Something became clear to me out of the NanoSpire discussion on the CMNS list.
Never lead with theory. Not if the intention is to change general
consensus on something. By starting with an opposition to consensus,
one alienates the majority, right off the bat, prejudices them
against accepting experimental results.
Experimental resuts can have many different explanations. If one has
some striking experimental results, instead of interpreting them with
some world-shaking theory, report them as puzzling. Identify with the
skeptics! Express skepticism!
"We have been unable to understand the heat we have measured as due
to chemical reactions or artifact. An unknown nuclear reaction could
possibly generate the energy, but the most likely candidate, given
the elements in our cells, is deuterium-deuterium fusion, and the
expected fusion products are missing. We have measured neutrons, but
at a level well below what would be expected from the heat. We have
identified helium as being produced, but the helium branch is rare
and there is no expected gamma ray. Most cells are inactive, we only
are seeing excess heat from one-tenth of the experiments we run.
However, the heat that we see when a cell is active is significant.
Our effort to identify the source of this apparent anomalous energy
is continuing."
With an announcement like this, when the neutron measurements were
impeached -- and they were certainly in error -- they would not have
been in trouble, since they already would have established the
neutrons as not significant as to the main effect.
Efforts to promote fringe physical theories, based simply on some
alleged explanatory power, are probably doomed. Rather, anomalous
experimental evidence, to even make the exploration of unusual
theories seem worth the effort, must be established and replicated.
If one establishes oneself, first, as a proponent of a fringe theory,
one sets up conditions to see the experimental evidence rejected on
the grounds that the experimenter may been cherry-picking data, may
be misinterpreting it, etc., etc.
That makes it tough for someone who does, indeed, come up with a
theory first. One has the theory, one develops a test, runs the test,
and finds the predictions of the theory to be correct. However, it is
as if it would be better if one stumbled across the test results first!
A good scientist will strongly resist the theory, i.e., will take
every precaution attempting to falsify it, not to build up evidence
for it! If not carefully restrained, the effort to prove a theory can
cause data selection that will then be the basis for rejection by skeptics.
Be one's own skeptic.
The NanoSpire people, if they are telling the truth, are in a very
unfortunate situation, but, again, they should be able to recover. If
they promote the fringe theories developed, even if those theories
are correct, they will inhibit acceptance of their very striking and
powerful evidence. People will be far more likely to think of fraud
or massive delusion, than if they approached this skeptically, and
just reported fact with a minimum of theoretical interpretation.
Indeed, if they mention theory, it would only be existing theory. "We
have been unable to understand our results in the light of existing theory."
Critical, in the end, will be independent replication. To get that to
happen, one must have credibility, unless someone happens to have the
equipment lying about and just tries it on a lark....
