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14 Years Later, Cold Fusion Still Gets The Cold Shoulder
segment writes "It has been 14 years since two little-known electrochemists announced what sounded like the biggest physics breakthrough since Enrico Fermi produced a nuclear chain reaction on a squash court in Chicago. Using a tabletop setup, Stanley Pons and Martin Fleischmann, of the University of Utah, said they had induced deuterium nuclei to fuse inside metal electrodes, producing measurable quantities of heat. That was the opening bell for one of the craziest periods in science. Cold fusion, if real, promised to solve the world's energy problems forever. Scientists around the world dropped what they were doing to try to replicate the astounding claim."
The linked AP story (carried on SFGate.com) is about the
Tenth International Conference on Cold Fusion, which took place in the last week of August.
We all know nothing but nonsense has been produced by that school!
Countries, or more probable Energy related companies - such as Oil Companies.
It is well known companies, such as Shell, BP etc are researching renewable energies - for example, wind power, solar power. Whats to stop them from researching Cold Fusion or other advanced power sources?
Whilst Oil is very profitable, they aren't going to remove their cash cow.
Take for example, a Light Bulb that lasts 20 years... , once such things have been purchased, there isn't any insentive to buy more...
Its all to do with money.
As an example - Years ago, an inventor invented a non addictive ciggerette (spelling)... a large tobbacco company bought the product... and well, its not around any more.. forgotten.
Gack. A monkey could handle the editorial duties here.
Let's see:
SCO
Cold Fusion
Software Patents
Microsoft Security Problems
Microsoft Conquers World
Latest Version of Apache released
Java suckage
BSD is dying
RIAA is stopping me from downloading
Somebody shoots something into space
Supression of video games
Latest hardware iz kewl
Guess what, much like in the MASH episode where Hawkeye is told for the 2345th time in a row that he has to choose between liver and fish,
WE WANT SOMETHING ELSE!
One sleepless night I pondered the set-up everyone's been using to test cold fusion, with all its failings, and came up with a new experimental test to try and isolate the effect. After toying with the idea for a few weeks, I decided I'd never build it myself, and published it. I sent emails to a few places that do such research, and never heard back.
http://www.shambala.net/misc/hoffmancell.gif
If anyone wishes to play with this design, please do; I'd even be interested if you tried and didn't find anything.
This is is of course presuming that what we understand now is correct and can never be altered.
A cynic might consider your comment akin to those made by those who persued Copernicus when he suggested something that broke all previous ideas apart!
We are of course, but children playing with pebbles on the beach when, the whole ocean lies before us.
Learn some humility Sir, we do not know it all!
If there were any fusion taking place, there would be excess heat, released neutrons (posibly), and helium produced, which could be called Alchemy (H + H = He). We know fusion is possible, because the Sun can do it, and we can do it will intertial or magnetic confinement and simple thermal energy applied to the hydrogen or duterium or tritium. If heat energy can do the job at pressures far below those found in an ordinary solid or liquid, you better know an awful lot before you make the claim that it is impossible to cause fusion in a solid with electrical energy at room temperature.
You are quite right that cold fusion has not been proven, but neither has the possibility of cold fusion been disproven. That would be a much harder job to do.