Talk:Cold fusion: Difference between revisions

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Cold fusion article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48Auto-archiving period: 10 days

IMPORTANT: This is not the place to discuss your personal opinions of the merits of cold fusion research. This page is for discussing improvements to the article, which is about cold fusion and the associated scientific controversy surrounding it. See Wikipedia:No original research and Wikipedia:Talk page guidelines. If you wish to discuss or debate the status of cold fusion please do so at the VORTEX-L mailing list.

	Cold fusion is a former featured article. Please see the links under Article milestones below for its original nomination page (for older articles, check the nomination archive) and why it was removed.
	This article appeared on Wikipedia's Main Page as Today's featured article on August 24, 2004.
Article milestones Date Process Result August 16, 2004 Featured article candidate Promoted January 6, 2006 Featured article review Demoted June 3, 2006 Peer review Reviewed June 7, 2006 Good article nominee Listed July 19, 2006 Good article reassessment Delisted December 26, 2006 Good article nominee Not listed May 28, 2008 Good article nominee Listed November 23, 2008 Good article reassessment Delisted Current status: Former featured article

The subject of this article is controversial and content may be in dispute. When updating the article, be bold, but not reckless. Feel free to try to improve the article, but don't take it personally if your changes are reversed; instead, come here to the talk page to discuss them. Content must be written from a neutral point of view. Include citations when adding content and consider tagging or removing unsourced information.

This article is of interest to the following WikiProjects:

Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Physics B‑class High‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Physics, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of Physics on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.PhysicsWikipedia:WikiProject PhysicsTemplate:WikiProject Physicsphysics articles B This article has been rated as B-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. High This article has been rated as High-importance on the project's importance scale. Please add the quality rating to the {{WikiProject banner shell}} template instead of this project banner. See WP:PIQA for details. Skepticism B‑class Mid‑importance This article is within the scope of WikiProject Skepticism, a collaborative effort to improve the coverage of science, pseudoscience, pseudohistory and skepticism related articles on Wikipedia. If you would like to participate, please visit the project page, where you can join the discussion and see a list of open tasks.SkepticismWikipedia:WikiProject SkepticismTemplate:WikiProject SkepticismSkepticism articles B This article has been rated as B-class on Wikipedia's content assessment scale. Mid This article has been rated as Mid-importance on the project's importance scale.

This article has been mentioned by a media organization: Stephen Foley (Tuesday, 3 February 2009). "So is Wikipedia cracking up?:It was a utopian vision: an encyclopedia for the people, by the people. But eight years on, Wikipedia is plagued by endless hoaxes, and lurches from one cash crisis to another. Will it become a footnote in the history of the web?". The Independent. {{cite news}}: Check date values in: |date= (help)

This is the talk page for discussing improvements to the Cold fusion article. This is not a forum for general discussion of the article's subject.

Put new text under old text. Click here to start a new topic. New to Wikipedia? Welcome! Learn to edit; get help. Assume good faith Be polite and avoid personal attacks Be welcoming to newcomers Seek dispute resolution if needed Article policies Neutral point of view No original research Verifiability

Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL

Archives: Index, 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 22, 23, 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, 31, 32, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 38, 39, 40, 41, 42, 43, 44, 45, 46, 47, 48Auto-archiving period: 10 days

Sorry, some of this article is just written HORRIBLY! I mean, just a mess. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.153.128.84 (talk) 02:49, 24 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It is indeed a mess. That is because irrational hard-core opponents of cold fusion insist on filling it with nonsensical, hand-waving objections to the research, instead of facts from the peer-reviewed literature, and an organized overview of the subject. Whenever anyone who knows about cold fusion tries to correct their nonsense, they ban that person from Wikipedia. This an acute example of the problems with the Wikipedia structure. Experts are denigrated and thrown out. Biased, ignorant fools dominate. This is true of the article on cold fusion and many other subjects I have checked. - Jed Rothwell —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.120.10.38 (talk) 00:17, 27 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm surprised that this comment from Jed Rothwell has not been removed yet. Does it have anything to do with ScienceApologist having been indefinitely banned from Wikipedia [removed link with personal details on an editor --Enric Naval] ? Could it be that his mob has been silenced ?130.104.206.154 (talk) 11:39, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Nah, it's just that nobody cares (aka the continued existence of this comment here is not currently causing any particular disruption, tempers have cooled down since the last fights, etc. I could explain more reasons but I would fall foul of WP:BEANS). --Enric Naval (talk) 12:42, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I am also surprised to see this remark is not been erased. The thought police must be busy elsewhere. One of them, TenOfAllTrades, deleted another remark of mine, explaining that I am a "banned user" -- an honor I was unaware of:

http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Talk:Energy_Catalyzer&diff=421321503&oldid=421320271

I grant that remark was snide but I thought it was pretty funny. A pity Mr. (Ms.?) TenOfAllTrades has no sense of humor.

Would it be possible for me to ban Mr. TenOfAllTrades? He contrived to lock me out of that article, which is a neat trick. I do not know the rules, or why some people are given these powers and not others, but it would be fun going around locking people out for no apparent reason.

To be serious for a moment, as I see it, what happens here is none of my business. I do not feel that I have any right to complain about your rules and customs. I have no idea who is in charge here but whoever it is, they have every right to lock me and other knowledgeable people out while they fill this article with blather. I am not being sarcastic. - Jed Rothwell, Librarian, LENR-CANR.org —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.232.7.250 (talk) 17:42, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

To the extent that anyone or almost anyone* is invited to edit articles, then the articles are "everybody's business". I will agree that this article has problems, but I don't think I would call it "a mess". It simply focuses too much on all the negatives that could be dredged up about CF, and ignores the positives as much as can be gotten-away-with. I expect some more positives to become non-ignorable in the future, as more results come in from pressurized-deuterium experiments. So, I'm merely biding my time. (*an example of someone not invited to edit: a spammer. Jed, I recall you got banned partly because some idiot wanted to expand the definition of "spammer" to include folks who like to brag about themselves with their signatures. By that argument, everyone who attches "M.D." or "PhD" after their names should also be banned. The REAL person to ban should have been the idiot....) V (talk) 18:02, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

You wrote: "It simply focuses too much on all the negatives that could be dredged up about CF. . ." It is much worse than that. Looking at the section on calorimetry, for example, these negatives are not "dredged up" so much as invented out of whole cloth. They are not a bit true, and even if they were true, they would not apply to any experiment I know of. They would apply only to an experiment in which the temperature is measured at one location in the electrolyte. No one does that. Fleischmann and Pons measured with an array of sensors ~1 cm long as I recall. Most others measure outside the cell, either at the walls or with flow or Seebeck calorimetry. This section is the product of the fevered imaginations of people who know nothing about the experiments or calorimetry. I have not carefully reviewed the other sections but at a glance they are equally bad.

I also noted that some of the references say the opposite of what is claimed in the article.

When I wrote that this is filled with blather, I meant it. That is no exaggeration. I believe the main problem is the "Randy in Boise" effect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Randy_in_Boise. Plus in this case the anti-science, anti-intellectual mindset of people who oppose cold fusion. However, as I said, and I sincerely meant, if that is how people here want things to be, it is none of my business. - Jed Rothwell, Librarian, LENR-CANR.org —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.232.7.250 (talk) 19:01, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Bring the evidence, and I'm sure it can be added to the article. But blaming a vast conspiracy on skeptics who are quite educated, pro-science and pro-intellectual is amusing at best. OrangeMarlin ^{Talk• Contributions} 22:46, 31 March 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The evidence can be found in the peer-reviewed literature, which you can read in any university library or at LENR-CANR.org. You will see that it contradicts the assertions made in this article. I said nothing about a conspiracy and I do not believe in one. This article is full of errors so it cannot be the product of people who are "quite educated" about cold fusion. Perhaps they are educated about other subjects.

Note that even if you do not believe in the scientific method, replication, or peer-review, and you have therefore concluded that the literature is mistaken, in a conventional reference book of this nature you would still be obligated to describe what the literature says. Not what you believe to be true, but what the experiments have revealed and the researchers have concluded. This article ignores the literature and describes only the self-published pet theories of a handful of anti-cold fusion fanatics. - Jed Rothwell, Librarian, LENR-CANR.org —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.120.10.38 (talk) 04:12, 1 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Let me try to be a little more specific and helpful. As I mentioned, the section on calorimetry is now devoted to crackpot theories about imaginary calorimeters. I suggest that the authors of this article should read the literature and learn about actual calorimeters used in cold fusion studies. They should write conventional descriptions of these calorimeters, with schematics and sample data. They might say that a variety of different types (isoperibolic, flow, Seebeck) have been used in order to eliminate systematic errors. They might describe a few of the challenges of calorimetry as applied to cold fusion, and improvements that have been made over the years to meet these challenges. I wrote something along these lines here: http://en.citizendium.org/wiki/Cold_fusion

Even if the Wikipedia authors are convinced that all published calorimetric data from all ~200 laboratories is wrong, they should report what the literature describes, not what they themselves think of it. The present article describes only the authors' opinions and theories, with no description of the claims. - Jed Rothwell, Librarian, LENR-CANR.org —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.120.10.38 (talk) 13:41, 1 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Did you find that amusing Orange Marlin? Someone who is pro-science pro-intellectual and educated would, at this point, begin actually researching the topic in primary literature. If that doesn't interest you, perhaps you should leave the article to people who actually care enough to do some work. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 142.58.24.190 (talk) 14:59, 1 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

A problem now rears its ugly head, that even the pro-CF people have to work with rather than against. This is a Wikipedia Policy regarding the uses of primary sources. A FEW can be offered as references, but they can't be used as direct sources of data for an article (almost any in-depth article). The Policy is that articles must get their data from secondary and even tertiary sources, articles about other articles, that is. Thus, while there are useful articles regarding CF experiments using electrolysis, I've been waiting for something like 2 years for some appropriate articles to appear regarding the direct pressurization of deuterium into palladium. The primary articles exist, but apparently they haven't caught the attention of most folks who write the kind of articles that Wikipedia wants as sources. V (talk) 06:37, 2 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

And it's even worse. I'm reading some sources (the kind wikipedia likes) to add more stuff into the article, and they treat pressurization of deuterium as something ludicrous. You should be familiar with the caveats they list; citing from memory: molecules in the solid are farther apart than in the gas so they should have lower fusion rates, such high pressures are unattainable by simple electrolysis, the pressures would break the palladium rod, etc. (btw, I'm not interested in entering a looong discussion in technical details, just commenting on what I read) --Enric Naval (talk) 08:10, 2 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Enric Naval wrote: "And it's even worse. I'm reading some sources (the kind wikipedia likes) to add more stuff into the article, and they treat pressurization of deuterium as something ludicrous. You should be familiar with the caveats they list; citing from memory: molecules in the solid are farther apart than in the gas . . ."

Those are not caveats. They are facts well known to people like Fleischmann. He literally wrote the book on metal lattices. If you are suggesting that fusion occurs because of pressurization, in a brute-force "squeezing" effect, that is ludicrous -- as you say. The pressure is typically 1 to 3 atm, so there would be fusion everywhere in nature it that were a factor. Your discussion appears to be a straw man: you are casting doubt about an assertion that no cold fusion researcher makes. Gas loaded systems work because the metal absorbs the hydrogen, not because hydrogen atoms are forced together or forced into the lattice under high pressure. What you are reading has no bearing on the subject.

I suspect you are replacing facts about cold fusion with your own ideas, your own original research, and “caveats” that you mistakenly suppose the researchers never thought of. - Jed Rothwell, Librarian, LENR-CANR.org

V wrote: “A problem now rears its ugly head, that even the pro-CF people have to work with rather than against. This is a Wikipedia Policy regarding the uses of primary sources. A FEW can be offered as references . . .”

That seems like an ill-advised policy. The farther removed from original sources you get, the more distorted and mistaken the report becomes. I have learned there are a number of other ill-advised policies here; see: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Expert_retention

Anyway, primary or secondary, my point is that your sources and the text should be about cold fusion, not some other subject. This article tells the reader little or nothing about cold fusion. It does not say what the researchers do, what the main instruments they use are, what levels of power, energy, tritium or helium they measure, or any other relevant details. There is no sample data, a few inadequate schematics, and nothing about key concepts such as heat beyond the limits of chemistry or helium correlated with heat in approximately the ratio as it is with plasma fusion. This article should be titled "Imaginary skeptical objections to cold fusion."

I do not understand why the skeptics feel they must hijack this article and make it about themselves, just because they do not believe the results. I am honestly mystified by that.

I am highly skeptical about creationism. I don’t believe a word of it. However, if I were writing an encyclopedia article about it, I would not devote the whole article to explaining "Why Jed thinks this can’t be true." I would leave out my opinions. As accurately as I can, I would report what the creationists say and what they think. If I asked a creationist "what is your source of information?" and she said, "the Bible" I would not say: "Sorry, that’s a primary source, we can’t include it" or "that is not a valid source of scientific information, we can’t include it." I would say: "Okay, what chapter and verse?" I would reference that verse and explain why the creationists think it proves their point. Let the reader decide whether it does or not.

If I included skeptical objections to creationism, I would also include the Creationist's own rebuttals to these objections. I would not pretend the creationists never thought of these objections, or never tried to meet them. This cold fusion article is filled with skeptical objections. Most are physically impossible and irrelevant, like the nonsense in the calorimetry section. There are a few genuine issues, but the article does not point out that the researchers themselves knew about these issues, and addressed them in 1989. For example, the article mentions recombination: "Several researchers have described potential mechanisms by which this process could occur and thereby account for excess heat in electrolysis experiments." It should also say that in every actual experiment on record, these mechanisms have been ruled out by using closed cells with recombiners, by measuring the gas flow, or by assuming complete recombination occurs and counting only the heat above the limits of recombination. The text as written gives the reader the false impression that this objection applies to real experiments. That's either a stupid error or it is disinformation.

As I said, the whole article is like this. Nearly every assertion is either factually wrong or distorted. The only mention of tritium says that it was not replicated. It was replicated in over 100 labs, at levels ranging from ~40 times background to millions of times background. Again, whoever wrote that is either grossly ignorant, or he knows the facts and he is writing anti-cold fusion propaganda.

Anyway, I am glad I have nothing to do with this article. I know hundreds of cold fusion researchers. They seldom agree about anything, but all of the ones who looked at this article agree it is outrageous nonsense. Not only is this nonsense, it is not very good at what it sets out to do, which is to discredit the field. McKubre and I have both said we could write far more damning critiques of cold fusion than any skeptic. I have done that for several experiments, which is why I have some prominent enemies in the field. The authors here invent imaginary problems. I know of many actual, real weaknesses that the authors of this article have never dreamed of. The papers at LENR-CANR describe them; the skeptics have not even bothered to read papers that support their point of view! I just uploaded one yesterday. - Jed Rothwell, Librarian, LENR-CANR.org —Preceding unsigned comment added by 99.120.10.38 (talk) 17:18, 2 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding these items posted by two different people: "molecules in the solid are farther apart than in the gas" and "Gas loaded systems work because the metal absorbs the hydrogen, not because hydrogen atoms are forced together or forced into the lattice under high pressure." Actually, if fusion actually happens, it is at least partly because inside the metal, the hydrogen does not exist as molecules or as atoms. The absorption process causes the gas to dissociate into electrons and nuclei. Even without fusion, such dissociation is the only way to explain why hydrogen can permeate palladium like a sponge, when helium (a smaller atom!) can't. So, in an electrolysis experiment when absorption takes place at atmospheric pressure, it can take a long time for enough bare hydrogen nuclei to get into the metal, for fusion to have a chance of occurring, while in a pressurization experiment, getting enough loose hydrogen nuclei into the metal is relatively easy. This is just simple logic and, as I've written before on this page, I'm pretty sure that every pressurized-deuterium experiment, with palladium, has produced anomalous energy. Talking about molecules inside the metal simply distracts from the observed facts (easy permeation, for hydrogen only, being one fact that nobody argues about). V (talk) 19:16, 3 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(My mistake, I keep using "molecules" for everything....)

Fleischmann did not "literally wrote the book on metal lattices". Let's not distort reality to make some authors look more authoritative than they really are, please. A couple of RS say that he didn't appear to have read the literature on the topic before starting, and that the phenomena inside lattices was well understood before Fleischmann started studying it (again citing from memory, btw). --Enric Naval (talk) 09:01, 4 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Freelion thinks a certain DIA document should be discussed in the article [1]. This DIA document appears to be leaked, not published, which means that according to [2], it should not be used as a source. Is there something I am missing? (See also [3]) Olorinish (talk) 01:47, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

What you are missing is the fact that the Defense Intelligence Agency e-mailed hundreds of copies of this report to scientists worldwide, as well as a copy to Rothwell with permission for him to upload it. It may thus quite reasonably be considered official, and a valid source as far as Wikipedia is concerned. Brian Josephson (talk) 20:04, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's interesting Olorinish. I guess we could remove the source but what about the statement - is it contestable? Could I re-word the statement (as it is general info) and put it back into the intro without the source? Meanwhile, just for the record, can we consider www.lenr-canr.org as a reliable source? Freelion (talk) 05:03, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The recent work and support is already described by other, sourced, statements. Regarding the question of whether lenr-canr.org is a reliable source, it depends on what the statement is. Olorinish (talk) 12:00, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Editors here may be advised to review Jed's comments at Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Noticeboard/Archive_72 with regard to the website he promotes. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:00, 6 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Are you following me LeadSongDog? You're very busy aren't you. Do you think you could find the time to answer my question at Talk:Nirmala Srivastava#2011 proposed rename of article? Thank you for the internal link on lenr-canr.org, that's helpful, thanks.

Olornish, the DIA reference does contain additional info about international experiments sponsored by state or major corporations which aren't mentioned in the article. Brian Josephson (talk), do you have any evidence of the DIA releasing that report? Freelion (talk) 00:06, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks to Leadsongdog we have an internal link to a conversation including the librarian of lenr-canr.org. He declares that he has permission to host all of the documents on the website. That means he has legally published these sources, which fulfills the requirements of WP:RS. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Freelion (talk • contribs) 00:37, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Just to clarify, it's previously been shown that LENR-CANR may contain copyright violations: not all of the material is potentially a copyright violation, but some material hosted is included through under the permission of the author, not the copyright holder (the journal). Thus although LENR-CANR is no longer black listed, external links to articles on the site need to be checked to confirm that they meet the copyright policy. - Bilby (talk) 00:55, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

In that case I believe the DIA reference is OK. Jed Rothwell says that he has permission to host that report and as he says, all the copyright holders of all the reports he hosts have the opportunity to remove them. The DIA report is one he mentions. He says the DIA knows that he is hosting it and even cites his website as one of its references. This DIA report has been on his website for quite a while as is evident by a Google search - many other websites also link to the report on lenr-canr.org. So the DIA has had ample opportunity to ask him to remove it if it is in breach of their copyright. We can take it in good faith that this report is being published with the owner's permission so we are not knowingly breaching any copyright as per copyright policy. Freelion (talk) 03:04, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I do not know the copyright status of that article. However, just in the hope of clarifying the general situation, it doesn't really matter how long an article has been hosted on a site, as the copyright holder may simply be unaware that the article is there. More importantly, though, whether or not it is legally hosted, this isn't a reason for not using the article - it is only a reason for not linking to the article. The question as to whether or not the article has been formally published, or has been leaked, is a separate issue - a leaked document may not be a verifiable reliable source, but this isn't a copyright concern per se. - Bilby (talk) 03:14, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

My previous comment argues that it is fair to assume this report has not been leaked and does not breach copyright. Freelion (talk) 03:40, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

My two cents: I'm almost certain that anything/everything published by the U.S. Government is considered to be Public Domain (even when it's "classified" and kept secret). That's because of the "work for hire" rules associated with copyright ownership. Someone who pays someone else to create something can be the copyright owner. In the case of the U.S. Government, all its employees are paid by the U.S. Public. So, works produced by the U.S. Government are Public Domain. V (talk) 05:49, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Though there's a lot of discussion of the copyright status of the document above, I don't see that anyone has addressed Olorinish's central point, the question of whether this is a WP:RS per Wikipedia standards. Has this document been published anywhere, or is there a reliable secondary source that discusses it? Private correspondence that is not remarked on by other sources does not meet our sourcing standards, even if it can be shown to be authentic and not encumbered by copyright. --Noren (talk) 13:03, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

BAD assumption, Noren. The DIA document is not primary data generated by researchers in the field; it is a secondary source describing various primary sources, and therefore it doesn't need tertiary sources describing it. I will agree, however, that its status as a "publication" needs to be clarified before it can be used as a WikiPedia source-document. V (talk) 05:48, 8 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Just above it was mentioned that this was mass-emailed to outside scientists by the department itself. That constitutes publishing. Kevin Baas^talk 22:45, 7 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Actually, it sounds more like an emailing than a publishing. Is emailing reports the standard way of distributing them? I would guess that when they really want to publish a report, they put in on a web site or something. Olorinish (talk) 00:30, 8 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Maybe if they REALLY REALLY want to publish it. That would definitely be something politically motivated. I've never heard of or seen that done before. Kevin Baas^talk 16:48, 8 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well it has been published - on the LENR-CANR website. As mentioned above, the DIA has had ample opportunity to ask Rothwell to remove it if it is in breach of their copyright. We can take it in good faith that this report has being published with the DIA's permission. They even use this website as a reference. Freelion (talk) 01:47, 13 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Is there any objection to using this report in the article now? Freelion (talk) 09:55, 15 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I still object to using it, since the DIA did not publish that report, which means that it likely does not represent the DIA's official position. Keep in mind that a very likely reason for not publishing such a report is that the evidence for cold fusion is still weak. If that changes, many organizations like the DIA will publish descriptions of it, after which this article should discuss it. Wikipedia isn't going anywhere. Olorinish (talk) 11:44, 15 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That doesn't fit any reasonable definition of "being published by DIA". Bilby's comment above would also apply. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:32, 15 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Regarding "likely reason for not publishing...evidence is weak": note this article: [4] which has been widely published, and the evidence is much thinner and more tenuous than that for cold fusion. From a statistical perspective, in fact, the evidence is quite dismal. So you that assertion, "likely reason for not publishing...evidence is weak", is baldly contradicted by empirical evidence. And furthermore, in such cases, we don't even think to question the "publishability". Kevin Baas^talk 12:54, 16 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This in fact alludes to a more fundamental point: that historically speaking, strength/weakness of evidence, even plausibility, has not been a significant factor in decisions about information dissemination. But we have only to look at politics and religion to see that... Kevin Baas^talk 12:46, 16 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The attitudes of some folks around here is hilarious. Remember the "Pentagon Papers"? Where were the claims that those documents were forged or did not originate in the Pentagon? Why is it, just because this document is about Cold Fusion research and positive, its origin is questioned? What if it had been negative? I bet the detractors wouldn't waste two seconds getting it into the article and trumpeting such negative points! V (talk) 05:52, 18 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The bottom line is that the DIA report has been published by the LENR-CANR website. Olorinish is only speculating that this is not the DIA's official position. We can use the LENR-CANR website as the reliable source for this document. I have yet to find the rule on Wikipedia that specifies that a government report has to be officially released. Freelion (talk) 03:15, 19 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This edit [5] would give far too much weight to a minor event, the emailing of a report by its author to people she knows. That is very different from a major institution publishing a document, since it may not have received the full review that published documents receive. Linking to the LENR-CANR web site doesn't bother me; perhaps someone should place the link (without comment) with the other references after the word "fusion" in the phrase "However, a small community of researchers continues to investigate cold fusion..." in the introduction. Would people be OK with that? PS: I think "small community of researchers" should be replaced with "some researchers." Olorinish (talk) 12:09, 19 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks Olorinish, I agree that we could avoid trying to imply the DIA has an official position. There is a lot in that document which is neutral though, like the list of ongoing projects. Here are 12 projects which are not mentioned in the article:

• Y. Iwamura at Japan's Mitsubishi Heavy Industries detected transmutation of elements when permeating deuterium through palladium metal in 2002.

• Additional indications of transmutation have been reported in China, Russia, France, Ukraine, and the United States

• Researchers in Japan, Italy, Israel, and the United States have all reported detecting evidence of nuclear particle emissions.

• Chinese researchers described LENR experiments in 1991 that generated so much heat that they caused an explosion that was not believed to be chemical in origin.

• Japanese, French, and U.S. scientists also have reported rapid, high-energy LENR releases leading to laboratory explosions, according to scientific journal articles from 1992 to 2009.

• Israeli scientists reported in 2008 that they have applied pulsating electrical currents to their LENR experiments to increase the excess energy production.

• As of 2008 India was reportedly considering restarting its LENR program after 14 years of dormancy.

• U.S. LENR researchers also have reported results that support the phenomena of anomalous heat, nuclear particle production, and transmutation.

• At the March 2009 American Chemical Society annual meeting, researchers at U.S. Navy SPAWAR Pacific reported excess energy, nuclear particles, and transmutation, stating that these effects were probably the result of nuclear reactions.

• A research team at the U.S. company SRI International has been studying the electrochemistry and kinetics of LENR since the early 1990s, reporting excess heat and helium production.

• In May 2002, researchers at JET Thermal in Massachusetts reported excess heat and optimal operating points for LENR manifolds.

• Researchers at the China Lake Naval Air Warfare Center in California first reported anomalous power correlated with Helium-4 production in 1996

Plus there are more details about Y. Arata from Japan and Violante from Italy. Freelion (talk) 04:07, 20 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(I haven't taken a through look, but, it those facts are notable, then it should be possible to find better sourcing for them.) --Enric Naval (talk) 08:58, 20 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

• In case it wasn't obvious, LENR-CANR is not an appropriate source here. We previously had a "convenience link" to the DOE report which turned out to be editorialised, Rothwell is not an honest broker here. Also his claims to have copyright permissions are dubious - they include material from publishers of whom I have previously asked similar permission (i.e. permission to reprint content written by co-members of the editorial board of a website) and been refused. I simply do not believe any claim of permission for copyright material on LENR-CANR, anything they claim is public domain should be linked from the original public domain source not from LENR-CANR due to its biases, and anything whihc is only on LENR-CANR and not discussed in reliable independent sources should be rejected on that basis alone. Guy (Help!) 20:08, 16 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This was added to the bibliography, as "published in Nature". However, this is not an article but a letter to the editor. We shouldn't give it a place in the article unless a secondary source says that this specific letter was important for some reason.

• Gryziński, Michał (27 April 1989), "Cold fusion: what's going on?", Nature, 338: 712, doi:10.1038/338712a0

--Enric Naval (talk) 11:09, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I tried the link and the text is behind a paywall. It doesn't make sense to me that a "free for anyone" encyclopedia should link to sources that only people who have money can access. OTHER than that, though, the text could have been important if the Editors of Nature had replied to that letter. They represent a significant voice in the scientific community, see, especially in terms of mainstream thinking at the time such a reply was (if it was) published. V (talk) 17:24, 12 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Now the artist is said to be only about the Fleischmann–Pons set-up. Although the start of the history section is somewhat more general. Perhaps we should spin of the Fleischmann–Pons part to it's own article an keep this as a page about cold fusion in general. // Liftarn (talk)

Since Scaramuzzi, F. (2000) is an accepted reference (117,119,124), I would suggest the following sentence, based on p. 9 of that source, be added to the end of the first paragraph of the section: Nevertheless, as early as 1997, at least one research group was reporting that, with the proper procedure, "...5 samples out of 6 that had undergone the whole procedure showed very clear excess heat production (4)."^[1] Aqm2241 (talk) 07:36, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The article should give a general overview of replicability of excess heat in the field. What's the point of giving WP:WEIGHT to this specific paper? This appear to be an isolated paper that had no repercusions in the general replicability of CF, we are giving it a lot of weight by mentioning it here, as if it was an important experiment. If the replicability of this specific experiment is so important and relevant, then why is this experiment not mentioned prominently in other sources since 2000? Why Hagelstein didn't consider it relevant enough to include it his 2004 report of the field, where he was trying to show that cold fusion was a replicable effect. Have other groups replicated it successfully? We shouldn't include specific papers unless they are really relevant for the field or they are needed to explain specific events. This paper doesn't seem to cut it. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:46, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Enric, are you then advocating that we delete all 3 of the present references to Scaramuzzi's paper? They have been there for as long as I remember.Aqm2241 (talk) 06:07, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

No, I'm saying to remove the mention of the "5 samples out of 6" experiment. --Enric Naval (talk) 07:07, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

If I find 5 better references in Hagelstein, are you likely to find any of them acceptable? This paper is 'relevant' in the field because Wiki editors have accepted it and it balances an argument put forth in the previous sentence.Aqm2241 (talk) 07:48, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Mentioning this isolated paper gives it a lot of weight, as if it had a lot of relevance on assessing if the effect of excess heat has been reliably reproduced. I don't see any source saying that CF experiments now can be replicated reliably 5 out of 6 times, and this is the impression given to readers by citing this experiment there.

Re Hagelstein, I suppose that you mean the report that he sent to the DOE in 2004. The DOE 2004 report said, among other things, "Most reviewers, including those who accepted the evidence and those who did not, stated that the [excess power / excess heat] effects are not repeatable, the magnitude of the effect has not increased in over a decade of work, and that many of the reported experiments were not well documented." They don't mention the 5 out of 6 experiment. --Enric Naval (talk) 21:17, 17 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

it should be noted that: a) by "not repeatable" they, of course, mean not _reliably_ repeatable (and some would argue to the contrary - they are experimental setups which some claim reliably repeatable), and b) if "the effect" had "increased in over a decade of work ", that would in fact be evidence that it was really experimental error, rather than some interesting physical process, as a physical process would be consistent in its magnitude. (though oddly they seem to be placing the statement so as to persuade the opposite) Kevin Baas^talk 13:01, 19 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Enric, your argument about the undue weight of that paper is correct. It is used 6 times (based on a single paragraph that is reviewing the arguments that have been proposed against CF. (The lead in to these statements is "It has been said that..." Here is a proponent of the field that is repeatedly quoted for anti-CF statements. Unless, at least one statement that represents the purpose of Scaramuzzi's paper is included in the Wiki article, I will have to eliminate all of the other comments on the same basis that you removed my contribution from his paper.

I have undone your revert. Aqm2241 (talk) 19:13, 23 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This website is cited or mentioned in many RS. i think it's time to accept that the wikipedia article should include it, even if it's only in the "external links" section. I propose this:

• lenr-canr.org, advocate website with bibliography.

--Enric Naval (talk) 10:50, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

When I search on "contributory prefix:Talk:Cold fusion" I find three archives that have discussed this site, there may be others elsewhere. Unless the search misses a resolution, I see no excuse for assuming this would not be wp:CCI.LeadSongDog come howl! 13:19, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think it would be POV to call it an advocacy site. Just because through a site you can learn about research that has been done about a topic, doesn't mean said site advocates a position about said topic. It seems ppl are assuming that not allowing access to research is the "default" position and represents neutrality, and thus allowing it would be "advocacy". Both the premise and the logic of that are false. Kevin Baas^talk 17:56, 27 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I received a lengthy email from User:Abd (edit | talk | history | links | watch | logs) responding to the above, in which he provided links to two discussions Talk:Martin_Fleischmann/Archive_1#Lenr-canr.org_allegedly_hosts_copyright_violations and [6]. Since he chose off-wiki communication and I do not wish to proxy for anyone I'll simply pass those links along without further comment at this time. LeadSongDog come howl! 13:26, 28 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The difficulty with lenr-canr.org is that they publish articles with the permission of authors. However, the authors don't always have the right to republish the articles, as the copyright belongs to the journal/publisher, and in some instances lenr-canr.org distributes papers which can reasonably be seen as copyright violations. Thus there has to be care taken about linking to individual articles in order to confirm that the individual link isn't linkvio. I'm not sure what this means with linking to the site as a whole, but I think there is some cause for considering the correct position. - Bilby (talk) 00:36, 30 April 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That's one difficulty. Another is that some of the material hosted there has been found to contain editorialising. A third is that site owner Jed Rothwell is banned for pushing links to the site. Another is that it uncritically represents the minority view only, without adequate context (unlike mainstream science and popular science sites, which report both positive and negative results (the problem being, for cold fusionists at least, that the negative results vastly outweigh the positive). Has anyone here seen Brian Dunning's "Here Be Dragons" movie? 40 minutes well spent. For the rest - well, this is just like arguing with homeopaths. It doesn't matter how often you point out to them that their field has no credible scientific mechanism, they will still keep repeating the same assertions based on the same work by the same people. As Abd found, sometimes the only answer is to tell them to shut up and go away. If any proof emerges for the supposed field of low energy nuclear science then it will have to come fomr quantum physics, not from endless repetition of anomalous empirical results. This is what the DOE review said (and of course the CF crowd represent that as a call for further research, rather than an instruction to go away until there is a credible mechanism to support their theory). Guy (Help!) 01:24, 17 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I've heard that Rothwell has actually been blocked rather than barred. But anyway, my own link, removed by someone, was to the Library page, meaning that people going to it would not see any of the editorialising/advocacy on the rest of the site but merely see strictly neutral information about the library context. Given the very positive value of the library as a reference source, and the rather nebulous objection, that a small proportion of the entries may be material to which publishers might take exception, it is a no-brainer, as they say in the US, that the library should be linked in.

--Brian Josephson (talk) 09:10, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

User:Brian Josephson added the lenr-canr.org link to the article, and it was removed by User:2over0 without explanation. I replaced it, asking why it was removed and referencing this discussion. 2over0 removed it again, saying, "Undid revision ... by EnergyNeutral ... contributory copyright infringement and WP:ELNO, same as it always was." I don't see the application of WP:ELNO to lenr-canr.org, and looking above, it seems this issue has been discussed before, at length, with different conclusions than 2ocer0 implies, so, unless there was something else not referenced, "same as it always was" doesn't make sense. Will 2over0 or someone else please explain this?

Above, I see that LeadSongDog has referred to WP:CCI. I thought that CCI meant "contributory copyright infringement," after the term 2over0 used, but it doesn't, it means "contributor copyright investigations," about contributors repeatedly adding copyright violations. Has this happened with lenr-canr.org? --EnergyNeutral (talk) 01:49, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I think this would be the policy: WP:LINKVIO. The present situation is not exactly covered. It's clear that we should never link to a page where we know that the page is copyvio. The lenr-canr.org bibliography, however, contains no copyvio, it's an original work itself. The issue would be whether the possibility that there are one or more supposed copyright violations, perhaps somewhere linked from the bibliography, should be enough to prohibit linking. While it's not specific for our situation, In articles about a website, it is acceptable to include a link to that website even if there are possible copyright violations somewhere on the site. If the possible existence of violations somewhere on a site created contributory copyright infringement by linking to the site itself, that the article was about the site itself would be no excuse. --EnergyNeutral (talk) 05:35, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

EnergyNeutral is correct. I used the wrong shortcut, wp:CCI when I intended wp:LINKVIO, which cautions against contributory copyright infringement. My apology for the confusion.LeadSongDog come howl! 05:55, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Well, I remain confused. What precisely is the problem with lenr.org? Can you be more specific, rather than just mouthing generalities? --Brian Josephson (talk) 21:39, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Just wondering -- do these editors advocating removal on what to my mind are tendentious grounds examine all links in articles with equal diligence? If not, this rather tends to suggest an agenda on their part. --Brian Josephson (talk) 08:59, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

The last paragraph of the article states:

"This decline of publications in cold fusion has been described as a characteristic of pathological science[67][68] and of a "failed information epidemics".[69] Cold fusion researchers occasionally succeed in publishing papers in prestigious journals; the 1993 paper in Physics Letters A is an important example because it was the last paper published by Fleischmann, and "one of the last reports to be formally challenged on technical grounds by a cold fusion skeptic".[68]:1919"

I would suggest adding: "On the other hand, the recently released Volume 4 of the peer-reviewed Journal of Condensed Matter Nuclear Science [JCMNS, http://www.iscmns.org/news.htm] is a collection of 25 papers on the topic."

Since at least 4 of these papers are review articles, I would further suggest that, not being primary sources, at least these 4 papers would be legitimate references for the Wiki article.

By the way, does anyone know what the 1919 at the end of the paragraph means? Aqm2241 (talk) 07:26, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

That means "page 1919 in reference #68".

I understand that the JCNMS journal was formed by cold fusion proponents so they could have somewhere to publish. We could mention the journal in the article, as an example of how proponents had to build their own communication channels.

The journal editors are also CF proponents, right? And editors are the ones who assign the peer reviewers to each article. Reviews published only there are not independent from the field and should be taken with a grain of salt. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:29, 5 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thx, I would have assumed the page number to be in the reference, not the text.

I think that a mention of the community having to publish its own journal would be excellent. Do you have a reference that is acceptable? Do you want to open the can of worms about how 'powers' above journal editors have breached contracts to overrule editors of standard physics journals and books about to be published? As you say, if any editor did not want to publish an article, he has a list of reviewers who would be happy to 'kill' the paper.

Can you think of a journal that was started by opponents of any field of interest? (Maybe Nanotechnology?) Where would be the most appropriate place to publish a review? I know that some academics would try to publish in Nature just because it has high 'impact-factor and thus higher KPI points.

Should Die Naturwissenschaften be eliminated from the list of acceptable journals on Wikipedia, just because it now has an editor who is pro CF? If so, would you then say that it is 'OK' prior to that date? Do you think that editor would/should ask you to be a reviewer (assuming that you were qualified)?

Would you consider this to be a valid review article? V. A. Chechin, V. A. Tsarev, M. Rabinowitz, and Y. E. Kim, “Critical Review of Theoretical Models for Anomalous Effects in Deuterated Metals,” International Journal of Theoretical Physics, Vol. 33, No. 3, 1994 Aqm2241 (talk) 06:53, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Cold_fusion#Publications already mentioned having to create their own publications, I added the journal. You should find sources for that can of worms.

No opinion on that paper, I'll let others look at it. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:30, 11 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Enric. Thank you for separating the two groups of journals. However, it might be important to also remove the word "fringe" in the prior sentence, since that is POV, derogatory, and perhaps libelous. Replacing 'fringe' with 'alternative energy' would be safer and more accurate. (Unless you wish to claim Bubble Fusion to be 'fringe', as an example.)

Does anyone know what happened to the reference that goes with the citation ^ a b Labinger 2005 ? Aqm2241 (talk) 18:01, 14 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Enric, Thx for fixing the Labinger 2005 Ref. Aqm2241 (talk) 19:32, 14 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Dilbert's take on cold fusion. Enjoy :-) Guy (Help!) 19:59, 16 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I have been spending a number of hours going over Schwinger's 1990 papers on the probability of Coulomb barrier penetration. The main arguments against them break down to the fact that his model did not predict the CF results; therefore, they could not pertain. The argument(s) against the process itself seem very weak. Also, Schwinger was no longer alive to counter it.

Since the 1st paragraph of the Explanations section ends with:

"Skeptics claim that cold fusion explanations are "ad hoc" and lack rigor.[112][113]"

I would suggest that we add:

"On the other hand,Julian Schwinger, recognized as one of the greatest physicists of the twentieth century, wrote a well thought out and knowledgeable paper [1] on how the Coulomb barrier can be penetrated in a lattice. An excellent review paper [2] that countered the available CF models at the time (1994) did not have a strong argument against Schwinger's model, but did emphasize that it did not predict the results observed in CF."

1. J. SCHWINGER, “COLD FUSION : A HYPOTHESIS” Zeitschrift für Naturforschung A, ISSN 0932-0784 CODEN ZNASEI 1990, vol. 45a, no5, p. 756

2. V. A. Chechin, V. A. Tsarev, M. Rabinowitz and Y. E. Kim, “Critical review of theoretical models for anomalous effects in deuterated metals,” 1994, Volume 33, Number 3, Pages 617-670 Aqm2241 (talk) 18:08, 24 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

there's way to many opinionated words in that suggested content. i get what you're saying and in general agree. i mean, you got two sides: "Skeptics claim that cold fusion explanations are "ad hoc" and lack rigor.", and then how i would paraphrase: C.F. researches acknowledge that they don't understand what's going on, and say "that is in fact precisely why we are researching it!", adding "duh!". they also point out that skeptics arguments are "'ad hoc' and lack rigor.", and "many are in fact quite specious, and baldly so. and besides, all the arguments and reasoning in the world isn't going to change what nature actually does because after all, nature really doesn't care what we have to say about it, which is the whole point of science, and you should know that already. so quit your squabbling and let's see what's actually going on here."

that, IMO opinion, would clearly and pretty faithfully get across what C.F. researchers feel and have to say. and it would be quite informative to the reader in that regard. however, i don't really think that language i just wrote there is very neutral, and don't get me started on WP:SYNTH and WP:OR, and WP:V!

so anyways, point is, that's what we're dealing with. we really got to be careful with the language, including avoiding words like "excellent" and "well thought out", however accurate they may be. rules we've got to play by, yet still somehow manage to right a decent, informative article. Kevin Baas^talk 20:35, 25 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Kevin, I thought that I was being balanced by praising both papers. However, you are correct; the whole addition would be rejected because I did not reference the praise and therefore it would be considered POV. I'll try again - unless you want to take a shot at it.

With regard to Swinger: should I just say again "Nobel Laureate in Physics," which is mentioned later in the article, or should I (can I) refer, via link, to the Wiki article on him that I quoted from? Aqm2241 (talk) 17:55, 28 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Let's look at this. The sources for the "ad hoc" and "lack rigor" comments are Derry (2002) and the 2004 U.S. DOE report. Derry is a tertiary source, a popular explanation, although academically published, not a scientific paper or monograph on the field. The section on cold fusion seems to be about four pages, in what I could see on Google. Derry says many things that are contradicted in later peer-reviewed reviews of the field. What Derry actually says:

... The first mystery is how fusion can occur at all [under cold fusion conditions] ... the second mystery is why there are not enough fusion products to account for the heat produced. Several theorists attempted to explain these two mysteries, but the proposed explanations all suffered from the same problem: they were all ad hoc explanations. An ad hoc explanation is an explanation that is not based on anything, an explanation where you just make it up as you go along and use any assumptions you need to achieve the result you want. No coherent theory that really explains the results has ever been proposed to explain cold fusion. A highly developed and interconnected set of theories and experiments, on the other hand, has evolved over fifty years to give us a coherent picture in which cold fusion is not possible.

This text is not reflected in our text, which has "Skeptics claim that cold fusion explanations are "ad hoc" ....

Is Derry a "skeptic?" What is the source for that? Derry has presented his own opinions, he doesn't source them. And there are some severe problems with what he wrote. In particular, the comment about "not enough fusion products to account for the heat produced." Long before he wrote, the ash, helium, was identified and found to be commensurate with the heat. There is imprecision in the ratio (20%, according to Storms, 2010[7][8]), but Derry is just plain wrong, and that work had been done and published long before he was writing, and is covered in other secondary sources as well.

Derry's position that there is no "coherent theory that really explains the results," however, agrees with Storms, who has criticized cold fusion theory on much the same basis. That is not a "skeptical" position, it's accepted by many researchers in the field. The most severe problem with Derry is the claim about fifty years of work producing a coherent picture in which cold fusion is not possible. That's only true if "cold fusion" is presumed to be a specific reaction, the brute-force or even simply catalyzed fusion of two deuterons to form helium, just like that, which would, from experiment and theory, produce radiation that is not observed. Low-temperature fusion is possible, though, and is known and accepted: muon-catalyzed fusion. "Cold fusion" is, instead, an "unknown nuclear reaction", as Fleischmann claimed it was, and calculating, with all that established theory, the probability of an "unknown reaction", is not possible! But what Storms shows, in the most recent secondary reliable source we have, under peer review, is that the fuel is deuterium and the product is helium, at about the right amount to account for the heat. Plenty of mystery remains about mechanism.

So, the question for our article is "what theories are there?" Storms answers this in his 2007 book, and in his 2010 review, and there is an excellent early source that covers what had been proposed early on, the review by Chechin mentioned above, which is also peer-reviewed secondary source, what we prefer to base science articles on, the only problem being its age (1994). Schwinger's paper is of interest, perhaps, but is not historically important, as far as can be seen at this time, it only shows that physicists of high repute worked on the problem; others could be mentioned, including Edward Teller. We need to focus on what is in peer-reviewed secondary sources in the mainstream scientific journals or academically published material of authority on the topic, not just passing mention. --EnergyNeutral (talk) 05:11, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This comment is taking a lot of clues from User:Nrcprm2026 [9][10] and from User:Abd [11][12]. --Enric Naval (talk) 10:55, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Typical detractor response: Attack the person making a post, and not the substance of the post. How can that policy help the article? It Can't. But this doesn't stop the detractors from attacking posters, anyway. Me, I don't care if the poster is an evil alien bent on world extermination; if the data is valid, that's all that matters for the article! So, Enric, is the data in that post valid? V (talk) 15:25, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I don't understand the point here. Enric Naval, who were Nrcprm2026 and Abd such that this comment is relevant here? Abd I know about from his lengthy and rambling comments on mailing lists and blogs related to cold fusion, but not the other person. The links you provide don't clear the matter up. --EnergyNeutral (talk) 22:55, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I see from your edit summary, these are banned editors. I read our article, based on Derry, I read that source, and read some of Chechin, linked above, and looked at what's prominent in the field. I don't see the connection between your links and what I wrote, could you explain, if it's relevant here? If not, don't, please. I'm basically opposing the suggested changes here, which I think not appropriate, but working toward fixing the problem. Are you on board? --EnergyNeutral (talk) 23:10, 29 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

OK, I'll address the substance of the post. Tertiary sources can be used to assess the scientific consensus in a field. The info also appears in other tertiary source such as Gyerin's Cultural boundaries of science p 184,217. There are secondary sources that also say the same things (I have added them to the article). Storms is a cold fusion advocate that makes overly-optimistic reports of the field (and I can source that over-optimism to Huizenga's book).

I guess there is no problem on using Chechin. But note that scientific articles are summaries of the field, not detailed briefings of every explanation that has ever been proposed. At most, we summarize the mainstream-accepted explanation. Non-accepted explanations might be mentioned if they help understand the history of the field or they are significantly mentioned in reviews (for example, the probability of the third pathway) --Enric Naval (talk) 09:23, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thank you, Enric. V (talk) 18:11, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Thanks. Tertiary sources, written by non-experts in a field, will show some kind of general consensus from the past. There is no doubt: there was a general opinion among scientists that cold fusion was rejected, but, when we find this opinion expressed, it is often associated with ideas that did not remain true, as shown by more recent and stronger sources.

You wrote about Storms and cited Huizenga. Huizenga is not unbiased. From Hoffman (1995):

John Huizenga has impeccable credentials ... he is also an intensely anti-cold fusion warrior, and his book reflects that stance. That's neutral, reliable source, on Huizenga. Hoffman was certainly not a "believer."

Following Hoffman, Huizenga is useful as to facts, not judgments, and his opinions should be attributed. Above, it seems, you seem to give your point of view, and cite Huizenga for it. This would be Huizenga's opinion, he'd never have gotten that into a peer-reviewed journal. I looked through Huizenga, who often mentions Storms, and did not see where he said what you implied. Page number? What I did find was mostly neutral mention, but in a few places he adds personal judgments without evidence (such as calling a comment by Storms, "self-serving".) --EnergyNeutral (talk) 17:40, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Huizenga's book has tons of reviews saying that it's a very good book, or that it's the definitive book on cold fusion, and it's cited many times. Hoffman's book doesn't have any such thing. Also, Huizenga's credentials >>> Hoffman's credentials.

Also, all the RS that say that nothing has changed since 1989. Also, claiming that the situation has changed, while providing RS that don't say such a thing, or providing sources written by insiders of the field (aka, non-independent non-third party views). --Enric Naval (talk) 17:58, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

I'm puzzled. Suppose something changed, say last year. How would we know? Suppose that all the people who used to believe something still believe it, but the peer-reviewers at mainstream journals start approving something else? Who is going to write the articles that the reviewers approve? The confirmed believers in the old views? Or someone who works with the field? Enric Naval, it seems to me that you are expressing your point of view. Is that correct? Isn't saying that Huizenga (1993) is the "definitive book on cold fusion" excluding the possibility of anything new? Hoffman (1995) was very knowledgeable on cold fusion, he was commissioned to report on it by the Electric Power Research Institute. Secondly, he was a skeptic (cautious) and he was neutral, he came to no conclusion about cold fusion. Third, he reviews Taubes (1993), Huizenga (1992), Mallove (1991) , Close (1990), and Peat (1989), comparing them. You are dismissing Hoffman? Why?

I thought that Wikipedia depends on publishers (and peer-reviewers at mainstream journals) to decide what's notable and reliable, not the authors, otherwise we would think that a self-published work was equal to one published by an independent publisher. Authors of peer-reviewed papers, and especially of reviews, are always experts in their fields, so isn't your argument circular, self-confirming? --EnergyNeutral (talk) 21:28, 30 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

We would know that something has changed by looking at what RS say. If the RS contradict each other, then we should look at how many RS say each thing, and the relative weight of each RS. Hoffman appears to have received no reviews outside of the cold fusion world, while Huizenga received lots of glowing reviews[13] and has much better credentials. Does Hoffman say that Storms' style has changed from 1992 to 1995? No? Then that means that they are talking about the same author and assessing the same reliability. In such a case I'll just go with the RS that has the best reputation. (P.D.: I just realized that Taubes 1993 mentions a cold fusion experiment coauthored by Storms in 1989, p 331-334: Storms and Talcott tested 150 cells, but they only ran 6 control cells, and only 4 of the controls used light water, and they failed to account for tritium contamination, "The Los Alamos experiment, in Dick Garwin's words, was really bad work". Taube's book also had good reviews[14].).

No, articles are based in "reliable, third-party, published sources with a reputation for fact-checking and accuracy". (All the nuances are explained at WP:RS, this is not the place to rehash them). The reviews of Huizenga's and Taube's books show that reputation. You need RS to show that Hoffman has that reputation, our personal opinion is not relevant.

There is a lot of difference between a) asking a mainstream expert in a mainstream field about technical aspects, and b) asking a advocate in a non-mainstream field about how mainstream scientists view the field. The latter one would fall under WP:FRINGE. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:00, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

Very good, we may be getting somewhere. We would know that something has changed by looking at what RS say. If the RS contradict each other, then we should look at how many RS say each thing, and the relative weight of each RS.. RS published in 1993 says "nothing has changed." RS published in 2010 says "X has happened." Is this a contradiction? How can earlier sources contradict later ones, when the knowledge of the field (and thus of peer reviewers) has surely advanced and not retreated? --EnergyNeutral (talk) 00:28, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

How about a recent textbook, Models of the Atomic Nucleus, by Norman D. Cook, Springer, 2010 (Second edition), which has a newly added chapter on LENR?[15].

Amidst the continuing debate, enough experimental work has been done to establish the reality of at least some of the "anomalous" work involved deuteron-loaded Palladium electrodes. Precisely what conditions and ingredients and what quantum mechanical rationalizations will be required remain topics for specialists to thrash out, and further controversy can be expected. But "anomalous results" have been reported several hundred times over the past twenty years (reviewed in Storms, 2007) and the glib dismissal of cold fusion as "junk science" in 1989 has been shown to be truly "junk evaluation."

Springer published the first edition of the book in 2006, and Cook doesn't seem to have written anything on cold fusion until 2008, so he is not some long-term "advocate." --EnergyNeutral (talk) 02:26, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

(edit conflict, you posted your last comment while I was still writing mine, I am adding a note at the end)

If the 2010 source has very low quality, one could argue that it's not reliable enough to counter the affirmation made by an older source. Otherwise, mainstream sources would have to repeat their assertions every x years.

Anyways, this is not about an isolated 1993 source. RS continue to say that CF is not accepted, for example:

All of the above are third-party, and we could look by separate at the reputation of each book (looking at author's reputation + book reviews, weighting the publishers, etc). Also, note the lack of textbooks saying that cold fusion is valid or accepted, or saying that the situation has changed.

If you use Storms 2010 to claim that the situation has changed, then you are probably running afoul of WP:FRINGE (mainly WP:FRINGE#Reporting_on_the_levels_of_acceptance). Giving a wrong idea of the actual levels of acceptance in the field (CF covers the fields of physics, nuclear physics and chemistry, I just say "the field" for brevity).

And look at all the sources I listed. Using Storms 2010 to claim that cold fusion is now accepted, without any context about how this is only the opinion of one of the proponents of the field, would be a violation of both W:UNDUE (giving undue weight to one source when you have many sources that contradict it) and WP:FRINGE#Quotations (the quotes of proponents should be contextualized to avoid misleading the readers and losing neutrality).

P.D.: To go back to Schwinger topic, read page 63 in Thirteen things that don't make sense (search for "schwinger" to find the page). It says that, in his latest years, Schwinger was disconnected from the latest developments in physics, also "Schwinger made several attempts to explain the cold fusion results and wrote eight theory papers. None of his theories properly explained the observations, but he never gave up (...)". Also, in the prologue of a collection of Schwinger's papers, p 13-15, also mentions the disconnection and gives a detailed account of the rejection of his papers (his first paper had to be published in the journal of a friend, second paper being published in prestigious journal despite getting negative peer reviews, with an editorial note saying that the journal didn't take responsibility for the content, third and fourth papers rejected for publication) [24]. (these details should be added to Julian_Schwinger#Career?) If we present his papers as "On the other hand (...) recognized as one of the greatest physicists of the twentieth century, wrote a well thought out and knowledgeable paper", then, we are stripping all the context and we are framing his explanations as being well-accepted in physics? Are there any followups to his work outside CF? And inside? (to assess if it should be mentioned as one of the theories proposed by proponents)

P.D.D.: OK, you found one scientific book (I understand that "textbooks" are for teaching stuff in classrooms and similar). Is this the Norman D. Cook that already supported CF back in 1989[25]? A short term advocate is better than a long term advocate? Didn't he write the LENR part of the book after he started publishing in CF conferences? Ah, whatever, the point is that the immense majority of science books present CF explanations as discredited or not accepted. --Enric Naval (talk) 03:12, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

This is an article on cold fusion, fringe science at worst, so we expect more coverage of what may be minority views, though never presenting them as if they were the majority view. I'm not advocating any particular conclusion on the balance, but that we stop giving media and popular sources the same weight as peer-reviewed secondary sources. It's clear that there is support for cold fusion, some of it new, and there is also common rejection, or an opinion of rejection, which lingers or persists. I'm suggesting we look at substantial coverage in peer-reviewed mainstream secondary source, and use that. Cook (2010) was mentioned because this is a nuclear physics textbook, published by Springer, newly revised, giving more than passing attention. Obviously, there remains controversy on cold fusion, as Cook notes.

The invented emphasis on "supported" or "advocate" or "believer"" is a division of scientists into political camps, whereas any scientist worth their salt maintains an objectivity, is skeptical of their own beliefs. Primary scientific sources are not in conflict. If source A says that "I did X, and saw Y," and source B says, "I did X, and saw Z," there is no conflict. A saw Y and B saw Z. Conflict arises in interpretation and judgment, and that is personal, which is why, if there is conflict, we attribute the judgments. "According to Storms (2010), [blah blah]." --EnergyNeutral (talk) 13:14, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]

It's worth quoting what Norman Cook wrote in 1989.

Norman D. Cook (Oxford University, England), "Computing Nuclear Properties in the fcc Model.", Computers in Physics, Mar/Apr 1989, pages 73-77.

[Article describes both a model and a computer program for calculating three nuclear properties for any specified nucleus: the rms radial value, the total Coulomb repulsion, and the total binding energy.]

Editor's note: Dr. Cook writes, "I have been engaged in theoretical work in nuclear structure theory for many years, and am convinced that there are enough unsolved problems at the level of nuclear structure (quite aside from lower level problems) that, on theoretical grounds alone, it would be quite premature to dismiss cold fusion as theoretically unlikely."

That's remarkable. It does not "support cold fusion." It opposes premature dismissal based on supposed theoretical impossibility. --EnergyNeutral (talk) 13:36, 31 May 2011 (UTC)[reply]