him in order to know his opinion on that experiment?

Quote from JedRothwell

It has accumulated hundreds of replications. Perhaps not "exact" by your exacting standards, but no one other than you would claim these are not replications, or they do not prove the original experiment was correct. As I said, the wide variety of different instrument types is a strength, not a weakness. It give more proof to the claim, not less. Only you would claim it is a problem, and you have no reason or rational basis for saying that. You are just looking for an excuse to dismiss the claims.

No, it's not only mine, it's McKubre's position. He added another point to his slide:

"d. Until an experiment is reproducible more-or-less at will, producing more-or-less the same results (including magnitude and timing) more-or-less every time then we cannot know that it is real and fully under our control."

As for these words, you can't say that CF is real, unless McKubre is wrong.

Quote

. . . You might have learned this if you had bothered to read the literature. Of course you and THH will never read it, except perhaps to pull out a few cherry-picked quotes which you misunderstand, such as the one from McKubre above. Regarding Miles' calorimeter with the sheath, you might have asked my Invisible Friend. She would tell you what I just did, in more detail:

I've read the F&P literature very carefully, but I've examined very well the F&P videos too. They contradicts each others.

Anyway, my best compliment, Jed, for you big work with "her". You made a very interesting and useful tool, even if for the moment she can't say nothing else of what she reads from your library.

Maybe a next AI generation will also be able to interpret pictures and videos so she will substitute me in explaining to you what really happened in the F&P experiments.

Quote from JedRothwell

There are hundreds of other less exact replications, many of them better than the original in various ways. For example, there were many with closed cells, which have some advantages, and others with diagnostics such as x-ray film and tritium detection. Many used better calorimeters.

It would not be a good idea to do only exact engineering replications. You want to try different instruments to see if the same results are found. If people only used the exact same instrument, they might all be making systematic errors. Whereas there can be no systematic error common to isoperibolic, flow and Seebeck calorimeters. The systems are different.

But, please, note, in the same slide presented at ICCF23, McKubre wrote:

" c. Reproduce exactly first. Work with the originator directly, in person, understand their procedures at every step until the original effect is recreated. In 1996 Lonchampt et al* set out "simply to reproduce the exact experiment of Fleschmann and Pons – to ascertain the various phenomena in order to master the experiments". The phrase underlined is critical. Only from the position of mastery can systematic effects be studied."

The original F&P experiment was held in 1992, Lonchamp replication a few years later. In about 3 decades since then, this experiment should have accumulated dozens of exact replications! How is it possible that nobody else, including McKubre, has replicated this experiment?

Quote from JedRothwell

Experiments with cold fusion also have clear replicable and certain results.

At ICCF23, McKubre stated (1):

"As far as I am aware Lonchampt and his team were and are the only group ever to attempt an exact engineering replication of the original Fleischmann Pons experiment."

So just one replication, and of a, well let's say, controversial experiment.

I don't think McKubre is less informed than you with respect of the CF experiments.

Who is right?

(1) RE: What should we do next ? - A relevant question from Matt Trevithick

Quote from JedRothwell

No doubt? Do you have ambient temperature data showing the effects of the AC unit? If you do not, then there is doubt, and you are merely speculating.

Other reasons to doubt:

Most AC units in laboratories have fine thermostatic control, to within a fraction of a degree. When you go any distance from the heat outlet, temperature variations are less than 0.1 deg C. Such temperature variations cannot measurably affect the inside of a calorimeter.

Yes, no doubt.

Please, read again my sentence above. I was referring to the explanation, and there is no doubt that the effect of an AC unit is a simpler explanation than an unknown nuclear phenomenon.

As for the ambient temperature, I know that it was kept constant within a small range, but it was done by means of an AC unit inside the cabin containing the cell. However the down-spikes in the TC4 curve are not due to the small ambient temperature cycling, rather to the strong increase of the convective coefficient of heat exchange between the H/D gas pipe and the ambient temperature caused by the periodic activation of the AC unit fan, as I explained in the post linked to my previous comment.

TC4 measures the temperature of a flange directly connected to the H/D gas pipe, it usually stays at above 250 °C, so when the AC fan blows its temperature starts to quickly drop. This is very old and basic thermodynamics, and provides a perfect explanation of the TC4 behavior, so it should have been preferred over any other new and bizarre explanation.

Quote

If the experiments were performed repeatedly at different times of the year, there would be air conditioning in summer and heating in winter. These produce different responses. You can tell the difference. Heating is usually much faster, unless there is a heat pump, and I doubt there would be one in Japan.

Not in the case of the experimental setup we are talking of. The cell was hosted inside a small cabin in a laboratory, and its ambient temperature was kept 2-3 degrees below the lab temperature by means of an AC unit installed inside the cabin, in winter as well as in summer.

Quote from Alan Smith

To paraphrase (slightly) the words of Akito Takahashi "Experimental results are independent facts.

Theory and explanation are also independent issues. to combine the three requires full consistency with as many rational physics aspects as possible".

But please note, he says " As many...as possible." And when you run out of the old 'possibles' you have only new ones left.

These are really wise words. First consider the old "possibles". The older are also the simpler.

But this plain and opportune rule has not always been followed in the CF research. Indeed, for what I saw till now, in my personal review of some of the most important CF experiments, it has never been.

For example, it has not been applied for the interpretation of the experimental results presented at ICCF22 by Akito Takahashi himself. In fact, there is no doubt that the variable cooling effect due to the on-off operation of an AC unit provides a much simpler, older, and already theoretically explained interpretation of the oscillatory down-spikes in the TC4 signal, rather than any other hypothetical, exotic, and unexplained new nuclear phenomenon.

For details, see: RE: The NEDO Initiative - Japan's Cold Fusion Programme

Quote from Alan Smith

As for Ascoli's 'foamgate' even if he is correct, which I doubt because the evidence is based at least (or mostly) on his imaginative re-interpretations of low-definition video clips. And he has (I am told) a vested interest in hot fusion so there may also be a conflict of interest there.

I hope, I'm allowed to say that you have been told a false information. I've no interest in hot fusion, neither vested, nor naked.

As for the "foamgate", if I'm correct, as clearly and indisputably shown by the available videos, it follows that paragraph 9 "Effect of Temperature" in Ed Storm pre-print, which relays on the F&P "Simplicity Paper", starts with a wrong statement.

Quote from Curbina

I have only deleted posts on the specific topic I warned wouldn’t be allowed. If you have other topics to discuss you are welcome here.

There would be many other interesting topics to discuss, but my logic suggests me that it's futile discussing unclear topics, when there is no possibility to find an agreement on a very clear and well documented one.

Quote from Alan Smith

I agree with Curbina. The F&P were wrong topic has been done to death. Ascoli is welcome to proffer other topics, but foamgate is not one of them, he has been indulged to a huge extent, more than almost any other member except our dear Gennadiy. If Stan Pons could be tempted out of retirement to reply (or start a new thread on foam) it might be worth carrying on, but failing that unlikely event we are NEVER going there again.

Okay, thanks for your offering, but I prefer to refrain from posting until another thread will be open on this same topic and, maybe, Stan Pons will directly explain how to interpret his results.

If not, goodby and good luck to everyone.

Quote from Curbina

Just so everyone knows, I warned once that I would delete posts relating to that, and I have simply done exactly as warned, I don’t mind keep doing that, we are not going back to that topic again. The closed thread contains all the arguments from both sides that will ever be.

But you are allowing only one side keeps repeating F&P were right: RE: The perpetual “is LENR even real” argument thread.

Quote from JedRothwell

Again, stop putting words in people's mouths. He said foam reduces accuracy. He did not say it makes accurate results impossible to the extent that no one can tell whether the water level has fallen 8 cm or 1 cm. If it were that bad, and accuracy was so low, F&P and everyone working with them would have seen that, and they would have abandoned that method.

Lonchampt wrote (1): "It is difficult to follow accurately the level of water during this period because of the formation of foam, so it is only at the end of the experiment, when the cell is dry that the excess heat can be calculated with precision."

Lonchampt didn't made any video, so it was difficult for him to follow the water level during the long boiling period.

On the contrary, F&P made a video in which it's quite easy to distinguish the level between the residual liquid layer and the high column of foam built-up during the several hours of boiling which preceded the final boil-off (2). The video shows that, during the last boil-off period, the liquid level dropped about 1 cm only, not 9 cm (that is half the total height of the initial water columns) as supposed by F&P in the calculation made in their Simplicity Paper.

(1) http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/LonchamptGreproducti.pdf

(2) https://imgur.com/a/q7QpRF5

Quote from Shane D.

It means you are sure they (FP's) were wrong.

Thanks.

To be more precise, I became convinced that both the conclusions of the F&P's Simplicity Paper are wrong.

And, do you have a your own opinion on the two issues (foam and arrow) which are under discussion? Had F&P been right or wrong in their two conclusive claims of the Simplicity Paper?

Quote

Sorry, but I am afraid this discussion will end soon.

Well, not the first time it would happen.

It wouldn't be a tragedy, my friend.

Quote from Shane D.

OK, then as far as you are concerned you have FP's dead to rights.

Sorry, I can't understand what does it mean.

Quote

And since you claim they were the genesis (although they were not) of the science, their offspring LENR in all it's various forms is a pseudoscience.

It's not me to say that F&P are at the root of LENR. See for instance this recent initiative (1): "ARPA-E acknowledges the complex, controversial history of LENR beginning with the announcement by Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons in 1989 that they had achieved deuterium-deuterium (D-D) “cold fusion” in an electrochemical cell."

As for pseudoscience, I can't draw that conclusion, but the obstinacy to refuse to looking into possible errors made by F&P is not a good starting point for anyone who is claiming to have obtained some extraordinary results in the field.

Quote

Other members disagree though, and it appears there is nothing from here on out that you, or THH can say to change their opinions, nor they yours.

I still hope it is possible. The opinions can be changed on the basis of the weight of the arguments, as Curbina said (2) "Let the weight of the arguments decide which vision prevails."

JR has just wrote (3): "What Ascoli set out to do, and what his intentions are now, are irrelevant. His claims should be addressed on their own merits regardless of his motivation. As it happens, his claims have no merits."

This is encouraging. Let's see if he really wants to enter in the merits of my arguments and answers my questions about the begin and the end of the boil off events (4)..

(1) https://arpa-e-foa.energy.gov/…55-4c3b-a211-b128d2a4a0e4

(2) RE: The Playground - No more Covid Games Please.

(3) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

(4) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

Quote from JedRothwell

What Ascoli set out to do, and what his intentions are now, are irrelevant. His claims should be addressed on their own merits regardless of his motivation. As it happens, his claims have no merits.

Fine, I agree.

Tell us, please, "when the boil off events begin and end" (1), for each one of the 4 cells in the "1992 boil off" experiment.

(1) https://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/RothwellJreviewofth.pdf

Quote from Shane D.

With all due respect, I would not put Ascoli in that party. THH..yes. You...yes. Ascoli...no. IMO, he is interested in one thing...Foamgate. Not the latest good news coming from the ICCF24, or Assisi. Not at all interested in sharing our excitement that we may finally be near the goal line after all these years.

Since 2011, I've been interested in many events and protagonists of the CF/LENR history. As you know, I've started commenting on the Ecat, then Celani, the MFMP experiments, then Takahashi, Mizuno and some other Japanese researchers.

Eventually, four years ago, I arrived at the beginning of the history, at F&P, the most important protagonists of the field. At that time, I have raised the same objections, I'm discussing now on this thread and I got the same reactions. At best, nobody has entered in the merit of my objections, with the only exception of Robert Horst (1). For years, people has invited me to look at other F&P's documents or at other researcher's claims, trying to divert the attention from the F&P's Simplicity Paper.

You are doing the same now, by complaining I'm not interested in the latest news from ICCF24, or Assisi. What should I say about them? Why should I discuss about any other LENR claim or experiment, when it is impossible to discuss on the evidence of the only experiment for which we have the original images, the same which have been used by the experimenters to derive their claims?

The availability of the "1992 boil off" videos allows everyone here to be in the same conditions. There is no more the privilege to say "I know something you don't" or "the experimenter knew something we don't". The images rule.

The "foam issue" is a test to understand if LF is scientific forum or only a fan-club. This is the reason why it has the priority in my present interest on LENR.

Quote

He is a man on a mission, and that mission seems to be to find whatever weakness in the science he can and use it to shame and discredit the entire field. With the boil-off, he believes he has found the instrument to accomplish that goal.

My intent (mission is too bombastic) is simply to search, understand and proclaim the truth, as it is normal in a scientific context. I've always looked for a sincere and constructive confrontation with others in order to avoid making mistakes myself.

Quote

He may be right, and it was an honest error, but if so, that was only a tiny part of the FP's story...as many have pointed out.

Why "may be right"? We have the images, the same images used by F&P to deduce their claims. We can arrive at a conclusion. Either I'm right, or I'm wrong. How is it possible that you are not interested to know if F&P were actually right or wrong in writing their final claims in the Simplicity Paper?

And how can you say that this experiment is only tiny part of the F&P's story?

An important phenomenon such as the alleged HAD derives from the claimed results of the "1992 boil off" experiment.

Footages from the related lab video have been included in a popular program such as "Good Morning America" in 1994 and in the documentary "Fire From Water" in 1998.

The Simplicity Paper was the first in the list of the papers selected by McKubre et al. to be submitted to DoE in 2004, when they were asked to provide the best evidence on LENR reality.

Is all this above just a tiny part of the story?

(1) RE: FP's experiments discussion

Quote from Alan Smith

Ascoli65 and THHuxleynew

Continually insisting that you are right, everybody else is wrong and that nobody has answered your allegations correctly is a game that quite a lot of the forum are tired of. I have had complaints about your obsessive and borderline irrational behaviour from both inside and outside the forum membership. The forum team are pondering further action.

Everyone here says he is right. Should I say I'm wrong?

I've been prevented to post in any other thread and invited to post only in this thread. That's okay. Better than nothing. Am I now also prevented to express my own opinion and defend it?

I was illustrating to THH my reasons about the mistakes in the Simplicity Paper (1). We were quietly discussing, when suddenly JR jumped in (2) by saying that F&P experiment "was irrefutable" and THH arguments were "nonsense". Who is actually claiming to be always right?

Yesterday, Curbina wrote (3): "Regarding the discussion about certain members and their intentions, I remind our community they are free to block anyone they dislike. The staff doesn’t encourage it, but is your right.

The forum staff asks our members to maintain a polite communication, one can deeply disagree without needing to resort to insults, mockery or derision. Let the weight of the arguments decide which vision prevails."

Okay, I perfectly agree with this call. I subscribe every single word in it and hope this is real wish of the entire LF staff.

In this spirit, I've explained my arguments about the foam and arrow issues. They are only based on original documents coming, directly or indirectly, from F&P.

JR wrote in its recent "Review of the calorimetry of Fleischmann and Pons" (4): "Unfortunately, this is an old VHS video, and it is a copy of a copy, so the quality is degraded and the picture is blurry, but you can still see when the boil off events begin and end."

Therefore, he has the chance to end this controversy by just indicating "when the boil off events begin and end", instead of saying that my or THH's arguments are nonsense.

This would be a correct and rational answer in a scientific confrontation, in which "the weight of the arguments decide which vision prevails", as Curbina wrote yesterday.

(1) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

(2) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

(3) RE: The Playground - No more Covid Games Please.

(4) https://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/RothwellJreviewofth.pdf

Quote from Alan Smith

I think we have heard quite enough of this.

Not enough for someone. Wyttenbach has insistently (and impolitely) asked "to explain the 3 hour after boil of heat production."

I gave to him the answer he was asking.

Quote

Your complaints are not backed up by much truly verifiable evidence, most of them have been answered in a polite and logical manner, but you will never accept that any other conclusions beside your own are valid.

In this thread I've raised 2 well specific issues related to the F&P Simplicity Paper, the "foam issue" and the "arrow issue".

They are based on the most truly verifiable evidence available in 30+ years of CF/LENR research, the "1992 boil off" videos.

These issues can be easily solved by looking at these lab videos.

In order to solve the "foam issue", I have asked JR (1) to tell us which are the time stamps on the video (2) when the boil off events begin and end.

In order to solve the "arrow issue", I have asked JR to tell us which is the time stamp on the video when cell 2 full dries and explain how it corresponds to the position of the vertical arrow on Fig.8 of the Simplicity Paper (3).

He answered (4): "As I said, if you were serious, you would boil some water in a graduated cylinder and see for yourself how well the volume can be measured."

I don't think this is a logical answer, nor polite, nor acceptable.

So I'm still waiting a logic and polite answer to my 2 specific arguments.

(1) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

(2) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tn9K1Hvw434  

(3) http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/Fleischmancalorimetra.pdf

(4) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

Quote from Wyttenbach

We still wait for our clowns/trolls to explain the 3 hour after boil of heat production.

Wyttenbach, calm down, please. You look hysteric and your insults only reveal the inconsistence of your arguments.

I've already told you (1-2), that the error made by F&P in claiming the "3 hour after boil of heat production" was explained in my comments linked to (1).

Let me make it easier for you.

a. Click on this link to my post: RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

b. Click on the link to the mentioned jpeg: https://imgur.com/a/ECW5yES

c. Look closely at the graph on the jpeg and read carefully the explanation given in my post

d. If you will understand what is written in my post and if you are able to make simple time conversions you will see why F&P have been wrong in placing the vertical arrow which in Fig.8 indicates the "Cell dry" condition, and you will understand why the "3 hour after boil of heat production" don't exist at all.

Quote

If you know the total volume it is easy to calculate the evaporation rate at a given temperature. (Leads to halve dry, empty)

In the Simplicity Paper there are 2 errors not only one. You are confusing the "foam issue", which invalidates the F&P claim on excess heat, with the "arrow issue", which invalidates the F&P claim on HAD. The Simplicity Paper contains 2 conclusions and both of them are wrong, for different reasons.

Quote

Conclusion:: Both trolls never did read the original papers.

Either you haven't read the Simplicity Paper, or you haven't understood it.

Quote

One troll did watch a faked video - a copy of a copy of what?

A faked video? Are you meaning that JedRothwell (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tn9K1Hvw434 ) and/or Steven Krivit (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBAIIZU6Oj8 ) published fake videos? Tell them.

Quote

The papers answer all questions also a voltage graph is included. Only clowns invent fake voltages...

When compared to the videos published by Krivit and Rothwell, the Simplicity Paper only demonstrates that F&P have mistaken both their conclusions.

(1) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?

(2) RE: Where is the close-up video of Fleischmann and Pons boiling cell?