Absolutely! Hydrogen fuel cells are starting to get pretty interesting now. Maybe that's why the fossil fuels industry manipulated the government into *CUTTING* alternative energy research at a time when the public clearly supports it! It's not a very deep conspiracy, but it sure is evil. I believe those same people even increased funding for fossil fuels "research". The last year in politics, including moves like this, has been enough to give me resolve to stop voting for the status quo (Democrats and Republicans) and start voting for real change (Green Party / Independent).
But even with more technologically interesting "research" going on, I think CF is far more interesting than H fuel cells because there may be whole new scientific principles underlying the results (inconsistent though they may be). The same cannot be said for HFCs, whose principles have been well understood for many decades.
A hoax is a deliberately orchestrated attempt to deceive. As such, all hoaxes can be systematically (and usually quite easily) taken apart and shown to be what they are. I don't see the same thing going on here. If cold fusion is a "hoax", then attempts to reproduce the result would be showing up 100% negative. But they're not. Why is that?
I'll be the first to suggest that it may not be Cold Fusion that's the answer to that question. But the reason for these conflicting results surely must be interesting nonetheless.
What bothers me about the anti-CF attitude is that it's against the spirit of open scientific inquiry. It's more of a technologist's attitude. We have a potentially interesting phenomenon here. Any child would want to know why the results are inconsistent. But a "reputable scientist" apparently would rather conform to the status quo and parrot the opinions of other reputable scientists.
I'm reminded of a quote from a famous Zen Master:
In the Beginner's Mind, there are many possibilities In the Expert's, there are few
Yeah, I have to agree. The Matrix was "okay", but definitely not great (especially the gaping holes in the premise, as you pointed out) and it's hardly a litmus test for geeks. Perhaps its biggest failing point is the *same* failing point that star wars had: glorifying form and special effects over substance.
Actually, I am troubled by the Jar Jar character more than annoyed. It seems to me that Jar Jar is almost certainly based on racist stereotypes of Jamaican blacks. I thought it might just be me, so I asked a couple of friends, and they said they had been thinking the same thing. It's really kindof sickening if you pay attention. Especially considering that our kids are watching this stuff and internalizing it.
"A less trivial example involves polynomial equations. One can state, for example, that a certain polynomial equation has no roots (that is, solutions) that are whole numbers. Such statements can turn out to be undecidable."
Other results that stem from Godel's work have more to do with limits on automated theorem proving and decidablility with respect to computation. For example, the halting problem. You would think that there *might* be a way to solve the halting problem, but it's provably unsolvable (!) for the same root reasons that some theorems can be stated which can't be proven or disproven. So, Godel's incompleteness theorems do have decidedly (pun intended) non-trivial impact (especially if you were hoping to create automatic theorem provers or code generation programs or something) on math logic and expose a variety of very serious and very real limitations on logical computation.
Besides the points that other posters have brought up below, I think there is a specter lurking in the background. Logic and causality are really human constructions with deep roots in the mind. There's no conclusive proof that the universe itself fully obeys the laws of logic and causality we have inferred from local and limited observation (this is especially true at very large and very small scales), nor can there be. Our whole system of logical and causal thinking is local and essentially axiomatic, and may not ultimately have little to do with how things truly work. What we know about physics at this point certainly challenges even the most basic assumptions about causality, if not logic itself.
What's more, even if the universe is somehow (from what little I know about quantum, I just don't see how) completely causal and logical, that doesn't necessarily make it any less mysterious. Formal logic has been shown to have some startling limitations. Kurt Godel's Incompleteness Theorem demonstrates beyond any doubt that there are True statements, in any sufficiently powerful logical system, which are unprovable. This essentially means that logic can be "undecidable" in some cases. There's nothing that says the universe itself can't have logic/consistency/decidability problems itself.
BTW, I'm not just trying to be argumentative here. Locality of causality and logic is all a very real possibility. Just ask a serious physicist.
The current issue of Scientific American has an article on Kurt Godel. Although most of his important contributions were in mathematical logic and theorem proving, he also did some work on relativity and spent a lot of time talking to Einstein. One of his contributions to relativity was a mathematical proof that time travel is not inconsistent with Einstein's theories of relativity. It might be inconsistent with something else we don't know about (or perhaps with something we've learned since then?), but it seems like we should keep our minds open.
Yeah, but if we really wanted to fight this kind of spying it would be very easy if people cooperated. Drowning the signal in a sea of noise would be trivial given some basic assistive technology (mailer demons that send and receive randomly generated "noisy" messages designed to trip up spy computers... everyone just starts up the demons and suddenly the whole world communication infrastructure is flooded with decoys)
Yes, indeed. Who *are* our heroes now (in 1999)? I'm pretty much stumped. But we certainly have a lot of simulations (media images mainly, but also video games and such) of heroes! I think we've had plenty of real-life heroes in the past (explorers, warriors, defenders of the poor and the weak, seekers of Truth etc.). I'm just not sure if they're still around. And even if they are, they're drowning in a sea of simulation.
I think it's very interesting to look at The Phantom Menace, and even Star Wars itself, as a Postmodern phenomenon. If Jean Baudrillard's theory applies, and I think it does, then Star Wars has reduced the mythical Hero to mere hyper-reality or "simulacra". According to Baudrillard, this false reality, created by simulacra like The Phantom Menace, actually exists to conceal the anxiety we have over the absence/disappearance of something real, in this case Real Heroes. It's easy to see how this might be the case in our world. Heroism fundamentally isn't about success (in particular, it's not about self-actualization, which is essentially anti-Heroic!). And so, in a society where individual social status and financial success are considered to be man's highest calling, it's not surprising that we'd need simulacra to remind us of what Real Heroes used to be like. Baudrillard is really on to something here, if you stop and think about it for a while.
The more I think about the (fairly recent) explosion of simulacra in our society, the more I recognize the core Truth in what Baudrillard is saying. We are mass-manufacturing simulacra to replace Real Truth. And we're doing it at such a rate that it we're now essentially bent on destroying, concealing or subjugating Truth almost everywhere. Why? Because we don't want to face the reality of what we're losing or what we've already lost. And the actual losses have been truly staggering.
I'm pretty sure this is what early religions were concerned with when they tried to stop people from worshipping idols and creating "graven images". They were worried (and rightly so, I think) that mere simulacra of God would replace the living Truth of God that (they believed) surrounds us. In fact, they were probably too late even then: God was already dead or dying (as an inherent cultural Truth), and thus all the simulacra -- to try to conceal it from ourselves. Certainly an odd way to behave (on the surface of it, anyway), but with multi-million dollar athletes, TV stars and politicians like Clinton held up as our leaders/heroes/role-models, it's easy to see why we might need The Phantom Menace to remind us of what heroes used to be like.
It seems to me that the more evident the absence of Heroes in our society becomes, the more our anxiety grows and thus the louder and more omnipresent the replacement simulacra must become to conceal the issue. Thus all the hype. If even to name something is to kill it, then surely The Phantom Menace is the epitaph of the Hero.
What is staggering to me is how anyone could be this far off! The quote I give you here is an example which is nothing short of outright bigotry. Which is what's causing all the pain and agony to begin with! We need to break the cycle. We don't need greater enforcement of uniformity in our society and we certainly don't need it in our schools. Instead, we all need to learn tolerance. Especially people like the author of this quote! (posted on CNN.com, and I might add as the *first* opinion of several)
"To all Decent Americans,
The students, and their associates, that were involved in the shootings in Littleton, Colorado were members of an anti-culture clique... you know the type: Disillusioned, disaffected, jaded, neo-gothic types, that relish the role of being the "outsiders". By their own admission, they were influenced by the death-rock of Marilyn Manson and the violence and hype of Hollywood.
Our community (Littleton) is asking the whole country not to allow their children, or their families access to this kind of music and boycott all television and radio stations that glamorize death and violence. We are also asking all not to patronize video, retail, businesses, magazines, and all other forms of media that peddle this poison. If the words of peace are falling on deaf ears, then we would like Hollywood to listen to our pocketbooks. It is time for the media to take responsibility for their actions and stop hiding behind the First Amendment.
Slashdot Mirror
But even with more technologically interesting "research" going on, I think CF is far more interesting than H fuel cells because there may be whole new scientific principles underlying the results (inconsistent though they may be). The same cannot be said for HFCs, whose principles have been well understood for many decades.
I'll be the first to suggest that it may not be Cold Fusion that's the answer to that question. But the reason for these conflicting results surely must be interesting nonetheless.
What bothers me about the anti-CF attitude is that it's against the spirit of open scientific inquiry. It's more of a technologist's attitude. We have a potentially interesting phenomenon here. Any child would want to know why the results are inconsistent. But a "reputable scientist" apparently would rather conform to the status quo and parrot the opinions of other reputable scientists.
I'm reminded of a quote from a famous Zen Master:
In the Beginner's Mind, there are many possibilities
In the Expert's, there are few
Yeah, I have to agree. The Matrix was "okay", but definitely not great (especially the gaping holes in the premise, as you pointed out) and it's hardly a litmus test for geeks. Perhaps its biggest failing point is the *same* failing point that star wars had: glorifying form and special effects over substance.
Actually, I am troubled by the Jar Jar character more than annoyed. It seems to me that Jar Jar is almost certainly based on racist stereotypes of Jamaican blacks. I thought it might just be me, so I asked a couple of friends, and they said they had been thinking the same thing. It's really kindof sickening if you pay attention. Especially considering that our kids are watching this stuff and internalizing it.
"A less trivial example involves polynomial equations. One can state, for example, that a certain polynomial equation has no roots (that is, solutions) that are whole numbers. Such statements can turn out to be undecidable."
Other results that stem from Godel's work have more to do with limits on automated theorem proving and decidablility with respect to computation. For example, the halting problem. You would think that there *might* be a way to solve the halting problem, but it's provably unsolvable (!) for the same root reasons that some theorems can be stated which can't be proven or disproven. So, Godel's incompleteness theorems do have decidedly (pun intended) non-trivial impact (especially if you were hoping to create automatic theorem provers or code generation programs or something) on math logic and expose a variety of very serious and very real limitations on logical computation.
What is an "ID jump drive"?
What's more, even if the universe is somehow (from what little I know about quantum, I just don't see how) completely causal and logical, that doesn't necessarily make it any less mysterious. Formal logic has been shown to have some startling limitations. Kurt Godel's Incompleteness Theorem demonstrates beyond any doubt that there are True statements, in any sufficiently powerful logical system, which are unprovable. This essentially means that logic can be "undecidable" in some cases. There's nothing that says the universe itself can't have logic/consistency/decidability problems itself.
BTW, I'm not just trying to be argumentative here. Locality of causality and logic is all a very real possibility. Just ask a serious physicist.
The current issue of Scientific American has an article on Kurt Godel. Although most of his important contributions were in mathematical logic and theorem proving, he also did some work on relativity and spent a lot of time talking to Einstein. One of his contributions to relativity was a mathematical proof that time travel is not inconsistent with Einstein's theories of relativity. It might be inconsistent with something else we don't know about (or perhaps with something we've learned since then?), but it seems like we should keep our minds open.
Yeah, but if we really wanted to fight this kind of spying it would be very easy if people cooperated. Drowning the signal in a sea of noise would be trivial given some basic assistive technology (mailer demons that send and receive randomly generated "noisy" messages designed to trip up spy computers... everyone just starts up the demons and suddenly the whole world communication infrastructure is flooded with decoys)
Maybe it's nonsense... but it's *interesting* nonsense if you look into it.
Yes, indeed. Who *are* our heroes now (in 1999)? I'm pretty much stumped. But we certainly have a lot of simulations (media images mainly, but also video games and such) of heroes! I think we've had plenty of real-life heroes in the past (explorers, warriors, defenders of the poor and the weak, seekers of Truth etc.). I'm just not sure if they're still around. And even if they are, they're drowning in a sea of simulation.
The more I think about the (fairly recent) explosion of simulacra in our society, the more I recognize the core Truth in what Baudrillard is saying. We are mass-manufacturing simulacra to replace Real Truth. And we're doing it at such a rate that it we're now essentially bent on destroying, concealing or subjugating Truth almost everywhere. Why? Because we don't want to face the reality of what we're losing or what we've already lost. And the actual losses have been truly staggering.
I'm pretty sure this is what early religions were concerned with when they tried to stop people from worshipping idols and creating "graven images". They were worried (and rightly so, I think) that mere simulacra of God would replace the living Truth of God that (they believed) surrounds us. In fact, they were probably too late even then: God was already dead or dying (as an inherent cultural Truth), and thus all the simulacra -- to try to conceal it from ourselves. Certainly an odd way to behave (on the surface of it, anyway), but with multi-million dollar athletes, TV stars and politicians like Clinton held up as our leaders/heroes/role-models, it's easy to see why we might need The Phantom Menace to remind us of what heroes used to be like.
It seems to me that the more evident the absence of Heroes in our society becomes, the more our anxiety grows and thus the louder and more omnipresent the replacement simulacra must become to conceal the issue. Thus all the hype. If even to name something is to kill it, then surely The Phantom Menace is the epitaph of the Hero.
Jonathan
Looks like NaderRules.{com|org|net} is still available... ;-)
NADER 2000!!
And, btw, go Green Party!
If you vote for Democrats or Republicans... YOU'RE JUST THROWING YOUR VOTE AWAY!!!
"To all Decent Americans,
The students, and their associates, that were involved in the shootings in Littleton, Colorado were members of an anti-culture clique... you know the type: Disillusioned, disaffected, jaded, neo-gothic types, that relish the role of being the "outsiders". By their own admission, they were influenced by the death-rock of Marilyn Manson and the violence and hype of Hollywood.
Our community (Littleton) is asking the whole country not to allow their children, or their families access to this kind of music and boycott all television and radio stations that glamorize death and violence. We are also asking all not to patronize video, retail, businesses, magazines, and all other forms of media that peddle this poison. If the words of peace are falling on deaf ears, then we would like Hollywood to listen to our pocketbooks. It is time for the media to take responsibility for their actions and stop hiding behind the First Amendment.
Mark Kinchen"