Posted on 07/30/2011 1:44:23 PM PDT by Liberty1970
Brian Josephson, the Nobel Prize-winning physicist, asked a question on Andrea Rossi’s blog about the quality of the 1MW demonstration in October. He has been a defender of true research in the LENR field, frequently challenging debunkers to back up their objections with logic instead of repeating the same one-sided attacks so often a signature of pseudosceptics. In answer, Rossi invited him to the test. I am assuming that the question did come from Josephson but there is no doubt that the invite is real:
Brian Josephson July 30th, 2011 at 4:17 AM
October demo Andrea,
You’ve said the 1MW E-cat due in October will be the real test, but in what way will it be more convincing than the ones done so far? Will it be done in such a way that people are sure about the amount of water/steam coming out of the reactor, and how dry the steam is (which affects the heat content)?
Andrea Rossi July 30th, 2011 at 6:11 AM
Dear Prof. Brian Josephson (Nobel Prize), First of all, thank you for your very important attention. Please read very carefully what I am writing to you: 1-The 1 MW plant that we will start up in October will be tested, on behalf of our Customer, by very, very high level world class scientists. You are in the list, so please, if you want and you can, take free the last week of October. 2- The test will be witnessed by several very, very high level world class scientific journalists 3- The E-Cats we are working with now in our factories, which will be the modules of the 1 MW plant, are producing perfectly dry steam, mostly without energy input, as you will see yourself if you will honour us with your presence. Very Warm Regards, Andrea Rossi
Done properly (and it will have to be), this public launch should provide enough proof for potential customers. At that point, and not before (no matter who calls for it) we will have some certainty about what happens next. If the launch is also attended by senior science correspondents, this is also the time we should see the story break – one way or another, depending on results. As so many people have said before, proving such a beast will not be hard and the time for preparation should help arm those like Brian Josephson (assuming he accepts) to be ready to give us a definitive ‘yes’ or ‘no’.
Never posted on his blog, where do you get this stuff?
You keep hitting the reply button to me. Don’t send replies to someone on a forum you don’t want a response to.
Don’t you get it?
In recent weeks we've been hearing about how Defkalion is asking for $40 million euros for exclusive manufacturing rights in each country from franchise purchasers.
Beware the Unveiling of the Rossi E-Cat 1 MW Reactor in October
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-chat/2756917/posts
I don’t know if scientists are having too much thought-mode or not, but they are setting the bar way too low for allowing stuff like this to enter regular scientific discussion.
It seems like a scientist writing a few paragraphs of conjecture without any data and only a random observations is enough to set the scientific journalists in to a tizzy.
Look at the dead polar bear incident..
I think what you are looking for isn’t a scientist making rogue pronouncements, but scientists doing research into things without direction in the great unknown.
So much research is either directed to politically correct research or research aimed at solving a known problem. The truly great discovers have happened when we weren’t even looking for them.
That’s a big pay off for the con artist, he is trying to get as many layers between the major marks and himself.
Well, in the case of physics, I think a lot of practitioners have reached the point of putting too much faith in their equations, and not doing an adequate job of experimentation.
In the case of biologist,ecologists, "climate researchers", I think they have put their "feelings" for "unspoiled nature" ahead of their science, often to the point of out and out fraud (lynx hair incident)
With Experiments, you have to explain what you are observing.
The least fantastical explanation is usually correct. In any case, you must be able to mathematically describe your theory to demonstrate it is at least probable. Math doesn’t lie, if your theory is correct, it fits like a jig saw puzzle into place.
With LENR type experiments, you have a reaction without a theory. LENR was the only theory attempted although discarded buy others. People are coming out with new theories all the time that can be tested against the observations.
I asked you first, but you wouldn’t leave me alone. You nagged me about your obsession, on and on, and on, and on. You stalked me. You badgered me. You just would not stop.
And now you claim that you want to be left alone. Uh-huh.
Face it. You have a horrible crush on me, and you know it.
Nice, but by no means necessary. All that is really needed is that the experiment be reproducible at will. And that has been the hard part with LANR/CF. There were just enough positive results to encourage further investigation, but not enough to meet the absolute standards of "good science".
But LANR/CF has turned out to meet Edison's motto "1% inspiration, 99% perspiration". After a very long and arduous effort, the ability to repeat is finally coming to fruition, and not just from Rossi. On one sense, Pons and Fleischman misled science, in that they made it look simple through their use of a simple apparatus. But as evidence has built up, people have found that the electrolysis of deuterium on/in palladium is VERY complex, and most of the postive results these days don't use electrolysis, but some other approach to get "high loadings" of D2 into Pd.
I don’t know, I look up the definition of scientific process:
http://www2.nau.edu/~gaud/bio372/class/behavior/sciproc.htm
Doesn’t appear that we have reached a Scientific Theory yet but we are already jumping to a commercial product.
Those involved say we don’t know how it works, it just does, trust us.
All we have is a grab bag of hypothesis with disagreement on the observations among groups.
http://www2.nau.edu/~gaud/bio372/class/behavior/sciproc.htm
I think you may be confusing "hypothesis" with "mechanism" or "theory". In the case of LANR/CF, the "hypothesis" is essentially "we have a non-chemical reaction that produces energy".
"Doesn’t appear that we have reached a Scientific Theory yet but we are already jumping to a commercial product."
Has happened many times in history. Don't sweat it. And sometimes there are phenomena that are nicely theoretically explained that never yield a commercial product. One example in this very field is "muon catalyzed cold fusion". Well explained theoretically, experimentally reproducible, but will never yield a practical energy producing device unless someone comes up with a simple/cheap way to generate muons.
"Those involved say we don’t know how it works, it just does, trust us."
Not really, virtually all the folks working in the LANR/CF area publish (as can be seen from the MANY papers cited at the "LENR/CANR" website). And I'm sure that Rossi will do so eventually, since he will be paying the U. of Bologna to do precisely a detailed and publishable study precisely for that purpose. Part of the problem has been the ongoing "witch hunt" from the "hot fusion" physicists to actively keep papers on the topic from being published, so progress has been impeded by the artificial warpage of the "process of science".
"All we have is a grab bag of hypothesis with disagreement on the observations among groups."
Again, not really. The multiplicity of hypotheses and observations seem to be converging on a common set of conditions that will allow good reproducibility. Several researchers recently described mechanisms/apparatus that allows the phenomenon to be easily repeated. I think progress in getting to a well-grounded theory will be forthcoming shortly.
Not confused, that is why I included the link, hypotheses is a untested explanation of a mechanism vs a theory that has gone repeated attempts/tests to discard the explanation of the mechanism.
Repeated tests have failed the hypothesis that they currently are running with but the original authors dismiss these test failures as poorly designed tests.
I know there are commercial products that went to market with a theory that was later discarded for another one, but I am unaware of a commercial product without any theory going to market. That would seem to be dangerous when the product could be found to either not function as expected or is hazardous.
Again, that happens more often than you think. A key point is whether the original authors can repeat their own work at will. If so, then that is an indication that the second "reproducing group" has one or more variables that are uncontrolled. And those may be variables that the first group is not even aware of, so it may or may not be due to "poorly designed experiments". But the RIGHT way to address the issue is not for the second group to pop up and say "it's a scam", but to work with the first group to see if that/those variables can be identified and controlled.
This is a major reason that various raw materials have "Lot Numbers" associated with particular batches.
"...but I am unaware of a commercial product without any theory going to market. That would seem to be dangerous when the product could be found to either not function as expected or is hazardous."
How about the steam engine?? And it "was" dangerous, as witness the many explosions along the way. Likewise gunpowder. Ditto on the explosions. Firearms?? When you start thinking it through, you realize that much of the technology that humans have today was developed "pre-science" by nothing more than "trail and error".
Gun Powder and Steam Engines all had well proven theories.
I was expecting you to say something like the Dialysis machine when had it’s theory thrown out for a new one years after it was a commercial device.
To my knowledge there hasn’t been such a product that didn’t even have a theory.
If the experiment is only succeeds when run by the original authors by definition it isn’t reproducible.
Are we to say that this device can be commercialized and run by many different individuals when you can’t even get different labs to reproduce each others work? If you can’t even describe how to run the experiment to another scientist, you can’t spec it out so that a manufacture can mass produce it.
This just doesn’t pass the smell test.
Nope. Combustion chemistry (and hence the explosive chemistry) were completely unknown, as were the thermodynamics needed to understand the steam engine. Both were entirely empirical.
"To my knowledge there hasn’t been such a product that didn’t even have a theory.
I just named several. History if full of them.
"If the experiment is only succeeds when run by the original authors by definition it isn’t reproducible.
Good Lord, man. Are you "really" THAT totally ignorant of science and the scientific validation of results. Repeatability of experimental results by the original researchers is THE first and foremost requirement of scientific validity. NO researcher publishes until they have run the same experiment many times. That form of reproducibility is what the whole field of scientific statistical analysis and error determination is all about.
Independent validaton by a different researcher or group is the SECOND order of validation.
"Are we to say that this device can be commercialized and run by many different individuals when you can’t even get different labs to reproduce each others work?"
Absolutely. And in many cases (such as trade secrets), companies put a lot of effort into assuring that others CANNOT "reproduce each others work".
"If you can’t even describe how to run the experiment to another scientist, you can’t spec it out so that a manufacture can mass produce it.
LOL. Guildmasters throughout history have manufactured any number of things without "describing experiments to another scientist". They knew the methodologies and the sources of raw materials that yielded the desired results. Whether other guildmasters could produce comparable items was irrelevant (and in fact if they could, it was a disadvantage to the first producer, as it made tighter competition possible).
"This just doesn’t pass the smell test."
Perhaps you need a new nose.
Sucker born every minute.
Invention of the Steam Engine, he understood it’s theory and improved his engine based on the theory prior to commercial production.
http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blwatts.htm
“Reproducibility is the ability of a experiment or study to be accurately reproduced, or replicated, by someone else working independently. It is one of the main principles of the scientific method.”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reproducibility
You just love making crap up, don’t you?
the claim that there are 14,000 credible observations is a total and utter fabrication.
***It comes from a public document by a physicist in China. But your wussy sniping comes from a nom-de-plume that you’re hiding anonymously behind.
The public source far outweighs your tinpan clanging.
After all that noise, it turns out you’re just one of those scientists who says that rocks can’t fall from the sky. What a waste.
That is one nice round figure, you have to admit. It sure does smell and look like crap.
It’s rounded down from 14,700. And that was in 2007. A more accurate figure would be 15,000.
If you have a problem with a fact from a scientific publication, then publish a counter argument in the same journal. It shouldn’t be that hard to disprove if you’re as right as you think you are.
Until then, it’s the best evidence we have. Far better than whether you think it smells good.
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