On Sun, Apr 28, 2013 at 12:39 PM, Edmund Storms <stor...@ix.netcom.com>wrote:
The answer a person makes to this question determines the rest of the > discussion. Consequently, this conflict in basic belief must be resolved > before any discussion is possible. I get the impression that a great deal > of conflict has been created during past discussions because this basic > question is not clearly resolved and lingers as an unconscious distraction. > Hi Ed, Speaking as a recent observer of the LENR field, I think your main argument is basically right. There are the different groups -- there are the majority of qualified scientists who are off doing other things; there are the engineers who take an Edisonian approach and who seem to be starting to gain traction (one can hope); and there are the seasoned veterans of the field, many of whom are also qualified scientists, who are all focused on their own pet theory and who seem content to ignore any evidence that might contradict it. In this regard I largely agree with Abd that a big part of the problem is that the field has not been approached with sufficient systematicity up to now to allow for the resolution of some basic questions which, once resolved, will help to bring the theorizers into greater agreement about what they should be trying to explain. An example of a basic question that has not been settled to my mind is what the EMF spectrum looks like when there is excess heat and when there is none -- for example, what is the x-ray signature across the range of experiments? There are snippets of information, but only a handful of solid datapoints as far as I can tell. Another question is what is the role of prior oxidation of the substrate? A third question is what is that funny phase-1a spike in the temperature that one often sees at the very start of hydrogen loading, which very much looks chemical and which sometimes is attributed to LENR? These are just three questions, but there are many others. We have snippets of information here and there, but there has not yet been the time or resources for a systematic investigation that would allow for them being sorted out for good. Your book has gone a long way in clearing away some of these questions, and I wish everyone would read it, as well as Beaudette's book, since they address mistaken assumptions one might have when first approaching the field. I suspect that if sufficient professional attention were brought to bear on this set of problems, bright minds with the money to explore them could make short work of explaining what is going on. What they would find, perhaps, is that one of the crazy ideas that was floated on this list or on one of the LENR forums was basically right. But we won't be able to get to that conclusion (or a completely different one) without doing the hard work of laying a foundation for getting there. I also agree that in the absence of progress along those lines, it is good that the engineers appear to be moving forward with the Edisonian approach -- let's cross our fingers that they're not just fooling themselves, since it seems to be an easy thing to do in this field. I am grateful to the LENR researchers for sticking it out through all these years, and also to the engineers, for ignoring the critics in the peanut gallery entirely. I'm optimistic that we'll eventually figure out what's going on. Eric
