NetNews Usenet Archive 1993 #1/NN_1993_1.iso/spool/sci/physics/fusion/3196

Internet Message Format | 1993-01-07 | 7.9 KB

Path: sparky!uunet!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!sol.ctr.columbia.edu!hamblin.math.byu.edu!yvax.byu.edu!physc1.byu.edu!jonesse
Newsgroups: sci.physics.fusion
Subject: Reply to Jed Rothwell/E=Mc2
Message-ID: <[e-mail]>
From: [e-mail]
Date: 7 Jan 93 12:44:08 -0700
Distribution: world
Organization: Brigham Young University
Lines: 128

Dear Colleagues,
Due to an unfortunate local system failure, I have not been able to receive
sci.physics.fusion postings for about a week.  I find that I owe responses to
Dick Blue, Frank Close, Bart Bartholomew and Jed Rothwell.  Jed first.

Jed amuses and dismays.  He chides Dick Blue in <[e-mail]>:
"You have published these outrageous, unfounded statements time after time."
"You just make this crap up and publish it without thinking."  (Jed Rothwell)

Hmmmm.  Perhaps some of Jed's own statements fit his description, for example:
"Jones, Huizenga, Morrison, Close --- believe theory overrules facts."
"One conclusive experiment can and MUST overrule the entire existing database,
no matter how certain or long established it may be.  ...Okay, a million,
million previous experiments showed that E=mc2.  So what?  Every single one of
them was wrong.  Period.  It does not work in metal lattices under
electrolysis, and Einstein was flat out wrong."  (Rothwell in "Brilliant as
usual, wrong as always" ca. 21 Dec. 1992)
And in a recent reply to me:  "*You* are the one who wants to throw away old
data, not me!  You are the one who asserts that the excess heat violates
e=mc2. ... *You* are the one who wants to overthrow Einstein." (Rothwell in
"A straw man & calorimeter drift)

The careful reader will find self-contradictions in Rothwell's faulty
assertions.  I am quite disappointed in Jed now.  I thought my essay on
"possible natural fusion in the earth" laid out the BYU hypothesis (1986)
of natural terrestrial fusion
briefly, showed that we indeed challenge existing theory (that 3He emissions
from volcanoes arise from 3He stored inside the earth since its formation)
but without overruling or throwing away existing data.  In none of this do
we challenge E=Mc2 -- we use it, arguing that some heat and 3He (and, leading
to a crucial experiment) tritium could be PRODUCED inside the earth by fusion.
Even though the expected d-d and p-d rates would be very small, these could
result in significant produced amounts on the scale of the earth.  Our
approach, I suggested, presented a "PATH OF LOGICAL SCIENCE."

Jed's response failed to address these points, instead he makes unfounded,
outrageous statements (quoted last above; his "a straw man" was a response to my
essay on natural fusion).

No, Jed, I do NOT assert that xs heat violates E=Mc2.  I DO assert in my 18
Dec. 1992 posting ("Open-minded versus empty-minded"):
"Consider Einstein's equation E=Mc2.  This was logically deduced in 1905, I
believe, but since has been tested EXPERIMENTALLY many, many times.  If someone
says that he has produced heat (E) by nuclear reactions without corresponding
mass (M) change, or (equivalently) commensurate nuclear products, he (or she)
is not just going against the grain of the establishment or of speculation,
he challenging thousands of experiments which have tested the relation E=Mc2.

"Note that there is an equals sign here; it is not enough to have a handful of
neutrons (as some claim, I among them) then to say that the xs heat of Pons/F.
or McKubre is therefore nuclear.  Nonsense.  The neutron fluxes we report
are a factor of roughly 10 trillion less than required to produce one watt of
xs power.  Properly interpreted using E = Mc2, then, our results REFUTE the
claims of P/F of xs heat production by nuclear d-d fusion.  Even now, NO ONE
has shown bona fide nuclear products commensurate with xs heat.  Not even
Yamaguchi -- see my earlier postings on this.  Certainly no P/F or Takahashi
or Notoya or McKubre or Mills or Bush or Storms or Srinivasan."  (S.E. Jones
in earlier posting "Open-minded versus empty-minded.")

Huizenga makes the point succinctly in his book:
"ROOM TEMPERATURE NUCLEAR FUSION WITHOUT COMMENSURATE AMOUNTS OF FUSION
PRODUCTS IS A DELUSION AND QUALIFIES AS PATHOLOGICAL SCIENCE."

The problem seems to be that Jed equates xs heat with nuclear reactions,
without requiring the presence of commensurate (see E/c2) products. This mindset
I have found to exist in many workers who take xs heat as being nuclear if
only the xs heat is real.  Consider Jed's recent response to Jon Webb ("Webb
is right") in which he discloses:
"I don't know anything about He3 or gamma rays, though, and you left out the
single most import, most overriding and undeniable product; the key to the
whole riddle:
   Heat
Don't forget that!  it is by far the easiest thing to measure, and the most
conclusive, by far.   -  Jed.  "

While educating about He3, gammas, neutrons, and other nuclear emissions is
evidently sorely needed, perhaps quoting from a recent paper by Dave Buehler,
Lee Hansen, Larry Rees and myself will help chip away at this type of fixation:

"...at the Nagoya meeting and elsewhere, we found that errors and uncertainties
in current experiments prevent unambiguous interpretation of claims of excess
heat generation.  Hence, this paper also outlines criteria for establishing
calorimeter performance for definitive measurements of "excess heat" in cold-
fusion experiments."
(There follows an extensive discussion on difficulties of calorimetric
measurements, precautions, etc. mostly by Prof. Lee Hansen of BYU.  We also
discuss the use of an X-ray spectrometer as a critical means of probing for
nuclear origins of heat, when the precise nuclear reaction is unknown.  I have
posted notes on this, here, some months ago.)
"Because all electrochemical calorimetric experiments intended to demonstrate
'excess heat' require correction for the heat of the electrolysis reaction,
the expected reaction must be verified and quantified.  Otherwise an incorrect
value for the thermoneutral potential will be used in the correction.  For
example, deposition of an alkali metal under a silicate (or aluminate or
borate) coating on an electrode in aqueous solution is possible at cell
voltages near 3 volts.  The thermoneutral potential for Li is about 2.9 volts,
compared to 1.5 volts for hydrogen.  An xs heat rate proportional to the rate
of deposition of Li would thus be found if the reaction were assumed to be
strictly generation of hydrogen.  The accuracy of the thermoneutral potential
must also be assessed.  A value derived from a single source or type of
measurement cannot be considered reliable.
Note also that if a lithium layer is deposited on an electrode under a coating
(e.g., silicate, borate or aluminate coating) and later should the coating
crack, then exothermic water-lithium reactions would result, producing
'heat bursts.'
[Note:  observations of heat may be real, without implying nuclear origins.]

"Excess heat" can only be proven to be nuclear in origin by showing that the
products of the nuclear reactions are produced at the same time and rate as
the heat and in amounts commensurate with the law of mass-energy conservation.
X-rays would, however, be a strong indicator of nuclear (MeV-scale)
reactions and would be an effective tracer of high-energy reactions when the
precise nature of the processes remains hidden.  Until such proof exists,
application of Occam's razor demands that "excess heat" be regarded as
having its source in ordinary chemical reactions."  (BYU pre-print, Dec. 1992,
copies available on request.)

Finally, I must re-emphasize that observations of nuclear-product emissions,
if confirmed, would NOT imply that the claimed heat in Pd/d systems is nuclear
in origin.  That is, a small nuclear effect may exist without producing
enough "excess heat" to be measured calorimetrically in the laboratory.
E = Mc2 cuts both ways.  QUANTITATIVE agreement is totally lacking between
claims of xs heat and nuclear products (by 10**6 even in the case of
Yamaguchi's neutrons.)

Respectfully,
Steven E. Jones