ITER has been in the news lately. By coincidence, I recently exchanged
correspondence with a public relations flack there. Attached is our
correspondence. This would be hilarious if these people were not getting
ready to piss away $10 billion of our money.
- Jed
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Exchange with ITER public relations flack
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subject: I suggest you read the literature before commenting on Fleischmann
and Pons
Dear Dr. Spears,
Frank Znidarsic forwarded a comment you made regarding cold fusion:
"After all, it was through that route that the poor experimentation that
led Fleischmann and Pons to go public rather than publish scientifically
were made fools of in the end."
Whether the experimentation was poor or good is a matter of opinion, but
your statements are incorrect as a matter of fact. A paper by Fleischmann &
Pons was accepted for publication before the University of Utah went public
with their work. After the paper was published, the effects they observed
were widely replicated, often at very high signal to noise ratios. Excess
heat has been measured at Sigma 90 and above, and tritium has been observed
at rates ranging from 50 times to several million times background. By
September 1990, the effect had been replicated by over 80 institutions
including China Lake, Los Alamos, Oak Ridge, BARC India, Brookhaven and so
on. In the years since then, although there has been extreme opposition to
the subject from mainstream institutions, several hundred peer-reviewed
papers describing positive replications have been published in leading
journals of chemistry and electrochemistry, and in some physics journals
including the Japanese Journal of Applied Physics. Approximately two
thousand other papers have been published in conference proceedings.
To be blunt, the extreme opposition to the subject comes mainly from people
like you, who make foolish and unwarranted comments about cold fusion
without first reading the literature. I suggest you review some of the
papers. Our web site features full text copies of over 400 of these papers.
See:
http://lenr-canr.org/
Sincerely,
Jed Rothwell
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
From: Bill Spears <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: Re: I suggest you read the literature before commenting on
Fleischmann and Pons
Date: Tue, 28 Jun 2005 23:31:48 +0200
To: Jed Rothwell <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Dear Jed,
I stick by my statement that it was the lack of proper peer review of
the Fleischmann/Pons paper that let them down in the end. There were so
many flaws in reasoning and explanation in their paper that if it hadn't
been so astounding a conclusion and from one (Fleischmann) such eminent
scientist (FRS) I'm sure it would never have been accepted.
Many then claimed to have replicated their results, a natural humann
failing (the I told you so syndrome) and many claimed they were not
replicable, and those who did the latter were more reputable labs with
better equipment and more careful experimenters, so their results won out
in the end. But it is clear that also bad science gets published so the
peer review process isn't perfect. But without it there is nothing, so it
is better than that.
The fact that there are loads of papers written about cold fusion doesn't
make it real. There are loads of books written about astrology but that
doesn't make it real either. There is clearly something going on (same
probably with astrology), but there are also some very bad experimentalists
out there, and poor reviewers, and its easy to baffle people with science -
so few really understand it. There is usually a simpler explanation. Even
the US DOE has decided to put some more funds aside to see whether they can
nail down the phenomena at work, but so far one has to say the jury's
out. Not yet proven either way.
Meanwhile, we have to go with something a bit less esoteric, which you can
see might actually work, but we can stop as soon as something alternate is
really proven beyond doubt.
This is not 19th century science - the establishment versus the rest.
Those days are long past. This is good scientific method against bad.
Bill
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Bill Spears wrote:
I stick by my statement that it was the lack of proper peer review of
the Fleischmann/Pons paper that let them down in the end.
The paper was peer-reviewed, and all subsequent papers on the subject have
been peer-reviewed. The review these papers are subjected to been far
harsher and exacting than most papers undergo, because there is strong
opposition to the subject.
Many then claimed to have replicated their results, a natural humann
failing (the I told you so syndrome) and many claimed they were not
replicable, and those who did the latter were more reputable labs with
better equipment and more careful experimenters, so their results won out
in the end.
As far as I know, that is not in evidence. Only three reputable labs
published negative results -- Cal Tech, Harwell and MIT. The results at Cal
Tech and Harwell were later re-examined by experts and shown to be
positive. The negative results from MIT were fraudulent: the original data
showed excess heat, but the data points were moved down.
I realize there are many rumors that "good" labs failed to see results in
1989, but as far as I know these experiments were never published, and some
appear to be mere rumors. If you can cite other reputable labs that
actually published peer-reviewed experiments, please let me know. I know of
hundreds of positive papers from highly reputable labs. Many of these labs
use the best equipment money can buy, such as the Mitsubishi experiment
which costs roughly $20 million; the University of Osaka particle beam; and
SRI's flow calorimeters, which are the most accurate and precise ever
constructed. The people performing these experiments such as Miles, Bockris
and Oriani, are considered the world's leading electrochemists, because
they wrote widely used, multi-volume textbooks, and they are Distinguished
Fellows and Distinguished Professors.
But it is clear that also bad science gets published so the peer review
process isn't perfect. But without it there is nothing, so it is better
than that.
I agree. If you believe that, then you should accept positive cold fusion
results, because they have all been rigorously peer-reviewed, unlike the
negative results. You should, at least, refrain from criticizing them until
you have read them carefully, and you should not characterize research
conducted by dozens of Distinguished Professors as sloppy.
The fact that there are loads of papers written about cold fusion doesn't
make it real.
Peer-reviewed, high-sigma replicated data *does* make it real, or nothing
in science is real, there are no standards, and no dispute can ever be
resolved.
There is clearly something going on (same probably with astrology), but
there are also some very bad experimentalists out there, and poor
reviewers, and its easy to baffle people with science - so few really
understand it.
Who do you refer to? Bockris? Oriani? McKubre, Mizuno, Iwamura, Storms,
Claytor? Please be specific. You are making general comments about unnamed
researchers that you think are "bad." This is not a falsifiable argument.
Who are these people? Where did they publish? Why do you think they are
bad? Your arguments must be held to the same level of rigor as the
published papers you are denigrating. You do not get a free pass, just
because you hold the majority view.
There is usually a simpler explanation. Even the US DOE has decided to
put some more funds aside to see whether they can nail down the phenomena
at work, but so far one has to say the jury's out.
I suggest you review the documents here:
http://lenr-canr.org/Collections/DoeReview.htm
I think you will find that the critiques offered by the negative reviewers,
such as #7, have no merit.
This is not 19th century science - the establishment versus the rest.
Those days are long past. This is good scientific method against bad.
In my opinion, scientists in the 19th century were generally more fair,
objective and open minded. See the book book "Excess Heat" by C. G.
Beaudette. There are hundreds of examples unrelated to cold fusion. For
example, here is a quote describing bigotry and closed-minded attitudes in
AIDS research, from M. Sandmaier "Vessels of Infection," New York Times
Book Review, 11/15/92:
"The reason women with AIDS have been virtually invisible, Ms. Corea
contends, is that the medical establishment has persistently refused to
recognize that AIDS in women doesn't always look like AIDS in men. As early
as 1983, a number of female doctors and other health workers around the
country began to notice a strong link between severe, recurring
gynecological abnormalities and the presence of H.I.V. infection in women.
But when they submitted research proposals to investigate this connection,
she says, both government and private funding agencies repeatedly turned
them down. And when the doctors conducted the research on their own time,
medical journals and scientific conferences consistently rejected their papers.
Sometimes this official chorus of 'nos' has reflected mere lack of
interest, at other times hostility. Ms. Corea reports that Judith Cohen, an
epidemiologist at the School of Public Health at the University of
California, Berkeley, was told by the chairman of her department that if
she continued to waste time studying AIDS in women, 'she had better find
another job.'"
- Jed
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
Spears has not responded, and I doubt he ever will. I copied my
correspondence to Znidarsic, Storms and Miles. I would love to see Mel
Miles chop this guy into quivering little chunks, but Mel is busy, and Ed
is even more busy, so I guess it would be best if they would ignore him.
- Jed
