Posted on 05/29/2013 5:04:01 PM PDT by Kevmo
Science and the Media
Forbes.com renews attention to widely disparaged “low-energy nuclear reactions”
The century-old business magazine applauds an arXiv paper claiming an "independent" LENR test.
May 28, 2013 Published: May 28, 2013
By Steven T. Corneliussen
"Forbes magazine," declared New York Times media reporter David Carr in 2009, "has long been a synonym for riches, success and a belief that business, left to its own devices, will create a better world." Amid widespread disbelief, Forbes.com is expressing enthusiastic faith in the world-transforming potential of one such device: the "energy catalyzer," or E-Cat, purported to exploit "low-energy nuclear reactions," or LENRs, as a gigantic energy-production breakthrough.
In March, Forbes.com publicized two NASA scientists' LENR enthusiasm. Now it has published the article "Finally! Independent testing of Rossi's E-Cat cold fusion device: Maybe the world will change after all." (At least one LENR proponent actually asserts big differences between LENRs and cold fusion.)
A team of Italian and Swedish authors describes this testing in the arXiv paper "Indication of anomalous heat energy production in a reactor device containing hydrogen loaded nickel powder." They write, "Andrea Rossi claims to have invented an apparatus that can produce much more energy per unit weight of fuel than can be obtained from known chemical processes." They report that their "independent test" took place in December and March experiments. They claim that "energy was produced in decidedly higher quantities than what may be gained from any conventional source."
With a few caveats, the Forbes.com piece extols their work: It's at long last "a report by credible, independent third parties" that "would appear to deliver"; while some of the authors have publicly supported Rossi and the E-Cat, "they are all serious academics with reputations to lose"; the paper is "detailed and thorough."
The Forbes.com piece ends this way:
While a few commentators have raised criticisms concerning how the measurements were made and sources of error, others have argued that the energy produced is so significant even knocking off an order of magnitude on either axis still portrays a process with insanely valuable output.
This is not, of course, the last word or even one anywhere near the end of this story but unless this is one of the most elaborate hoaxes in scientific history, it looks like the world may well be about to change. How quick will depend solely on Rossi.
Though Forbes.com appears alone in its enthusiasm, on the Web it's not hard to find reports and discussion about the arXiv paper. But it's even easier to find skepticism and ardent disbelief.
MetroNews Canada consulted officials at General Fusion in British Columbia, a public–private venture in nuclear fusion, and found them "unfazed." An article at the Register, an online technology publication that claims to have more than 7 million unique users worldwide, presents frank skepticism, especially about trade secrets invoked in the paper. Charging that Forbes.com "got all gushy," this publication predicts that "the test is probably going to be vulnerable to scientific tooth and claw from the start, since it amounts to researchers being asked to visit the premises of EFA–that is, the company that holds the production rights for the E-Cat–and test a black box whose operations are invisible."
A news report at Popular Science notes that the arXiv paper hasn't been peer reviewed and observes that it "leaves out crucial details, for example referring to 'unknown additives' instead of specifying what chemicals actually go into the reaction." The article points out that Rossi "has a history of blocking even simple tests" and that he "has previously passed off spurious inventions, including a machine that was supposed to turn waste into oil."
Steven Krivit, a longtime LENR observer and advocate, has also taken dead aim at the arXiv paper. At his New Energy Times website, his article "Rossi manipulates academics to create illusion of independent test" charges that the authors "did not perform an independent test," but instead, "were participants in another Rossi demonstration and performed measurements on one of Rossi's devices in his facility." Krivit "stopped counting the Rossi demonstrations after the 13th one." He says that the authors "lack full knowledge of the type and preparation of the materials used in the reactor and the modulation of input power, which, according to the paper, were industrial trade secrets" and that they "didn't perform any calorimetry."
As of early on 24 May, Google yields no links to major media joining Forbes.com in reporting, enthusiastically or not, on the arXiv paper.
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Steven T. Corneliussen, a media analyst for the American Institute of Physics, monitors three national newspapers, the weeklies Nature and Science, and occasionally other publications. He has published op-eds in the Washington Post and other newspapers, has written for NASA's history program, and is a science writer at a particle-accelerator laboratory. .
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Businesses, organizations and/or individuals are free to buy or refrain from buying an E-Cat. Serious skeptics should refrain from using any energy produced by an E-Cat.
Written by Joseph Fine, 29 May 2013 08:10.
Anyone can read the paper and see that indeed the authors tested Rossi's device as a black box and are reporting that it works as advertised, i.e. it produces large amounts of anomalous energy. The mechanism by which the energy is produced is not discussed in the paper (it is not in the paper's scope). Presently I am not aware of any technical criticism that would invalidate the conclusion of the paper and the authors have clarified some incompletely described technical points in net discussion. The results of the paper are probably quite shocking to many because anomalous heating by nuclear reactions is currently not taken seriously by many or most physicists. This fact notwithstanding, constructive criticism of the paper should be concentrated on trying to find actual flaws in their measurement protocol.
Written by Pekka Janhunen, 29 May 2013 06:27.
Dear Steven T. Corneliussen I am surprised that you quote Mr. Krivit as he has no Physics or Chemistry qualifications or credentials. His website seems to be designed to elicit money and your credit card details. You also do not appear to have read the arXiv paper, rather you seem to be sourcing your report on what various blogs and other reporters say. I would suggest reading the report would be the bare minimum you need to do before consulting blogs on the subject, and the use of a low quality source such as Mr. Krivit and his give me your cash and credit card site, is probably not conducive to your reputation as a journalist.
Written by Ian Walker, 29 May 2013 06:16.
The reaction from General Fusion is not surprising. From a business perspective, they would be fools to praise a potential competitor. As for Krivit, he is an advocate for the Widom-Larsen theory of LENRs. He's known to attack LENR researchers which propose other theories (http://www.std.com/~mica/krivit02052012.html) and Rossi has stated that he believes the Widom-Larsen theory to be wrong.
Written by A.B., 29 May 2013 06:16
He’ll never sell a working Ecat
***So, now your faith position has you predicting the future. Do such comments as pushing your own faith that it’s a scam, do they further science? No. Do they further anti-science? Yes.
Thanks 4 Bumping The Thread T4BTT.
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/chat/2965392/posts?page=19#19
However, one could make the case that Rossi's gang of 7 made a perfect example of how not to do a scientific research paper.
It only has a handful of reader reviews, and two of them are by WW.
The book description says, "An investigative report prepared for the general reader to explain how the most extraordinary claim made in the basic sciences during the twentieth century was mistakenly dismissed through errors of scientific protocol."
I know how *I* interpret that (big conspiracy, scientists don't know what they're talking about, bla bla bla). I'd bet your interpretation is along the same lines.
***So when these 7 scientists were tasked with reading multimeters and thermometers attached to his box, don’t you think they triple-checked their readings before publishing them? Or are they part of your ever-widening conspiracy that includes 14,700 times the effect was replicated even prior to Rossi showing up? If you were really here to further science, you would honestly and genuinely address these things.
The con man sets up his "demonstration" in such a way as to hoodwink the non-scientists he's trying to scam. You can find schematics easily enough to make a live circuit that nonetheless reads zero on the meters. A thermometer demonstrates nothing in a world where exothermic processes abound. The fact that Rossi won't allow anyone but himself to actually see the "working parts" of his device or do any kind of meaningful analysis that would support his claim is a huge red flag. It's also highly suspicious that he won't actually disconnect his device from a power source while it's supposedly running in self-sustaining mode. And so on and so forth; it does not take a rocket scientist to pick out a scam here.
As I've said before, and will continue to say, if there were anything scientific going on, I'd be happy to discuss it. Your repeated attempts to call this scam "science" don't make it so. And, despite Intrade's recently being shut down (for irregularities, go figure!), I am still highly suspicious of your claims to be investing in this scam.
The muon process takes a ton of energy (figuratively speaking). It isn't a source of energy.
You can also achieve a sort of fusion by bombarding atoms with neutrons. Again, this process does not release energy. Its use is to make radioisotopes for medicine and medical research.
Fusion, in the sense of pushing two charged atomic nuclei together to force them to fuse, is impossible except at really high temperature (i.e. at high energy), and only small charged atoms can be fused in this way. There is not sufficient energy in the galaxy to fuse large atoms together.
Really. Give examples. Provide the references. Only peer-reviewed references in established reputable physics journals, please. I won't consider "papers" posted on an online "physics journal" that was created for the purpose of publishing stuff that couldn't possibly be published in a real scientific journal.
Can't and won't. I read widely and don't keep track of what particular facts I saw where. I read for my own benefit and edification, not to track URL's to win (or even further) arguments. In general, what I recall is that some groups are claiming to have detected spikes of neutrons during earthquakes. I believe the term "piezonuclear" is associated with the work. Which, of course, the physicists who put theory ahead of experiment say cannot possibly happen. There is a separate hypothesis that isotopic abundances for elements in the earth's interior don't precisely match those in solar space, and the researcher is saying that cold fusion might explain those isotopic differences.
"Only peer-reviewed references in established reputable physics journals, please."
Since, as I recall, this work was in geology, it is quite unlikely to be posted in an "established physics journal". There are other fields of science besides physics that are just as legit. And less hobbled by the erroneous notion that "if theory forbids it, it cannot exist".
"I won't consider "papers" posted on an online "physics journal" that was created for the purpose of publishing stuff that couldn't possibly be published in a real scientific journal."
Frankly, Scarlett, I could give a flying damn what you will or won't "accept". But I guess that is what keeps you from reading Beaudette's book and following up on the papers referenced therein.
The con man sets up his “demonstration” in such a way as to hoodwink the non-scientists he’s trying to scam. You can find schematics easily enough to make a live circuit that nonetheless reads zero on the meters.
***Discussed and dealt with on several Vortex threads. Basically, such a thing was accounted for.
http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-
http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-
http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-
http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-
A thermometer demonstrates nothing in a world where exothermic processes abound.
***You’re displaying tremendous ignorance here. Let’s say a scientist measures the thermometer of a scaled device and it turns out to be 30 degC. Then he measures a very similar device and it turns out to be 300degC. Is the 2nd device 10X hotter than the first device? It’s a very, very straightforward answer, yet there are so many freepers inhabiting these threads who don’t seem to understand it.
The fact that Rossi won’t allow anyone but himself to actually see the “working parts” of his device
***It is black box testing. Why is that so hard to understand? Rossi is protecting his trade secret. The Wright brothers never submitted their device to demo until they had an agreement that once it was revealed, then they would get paid for selling airplanes. Freepers like you would have been calling the Wright brothers scam artists. It’s sickening.
or do any kind of meaningful analysis that would support his claim is a huge red flag.
***Once again. Try to get an idea of what black box testing is all about.
It’s also highly suspicious that he won’t actually disconnect his device from a power source while it’s supposedly running in self-sustaining mode.
***He has in the past, and this time around he wasn’t even present during the testing. So where do you get this idea?
And so on and so forth; it does not take a rocket scientist to pick out a scam here.
***It does appear that it takes someone with a very active imagination to invent one, however. You seem to have a very high opinion of Rossi — for your theory to be true he would need to be the greatest magician and scam artist in history. For mine to be true, he would only need to be a mediocre demonstrator.
As I’ve said before, and will continue to say, if there were anything scientific going on, I’d be happy to discuss it.
***Very highly doubtful.
Your repeated attempts to call this scam “science” don’t make it so.
***If it is a scam, then prove it. Send Rossi to jail. What Rossi is engaging in is engineering, and as a courtesy he sent one of his units to some scientists as long as they don’t steal his industrial secret. Science is trailing engineering at this point.
And, despite Intrade’s recently being shut down (for irregularities, go figure!), I am still highly suspicious of your claims to be investing in this scam.
***And now I am highly suspicious of your claims because you have such a high opinion of Rossi. Maybe it’s a conspiracy with those 7 scientists and those 14,700 replications which took place before Rossi even came onto the scene! Widest conspiracy theory in history. Good luck with that.
It's widely disparaged by those who don't want nuclear power of ANY sort, either for environmental reasons, or because they're afraid of nuclear power, and don't understand how the LENR process works. Or by folks who are just plain skeptical, because of the experience with Pons and Fleishmann, though, in their defense, they TOLD the press it wasn't ready, but their employer forced them to demonstrate it anyway. That scared people off the technology for years, simply because of the media denigration of 'cold fusion'.
I'm willing to cut the LENR folks some slack; it took a while to get to the point where fission reactors were safe and useful for the general public, even though they knew how the science and the process worked.
If private groups or individuals want to invest in this technology, that's terrific. If those who put their money at risk make a bundle off the results, even better!
Yep, I figured as much. The thing about legitimate science is that I don't have to have a list of esoteric websites to "prove" my point. Real scientific evidence is documented so widely and repetitively that a simple Google search will return any number of hits. My problem is never in digging up corroborating references; it's in choosing a reference which is accurate yet explains the material in language that a layperson can understand. If you can't find a single legitimate reference from a reputable source to support the claims of cold fusion (LENR, or whatever you want to call it), that's pretty telling.
You can't hide your inability to provide any references to naturally occurring cold fusion with vague remarks about neutrons and earthquakes. Neutrons result from nuclear decay, which is not cold fusion. Apparently, a few groups are trying to determine if fluxes in the natural neutron flow are predictive of earthquakes. I wish them luck; so far, no one has succeeded at finding a method of predicting earthquakes. Also, it is unclear why you would mention isotopic abundances. As I recall reading, the one time Rossi actually allowed any isotopic analysis of claimed cold fusion reaction products, the "products" turned out to have the identical isotopic profile as mined nickel and copper--and the isotopes one would have expected were not found. Now Rossi refuses to allow isotope analysis.
Since, as I recall, this work was in geology, it is quite unlikely to be posted in an "established physics journal". There are other fields of science besides physics that are just as legit. And less hobbled by the erroneous notion that "if theory forbids it, it cannot exist".
*All* hard sciences are physically based. No exceptions. It doesn't matter whether the science is nuclear physics, astronomy, biology, geology, genetics, or whatever. Physical laws are universal and immutable.
Are you familiar with the results being achieved at SRI INternational? They are demonstrating LENR in ongoing tests.
Here’s one
http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/Kirkinskiifusionreac.pdf
And a couple of references:
N. Hawkins, “Possible Natural Cold Fusion in the Atmosphere,” Fusion
Technology, 19, 2112 (July 1991).
N. Hawkins et al., “Investigations of Mechanisms and Occurrence of
Meteorologically Triggered Cold Fusion at the Chinese Academy of
Sciences,” Proc. Conf. Anomalous Nuclear Effects in Deuterium/Solid
Systems Provo, Utah, October 22-24, 199
Ah, are you being purposefully obtuse here? So what, if Rossi monitors his black box with the most sensitive thermometers in the world. It's still a black box. He still won't allow any independent examination of the black box. Exothermic processes are so ubiquitous that merely demonstrating an increase in heat means nothing. With no effort at all, I can think of any number of ways to generate heat. I would be absolutely dumbfounded if you were to claim that the *only* way in which heat can be generated is through cold fusion. The simplest explanation here is that Rossi rigged the circuit so that the meters show zero when it really has current running through it, and, inside the black box, the current was running through a resistor, generating heat.
The fact that Rossi won’t allow anyone but himself to actually see the “working parts” of his device
***It is black box testing. Why is that so hard to understand? Rossi is protecting his trade secret. The Wright brothers never submitted their device to demo until they had an agreement that once it was revealed, then they would get paid for selling airplanes. Freepers like you would have been calling the Wright brothers scam artists. It’s sickening.
Seriously, do you think I was born yesterday? There are ways to protect trade secrets--oh, but there must be real trade secrets to protect.
Your analogy to the Wright brothers falls flat for a number of reasons. First and foremost, the Wright brothers were not inviting people to come see their flying machine and then showing it to them on the ground at point A, and again at ground point B, but not letting them see anything in between while telling them that it flew. They actually showed their machines to people. People took pictures of the machines in the air. The Wright brothers also did not claim that flight violates physical law, or that they somehow found a loophole in physics. They obtained patents along the way, did a whole lot of experimentation, and published their results in journals. While Rossi claims all the secrecy is needed to supposedly protect trade secrets, legitimate companies seem to protect trade secrets all the time using the legal mechanisms that exist for that exact purpose.
or do any kind of meaningful analysis that would support his claim is a huge red flag.
***Once again. Try to get an idea of what black box testing is all about.
Oh, I know perfectly well what it's about. It's about hiding the fact that there is no magical process going on inside the black box. A sufficient amount of showmanship effectively directs people's attention away from that little complication.
It’s also highly suspicious that he won’t actually disconnect his device from a power source while it’s supposedly running in self-sustaining mode.
***He has in the past, and this time around he wasn’t even present during the testing. So where do you get this idea?
From this excerpt from an article about it: The setup included the system being fed by: “... a TRIAC power regulator device which interrupted each phase periodically, in order to modulate power input with an industrial trade secret waveform.” (Emphasis added) Not hard to figure this out--that device fed power into the black box the whole time. It is also significant that the people who *were* around for the testing are the exact same people who have been participating in the scam from the start. There still has been no independent test, nor will there be.
And, despite Intrade’s recently being shut down (for irregularities, go figure!), I am still highly suspicious of your claims to be investing in this scam.
***And now I am highly suspicious of your claims because you have such a high opinion of Rossi. Maybe it’s a conspiracy with those 7 scientists and those 14,700 replications which took place before Rossi even came onto the scene! Widest conspiracy theory in history. Good luck with that.
Oh, all of those replications, all published in the form of abstracts presented at conferences meant to highlight pseudophysics. Oh, I am so convinced now! With little effort, I can find thousands of mentions of paranormal or psychic research on Google--there are several societies and journals dedicated to it, in fact. Does that mean paranormal activity is real, too? Should I start believing in telepathy and poltergeists now?
Ah, are you being purposefully obtuse here? So what, if Rossi monitors his black box with the most sensitive thermometers in the world. It’s still a black box.
***It wasn’t Rossi monitoring it. It was 7 independent scientists. Do you accept their measurements?
Exothermic processes are so ubiquitous that merely demonstrating an increase in heat means nothing.
***Ah, are you being purposefully obtuse here? It is CHEMICAL exothermic processes which are so ubiquitious, and the heat generated in this test was ten times that which can be achieved by ANY chemical.
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