Whats your views on cold fusion? Are there any experiments on which we can grab ourselves and say look something wierd is happening? Im not physicists. And sorry for my english.
Some interesting experiments performed so far. Not a source of power from what we can tell. Lots of frauds in this field getting money out of gullible people, unfortunately.
As I understand the the idea itself is solid, i.e. energy from nuclear fusion. What I'm unclear of is whether it;s but there's no evidence that it can be accomplished in reality. There's an article on Wiki about it. See http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cold_fusion
If you look in the history of this forum you will find an extremely long and largely unedifying controversy on the subject. As I understand it, cold fusion is one of those issues that suffers from the difficulty that the effects reported seem to be unrepeatable. So, either there is something there that experimental procedures have not yet succeeded in isolating from chance influence, or there is nothing there and all we have is the social/psychological phenomenon of an embattled community of diehard believers who will take a long time to give up. And as Billvon observes, a certain number of charlatans - or probable charlatans - have tried to promise power generation from it before the science has been bottomed out, which further obscures the picture. But lack of repeatability is a killer in science: if people can't replicate your findings, you will not be taken seriously.
That is a somewhat, possibly unintentional overstatement of the current status of cold fusion in the scientific community (perhaps accidentally compared to "hot" fusion?). Normal, "hot" fusion exists and is well established and understood. Cold fusion is not currently accepted by the scientific community to be a real phenomena because: 1. Experiments purporting to demonstrate it are unreliable/difficult to reproduce. 2. Existing theory predicts that cold fusion is impossible, so the claimed mechanisms that might allow it aren't just new theory, they actually violate existing theory. So while there may be something interesting happening in some of the experiments, the consensus is that it is probably a chemical phenomena, not a nuclear one. In addition, because of the seductive promise of it, cold fusion is the subject of quite a lot of perpetual motion type crackpottery, which makes evaluation of it sometimes difficult.
Russ - As I said about I hold that it's possible for the fact that there's no reason to assume otherwise. I have to say this so please don't take it personally, it's simply a pet peeve of mine, i.e. people making assertions and expecting others to believe it for some unknown reason - Regarding your claim Existing theory predicts that cold fusion is impossible I have to say this: I find that kind of response to be irritating. This is a science forum and as such its expected that when someone makes an assertion such as this, especially when you're contradicting me, that they back it up with solid facts. One legitimate source of knowledge is authority so long as the person isn't using themselves as the authority. I saw your profile so its not as if you're advertising yourself as a physicist and as such you can't expect me to accept you as an authority on the subject. I mean, Russ, you wouldn't take anything I say merely on my word alone, would you? No, you wouldn't. So given that why would you expect us to take your assertion without any form of backing up? After I read your response I took it upon myself to ask an authority on the subject and received a response. Since this is a very prickly issue he doesn't want me to quote him. I'd tell you what he said but that's of no use if you don't know who said it. Moving on - (1) What is it that I wrote is an overstatement and in what sense is it an overstatement? (2) If this is what Existing theory predicts then there should be a proof of it somewhere I can read. If you know where I can find this then please post the reference. If not then please post the source you learned of this. Thanks, Pete
You linked the wiki article: it has an entire section titled "incompatibility with conventional fusion". And since we're talking about the scientific method, that's not an assumption, that's a scientific conclusion based on extensive experimentation with strong theoretical backing. You're free to "hold out hope", but it is just flat wrong to call the conclusion that it probably isn't real an assumption. It was your first sentence and what I said was exactly what was wrong with it: "As I understand the the idea itself is solid, i.e. energy from nuclear fusion." The idea itself is not solid because it contradicts how nuclear fusion is understood to work. The status of cold fusion hasn't changed in 24 years, so I have no idea where I first learned it, but you can read about the flaws in your own reference. Perhaps one of my earlier readings was Bob Park's (spokesperson for the APS) "Voodoo Science", published in 2000. I used to know where to find it online, but to type a quick quote: " ....theorists had reported that cold fusion violated not one but several accepted physical principles....A scientific consensus was taking form."
Pmb: Sometimes it requires a lot of effort to explain why existing theory denies some claim. I assume that you have little pertient knowledge on this issue. The reason mainstream physicists ignore or deny cold fusion claims is based on the force of electromagnetic repulsion between protons. Those who argue in favor of cold fusion are making extraordinary claims, which require extraordinary evidence to be considered worthy of consideration. There is little or no evidence supporting such claims. Electromagnetic forces are circa 10[sup]37[/sup] greater than gravitational forces. There are those (perhaps you) who do not appreciate the magnitude of 10[sup]37[/sup]. It might be better to point out that a half ounce (circa 14 gram) magnet can cause a pin to jump up from the surface of the Earth. Hot fusion takes place in the core of a star where there are extreme temperatures (millions of degrees) & extreme pressures. Note that temperature is a measure of particle motion. Hence positive nuclei are extremely fast in the dense stellar core, making collisions & fusion likely. There is no reason to believe that slow moving nucleii will collide & fuse. BTW: There are some mainstream physicists experimenting with muon-catalyzed fusion, but those experimenters do not expect it to become a commercally feasible source of power. A muon has a negative charge like an electron, but is much heavier/larger. A hydrogen atom using a muon instead of an electron is a better candidate for fusion than an ordinary hydrogen atom.
From a physicist, that is a pretty shocking question. Extraordinary or just new, as a physicist, I'm sure you are aware that the burden of proof is still on cold fusion proponents. No, I meant exactly what I said. So you do know about cold fusion - so why do you feign ignorance of it?
PmbThe following are from Posts by you. Quantum tunneling was mentioned in the long thread on this subject. It might have been originally mentioned by me (I do not remember). I did comment on this concept with a remark similar to the following. Whatever my wild guess was, somebody claimed that it was an underestimate. Of course those who are arguing for cold fusion are claiming that it might (or will) be a useful source of energy & tunneling effects are not significant enough to support such a claim. You asked about my credentials. I majored in mathematics & minored in physics a long time ago. I have read Scientific American almost every month since I was circa 9 years old (My father had a subscription). In the cold war era, I was a member of a think tank which planned for WW3 using manned bombers & thermonuclear weapons (It was prior to missile technology). In the past ten years, I have been working on understanding Quantum Theory & have several books on the subject. Quantum Reality by Nick Herbert is a good introductory book for those wanting to start learning this subject. Remember, however, what some experts have said. Paraphrases not exact quotes. In spite of my background, I do not consider myself to be an expert physicist, only a well informed amateur. It is my guess that I am more knowledgeable on the pertinent subject matter than you. The last of the above statements by you is astonishing. From my Post #8 The above seems to me to provide cogent reasons why mainstream physicists ignore the possibility of cold fusion. It provides justification for considering it to be an extraordinary claim requiring extraordinary proof to be worthy of consideration. BTW: You seem to ignore the notion that those making claims contrary to the mainstream POV have the burden of proof. Your statement that there is no proof against cold fusion is pointless. You seem to be requiring that dissers of cold fusion be more open minded. My POV is: Furthermore advocates of cold fusion are claiming the possibility of far more energy that what could result from tunneling effects (Not more than one fusion per century from a kilogram of mass). There seems to be a faith-like belief in cold fusion. Just as Creationists switched their arguments to Intelligent Design arguments, some of the cold fusion advocates started talking about LENR (Low Energy Nuclear Reactions). A rose by another name still smells & looks like a rose.
