prof. Focardi in a recent interview asserted that "Cold Fusion" was a name sticked by "hot fusionists" in scorn of LENR research. Of course there is a chance that he was just joking.
mic 2011/5/2 Jed Rothwell <[email protected]>: > Wm. Scott Smith <[email protected]> wrote: >> >> When we say "Cold Fusion" they are almost justified in assuming that it >> should work the same way as hot fusion. > > No one picked the name "cold fusion." It just came along. F&P did not like > it. Researchers have often gather to pick another name, such as LENR. See p. > iv here: > http://lenr-canr.org/acrobat/NagelDJproceeding.pdf > People who assume that cold fusion should work the same way as hot fusion > know nothing about the subject. Changing the name will not reduce their > ignorance. > It does not matter what you call something in any case. Many words are > technically inaccurate, such as meteorology. Weather is not caused by > meteors, but we still call it that. > You can make the case that nearly all words in all languages are derived > from something that lags one meaning behind the present meaning, so they are > never accurate. For example, we call a collection of files on a computer a > "folder." This is derived from a manila folder used in a physical file > drawer. When my daughter at age 12 first saw one she said, "ah, so that's > what the icon thing is." > The file drawer folder, in turn, is derived from the word "fold" which is > what you do to the stiff manila paper; you fold it in the middle. This is > from the Old English falden, which may mean plait, or twine. > Words lag and never quite accurate because we usually use old words to > describe new things. On rare occasions we make up a brand-new word such as > "telephone," or "byte." Other newly coined words usually derive indirectly > from some older word, sometimes something whimsical. The nuclear science > word "barn" derives from a barn, meaning storage shed, from the saying, "you > couldn't hit the side of a barn." > Nearly all words, going back thousands of years, are derived from other, > even older words. Often the original meaning is lost, or obscure. Sometimes > the derivation is apparent when you stop and think about it, with a word > such as "understand" which implies shoring up something, or putting a base > under it. This is not much help for people learning English because other > languages have different metaphors for the same idea. In Japanese > "understand" is "wakaru" which derives from cutting or breaking down > something. It means analyzing it by dissection as it were, somewhat the > opposite of shoring it up. Knowing word origins is fun but it seldom helps > us understand what the words actually mean. That can only be learned by > context. > The meanings of all words constantly evolve and change, although often at a > pace too slow to observe in a lifetime. Language along with all products of > biology must evolve. It is never precisely the same in two different > individual members of a species, or in one member at two points in time. It > is, quite literally, as unique as our fingerprints or our DNA, or the body > shape of gall wasps. Alfred Kinsey recognized and categorized hundreds of > thousands of variations in this, and saw no two gall wasps alike, because > there are no two alike, and never will be. Nature recognizes no average, > mean, or ideal body type -- such concepts have no meaning in biology. The > recognition of this fact, and the ramifications of it, were central to > Kinsey's later work in human sexuality, and the importance of this concept > is second only to Darwin's theories, in my opinion. > - Jed >
