I'm not longer think Rosi is a fraud. But there are still possibility
for serious mistakes.
If he have his instruments wrong calibrated as
in the Uppsala test there may be no
exes energy at all or at least not
much of it.
On Mon, 14 Apr 2014 15:15:46 -0400, Axil Axil wrote:
"Boyne portrays them well. Like the guy who claimed he had a flying
machine in his briefcase. They remind me of Certain Unnamed People in
this field."
Say it Jed, you are referring to Defkalion, aren't you?
This is nothing that you haven't said before.
On Mon, Apr 14, 2014
at 2:59 PM, Jed Rothwell wrote:
Lewan's book describes several tests
conducted by Rossi which ended in failure, and some that ended in
fiascos. An example was the test for Hydrofusion:
"The instruments
Rossi was using to measure how much electrical energy was consumed to
heat the device showed lower values than the instruments that the
researcher from SP [Technical Research Institute of Sweden,] had
brought. The difference was not trivial--Rossi's readings were between
half and a third of the researcher's measurements. If the researcher's
instruments were credible, the device was consuming two to three times
more electrical energy than expected. It wasn't producing three times
more energy than the input but was delivering no net energy. It did not
work. I believed the researcher's instruments because I had immediately
understood the source of the problem. . . ."
There was a test in
Uppsala when the equipment came unglued because Rossi glued it the night
before and did not give it enough time to set. Then there was the visit
by Jim Dunn and NASA, when Rossi came unglued. Lewan describes it
diplomatically.
I knew about these tests, plus I know of two other
failed tests not described in the book.
This may sound paradoxical,
but in a strange way these failures bolster my belief that Rossi cannot
be a hoax, so his claims are probably true. As I have said before, if he
is a confidence man, he is the most incompetent one on earth. He
inspires no confidence in anyone, especially when he does tests that
fail drastically for obvious reasons.
Why would a con man go around
doing these things? It is not difficult to arrange a fake energy device
that seems to work perfectly. At least until someone examines it closely
with proper instruments. So why would you set up a fake energy device
that looks like it is not working? Why would you spend vast sums of
money and years of effort making a pretend 1 MW reactor with 51
complicated boxes in it? It seems to me it is far more likely he is what
he appears to be: a brilliant but headstrong inventor who often does
sloppy work. He often cuts corners because he assumes he is right. He
has no regard for conventional scientific standards. He does not
understand why other people do not believe his claims. He refused to do
properly designed, careful tests with good instruments, because he said
such tests will not convince anyone and will do no good. He had no
reason to say that! He did not even try doing careful tests. So how did
he know they would fail to convince people? I found that infuriating.
Many lone inventors share some or all of these characteristics.
Inventors are not all alike of course but they all have great
self-confidence which breeds these kinds of attitudes. If they did not
have confidence, they would not continue working for years despite
opposition, lack of money, lack of support and even danger.
The Wright
brothers were the opposite of sloppy. They were very careful and
methodical. But, for a long time they put off doing definitive public
flight tests partly because they thought a test would do no good. They
sounded a lot like Rossi in that respect. They felt contempt for the
public and for skeptical scientists and engineers. This was unwarranted.
When they finally got around to doing a public flight test in August
1908, the situation changed overnight. The world was their oyster.
Newspaper celebrated them, millions of dollars fell into their hands,
the top industrialists clamored to cut a deal with them, and the
Congress gave them gold medals. I think it is likely something similar
would happen to Rossi if he would only let it happen. Perhaps he is
finally on track to doing that with Cherokee Investment Partners.
Lewan's book reminds me of some of the personal histories of the
Wrights, such as "First Flight" by Heppenheimer, and the fictionalized
"Dawn over Kitty Hawk" by Boyne. There was a cast of characters
associated with aviation from 1890 to 1908, including many stupid
people, many cranks, and some out-and-out frauds along for the ride.
Boyne portrays them well. Like the guy who claimed he had a flying
machine in his briefcase. They remind me of Certain Unnamed People in
this field.
The Wrights were not what you would call stable, sane,
ordinary people. Read "The Bishop's Boys" for details on their
dysfunctional family, lack of sociability, and their peculiar Victorian
psycho-sexuality. Their sister, Katherine, married late in life. Orville
was so upset with her for marrying he did not speak to her for years. He
considered it a betrayal.
- Jed
Links:
------
[1]
mailto:[email protected]
