People doing scientific research or R&D should read this letter carefully:
http://www.lilienthal-museum.de/olma/el2127.htm I have quoted this in my essay. The full letter is worth reading. It helps to know some of the early history of aviation, but even without that you can benefit. This part applies directly to cold fusion, and should be taken a warning: One of the greatest difficulties of the problem has been little understood by the world at large. This was the fact that those who aspired to solve the problem were constantly pursued by expense, danger, and time. In order to succeed it was not only necessary to make progress, but it was necessary to make progress at a sufficient rate to reach the goal before money gave out, or before accident intervened, or before the portion of life allowable for such work was past. The problem was so vast and many sided that no one could hope to win unless he possessed unusual ability to grasp the essential points, and ignore the nonessentials. It was necessary to have a genius for solving almost innumerable difficult problems with a minimum expenditure of time, a minimum expenditure of money, and a minimum risk of accident. A study of the failures of the nineteenth century shows clearly that none of the important workers stood still, but that the rate of progress was so slow that each one was overcome and removed from the race by one of the causes just mentioned before the goal was reached . . . - Jed
