Table Top Fusion Courtesy of Tiny Bubbles

Erik Baard writes: "The peer-reviewed journal Science is carrying a cover story about the possibility of table top fusion. Not cold fusion, mind you, but the apparatus might look that way to some. Oak Ridge and other labs say they have gotten the fingerprints of fusion (neutron production) from collapsing bubbles in liquid, a process that heats a local area to temperatures as hot as the surface of the sun, and releases photons. The disputes are already here -- notably from Dr. Robert Park of the American Physical Society and from critical reviewers who say they haven't repeated the neutron production. But the authors say the critics didn't calibrate their equipment correctly. Articles regarding the discovery can be found on Eureka Alert " CD: Looks legit, but Pons and Fleishman (and the University of Utah for that matter) talked a good game. I suppose I'll belive in tabletop fusion when a generator comes atached to my next laptop. The author of this post also has a longer article up at the Village Voice

Comments

What's different this time

[Lumpish Scholar]

We hear a lot of wild claims from people calling themselves scientists. Unlike most of those, this is:

• a peer-reviewed article appearing in a major (if not the major) scientific journal,
• reporting an experimental result (not a business plan),
• that we're hearing about because the article is going to press (not because it was planned or submitted; admittedly, we're hearing it a little early because of advance reports).

These are all good signs of good science. The better sign will be attempts to reproduce the experiment, with both successes and failures published in the same professional manner.

It's an extraordinary claim, and will require extraordinary evidence. Yes, this is just a first step; but at least it's in the right direction.

Re:Not likely

[Roland Walter Dutton]

In the interests of some context, here's a skeptical review of Dr. Park - and here's another. The former is by Brian Josephson - discount his interest in parapsychology against his Nobel Prize and his Cambridge professorship at whatever rate your preconceptions dictate. The latter is by a Wired hack.

I'm no scientist, and I've never researched the issues involved, so I'm certainly not proposing to pass judgement on whether this (extraordinary) claim has any likelihood of being justified, or whether Dr. Park's quoted reasoning is sound. But I will say that Dr. Park's eagerness not only to reject the possibility as quickly as possible but to quickly silence those who entertain the possibility through mockery as fast as possible cannot inspire confidence about his judgement.

Dr. Park and his ilk work to make a pariah of any scientist who gives any credence to an extraordinary claim which is subsequently proven false (or is considered to have been proven false, or in fact why bother waiting for proof at all?) The resulting social impulses to avoid exclusion and join in pelting the menacing sinner are what make this a powerful means of winning arguments. "Hark: A COLLECTIVE GROAN CAN BE HEARD . Better join in the groans fast before anyone starts looking your way!"

But for Heaven's sake, if we accept that the normal process of review will be able to effectively determine whether these results are sound or not, then the absolute worst that can happen is that some time and money will be spent in finding that the results are not sound, and that some people will thus be proven wrong. In science people are proven wrong, through the expenditure of some time and expense, all the damn time! Being willing to consider new ideas necessarily entails the risk that you will consider, or take seriously, ideas that turn out to be false. If you're terrified of ever believing something that turns out to be wrong, don't do scientific research. The exact same standard should hold for extraordinary claims as for more mundane ones: if they have some prima face credibility, let them join the rough-and-tumble of review. Extraordinary claims do merit searching, skeptical examination: those who make or consider them surely don't deserve any more or less odium than scientists who turn out to have been fraudulent, or foolish, or just mistaken in regard to more mundane ones.

Oh, and for all you freshly minted M.Sc.s and docs out there who are saddling up to join the posse and defend the faith in this forum: consider first that in all academic fields it tends to be the young postgrads who are loudest and most confident in defending the current thinking. Older academics are (on average, of course) a little less sure of themselves: could it possibly be that they have learned something?