OK, Jed, you've made a lot of good points. I will admit that you've
made a very good case, and shut up about this.
With ... er ... just one or two last comments:
On 01/17/2011 04:00 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote:
> Stephen A. Lawrence wrote:
>
>> I'm still reading the discussion with deep interest. I've slung some
>> mud, it's true, but largely in the hope that my points would be
>> answered.
>>
>>
>> (The unfortunate thing is, if this is not on the up-and-up, then it's
>> in the world of con games, and nobody on this list is an expert at
>> them. Furthermore, I would guess that nobody at Bologna is an expert
>> on con games.
>
> I think you should propose a method by which a con game would be
> physically possible without the cooperation of the people who designed
> the calorimetry, brought the instruments, and operated them. Imagine,
> if you will, that an Interstellar alien gives you a small
> indestructible box that cannot be opened, and tells you only that if
> you input 400 W, it will produce 12 kW. Even though you cannot see
> inside it, and you have no idea how it works, please describe it might
> be a "con" if you yourself test it, or if a group of distinguished
> expert professors test it. In what sense could it be wrong?
>
> A calorimeter by its very nature "knows" nothing about the source of
> the energy. All calorimeters are inherently "black box" testing
> machines. They see all heat the same way, be it nuclear, chemical or
> mechanical friction. They do not NOT see heat that is not really
> there, and there is no way you can fool one.
>
> There are no hidden inputs or outputs to this device. It is small
> enough and portable enough to confirm that. The only inputs are
> electricity, hydrogen gas, and water, and the only output is hot water
> which turns to steam. I do not think it is physically possible for
> this to be con. If you do, please describe the general nature of this
> con. If you cannot suggest any plausible con, then your assertion is
> like saying: "I think it is magic." That is to say, your assertion
> cannot be tested or falsified. If an invisible, undetectable,
> unspecified con is possible, any experiment might be one.
>
> As I said, anyone could think of ways to make a stage magician trick,
> or a movie special effect version. That's trivial. But that would be
> instantly apparent to the professors. They would see an extra hose or
> a heavy-duty electric wire. You cannot hide such things from people
> who are right there, looking at and arranging the equipment (which
> they did), when those people understand the nature of electricity,
> water, steam, physics and chemistry. There is no conceivable way you
> can make them think that hot air is steam.
>
> I assume you are not asserting that the professors are in cahoots with
> Rossi. If they are, all bets are off.
>
> By the way, a wire capable of conducting 12 kW is MUCH thicker and
> heavier than an ordinary 1.5 kW wall socket wire. See the wires on
> electric water heaters or clothes driers. If you tried to draw 12 kW
> with an ordinary wire it would burn up instantly.
Right, dissipated power = I^2 * R.
You can draw 30 amps from a 15 amp rated wire without an instant
disaster, but (50/30)^2 = 2.8 times the heating effect of the 30 amp
overload, or about 11 times the rated carrying capacity of the wires,
and that's going to melt down pretty quickly.
In any case input power was measured, so playing games with that is not
a viable option.
>
> I am not necessarily ready to believe this claim. I think Nagel's
> criteria should be applied. But I am even less ready to reject it on
> the basis that calorimetry might not work for unspecified reasons
> which no one can define, test, or falsify.
OK, but if you're /not/ ready to accept the claim, what reason could you
cite for rejecting it? It seems to me there are only three
possibilities here.
1. It's all true.
2. Rossi is fooling the scientists who are on site and running
the show. This, I think you have said, is not plausible.
3. They're all in cahoots. This seems pretty implausible, even
to me.
So, what other possibility is there? The signal is too big for the
result to be a "mistake".
Rejecting it on account of criterion #5 -- saying it hasn't been
replicated or run long enough to rule out magic chemicals inside the
box -- seems pretty thin. It sounds a lot like saying "something was
wrong with the demo but I don't know what".
>
> - Jed
>
