Abd ul-Rahman Lomax wrote:
In an examination of arguments, all arguments should be presented in
such a way that those who believe the argument would say, "Yes,
that's what we believe."
I quote the skeptics verbatim. What they are saying is not
complicated or difficult to understand, so I am confident that I have
not misrepresented their arguments. However in many cases they do not
wish to own up to their own beliefs. That is why they deleted this
document as soon as I uploaded to Wikipedia, as I knew they would
(see the post-script):
<http://pages.csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/cf/293wikipedia.html>http://pages.csam.montclair.edu/~kowalski/cf/293wikipedia.html
I do not think I have misrepresented any of the arguments in the 2004
DoE panel members' statements, except perhaps this one:
1. Theoretical objections to experimentally proven facts are a
violation of the scientific method
Naturally, some of them would dispute the notion that the facts are
experimentally proven.
Others clearly state that even though the data seems strong but, as
reviewer 7 put it, "From a nuclear physics perspective, such
conclusions are not to be believed." I do not see how that can be
anything but a #1 error. Either you believe that strong data always
trumps theory, or you believe that theory can sometimes overrule it.
You can't have it both ways.
Reviewer 2 wrote: "It is hard to imagine how 23.8 MeV of excitation
energy, nearly 9 orders of magnitude more than in the case of the
Moessbauer effect, could be coupled to and transferred to the phonons
of the lattice!"
I list that as two errors in the table:
1. Theoretical objections to experimentally proven facts are a
violation of the scientific method
3. A reviewer's inability to imagine or understand a result is not a
valid reason to reject it.
Reviwer 5 gives also makes error #3:
[Hagelstein] page 3 [says] 'in no case was a calorimetric imbalance
observed (19 examples) where an electrode failed to achieve a bulk
average D/Pd loading of 0.90. However, all electrodes achieving a
loading of 0.95 or greater (15 examples) exhibited an heat excess
more than 3 times the measurement uncertainty'. If this is the case,
then I fail to understand why gaseous loading of Pd with D using up
to 3.1 GPa of D2 to achieve D/Pd ratios greater than 0.95, does not
lead to CF. Baranowski and coworkers (J. Less-Common Mets., 158
(1990) 347), who have had extensive experience with high pressure
loading of metals with H2 and D2, failed to observe any evidence of
excess heat in a system which is inherently simpler than the
electrochemical ones.
"I fail to understand" in this context is a polite way of saying "I
doubt it." This is not literally a confession that the author is
ignorant, or confused. The author expresses strong doubts elsewhere
in the statement. If this meant, literally, "I fail to understand"
("I don't get it!") that would be a reason to recuse oneself or not
reach any conclusion, positive or negative.
Also, the assertion that an inherently simpler method of loading is
more likely to produce the effect makes no sense, since the evidence
indicates that various triggers and stimuli shown in McKubre's
equation accompany one loading method but not another. This is an
example of a little knowledge being a dangerous thing.
- Jed
