1995.06.28 / Barry Merriman /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 28 Jun 1995 16:16:04 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <3sqkrq$dh4@maureen.teleport.com> Charles Cagle  
<singtech@teleport.com> writes:
> You are a true expert at missing the point. Stick to the point.
> 
> Charles Cagle
> Chief Technical Officer
> Singularity Technologies, Inc,

What is the point? The only relevant point in regards to
you is that which you do know something about, namely your
work on fusion, etc. 

You claim to have some technical references that show our
present theory of the coulomb barrier is wrong. I'd love to look
up some of those, but you are not forthcoming with the information.


--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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1995.06.27 / Ben Weiner /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: bweiner@electron.rutgers.edu (Ben Weiner)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 00:01:08 -0400
Organization: Rutgers University

matt@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU (Matt Austern)writes:
  (Hi there Matt!)

>Have there ever been any discoveries that were initially ridiculed by
>the scientific community and were later recognized to be
>breakthroughs?  Maybe.  If there are any, though, they're a lot rarer
>than most non-scientists think.  I'm not familiar with any in my own
>field (physics), but maybe there are some.  In geology, plate
>tectonics might be a valid example.

In the semi-popular myth about the history of science, Wegener's
theory of continental drift is often cited as an example of a correct
theory that got ridiculed as crackpot but later turned out to be true.
Of course, when you dig into it, it gets a lot more subtle.  Wegener's
original theory was in fact considered and rejected by the geological
establishment.  It was rejected _correctly_.  

Although continental drift is now accepted as "true," at the time it
was _wrong_.  I believe the reason is that Wegener's predictions for the
motion of the continents were way too big, far above the then-known
upper limits.  (Stephen Jay Gould's got an essay about this somewhere.)
Recently I was talking about this with my mother, who actually knows
something about geology, and I think we concluded, in simplified
version, that Wegener's drift rates were way too high because he had
used the age of the sun (hence earth) as estimated by Kelvin and
Helmholtz, which of course is about 50 times too small.

Although, I just tried to look this up, and here's a different 
perspective:

  "[Wegener made] a good empirical case that the continents had
  drifted apart.  Wegener based his arguments on detailed geological
  similarities between the east and west shores of the Atlantic Ocean.
  At the time, however, the mantle and crust of the Earth were known to 
  be solid, and Wegener could propose no plausible mechanism by which
  the continents could move.  His ideas of continental drift were 
  therefore dismissed and even ridiculed by nearly all of the scientific
  community, even though additional evidence accumulated over the 
  following decades that supported past connections between land masses
  that are now widely separated.
  
  "Wegener had proposed that continents somehow moved through the fixed, 
  underlying basaltic crust.  This idea doesn't work.  Continental drift
  could be accepted only when a new theory of the crust of the earth was
  developed, called _plate tectonics_.  In this theory, we recognize
  that the oceanic crust also moves, driven by the slow convection
  currents that transport heat within the [lower] mantle."

  [it goes on to say that the first direct evidence for moving
   lithospheric plates came from the discovery of fresh lava on
   the Mid-Atlantic Ridge in the _1960s_]

  source: _Exploration of the Universe_ by Abell, Morrison & Wolff,
  not an ideal geology reference but all I have in the office.
  If some geologist is reading this and wants to correct me,
  please do.

Well, it's the same story.  Wegener didn't deserve to be ridiculed,
but basically he was ahead of his time, which is a polite way of
saying that in his time, he wasn't right.  Note the distinction
between "continental drift" and "plate tectonics."  The former is a
speculative idea which explains some geological observations - an
idea, which, in much modified form, turns out to be correct.  "Plate
tectonics" however is more than just "continental drift" - it's a 
full-blown theory, or if you like, a fully developed Kuhnian paradigm.

Notice how the theory is formed from a phenomenon - continental drift,
which is essentially a geological observation - and a mechanism,
the lithosphere which "drifts" on the lower mantle.  You need both,
crackpots generally forget one or the other.


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1995.06.27 / Tim Mirabile /  Re: Permanent Magnet CF Experiments?
     
Originally-From: Tim Mirabile <tim@mail.htp.com>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Permanent Magnet CF Experiments?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 05:51:51 GMT
Organization: HTP Services

DEVLI <CST9436@RDC.AB.CA> wrote:
>hi, Bill  Just pickled up this thread  Taking an internet course in Red 
>Deer.  TTYL  EJP

Better ask for a refund of the tuition

-- 
Tim


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1995.06.28 / Matthew Kennel /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: mbk@caffeine.engr.utk.edu (Matthew Kennel)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 28 Jun 1995 17:29:07 GMT
Organization: I need to put my ORGANIZATION here.

Tom Potter (tdp@id.net) wrote:
: In article <DAp7z4.EJq@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca>, aroytbur@alchemy.che
.utoronto.ca (Artur Roytburg) says:
: >
: >Just a small point. Despite very limitted acceptance presently,
: >I would suggest that Causal Theory of Quantum Mechanics 
: >(developed by Broglie and Bohm) may be just the theory
: >that takes a long time to come through.
: >Can this theory bring a new light if it is accepted widely? Only
: >time will tell. Bohm published his first articles on this subject in
: >1953 and since then many problems in his theory has been overcome. 

: The thought occurs to me:
: how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
: to be validated and accepted,
: if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?

About as long as it would take for a radical theory of spacetime to
be validated and accepted if said theory were the work of a Jew.

matt
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1995.06.28 / Barry Merriman /  PCAST Fusion Report Briefing
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: PCAST Fusion Report Briefing
Date: 28 Jun 1995 20:07:04 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

We had a meeting this morning about the content of the 
PCAST report---which will be presented to  President Clinton
July 11---given by Bob Conn (our Dean of Egineering and the
Vice chair of the PCAST committee). By the way, this particular
PCAST committe consisted of 9 people, only 2 of which hav
any direct involvement with Fusion (Conn and the Committee 
Chair). Of the remaining, a few were involved with energy
and the others from other disciplines entirely.

My understanding <I don't have a copy of the
report itself, so this is all just from memeory and notes>
of what he said, in a nutshell, is:

I. PCAST endorses the idea that fusion energy research 
is of great value, and they support the DOE's original
plan (to produce a DEMO reactor by 2025)---HOWEVER, they
acknowledge that the current budget situation simply
wont allow that plan to proceeed.

II. They put forth a plan that would still allow fusion to (barely) 
move forward as an energy research program (rather than just 
a basic science plasma physics program), within
the coming budget constraints. Conceptually, the idea is to 

(1) support plasma physics; 

not only is this a necessary foundation
for a fusion program, it is also on the cutting edge as 
a scientific discipline (since many hot concepts and phenomena and
theoretical techniques were first developed and/or are quite
prominent in plasma physics--all manner of stuff to do with
dynamical systems, chaos, turbulenece, nonlinear physics, etc).


(2) achieve a sustained, burning fusion plasma; 

this is the 
Holy Grail of fusion energy research, and is also the one regime
of performance that has never been studied.

(3) Support fusion reactor materials research; 

the only way to realize the
potential of fusion to produce _clean_ energy is to build the device
out of the right materials---otherwise, you simply can't have an 
attractive reactor concept (e.g. if you simply
used steel as a structural material, the activation from the neutrons would
make it less desirable than a fission reactor).

II. The way these necessary conceptual goals would be achieved 
with a minimal budget is as follows:

(1) Keep fusion funding flat at $320 Million/year for the next ~10 years.
(This years budget is $366, so that is a substantial %15 cut already)
(This is a _major_ departure from the original DOE plan, which calls
for the budget to double over the next few years.)

(2) Maintain the commitment to ITER, be give it a much reduced mission
of simply achieving a sustained burn; this would cut the ITER price
tag to $4 Billion (from its present $10 Billion), and cut out the
engineering goals for ITER. US contribution would be $1 Billion.

(3) Extend the lifetime of TFTR at Princeton a few more years, to
squeeze more info out of it relevant to future burning plasma experiments.

(4) No TPX (i.e. indefinitely delay TPX)

(5) No Demo (i.e. Indefinitely delay DEMO)



Seems like quite a reasonable formulation to me, although there
are obvious concerns about how the US's partners in ITER would
react to these plans.

On the other hand, the current house budget gives fusion 
$229 Million next year, though a last minute action was taken
last week to add in another $25 million, so that may occur officially
soon. PCAST views this budget as disasterous and very wrong, given
the importance of energy research in general and fusion in
particular. Basically, that would screw up the program so badly that
PCAST makes no recomendations for tha scenario.

I'm curious as to what the reaction of folks at other sites is. 




--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Bob Casanova /  Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
     
Originally-From: cas@ops1.bwi.wec.com (Bob Casanova)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 16:10:56 GMT
Organization: Westinghouse Electric Corporation

In article <603923499wnr@moonrake.demon.co.uk> "Alan M. Dunsmuir"
<Alan@moonrake.demon.co.uk> writes:
>From: "Alan M. Dunsmuir" <Alan@moonrake.demon.co.uk>
>Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
>Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 12:36:08

>In article: <3soare$lg0@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca>  mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgar
.ca (Michael Ernest 
>Fullerton) writes:
>> I think skeptopaths also ignore data because they cannot tolerate
>> change or uncertainty.  Or perhaps they lack the thought
>> processes to think in a novel way.
>> 

>No, Micky, we just lack the ability to think and reason the way you do.

Thank whatever Powers may be!


>-- 
>Alan M. Dunsmuir [@ his wits end]     (Can't even quote poetry right)

>         I am his Highness' dog at Kew
>         Pray tell me sir, whose dog are you?
>                              [Alexander Pope]

>PGP Public Key available on request.



Bob C.

* Good, fast, cheap!  (Pick 2) *
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1995.06.28 /  jedrothwell@de /  Re: A review of Infinite Energy, No. 2
     
Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: A review of Infinite Energy, No. 2
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 95 17:19:24 -0500
Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice)

Johmann <johmann@aol.com> writes:
 
>Overall, I did not learn as much about the Potapov device as I would
>have liked; but if its over-unity claims are real, then I assume
 
We did not present as much information about the Potapov device as we
wish we could have. We did not have the information soon enough to meet
the deadline. It takes a long time to get it, and it has to be translated.
We tried to get more in this issue, but we ran out of time. In the next
issue we will have more including, I hope, something from Scott Little
about his tests, and from other people who are testing it or have tested
it in the past.
 
Thank you for your comments.
 
- Jed
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1995.06.28 /  jedrothwell@de /  Re: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
     
Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 95 17:33:00 -0500
Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice)

Ah, I see you looked it up in the encylopedia. Good thinking! Next time
you should do that *before* talking about the man, so you can avoid making
a dumb mistake. Someone is sending me an article about power meters so that
I don't slip up again in that area.
 
Now that you have looked up Semmelweis, I suggest you take the information
with a grain of salt. As we have seen, several versions of his life story
are running around. I took mine from a strange old book titled "The
Immortality Factor" by Osborn Segerberg. If you look up two or three more
accounts, you will find two or three different stories. That is true even
of more recent events, even though they are well documented. Events like
the Battle of Midway, for example. However, even though it is true there
are different versions of the life and Semmelweis, there is one central
fact about him and his work which anyone knows, and anyone can verify: he
failed to convince the world. Perhaps a few people paid attention to him,
but the vast majority of the doctors in every Western nation ignored him.
As I said, everyone knows that even as late as 1865, doctors in the most
advanced and effective army on earth did not heed his lessons. In 1860, the
Union Armies started out with even lower medical standards than the rest of
the world, but by 1865 they led the world in cleanliness and effective
treatment, thanks to the work of the sanitation corps and reformers. This
is well documented. But, they still did not grasp the essential lessons
of Semmelweis and the other early researchers, which are: Wash Your Hands;
Change Your Clothes. In many advanced hospitals in the U.S. and Europe,
doctors still wore their street clothes as late as 1890 I believe. Even though
gradual progress was made thanks to people like Semmelweis, the main lesson
was ignored, trampled up, and forgotten for 50 years longer than it should
have been. That is a fact of history anyone can learn, in any history of
medicine. The nitty gritty details of Semmelweis's own life are not as
important as that overall fact of history.
 
- Jed
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1995.06.28 / Barry Merriman /  Re: Mea culpa: wrong about billing meters
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Mea culpa: wrong about billing meters
Date: 28 Jun 1995 20:12:41 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <JI7c32F.jedrothwell@delphi.com> jedrothwell@delphi.com writes:
> Many people have written to me here and by private e-mail to tell me that
> power company meters do not measure apparent power. Sorry about that folks, I
> was wrong.

Well Jed it does my heart good to see you actually admit you are
wrong. Now that didn't hurt, did it? There is some hope for you yet.
Now, perhaps you will also be willing to admit that your
were misinformed by the particular biography of Semmelweis that
you read, which apparently presented the mythical version of his life.

Personally, I am glad everytime I am wrong about something---it means
I'm going to learn something. Being wrong is nothing to be ashamed of;
being wrong and not admitting you are wrong is, and that is where scientists
tend to part company with other human endeavors.




--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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1995.06.27 / Ben Weiner /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: bweiner@electron.rutgers.edu (Ben Weiner)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 14:06:36 -0400
Organization: Rutgers University

Dieter Britz <britz@kemi.aau.dk> writes:

>On 26 Jun 1995 matt@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU wrote:

>[...] 
>> Have there ever been any discoveries that were initially ridiculed by
>> the scientific community and were later recognized to be
>> breakthroughs?  Maybe.  If there are any, though, they're a lot rarer
>> than most non-scientists think.  I'm not familiar with any in my own
>> field (physics), but maybe there are some.  In geology, plate
>> tectonics might be a valid example.

>Surely You're Joking, Mr. Austern? Indeed, plate tectonics is an example,
>in fact one of many. How about Darwin, Einstein, etc? 

As Matt has pointed out elsewhere, both relativity and quantum mechanics
were rapidly accepted as correct so Einstein is not a good example.  Of
course there were elements of the classical physics establishment who
never got used to them, but that's not the same as widespread ridicule
and resistance ...  Darwin is also an anomalous example, because 
resistance to Darwinian evolution was driven by religious doctrine and 
by British class politics as well as by any scientific disagreement.

>I don't want to use
>up working time thinking up examples. My friend and former teacher H.H. Bauer
>has written several papers on his idea of the resistance of scientists to
>new ideas. There is, for any fairly radical new idea, a spectrum from mild
>annoyance to open aggressive refusal to accept. 

This is often true (not always - e.g. inflationary cosmology.  Many people,
myself included, think inflation may not turn out to be correct for 
describing our universe.  But almost from the moment it hit paper,
everybody who heard about it realized that it was an awfully good idea.)  
But conservatism is part of science.  One has to be very critical
of everything.  Perhaps if Matt had said "Have there ever been any 
discoveries that were very well supported and unreasonably initially
ridiculed ..." which I think is what he meant, it would sound better.

>Often, there is good reason
>to hold back. SJ Gould likes to point out that in the framework of the time
>of such new ideas, opposition is often reasonable. E.g. plate tectonics was
>not very well supported when first suggested. There are other examples.

Yes.  The scientific community _has_ to criticize new results (both
experiments - N-rays, the 17-keV neutrino, P&F, etc, and theories)
and all too often it has to do it because the investigator didn't
bother to follow the advice - "Be your own harshest critic."
Ideally this criticism would not involve personal attacks, but all
too often it does.

As I outlined in a separate posting, Wegener is an example of justified
opposition.  His proposal of "continental drift" didn't work in the 1920's - 
but much later, with new data (paleomagnetism, lava flows in the Mid-Atlantic
Ridge, etc) it was revived and incorporated into the framework of "plate
tectonics," which dates from the late 1960s, and there it did work.  
In retrospect, of course, he _did_ have good points about geological
similarities between the east and west coasts of the Atlantic, which
did precipitate a controversy in geology, and perhaps continental drift
should not have fallen into eclipse from the '20s to the '50s.  But it
is not the open-and-shut case of "unjustly killed theory" that is often
assumed.

btw, the Enyclopaedia Britannica (1985 ed.) has a nice historical overview,
under the heading "plate tectonics," if anyone's interested.

>-- Dieter Britz  alias  britz@kemi.aau.dk

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1995.06.28 / Thomas Kunich /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 23:20:25 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <3sq2pm$4n2@dartvax.dartmouth.edu>,
Archimedes Plutonium <Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu> wrote:

>Kunich, it is
>okay if your posts had some critical science to them, some experiments
>that you did, but you are here just to goon vandalize.

Forgive me AP, but what experiments have you done?

>Many good people out there are trying to solve fusion, and you come
>around with your defeatist and destructive joke-making. Follow-up this
>post Kunich, I am more than anxious to tell you to go to hell. 

As you have been doing rather regularly. So what? Now, tell us that Pons
and Fleischman are "trying to solve fusion." What a joke! You can't even
see a con job when it has you by the privates!

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1995.06.28 / Richard Schultz /  Re: If he only had a brain
     
Originally-From: schultz@garnet.berkeley.edu (Richard Schultz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: If he only had a brain
Date: 28 Jun 1995 19:49:07 GMT
Organization: Philosophers of the Dangerous Maybe

In article <DAvxsJ.2z6@world.std.com>,
mitchell swartz <mica@world.std.com> wrote:

>Mr. Schultz remains a key anti-CF strawman -- 

Yes, I confess it.  I was invented by the CF true believers in order to
give something for them to knock down, even though the true skeptics never
made me as an argument.

>and his mail-box, based upon some of his posts and quotes, remains
>well "over the rainbow".    

I hope you haven't been reading my mailbox -- you might get in trouble
for that.  As for my .sig quotes, well, I've known that you don't have
anything approaching a sense of humor; generations of stereotypical
MIT dweebs salute you, I'm sure.  But I think that's what makes you so
much fun.

[re: coherence length]
>  You would be familiar if you kept up with the cold fusion literature.
>It is big, but not a big as that on HOT FUSION or EBOLA virus,
>so there is not explanation for your constant need to be "spoon-fed".

Did it occur to you that the amount of effort you spend in personal 
invective might have been better spent in just answering the question?
Many newsgroups involve discussions of things that are "in the literature".
One of the reasons that I read this group is because I want to learn 
something about what the cold fusion advocates are thinking.  It's kind
of hard though, because every time one asks them a serious question, one
is told "it's in the literature" wihtout even a reference!  It kind of
makes you question whether knowledge or obfuscation is their main agenda.

[semi-coherent description of coherence length in lasers deleted]

>If Schultz -- or the other TB-skeptics -- had actually 
>read the cold fusion literature (e.g. Proc. of 
>ICCF-4) there use of coherent lengths, systems, and
>function were discussed in at least two papers.  In one
>this refered to Peter Hagelstein's theories, in the other
>this dealt with the PERIODIC wavefunction within the
>palladium lattice.   

What evidence do any of these people have that a deuterated Pd lattice
is a coherent system?  Why Pd particularly?

>Any further discussion would require a reading of  more literature.
>  It is unlikely any TB-CF-skeptic will.     

Well, if you don't give me any references, I certainly won't.
By "references" I mean references in the refereed literature.  In
my field, conference proceedings are a second-level source at best.

>-rs  "So tell me, is challenging another poster's manhood, as in asking
>-rs  "are you man enough to answer these questions", appropriate
>-rs  to science?  If so, how?  If not, why not?"
>
>  Wish we had WAIS here because memory serves that  it was
>Mr. Schultz who did cruise the net here seeking, and discussing,
>the size of his organ.  Since he has acted like a goober when he
>did this, the phrase was used to maximize the impedance match
>to his "mind".

Well, you don't need WAIS -- just telnet to sunsite.unc.edu and log in
as "swais" and it will do the work for you.  You will discover that 
several years ago, I pointed out that you could save all of us a lot of
time by simply announcing that your penis was bigger than mine.  The point
was, alas lost one you, as most points are.  Basically, what I was trying
to tell you was that as flamers go, you are pretty much the lamest of the
lame, and I was advising you to just go ahead and use what traditionally
(at least in my days on Usenet, which go back about 13 years to before the
Great Renaming, indeed to the days when we were All Rich Rosen) has been
considered the absolutely lamest flame there is.  I spologize that this
lack of context has bothered you for so long.  In any event, I never
discussed the size of my organ (which is both Great and Swell -- a little
musical in-joke there heh heh), but merely suggested that you sounded like
someone who has a fun time discussing his.  In any case, it strikes me 
that your answer doesn't make sense.  You agree that it is not in keeping
with the (ahem) high level of discussion you'd like to use phrases like
"are you man enough to . . .".  Wouldn't you be better off ignoring me
then, if you really feel that that's the only level at which I can 
discuss things?  But since you read alt.revisionism, you must know that
I don't spend my life flaming people, and that when there is something
to discuss, I discuss it.

>-rs  "Let me rephrase:  if it is appropriate, then perhaps you can tell
>-rs  us why *you* are not man enough to send me either a copy of
>-rs  your publication list or enough information so that I can find it
>-rs  myself?  Or are you afraid that your claims about its content will
>-rs  turn out to be, let us say, inflated? 

>This is irrelevant to fusion, but if you start and post yours, at least
>some of us will certainly consider following your lead.

Asked and answered.  As you know, the whole thing started when you made
some random and totally wrong statements to me in private email (you got
mad when I alluded more specifically to them here, so we'll have to leave
it at that).  You responded with something like (I don't keep your email)
"well, how many publications do *you* have in field X" to which I responded,
truthfully, that I have none so far, as the project on which I am currently
working has not yet reached the point of yielding publications, although
it is in field X.  I then responded by asking how many publications you
have in field X -- to which you never replied.  As for my overall publication
list, I have already said that I would gladly send it to anyone *except you*
who asks for it.  In your case, I will only send it after you have asked
me for it as many times as I have asked you for yours (so when *are* you
going to send me yours?)  I would have thought that an MIT graduate would
be able to calculate that as I had already asked you three times before
you asked me, and that every time you ask me, I respond by asking you, you
are unlikely to see my publication list before you tell me yours.

>It was Mr. Schultz who failed to answer.  Mr. Schultz interrupted reasonable
>postings between Dick Blue and myself -- 

If the postings were between you and Dick Blue, and not for others to
become involved in, perhaps you should stop wasting bandwidth and take
it to private email.

> -rs  "For instance:  how many conferences have you been involved with 
> -rs  programming?  That can't take too long to calculate."

>Nothing to do with fusion of course.

Not true.  This started with *your* claim that the ACS Division of Nuclear
Chemistry was somehow "censoring" people who wanted to give papers on
cold fusion.  I pointed out that based on my experience with the way 
programming is done (e.g. the rooms and amount of time alloted to a 
particular session is usually determined a year or more in advance), I
felt that the explanation offered by the session chairperson was far more
reasonable than yours was.  I then asked what experience *you* had that
would lead anyone to question which of the two of us knew, and which one
didn't, what he was talking about.  If you were to answer this one the way
I suspect you would (assuming you were telling the truth), it would
strongly weaken your case that CF was being "censored" at ACS meetings
(although since everyone who submitted a paper was invited to give it,
it's hard to imagine how anyone who wasn't halucinating would have thought
there was any censorship to begin with).

> -rs  "Or how about this:  how much energy is deposited to the lattice in
> -rs  a Moessbauer transition?  How much goes to the gamma ray?"
>This was discussed.  

And the answer makes your hypothesis look kind of stupid, doesn't it?

>  If you have anything to add state it or hold your "piece".
>Do your own calculations, and "put your head on the chopping
>block" with your numbers, calculations, and theories.

As I said, you seem to enjoy missing this point.  It's *your* hypothesis.
That means that *you* are the one who is responsible for showing the
numbers, calculations, and the like, that will lead anyone to believe
it's anything but garbage.  I don't need to do the calculations any more
than Dick Blue does -- it's obvious to both of us (and to inter alia
Steven Jones) that your hypothesis is fundamentally silly, so it's up
to *you* to show that it isn't.

>-rs  "Or how about this:  what influence upon the *lifetime* of the Fe*
>-rs  excited state does the lattice have in Moessbauer spectroscopy, and
>-rs  how does this extrapolate to setting an upper limit on the lifetime
>-rs  of the He* state in a putative "Moessbauer like" CF process?"

>Mr. Schultz -- care to elaborate with a rate calculation?

This calculation has already been done here in s.p.f., which by your
own arguments, means that I don't have to post it here. 

>And the upper limit is that it is FORBIDDEN.

Your sentence is missing an antecedent.  What is FORBIDDEN?  That the He*
ever enter the excited state?  That can't be true.  That the decay of
the He* is forbidden?  The point I am trying to get at is one that you
have missed before, so I thought I'd try a slightly different angle.  We
know the lifetime of the excited state of the He* produced by d-d fusion
(which is the same whether that state is produced by "hot" or muon-induced
fusion).   You suggest that that state gives up all of its energy to the 
lattice.  As Steven Jones has demonstrated, special relativity prevents
all of the energy from being depostied as phonons in the normal lifetime
of the He*.  So your hypothesis must contain some mechanism by which the
excited-state lifetime of the He* is extended.  Since you are using 
Moessbauer spectroscopy as an example of lattice-nuclear interactions,
I assume that you will use that as the starting point for your calculation
of how much the He* lifetime is extended by the nuclear-lattice interaction.
 
>-rs  "Or how about this:  Radioactive decays in lattices such as those of
>-rs  U and Th are MeV processes that are invariably accompanied by MeV
>-rs  energetic particles or photons or both.  What mechanism would suppress
>-rs  such emissions in the case of (and *only* in the case of) He* in a
>-rs  Pd lattice?"

>  New pathways don't require suppression.  Do they.

The "new" pathway has to suppress the old one -- or else we'd see it.
You are suggesting that the only case of a MeV excitation that does not
lead to MeV products is He* in Pd.  Therefore, there must be some 
mechanism that not only provides a pathway for turning all of this MeV
energy into eV phonons, but also prevents the He* from *ever* decaying the
way it does when it's not in the lattice.  What mechanism do you propose
that would do such a thing?

> -rs  "Or how about this:  what is the difference between a "virtual photon"
> -rs  and a "real photon"?"
>
>along what axis?   Why would Mr. Schultz ask?  ]
>Mr. Schultz:  Please elaborate since 
>although you can ask a lot of questions you rarely take the time
>explain your reasons, if any, if ever.

Back when Steven Jones was explaining the constraints placed upon your 
hypothesis by special relativity, you used one of his arguments to "calculate"
that the sun's photons couldn't travel more than a nanometer, so therefore
the sun couldn't be shining.  Jones responded by asking you if you knew
anything whatsoever about QM, in particular the difference between a
real and a virtual photon (your "calculation" implied that you didn't know
the difference back then).  You never answered him or indicated that you
acknowledged the error in your calculation.  I was just wondering if you've
figured out what you did wrong since then.

> -rs    Earlier, Swartz claimed that he had already answered all of the 
> -rs    issues about his Moessbauer Hypothesis. [zip]"
>Incorrect and self serving.  Typical for Mr. Schultz.

Well, in message <DAs72z.6pu@world.std.com>, posted on Monday, Mr. Swartz
responded to my question

-rs    "For instance, it has been explained to him at
-rs  length and in detail why the Moessbauer effect is irrelevant to the 
-rs  question of how the putative He* nucleus can decay to He without producing
-rs  significant amounts of high-energy radiation.  Has he tried to show that
-rs  there is some fallacy in those arguments?"

By saying 

>Yes. Spent too much time doing it previously here (circa 1992 and 1993)
>and will absolutely not repeat it again.

Which I took to mean that you were saying you had answered the objections.

> Since the coupling can exist, there is
>a precedent in material science to explain the CF phenomena.

As Dick Blue tried to explain, you cannot use them as a precedent.  Actually,
he explained it very well.  But I seriously doubt that you understood his
explanation.

>There is no evidence that they place role in CF. [whatever that means --rhs]
>Never said they did.  Wouldn't have been prudent.

Then why even bring them up?  The coupling involved in the Moessbauer
effect is orders of magnitude to small to have anything to do with CF, 
and would tend to suppress rather than enhance the effect you're looking
for.  If you want to find a precedent, then you have to find a relevant one.

>The mendacity has all been yours, Mr. Schultz.  As CF is borne
>out in more labs, and more readers become aware, Schultz
>and his Doppelgangers will be exposed for what they are --

You've already said that there's only one of me.  What caused you to
change your mind?  In any case, I have made my opinion on the matter 
quite clear:  extraordinary claims require extraodinary evidence.  As
far as I am concerned, such evidence is lacking.  And as Mr. Swartz knows,
since he knows my field of research, it matters not one whit to any funding
I would receive.  I have no stake in there being such a thing as CF, or
in there not being such a thing as CF.  In fact, I have always felt that
the world would be a much more interesting place if there were such a thing.
But I am not willing to suddenly give up my belief that the universe is
governed by physical laws to the extent that I will believe in a new
phenomenon that appears to violate them unless someone can make a compelling
cause for the new phenomenon.  I do not see that the CF experiments count
as anything near compelling evidence.  They are to me much more reminiscent
of ESP results, in which success is redefined for each experiment, so that 
every experiment is positive, even if it's inconsistent with other "positive"
results.  That's why I'm so interested in your hypothesis.  If you can
make a case that there is some reason to believe that CF can occur in
theory in a manner consistent with the results you like, I might be more
willing to accept those results.  But when you spend your time calling 
people names, refusing to answer their questions, and posting half-witted
flames, I have to wonder.
--
					Richard Schultz

"Look, strange women lying on their backs in ponds handing out swords. . .
that's no basis for a system of government."
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / M Fullerton /  Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
     
Originally-From: mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgary.ca (Michael Ernest Fullerton)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
Date: 27 Jun 1995 07:09:34 GMT
Organization: The University of Calgary

Richard H. Schultz (rschultz@phoenix.princeton.edu) wrote:
: In article <3sdmcj$buu@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca> mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgary
ca (Michael Ernest Fullerton) writes:
: >Richard Schultz (schultz@garnet.berkeley.edu) wrote:
: >: In article <xeyfWYi.jedrothwell@delphi.com>,  <jedrothwell@delphi.com> wrote:

: >: >Nobody here has ever disproved my data, or shown any mistakes in the
: >: >experiments, therefore the data stands and I am right.
:   
: >: Do you believe that UFOs are extraterrestrial spacecraft?  After all, that
: >: is *exactly* (as in word for word) the argument that the proponents of
: >: the "we are being visited by extraterrestrials who are clever enough to
: >: never show themselves clearly and obviously" school of thought use.  

: >'[Some] UFO's are piloted by ET's.'
: >' "Cold fusion" is caused by X.'
: >
: >Those sound like theories to me.  Jed seems to basically be
: >saying:  I see all this evidence for a new source of energy.
: >What is wrong with this?  Isn't this how science is supposed to
: >work?  Or is science about mindlessly _believing_ that all unusual
: >things must automatically be bunk?

: No, science is generally about trying to find explanations for events.
: (You'll notice that Rothwell himself never answered my question.)  The
: commonality between Rothwell and the UFO Believers that I was pointing
: out is not their preference for theories that fly in the face of well-
: established science, nor is it that the alternate theories that they
: propose in fact make no sense a priori.  It is rather the common claim
: that "I cannot think of any other explanation, therefore it *must* be
: X", or perhaps more precisely, "I cannot think of any explanation that
: does not invoke X, therefore X must be the cause of my observations."

: One's inability to explain an observation does not mean that the 
: observation has no explanation.

I don't recall anyone here ever making such claims.  Perhaps you
are mistaken? 

: >Isn't science about collecting data, and trying to be sure it is
: >right? Or is science about believing certain data is always
: >wrong, and spending all your time trying to deny it?

: I am not an expert in the philosophy of science.  As far as I can tell,
: most scientists go about their business and leave the question of what
: they are doing to the philosophers.  But one famous quotation from the
: sociologist Marcello Truzzi is worth mentioning here:  "Extraordinary
: claims demand extraordinary evidence."  Whether it is extraterrrestrial
: spacecraft, ESP, polywater, or cold fusion, any claim that is in serious
: conflict with well-established theory (here I am using theory in its
: precise sense, as in Atomic Theory) must necessarily be supported with
: not just adequate evidence, but with *extraordinary* evidence.  

So, before the extraordinary evidence is found, the phenomena can
be mindlessly believed to be bunk?

: If you read what most of the skeptics say, most of them are not 

Most of the "skeptics" are in actuality true-believing skeptopaths.

: opposed in principle to the idea that Coulomb's Law, Conservation of
: Angular Momentum, Quantum Mechanics, etc., might be violated in this
: bizarre set of circumstances.  What they tend to think is that given
: a choice of "these theories that have explained every observation ever
: made so far are wrong" and "there is some flaw in the experiment or the
: interpretation of the data," they will choose the latter.  And that is
: (more or less) the way science does work.  For example, earlier in this

When they examine the experiment and find no flaws they will
still cling to the belief that the experiment is flawed?

: century, there was a major revolution in physics, and by and large, the
: new theories gained rapid acceptance because they explained the data
: better than the old theories.  Indeed, if you look carefully at the
: first experimental "verification" of General Relativity, it really
: wasn't good enough to distinguish the predictions of Relativistic
: and Newtonian gravitational theories, but as the former already 
: explained a lot of things that the latter could not, people were 
: predisposed to believe that data.  On the other hand, plate tectonics
: took quite a bit longer to be accepted than relativity or quantum
: mechanics, because at the time it was proposed, there really weren't
: that many observations that it could better explain than competing
: theories, and it wasn't until such observations were made that the
: theory gained wide acceptance.

: And one final point for you to consider:  one of the most prominent and
: well-spoken skeptics (Steven Jones) started out as the person who
: thought cold fusion might be real and set out to look for it.  So your
: apparent belief that the skeptics are ignoring the data because it would
: upset their pet theories (or perhaps jeopardize their funding) does not
: appear to be borne out by the data.  Dare I ask if you plan to modify
: your theory accordingly?

I think skeptopaths also ignore data because they cannot tolerate
change or uncertainty.  Or perhaps they lack the thought
processes to think in a novel way.

--
Michael Fullerton |  Seeds, like ideas, don't germinate in concrete
Home Page:           http://www.ucalgary.ca/~mefuller/
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Robin Spaandonk /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: rvanspaa@netspace.net.au (Robin van Spaandonk)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 07:01:02 GMT
Organization: Improving

On 25 Jun 1995 15:28:40 GMT, little@eden.com (Scott Little) wrote:

>Preliminary Test Results on the Potapov Device
>Scott Little
>H.E. Puthoff
>EarthTech Int'l
[snip]
>recommended operating conditions for the YUSMAR-2.  Our head 
>pressure was about 60 psi instead of the recommended 71 psi 
>but our 106 gpm flow rate was at the high end of the 
>recommended range (55-101 gpm).  It therefore does not seem 
>likely that we were "underfeeding" the device.

>We can find no explanation for the failure of this Potapov
>device to perform as reported (300% over-unity).  It is 
>possible that we have failed to meet some operating condition
>that is critical for the over-unity performance.  We will be
>exploring other operating conditions in the future and we
>welcome any suggestions for further testing. 

The only suggestion I can make, is the possibility, that far from
underfeeding it, you may have been "drowning" it. I.e. if the flow
rate was too high, then the temperature may not have been able to
attain a (possibly critical?) required level.
I look forward to further tests, preferably with all parameters in the
middle of their suggested ranges.

Regards,

Robin van Spaandonk <rvanspaa@netspace.net.au>


cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Thomas Kunich /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 07:56:00 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <3sfj4o$fhk@dartvax.dartmouth.edu>,
Archimedes Plutonium <Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu> wrote:

>Do you think the first CF reactor or
>neutron device would be a loudly heralded celebration with news media
>coverage?

Say, like the announcement of Pons and Fleischman? Why, no, I don't belive
that anyone would ever actually report CNF at a press conference.

>CF has the potential to change the balance of world power
>among nations, dumbo, bet you never thought of that.

I guess that's why Russia is so far ahead of us. No, wait, that's _France_
that's so far ahead of us. No, wait, that's Japan that's so far ahead
of us. No, wait, it must be Sark that's so far ahead of us.

>  If Japan takes the major adances in technology, it behooves them to
>be as secret as possible.

Yeh, so secret that they cannot even use this wonderful new power source
that will give them such a technological boost. Real useful discovery
that.

>If Pons and Fleischmann leave the arena of
>CF, it is not out of some imagined defeat but the reverse--that it has
>now already surpassed them in engineering.

Of great, anyone that leaves CNF research is only doing so because
they know that they are being surpassed by others. But of course
that surpassing excellence is top secret.

>  My advice to you and so many posters to sci.physics.fusion is just
>keep an open mind. There may not be much to report for a long time in
>cold fusion, but some breaking news will eventually occur and CF will
>then be a bigger science than the high temperature superconductors.

With boosters that act even younger than their juvenile age, ignore
all evidence to the contrary and make false claims in others names,
I don't believe that you even have a clue what's going on. You are
just having fun reading your own assinine messages hidden behind a
pseudonym. What you need is a good spanking and being sent to bed
without your supper.

cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Alan M /  Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
     
Originally-From: "Alan M. Dunsmuir" <Alan@moonrake.demon.co.uk>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 12:36:08
Organization: Home

In article: <3soare$lg0@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca>  mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgary
ca (Michael Ernest 
Fullerton) writes:
> I think skeptopaths also ignore data because they cannot tolerate
> change or uncertainty.  Or perhaps they lack the thought
> processes to think in a novel way.
> 

No, Micky, we just lack the ability to think and reason the way you do.
-- 
Alan M. Dunsmuir [@ his wits end]     (Can't even quote poetry right)

         I am his Highness' dog at Kew
         Pray tell me sir, whose dog are you?
			      [Alexander Pope]

PGP Public Key available on request.


cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Bernd Paysan /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: paysan@informatik.tu-muenchen.de (Bernd Paysan)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 12:46:32 GMT
Organization: Technische Universitaet Muenchen, Germany


In article <3sn3eb$qdv@agate.berkeley.edu>, schultz@garnet.berkeley.edu
(Richard Schultz) writes:
>
>In article <MATT.95Jun26115509@godzilla.eecs.berkeley.edu>,
> <matt@physics.berkeley.edu> wrote:
>
>>Relativity was not ridiculed by the scientific establishment:
>>it was accepted extraordinarily quickly and its discoverer was given a
>>number of unprecedented honors.
>
>Don't forget that General Relativity was accepted within a couple of
>years of its first publication because it had a much greater explanatory
>power than Newtonian gravitation.  Also because it was more "aesthetically"
>pleasing (e.g. equivalence of gravitational and inertial mass).  As
>I recall, the first "proof" of General Relativity (bending of light
>around the sun) actually isn't as good a proof as was claimed at the time,
>that the true uncertainty of the experiment allowed for the Newtonian 
>prediction to be correct.  Amusingly enough (considering a thread that
>one would have though would be unrelated to this one) one of the more 
>interesting examples of experimental evidence for General Relativity 
>involves Moessabauer spectroscopy.  Consult Mitchell Swartz for the 

GR was accepted relatively fast, but IMHO it is the case, because Einstein
was already an authority when GR came up (in about 1912). There was an
alternative theory in that time, from Nordström; that had about the same
predictions at that time (at that time, Einstein mispredicted the light
deflection, he corrected it in about '16 or so). Nordström didn't more
than extending SR to accelerated frames and integrated; assuming Newton's
field equations. This gave about the same results (at that time - perhaps
later Nordström could have corrected the misprediction of light
deflection, too), without having singularities like GR (no, this property
wasn't known in 1912).

There was a loud discussion between Einstein and Nordström in "Analen der
Physik", a german physical letter published in Leibzig (which had a
primary role in this time). Nordström said about GR, that it was
"intellectual"; meaning too clumsy and complicated for the results, and
Einstein didn't say anything worthful. He mainly insisted in that SR can't
handle accelerations. Certainly he was wrong, but Nordström didn't
continue with his theory; Einstein did. Both theories used the principle
of equivalence, and both predicted gravitational redshift. Nordström's
theory wasn't ruled out therefore for a long time - it is ruled out now,
because of the mispredicted light deflection, but this could have been
corrected.

So in 1912 there was no reason for choosing either Nordström's gravitation
theory or Einsteins GR - we all know which was choosen. It was the effect
of an agressive act. And Einstein won, because he already was an authority
these days, not because of technical reasons. If Nordströms theory had
won, you could teach it in high school; try to teach GR in a high school
physic class.

-- 
Bernd Paysan
"Late answers are wrong answers!"
http://www.informatik.tu-muenchen.de/~paysan/
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Mahipal Virdy /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: virdy@pogo.den.mmc.com (Mahipal Singh Virdy)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 12:44:23 GMT
Organization: Martin Marietta Astronautics

In article <1995Jun26.192513.10018@news2.den.mmc.com>,
Mahipal Singh Virdy <virdy@pogo.den.mmc.com> wrote:
>In article <singtech-2506951314030001@ip-salem2-17.teleport.com>,
>C. Cagle <singtech@teleport.com> wrote:
>>In article <3si7pu$clg@martha.utk.edu>, mbk@caffeine.engr.utk.edu (Matthew
>>Kennel) wrote:
>>
>>> Is there an insufficiency with the current state of knowledge? 
>>
>>That question there says it all.  
>>
>>To even ask it automatically identifies you not as part of the solution,
>>but as part of the problem.
>>
>>-- 
>>C. Cagle
>>CTO
>>Singularity Technologies, Inc.
>>singtech@teleport.com
>>
>>"It is dangerous to be right in
>> matters on which the established
>> authorities are wrong."
>>Voltaire
>
>It's moments like this that makes surfing sci.physics deLIGHTful... ;-)
>
>Mahipal,
>|meforce>
>

I just meant "Check Mate!" as far as the argument was going. I wouldn't
want to call somebody that I know nothing of "part of the
problem/solution, etc.". Sorry if I came across that way at first.

Mahipal,
me changes...

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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Bruce Dunn /  Re: Potapov device test discussion
     
Originally-From: Bruce_Dunn@mindlink.bc.ca (Bruce Dunn)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test discussion
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 95 07:34:24 -0700
Organization: MIND LINK! - British Columbia, Canada

Bill Rowe writes:

>
> I think there are a couple of interesting aspects to the second estimate.
> First, it appears the pump adds nearly as much heat to the water as the
> Popov device.


Clearly, what is needed in the test setup is some thermometers to measure
the temperature of water going into the pump, going from the pump to the
device, and going out of the device.  The delta Ts and flow rates should
directly indicate the thermal inputs of the pump vs. the device.


--
Bruce Dunn    Vancouver, Canada   Bruce_Dunn@mindlink.bc.ca
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Thomas Zemanian /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: ts_zemanian@pnl.gov (Thomas S. Zemanian)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: 27 Jun 1995 14:41:28 GMT
Organization: Battelle PNL

In article <mmalloryDAtJrx.I6A@netcom.com>, mmallory@netcom.com (Mark
Mallory) wrote:

> jedrothwell@delphi.com wrote:
> : Another problem here is that you got yourself a power company billing meter.
> : That's fine, but it shows apparent power. You need to know the power factor
> : to compute real power. I'll bet if you use a better meter to measure PF, you
> : will see that you are a tad over unity already. Maybe 10 or 20%. That's
> : no big deal compared to what the Yusmar will give you when you set it up
> : right.
> :  
> : - Jed
> 
> This is baloney.  Jed obviously knows nothing about electrical 
> instrumentation.  Virtually all "power company billing meters" (watthour 
> meters - what the power companies use to determine our electric bill) take 
> power factor into account.
> 

[description of power meter deleted]

I hope we're not going to hash this out again, as we did in excruciating
detail with the Griggs Gadget.  Scott, have you the means to power the
device with a DC motor, thereby obviating phase angle arguments?

--Tom

--
The opinions expressed herein are mine and mine alone.  Keep your filthy hands off 'em! 
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Bob Casanova /  Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
     
Originally-From: cas@ops1.bwi.wec.com (Bob Casanova)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 16:09:50 GMT
Organization: Westinghouse Electric Corporation

In article <3soare$lg0@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca> mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgary.c
 (Michael Ernest Fullerton) writes:
>From: mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgary.ca (Michael Ernest Fullerton)
>Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
>Date: 27 Jun 1995 07:09:34 GMT

<Meaningless gabble snipped>

He's *baaaaccckk!*


>--
>Michael Fullerton |  Seeds, like ideas, don't germinate in concrete
>Home Page:           http://www.ucalgary.ca/~mefuller/

Bob C.

* Good, fast, cheap!  (Pick 2) *
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Mitchell Jones /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 11:00:14 -0500
Organization: 21st Century Logic

In article <3sligr$n9t@soenews.ucsd.edu>, barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry
Merriman) wrote:

> In article <3skndi$k3g@news.ccit.arizona.edu> frank@bigdog.engr.arizona.edu  
> (Frank Manning) writes:
> 
> > In 1847, Ignaz Semmelweis got the idea that the washing of hands in a
> > solution of chlorinated lime would cut down on diseases spread by medical
> > teachers and students in hospitals. After the change in procedure,
> > fatalities from puerperal fever in one Vienna hospital fell from 12% to 1%.
> > Even so, his theory aroused fierce opposition from entrenched authority,
> > and his career suffered badly.
> > 
> > -- Frank Manning
> > 
> 
> ..for awhile. As I recall, it caught on quite soon enough---because
> it was so easy to demonstrate the effectiveness---and he lived to be
> a recognized hero.
> 
> 
> --
> Barry Merriman
> UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
> UCLA Dept. of Math
> bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)

Wrong again. Semmelweis developed his theory from observing the different
fatality rates when babies were delivered by doctors, who in those days
were in the habit of moving back and forth between the delivery room and
the autopsy room without washing their hands, as compared to midwives, who
obviously performed no autopsies. The "puerperal fever" was simply an
infection (staph, I think) transmitted from cadavers to a woman's vagina
during delivery. Thus Semmelweis' campaign for the routine washing of
hands involved an explicit claim that doctors in hospitals were mass
killers, and that their birthing services were inferior to those of
midwives (a statement that remains true today, incidentally). Result:
Semmelweis' professional colleagues hated him and hounded him without
mercy. As a consequence, he began to exhibit bizarre, paranoic behavior
(who wouldn't: his colleagues were, in fact, out to get him!), and they
seized upon that behavior as an excuse to have him confined, under
restraints (he was strapped to his bed), in a lunatic asylum. And, when he
wore his skin raw by tugging at his restraints, one of the physicians who
hated him was called straight from the autopsy room to dress his wounds.
Semmelweis begged the man to wash his hands before dressing the wounds,
but his lunatic ravings were ignored, and so Semmelweis died of the
affliction he had tried to cure.

--Mitchell Jones

===========================================================
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Alan M /  Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
     
Originally-From: "Alan M. Dunsmuir" <Alan@moonrake.demon.co.uk>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 17:21:16
Organization: Home

In article: <cas.18.000B2A52@ops1.bwi.wec.com>  cas@ops1.bwi.wec.com
(Bob Casanova) writes:

> He's *baaaaccckk!*

.and this time, he has his own Web page! <g>
 
-- 
Alan M. Dunsmuir [@ his wits end]     (Can't even quote poetry right)

         I am his Highness' dog at Kew
         Pray tell me sir, whose dog are you?
			      [Alexander Pope]

PGP Public Key available on request.


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------------------------------
1995.06.27 /  matt@godzilla. /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: matt@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 18:56:05 GMT
Organization: University of California at Berkeley

In article <Pine.OSF.3.91.950627084814.2185B-100000@kemi.aau.dk>
Dieter Britz <britz@kemi.aau.dk> writes:

> > Have there ever been any discoveries that were initially ridiculed by
> > the scientific community and were later recognized to be
> > breakthroughs?  Maybe.  If there are any, though, they're a lot rarer
> > than most non-scientists think.  I'm not familiar with any in my own
> > field (physics), but maybe there are some.  In geology, plate
> > tectonics might be a valid example.
> 
> Surely You're Joking, Mr. Austern? Indeed, plate tectonics is an example,
> in fact one of many. How about Darwin, Einstein, etc? 

Check the references.  In particular, check article
<MATT.95Jun24134840@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU>.  In that article, I
went into excruciating detail about how Einstein's work on special
relativity was in fact a stunning counterexample: how Einstein's work
was studied by theoretical physicists all over Europe within a year of
its publication and how, within five years, he was being showered with
honors.  Or, if you don't want to read my article, I recommend Abraham
Pais's biography of Einstein, _"Subtle is the Lord"_.

I was accused of setting up a "straw man" for pointing out the
falsehood of this claim with respect to Einstein.  I guess it's not
such a straw man after all, is it?

I won't comment on Darwin, since I don't know the history of biology
nearly as well as I know the history of physics.  (Not to mention that
the history of Darwin's contribution to evolutionary biology is
complicated because of Darwin's very long delay in publication.)  I do
want to point out, though, that there's a big difference between the
reaction of the scientific community and the reaction of the general
public.  Was The Origin of Species really resisted all that
strenuously by biologists and natural historians?
--
Matt Austern				      matt@physics.berkeley.edu
http://dogbert.lbl.gov/~matt
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / MARSHALL DUDLEY /  Re: Implications of Miles results
     
Originally-From: mdudley@brbbs.brbbs.com (MARSHALL DUDLEY)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Implications of Miles results
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 14:29 -0500 (EST)

->   In Message-ID: <9506261452.AA25687@pilot03.cl.msu.edu>
-> Subject: Re: Implications of Miles results
-> blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue) writes:
->
-> "I will turn your argument around to point out that given the rates
-> and the time scale there can be only one isolated decay occuring
-> at a time.  I believe that has implications concerning collective
-> effects that are generally not recognized by CF believers."
 
Such an assumtion requires that each event is independent of other events.
Some people are postulating a type of coupling between events, such as phonons
which would necessarily result in many events taking place virtually
simultaneously if correct.  Thus these theories would predict someting more
akin to a laser than black body radiation.
 
                                                                Marshall
 
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / MARSHALL DUDLEY /  Re: Implications of Miles result
     
Originally-From: mdudley@brbbs.brbbs.com (MARSHALL DUDLEY)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Implications of Miles result
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 14:49 -0500 (EST)

mbk@caffeine.engr.utk.edu (Matthew Kennel) writes:
 
-> I know this is a classical notion; not quite correct for quanta but
-> the general physical principle applies:  fast means high frequency.
 
Actually the wavelength of photons is not dependent on the speed of the charged
particles, but on the acceleration or deceleration rate of the particles.  It
is dependent on the first derivative of the velocity, not the velocity itself.
 
                                                                Marshall
 
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / MARSHALL DUDLEY /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: mdudley@brbbs.brbbs.com (MARSHALL DUDLEY)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 14:56 -0500 (EST)

jedrothwell@delphi.com writes:
 
 
-> Another problem here is that you got yourself a power company billing meter.
-> That's fine, but it shows apparent power. You need to know the power factor
-> to compute real power. I'll bet if you use a better meter to measure PF, you
-> will see that you are a tad over unity already. Maybe 10 or 20%. That's
-> no big deal compared to what the Yusmar will give you when you set it up
-> right.
 
Jed,
 
Power company billing meters factor in power factor already.  They read out in
real power, throwing away any imaginary (out of phase) power.  I am surprised
you do not already know this.  If you check the design, in phase current will
spin the disk one way, and 180 degree out of phase current will spin it the
other way.  Imaginary power will cause the disk to vibrate at 60 htz, but not
move in either direction.
 
                                                                 Marshall
 
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 /  Johmann /  A review of Infinite Energy, No. 2
     
Originally-From: johmann@aol.com (Johmann)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: A review of Infinite Energy, No. 2
Date: 27 Jun 1995 15:25:23 -0400
Organization: America Online, Inc. (1-800-827-6364)

The second issue of Infinite Energy, edited by Eugene Mallove, is out,
and this is my brief review of it.

physical qualities: 8 1/4" x 11", 56 pages, color cover and b&w
interior. The b&w image quality is better in this second issue than in
the first issue, but that is a minor point.

Jed has two articles in this issue: highlights of ICCF5, and a piece
covering calorimetry.

Dennis Cravens has an article describing in detail his ICCF5
demonstration device, which uses the Patterson power cell.

Two articles -- one by Bruce Klein of Bechtel Power, the other by
Robert Horst of Tandem Computers -- consider cold-fusion in a
big-picture way: its relevance to a large engineering company like
Bechtel (Klein's article), and what can be expected for CF as for any
high-tech product (Horst's article).

The issue's highlight article is the report by Chris Tinsley of his
trip to Moldavia (accompanied by Peter Gluck) to see for himself the
fabled Potapov device. This is the claimed over-unity water heater
made and marketed in the former Soviet Union. The article has many
photos of the Potapov device, and it's good to see some real
investigative, on-the-scene reporting here. However, unlike when Jed
visited Griggs, Tinsley conducted no tests himself; but since the
claimed purpose of his trip included the purchase of a few devices for
testing in the US, test results are suggested as possible in a future
issue.

Overall, I did not learn as much about the Potapov device as I would
have liked; but if its over-unity claims are real, then I assume
future issues will have additional details. Even if it turns out that
the over-unity claims are bogus (Scott Little is testing the device
now), or greatly exaggerated, I still hope to see a follow-up.
Regardless of the truth of the matter, it is an interesting story.

The remaining articles are a mixed bag, including a copy of Puthoff
and Little's article originally posted on the Internet in which they
debunk the MRA device (remember that? two amateurs claimed to have
invented an over-unity electronic circuit). Along with the debunking
article is a reply by Norman Wootan (one of the "inventors" of the MRA
device) who claims that Puthoff and Harold killed the over-unity
effect by the way they tested it. My own guess is that the MRA is bunk
as Puthoff and Harold claim, and Wootan is just trying to save face.
But anyway, both sides of the MRA story are in this second issue of
Infinite Energy.

That concludes my review.

For those who want a subscription (recommended for those who want to
keep up with the CF field) here is the relevant info:


      Infinite Energy is published six times a year
      a 1-yr subscription: $29.95 US and Canada, $49.95 foreign

      Phone: 603-228-4516 (Visa or Mastercard accepted)

      Address: Infinite Energy Magazine
               P.O. Box 2816
               Concord, NH   03302


Kurt Johmann
--
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Kevin Sterner /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: sterner@sel.hep.upenn.edu (Kevin Sterner)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 19:24:09 GMT
Organization: University of Pennsylvania

In article <MATT.95Jun27115605@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU>, matt@godzill
.EECS.Berkeley.EDU writes:

> I won't comment on Darwin, since I don't know the history of biology
> nearly as well as I know the history of physics.  (Not to mention that
> the history of Darwin's contribution to evolutionary biology is
> complicated because of Darwin's very long delay in publication.)  I do
> want to point out, though, that there's a big difference between the
> reaction of the scientific community and the reaction of the general
> public.  Was The Origin of Species really resisted all that
> strenuously by biologists and natural historians?

I'll go further.  I assert that the violent denunciation and repression
of Darwin's discoveries were DUE to the fact that his theories were
plausible, and that his denouncers actually suspected that his theories
might be correct.  If Darwin had suggested that volcanic eruptions were
responsible for the creation of new species, based on his observations
of unusual species on volcanic islands, the people who were (and are)
so vociferous in their objections to him would probably have ignored him,
even though such a theory would be just as non-biblical as the correct
theory.

What really gets under the skin of a crackpot--and what distinguishes
him from an intellectual revolutionary--is not that his work gets
suppressed, but that it gets ignored.

-- K.

 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Kevin L. Sterner  |  U. Penn. High Energy Physics  |  Smash the welfare state!
 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / John Logajan /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: jlogajan@skypoint.com (John Logajan)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: 27 Jun 1995 19:26:49 GMT
Organization: SkyPoint Communications, Inc.

Thomas S. Zemanian (ts_zemanian@pnl.gov) wrote:
: I hope we're not going to hash this out again, as we did in excruciating
: detail with the Griggs Gadget.  Scott, have you the means to power the
: device with a DC motor, thereby obviating phase angle arguments?

Actually a better way just mentioned by Bruce Dunn is: "The delta Ts and
flow rates should directly indicate the thermal inputs of the pump vs. 
the device."

You wouldn't need to worry about pump efficiency, watt-hour meter
accuracy, power factor, etc.   Flow rate, pressure drop, and temperature
delta tell you everything you need to know.

--
 - John Logajan -- jlogajan@skypoint.com  --  612-633-0345 -
 - 4248 Hamline Ave; Arden Hills, Minnesota (MN) 55112 USA -
 -   WWW URL = http://www.skypoint.com/members/jlogajan    -
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 /  jedrothwell@de /  Mea culpa: wrong about billing meters
     
Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Mea culpa: wrong about billing meters
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 95 15:42:37 -0500
Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice)

Many people have written to me here and by private e-mail to tell me that
power company meters do not measure apparent power. Sorry about that folks, I
was wrong. It is good to know that if I ever make a technical error in s.p.f.,
I will be corrected immediately, by many people.
 
I suppose I must not have made many mistakes in the past, because I have never
gotten so many private and public e-mail admonishments. I must have a good
track record. That's heartening. It is almost as if every skeptic on earth is
out there gunning for me! Waiting for me to drop the ball . . . It gives a
person a special sense of responsibility. Makes a person look over his
shoulder while walking down dark alleys. Gives you a sense Someone is
Watching. Yes, indeed.
 
Ahem! Enough paranoia, back to business. Let me suggest to this helpful squad
of people that you turn your attention to messages from Richard Blue, Tom
Droege or Steve Jones. Imagine how many technical errors you will catch!
Someone besides me should explain to Richard that the specific heat of water
does not arbitrarily change just because his latest "theory" demands it
should. You cannot "store heat" in water without the water temperature rising.
You cannot magically release heat from water by running the water through a
cell (as Cravens does), or running it near a cell (as everyone does).
 
- Jed
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1995.06.27 /  jedrothwell@de /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: jedrothwell@delphi.com
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 95 15:46:43 -0500
Organization: Delphi (info@delphi.com email, 800-695-4005 voice)

<jedrothwell@delphi.com> writes:
 
>Another problem here is that you got yourself a power company billing meter.
>That's fine, but it shows apparent power. You need to know the power factor
 
Oops! I got that wrong, as several people have said. Please see message
thread "Mea culpa: wrong about billing meters" for a paranoid response.
 
- Jed
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Tom Potter /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: tdp@id.net (Tom Potter)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 21:32:13 GMT
Organization: Earth

In article <DAosCE.Enp@eskimo.com>, billb@eskimo.com (William Beaty) says:

>"...there are always going to be Newtons coming along whose ideas are so
>foreign and outrageous as to be beyond the ken of the experts." 

The main problem, with fools beating up on real and imagined crackpots,
is that true geniuses are inhibited from presenting their ideas to
the world, for fear of critism.

Even Newton was inhibited for making many of his ideas public for
many years because he was so hurt by criticism.

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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Tom Potter /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: tdp@id.net (Tom Potter)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 21:38:55 GMT
Organization: Earth

In article <DAp7z4.EJq@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca>, aroytbur@alchemy.chem.
toronto.ca (Artur Roytburg) says:
>
>Just a small point. Despite very limitted acceptance presently,
>I would suggest that Causal Theory of Quantum Mechanics 
>(developed by Broglie and Bohm) may be just the theory
>that takes a long time to come through.
>Can this theory bring a new light if it is accepted widely? Only
>time will tell. Bohm published his first articles on this subject in
>1953 and since then many problems in his theory has been overcome. 

The thought occurs to me:
how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
to be validated and accepted,
if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?



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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Barry Merriman /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 21:40:22 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <tomkDAtnDC.D2y@netcom.com> tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich)  
writes:
> In article <3sfj4o$fhk@dartvax.dartmouth.edu>,
> Archimedes Plutonium <Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu> wrote:
> 

> I don't believe that you even have a clue what's going on. You are
> just having fun reading your own assinine messages hidden behind a
> pseudonym. What you need is a good spanking and being sent to bed
> without your supper.

Uhh...Tom, I've got some frightening news for you: his legal name
_is_ Archimedes Plutonium. Just to save you some future effort, allow me
to Point out that Arch. Plu. is a dishwasher at Dartmouth, who
sincerely believes that the universe is a Plutonium atom, or some
such doctrine. Aside from his prolific ramblings on physics, he has
posted many ``proofs'' or counter examples to famous mathematical
thereoms/problems on the math nesgroup (and all his math ideas
are blatantly flawed, to anyone who has a modest understanding of
advanced mathematics *and* the ability to reason logically.)

In short, A.P. is deranged. 




--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Thomas Zemanian /  cmsg cancel <ts_zemanian-2706951452010001@ts_zemanian.pnl.gov>
     
Originally-From: ts_zemanian@pnl.gov (Thomas S. Zemanian)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: cmsg cancel <ts_zemanian-2706951452010001@ts_zemanian.pnl.gov>
Date: 27 Jun 1995 22:03:01 GMT
Organization: Battelle PNL

cancel <ts_zemanian-2706951452010001@ts_zemanian.pnl.gov>
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Thomas Zemanian /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: ts_zemanian@pnl.gov (Thomas S. Zemanian)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: 27 Jun 1995 22:05:26 GMT
Organization: Battelle PNL

In article <3spm1p$jle@stratus.skypoint.net>, jlogajan@skypoint.com wrote:

> Thomas S. Zemanian (ts_zemanian@pnl.gov) wrote:
> : I hope we're not going to hash this out again, as we did in excruciating
> : detail with the Griggs Gadget.  Scott, have you the means to power the
> : device with a DC motor, thereby obviating phase angle arguments?
> 
> Actually a better way just mentioned by Bruce Dunn is: "The delta Ts and
> flow rates should directly indicate the thermal inputs of the pump vs. 
> the device."
> 
> You wouldn't need to worry about pump efficiency, watt-hour meter
> accuracy, power factor, etc.   Flow rate, pressure drop, and temperature
> delta tell you everything you need to know.
> 

Ah.  Right you are.  I was still thinking along the lines of the GG, and
assumed that some shaft work went into the device.   After rereading the
initial post in this thread, I see that such is not the case.  Thanks.

--Tom

--
The opinions expressed herein are mine and mine alone.  Keep your filthy hands off 'em! 
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Thomas Kunich /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 22:53:04 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <3spts6$1es@soenews.ucsd.edu>,
Barry Merriman <barry@starfire.ucsd.edu> wrote:

>Uhh...Tom, I've got some frightening news for you: his legal name
>_is_ Archimedes Plutonium. Just to save you some future effort, allow me
>to Point out that Arch. Plu. is a dishwasher at Dartmouth, who
>sincerely believes that the universe is a Plutonium atom, or some
>such doctrine.

>In short, A.P. is deranged.

Oh, well, my apologies to Achimedes. Certainly his style is identical
to that of a person who haunted many BBS'es and Internet in the early
days. I eventually met him in person several years later -- at that time
he was 14! Imagine how young he must have been when he was really in
his flame mode. :-)

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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Thomas Kunich /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 23:00:36 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <3sptpf$86i@kilroy.id.net>, Tom Potter <tdp@id.net> wrote:

>The thought occurs to me:
>how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
>to be validated and accepted,
>if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?

Yes indeed, every publisher is a racist and every scientist a skeptic
of any work coming from an author of unknown race. Really got a tight
hold on reality here, don't you?

Quantum mechanics, as you've seen here, has to prove and reprove itself
all the time. And there have always been questions about the accuracy
of Newton's work. Do you suggest that everyone should calmly agree that
all present theories with majority support shouldn't be questioned?

The bumper sticker, "Question Authority" is a truism. We should all be
open enough to question theories. But we should also be educated enough
to phrase such questions from a base of knowledge, not of emotion.

The CNF people believe in CNF because they _want_ to think that the world
is a big question mark to everyone else as well as they. While I suggest
questioning theories, I also think we need to require new theories to
be _better_ than old ones.

cudkeys:
cuddy27 cudentomk cudfnThomas cudlnKunich cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Mitchell Jones /  Re: Barry Merriman is irrational and unscientific
     
Originally-From: 21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Barry Merriman is irrational and unscientific
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 18:11:29 -0500
Organization: 21st Century Logic

In article <21cenlogic-2606951027460001@199.172.8.177>,
21cenlogic@i-link.net (Mitchell Jones) wrote:

> In article <3saphc$kts@soenews.ucsd.edu>, barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry
> Merriman) wrote:
> 
> > In article <21cenlogic-2006950053370001@199.172.8.129>
21cenlogic@i-link.net  
> > (Mitchell Jones) writes:
> > 
> > > > 
> > > Barry, I have been thinking 
> > 
> > Well, thats a good start.
> > 
> > (Its a joke! :-)
> > 
> > >about your theory and I am beginning to have logical problems with
> > > it. 
> > 
> > I hope you didn't get into one of those infinite loops like
> > on the old Star Trek, where your head starts smoking, and the
> > pitch of your voice keeps escalating.
> > 
> > (Its another joke! Isn't it fun to be able to selectively
> > edit what other people say! Now I know what motivates all those
> > TV reporters. :-)
> > 
> > Okay, now down to business:
> > 
> > > 
> > > In other
> > > words, since the temperature of the rotor cannot decline without dropping
> > > the pump out of the "steam phase," and since the rotor temperature has to
> > > drop if it is to dump stored heat, it follows that it can't dump stored
> > > heat while operating in the steam phase. But your whole theory rests on
> > > the premise that the rotor can dump stored heat while operating in the
> > > steam phase. Therefore, if my analysis is correct, your argument must be
> > > wrong. 
> > > 
> > 
> > Basically, to turn you analysis around, I could say all you prove is 
> > that the  simple picture _you proposed_ for what is going on inside the
> Griggs 
> > device is not true.
> 
> ***{Barry, I was not trying to paint a detailed picture of the device. I
> was trying to selectively focus on one aspect of its operation. The key
> intellectual task here is to visualize what happens as the rotor
> temperature rises.
> 
>  For the rotor, thermal equilibrium means that heat flowing into the rotor
> equals heat flowing out. The most significant component of heat in arises
> due to the frictional drag of the fluid on the rotor surface, which
> obviously drops whenever the water contacting the rotor begins to flash to
> steam. In the case where the temperature of the rotor rises at constant
> r.p.m., heat out (due to radiation, conduction, and convection) rises,
> while heat in is relatively stable *unless a state change occurs in the
> fluid*--which means: unless the rotor passes the flash point temperature.
> If no state change occurs, heat out will eventually become large enough to
> equal heat in, and equilibrium will result. However, if the r.p.m is large
> enough, the flash point temperature *will* be reached, and the frictional
> drag on the rotor surface will sustain a huge drop when that happens. This
> means heat in will sustain a huge drop, and the rotor will begin to dump
> stored heat, and its temperature will fall. Result: to restore thermal
> equilibrium, the r.p.m must be boosted *way* up in order to return the
> frictional heating to the level necessary so that heat in is equal to heat
> out.  
> 
> Nothing in this analysis implies that what is going on isn't complex. In
> truth, the various differentially small areas on the rotor's surface are
> going to reach the flash temperature at varying, though interrelated,
> times. I would expect the effect to begin at the midline of the cylinder,
> work out toward the ends, and then down toward the axis of rotation. This
> implies that some regions will be experiencing turbulent flow while others
> are experiencing laminar flow, and still others are below the flash
> temperature. But through all of that complexity, one constant will remain:
> there is simply no plausible way for the average temperature of the rotor
> to decline after it reaches equilibrium *unless the r.p.m. also
> declines.*  So here is the only reasonable way for the "stored heat"
> scenario to play itself out: 
> 
> (1) In the warmup phase, Griggs raises the r.p.m. *way* above the minimum
> necessary to maintain the steam phase, thereby raising the rotor
> temperature close to its melting point, and achieves thermal equilibrium
> at that level. The vast amount of heat stored in the rotor by such a
> procedure will, of course, not be measured, because no measurements are
> taken during this phase of the experiment. 
> 
> (2) As soon as the experimental phase of the experiment begins, Griggs
> causes the r.p.m. of the rotor to gradually drop. When this happens,
> frictional drag on the rotor surface drops, and heat out of the rotor
> begins to exceed heat in--which means: the rotor begins dumping stored
> heat into the fluid stream. By this method, heat stored in the rotor
> during the warmup phase (and, thus, unmeasured heat) is dumped back into
> the fluid stream.
> 
> It is interesting that, in Jed's data, there is no plot of rotor r.p.m. 
> --Mitchell Jones}***
> > 
> > In your proposed picture, there is simply a steam layer that forms near
> > the rotor when the rotor reaches the flash point temperature. Allow 
> > me to remind you that, if this be the case, you, being a CF believer
> 
> ***{You have no evidence that I am a CF believer, Barry. It happens that I
> hold a theory of physics that is compatible with these types of excess
> energy results, but that theory does *not* say: "The Griggs Hydrosonic
> Pump is a bona fide excess energy device." Thus, even though my theory
> leaves me open to such possibilities, specific claims must be proven, and
> I hold a very high standard of proof. At the present time, I am not
> convinced that *any* of the present devices discussed in this newsgroup
> are excess energy devices, though I am in fact open to being convinced.
> --Mitchell Jones}***
> ,
> > must believe that CF occurs when one creates a layer of steam next to 
> > an aluminum surface. I have a hard time with that logic :-)
> 
> ***{Even as a joke, this is simply a silly thing to say. The collapse of
> cavitation bubbles in the Hydrosonic pump produces huge overpressures.
> Granted, by the precepts of contemporary physics, those overpressures
> could not possibly produce excess energy; but, if those precepts are
> wrong, the conclusion drawn from them could also be wrong. In any case,
> nobody ever implied that the excess energy, if it exists, arises due to
> the exposure of an aluminum surface to steam. --Mitchell Jones}***   
> > 
> > Now, in fact, I assume that you really think it takes more to get CF than
> > just a layer of steam near an aluminum surface, otherwise you would
> > be at home doing calorimetry experiments on your kitchen stove.
> > So, the point is, you yourself must belive there is _more going on_ 
> > inside the Griggs device than simply the formation of a steam layer
> > when the rotor temperature reaches the flashpoint.
> 
> ***{Right as rain. --MJ}***
> > 
> > How does this allow me to shield my ``theory'' (its not much of 
> > a theory, as I try to make minimal assumption about what is going 
> > on) from your analysis? Well, I simply invoke the idea that there
> > is more going on than what you proposed. Here is one of
> > _many_ possibilities: the formation of the steam layer is not
> > _uniform_ over the rotor surface, due to the effects of variable rotor
> > temperature, turbulent flow, cavitiation (and all other fluctuation
> > inducing factors). During the warm up phase, small regions of
> > steam layer are forming and vanishing all over the rotor. Any little
> > patch that forms tens to reattach due to srrounding fluctuations.
> > Then, once the temperature gets very hot, there is a phase change: 
> > when a critical fraction of the rotor area is simulatenously
> > in a steam layer, there are not enough fluctuations to reattach it,
> > and it bifurcates into an all detached mode.
> 
> ***{Irrelevant. You need to focus on the issue, which is: (a) why would
> the r.p.m be boosted above the minimum level necessary to keep the device
> in the steam phase; and (b) even if it were, how could the rotor dump its
> excess heat in the steam phase if the r.p.m. were not falling? --Mitchell
> Jones}***
> > 
> > So, in short: your analysis is based on the assumption of a very uniform,
> > laminar flow situation in the rotor. 
> 
> ***{Wrong. See above. --MJ}***
> 
> The reality is that it is
> > a turbulent, strongly cavitating, multiphase flow. 
> 
> ***{Absolutely. --MJ}***
> 
> I could easy imagine
> > such a system bifurcating to its low drag ``detached'' state 
> > at a temperature far in excess of the normal flash point, just as turbulent
> > flow past a sphere stays attached to the surface far beyond the point
> > where a laminar flow separates.
> 
> ***{Irrelevant. To repeat: the question is: (a) why would the r.p.m be
> boosted above the minimum level necessary to keep the device in the steam
> phase; and (b) even if it were, how could the rotor dump its excess heat
> in the steam phase if the r.p.m. were not falling? --MJ}*** 
> > 
> > For further inspiration, look at the different flow modes of a 
> > Taylor-Couette cyclinder some time (this is essentially a griggs
> > geometry rotor, but run at low speeds). Depending on its
> > adjustable parameter (which is rotor speed in that case), it falls
> > into one of _many_ complex flow patterns. It doesn't take much imagination
> > to think that the flow inside the griggs device could behave very 
> > differently from the simple picture you suggest.
> 
> ***{To repeat, I am not suggesting a simple picture: I am focusing on the
> relevant aspect of a complex picture. --Mitchell Jones}***
> > 
> > Because of that, that is why I don't suggest burning too many
> > brain cells on trying to analyze a precise scenario for the
> > rotor-stored-heat+reduced-drag-flow-mode hypothesis. The rotor
> > clearly is _capable_ of storing enough heat for a ~1 hour run
> 
> ***{It is, indeed, *if* its r.p.m is raised *far* above the minimum
> necessary to keep it in the steam phase. But even if that were to occur,
> it could not dump that stored heat unless the r.p.m. of the rotor were
> then reduced. The crucial question, therefore, is this: is there anything
> in the experimental setup that, in the second phase of the run, could
> bring about a gradual reduction of rotor r.p.m? And, as it happens, the
> answer is yes! If you will review Jed's description of the run, you will
> note that the effluent from the pump passes through a rubber hose into a
> 55 gallon drum. To collect heat that may be trapped in steam, the hose is
> held at the very bottom of the drum as the fluid accumulates in the drum.
> Result: as the water level rises in the drum, the backpressure rises and,
> logically, the r.p.m. of the rotor gradually declines. Which means: the
> rotor gradually declines in temperature and dumps its stored heat into the
> fluid stream! Bottom line: this experimental design is badly flawed, and,
> in all likelihood, the Hydrosonic Pump is *not* an excess energy device! 
> --Mitchell Jones}***
> 
> , 
> > and its clear that a reduced drag mode _does_ occur. But figuring out
> > the nature of this reduced drag mode could be quite chanllenging.
> > It is much less challenging to simple DO AN EXPERIMENT WHICH 
> > MEASURES OR BOUNDS THE HEAT STORED IN THE DEVICE PRIOR TO 
> > EXCESS HEAT STEAM MODE OPERATION.
> 
> ***{Barry, you gave up too soon on the analytical process. What you should
> have done was continue your attempts to visualize what was going on inside
> the device. That would have enabled you to identify the flaw in the
> design, and validate your position. Instead, you were apparently worried
> that such a process might produce the wrong conclusion, and you backed
> off, leaving the fun to me! As for further experimentation with the Griggs
> device, I really don't see the point. Now that the design flaw has been
> clearly identified, there is no mystery to be investigated. Of course, if
> further runs are done, I suppose it will be instructive to analyze them as
> well. One thing is very clear: if Griggs modifies his experimental design,
> the new design must measure rotor r.p.m., and must hold it constant during
> phase two. One way would be to hold the effluent level constant in the
> outflow tank by installing an overflow pipe and a second reservoir.
> --Mitchell Jones}***
> > --
> > Barry Merriman
> > UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
> > UCLA Dept. of Math
> > bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)
> 
> ===========================================================

Hell, I hate to reply to my own stuff, but you guys are thinking about
this post for too long! So here's an update: within an hour of posting
this, Jed informed me via e-mail that he noted in his writeup that Griggs
was using a 3-phase, AC electric motor, and that this meant the r.p.m. had
to be constant. In my reply, I noted that if the motor were a synchronous
type (i.e., with a DC feed to the rotor windings), then that would clearly
be true. But if, as in most cases, the motor was of the inductive type
(with no external feed to the rotor windings), then the only way a current
could flow in the rotor windings would be if the r.p.m. of the rotor fell
behind that of the rotating stator field. Only in that case would the
rotating stator flux lines cut the rotor windings, thereby inducing
current. Granted, most inductive 3-phase electric motors  have very low
"slip"--which means: the decline in rotor r.p.m. with load is small--but
some have large slip, and I wasn't about to discount the possibility that
Griggs was using motors of this type without hard information. Result: Jed
informed me that Griggs measured rotor r.p.m. on his dynamometer, and
found it to be a rock-steady 3500 r.p.m.  Therefore, score a point for
Jed! Ratatatatata! Boom! Crash and burn, as he says! 

So, do I go off and lick my wounds? Hell no, I turn and attack again! How?
Simple: I remain convinced that the rising backpressure due to the
increasing head in the effluent tank may be significant. Suppose, for
example, that when Griggs turns the valve that diverts the steam flow from
the air to the effluent tank, the rising backpressure causes the water
outflow from the pump housing to fall below the water inflow. That would
have to happen, wouldn't it? And if water out suddenly falls below water
in when the measurement phase commenses, doesn't that mean a water buildup
inside the rotor? Clearly, it does. And doesn't a water buildup in the
rotor mean improved thermal conductivity from the rotor to the fluid
stream? Clearly it does. And does this not mean that the rotor will begin
to dump stored heat into the fluid stream at this point? So it would seem.


So, what do you say to that, Jed? Let me guess: Ratatatatata! Boom! Crash
and burn! Well, if that's the way you are going to play, then I'm going to
take my marbles and go home!

Unless I find a hole in your answer, that is!

--Mitchell Jones

===========================================================
cudkeys:
cuddy27 cuden21cenlogic cudfnMitchell cudlnJones cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszL cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.27 /  meron@cars3.uc /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: meron@cars3.uchicago.edu
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Tue, 27 Jun 1995 23:38:56 GMT
Organization: CARS, U. of Chicago, Chicago IL 60637

In article <tomkDAut90.1xC@netcom.com>, tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich) writes:
>In article <3sptpf$86i@kilroy.id.net>, Tom Potter <tdp@id.net> wrote:
>
>>The thought occurs to me:
>>how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
>>to be validated and accepted,
>>if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?

Could you point to any specific example in recent history in which a theory
which was later proven true was rejected, or a theory which was later proven
false was accepted, solely due to the race or nationality of its author (not 
counting pathological examples like the rejection of "Jewish science" by the 
Nazis)



Mati Meron			| "When you argue with a fool,
meron@cars3.uchicago.edu	|  chances are he is doing just the same"
cudkeys:
cuddy27 cudenmeron cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.27 / A Plutonium /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu (Archimedes Plutonium)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 23:04:22 GMT
Organization: Plutonium College

In article <tomkDAtnDC.D2y@netcom.com>
tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich) writes:

> >  If Japan takes the major adances in technology, it behooves them to
> >be as secret as possible.
> 
> Yeh, so secret that they cannot even use this wonderful new power source
> that will give them such a technological boost. Real useful discovery
> that.

 Save posts by jerks. A fitting attribute which the Internet can and
will hold you to -- "accountability". When the science is
unquestionably there. Then go back to these posters and oust them out
of all science. There are plenty of other jobs that science jerks can
fill and so many of our graduates in science are begging for a job.
When the science is there, let the bosses of these science jerks know
well what little minded fools they have. And if nothing else blacklist
them by showing FAQs of pre cold fusion jerks or virulent goons. Yea
the Internet is say anything you want, but when you lose on a important
science issue, we are not going to let you forget that you were a goon
of science in fact we will call it the crackpot list of science and it
will be public knowledge as long as there is an Internet. Kunich, it is
okay if your posts had some critical science to them, some experiments
that you did, but you are here just to goon vandalize. What was the
point of your original post other then show your "smelly character".
Many good people out there are trying to solve fusion, and you come
around with your defeatist and destructive joke-making. Follow-up this
post Kunich, I am more than anxious to tell you to go to hell. 
cudkeys:
cuddy27 cudenPlutonium cudfnArchimedes cudlnPlutonium cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Akira Kawasaki /  Potapov heater reported on by Chris Tinsley in 'Infinite Energy' #2
     
Originally-From: aki@ix.netcom.com (Akira Kawasaki )
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Potapov heater reported on by Chris Tinsley in 'Infinite Energy' #2
Date: 28 Jun 1995 00:35:49 GMT
Organization: Netcom

   Just received a copy of the second issue of 'Infinite Energy'
magazine published by Dr. Eugene Mallove. The cover features Dr.
Patterson and his cold fusion cell. Also in the issue there is an
article (with pictures) written by Chris Tinsley of going to Moldavia
to visit Dr. Potapov and his company. The company have been and is
busily commercially manufacturing various models of a water heater
apparantly exhibiting excess heat to the consumer's delight on use.
Tinsley also mentions of tests being set up in England and the U.S. to
test the device. Also there is a theory presentation by Dr. Sapogin to
explain the effect. Many other interesting features supporting cold
fusion --- most naturally!
-AK-
cudkeys:
cuddy28 cudenaki cudfnAkira cudlnKawasaki cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszS cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Mark Mallory /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: mmallory@netcom.com (Mark Mallory)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 00:22:12 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

Tom Potter (tdp@id.net) wrote:
: In article <DAp7z4.EJq@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca>, aroytbur@alchemy.che
.utoronto.ca (Artur Roytburg) says:
: >
: >Just a small point. Despite very limitted acceptance presently,
: >I would suggest that Causal Theory of Quantum Mechanics 
: >(developed by Broglie and Bohm) may be just the theory
: >that takes a long time to come through.
: >Can this theory bring a new light if it is accepted widely? Only
: >time will tell. Bohm published his first articles on this subject in
: >1953 and since then many problems in his theory has been overcome. 

: The thought occurs to me:
: how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
: to be validated and accepted,
: if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?

Or a Jew?

cudkeys:
cuddy28 cudenmmallory cudfnMark cudlnMallory cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Barry Merriman /  J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
Date: 28 Jun 1995 00:55:52 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

Jed Rothwell and now Mitch Jones are spreading *folklore* about 
Ignaz Semmelweis. I would just let it go, but (1) I hate to see popular
myths propagated unchecked, and (2) maybe there is some small
chance I can demonstrate to these guys that there are some flaws
in their world views.

Now look: I didn't start this topic, and I don't
what its relevance to CF is. Apparently CF believers
keep an active file labeled 
"Brilliant Minds Thwarted By Their Ignorant Contemporaries"
and un-critically accept all entries they read about. Case
in point: Most of the melodrama built about around 
Semmelweiss is a _fiction_.

The original exchange is innocent enough: 

> Frank Manning wrote:
>  
>     "In 1847, Ignaz Semmelweis got the idea that the washing of hands . . .
>     Even so, his theory aroused fierce opposition from entrenched authority,
>     and his career suffered badly."
>  
>  
> barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
>  
>     "..for awhile. As I recall, it caught on quite soon enough---because
>     it was so easy to demonstrate the effectiveness---and he lived to be
>     a recognized hero."

First, let me amend this by saying I had Semmelweis partly confused with 
some of his contemporaries, such as Lister & Pasteur, who did achieve 
the full measure of fame they diserved. Also, let me point out that 
Manning post is not too far off---I was just trying to counterbalance
his conclusion that Semmelweis was crushed by the powers that be.
As I will point out below, Semmelweis's accomplishment was _far_ from ignored
or suprresed, and his carrer suffered primarily due to his own
personal problems, not those imposed upon him by others.


Now, Jed Rothwell jumps in with his usual caustic style:

>  
> You recall wrong, Barry. I suggest you do your homework. Semmelweis was
> driven out of Vienna in disgrace. He was never granted a license to practice
> medicine. 

that is false, he did practice medicine, and he left abruptly from
vienna on his own, not driven out.

> He died a few years later from an infection following a medical
> proceedure. 

No, he died 15 years later, followoing a severe beating and suffering
from degenrative brain disease.

>The doctors who attacked him went on murdering their patients for
> another generation or two (20 to 40 years). I am amazed you are so ignorant
> ... [Civil war infections]...but alas, Semmelweis had been long forgotten. 
>  
> Merriman, like most "skeptics" frequently makes offhand remarks about CF that
> are astounding incorrect and ignorant. Now we see that he is grossly
> ignorant about other subjects as well. - Jed

Well, Jed, what goes around comes around. But thank you for 
suggesting I do my homework. Now, please replace ``skeptic''
by ``believer'' in the above diatribe, and insert your own name in
as the recipeint of your invectives. Thank you.

Next, Mitch Jones (apparently not wanting to dwell on his recent
incredibly wrong post about the US fusion budget and progress
in magnetic fusion) jumps in, with a full elaboration of the 
popular Semmelweiss myth: responding to my post, he says

>Wrong again. 

Uh, what is this ``again''? If I recall, the only recent wrong was your
claim that the US spent ``roughly $100 Billion'' on fusion, with
no success at all. But I guess you don;t want to debate a point
on which you are clearly in the wrong by a large margin (U.S.
has spent roughly $15 billion on magnetic fusion, in 1995 dollars,
with plenty of success.)

Back to Mitchell Jones's popular mythology:

>Semmelweis developed his theory from observing the different
>fatality rates when babies were delivered by doctors, who in those days
>were in the habit of moving back and forth between the delivery room and
>the autopsy room without washing their hands, as compared to midwives, who
>obviously performed no autopsies. The "puerperal fever" was simply an
>infection 

so far so good.

> Thus Semmelweis' campaign for the routine washing of
>hands involved an explicit claim that doctors in hospitals were mass
>killers,     


Yes, delivered with considerable personal invective, as his writings
show. This presentation is not likely to win any converts
to a new doctrine, is it? (some CFers could take
a lesson here.) 


> Result:
>Semmelweis' professional colleagues hated him and hounded him without
>mercy. 

This is false, He was _well_ received by his younger couleagues
and _teachers_. Only the senior doctors resisted his ideas, though
they did not attack him as you suggested.


>As a consequence, he began to exhibit bizarre, paranoic behavior
>(who wouldn't: his colleagues were, in fact, out to get him!), 

No, they were not out to get him---in fact, he had many powerful 
supporters initially, whom he alienated by his own actions.
His bizarre behavior set in more than a decade after the inital controversy.


>and they
>seized upon that behavior as an excuse to have him confined, under
>restraints (he was strapped to his bed), in a lunatic asylum. 

It was not an excuse. By his own wife's accounts, he became 
fully psychotic and she was unable to care for him. She and
some of his _friends_ are the ones who had him committed.


> And, when he
>wore his skin raw by tugging at his restraints, one of the physicians who
>hated him was called straight from the autopsy room to dress his wounds.
>Semmelweis begged the man to wash his hands before dressing the wounds,
>but his lunatic ravings were ignored, and so Semmelweis died of the
>affliction he had tried to cure.
>--Mitchell Jones

This last part is _total_ fabrication, propagated in most popular
accounts. It is obviously added to get the
full measure of irony in the retellings of the story. Do you ever 
question these sort amzing coincidences? It should be clear
to any reader that this ending is a little too symetrical to be true.
Also, M. Jones's account gives a compressed sense of time---I.S's decline
and death occured 20 years after the original controversy.

Here is the brief, straight dope on Semmelweiss. The full account
is in the medical history "Doctors", by Sherwin Nuland, M.D., professor
of surgery and the history of Medicine, at Yale. copyright 1988 & 1995,
pages 238--262 (by the way, Jed: this was easy homework for me,
as it was already on my bookshelf at home, well worn).

Here is a summary quote from the introduction (pg 239):

"He was brought to his tragic fate by his own self destructive nature, 
and not, as popular historians have told us for generations, by the
overwhelming gods of a backward medical establishment."


Now, lets stick with the facts of the matter, breifly. 

I.S. was anewly graduated doctor in Vienna, 1844, and took a
3 year position there as an assistant to a senior obstetrician.
Through  accurate observations and a great insight,
he came up with the idea that childbed fever 
(which killed postpartum mothers in large
numbers, up to 25% that went to the hospital at times) was an 
infection transmitted by unwashed hands (subsequent to autopsies).
He tested his idea by using his authority to implement a hand washing 
policy at the hospital for a year, and the statistics clearly showed
he reduced the incidence from 18% to 1%. His boss stubbronly
refused to admit that I.S. had found the solution to this longstanding
problem, however.

I.S. did not publish or publically defend these results, but 
several of his younger colleagues and former teachers immediatly 
(1847) took to promoting I.S.'s work, published medical journal articles, 
made public statements, and even delivered  an address to the Austrian 
academy of Sciences, their most prestigous scientifc body.

Another quote (pg 248):

"The mythologists of I.S.'s life write of a lonely, misunderstood
figure, fighting an almost universal opposition before being 
overwhelmed by the sheer weight of numbers and influence, 
and consequently deystroyed. The truth is otherwise. The emerging leaders
who within a few years became victorious in Vienna, were all
with Semmelweis. In a portrait made in 1853 of the 
Collegium of the medical faculty nine of the 15 professors in the picture
are among those who gave active support...Of those pictured, only...[one]...
still remained to represent the oppostion. (The other five
men took no stand."

For a variety of complex, not fully understood, social, cultural
and racial reasons, I.S. himself made no public presentations
of his results. However, on the personal level he had become 
quite obnoxiuos, and anyone who questioned his results was greeted
with his derisions and accusation of being a murderer if they failed
to follow his advice. In short, he was an a**hole about it all, and
this no doubt turned off some doctors who would have otherwise
been more receptive. His boss, for one, remained unconvinced and 
I.S. job was not renewed (1849).

Coaxed by his supporting younger colleagues into action a year later , I.S.
finally, 3 years after his discovery,  spoke at a forum for the Medical
Society of Vienna, to which he had been elected in 1849, sponsored by
his supportive colleagues, one of whom was the society president.

I.S. was declared a resounding victor of the debate, which
was spread over 3 society meetings. At this point, I.S.'s work
was on the verge of full acceptance, but he blew it for himself.
He never submitted a written version of his speeches to the Society,
and so his arguments went unpublished, except as abstracts,  while his
debate challeger submitted a full version of his arguments. Second,
I.S. turned down a minor appointment in Vienna, which he judged
inferior. Without even saying goodbye or notifying his freinds
and supporters, he left Vienna.  This left hard feelings with many
of these folks, who had worked hard to popularize I.S.'s work and
help him personally.

I.S. went back to Hungary, demonstrated his techniques at a hospital
there with great success, and by 1855 was made a professor of
obstetrics at the University of Pest in hungary, a mediocre university
compared to Vienna. At the time of his election, his presenters said his
well known discovery had been recognized by the Academy of Sciences in Vienna.
I.S. became a very active and powerful professor at Pest, though his 
brusque style alienated many people.


Back in Vienna, I.S. himslef was largely forgotten. His former suporters
were not obsetricians themselves, and they went along with their
own busy researchers. The folks in charge of Obsetrics were personal
enemies of I.S., and disavowed I.S.'s work. HOWEVER: they maintained his
practice of hand washing, and thereby kept the mortality rate 
under control, even though they made up their own incorrect reasons for
doing this. So, at least, the benefit of I.S.'s discovery was not lost.

As a professor, I.S. began to correspond
with other obsetricians on his theory, and took any criticism of
it personally. Finally, a decade after his departure from Vienna,
1860, he  publish a book on  his results, but it was rather rambling in
its presentation, and includes a long polemic of violent attacks 
against his destractors, with much talk of murderers and adversaries.
The translations of this work clearly show  he is developing a mental 
illness. His book was widely ignored, becuase the 
scientific content was so poorly organized and difficult to follow.

Subsequent letters to the obstetric community became ever more beligerant.

Finally, by 1862 he was exhibitng clear manic-depression, loss of
memory, fits of bizzarre behavior, and finally psychosis. by 1865 His wife
could no longer car for him,and she took hi back to Vienna, where she and
one of his few remaining old friends had him put in a private asylum. 
After that, she was denied access to see him, and he died two wakes later.

As for the mythology of his death by infection at the hands of his
persecutioners:

"It has been traditional to say...that at his autoposy I.S. was found
to have died of the same disease he had been fighting all his professional
life. A laceration sustained while examing one of his last aptients
is said to have ... resulted ina massive infection....Unfortunately for 
the legend, this wounding, like so many other parts of the mythology, appears
to be without firm basis in fact."

He goes on to describe that careful study of the autopsy results,
along with photographs and X rays of his remains taken a century
later, and other recent disclosure as well as known practices, strongly
suggest that I.S. died from a beating given to him at the asylum
upon admission (and thus the reason why his wife was denied access
to see him the next day), shich was a practice of the times to subdue
violent psychotic patients.

Also, as to the cause of I.S.'s psychotic decline, the best attempts
at modern diagnoisis suggest that I.S had a form of Alzeheimers disease
which strikes younder people (he was about 46 when he died). Aside
from matching his symptoms, this particular disease causes a rapid
agind of appearance, which is clearly evident in photos
of I.S. taken 4 years apart of I.S when he was 38 and 42, which
show a great deal of aging in that short time. This disease itself
would have been fatal in a few years.

So, to summarize: I.S. made a great discovery. His discovery was
largely well recieved and was indeed put into practice, though there
certainly were holdouts amond the old guard, and some powerful people
had a personal animosity toward him. I.S. himself suffered from
a bad personality and a developing mental illness that damaged his 
career (as well as some cultural, social and racial differences) and
terminated his life prematurely, but still he was a recognized professor 
of medicine for over 5 years before his rapid decline set in.
 

So: Jed Rothwell and Michael Jones: would you care to debate 
the veracity of the above with the highly mythologized versions
you presented.

In particular, lets cut to the chase: there is no support in 
the Ignac Semmelweis story for the idea the cold fusion researchers
are a persecuted minority who's ideas are in danger of
being crushed by a stifling scientific hierarchy. I suggest you
shed yourself from the martyr/savior complexes that you see to be
fostering. 












--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Barry Merriman /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 28 Jun 1995 02:50:09 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <3sptpf$86i@kilroy.id.net> tdp@id.net (Tom Potter) writes:
> In article <DAp7z4.EJq@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca>,  
aroytbur@alchemy.chem.utoronto.ca (Artur Roytburg) says:
> >
> >Just a small point. Despite very limitted acceptance presently,
> >I would suggest that Causal Theory of Quantum Mechanics 
> >(developed by Broglie and Bohm) may be just the theory
> >that takes a long time to come through.
> >Can this theory bring a new light if it is accepted widely? Only
> >time will tell. Bohm published his first articles on this subject in
> >1953 and since then many problems in his theory has been overcome. 
> 
> The thought occurs to me:
> how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
> to be validated and accepted,
> if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?
> 

These days? No longer than if the progenitor were white. A hundred years
ago, there would have been a slowdown, mainly due to the difficulty
the progentor would have had in obtaining a suitable position at a
lab or university. In this era of affirmative action, that would no
longer be a problem, as minority staus would be seen as an added
benefit in hiring, rather than a detriment.






--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Charles Cagle /  Re: URGENT: Physics Support Still Needed
     
Originally-From: Charles Cagle <singtech@teleport.com>
Newsgroups: sci.energy,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: URGENT: Physics Support Still Needed
Date: 28 Jun 1995 03:26:27 GMT
Organization: Teleport - Portland's Public Access (503) 220-1016

You are absolutely correct


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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Charles Cagle /  Re: Cold Fusion???
     
Originally-From: Charles Cagle <singtech@teleport.com>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion???
Date: 28 Jun 1995 03:54:18 GMT
Organization: Teleport - Portland's Public Access (503) 220-1016

barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman) wrote:

>Oh, and Phil, one more comment: beware of taking science advice from
>folks on the Internet. It is quite possible that they don't know
>what they are talking about, and may also spin hyperbolic lies in order 
>to grind some personal axe. 

That specifically applies to you, Barry.

>Mitchell Jones provides a good example of
>this above. His one testable claim, the $100 billion dollar figure, is 
>too large by a factor of about 5 (The US has spent around $10 billion,
>over 35 years; if you adjust into todays dollars, _maybe_ that would 
>total $50 billion, 1995). And his claim that there is not
>one scintilla of success is laughable. Perhaps he could explain how the
>evil DOE scientists have fooled congress and DOE officials into 
>continuing funding for 35 years, while, meanwhile in the labs, 
>they were not accomplishing anything at all....
>
50 Billion in today's dollars re: his claim of 100 Billion is a whole 
lot closer to the truth than claims of potential success with PPPL's 
fusion efforts.  And with all the side line support it may be closer to 
the truth at 100 Billion than most are willing to admit.  Amazing how 
creative accounting can enter into the picture when hiding the true 
cost.  If funds are distributed to ancilliary programs should we count 
them?  How about the costs to keep gov't labs going which have 
connections and interests in the fusion programs?  Not count them either 
or any related portion of associated expenditures?  I think Mitchell is 
far closer to the truth than you are Barry.  I notice how nasty all you 
guys get when your livelihood becomes threatened.  Reminds me of seeing 
how angry con artists get when someone starts setting his mark straight 
- like on 60 minutes.  The truth hurts.  If you can't admit that the 
U.S. program on fusion is in moral and scientific trouble then you are 
also in moral trouble, or morally bankrupt.

>
>If anything, the reason fusion is in trouble now is because of making 
>too much progress...the limitations of the Tokamak have become too 
>clear now that the technology is fairly well developed.

Get real here, Barry.  The only honest ways of interpreting this 
statement is to realize that their progress is toward overt 
demonstration that the entire program is a bust.  The limitations of the 
Tokamak are that it will never yield break even.  I would say that is 
pretty good reason for pulling the plug on the thugs.


Charles Cagle
Chief Technical Officer
Singularity Technologies, Inc,
1640 Oak Grove Road, N.W.
Salem, OR 97304

Ph/Fx 503/362-7781

 -----------------------------------
I sought the fount of fire in hollow reed,
Hid privily, a measureless resource
For man, and mighty teacher of all arts.  - Aeschylus ..Prometheus Bound

email> singtech@teleport.com


cudkeys:
cuddy28 cudensingtech cudfnCharles cudlnCagle cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Charles Cagle /  Re: Cold Fusion???
     
Originally-From: Charles Cagle <singtech@teleport.com>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion???
Date: 28 Jun 1995 03:54:21 GMT
Organization: Teleport - Portland's Public Access (503) 220-1016

barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman) wrote:

>Oh, and Phil, one more comment: beware of taking science advice from
>folks on the Internet. It is quite possible that they don't know
>what they are talking about, and may also spin hyperbolic lies in order 
>to grind some personal axe. 

That specifically applies to you, Barry.

>Mitchell Jones provides a good example of
>this above. His one testable claim, the $100 billion dollar figure, is 
>too large by a factor of about 5 (The US has spent around $10 billion,
>over 35 years; if you adjust into todays dollars, _maybe_ that would 
>total $50 billion, 1995). And his claim that there is not
>one scintilla of success is laughable. Perhaps he could explain how the
>evil DOE scientists have fooled congress and DOE officials into 
>continuing funding for 35 years, while, meanwhile in the labs, 
>they were not accomplishing anything at all....
>
50 Billion in today's dollars re: his claim of 100 Billion is a whole 
lot closer to the truth than claims of potential success with PPPL's 
fusion efforts.  And with all the side line support it may be closer to 
the truth at 100 Billion than most are willing to admit.  Amazing how 
creative accounting can enter into the picture when hiding the true 
cost.  If funds are distributed to ancilliary programs should we count 
them?  How about the costs to keep gov't labs going which have 
connections and interests in the fusion programs?  Not count them either 
or any related portion of associated expenditures?  I think Mitchell is 
far closer to the truth than you are Barry.  I notice how nasty all you 
guys get when your livelihood becomes threatened.  Reminds me of seeing 
how angry con artists get when someone starts setting his mark straight 
- like on 60 minutes.  The truth hurts.  If you can't admit that the 
U.S. program on fusion is in moral and scientific trouble then you are 
also in moral trouble, or morally bankrupt.

>
>If anything, the reason fusion is in trouble now is because of making 
>too much progress...the limitations of the Tokamak have become too 
>clear now that the technology is fairly well developed.

Get real here, Barry.  The only honest ways of interpreting this 
statement is to realize that their progress is toward overt 
demonstration that the entire program is a bust.  The limitations of the 
Tokamak are that it will never yield break even.  I would say that is 
pretty good reason for pulling the plug on the thugs.


Charles Cagle
Chief Technical Officer
Singularity Technologies, Inc,
1640 Oak Grove Road, N.W.
Salem, OR 97304

Ph/Fx 503/362-7781

 -----------------------------------
I sought the fount of fire in hollow reed,
Hid privily, a measureless resource
For man, and mighty teacher of all arts.  - Aeschylus ..Prometheus Bound

email> singtech@teleport.com


cudkeys:
cuddy28 cudensingtech cudfnCharles cudlnCagle cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Bill Rowe /  Re: Potapov device test discussion
     
Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test discussion
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 03:34:00 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <73044-804263664@mindlink.bc.ca>, Bruce_Dunn@mindlink.bc.ca
(Bruce Dunn) wrote:

>Bill Rowe writes:
>
>>
>> I think there are a couple of interesting aspects to the second estimate.
>> First, it appears the pump adds nearly as much heat to the water as the
>> Popov device.
>
>
>Clearly, what is needed in the test setup is some thermometers to measure
>the temperature of water going into the pump, going from the pump to the
>device, and going out of the device.  The delta Ts and flow rates should
>directly indicate the thermal inputs of the pump vs. the device.
>
Measuring the temperatures at various points is a good idea but may not be
too easy. Assuming the estimates I made are correct, the expected deltal T
is only slightly larger than the 0.05C uncertainty Scott had indicated for
the temperature measurements.
-- 
William Rowe                                                   browe@netcom.com
MD5OfPublicKey: F29A99C805B41838D9240AEE28EBF383
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Bill Rowe /  Re: Fusion through electron-beam inertial confinement???
     
Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Fusion through electron-beam inertial confinement???
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 03:42:38 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <26JUN199522542314@ariel.lerc.nasa.gov>,
edwlt12@ariel.lerc.nasa.gov (Mike Jamison (ADF)) wrote:

>In article <3sfv94$nim@martha.utk.edu>, mbk@caffeine.engr.utk.edu
(Matthew Kennel) writes...
>>Arthur H Kerschen (ahk@helium.gas.uug.arizona.edu) wrote:
>
>[snipped e-beam fusion discussion]
>> 
>>THe only advantage to using e-beams vs lasers is that they might
>>be more energy efficient compared to the precise but inefficient (2%) lasers.
>
>I think those lasers are maybe 0.2% efficient, Matt - or maybe they're even
>worse than that.
>
>Remember, CO2 lasers are about 10% to possibly 20% efficient, He-Ne lasers
>are lousy, etc.  About the only thing close to a CO2 laser is the solid state
>diode laser, but they're low power, relatively speaking.
>

I believe you are correct about CO2 lasers, but I don't think CO2 lasers
can be effectively used for laser driven fusion. The problem is the longer
wavelength. As the pellet sheds outer material it starts to absorb energy
from the laser pulse. Longer wavelengths are less effective at penetrating
this layer requiring more energy per pulse to create the same implosion
effect.
-- 
William Rowe                                                   browe@netcom.com
MD5OfPublicKey: F29A99C805B41838D9240AEE28EBF383
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cuddy28 cudenbrowe cudfnBill cudlnRowe cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Charles Cagle /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: Charles Cagle <singtech@teleport.com>
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 28 Jun 1995 04:12:42 GMT
Organization: Teleport - Portland's Public Access (503) 220-1016

You are a true expert at missing the point.  A master of obfuscation.  A 
prince of disassociation.  Reaping and sowing, barren and fertile 
grounds are unfamiliar concepts with you?  A straw man is also setting 
up something that is easy to knock down.  Stick to the point.

Charles Cagle
Chief Technical Officer
Singularity Technologies, Inc,
1640 Oak Grove Road, N.W.
Salem, OR 97304

Ph/Fx 503/362-7781

 -----------------------------------
I sought the fount of fire in hollow reed,
Hid privily, a measureless resource
For man, and mighty teacher of all arts.  - Aeschylus ..Prometheus Bound

email> singtech@teleport.com


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cuddy28 cudensingtech cudfnCharles cudlnCagle cudmo6 cudqt2 cudszM cudyr1995 
------------------------------
1995.06.26 / Ben Weiner /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: bweiner@electron.rutgers.edu (Ben Weiner)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 26 Jun 1995 18:46:51 -0400
Organization: Rutgers University

kovsky@netcom.com (Bob Kovsky) writes:

>	With due acknowledgement for the varieties of historical 
>experience, the general rule is that new ideas are first dismissed, then 
>denounced, subsequently opposed, and only finally accepted.  Any history 
>of science will describe such a course of events.  Try <The Structure of 
>Scientific Revolutions> by Kuhn for openers.

Please don't assume ignorance on our parts - and don't generalize
blithely with this little story about the evolution of theories from
scorned to accepted.  Actually, Kuhn's book doesn't say this, or
certainly it's not one of Kuhn's major points.  Especially about the
dismissal of new theories.  Please show me where he does say it.  I
would say that a better cartoon summary of the ideas about paradigm
shifts in "The Structure of Scientific Revolutions" is:

1. Scientists do "normal science" within a given paradigm
2. Anomalies - results that don't fit - begin to crop up, but
   may not be recognized as anomalies.
3. Eventually the pressure of anomalies becomes obvious and leads
   to a crisis.  (Though often some are not recognized as anomalies
   until seen from the context of a new paradigm.)
4. "But not all theories are paradigm theories.  Both during pre-paradigm
   periods and during the crises that lead to large-scale changes of 
   paradigm, scientists usually develop many speculative and unarticulated
   theories that can themselves point the way to discovery.  Often, 
   however, that discovery is not quite the one anticipated by the
   speculative and tentative hypothesis.  Only as experiment and tentative 
   theory are together articulated to a match does the discovery emerge and 
   the theory become a paradigm."  (Kuhn, _Structure_, ch. VI)

The crucial difference between this cartoon and the one Bob Kovsky
offered is that this one emphasizes *anomalies* - experimental results
- and Kovsky emphasized *theories*.  In the Kuhnian view, results make
the old paradigm quite shaky well before any new paradigm is fully ready 
to replace it.  By the time a new paradigm is fully articulated
most of the scientific community is well convinced of the crisis in
the old.  (There are examples, such as Darwinism, where resistance
goes on much longer.  Usually there are external reasons - religious
doctrine being the obvious one for evolution.)

This is an especially important distinction to draw when discussing
Usenet crackpots, who tend to offer completely new theories but no
new results.  [This is a usenet bias, as in the real history of science
not all crackpots are theorists; there have been quite a few bogus new 
results - N-rays, polywater, cold fusion, etc. (some of which were not
totally crackpot) ]  

Kuhn's book exploded the vision of science as a constant accumulation of 
knowledge and progression toward truth - the teleological view, or
"Whig interpretation of history."  It has so penetrated the fabric
of our thinking about science that "we are all Kuhnians now."  (To
paraphrase whoever said that about Keynes.)  Ironically, at the time
the old guard of the philosophy of science attacked Kuhn as anti-rationalist 
and undermining the legitimacy of science.  Now, the only people who
cite Kuhn to undermine the legitimacy of "normal" science are on the 
fringes.

Here is another apposite quotation:

  "Anomaly appears only against the background provided by the paradigm.
  The more precise and far-reaching that paradigm is, the more sensitive
  am indicator it provides of anomaly and hence of an occasion for
  paradigm change.  In the normal mode of discovery, even resistance to
  change has a use ....  By ensuring that the paradigm will not be too
  easily surrendered, resistance guarantees that scientists will not be
  lightly distracted and that the anomalies that lead to paradigm change
  will penetrate existing knowledge to the core.  The very fact that a
  significant scientific novelty so often emerges simultaneously from
  several laboratories is an index both to the strongly traditional
  nature of normal science and to the completeness with which that
  traditional pursuit prepares the way for its own change."
      ---T.S. Kuhn, _The Structure of Scientific Revolutions_, end of Ch.VI


C. Cagle somewhat snidely suggested that people here should go read Kuhn.  
Perhaps in fact it is C. Cagle who needs to re-read Kuhn.
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / mitchell swartz /  If he only had a brain
     
Originally-From: mica@world.std.com (mitchell swartz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: If he only had a brain
Subject: If he only had a brain
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 13:36:19 GMT
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA


   In Message-ID: <3sn8hm$1ap@agate.berkeley.edu>
Subject: If he only had a brain
schultz@garnet.berkeley.edu (Richard Schultz) projects again,
suggesting ---  no.... proving decisively that HE is without a
very functional analytic brain.

Mr. Schultz remains a key anti-CF strawman -- and his mail-box,
based upon some of his posts and quotes, remains
well "over the rainbow".    Although he certainly remains tedious,
perhaps there are a few sentient minds out there who might profit
by this discussion.

 -rs  "You know, if you would just once -- just once include a comment of
 -rs  substance, we might actually get somewhere.  To encourage you to do
 -rs  so, I will repeat a serious question that has been asked of you
 -rs  at least four times.  In a previous post, you listed among the factors
 -rs  that influence CF reaction products "coherence length."  I am not
 -rs  familiar with the term "coherence length" in this context.  Could you
 -rs  please explain what it means when one is talking about Cold Fusion?
 -rs  Thank you.  "

Mr. Schultz:
  You would be familiar if you kept up with the cold fusion literature.
It is big, but not a big as that on HOT FUSION or EBOLA virus,
so there is not explanation for your constant need to be "spoon-fed".

 As is commonly uses "coherence length" is 
a term used to refer to lasers. and to other coherent systems.
In those cases it is a function of physical relations
within the laser as it is designed, and it also
applies to the nature of the laser's active medium itself.
Now with respect to electromagnetic radiation in a relatively confined
chamber,  including optical wavelengths, it
has also been used to refer to in-phase amplification from 
deexcitations from excited states driven by the Einstein B-coefficient.

[With respect to Schultzs' previous incorrect comment:
There is nothing indirect about the laser medium -- it is
key to the functioning of the device; and the Lamb dip
within the population comprising the excited state of the
medium confirms the impact of the laser upon it and visa versa.]

[speaking in frequency space -- 
The coherence length in that case enables the Fabry-perot
 "comb" structure (1) multiplied with the gaussian output
of the medium (2) [convolved in time]
is what makes the laser work (if you can
make the medium active by inverting populations
and then select out one (or more)
of the spikes of the product (1*2) in frequency-space.]

If Schultz -- or the other TB-skeptics -- had actually 
read the cold fusion literature (e.g. Proc. of 
ICCF-4) there use of coherent lengths, systems, and
function were discussed in at least two papers.  In one
this refered to Peter Hagelstein's theories, in the other
this dealt with the PERIODIC wavefunction within the
palladium lattice.   

Any further discussion would require a reading of  more literature.
  It is unlikely any TB-CF-skeptic will.     

=======================================

   >  Schultz' sexism, and fawning over sheep, appears to be as
   >inappropriate as many of his "comments" are to science. 
-rs  "So tell me, is challenging another poster's manhood, as in asking
-rs  "are you man enough to answer these questions", appropriate
-rs  to science?  If so, how?  If not, why not?"

  Wish we had WAIS here because memory serves that  it was
Mr. Schultz who did cruise the net here seeking, and discussing,
the size of his organ.  Since he has acted like a goober when he
did this, the phrase was used to maximize the impedance match
to his "mind".

=======================================

-rs  "Let me rephrase:  if it is appropriate, then perhaps you can tell
-rs  us why *you* are not man enough to send me either a copy of
-rs  your publication list or enough information so that I can find it
-rs  myself?  Or are you afraid that your claims about its content will
-rs  turn out to be, let us say, inflated? 

Mr. Schultz:
This is irrelevant to fusion, but if you start and post yours, at least
some of us will certainly consider following your lead.

=======================================

   >The quote is just another example of his truly unique behavior
   >and a window into his "mind".
-rs  "Instead of finding examples of my so-called unique behavior, why
-rs  don't you simply address any of the substantive issues I have
-rs  raised, either the recent ones, or the ones from several months ago,
-rs  or the ones from several years ago?  It would probably be a better
-rs  use of your time."

It was Mr. Schultz who failed to answer.  Mr. Schultz interrupted reasonable
postings between Dick Blue and myself -- as he has done with others
and other posts -- but failed to reply as is his m.o.  It was
brought to Mr. Schultz's attention but he feels too uncomfortable
to respond except in a tardive manner, if at all.

=======================================

 -rs  "For instance:  how many conferences have you been involved with 
 -rs  programming?  That can't take too long to calculate."

Nothing to do with fusion of course.
The fact is that despite Mr. Schultz's obfuscation
the group for which Mr. Schultz spoke for, and interrupted 
communication with, the organization cited -- based upon letters 
received by the participants -- 
did attempt to banish all of cold fusion to a parking garage.  
Mr. Schultz did not respond to those issues either with specificity.

=======================================

 -rs  "Or how about this:  how much energy is deposited to the lattice in
 -rs  a Moessbauer transition?  How much goes to the gamma ray?"

This was discussed.  
Mr. Schultz
  If you have anything to add state it or hold your "piece".
Do your own calculations, and "put your head on the chopping
block" with your numbers, calculations, and theories.

=======================================

-rs  "Or how about this:  what influence upon the *lifetime* of the Fe*
-rs  excited state does the lattice have in Moessbauer spectroscopy, and
-rs  how does this extrapolate to setting an upper limit on the lifetime
-rs  of the He* state in a putative "Moessbauer like" CF process?"

Fascinating question.
Mr. Schultz -- care to elaborate with a rate calculation?
And the upper limit is that it is FORBIDDEN.
Doubt that you will however.

=======================================

-rs  "Or how about this:  Radioactive decays in lattices such as those of
-rs  U and Th are MeV processes that are invariably accompanied by MeV
-rs  energetic particles or photons or both.  What mechanism would suppress
-rs  such emissions in the case of (and *only* in the case of) He* in a
-rs  Pd lattice?"

  New pathways don't require suppression.  Do they.  They offer
new mechanisms.  Sort of like additional pathways in
triplet decay from excited electronic orbitals.

=======================================

 -rs  "Or how about this:  what is the difference between a "virtual photon"
 -rs  and a "real photon"?"

along what axis?   Why would Mr. Schultz ask?  ]
Mr. Schultz:  Please elaborate since 
although you can ask a lot of questions you rarely take the time
explain your reasons, if any, if ever.

=======================================

 -rs  "Just to point out where those last four came from. 
 -rs    Earlier, Swartz claimed
 -rs  that he had already answered all of the issues about his Moessbauer
 -rs  Hypothesis. [zip]"

Incorrect and self serving.  Typical for Mr. Schultz.

=======================================

 -rs  "Funny that.  In any case, Swartz did not refute a single one of these
 -rs  serious objections to his hypothesis, as anyone who looks through the
 -rs  archive can easily determine."
 
Funny that.  Even Dick Blue now admits that these couplings
can exist, 

     -"(on the nuclear-lattice coupling in the Mossbauer effect which
      -  demonstrates that such a coupling exists)
     -Mere existance of such coupling is not at issue.
     -  I concede that couplings
     -do exist!"
       [Message-ID: <9506261452.AA25687@pilot03.cl.msu.edu>
             blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue)]

 Since the coupling can exist, there is
a precedent in material science to explain the CF phenomena.
There is no evidence that they place role in CF. 
Never said they did.  Wouldn't have been prudent.

=======================================

 -rs  "He has the opportunity to do so now, and I would hope that he would
 -rs  avail himself of it.  After all, he (or his Doppelgaenger) wouldn't
 -rs  want to appear (dare I say it) mendacious."

The mendacity has all been yours, Mr. Schultz.  As CF is borne
out in more labs, and more readers become aware, Schultz
and his Doppelgangers will be exposed for what they are --
"an abcess on the arm of industrial and scientific progress
on this matter".

       Best wishes, colleagues.
          Mitchell Swartz

=======================================

         "French bread makes very good skis" 
           [Richard Schultz]

"I think you're thinking of Wyoming, where the men are men, 
the women are men, and the sheep are scared."
       [Richard Schultz, 22 Jun 1995; 
          <3scoir$m73@agate.berkeley.edu>]




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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Bill Snyder /  Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
     
Originally-From: bsnyder@iadfw.net (Bill Snyder)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test (preliminary)
Date: 27 Jun 1995 20:48:02 GMT
Organization: Internet America

In article <mmalloryDAtJrx.I6A@netcom.com>, Mark Mallory 
(mmallory@netcom.com) says...
>
>jedrothwell@delphi.com wrote:
>: Another problem here is that you got yourself a power company billing 
meter.
>: That's fine, but it shows apparent power. You need to know the power 
factor
>: to compute real power. I'll bet if you use a better meter to measure 
PF, you
>: will see that you are a tad over unity already. Maybe 10 or 20%. 
That's
>: no big deal compared to what the Yusmar will give you when you set it 
up
>: right.
>:  
>: - Jed
>
>This is baloney.  Jed obviously knows nothing about electrical 
>instrumentation.  Virtually all "power company billing meters" (watthour 
>meters - what the power companies use to determine our electric bill) 
>take power factor into account.
>

Rothwell has made this statement about utility meters before, over on the 
CompuServe Science forum when he first began to puff the Griggs device.  
He was corrected by several people that time too.  Seeing him repeat this 
obvious and silly BS after all this time, one has to wonder if it is the 
Official Griggs/Rothwell Party Line on obtaining "excess heat" from such 
devices ("Well, yes, according to the power company's meter it's only 80% 
efficient, but you see *that* meter isn't measuring the *REAL* input 
power...")

  -- Bill Snyder            [ This space unintentionally left blank. ]

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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Barry Merriman /  Re: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
Date: 29 Jun 1995 01:48:17 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <5kxcXkM.jedrothwell@delphi.com> jedrothwell@delphi.com writes:
> there is one central
> fact about him and his work which anyone knows, and anyone can verify: he
> failed to convince the world... the main lesson
> was ignored, trampled up, and forgotten for 50 years longer than it should
> have been. That is a fact of history anyone can learn, in any history of
> medicine. The nitty gritty details of Semmelweis's own life are not as
> important as that overall fact of history.
>  

Well, I agree but I would amend that a little: he failed to 
convince the world primarily becasue of his own personal failings.
The fact is the medical world was going to have initial resistance
to disinfection, since it was an entirely new concept and practice.
Thus, there is a certain amount of ``lobbying'', both via
definitive experimental demonstrations, and personal campaigning, 
that had to be done. Semmelweis simply did not have the personality
and mental stability to carry through such an extended, uphill battle.
His personality was too harsh, and he overall behavior was too
erratic to carry out such a campaign.

A better indicator of the way things _could_ have worked is to 
look at lister. 20 years after I.S.'s initial demonstration, 
(ie 1867) Lister independently discovered the idea of surgical
disinfection, based theoretically on the newly published results
of pasteur. So, Lister had both a theoretical basis for his work
(Pasteurs demonstration that germs decomposed organic matter),
and carried out a number of clinical demonstrations. Further,
Lister is said to have had a superlative personality and
character...no one had bad things to say about him personally.
So, here you have the best possible situation for a new
discovery: a theroetical basis, numerous clinical demonstrations,
incredible benefits to be realized, and a likable protagonist. 
STILL, it took 15 years of slow steady progression for Listers
work to win widespread conversion and recognition in his
own country of Germany, and even longer in other countries. Lister
himself predicited it would take a full generation for his ideas
to become accepted.

So, you see, Semelweis clearly failed because he didn't have the 
personal skills needed for such a campaign. Rather than lamenting 
the tragedy of Semmelweiss---who essentially self-destructed,
throwing himself off a path originally much like Listers inexorable
climb---one should lament the tragedy of Lister, who, even doing
*everything right* took 15 years to spread his ideas just
within his country.

Yes, in a perfect world all other physicians would have rapidly 
grasped the significance and import of I.S.'s results, at least as
they applied to obstetrics. But it is unrealistic to expect that,
*especially in a time when the scientif method of proof
was still developing in clinical medicine*. In this day and age,
especially in medicine, the timescale for such changes is 
clearly much shorter, as introduction of the polio vaccine
shows, for example. 

These days, any phenomena that is robustly 
repeatable and readily reproducible is pounced on and recieved
immediatley, as the case of high temperature super conductivity
clearly shows (remember that was a _radical_ discovery; no significant
increase in critical temperature had been made since the discovery
of superconductivity 80 years prior, and further there was a well
respected quantum theory of superconductivity that ruled out
critical temperatures much higher than those already known. );
*two* years after the announcement, I was playing with 
widely available demonstrations of the HiTc materials 
(Meisner effect) at liquid nitrogen temperatures in physics classes.

That differs considerably from the history of P&F cold fusion, which,
in the wake of HiTC, received a similar initial *massive* burst
of scientific attention, and then fizzled as the inability to replicate
mounted....6 years later (and 10 years after P&F actually claim
to have started their researh on it) we are still waiting for P&F
to propose a replicable experiment. 






--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / A Plutonium /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu (Archimedes Plutonium)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: 29 Jun 1995 01:07:20 GMT
Organization: Plutonium College

In article <tomkDAwou1.9wG@netcom.com>
tomk@netcom.com (Thomas H. Kunich) writes:

> As you have been doing rather regularly. So what? Now, tell us that Pons
> and Fleischman are "trying to solve fusion." What a joke! You can't even
> see a con job when it has you by the privates!


  To the contrary, I see many con jobs in science and math. Here is a
short list.
1) Weinberg on Big Bang
2) Hawking on Black Holes
3) whoever on Neutron stars
4) Evolution theory
5) Einstein on GR
6) Guth on Inflation
7) BCS on superconductivity
8) Cantor on transfinites
9) Cantor on diagonal method
10) Apell&Haken on 4 color mapping problem
11) Smale, Freedman on PC
12) the Continuum Hypothesis nonproblem
13) Taylor/Wiles on FLT

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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / A Plutonium /  Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
     
Originally-From: Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu (Archimedes Plutonium)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: Where's the CNF water heater Heeter?
Date: 29 Jun 1995 01:16:30 GMT
Organization: Plutonium College

In article <3sl0hp$im0@newsbf02.news.aol.com>
mrichar353@aol.com (MRichar353) writes:

> Also, I just can't stand this "accurate hadron count" bit anymore. Sounds
> rather scientific, very impressive. Please tell me how you would
> accurately count the hadrons (about 10^24 or so) in the samples? Puleese!

Okay, thanks for I am trying to brew up a experiment on this "HADRON
COUNT"

Obviously to spot say 100 hadrons and keep a close eye on them is
beyond our science means as of present. But here is another way which
is indirect.

We can weigh a whole physics cold fusion apparatus. Picture sort of
like a balancing beam with two apparatuses. Both ends of the balancing
beam have identical equipment. Balance them as best we can with modern
state of the art equipment. Now do the cold fusion experiment in the
one and not the other. Warning: experimental physicists can compensate
for the electricity flow in the one which is not in the other. If
radioactive spontaneous neutron materialization (cold fusion) is
occurring in the cold fusion apparatus, and enough of rsnm then the
balancing beam will fall on that as more weight. If conservation of
energy/mass is violated by cold fusion devices, then it seems to me
that a accurate balancing beam can measure it. 
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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Barry Merriman /  Top Ten Reasons To Cut The Fusion Budget
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Top Ten Reasons To Cut The Fusion Budget
Date: 29 Jun 1995 02:12:16 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE


The Sci.Physics.Fusion Top Ten Reasons to Cut the Fusion Budget
 --------------------------------------------------------------

10. KitchenAide soon to release new blender with special
    ``Grigg's Frappe'' excess heat setting.

9. Must redirect funding to close US-Japan Cold Fusion Cell Gap

8. All future energy needs can be met by burning 
   unsold issues of "Infinite Energy" magazine.

7. One word: "Sono-fusion"

6. The American people just can't wait for the Higgs Boson!

5. Because Jed Rothwell says so, so SHUT UP!

4. Savings will allow endowed "Paul Koloc" Chair at MIT Dept of Poetry

3. Zeroing out fusion budget allows program to prosper
   by tapping into budgetary quantum Zero Point Fluctuations.

2. Money needed to stockpile strategic reserve of Palladium.

And the number one reason the fusion budget should be cut....

1. Five words: "WELFARE QUEENS IN WHITE COATS!"


--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Monkey King /  Re: Potapov device test discussion
     
Originally-From: monkey@engin.umich.edu (Monkey King)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test discussion
Date: 29 Jun 1995 03:01:51 GMT
Organization: University of Michigan Engineering, Ann Arbor

In article <3srotd$lao@netfs.dnd.ca>, Bill Page <wspage@ncs.dnd.ca> wrote:
>In article <73044-804263664@mindlink.bc.ca>, Bruce_Dunn@mindlink.bc.ca
(Bruce Dunn) says:
>>Clearly, what is needed in the test setup is some thermometers to measure
>>the temperature of water going into the pump, going from the pump to the
>>device, and going out of the device.  The delta Ts and flow rates should
>>directly indicate the thermal inputs of the pump vs. the device.
>>
>I wonder if it is practical to attempt to measure 0.1 deg. C. temperature
>differences in a high volume turbulent flow. Even measuring the flow
>rate accurately enought might be problematic. It is much easier to
>measure the integrated effect on the heat reservoir.

It may not be practical to measure delta-T as it flows, but how about
taking out the Potapov device, just run the water through the pump for some
time, say 30 minutes, and measure the final temperature?   You can then put
the Potapov thing back in, run for the same time, and see the difference.


-- 
Monkey King                 | This message printed on 
monkey@engin.umich.edu      | recycled material.
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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / A Plutonium /  Re: 10 billion spent on hot fusion? Instead divide it three 
     
Originally-From: Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu (Archimedes Plutonium)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: 10 billion spent on hot fusion? Instead divide it three 
Date: 29 Jun 1995 02:52:46 GMT
Organization: Plutonium College

In article <jaboweryDAvABp.Dx0@netcom.com>
jabowery@netcom.com (Jim Bowery) writes:

> How much money was spent on light bulb implosion fusion last year?
> 
> I've got a whole buncha votes in my district sez we should put money
> on that one, too!
> 
> Look, dear one, if you aren't willing to put YOUR OWN MONEY where your 
> mouth is, please have the decency to avoid hindering those of us who are.
> 
> Picking winners in technology is not generally a good role for poltical 
> processes.
> 
> Yes, I know this flies in the face of decades of declining 
> technical and economic prowess as the politcians triumphed -- 
> but some of us would rather see progress for some strange reason.

  Maybe I am misunderstanding your political savvy? But are you saying,
take all the presidental candidates and inertially confine them? Then
take multiple lasers and implode them to see if they for once do not
"duck" the issue?

  The main drift of my post was just recognition of facts. 
1) Hot fusion has two strikes against it, whether the theory works is
unknown and the control of plasma is perhaps a losing cause.
2) Inertial confinement has only one strike against it, does the theory
work? But control is inherent, it is built into the system, unlike hot
fusion.
3) Sonoluminescence, we do know that we have a science as yet
unexplained. It may be inertial confinement of cavity physics of sound
energy.
4) Cold fusion, CF, we do not yet have a confirmed science. But it may
be inertial confinement of cavity physics of electrical energy.

  From looking at those facts, I thought it prudent that most of the
money spent on research of fusion be allocated to the inertial
confinement fusion. I reiterate that in inertial confinement the
CONTROL of the fusion process is already built in. So it would seem
that success for fusion would have the best chances with inertial
confinement. Plus adding to inertial confinement is the science of
sonoluminescence and CF which both may be the same cavity physics.
  It is good to stop now and then and review the logic for further
attack. And I want to mention that I am informed that CF is not
sonoluminescence for reasons of lattice; coherency; loading. Well, that
may be, but when the science of sonoluminescence mechanism is unknown,
then it is obvious that cold fusion where it is not yet a confirmed
science can not hold claims of what it is and what it is not.

  It may turn out that CF is a science. But a science that is not
output predictable. Think about it. We may find out that CF exists,
just as sonoluminescence exists. But as a science it is not amenable to
apparatus devices which yield results in a predictable manner. CF
devices may be radioactivity writ large. Devices which give off more
energy than put in, but only with unpredictable output. With a lump of
plutonium say, the heat output is predictable because of the very many
individual atoms composing the lump. So then the unpredictable single
atom of PU is transfigured into the highly predictive equations of
radioactive decay because of the large number of single PU atoms. But
CF may be physics's first experiments into a science which exists, but
is a quantum experiment writ large and thus unpredictable. And it may
be always unpredictable, but that will not keep us from finding out
more and more about it. It will just make CF an impractical energy
source.
cudkeys:
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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Barry Merriman /  Re: Barry Merriman is irrational and unscientific
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Barry Merriman is irrational and unscientific
Date: 29 Jun 1995 03:45:21 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <21cenlogic-2706951811290001@austin-1-10.i-link.net> 

> I remain convinced that the rising backpressure due to the
> increasing head in the effluent tank may be significant. Suppose, for
> example, that when Griggs turns the valve that diverts the steam flow from
> the air to the effluent tank, the rising backpressure causes the water
> outflow from the pump housing to fall below the water inflow. That would
> have to happen, wouldn't it? And if water out suddenly falls below water
> in when the measurement phase commenses, doesn't that mean a water buildup
> inside the rotor? Clearly, it does. And doesn't a water buildup in the
> rotor mean improved thermal conductivity from the rotor to the fluid
> stream? Clearly it does. And does this not mean that the rotor will begin
> to dump stored heat into the fluid stream at this point? So it would seem.
> 

Except that normally one would also expect a commensurate increase
in viscous coupling if the thermal coupling is increasing, and this
would show up as a variable load on the motor. So, it seems unlikely
that you would remain in low drag mode but have a strongly
increasing thermal conductivity.

Also, I don;t recall that it was clearly said there __is__ and
increase in backpressure. This would only be true if the steam
tube were at a constant height, well below the barrel water
level. 

Again, I stick by my approach: ours is not to reason why,
our it but to do the energy balance correctly in the experiment.


--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Barry Merriman /  To Steve Jones: What happened to Journal Muon Catalyzed Fusion?
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: To Steve Jones: What happened to Journal Muon Catalyzed Fusion?
Date: 29 Jun 1995 03:59:08 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

I noticed our group library has about 6 issues of the Jounral
Muon Catalyzed Fusion, and that it only prsisted 1987-92;
you were listed as an editor...what led to the termination,
and is there any active muon work still going on?



--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Bill Rowe /  Re: Potapov device tests
     
Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device tests
Date: Thu, 29 Jun 1995 03:46:17 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <9506281405.AA11932@pilot02.cl.msu.edu>, blue@pilot.msu.edu
(Richard A Blue) wrote:

[ skipped ]

>Now what does the Potapov device add to the problem?  It is driven by the
>mechanical power of the fluid stream and it outputs heat.  Here we define
>efficiency as total power out over the mechanical power input.  The
>question at hand is what is that efficiency?  The claim has been that it
>approaches 300%, but Scott's measurements do not confirm that claim.  In
>fact what Scott observes is perfectly consistant with what you would
>expect.  The Potapov device is essentially 100% efficient!  It is in fact
>hard to imagine how one could make it less efficient.

I think the Popov device should be somewhat less than 100% efficient as
long as the output considered is only the increase in water temperature.
Some energy must go toward heading the Popov device itself. Some portion
of this energy should get transferred to the ambient environment which
implies the thermal energy of the water is somewhat less than the
mechanical power input.
-- 
William Rowe                                                   browe@netcom.com
MD5OfPublicKey: F29A99C805B41838D9240AEE28EBF383
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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Barry Merriman /  A conspicuous House Budget Item
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: A conspicuous House Budget Item
Date: 29 Jun 1995 04:08:58 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE


From the proposed U.S. House of Representatives budget:

>BASIC ENERGY SCIENCES:  "The Committee recommendation for Basic
>Energy Sciences is $792,661,000, a decrease of $18,758,000 [or
>2.3%] from the budget request of $811,419,000.  [FY95
>appropriation: $733.9 million.]
>
...
>
>"Within available funds, $1,000,000 is provided to fund
>peer-reviewed research on the potential energy applications of
>sonoluminescence.  Sonoluminescence is an effect in which highly
>concentrated sound waves in liquids generate very short bursts of
>light from bubbles in the liquid.  Calculations have suggested the
>possibility of its use in inertial fusion applications."
>

Now, who got that little item tucked in there?!? So, I guess
ol' Newt is a sono-fusion guy :-). Personally, I support the
research, but I just though it odd they felt compelled to explicity
mention it in the budget...I didn't realize sono-fusion was
a major topic with the U.S people :-). Also, it seems odd that
congress is mandating specific research topics.

Now, how can I get my chunk of that COOL mill---I could
use a new Jag :-)



--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / Bill Rowe /  Re: Time to close it down?
     
Originally-From: browe@netcom.com (Bill Rowe)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Time to close it down?
Date: Thu, 29 Jun 1995 03:55:44 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

In article <1995Jun28.045534.2528@rosevax.rosemount.com>,
bill@texan.rosemount.com (William Hawkins) wrote:

>I've been away for a while.  On return, it looks like the
>inmates have taken over the asylum.

Perhaps. Often there does seem to be a lack of care in some postings.

>Sci.physics.fusion was created when cold fusion was a new
>phenomenon, and the possibility of new scientific discoveries
>existed.  Six years later, there has been no new science, and
>the psuedoscience has dominated the discussion.  Seems like it
>is time to disband the sci group and return it to alt.

I agree the case for cold fusion hasn't been completely made. However,
there are some interesting data which hasn't been adequetely explained
using more conventional physics. It seems to me as long as this is the
case, it isn't time to disband the group.
-- 
William Rowe                                                   browe@netcom.com
MD5OfPublicKey: F29A99C805B41838D9240AEE28EBF383
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------------------------------
1995.06.29 / David Burkhead /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: r3dlb1@dax.cc.uakron.edu (David L Burkhead )
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 29 Jun 1995 04:27:25 GMT
Organization: The University of Akron, Akron, Ohio

>Dieter Britz <britz@kemi.aau.dk> writes:
>
>>On 26 Jun 1995 matt@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU wrote:
>
>>[...] 
>>> Have there ever been any discoveries that were initially ridiculed by
>>> the scientific community and were later recognized to be
>>> breakthroughs?  Maybe.  If there are any, though, they're a lot rarer
>>> than most non-scientists think.  I'm not familiar with any in my own
>>> field (physics), but maybe there are some.  In geology, plate
>>> tectonics might be a valid example.
>
>>Surely You're Joking, Mr. Austern? Indeed, plate tectonics is an example,
>>in fact one of many. How about Darwin, Einstein, etc? 
>

     That turns out not to be the case.  What was "initially rejected"
was not plate tectonics, but continental drift.  The continental drift
theory was _not_ the same thing as plate tectonics, although they do
share some similar features.  The objections to continental drift,
chiefly that the continents could not plow their way through the ocean
floor crust were valid then, and are valid now.  It was not until a
new theory, backed up by new data, involving the entire crust being
broken into "plates" that moved as a unit (carrying the continental
bodies with them) instead of continents somehow swimming through thick
basalt, that it could be accepted.

     When the new theory, supported by new data, arose, it quickly
became the standard since it explained observations better than
previous theories.

     Thus, "plate tectonics" is _not_ an example.

David L. Burkhead
r3dlb1@dax.cc.uakron.edu
d.burkhead@genie.geis.com

-- 
          Spacecub  -  The Artemis Project  -  Artemis Magazine

                             Box 831
                      Akron,  OH  44309-0831
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------------------------------
1995.06.27 / Ben Weiner /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: bweiner@electron.rutgers.edu (Ben Weiner)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 27 Jun 1995 22:18:40 -0400
Organization: Rutgers University

tdp@id.net (Tom Potter) writes:

>The thought occurs to me:
>how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
>to be validated and accepted,
>if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?

innuendo aside (why drag race/ethnicity into this?), if a completely 
valid theory of everything (presuming such a thing exists, of which 
I am not convinced) is published tomorrow, it will take a _long_ time 
before it is accepted by all physicists.  Even if it's published by
somebody who might be expected to come up with a theory of
everything, say Ed Witten.  

If the supposed TOE is published by an established theoretical
physicist who happens to be Mayan or Black (African-American, 
did you mean?), I don't think it will take significantly longer
to be accepted than if published by a established theoretical physicist
who happens to be white.  If it is published by, say, a person
without a college degree, it will take a very long time to be
accepted regardless of the ethnicity of the proponent.

I hope you weren't using "Mayan or Black" as short hand for outsiders
excluded from the physics establishment.  You didn't really mean to
imply that there aren't any Mayan or Black physicists, did you?
Because of course there are - not in proportion to their share of
the world's population, regrettably, but it seems like you might
have just written all the Mayan or Black physicists out of your mind.

(Friendly warning:  Don't try to out-politically correct me.  You
are messing with an expert.  Heh, heh, heh.)

btw, about TOEs, theories of everything are overrated.  The day
somebody comes up with a theory that allows simple analytical
calculation of magnetohydrodynamics problems, then I'll be impressed.
Also, I have an open challenge out to all crackpots on sci.physics
to come up with a good alternative theory for the temperature 
dependence of the heat capacity of metals.  Nobody's ever bit.

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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Barry Merriman /  Re: Cold Fusion???
     
Originally-From: barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Cold Fusion???
Date: 28 Jun 1995 04:44:49 GMT
Organization: UCSD SOE

In article <3sqjpa$dh3@maureen.teleport.com> Charles Cagle  
<singtech@teleport.com> writes:
> barry@starfire.ucsd.edu (Barry Merriman) wrote:
> 
> >Oh, and Phil, one more comment: beware of taking science advice from
> >folks on the Internet. It is quite possible that they don't know
> >what they are talking about, and may also spin hyperbolic lies in order 
> >to grind some personal axe. 
> 
> That specifically applies to you, Barry.

Oh really? Care to spell out how---or do you think you do so below?

> 

> claim of 100 Billion is a whole 
> lot closer to the truth than claims of potential success with PPPL's 
> fusion efforts.  And with all the side line support it may be closer to 
> the truth at 100 Billion than most are willing to admit.  Amazing how 
> creative accounting can enter into the picture when hiding the true 
> cost.  

Creative accounting??? Look, Mr. Cagle, I spelled the U.S.
magnetic fusion energy budget out in fair detail, from 
its inception in 1958 to the present. The total expenditures
are about $8 billion, maybe translating to $15 billion in 1995 dollars.
THAT WAS THE BUDGET. Exactly what hidden expenditures are you talking 
about?

Unless you can document a hidden expenditure, I suggest you abandon
the futile attempt to inflate expenditures.

> How about the costs to keep gov't labs going which have 
> connections and interests in the fusion programs?  Not count them either 
> or any related portion of associated expenditures?  I think Mitchell is 
> far closer to the truth than you are Barry.  

The national labs do _far far more_ than work on fusion. Their
primary reason for existence is weapons development. It is
rediculaous to try and include their budgets into the costs
of fusion, just because a small fraction of lab personell work
on fusion.

>  The truth hurts.  If you can't admit that the 
> U.S. program on fusion is in moral and scientific trouble then you are 
> also in moral trouble, or morally bankrupt.

Uh, I'll admit it when you provide some actual evidence rather than 
just a claim from someone of dubious background---unless you would
care to post your credential for making such claims in liue of
actual evidence. I mean, if you were a former top DOE official 
maybe your comments would carry some weight on their own. But,
in reality I suspect you are a crank with their own axe to grind.
You wouldn't happen to have any radical new theories of physics
that allow miraculous inventions which never actually
get built, now would you?> 

> The limitations of the 
> Tokamak are that it will never yield break even.  I would say that is 
> pretty good reason for pulling the plug on the thugs.

Yes, that is an excellent reason to pull the plug, and such a plug
was pulled onmagnetic mirror fusion, so that is proof that fusion
managers are not afraid of pulling such a plug, no?

However, since JET is scheduled to demonstrate breakeven next 
year, how is that going to effect your world view. Would
you care to bet, say $1000 that they can't do it?


> 
> 
> Charles Cagle
> Chief Technical Officer
> Singularity Technologies, Inc,

And, pray tell, just how many staff scientists work underneath you?
You wouldn't happen to be the _only_ technical officier would you?
I am still waiting for you to send me some technical references to your 
radical ideas, but I guess it is not in your best interest to correspond
with actual scientists.


--
Barry Merriman
UCSD Fusion Energy Research Center
UCLA Dept. of Math
bmerriman@fusion.ucsd.edu (Internet; NeXTMail is welcome)


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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Jim Bowery /  Re: 10 billion spent on hot fusion? Instead divide it three ways
     
Originally-From: jabowery@netcom.com (Jim Bowery)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion,alt.sci.physics.plutonium
Subject: Re: 10 billion spent on hot fusion? Instead divide it three ways
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 05:09:25 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

Archimedes Plutonium (Archimedes.Plutonium@dartmouth.edu) wrote:
:    A prudent person would review the govt. money allocated for physics
: fusion. How much govt money was spent on plasma hot fusion last year?
: How much govt money was spent on inertial confinement fusion last year?
: How much govt money was spent on cold fusion last year?

How much money was spent on light bulb implosion fusion last year?

I've got a whole buncha votes in my district sez we should put money
on that one, too!

Look, dear one, if you aren't willing to put YOUR OWN MONEY where your 
mouth is, please have the decency to avoid hindering those of us who are.

Picking winners in technology is not generally a good role for poltical 
processes.

Yes, I know this flies in the face of decades of declining 
technical and economic prowess as the politcians triumphed -- 
but some of us would rather see progress for some strange reason.
-- 
The promotion of politics exterminates apolitical genes in the population.
  The promotion of frontiers gives apolitical genes a route to survival.
                 Change the tools and you change the rules.
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / M Fullerton /  Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
     
Originally-From: mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalgary.ca (Michael Ernest Fullerton)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Merriman's theory shot down in flames!
Date: 28 Jun 1995 05:59:33 GMT
Organization: The University of Calgary

Alan M. Dunsmuir (Alan@moonrake.demon.co.uk) wrote:
: In article: <3soare$lg0@ds2.acs.ucalgary.ca>  mefuller@acs4.acs.ucalga
y.ca (Michael Ernest 
: Fullerton) writes:
: > I think skeptopaths also ignore data because they cannot tolerate
: > change or uncertainty.  Or perhaps they lack the thought
: > processes to think in a novel way.
: > 

: No, Micky, we just lack the ability to think and reason the way you do.

Yes, rationally and logically.

--
Michael Fullerton |  Seeds, like ideas, don't germinate in concrete
Home Page:           http://www.ucalgary.ca/~mefuller/
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 /  matt@godzilla. /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: matt@godzilla.EECS.Berkeley.EDU
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: 28 Jun 1995 06:54:01 GMT
Organization: University of California at Berkeley

In article <mmalloryDAux10.LEI@netcom.com> mmallory@netcom.com (Mark Mallory) writes:

> : The thought occurs to me:
> : how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
> : to be validated and accepted,
> : if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?
> 
> Or a Jew?

I was thinking the same thing.

Just a reminder: 90 years ago, it took about five years a
revolutionary (but correct) theory to be adopted, when its
author was a Jewish patent clerk.  Please don't forget that
back then, anti-semitism meant something.

The Nazis did denounce relativity as "Jewish science", but 
the physics community accepted Einstein.
--
Matt Austern				      matt@physics.berkeley.edu
http://dogbert.lbl.gov/~matt
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Dieter Britz /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: Dieter Britz <britz@kemi.aau.dk>
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 11:59:39 +0200
Organization: DAIMI, Computer Science Dept. at Aarhus University

On 28 Jun 1995, Barry Merriman wrote:

[...]
> > The thought occurs to me:
> > how long would it take for a completely valid theory of everything,
> > to be validated and accepted,
> > if the theory was the work of a Mayan or Black?
> > 
> 
> These days? No longer than if the progenitor were white. A hundred years
> ago, there would have been a slowdown, mainly due to the difficulty
> the progentor would have had in obtaining a suitable position at a
> lab or university. In this era of affirmative action, that would no
> longer be a problem, as minority staus would be seen as an added
> benefit in hiring, rather than a detriment.

You're right and wrong. Race would initially have close to zero to do with
it. The problem would start with the referee reading the paper submitted,
in which the new theory is described. The paper being sort of momentous,
the referee(s) would, after reading a few sentences, have another look at 
who the author is. If it's not a well known name, chances are the referee 
would reject the paper. If he/she does not, and the paper attracts 
attention, THEN I reckon race might start to play a role in how well the 
theory is accepted; one can't be sure but one would hope it would be a 
minor role.

We can't deny that the academic standing of an author has some importance.
E.g., Bockris's antics with transmutation, would be ignored as those of yet
another crackpot, if it were not for the stature of the man. When I first
read about 'cold fusion' way back in March 1989 in a Danish Sunday paper,
my first reaction was to chuckle to myself - ho ho, Sunday paper stuff. Then
I saw Fleischmann's name, and did a double take; I know him and his work, he
is a very respected electrochemist. So I read the whole thing in detail. Now
some of you will say that this shows I am flawed as a scientist (and I might
well be), but I reckon that this is pretty normal behaviour. One does not 
have the time or inclination to closely investigate all the amazing claims
made all the time, and one selects what one focusses on.

-- Dieter Britz  alias  britz@kemi.aau.dk

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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Richard Schultz /  Re: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
     
Originally-From: schultz@garnet.berkeley.edu (Richard Schultz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: J. Rothwell & M. Jones Wrong on Semmelweis
Date: 28 Jun 1995 11:13:18 GMT
Organization: Philosophers of the Dangerous Maybe

In article <3sq9ao$4tn@soenews.ucsd.edu>,
Barry Merriman <barry@starfire.ucsd.edu> wrote:

>After that, she was denied access to see him, and he died two wakes later.

Thus providing James Joyce with the inspiration for one of the Twentieth
Century's least comprehensible (excuse me, greatest) novels.

More seriously, that was an excellent post, although I'm not sure what
good you expect it to do.  For instance, Jed Rothwell once posted that
the New York Times did not believe that the Wright Brothers had a
working airplane for several years.  I responded by quoting the 1903
New York Times articles that proved him wrong, but that has not stopped
him even momentarily from promulgating his myth of how the "media"
refused to believe that flight was possible even after it had been 
demonstrated.
--
					Richard Schultz

"It is terrible to die of thirst in the ocean.  Do you have to salt your
truth so heavily that it does not even quench thirst any more?"
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / William Hawkins /  Time to close it down?
     
Originally-From: bill@texan.rosemount.com (William Hawkins)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Time to close it down?
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 04:55:34 GMT
Organization: Rosemount, Inc.


I've been away for a while.  On return, it looks like the
inmates have taken over the asylum.

Sci.physics.fusion was created when cold fusion was a new
phenomenon, and the possibility of new scientific discoveries
existed.  Six years later, there has been no new science, and
the psuedoscience has dominated the discussion.  Seems like it
is time to disband the sci group and return it to alt.

Usenet has a way to create groups. Does it have a way to
delete them?  While it is true that anyone who does not want
to receive the rantings that dominate this group can simply
unsubscribe (as I will), unsuspecting young minds will be
drawn to this group in the mistaken impression that it has
some basis in science.  OTOH, Usenet is full of traps for
the impressionable.  I still think the right thing to do is
to return this group to alt.

Bill Hawkins  bill@bvc.frco.com  My opinions only, not theirs.
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Nick Maclaren /  Re: I don't see a FAQ, so here goes a Cold Fusion question
     
Originally-From: nmm1@cus.cam.ac.uk (Nick Maclaren)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: I don't see a FAQ, so here goes a Cold Fusion question
Date: 28 Jun 1995 12:33:31 GMT
Organization: U of Cambridge, England

In article <343154687wnr@moonrake.demon.co.uk>, "Alan M. Dunsmuir"
<Alan@moonrake.demon.co.uk> writes:
|> In article: <damir-2406950023470001@damir.mindspring.com>  damir@mind
pring.com (Damir Smitlener) 
|> writes:
|> > Are people being foolish by investing (eg buying stocks) in firms claiming
|> > success, either present or near-future, in this field? Is there real
|> > substance here, or is it another PolyWater - or is it just to early to
|> > tell?
|> 
|> ARE people investing? If they were, they would be very foolish indeed.

Without entering into the CF debate as such, I must contradict this,
on two grounds.

Commercial research funding is a form of gambling, and can be
analysed by standard Game Theory.  CF always was a very long shot,
but had/has the potential to repay its investment thousands of times
over.  This means that investing in it could still be worthwhile,
even if you believe that it is 99.9% sure to be an imaginary effect.
If you believe that it is 99.9999% sure to be imaginary, it probably
isn't worth investing in.

The second aspect is that of energy storage.  Many of the standard,
conventional explanations of some of the effects imply massive levels
of energy storage.  Any technique with energy storage much more efficient
than lead-acid batteries could be worth real money, irrespective of any
energy generation.  sci.energy.hydrogen is full of postings about
research into this area.


Many people and most politicians look for the most likely result, and
ignore the fact that this may not be the best criterion.  It is
critical to consider BOTH the likelihood of success AND the probable
gain, if the outcome is successful.  It is also essential to consider
ALL plausible outcomes, and not just the intended one.  Consistently
successful entrepreneurs are rational gamblers.


Nick Maclaren,
University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory,
New Museums Site, Pembroke Street, Cambridge CB2 3QG, England.
Email:  nmm1@cam.ac.uk
Tel.:  +44 1223 334761    Fax:  +44 1223 334679
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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Richard Blue /  Re: Potapov device tests
     
Originally-From: blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device tests
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 14:10:25 GMT
Organization: Sci.physics.fusion/Mail Gateway

Having seen various responses to the posting of Scott Little's
test results for the Potapov device it becomes clear that a
review of the really basic physics may help to keep any discussion
on track.  Pardon me while I attempt to do that.  If I make any
mistakes, please offer corrections.  That way, in short order,
we should be able to clear away some of the fog.

I think what we have here is an electric motor that takes in
electric power at some measurable rate and delivers mechanical
shaft power to a pump with some efficiency of the order of
80%.

The mechanical shaft power drives a pump which can output that
power in one of two forms.  The pump can do mechanical work on
the fluid flowing in an external circuit, and the pump can heat
the water through turbulance, etc. internal to the pump.  One
might define an efficiency for the pump as the ratio of the mechanical
work done on the external fluid circuit divided by the mechanical
work input at the shaft.

Under an assumption that there is no energy source internal to the
pump simple energy conservation tells us that any power that does
not show up as work done on the external fluid circuit must be
converted into heat within the pump.

To understand what the pump is doing there are basically two sets
of measurements needed, both of which involve the fluid flow rate.
The mechanical power output of the pump can be determined by multiplying
the Volume rate of flow by the pressure difference across the pump.
The thermal power output of the pump can be determined by multiplying
the Mass rate of flow by the heat capacity of the fluid and the temperature
difference across the pump.

What I think needs to be explicitely recognized is that operating parameters
for the system can be varied to change the mechanical efficiency of the
pump from some maximum right down to zero.  It is possible to make the
pump do nothing but heat the water!   The Griggs device seems to tend in
that direction, but it is not clear that it does a better job of being
inefficient (in the mechanical sense) than would any off-the-shelf water
pump.

Now what does the Potapov device add to the problem?  It is driven by the
mechanical power of the fluid stream and it outputs heat.  Here we define
efficiency as total power out over the mechanical power input.  The
question at hand is what is that efficiency?  The claim has been that it
approaches 300%, but Scott's measurements do not confirm that claim.  In
fact what Scott observes is perfectly consistant with what you would
expect.  The Potapov device is essentially 100% efficient!  It is in fact
hard to imagine how one could make it less efficient.

Again the mechanical power input from the fluid stream can be determined
from the flow rate and the pressure difference while the flow rate and
temperature difference give the thermal power.  It would seem then that
the flow rate, temperatures at four points in the circuit and pressures
at four points in the circuit will tell all.

The confusion begins when you start to look for adjustable parameters with
which you may seek to control the performance of the Potapov device.
Basically that device, as I understand it, is totally passive.  You have
a flow rate and a pressure differential that are totally linked.  If
you set one the other is determined.  At this point we see the Potapov
fans running for cover under the excuse that Scott has not done his
testing in the appropriate operating range.  The "effect" has not
kicked in.

It seems to me that if you buy that argument, Scott has little choice but
to beef up his pump to get a higher throughput.  That is unless there
is buried in the Moldavian instruction book some information as to how
one tunes the device to make it work its magic at a lower flow rate.

Dick Blue

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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Richard Blue /  Re: Implications of Miles results
     
Originally-From: blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Implications of Miles results
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 14:40:27 GMT
Organization: Sci.physics.fusion/Mail Gateway

Re-re-recross of Mitchell Swartz.

If you did the calculation I suggested you would learn that the
Mossbauer coupling leads to a decrease in the energy transfer from
the nuclear transistion to lattice heating.  We are looking for
something that does the opposite.  You might also learn that
the strength of the coupling is not in the right ball park - not
even the right universe - to be relevant to the CF debate.

As for calculated transistion rates,  I have a set of numbers that
are experimentally verified and are consistant with known physics.
What do you offer as an alternative?  A big fat nothing!  And it
has remained that way for 6 years.  You want me to save the CF
bacon?  Forget it!

Now on the question of detectability of nuclear radiation, I did leave
myself an out.  I did say that you could detect the radiation if you
did not do something very stupid.  Your reply indicates that you
advocate doing something stupid in order to be sure that any emissions
fail to reach the detector.  I can't help you if you insist on not accepting
sound advice as to how the experiments should be designed.

First you must have a clear picture as to what forms of radiation you
expect to detect.  You should have an estimate of the rates and energies
and then chose the detector that is appropriate for testing your specific
hypothesis.  Clearly if you have no hypothesis to test there is little
point in beginning the excercise.  If you are on a fishing expedition
you may want to select a "general purpose" detector of some sort.  Actually
Pons and Fleischmann did not do too badly in selecting a NaI scintillator
for the first try.  Their problem came later.

Now since this ground is so well plowed, the mystery is why people doing
CF research and publishing CF claims insist on not using the appropriate
detection methods.  Clearly if you never look you can continue to claim
nothing is there.  However, I think you and I agree that there is nothing
to detect.  I say that is a significant fact!  You say it has no real
implications for CF.

At this point the disagreement moves beyond experimental data to the
interpretation of those data.  If you have no new theories to offer we
sort of have to stick with the old ones, right?

Dick Blue

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------------------------------
1995.06.28 / Bob Kovsky /  Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
     
Originally-From: kovsky@netcom.com (Bob Kovsky)
Newsgroups: alt.sci.physics.new-theories,sci.physics,sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Has anyone convinced a crackpot?
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 15:05:36 GMT
Organization: NETCOM On-line Communication Services (408 261-4700 guest)

Ben Weiner posted a long note quoting and opposing my previously-stated 
views. I see no point in responding in detail, but he did challenge me:

>kovsky@netcom.com (Bob Kovsky) writes:
>
>>	With due acknowledgement for the varieties of historical 
>>experience, the general rule is that new ideas are first dismissed, then 
>>denounced, subsequently opposed, and only finally accepted.  Any history 
>>of science will describe such a course of events.  Try <The Structure of 
>>Scientific Revolutions> by Kuhn for openers.
>
>Please don't assume ignorance on our parts - and don't generalize
>blithely with this little story about the evolution of theories from
>scorned to accepted.  Actually, Kuhn's book doesn't say this, or
>certainly it's not one of Kuhn's major points.  Especially about the
>dismissal of new theories.  Please show me where he does say it.  

"...Just because it is a transition between incommensurables, the 
transition between competing paradigms cannot be made a step at a time, 
forced by logic and neutral experience.  Like a gestalt switch, it must 
occur all at once (though not necessarily in an instant) or not at all.
	"How, then, are scientists brought to make this transition?  Part 
of the answer is that they are very often not.  Copernicanism made few 
converts for almost a century after Copernicus' death.  Newton's work was 
not generally accepted, particularly on the Continent, for more than half 
a century after the <Principia> appeared.  Priestley never accepted the 
oxygen theory, nor Lord Kelvin the electromagnetic theory, and so on.  
The difficulties of conversion have often been noted by scientists 
themselves.  Darwin ... wrote...  and Max Planck ... sadly remarked..."
	"...Lifelong resistance, particularly from those whose productive 
careers have committed them to an older tradition of normal science, is 
not a violation of scientific standards but an index to the nature of 
scientific research itself.  The source of resistance is the assurance 
that the older paradigm will ultimately solve all problems, that nature 
can be shoved into the box the paradigm provides."

And so on.

Kuhn, <The Structure of Scientific Revolutions>, at 148-150 in my 
paperback version (Second Edition, Enlarged) (in lurid pink), chap. XII.


*   *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *   * 
    Bob Kovsky          |  A Natural Science of Freedom 
    kovsky@netcom.com   |  Materials available by anonymous ftp
                        |  At ftp.netcom.com/pub/fr/freedom
*   *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *    *   * 
cudkeys:
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1995.06.28 / Bill Page /  Re: Potapov device test discussion
     
Originally-From: wspage@ncs.dnd.ca (Bill Page)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Potapov device test discussion
Date: 28 Jun 1995 14:27:57 GMT
Organization: Daneliuk & Page

In article <73044-804263664@mindlink.bc.ca>, Bruce_Dunn@mindlink.bc.ca (Bruce Dunn) says:
>
>Clearly, what is needed in the test setup is some thermometers to measure
>the temperature of water going into the pump, going from the pump to the
>device, and going out of the device.  The delta Ts and flow rates should
>directly indicate the thermal inputs of the pump vs. the device.
>

I wonder if it is practical to attempt to measure 0.1 deg. C. temperature
differences in a high volume turbulent flow. Even measuring the flow
rate accurately enought might be problematic. It is much easier to
measure the integrated effect on the heat reservoir.
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1995.06.28 / mitchell swartz /  Re: Implications of Miles results
     
Originally-From: mica@world.std.com (mitchell swartz)
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Re: Implications of Miles results
Subject: Re: Implications of Miles results
Date: Wed, 28 Jun 1995 15:57:29 GMT
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA


 In Message-ID: <9506281436.AA10679@pilot02.cl.msu.edu>
Subject: Re: Implications of Miles results
blue@pilot.msu.edu (Richard A Blue) continues his
"Re-re-recross" .....

 -If you did the calculation I suggested you would learn that the
 -Mossbauer coupling leads to a decrease in the energy transfer from
 -the nuclear transistion to lattice heating.  We are looking for
 -something that does the opposite.  You might also learn that
 -the strength of the coupling is not in the right ball park - not
 -even the right universe - to be relevant to the CF debate.

  True.  This is obvious.  The question was the existence of
coupling through the S-orbitals.   QED.
Please show us further.  Put your numbers down. 
Did you multiply your "strength of the coupling" by the
number of filled sites in the fully loaded palladium, Dick.
 Looking forward to seeing them. 

   =================================.

-As for calculated transistion rates,  I have a set of numbers that
-are experimentally verified and are consistant with known physics.
-What do you offer as an alternative? 

The actual observed rates of course.

   =================================.

-  You want me to save the CF
-bacon?  Forget it!

Hmmmm.   That belongs in the next CF play or movie.  

   =================================.

-Now on the question of detectability of nuclear radiation, I did leave
-myself an out.  I did say that you could detect the radiation if you
-did not do something very stupid.  Your reply indicates that you
-advocate doing something stupid in order to be sure that any emissions
-fail to reach the detector.  I can't help you if you insist on not accepting
-sound advice as to how the experiments should be designed.

  Hardly.   There was no advocation of that and I challenge you to show
your erroneous interpretation.

   =================================.

-First you must have a clear picture as to what forms of radiation you
-expect to detect.  You should have an estimate of the rates and energies
-and then chose the detector that is appropriate for testing your specific
-hypothesis.  Clearly if you have no hypothesis to test there is little
-point in beginning the excercise.  If you are on a fishing expedition
-you may want to select a "general purpose" detector of some sort.  Actually
-Pons and Fleischmann did not do too badly in selecting a NaI scintillator
-for the first try.  Their problem came later.

Well put.  The output is mainly phonons, mainly enuf to heat significant
masses, and so calorimetry is a better detector.

   =================================.

-Now since this ground is so well plowed, the mystery is why people doing
-CF research and publishing CF claims insist on not using the appropriate
-detection methods.  Clearly if you never look you can continue to claim
-nothing is there.  However, I think you and I agree that there is nothing
-to detect.  I say that is a significant fact!  You say it has no real
-implications for CF.

  The equipment to date is insufficient to rule out very low energetic
radiation, and some of the detectors have demonstrated emissions.

   =================================.

-At this point the disagreement moves beyond experimental data to the
-interpretation of those data.  If you have no new theories to offer we
-sort of have to stick with the old ones, right?

  No, Dick, there are other forums.  BTW my respect for your
ability to focus in on the scientific issues has increased much.
Too bad many of the other posters dont follow the lesser travelled
road to high S/N.
   Best wishes.                        -   Mitchell



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