I said imagine one CF experimenter, just one for a start, has been wrong and won't admit it, and you keep throwing various things at me to avoid the perspective. Why? Can't you question your beliefs even as a mere hypothesis? I am not saying this is so, just imagine.
Michel ----- Original Message ----- From: "Jed Rothwell" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <vortex-L@eskimo.com> Sent: Friday, February 09, 2007 10:13 PM Subject: Re: [Vo]: Empathy (was Re: More about the skeptics' mindsets) > Michel Jullian wrote: > >>I never asked what was the probability (which you underestimated >>BTW, in all fields of science there is at least _one_ renowned >>scientist who has made an error, can't you think of examples?) > > Not just one! I know HUNDREDS of renowned scientists who have made > huge errors for 17 years. They think cold fusion does not exist. > People can always have wrong ideas. Throughout history most of our > ideas have been wrong, and probably still are. Furthermore, > experimental scientists often make mistakes. As Stan Pons says, "if > we are right half the time we are doing well." > > However, it is the experiments which are right, not the researchers. > As I said, the researchers at Caltech did the experiment correctly, > they got the expected result, but they misunderstood their own work > and they do not realize it proves cold fusion is real. > > On average, scientists doing experiments get it right. That is why we > can be sure that replicated results are real. If that were not the > case, science would not work. Individual automobile drivers do have > accidents, but when you randomly select a group of 200 drivers you > can be certain they will not all have an accident the same morning. > When you take a group of 200 electrochemists and have them do > research for 17 years, they will not all get the same wrong answers. > > What scientists do is a form of animal behavior -- primate behavior. > Like any other animal behavior, it works most of the time, or they > would stop doing it. Cats are good at catching birds and mice. Even > though a cat will often fail to catch a mouse, you can be sure that > as a species cats successfully catch mice because otherwise they > would go extinct. > > >>. . . only what you would do if you were that scientist, or how you >>could distinguish that their claims are erroneous if you knew such >>scientists and trusted them because of their high skills. > > I do not judge claims according to whether I trust the scientists or > whether they are skilled and not. I judge the claims to be correct > when the experiment is good, and it has been replicated. I interpret > it according to the laws of physics. I know how calorimeters work. I > know a good calorimeter when I see one, and I am confident that the > laws of thermodynamics are intact, so I can be sure that cold fusion > produces excess heat beyond the limits of chemistry. I do not "trust" > researchers any more than I trust cats to catch mice. I do not need > to have "faith" in cats. I know a dead mouse when I see it, and I > know excess heat. > > >> As for the missing skill or knowledge, nobody can know everything, >> why wouldn't say a highly competent electrochemist totally lack say EE >> skills? > > First of all, that is impossible. No one can "totally lack" such > skills and still get a degree in electrochemistry. All experimental > scientists learn to use such instruments. Second, I have enough EE > skills to recognize that a calorimeter is working -- or not. I > recognize schlock research. Third, the the EE skills, instruments and > techniques required to do cold fusion are not all that advanced. As I > said, most of the instruments were perfected between 100 and 160 > years ago. Of course even ancient instruments and tools can be > difficult to use. Violins and axes were invented thousands of years > ago yet they take skill to use correctly. I cannot play a violin, and > although I have operated calorimeters, I have a lot to learn about > them. But I can tell when someone else is using a violin or > calorimeter correctly. > > If cold fusion called for advanced knowledge of complex instruments, > and if the claims were extremely esoteric and subject to > interpretation, or complex mathematical analysis, like the claims of > the top quark, then perhaps hundreds of scientists working in one > group might all be wrong. But hundreds of scientists could not have > made independent mistakes measuring excess heat or tritium. > > >>If you're satisfied now that the probability is not zero . . . > > The probability of 200 professional scientists making elementary > mistakes day after day for for 17 years is as close to zero as you > can get. It would not happen in the life of the universe. As I said, > this would be like randomly selecting a group of 200 drivers every > morning for 17 years and in every single case finding that all of the > drivers you selected make a mistake and caused an accident every > single day. 1,241,000 accidents in a row! Or, as I said, it is like > randomly selecting 200 cats every month, and seeing every one of them > starve to death in a country filled with mice. > > - Jed >
