At 11:30 am 21/07/2005 -0400, Jed wrote: >There have been a few instances in which irreproducible but high-sigma CF >events occurred. The best examples are the 1985 explosion in Fleischmann >and Pon's lab, and Mizuno's 1991 massive heat after death event. Even >though these could not be reproduced, because of technical difficulties and >safety concerns, the researchers themselves never had the slightest doubt >the events were real, and anomalous.
Never mind the bucket, what about the experiment (page 74 of your book: Nuclear Transmutation = The Reality of Cold Fusion) where Mizuno says, ========================================= One day when I performed this test an extraordinary thing happened. The sample colour suddenly changed from dark red to red, to yellow - a clear indication that the temperature was shooting up. The heat increased, the sample glowed white, and after ten or twenty seconds it began to melt. I thought this must be a reaction to the deuterium. In a panic I ran to the vacuum pump to remove the deuterium gas and the temperature gradually dropped. It was a quick reaction just as I had hoped for, but I could no longer ignore the fact that this research was potentially hazardous. ========================================= Of course it's bloody hazardous. For a scientist to complain about hazard is like a soldier complaining when people start shooting at him. If you join the army you must expect to get killed or seriously injured and you can't start moaning about it when you do. Exploring any unknown territory is obviously dangerous. Not only dangerous physically, but professionally and emotionally too when you return home to report what you have seen. One couldn't ask for a better example than P&F. Mizuno should have repeated the experiment and taken it to completion with a full video record. It's not as though the experiment was irreproducible, is it? He goes on to admit that with a further 20 specimens he got 15% "clear cases of excess heat." I'm sure an Edison would have been delighted with such a high incidence of reproducibility. Mizuno's failure to finish what he started may not amount to desertion in the face of the enemy but it certainly raises questions about dilettantism. Frank Grimer
