Shades of Pons-Fleischmann, 1989, perhaps? Or possibly not...? Newsday is reporting UCLA Researchers Produce Nuclear Fusion: "In the latest attempt to create nuclear fusion under laboratory conditions, scientists reported they achieved it in a tabletop experiment that uses a strong electric field generated by a small crystal."
Coincidentally, last night I was finishing up the wonderful new book A Different Universe by Robert Lauglin. His comments on the cold fusion scandal:
The cold fusion example is dear to my heart because I was in an office with a nuclear expert when a journalist phoned him and asked him for comments on the [Pons-Fleischmann] paper. It was probably the closest I have ever come to dying of a heart attack, for we were both suffocating with laughter reading the pages, each funnier than the last, as they slowly crept out of the FAX machine.... [Their] claim made no sense at all quantum-mechanically. The energy scales of ordinary chemistry are not right for catalyzing nuclear reactions. But it turned out that enough people did not believe in quantum mechanics, were willing to distort its complexities to their own ends, or simply viewed its practitioners as con artists that the voices of reason went unheard.... [This led to work that] wound up squandering between $50 million and $100 million of taxpayer money.
In the present case the claims are more modest, but a healthy skepticism is definitely warranted.
Posted by geoff2 at April 27, 2005 02:00 PMHuh. So what if they produced table top fusion. This has already been done in the 1960's by Philo Farnsworth inventor of the television. This is already known but is totally ignored by the mainstream scientific establishment. Now they essentially reinvent his idea and claim credit. Pathetic. Check out his link: http://fusor.net/.
Posted by: assman at April 29, 2005 11:17 AMRight. Several people have pointed out that this is no big deal, a well-known effect. Stay tuned for a detailed analysis. And thanks for the pointer.
Posted by: Geoff Arnold at April 29, 2005 11:30 AMAnd of course "assman" is wrong about Farnsworth inventing television. John Logie Baird was doing public demonstrations of TV before Farnsworth had anything going in the lab. And no, the fact that Baird's system wasn't 100% electronic is no big deal - what do you think DLP is? (However, this thread is about cold fusion, not TV.)
Posted by: Geoff Arnold at April 29, 2005 11:37 AMSorry to burst your skeptical bubble, but Pons-Fleischmann apparatus and the current sonofusion apparatus which have created fusion products did so due to phenomenon which occur at the nano-scale level. Yes, the energy levels of "ordinary" chemical experiments do not provide the impetus for accelerating fusible nuclei. However, you unimaginatively discount ultra-small scale phenomenom which are postulated to be at work.
What I remain skeptical about is if any of these believable effects will ever create the multiples of input energy necessary for practical power generation, or will they simply remain as interesting laboratory experiments.
Time, effort, and imagination will eventually provide the answers to that question...
Sorry for the criticism, but you may wish to remove "Dreamer" from your list of characteristics - you seem to be missing the essential prerequisite - that of being open to all possibilities, but of being *scientifically* skeptical until proof is obtained.
Proof ==> Reproducible technique(s) which validate the claims made.
Posted by: Fidel at May 8, 2005 03:13 PM
Fidel's comments confuse me. I've expressed my skepticism, I've noted that others have commented that the effects reported are familiar and unsurprising. I don't see any conflict between being a dreamer and a skeptic. So what exactly is the bubble he wishes to burst?
Posted by: Geoff Arnold at May 10, 2005 09:49 AM