Posts by interested observer

Quote from JedRothwell

Since I have repeatedly said it probably will not be tamed, you are once again claiming that I said the opposite of what I actually said.

I have emphasized the difficulties. I point out that we do not even understand it well enough to control it. I have said that research does not always work, and that problems such as plasma fusion and cancer have not been solved even though hundreds of billions of dollars have been spent on them. In IO's funhouse mirror, this comes that I insist he "must conclude" it will be tamed. The very opposite of what I said!

Here you demonstrate why you would make a lousy programmer. This is not the quality of a party hack. It is the quality of an old-school computer hacker. Someone who will fight the problem to death, spending hours or days to find a bug caused by a misplaced comma. Nothing is too petty for a programmer, because a misplaced comma can crash an airplane. Someone who insists you define your terms, support your arguments, and address the technical issues with facts from the literature. A literal minded person who does not like ambiguity.

That's me.

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Wow. You literally don’t understand what I write. I thought you were just playing games, but no. You are actually so literal-minded that you don’t comprehend sarcasm. Of course I don’t ascribe the view to you that you think CF will definitely be tamed. (I can’t believe I am explaining this...) My comment was to point out how absurd it is that what you said is basically the same as what I said if you don’t get your knickers in a bunch over the word “fundamental”. I got news for you: this is not a computer program and a misplaced comma is not going to crash it.

I completely agree with your little paragraph about the difficulties facing CF and, despite your linguistic nitpicking and knee-jerk yakking about the literature, it is essentially all I had to say about the subject. That you choose to make something entirely different out of it is your own tilting at windmills. But hey, who am I to keep a guy from ranting when it’s his favorite thing to do?

“No one is convinced cold fusion will be figured out. On the contrary, it probably will not be figured out. Probably, the academic politics will continue, there will be no funding, and the researchers will all die off. However, if there were funding, the problems might be solved. Science often works. Not always of course. A great deal has been spent on things like plasma fusion and cancer research, but little progress has been made.”

This works for me. Or is the only Jed-approved response is that since I cannot cite a technical issue that will prevent CF from being “tamed”, I therefore must conclude that it will and that your statement that the problems only “might be” solved is unreasonable and way too speculative.

I would indeed make a lousy programmer. You, on the other hand, would make a splendid party hack who never met an argument too petty not to fight to the death.

Thanks for the immense blob of ad hominem drivel. You are a true scholar.

Quote from JedRothwell

There is never any guarantee of anything in research and development. It wouldn't be "research" if it were guaranteed.

No one is convinced cold fusion will be figured out. On the contrary, it probably will not be figured out. Probably, the academic politics will continue, there will be no funding, and the researchers will all die off. However, if there were funding, the problems might be solved. Science often works. Not always of course. A great deal has been spent on things like plasma fusion and cancer research, but little progress has been made.

Pretty much all I was saying. Your primary objection is that it is not profound. It was not intended to be. But since I said it, you have to strenuously object and say I have no business making such an observation. And please don’t go off on a semantical diatribe about “fundamental”. You have a crying need to object to whatever I say, even if you basically agree with it. Surely you must have better things to do with your giant brain.

Quote from JedRothwell

That is 100% contrary to what I said. I said it is not under control. If it were, it could be scaled up. Also, it is not well understood. That should be obvious. If it were well understood it could be controlled.

“You claimed that "the fundamental nature of the phenomenon [could be] the ultimate stumbling block." Explain why you say that.”

I say it because it is not well understood and there is no guarantee that it will ever be well understood.

Your turn to read what I write more carefully. I am not saying that it won’t eventually be well understood. I am saying that it is possible that it won’t. That is not absurd. Not all scientific puzzles get solved even if those working on them are convinced that they will figure them out. In this case, it hasn’t happened in 30 years and it might not in 30 more. Or it might all get figured out quite soon. I don’t know. And despite your haughty and overbearing attitude, you don’t know either.

Ok Jed. Have it your way. If it turns out that CF never ends up becoming a practical technology, it will be entirely a result of academic politics, the most powerful force in the world. A trillion-dollar industry will never exist because of it. End of story. Happy now?

"cold fusion may be impossible to make into a practical source of energy because the fundamental nature of the phenomenon [could be] the ultimate stumbling block"

And I thought you were a native speaker of English. I realize that you live for picking fights, but this is absurd. Until cold fusion IS made into a practical source of energy, it is POSSIBLE that it can't be. I am not taking any stand on the issue. And until we truly understand the fundamental nature of the phenomenon, it is POSSIBLE that because of that fundamental nature, practical use won't happen. Again, I am not implying anything of the kind. I am not laying odds. I am not taking sides.

Jed, why don't you stop this ridiculous attack mode already. It forces you to simultaneously claim that cold fusion is well understood and under control and that it is poorly understood and requires much more work if it is ever to come to something. Depending on who you feel like fighting with, you take either position. Enough already. I imagine that if I said that cold fusion was the greatest thing since sliced bread, you would say that it sucks. Chill out already!

Quote from Shane D.

You never hinted on ECN's about your strong science background, but every once in a while, you were left no other choice but to admit it. You have not changed. Like it was painful to acknowledge you knew what you were talking about. I always respected that in you.

Well, there are several people here who endlessly tell me how little I know about science and, more importantly, how much they know about science. I’m quite content to let them revel in their superiority. What do I care?

Quote from RobertBryant

Alluding to LENR.??..

No

Quote from RobertBryant

I think IOs comment is probably better in Clearance rather than in Skeptics

Does IO mean Brillouin or Robert Godes?

Wow! The “you” in “you are dog-meat” referred to me. You are offended that I insulted myself?

You are getting desparate to find things to complain about.

As for the Brillouin question, what are you on about? I posted a list of various LENR-related entities (persons as well as companies) that people talk about. Yes, I used the word people - obviously a grave and unforgivable error. Clearly I just can’t say anything that doesn’t set you off.

Quote from Shane D.

BTW IO...don't you work in the alternative energy industry?

I have done work in several differeent areas of alternative energy. I would describe my view by saying the only really practical approach to the essential energy transition is an all-hands-on-deck strategy. Solar, wind, hydro, ocean, and so on are all needed. LENR too if it gets to the point of practicality. The only people who say there is a silver bullet are silver bullet salesmen.

“People are so itching for a fight that they don’t even care what their opponent is saying.”

How true these words are!

Two posts in a row of people working hard to spin my words to suit their diatribe.

So let me get this straight: saying that it is not certain what things might prevent the development of LENR is denigrating its researchers. I guess I forgot that they are omniscient and, despite the claims that there is a crying need for more research, they already know all the answers. My bad. I have truly dissed them. And that is an example of my destructive mission? Sheesh!

My other attacker: my observation that many casual observers lump together the charlatans with the legitimate researchers is an attack on those legitimate researchers. Right. That surely is what I intended to say. Actually, if you do the appropriate numerology on my words, I probably insulted the wives and children of the researchers as well.

Boy, if you are not part of the tribe, you are dog-meat. I can only imagine what would happen if I actually was anything like the anti-LENR force you pretend I am. Don’t you guys have more important battles to instigate?

Jed, let’s leave calling into question the research aside since that is a vague concept. So tell me where I have said the research is impossible or where I have denigrated researchers. Please. I would like to be reminded of these things since I can’t recall any examples. Or are you simply playing the “all you skeptics are alike” card?

Quote from RobertBryant

I am glad to see that you have a more defined mission on LF.

I would be most interested in learning what my mssion is on LF, given that I don’t have one. I have found the Rossi saga to be quite fascinating for the past 8 years and in recent years this has been the best place to keep an eye on it. The fact that Rossi has managed to entangle the LENR community in his scam is unfortunate, but so be it. You can choose to believe me or not, but I have no axe to grind with regard to LENR and certainly no “mission” with regard to it.

Quote from JedRothwell

Experts say it is certain. You have said you do not understand the technical issues, so you have no basis to dispute these experts. For all you know, it is 99% politics and 1% the fundamental nature of the problem.

Yes. For all I know, that is correct. It also doesn’t change my pessimism that the situation will change. But like I said before, perhaps new developments will change matters including academic politics.

“So what is uncivilised about asking for the stats on your broad and sweeping generalisation”

There was no sweeping generalization. I said I had a problem with people who espouse a certain opinion here. I didn’t say how many such people there are but only that there are some. I have no clue about the stats on this any more than on any other viewpoint expressed here. There are 3000 members here and probably 30 of them account for 90% of the content. Who knows which views are common and which are esoteric?

Quote from RobertBryant

Who said that when and where ... how many.? What problems?

I'm interested .. in the substance behind this Euclidean point

Don’t be disingenuous. Of course I mean the world’s energy problems. And there have been numerous posts espousing the view that without LENR, all is lost. Also many posts claiming we are months away from turning the world upside down with LENR technology. I am not going to search through thousands of posts for examples. If you think I am making this up, suit yourself. Not your own view? Glad to hear it.

But you will not have a civilized discussion of any of this because you are 100% ad hominem with me. So have a nice day.

Quote from JedRothwell

Whether anything will come of it is impossible to say. That depends on academic politics. It is unlikely cold fusion will be recognized or funded, so probably nothing will come of it. On the other hand, it has been demonstrated for months at power densities and temperatures equivalent to a fission reactor core. (Actually, better than that.) So, there is no question that if it can be controlled, it can be made practical. There is good reason to think it can be controlled, but no proof yet.

I have no problem with your position. Whether academic politics or the fundametal nature of the phenomenon is the ultimate stumbling block for applications is not certain. What is certain is that I have real problems with people who say that LENR is now ready to solve the world’s problems and that nothing else can. That strikes me as lunacy.

But this smacks of reasonable discourse and is probably frowned upon by people who want to pigeonhole me as “anti-LENR” and not appropriate to discuss matters with.

Shane, you were bascially the only Rossi supporter on ECN who wasn’t belligerent and combative so you were actually worth talking to. Of course, that place was not really about LENR at all; it was about Rossi. Over here, LENR is supposed to be the focus, but the same anger predominates. It is mostly manifested in the handful of remaining Rossi supporters, but it is prevalent even among those who have seen the light with Rossi. People are so itching for a fight that they don’t even care what their opponent is saying. My own view of LENR has evolved over the years, but that really doesn’t seem to matter. If you ain’t with us, you’re agin us is how it works. As far as I am concerned, the critical question is not whether LENR exists. I’ll bow to the 153 replications and the Forbes 100 Best Electrochemists. Fine - it’s real. The real question is whether anything will ever come of it. Of that I remain skeptical and defeating SOT and THH in a war of words will not make a damned bit of difference. And my self-appointed nemesis (who produces new blue placeholders every time I post) will be thrilled to learn that what I have to say on the subject won’t make a damned bit of difference either. Maybe some of the work that is ongoing will somehow change things. We’ll just have to see.

Sojourner Soo? The lunatic who thought Rossi was the harbinger of a Kondratiev Wave that would reshape society? You thought that was me? You are joking, right?