Edmund Storms wrote:
I wish the Boss work were a breakthrough. Unfortunately, the process that makes apparent neutron emission during co-deposition cannot be operating in a heat-producing cell.
Well, that means it is not practical breakthrough but it still might "illuminate the mechanism" as I put it. History is full of examples of laboratory breakthroughs that had no direct practical application yet which pointed the way to practical improvements in other, related technology.
Otherwise, the neutrons would have been easily detected.
My point is that once you detect the neutrons in any cold fusion cell perhaps they will reveal the essential information that leads to a theory.
Radar was not a nuclear reaction that might be put in homes. No one will permit a device that might blow up unexpectedly to be put into use. We all know this doesn't happen, but this must be proven beyond any doubt to the regulators. Only a complete understanding of the process will be believed.
I think this is somewhat overstated. At some levels we do not have "complete understanding" of anything, even combustion. We certainly do not have complete control over combustion. Fires from heat engines and heating equipment killed thousands of people every year. If cold fusion devices are developed for specialized niche applications, and then they are run for millions of hours without incident, I think people would be willing to put them into homes. People are willing to accept a high degree of risk, after all. They drive automobiles at high speeds even though this causes roughly 40,000 deaths per year.
Because of a psychological quirk, people are more willing to accept risk in long-established technology than in brand new technology. This is Hamlet's principle: novelty and the unknown "puzzle the will" and "makes us rather bear those ills we have than fly to others that we know not of."
But there are limits to this quirk. If the situation becomes desperate, or if cold fusion costs thousands of times less than conventional energy, people will overcome their fear of it. If it can be shown that whatever the hypothetical hidden risks may be, cold fusion automobiles are apparently far safer than gasoline powered ones, people will use them. After all, US society has not always been so fearful of new ideas and novelty. In the 1950s and 1960s we built nuclear power plants with abandon. Perhaps we were too willing to try out new technology without careful testing! But in any case, cultures and norms change constantly and we may return to that older way of thinking, and older willingness to take changes. We may have no choice.
- Jed
