Another thing I’d lose is the Conan-Doyle quote. When I have actually found myself in that situation in the past, having though I’d eliminated the possible, it was usually a failure of imagination. The more common error is to fail to see a possibility as existing at all and thus miss it.
***I see you are a genuine inductive learner. You will enjoy this pursuit. I share your view of such a quote from a work of fiction as if it had some form of validity — which you have shown it actually does not.
Generally I’d avoid all appeals to authority as a form of argumentation.
***One of the things I would point out at this juncture is that I have caught a whole bunch of frantic skeptics using dozens of classic fallacies. They use them over & over again, even after having been pointed out. That is a major source of frustration.
Some of the data looks pretty good. What is needed is more and better data to make the case.
***Of course, that is what everyone wants. However, Rossi is not interested in scientific study. His interest is in generating enough data to have the customer sign on the dotted line and put cash across the table. That is a little bit lower of a threshold but it is a compelling one because the more e-cats are sold, the fewer are the objections until there’s a simple tipping point of acceptance. By having sold units all along before that tipping point, Rossi would have been ahead of the game.
I trust the guys currently running the independent tests to do them honestly. Cases of individuals committing scientific fraud occur often enough that I have personally seen more than one. Groups of three I haven’t seen or heard of yet so I am in principal happy with three guys doing independent testing. Most likely they are not colluding. Are there any plans to do more tests with better calorimetry?
***No. Rossi says he’s done testing, he’s selling units now.
Didn't expect a reply to my comments, but appreciate it. WRT classic fallacies, I have seen much of that from both sides. As you know, truth does not have a side, and volume does not make an argument. I have seen some of the abuse you put up with and you have shown yourself to be a model of restraint.