repoman

OT - But I thought it was funny

a few months ago I was listening to an internet Job service and then had a voice-over testimonial: " 'I put my resume on Dice and I had three offers for triple my salary the next day' Bob, a Cold-Fusion specialist from Denver"

I was thinking what a crappy example for a commercial, couldn't they at least give a possible job!

Anyway I found out a few months later that it is some sort of computer program.

Corwin

It's a web design/web based database application.

ohwilleke

There is a pretty basic way of testing any proposed way of generating energy. Can you set up a machine to puts more out than it takes in consistently. The reason to look for neutron output is to verify that fusion is taking place notwithstanding the fact that the energy it takes you to get the reaction started exceeds energy output . . . making it a promising but not very practical lead for future research.

Controlled hot fusion has come close but no cigar . . . but, the principal has been proven with the H bomb, the Sun, etc. Cold fusion has similarly not produced the desired results, but we have no proof of principal to tempt us in the same way that we do with hot fusion.

Quite frankly, I wouldn't be surprised to see a bright thirty-something physicist one of these days prove theoretically that there is an absolute minimum energy output per second for any sustained fusion reaction which is beyond what can be harnessed practically on Earth (e.g. a minimum rate of energy output for sustained fusion comparable to a small H bomb going off every few seconds).

David Gould

I may as well ask why are you so obsessed with 'proving it right'.

I guess I get annoyed at all these people who think that millions of scientists are deliberately concealing the truth or being very very dumb.

Now, I have now doubt that some scientists may well deliberately conceal the truth. And I have no doubt that some scientist are ver, very dumb in some areas. But to suggest that milliosn of them fit in one of these categories is ridiculous.

Think about it logically: if there was an easy, bench top experiment that worked even a high percentage of the time and there was a theoretical basis, why would cold fusion need billions of research dollars? A few million would be needed at the most. And scientists, even ones that had worked their whole lives in hot fusion, would be easy to convince - if they are looking to make a name, if something works and is as easy and cheap as its proponents claim, then it would be easy to make a name.

Obviously, though, it is not as simple as the proponents claim. Otherwise, it would be being done - christ, even if it worked one time in a hundered, if it was so bloody easy I could run a thousand such experiments every week and get plenty of good results.

Again, I am attackign Pons - his idea was wrong, his results were wrong, and then it appears as though he deliberately treid to conceal that fact from the world while wringing research dollars out of the gullibel Utah state government.

Corwin

Ah, that'd be the axe to grind against 'non-traditional' science then. Ok, I can deal with that... as long as we know where we stand.

Why am I trying so hard to prove it? Because Edison was a jerk and a thief.... and I would dearly love to see the power monopolies shattered. If cold fusion, or any other form of fusion, or any other form of power generation for that matter, can do this? Without polluting? Great... let OPEC and the energy groups in the States whither away....

JB01

<a href="http://www.pppl.gov/projects/pages/tftr.html" target="_blank">TFTR</a>

<a href="http://www.jet.efda.org/pages/content/press-release-1997.html" target="_blank">JET</a>

I'm not aware of any ZPE or CF experiment that can claim tens of megawatts of fusion power output.

[ March 07, 2002: Message edited by: JB01 ]</p>

David Gould

If you mean by 'non-traditional science' science that doesn't work but about which people make grandiose and false claims, then yes - I have an axe to grind against non-traditional science.

I too would love to see cheap, available, non-polluting energy. Most of the world's population would, too - including, you may be stunned to discover, millions of scientists.

Pons claimed his experiment was easy, cheap and gave wonderful results based on a solid theoretical foundation.

He was wrong about the theory.
He was wrong about the ease of his experiment.
It turned out he had been wrong about the results too.
Now the claim is that all they need is a few more million to make it work, so the 'cheap' thing was obviously wrong as well.
When you add to that that he apparantly deliberately tred to cheat a double blind experiment with false results, it makes me a little dubious about the whole thing.

As I said, my criticism is directed at Pons and his work.

Others may well be doing better. I wish them luck.
I also hope that they do not do the things that Pons did, and turn science into a free energy media circus that discredits science as a whole.

Corwin

Yet you all have to contend with the fact that the experiment DOES produce results part of the time.

Let's look at it this way....

We don't KNOW why it works sometimes. You're just insisting that the results are wrong and it never does. It's like saying 'steel can never be harder than is made generally' and ignoring the existance of Toledo steel.

David Gould

Pons did not produce results some of the time. All of his resutls were a complete crock of shit, which is why he tried to cheat on the double blind experiment that he said would prove him right.

As I said, others may be doing better. Good luck to them.

Corwin

They'll need it with people like you around. Not that it will do any good since because of you and people like you nobody listens to the results they DO get... unless they're negative.