Posts by THHuxley

Quote from Rical

In the Lugano report, we see on page 7 that the calibrated calorimetry was made 23 hours during on the dummy reactor, without active charge.

"Therefore, by comparing power input, as measured by the two power analyzers, to power output as measured by us, we were able to ascertain that no overestimation had occurred. In other words, the data relevant to the dummy reactor served the purpose of checking the method used."

"to 1400°C. Subsequent calculation proved that increasing the input by roughly 100 watts had caused an increase of about 700 watts in power emitted."

Then Barty and Frank Acland on ECW "for some reason", for these excellent reasons, do not publish your spam which is pseudo-scientific.

You, Peter Gluck, Thomas Clarke and Mary Yugo, try to destabilize people who are not able to undestand your pseudo-science.

But that is naive. What will you do when LENR reactors will be sold all around the world ? You will buy them for your own house and continue to spam ? I hope for you that you gain some money from your writing.

Best regards.

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Rical, you will note, if you read my paper, that I address exactly the matter that you raise above. As did the Profs, who agree with me at least that it is not an adequate control. The dummy measurement was at a (claimed) temperature of 450C. the active test was at a (claimed ) temperature of 1400C.

You can probably see that the very large difference in temperatures means that a match at 450C says nothing about a match at 1400C. In fact the real difference in temperature is much smaller, but due to the nonlinearity in the adjustment equations enough to make a very large difference. Specifically, just one example, the low temperature tests have convection and radiation roughly equal. The high temperature tests have radiation by far more dominant.

I'm glad you note the 700W "acceleration' in output for 100W input. My work shows very neatly that this is entirely due to the wrong temperature estimation. It is an artifact, and in fact the two active COPs are the same to within 1%. That is actually a very good validation of my work. I'd happily explain to you the precise calculations, and reasons for them - note that my code is provided for anyone to check.

I suggest, if you think there are errors in my paper but do not wish to critique it yourself, that you tell Frank Acland on ECW (I bet he will let you post) to link my paper - or this thread - there. Then the poeple on ECW can crawl all over my equations and the exact code I used to get the results. There are many matters to check which competent people could do, and I will answer questions, and given criticism I will either admit error or show why the criticism is wrong.

It is a shame that Frank A does not allow this (I actually sent my paper to him first, but received no reply except that I was banned from ECW) since I think ECW readership is greater numerically than readers here, and I know there are a few people on ECW capable of checking this. Of course there are also people here who can do that!

Finally, may I recommend Carl Sagan's "baloney detection kit".
http://www.brainpickings.org/2…detection-kit-carl-sagan/
You might like to read through and consider your post and mine in the light of it.

best wishes, Tom

Quote from AlainCo

@Thomas Clarke
re reading new articles on IR cam, it seems that unlike modern pyrometers which are multicolor, all (usual) IR cam are just dumb wideband bolometer semiconductor array, with IR filtering optic in front. This is what Optris camera says, and there is no hope to have anything better.

@Andrea Calaon

yes, I agree with your approach.
As i said earlier a key question is how the IR cam estimate temperature. My estimation integrating bolometer response to the 7.5-13um was that it was nearly linear.
this mean that emissivity have a linear effect on estimated temperature (relative to about 220C)...

quickly computin
with 1450C estimated, if emissivity in the 7.5-13µm is not 0.4 but 0.9 (x2.25 more) then temp is 744C 1017K. e~0.53. T^4 ~ 1.07e12 -> p~.57
with 1250C estimated, if emissivity in the 7.5-13µm is not 0.4 but 0.9 then temp is 675C 948K.e~0.57. T^4 0.81e12 -> p~0.46
the ratio of power is 1.23, while for electricity it is +12% from 800 to 900W
during the calibration at 450C if emissivity was 0.9 instead of 0.7 , temperature would be 400C 673K. e~0.75. T^4 ~ 0.205e12 -> p~.15

compared to 900W the change in eT^4 power is x3.7, while power in x2
compared to 800W the change in eT^4 power is x3.06 while power is x1.72

there is many things to account :
- first change the calibration temperature with the same algorithm. here this decrease calibration temp by 50C
- estimate change in power between the various stable states and compare with electric power.
- intégrate convection (I did not do that her...)
- integrate temperature difference on the body (I did not do)

with that simplified computation there are incoherence that appear :
- the change from 450W to 900W seems to cause x3.7 instead of x2 power increase, from 400 to 745C, implying a COP of 1.85
- the change from 450W to 800W seems to cause x3.06 instead of x1.72 power increase, from 400 to 675C, implying a COP of 1.71
- the change from 800 to 900W seems to cause 23% increase instead of 13% with a 70C change in temperature from 675 to 745C

to correct that discrepancy one should assume emissivity is 0.2 at high temperature, which is not logical since even if alumina is transparent, finally metal below radiates, and moreover fins and grains decrease reflectivity.

anyway the solution si maybe in the detailss :
- the convection
- the local temperatures

the computation should be remade totally, as in the report, but with new emissivity assumption.

There is even a worst (best) hypothesis :
- assume that alumina is black and opaque in the IR range as we do here, not only because alumina is opaque and black at this wavelength, but because the fins and grains increase the emissivity.
- consider that the full reactor is either opaque at some wavelength, but else it is transparent with dark heating element below, with reflectivity reduced (thus emissivity improved) because of fins and grains
-> this could mean simply that total emissivity is much higher, that transparency is null, and that reflectivity is very reduced, leading why not to emissivity about 0.9

This would lead to the similar result a Lugano report, but at lower temperatures.

I don't say it is good by accident, I say that not only it is a dubious report, but that may even fall to the good COP value by accident.
-> a bit pathetic. I agree.

more positively, I propose from quick computation, that a fair COP of 1.7+ is observed, even taking extreme but realist hypothesis on emissivity.
-> this is to be checked as convection and temperature variation on the surface, may push the result to the COP 1.0 neutral value.

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Alain,

I'm not quite sure how you are re-estimating temperature - but you are getting this wrong.

For a rough calculation:

1401C = 1624K
the total (entered by profs) / band emissivity is 0.4/0.9 => the real temp is 449C if Rayleigh-Jeans applies

This is too low because of various approximations in the above (Rayleigh -Jeans does not exactly apply) which underestimate the effect, and ignore other issues.

However my calculations are more accurate, with numerical integration from exact Planck curve, etc, and give COP=1.07.

When you estimate the "acceleration" because teh difference here is small you need to do the estimation accurately, and incorporate the fact that the adjustment based on diffeence in emissivity is larger for the higher temperature than the lower one. This exactly cancels with your difference.

If you agree with this all is good. If you disagree could you say how?

Now I agree with you there are many uncertainties in this calculation, which I summarise in my paper. If you expected a priori that this experiment would give extraordinary results you could use the uncertainties to justify COP > 1, maybe max COP = 1.5.

However what is the point of that? You might as well not look at the experiment and keep your a priori idea that COP > 1. The experiment has not in anyway validated this.

In fact the experiment excludes COP > 1.5.

There are then problems.
(1) Would Rossi really have given to the profs a device with COP of only 1.5 if he had usable e-cats? Why would he do this? He wanted positive results for a patent application.
(2) The COP is not temperature dependent (see my calculations). This makes it much more likley this COP is in fact due to errors

This reactor was supposed by the Profs and Rossi to be a definitive test of whether (or not) his stuff works. Rossi himself has often said he is not yet sure whether his stuff works. The results of this experiment are negative. You could get a higher possible COP from an experiment with a non-working device just by making the experiment more innacurate!

Quote from LongView

I happened to cite the CF - LENR and out of nowhere I picked Palestine v. Israel as issues that surely do not receive an unbiased treatment.

The trouble with contentious issues is that they are that exactly because there is disagreement about what constitutes bias. In the Palestine/Israeli context, for example, the BBC gets vociferous complaints of bias from both sides. I think they reckon when these average out equal they are doing OK. Of course in general that may not be true, and the quality of the complainers is relevant.

Should we give equal space to Creationsim and Darwinism whenever evolution is discussed?

Best wishes, Tom

Quote from AlainCo

however, I recently read that pyrometer which initially were working the same way, now use 2 and even more than two bolometer with different bandwidth, so they can not only estimate the uniform emissivity (with two bandwidth), but even also estimate variable emissivity (with more than two).

It does not seems to be the case here, but is it sure that Optris IR cam cannot estimate emissivity (even if it requires a calibration initially - maybe just a hint to start algorithm from a good value).

Yes, The optris-160 used has single band measurement. You are quite right that two-band measurement is more sophisticated and can, for example, actually work out emissivity under the assumption that the material measured is a perfect gray body. That still would not be good enough here. I reference the Optris manual as a web link in my paper.

Tom

Quote from Andrea Calaon

IMHO suggesting that Rossi could have tampered with the powders, is in between ridiculous and offensive for all the people involved.

There is, as far as I can see, in this hypothetical case only one person involved, Rossi. Others:
[lexicon]IH[/lexicon] - it is quite clear from Darden comments, and events, that his funding for Rossi is hands off
Lugano Profs: one member of there team was present during fuel extraction/insertion. However they did not check for deliberate substitution, nor did they consider that their job. They have made comments like "oh, well, if Rossi was deliberately tampering then anything is possible...". They dismiss this is unlikely.

So: there is only one person required to be involved. Opinions obviously differ sharply on the matter of whether Rossi deliberately substituting ash is ridiculous.

In any case I've pointed out that for fans of Rossi (I'm not one) you could note that the original (years ago) ash sample was, Rossi now long after the event says, "contaminated". Therefore the isotopic results that at the time were very interesting must now be discounted. Who can be sure that Rossi will not, in a few years time, realise that this sample too might have been contaminated?

You may think that argument is ridiculous. I do too, but only because I think it absurd that a sample seriously given at the time for isotopic analysis and taken as real should later be discounted as not real by Rossi himself years after, but was not qualified by Rossi at the time. I thus have an expectation that ash samples from Rossi may turn out unreliable, for whatever reason.

Finally, for those who are Rossi fans there are any number of contamination mechanisms for 62Ni which are quite innocent. We know that at one time Rossi stated that 62Ni was required as fuel for his process to work, and that he said he had developed a process to enrich this. In which case he would have many 62Ni samples lying around, and contamination of the reactor tube, or the bag, must remain possible. It is also worth noting that the isotopic analysis showed a level of purity comparable with typical commercial 62Ni.

In this story there is so much speculation that I prefer to stick to what we know. However what we know makes any use of the isotopic results as evidence for extraordinary physics unwarranted. Whether they are evidence for misdoing from Rossi is a more complex question and not one I feel it is necessary to answer.

Quote from Andrea Calaon

Dear Thomas Clarke,
I am analysing in detail your article and your code (I just run the script through Anaconda Python and I checked the input data). I am not finished yet, but I have some comments.
You say: “In [5] the dependence of R on T is assumed to be R∝T⁴”.
I do not understand what you mean.

First thanks for checking my stuff. It is always helpful

Quote

In [5], in order to obtain the surface temperature during the test, the following system is solved iteratively:

• eq_emiss(T)*integral(Planck(λ,T)) = integral(Planck(λ,T)*emiss(λ)*sens(λ))
• T = CameraSoftware( eq_emiss*integral(Planck(λ,T) ) )

The two unknowns are:

• T, the alumina surface temperature,
• eq_emiss, the equivalent emissivity to be input in the camera. It is defined at each temperature by the equation: eq_emiss(T)*integral(Planck(λ,T) ) = Measured_Power(T). Where Measured_Power is the unknown total power measured by the camera at each temperature.

Planck is the black body spectral radiance, emiss is the known emissivity of the alumina (assumed independent of T), sens is the known sensitivity of the IR camera (assumed independent of T). The integral is performed only on the camera range (7.5 to 13 [μm]).

The function CameraSoftware, is not exactly known, but can be investigated by testing it.

What Higgins does is to find (iteratively) first a curve of eq_emiss(T) defined by equation (1):

eq_emiss(T) = integral(Planck(λ,T)*emiss(λ)*sens(λ)) / integral(Planck(λ,T))

This curve is then combined with the second equation, by iterating experimentally on the camera software:

T = CameraSoftware(Measured_Power,eq_emiss),

finding the combination (T, eq_emiss) that satisfies both equations and solves the system. At the solution temperature alumina would emit (in the camera range) a radiation that, attenuated by the sensitivity of the camera, would cause the same temperature reading (by the camera software) when using the eq_emiss.

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Have you looked at my description of the transformation necessary?
Inputs:
Trep: reported temperature (from report)
Erep: emissivity entered by Profs (from their book data) - around 0.4
Eq_emiss: what the emmissivity should have been (around 0.9)

Desired outputs:
Treal: Real temperature

I have no disagreement with Bob's calculation of eq_emiss (which I call Eband). I calculate it again, myself, from his data. But, actually, it is relatively insensitive to T - the alumina spectral emissvity in the camera range if fairly constant at 0.9ish. (There is some change at the low wavelength end which is why Bob and I both calculate it. I use numerical integration. But a "look at it an estimate" approach would do OK for this aspect of the calculation).

The problem is how Bob uses this to determine Treal from Trep.

Quote

Once the operating temperature is known, in [5] the total radiated power is calculated as the black body radiation scaled down by the emissivity of alumina.

This is where the critical step is needed. HOW is the operating temperature Treal known from Trep and Erep and eq_emiss? Bob does not explicitly address this, and I guess this gets to the heart of your lack of understanding. Obviously, entering the wrong emissivity (Erep not eq_emiss or Eband). So we need to work out what the Optris camera would do if the right emissivity were entered. I give the equations to do this, and the code you have got solves these (iteratively). Bob does not do this. He assumes that the correction factor in temperature is the fourth root of the ratio of the two emissivities. And that - returning to your original point - is because he assumes that the T^4 dependence of the total emissivity is relevant to the temperature recalculation. But that depends on the band emissivity Eband(T) because we are in fact comparing band emissivities when the work out the adjusted temperature. Note that later on in the calculation, when we work out total power from temperature, it is the ratio of total emissivities that matters.

Quote

Higgins actually does something more, he calculates an equivalent broad-band emissivity for each surface temperature, so that it becomes possible to calculate the total radiated power just multiplying the total Planck radiation (Stefan–Boltzmann law=σT⁴) by a single number: the equivalent broad-band emissivity,eq_emiss_tot.

The broad-band (single value) emissivity is calculated “averaging” the alumina emissivity curve (completed “manually” by Higgins between 1 and 4 [μm] because of lack of data and considering the progressively increasing transparency of alumna at higher temperature), using Planck’s spectral radiance as weight, similarly to what was done for the first equation of the system above:

eq_emiss_tot(T)=integral_broad( Planck(λ,T)*emiss(λ)*sens(λ) ) / integral_broad(Planck(λ,T))

This time the integral (broad-band) extends from 1 to 25 [μm], covering the vast majority of the emitted power. Therefore the integral_broad(Planck(λ,T)) is now practically equivalent to σT4. So at any temperature the broad-band single value emissivity allows to scale down the Stefan–Boltzmann power obtaining the real total radiated power, and so the COP.

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Right. so this is the second part of the calculation - where Bob and I agree. Given Treal you can calculate the total emissivity from the alumina spectral emissivity and teh Planck curve. Naturally this is temperature-dependent. The point is that Bob and I both agree with the Profs when it comes to total emissivity. The profs looked up a book value (which I use) Bib recalculates from book values of spectral emissivity. There is no big difference between the two. In reality the precise power is unknown because alumina total emissivity depends on microstructure etc and is not constant. But Bob and I and the Profs are using typical values which are probably OK.

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I do not see the mistake you point out: “The mistake in the Report comes from using textbook values for total emissivity when what is needed is the corresponding value of the band emissivity”.

Do you not? You have just summarised, above, what this problem is and how Bob noted it. Though not how Bob used that knowledge to adjust the report data - which is the bit I do but Bob does not do properly - and I agree it is quite subtle.

eq-emiss is the band emissivity. The profs used the total emissivity (0.4) entered into the camera when they should have used the band emissivity (0.9).

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The only missing bit in Higgins’ procedure is your calculation of the apparent higher emissivity due to the ridges on the surface. Apparent emissivities of corrugated surfaces are higher than the “flat” (real) emissivities, especially at intermediate values (around 0.4-0.5). This, as you say, influences the estimation of the temperature reached by the reactor surface. Apparent higher emissivities due to the ridges mean that the Optris camera will receive in its measuring range more energy than that of a flat surface. So the real surface temperature and the radiation power are lower than as estimated without the correction.

Right. This is standard stuff and can be proved from first principles as I do. It is a small correction (+20% or so on power). It does make the output power higher than it would be if you did not make the correction. I have included it - otherwise the adjusted COP would be about 0.8. Interestingly it must be made twice - once as a variation on eq-emiss, once as a variation on the total power out due to total-emiss.

in fact, thinking about this, I have not quite got this adjustment right. I've done it on the integrated values. It should probably be done on the spectral values before integration. So it would be interesting to see what change that makes. But the adjustment is small (given the large inherent errors) and the error in the adjustment due to this approximation is even smaller.

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However the total power radiated will be more than that calculated without the correction because of the higher apparent emissivity (higher surface, limited by the reciprocal view factors of the faces inside each ridge). Since the second effect is larger than the first, as you point out in your table, the final radiated energy is higher than that estimated by Higgins.

Yes - this second correction is done by neither Higgins nor the Profs. But it is done by me, and my headline figures incorporate it. (You can check that from the code).

Quote

The dummy run in series, as you say, is an essential operation that unfortunately was not carried out in the Lugano test.

About isotopic shifts. They are real, have been measured not only by the testers of Rossi, but by tens of researchers in LENR experiments. IMHO suggesting that Rossi could have tampered with the powders, is in between ridiculous and offensive for all the people involved.

There are quite a number of different issues you raise here. The isotopic shift here (complete conversion to 62Ni) is completely different from anything observed anywhere else. The otehr claims of isotopic shifts are all within the bounds of experimental error - either contamination or misinterpretation. They are at very low levels. Or, (Hg in CFLs) they are real shifts but from fractionation not nuclear transformation.

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The client of Rossi will comment and this will settle all debates. We shall be patient.

I don't understand how what this "client" says could settle anything, unless we knew what was his connection to Rossi and also who was providing the technical advice on which he was making his decisions.

The Lugano test was billed (by Rossi) as the gold standard independent test. Are we now to ignore that?

Quote from Longview

Now let me critique your critique on LENR. We need to get it straight. LENR is not a theory, unless you take the meaning "Lattice Enabled Nuclear Reactions". For many it is "[lexicon]Low Energy Nuclear Reactions[/lexicon]". Most I think believe this is the most prevalent meaning of the acronym. And we would have to say that designation is strictly descriptive, not theoretical. The term should be refined a bit, clearly sometimes, or even often, events are reported, or hoped for, that are not "Low Energy" at all. If they were true observations, they are quite high energy per nuclear reaction. The "Low Energy" has to refer to the activation energy. If chemical level process or reactions at up to a few keV can give rise to nuclear products from say one MeV to 30 MeV that would be an example of LENR, and clearly there is the meaning that the reaction was activated by low energy, not that the products are low energy at all. But we cannot keep chasing our own tails. For me, it is all really CF and always has been. When and if it matures, physicists of the old school and new will likely return to that as the most general designation in public popular discourse. But I repeat it is not a theory.... as you point out Kim has a theory and there are many other theories... they can fit as explanations under the category of LENR or CF. That is any of those theories (Kim, Chubb, Arata, Mills, Storms whoever) can fit as hypotheses or explanations of some or all of items in the descriptive category of LENR or CF, or CANR or whatever. You surely noted that the Lipinskis refuse to call their process LENR or CF ... but, I believe that is a legal tactic rather than a categorical fact.

I agree LENR is used as a descriptive term. But not that it describes nuclear reactions. It actually describes a great variety of anomalous evidence: anomalous particle counts, anomalous power measurements, (hardly ever: anomalous isotopic analyses).

None of these anomalies are coherent, in the sense that they can predict each other. The meta-hypothesis of "experiment error or misinterpretation" fits 99%. It would not be unreasonable to reckon that the meta-hypothesis of fraud/delusion could fit the other 1%.

Against these meta-hypotheses, which are ordinary, we have no proper scientific hypothesis. We have a meta-hypothesis of extraordinary nuclear reactions. This must then be bent quite a lot to fit the (lack) of evidence for nuclear reactions. of course, since it is not a theory just a meta-hypothesis anything required of it can be assumed.

Now, for me, that makes the LENR meta-hypothesis very weak, as well as being extraordinary. The "error/delusion/fraud" hypothesis wins by a very large amount because it is ordinary - for example of the publicised experimets with details I've found obvious errors in at least half. Given the lack of details that is impressive. It also wins because it fits the random and erratic data seen like a glove. It also fits the fact that none of these effects, when replicated, turn out to stau large. It also fits the fact that all of the replicable effects are within experimental error, and when experiments are tightened up the effects reduce.

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The place of publication for this potentially revolutionary process is something we can debate. There is no room in conventional physics for publishing this work. There would have been room in the very permissive journals and publications that have grown up around LENR / CF. But had they done that, then they would have been constrained against assuring their proprietary rights to patent protection. For what their work apparently is, the route to disclosure is likely just right. Unlike Rossi, they appear to have very sophisticated patent attorneys and/or agents working on their behalf. No surprise considering their venue in Palo Alto, currently the worlds likely leading hotbed of patent litigation (or is that now Shanghai?).

There is room in physics for publishing LENR - it just has to be of decent quality:

Holmlid
Hagelstein
Larssen

would be clear examples. The experimental work does not often get published (Holmlid's is) because it does not make the quality test of having good methodology and results that are significant. I'd argue that is because there are no significant results. It is also true that many of the people doing LENR research are sloppy in their experimental method.

I'd say such sloppiness is almost requied for LENR experimentalists because if accurate you end up with a whole load of null experiments and get bored after a while. There are some good people doing LENR experiments in this state - you don't hear much about them because null experiments well done are not of much interest on the internet. (Earthtech, some other guy MFMP have been talking to whose name i forget, to mention two examples).

Quote from Pathoskeptic

Theory is necessary for understanding what is happening. I can see you do not understand this simple fact about science.

What a waste of time.

More positively:

Good grasp of theory is necessary to understand what experimental results mean, and (when there are errors) catch them. You can see in part the believer mentality comes from accepting experimental results uncritically because of not having the theoretical tools to work out what they mean and whether this makes sense.

theory is also necessary in a different way. You can't knock down standard theories without an alternate hypothesis to put in their place. In that case your hypothesis is scutinised,as a new potential theory, for consistency and for making predictions that are experimentally validated.

Much of the LENR argumnet here is negative. "Here is an experiment with an anomaly which i don't understand => LENR".

Now, experiments with real anomalies indeed represent something that motivates new hypotheses, challenges existing theory. But it is not good when you don't have a predictive hypothesis to put in place of existing theories. If all your LENR hypothesis predicts is that sometimes (but not usually) experiments will show excess heat it is not a real theory, and certainly can'r be preferred over some mundane explanation for occasional excess heat like a combination of error and fraud.

Kim, for example, develops a BEC model of L:ENR, and initially he predicted that LENR results of excess heat would happen more readily at lower temperatures. that prediction failed, and he has now changed his ideas to match observation. that is not a good sign. Loose theories can always be over-fitted to evidence. Different evidence, just change some feature of the not understood theory. The theory starts to have traction when it makes definite predictions for new results which are later found correct. Kim's theory was, initially, such a definite predictor. Unfortunately the prediction was not validated.

So, if you think LENR (as possible new physics) is about experiment and no theory you are going to get things very wrong. There are some experimental results so striking they support new theories anyway if validated. LENR unfortunately has a collection of non-striking results at the moment.

Were Rossi's claims to be founded they would be very clear striking results. Unfortunately when independently tested they vanish. (The isotopic evidence - striking - was not independent).

Quote from Longview

Hubert Lipinski is a Ph.D. physicist. The patent application is well written.

How can you critique it without reading beyond the headers and the abstract?

How do you know an SME has not reviewed it under an NDA? The chances are good that this has happened more than once over the 7 years or so of record.

As I understood my first read through over a month back, the particles measured by the hardened ORTEC (PIN) detector must first pass through an aluminized mylar sheet of substantial thickness, I would say the reading cannot be simply stray protons or stray helium nuclei. Surely the nuclei have to have substantial (MeV ?) energies to register in that setup. For negative controls you at least have numerous experiments where the conditions are clearly and consistently failing to give substantial readings. If you are talking of the detectors there were definite calibration standards used, and those are dated and kept secured between uses. But all that is material to be examined by experts, to be sure.

I wish you had not presented your argument Ad Ignorantiam above and your argument Ad Populum elsewhere (where the populace is physicists and moneyed interests).

That scientists cannot read something that other scientists have failed to read. Is this again evidence against big science, that somehow it is fatally flawed? And what does it say of "big physics", which is after all largely supported by public funding of one sort or another?

I know I am going to read the whole patent application again. I suspect I'll feel better after that.....

Longview

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I think you are not understanding my argument. I'm not saying I can show the experiments described in the patent application wrong. I'm saying there is not nearly enough information for their evidence to be string. [and, also, that I'm no expert in the relevant fields and so it would take me a long time to critique them, even given extra information]

You argue that these experiments may have been critiqued under NDA and the evidence may be very strong that there is something extraordinary here. That is possible. But, given that it is extraordinary, it is not very likely.

Compared with Rossi we do not have copious negative evidence - so this is a much better bet. But nor do we have strong positive evidence. To make something so extraordinary the preferred hypothesis you need extraordinarily strong positive evidence.

As for big physics etc. If there were decent experimental results written in a way that could be evaluated by physicists (obviously with more details than this patent application) that showed extraordinary new results they would jump on it - some would replicate - etc. Look at the CF first 6 months.

That has not happened. Maybe Lipinski etc have indeed something extraordinary but are keeping it quiet for commercial reasons. Or, maybe they have some results that seem interesting but don't quite add up when examined more closely. I'm not saying the patent app is bogus, just that they misinterpret something. Both those things are possible, but one of them requires some extraordinary new physics.

It is proper to rate the extraordinary less likely than the ordinary. it does happen, but only once in a blue moon, whereas between blue moons there are an awful lot of false alarms. In this case the lack of publication and critique means a false alarm could remain in the minds of Lipinski et al for a long time. If you thought you had evidence of something extraordinary you would not easily give up on it (somone said above that even with only the hope of something extraordinary, and no evidence, they would not give up on it).

Thus far the Lipinskis don't tick many positive boxes, but equally they don't (from what I know, which is little) tick many negative boxes. In that state of little knowledge it may be that you reckon the chances that they have what they claim are higher than I do.

Tom

Quote from AlainCo

Can you explain the resulst without a conspiracy theory ?
at least Thomas propose scientific explanations, possible or not, but scientific.

The alternative explanation requires only that Rossi substitutes fuel and/or ash. there is no reason to suppose the one member of the experimental team would be aware of this - there are many ways it could have been achieved.

I'm not a fan of conspiracy theories - but it is remarkable what one person with people around not predisposed to question can do.

The one thing we do know is that people around Rossi disposed to question (e.g. Krivit) get called snakes and asked to leave.

We can agree about the importance of hard work in this whole process.

Specifically, those doing experiments and making public claims of results can make their work more useful to others by cross-checking assumptions and doing the additional work that only they can do to make results clearer.

To take two topical examples:

In the Lugano case - the researchers could have cross-checked temperature.

In Jiang's case, he could have cross-checked how well the thermocouples were working and which was actually "broken".

Such care would reduce the amount of "noise" in reported results and make it easier (if less exciting) to see what was going on.

MFMP, to be fair, do this quite well.

I'm sorry to have no reply here.

My conclusion is therefore that the specific results shown here do not indicate excess heat because the mechanism for T2 gain error seems much more likely than for T3 error that duplicates T1 by chance.

I was hoping that Jiang would comment with more information about, perhaps, some additional testing of the equipment used here, or some error in my analysis above.

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2. If this works, it is really simple to prove = either there is excess heat or not. Simple measurements will tell this.

If that were true generally there would not be 30 years of LENR experiments with no clear results.

Specifically I agree with you that claims of sustained COP > 2 with 100s of Watts in should be easy and clear to prove. That has not stopped a number of claims - including the one I comment on - that are provably unfounded. Simple can be got wrong by scientists who are working outside their own area - even more so for amateurs. (Look to Jiang's results for another obviously unfounded claim).

More seriously, I think you are in principle wrong on the "no" side. There have been any number of experiments showing no excess heat, and that will not settle the interest here. Since LENR is by definition not well defined, and (again by definition) the precise conditions to obtain it are not understood, all you need is one positive claim that is believed and all replications that fail will be seen as varying in some necessary condition. Also I note many commenters here who see a COP of 1.1 as indicative evidence. What a waste of time and energy!

The correct conclusion from what you say is that in six months, with no replicable clear result, the whole "hot-cat replication" meme would be written off as a null result. I'm wondering whether that will happen.

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In chemistry, which is thankfully still alive, there is the common wisdom that the majority by far of the disclosures of new chemistry and new chemical technology are first seen in patents. Further, that much technology never appears in journals. The rule is that you cannot do a thorough literature search without extensive patent searching as well. I see no reason to doubt that, and have some considerable experience confirming it personally. In the days when one could easily browse Chemical Abstracts at your nearby University library it was quite clear, even though the Abstracts reviewed only a subset of the extant new patent literature.

For phenomena which break accepted physics by a large amount unfortunately patents are a bad indicator - such ideas seem to attract lone inventors who have crackpot ideas but can be remotely convincing, and the hit rate (fraction of such that are actually some new effect) is currently zero - to my knowledge.

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Let us add this to the situation the Lipinskis find themselves in: big physics, that is big name laboratories and big name "investigators" have a set of likely unwritten rules. One of the rules is that anything new suggested by someone from outside the "club" is surely "rubbish" (using your unfortunate term for something the Lipinskis call "MEE" theory, that is a "grand" theory that is quite unproven and perhaps improbable and/or unprovable, and with which you, along with me, disagree).

You might pursue an unusual line of investigation based on either theory or experiment. If on theory - you need to evaluate the theory. For example, no-one would spend even $1 based on one of Axil's word salads, yet those could, in some sociological sense, be described as unconventional theories.

In this case it is pretty clear there is a totally unsupported and erroneous theory making a specific prediction (the 233eV resonance) and experimental evidence to support this. In that case you investigate because of the experimental evidence - resonances are interesting - and further results can inform a better theory. My reading of this however is that the later results do not support this 233ev resonance and therefore the theory (only initially supported by this claim of resonance) has no backing. Rubbish is shorthand, and not polite, but quicker than "hypothesis with no experimental evidence and internal theoretical inconsistensies".

For non-physicists it can seem that theories are rejected or not based on sociological phenomena. In reality the "hard" aspects of physics - none harder than nuclear - work well because the underlying phenomena are determined by powerful and simple rules many of which we know. Coherence with the massive amount of existing theory and experiment then becomes an important and valid criterion.

I don't see any "club" preventing funding for weird approaches. NASA funds LENR based just on Bushnell's personal opinions. Much LENR research is sponsored by eccentric donors liking the idea. In general scientists look for novelty and any unusual theory with merit gets jumped on. 99% of these jumped on theories turn out to be completely wrong.

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We really don't know how difficult it may have been to get their material published. Were you on any editorial board or review committee that may have judged some of their work? I know I was not. I do not think it is fair to pre-judge their efforts simply because of the circumstances beyond their control which may have forced them toward the patent route to disclosure-- a route that is not that unusual when dealing with genuine innovation by small entities. The quality of their disclosure speaks robustly to the fact that patent disclosures can be effective ways to transmit technological progress--- the most important function of patents from the outset.

If they had what they claim you might expect (depending) no public disclosure but write-ups under NDA to get funding. You would not rule out patents. Were it not real, you would expect what there is, patents.

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I should add, there is no indication that the Lipinskis are suffering for lack of funding (they sold cc:mail to Lotus in the 90s, seem to be moving upscale in addresses with each move, Alabama, Louisiana, Texas and now Silicon Valley). In addition to their office in Palo Alto and there laboratory nearby, they seem not to be inviting outside investment. I am sure that in due time someone will take that interest.

in such a case there is no way, given secrecy, to be sure. If they are self-funding then it means nothing, if they have obtained a lot of money from elsewhere it makes things a bit more interesting. My problem is that the claims are so extraordinary, if hitting Li with protons delivered such results for real others would have seen it. If you argue there are very specific conditions needed to get these results then the problem is that in conditions of secrecy and no write-up those "very specific conditions" could be either erroneous experiments are some new extraordinary effect. Experience tells us that the first is very highly more likely than the second.

Do you have a properly written report of any of the experiments (say one of the "killer result" ones)?

Of course I'd agree that this is a better bet than Rossi - but then that bar is so low it means nothing.

It is little things, like not knowing what was the background level of counts, and no having a control (which would greatly reduce the possibility of some other effect triggering the counter) that just can't be estimated from raw results.

I agree the results are impressive, and were there proper evidence for them I would be all over it. One reason for not putting much store in patent descriptions is there is, as well as lack of detail, too much conflict of interest.

For the particle count results (not understanding much, and not having a clear writeup) I'd suggest the following. (Probably completely wrong). Evidence of extraordinary high fusion counts comes from:
(1) particle count
(2) ion energy

I suggest that the high particle counts might be direct capture of protons and/or ionised He. These would be low energy, true, but the ion energy measurement is obscure to me, and I notice the phrase "maximum ion energy" which could apply to a very small subset of the ions from background etc - you'd expect some fusion with this setup. I'm unwilling to look at this patent description in great detail because I know most of my questions will not be answered and it is quite a lot of work to deal with the ones that can be answered, from such a limited write up as here.

If you reckon these people are sane, you could look at whether what is happening is consistent with the apparent claims. Fusion is the holy grail and an unconventional fusion approach with clear evidence would attract massive funding from industry. For some money, or a place in an existing lab, all you need is an interesting unusual claim and one person convinced (no SME) with patents like this as evidence. It is not evidence, of course, but it works as remarkably good PR.

For significant development and >1e7 dollars you normally need better evidence, e.g. a write-up of the evidence that could be properly checked by an SME under NDA. This would not necessarily be public. But the significant development money would be obvious. Unfortunately this is not a great tell, we all know very large amounts of money spent by industry on completely hare-brained projects, and no-one aware of this at the time because the whole is wrapped in secrecy.

Tom

OK. Actually I do remember looking at this stuff a while ago.

(1) the theory is rubbish, as many such are.

(2) the experimental take home - that there is a resonance which enables 233eV protons to fuse, has no support in the experimental data and is simple enough that were it real (rather than an artifact) it would be known. Notice that the "good" results aare not clustered around beam energy of 233eV.

(3) We then have a large number of experiments which are shooting a proton beam at lithium and observing particle counts. The claimed out out power of 140W max is exceptional but also very unclear. This power has not been measured but is instead esitimated. I have neither the patience nor the expertise (I know nothing of detector characteristics etc) to evaluate these. What I do know is that:
(1) it is easy to get artifacts from this type of highly indirect measurment
(2) patents are not the right way to evaluate this. If real it could be published and critiqued. If real and commercially secret it could be shown under NDA and the chance of getting 140W from 0.5W is enticing enough for very large industrial interest.

So, I find this interesting, but totally insufficient to break 50 years of experience shooting proton beams at targets and comparing teh results with very accurate standard model theory for nuclear cross sections.

If it were true it would lead to extreme interest. Scientists like new stuff, and something like this if robustly demonstrated would generate that. Which is why I suspect it is not so robust. But, if robust, you can expect a solution to the worlds energy problems shortly.

Speculative patent applications, as this one, are no substitute for science. They are generally done by people wanting funding. They do not give enough detail to allow critical evaluation of the experiments.

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What is all that in reference to? I looked up Lipinski's web site and to the non-specialist it's underwhelming.

This is a misundestanding. I have not read nor referenced Lipinski.

I was talking about Meade's CFL paper.

I've been looking at these claims. The ones with decent evidence and methodology just don't stand up. See for example my reply on the Jiang thread. He assumes T3 does not work, when it is clear it does from the readings. He says T2 works, based only on exponential decay, when its clear it could have the wrong gain voltage amplification (many ways for that to happen).

What I don't understand is that the LENR people here and (I guess) on ECW don't look at this evidence - I'm sure they are more interested in it than me!

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a bit a facetiousness might have been percieved (rightly or wrongly) and that kicked the switch.

Quite a lot of facetiousness in that comment. But I believe it was almost indistinguishable in tone from many typical ECW comments. And my previous posts were just pointing out science issues, or their consequences.

I find it reprehensible that ECW does not post the Lugano recalculation paper. It can be criticised, and would if posted on ECW. But it is relevant to all the people doing replications, and without doubt of interest.

Tom

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Do you have the full article? Your response there looks like it is from the abstract.

Yes I have the full article. I read with some interest a few years ago so was reminding myself from a very cursory re-read! But i did check the 199/200 mismatch to the known mechanisms. it is small, and could clearly come from some second-order modification of known mechanism. Interesting to work out what this is but maybe difficult.

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Further, we have "fusionist" now as "ogfusionist" kindly back in our midst again, with claims of very abundant excess heat and a rather simple reactor. The main issue there will be preventing the system from melting itself with runaway excess heat. I recall that his work may have originally predated F-P and was probably a complete mystery at the time. Now it is just the kind of experiment and potential parameter establishing tool for setting the boundaries of LENR (which I agree with you has too much leeway, too much lack of specificity--- but that is what big physics created by prematurely vilifying the former designation.)

So there are many claims of abundant excess heat. I will predict what I think likely, which is that none will stand up. To examination and replication. But here's the thing. This is not some claimed minor effect contentious and inside experimental error. If these COP > 2 effects are real they can easily be measured beyond shadow of doubt. MFMP and a few others have the persistence and (with help) the competence to get to shadow of doubt. So if you are correct we will have that within 6 months at the outside.

Otherwise you might want to consider the possibility that I am right.

Best wishes, Tom

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Condensation of a subset of Ni atoms that are preferentially involved in some LENR reaction would potentially and perhaps completely upset your well intentioned analysis. See my points "A, B and C". Of course I am asking you to see the "other" side for…

The ToF-SIMS isotopic analysis was of the presented particle surface, so I agree that a hypothesis of surface only nuclear transmutation would provide these results at overall levels so low they were not detectable on heat balance.

That is not quite my point. I can never argue "LENR could not have done this" since LENR is not precisely defined and therefore what it might do is broad. All that can be argued is that something else is more likely to have done this. Suppose I were to say "magic could not have done this!". That statement would be unprovable - manifestly magic could have done this, or anything else. The situation with LENR is not quite as extreme, but nearly so. If I define LENR-magic as the subclass of magic that makes experiments show heat and (naturally ocurring) isotopic anomalies the analogy becomes precise, because there is no more predictive power in LENR theories than in LENR-magic.

Scientists look for coherence in data, where theories make predictions that are subsequently found true. In this case LENR makes no predictions except "something anomalous". The replacement of Ni58+Ni60 by Ni62 is not what any LENR theorist would have predicted as plausible before these observations. A posteriori, LENR can be invoked to explain them, but only with other assumptions which then make less radical explanations likely. So we do not have an impressive anomaly requiring LENR to explain.

In this case, for example, I can continue to give explanations to do with handling other than deliberate substitution (though that could obviously be done by Rossi alone and therefore must be on the table). There could be contamination of Ni in the fuel or ash with bought 62Ni, which we believe Rossi may have been using as a catalyst etc (there was some evidence that Rossi has bought such, and while such evidence is weak, it is certainly plausible that at some time Rossi had been working with readily available 62Ni, since he has stated that 62Ni is necessary for his process). Also Rossi has previously stated that ash submitted for isotopic analysis was contaminated. What happens once can happen again, and one of the Lugano team present during insertion/removal could not possibly speak to whether or not contamination occurred. Suppose, for example, that the inside of the reactor tube was contaminated with a previous sample of 62Ni?

Whatever problems there may be with selective surface fractionation it must be that we do not know. We cannot rules out all possible mechanisms, or even properly reason about what they are, through lack of knowledge. And fractionation would fit the other observations:

• no non-natural nuclei
• no high energy products detected
• no heat excess

better than LENR

For LENR to be a preferred hypothesis, because it is extraordinary and makes no specific predictions found true here, we would need to have ruled out other more plausible explanations. As you can see there are at least three (not ranked in any specific order):
(1) fractionation
(2) contamination
(3) deliberate substitution

In the absence of anomalous excess heat they all take precedence over LENR.