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exceptions

Over 20 years of reviewing cold fusion articles, there are several points that are resilient. Steven Jones achieved room temperature muon catalyzed fusion. There is no physical explanation. I remember the TV press conference from 1989 when Fleischmann said the "pressure inside the palladium crystal exceeded a billion billion atmospheres" - 10^27. Recorded press conference yields that confinement time is the difference between CF and HF. P/F experiment ran for months. HF confinement is in picosecond range. There is speculation that He3 from volcanoes is produced by pressure in the Earth's core by fusion. An astrophysicist said that only other astrophysicists can understand the pressure affect of fusion. Physicists are locked up in their kinetic energy calculus bubble. Also, the Pons / Fleischmann experiment used 5 auto batteries in parallel - over 4000 cold cranking amps - to charge the palladium. I have never seen an attempt to exactly reproduce the P/F experiment. All naysayers were busy trying to patent their own versions. Danarothrock (talk) 21:53, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Should we name the several entrepreneurs or just say they exist

"Several entrepreneurs have claimed in the past that a working cold fusion energy generator is near to commercialization, yet so far no working machine is available on the market."

I added the "who" part. I claim this is perfectly appropriate because the text only talks about the E-Cat. Reverting this requires a better excuse than to call it POV pushing.84.106.26.81 (talk) 14:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

What we write should be verifiable. It is not a must to write down each verification. Surely you won't argue that several entrepreneurs have indeed claimed that they had a working machine. Adding them into the article (maybe somewhere else) is something that we can discuss. POVbrigand (talk)

The tag is arguibly correct. Tags like {{who}} and {{clarify}} are just requests to clarify confusing stuff. Physics world (free registration) explains the case of Petterson cells. Park explains it too in Voodoo Science. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:01, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Issues section violates scope

I changed the section title from:

"issues"

into:

"Issues with the Pons and Fleischmann experiment"

While not a very elegant solution it appeared to me that all those sections apply to the Pons and Fleischman experiment. This is not the whole scope of the article.84.106.26.81 (talk) 14:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Yes, this (even if not very elegant) will solve some of the problems of discussing old and new stuff. It adds clarity. POVbrigand (talk)

The issues apply to the whole field, not just the first experiment: why the fusion shouldn't be happening in the lattice, what byproducts should be observed according to theory, etc.

I will amend that somewhat. Because one of the issues is whether or not any CF experiment can actually produce so much anomalous energy that it cannot be explained without invoking a nuclear reaction. If that issue happens to one day get resolved positively --as far as I can tell, it is the most important issue that CF researchers should be focusing on-- then the theorists can argue the other issues regarding overcoming nuclear Coulomb repulsion, reaction pathways, and byproducts. V (talk) 18:44, 18 November 2011 (UTC)

I propose we go through the Issues section and explicitly state when the issues were raised and when the "issues" were debunked. I don't know how, but we need to add clarity for the casual WP-reader. --POVbrigand (talk) 11:54, 25 November 2011 (UTC)

DOE decided to leave research to undefined small group

This should probably have been split over more divs.

I reduce this:

"In 1989, the majority of a review panel organized by the US Department of Energy (DOE) found that the evidence for the discovery of a new nuclear process was not persuasive enough to start a special program, but was "sympathetic toward modest support" for experiments "within the present funding system." A second DOE review, convened in 2004 to look at new research, reached conclusions similar to the first."

Down to this:

"In 1989, and in 2004, the US Department of Energy (DOE) considered a special cold fusion program."

This is all they did. They considered researching it. It isn't even note worthy to be honest. I'm sure you wonder why, let me explain: The US DOE has an enormous budget. Cold fusion was not even significant enough to build one cell. To then jump to the conclusion they investigated the topic is nonsense.

DOE dismissal is non significant. While the sources may not be used many researchers attempted to contact the DOE in a fruitless effort to inform them. I will try find good sources but I think my motivation is clear? While I understand it might appear that way, it has nothing to do with my POV, I'm only interested in accuracy. Feel free to add 100 skeptics who actually tried to build a cell and transcribe exactly what they concluded. It wouldn't bother me at all. No actual work was done by the DOE. They chose not to.84.106.26.81 (talk) 04:13, 15 November 2011 (UTC)

Symantics: "they considered" might be read as "they proposed". I don't support your change here. POVbrigand (talk)

removing the negative parts of the DOE review. Then you added the work of a group of scientists that happen to work in SPAWAR, as if it had been promoted by SPAWAR. And implying that the SPAWAR experiment revokes the DOE conclusions (and using a press release a go against the DOE report). And again trying to imply that the new experiments are wholly unrelated to F&P's experiment. I think that people in the talk page are asking you for sources for that change. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:11, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

In the same edit I changed this: "A small community of researchers continues to investigate cold fusion" into this "Researchers continue to investigate cold fusion."

We have no credible source for "small". What does small mean in this context anyway? Illustration: http://www.iccf11.org/index2.htm they might look small on your monitor, they are big names in science and they are many. You want to source "small" on this: and this: It looks to me like the sources only confirm there is actual research. The word "small" isn't on any of the pages. Small also suggests there is some appropriate size for such research effort? If the effect is that small we shouldn't expect large numbers of investigations? Are you suggesting there is a big effect?

It should be obvious removing it was not based on my POV. I actually bothered to open all those pages. What is actually going on is that the negative side of the argument has no sources (the small part) while the positive side (the research exists) is completely stuffed with them. If there is any unjust POV that would be it. I removed the unsourced part. If this means cold fusion now looks like something real then that would be something you will have to get used to. I'm very obviously just trying to write things as they are reported. No harm was done.

I do understand it might look that way. Just so that you know ;) 84.106.26.81 (talk) 14:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

The "ongoing scientific work" section is hopelessly underdeveloped. But the community is small and we should state that. POVbrigand (talk)

Implying that it continues to be researched by a non-small group, against sources. don't say the word "small", because "a small community" is an attempt at summarizing them. It's not a word-by-word copy of one of the sources. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:11, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

heat after death

here I change this:

"By late 1989, most scientists considered cold fusion claims dead,<ref name="Browne_1989" /><ref name="most scientists">{{harvnb|Taubes|1993|pp=262, 265–266, 269–270, 273, 285, 289, 293, 313, 326, 340–344, 364, 366, 404–406}}, {{harvnb|Goodstein|1994}}, {{harvnb|Van Noorden|2007}}, {{harvnb|Kean|2010}}</ref> and cold fusion subsequently gained a reputation as ].<ref name="nytdoe">"

into this:

"By late 1989, many scientists considered cold fusion research ].<ref name="Browne_1989" /><ref name="most scientists">{{harvnb|Taubes|1993|pp=262, 265–266, 269–270, 273, 285, 289, 293, 313, 326, 340–344, 364, 366, 404–406}}, {{harvnb|Goodstein|1994}}, {{harvnb|Van Noorden|2007}}, {{harvnb|Kean|2010}}</ref><ref name="nytdoe">"

I wouldn't know why but if those should really be 2 separate statements the pathology should come before death. Maybe it is a bad idea to describe a controversial topic with a controversial term without attribution? May 3, 1989 Dr. Douglas R. O. Morrison said it was an example of pathological science. The "subsequently" chronology doesn't work. 84.106.26.81 (talk) 14:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

No, after late 1989 cold fusion was considered dead, what happened after that until today was perceived as "dragging on" pathological science. I like the original way better. POVbrigand (talk)

Implying that CF was only considered pathological science by late 1989, against the sources in the paragraph (which are more recent than 1989). And implying by extension that it no longer is considered pathological. Also weakening the sentence by changing "most" to "many", against what sources say.

Perhaps it would be a good idea to explain what pathological refers to in this context. 84.106.26.81 (talk) 19:20, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Believe me, it's no use. Pathological science as a label was already discredited. It's a useless label. BUT, it is attached to cold fusion and that's a fact. So we report it here in the article. --POVbrigand (talk) 19:26, 8 December 2011 (UTC)

Jones faxed the paper to Nature

I inserted: "In 1980, Dr. Steven E. Jones used a similar device, he did not claim excess energy was produced. But more neutrons were detected than could be expected from normal sources."

"Realizing their work was very similar, Jones and P&F agreed to release their papers to Nature on the same day, March 24, 1989. However, P&F announced their results at a press event the day before. Jones faxed his paper to Nature." - Ludwik Kowalski (3/5/04)Department of Mathematical Sciences Montclair State University, Upper Montclair, NJ, 07043

Removing that bit was clearly vandalism Enric. :) 84.106.26.81 (talk) 15:09, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Absolutely not. The "truth" is somewhere in the middle and we should be careful with the wording POVbrigand (talk)

under Cold_fusion#Repulsion_forces you can see an explanation of why Muon-catalyzed fusion is not relevant. This makes it look as if F&P's experiment was replicated by Jones. Jones' experiment is accepted by mainstream science as a correctly performed experiment with results that can be explained by current theory, as is accepted as replicated successfully. The NYT calls them similar, but more reliable sources that give more in-depth explanations. And, yes, as POVbringand says, there are a lot of caveats there. -unsigned by enric

It's a poor argument:

• Muon-catalyzed fusion is a LENR.

• This article is about LENR.

• This article is not about Pons and Fleishmann, they have their own articles.

84.106.26.81 (talk) 10:08, 22 November 2011 (UTC)

uninteresting

here I change: "and Stanley Pons in 1989 that they had produced anomalous heat ("excess heat") of a magnitude they asserted would defy explanation except in terms of nuclear processes. They further reported measuring small amounts of nuclear reaction byproducts, including neutrons and tritium."

into: "and Stanley Pons in 1989 that they had produced anomalous heat ("excess heat") that would defy explanation except in terms of nuclear processes and that they measured small amounts of nuclear reaction byproducts, including neutrons and tritium."

I thought that was an improvement.

In the original paper Fleischman says: "...the bulk of the energy released is due to an hitherto unknown nuclear process or processes"

It is a matter of taste, I liked my own version better. I don't think it really makes enough difference to justify a debate. If you see something wrong with it I don't really want to hear about it. Just revert it. 84.106.26.81 (talk) 14:36, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

I like the original version better. We should keep it POVbrigand (talk)

F&P said that it could only be explained by nuclear processes. Other said that it could be explained by flawed measurements, contamination, overlooked chemical reactions, unaccounted inputs, etc. Other cell exploded in other lab, and a investigation concluded that it was a chemical reaction (I think this appears in Huizenga). I think our article doesn't say it, but F&P thought that it could only be nuclear because of the explosion of a cell during one night. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:11, 14 November 2011 (UTC)

Sorry - but I like the original version better too. It makes it crystal clear that Pons claims that this result can only be the result of nuclear processes - where the second version can easily be read as if it is an established fact that the result that Pons obtained can only be nuclear in nature. Since that is absolutely not the case, we need to keep that clarification from the first version. SteveBaker (talk) 04:35, 29 November 2011 (UTC)

interesting

MARTIN FLEISCHMANN can still remember the morning he entered his lab and saw the terrific hole in the workbench. It was about the size of a dinner plate. Beneath, nestled in a shallow crater in the concrete floor, were the remains of a chemistry experiment that had been fizzing idly for several months without incident. "It had obliterated itself!" he recalls.

It happened overnight, so no one witnessed the meltdown that took place in a basement lab at the University of Utah, Salt Lake City, in 1985. But for Fleischmann and his longtime colleague Stanley Pons, there could be only one cause: room-temperature or "cold" fusion. If they were right, the chemists had made a reaction that nuclear physicists had thought next to impossible, one that potentially held the key to almost limitless clean energy. Yet four years later, and just weeks after they had announced their discovery at a now infamous press conference on 23 March 1989, their work was dismissed from mainstream science. Cold fusion became a pariah field, and Fleischmann and Pons fell under the shadow of disrepute. Danarothrock (talk) 00:28, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

NASA

I removed the following text here because of a failed verification:

The reference is pointing to an announcement of a lunch talk for the AIAA (http://www.aiaa.org/) which struck me as odd when I was looking into this. Wouldn't the appropriate link be to NASA-Langley?

So I looked into this more carefully. The claim is that Robert W. Moses is being funded through a Creativity and Innovation Grant through Langley. And, indeed, he is being so-funded as can be seen [http://www.nasa.gov/centers/langley/news/researchernews/rn_innovationmetric.html here].

However, he is not being funded to study cold fusion. He is being funded to study through the Atmospheric Flight & Entry Systems Branch, Sys. Engineering Directorate, "How Fast to Mars is Fast Enough?" If he is using his funds to conduct "LENR" experiments, he is probably in violation of his grant terms.

I have put in inquiries to the project director, Marty Waszak, to see if he can shed some light on the matter. In the meantime, I think it highly irresponsible for us to claim that NASA funded a cold fusion experiment until we can find a statement from NASA that such is the case. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.59.169.48 (talk) 21:54, 20 December 2011 (UTC) SOCK of banned user VanishedUser314159 --POVbrigand (talk) 19:06, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Good call - and thanks for the excellent detective work! Fact-checking is an oft-overlooked function of good Misplaced Pages editors. SteveBaker (talk) 23:24, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

I'd bet the Langley guy is using the "we'll have LENR-powered spaceships in X years" excuse, like someone at the Glenn Research Center . --Enric Naval (talk) 23:27, 20 December 2011 (UTC)

• It’s rare that I have an opportunity to thank an I.P. editor for thorough and rigorous research and homework. Well done. Why don’t you register? Greg L (talk) 04:09, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Above here is OR. The IP might well be a banned user, that's why he won't register. NASA has performed and is performing LENR research, and they have spoken to Rossi. But no mention of NASA is in the Cold Fusion article. Congratulations for your joint censorship. Keep it up. You will surely find reasons to delete ENEA and SPAWAR from the article too if you all join hands.

Read this: Tests conducted at NASA Glenn Research Center in 1989 and elsewhere consistently show evidence of anomalous heat during gaseous loading and unloading of deuterium into and out of bulk palladium. At one time called “cold fusion,” now called “low-energy nuclear reactions” (LENR), such effects are now published in peer-reviewed journals and are gaining attention and mainstream respectability. The instrumentation expertise of NASA GRC is applied to improve the diagnostics for investigating the anomalous heat in LENR. Presentation attached.

You all are just pushing YOUR ANTI CF POINT OF VIEW.

--POVbrigand (talk) 10:54, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

And that is an opinion from an individual researcher, not an statement from an official research body, not a review of the field from a mainstream source with good reputation. And available evidence was considered insufficient by DOE in 1989 and 2004, which would include the 1989 GRC results. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:05, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

It is your wishful thinking that it's only an opinion from an idividual researchers. It is on the website of an official research body. the DOE has nothing to do with it. "which would include" please provide evidence instead of pushing POV. --POVbrigand (talk) 11:15, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

It's text summarized from a presentation on a workshop. The presentation claims a 2009 "NASA IPP-sponsored effort" (IPP = Innovative Partnerships Program). I can't find a list of 2009 IPP partnerships to confirm this. How can we verify that this is not the same situation as the Langley guy above? (Being funded for something else, and then performing LENR research using part of those funds).

And IPP are partnerships started by some company that has requested research in order to get a patent. It's not a full-blown NASA program. NASA has decided to start on its own to start a program because of seeing merit in cold fusion.

These are low-quality sources, with no confirmation on other sources, being used by some supporters to make misrepresentations, with no review sources making interpretation of its significance for the field, written by people inside the field and with a conflict of interest, going against conclusions in better quality secondary sources, etc. --Enric Naval (talk) 11:52, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

No, it is not a summary of the presentation, that is your SYNTH. The text was there a long time before the presentation was added recently. You are analyzing the content of the presentation and comparing that with the limited resources you have access to to make your own SYNTH and to support your predefined biased conclusions.

The content of WP-articles is governed by content policies and not by your made up "low-quality" wishful thinking. --POVbrigand (talk) 12:24, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Let's check archive.org. The last entry is for July 2010, but it's currently down(we'll have to re-check later) . The before-last entry is October 2009, where neither the text or the presentation are present. It's been for 2 years at most.

From other sources I see that it's been only since the workshop was made in September 2011.. ecat-news.com says that the text was caused by the workshop , in Vortex-l they were expecting for the presentation to be uploaded right below the text. That text is an introduction to that presentation, its only reason for existing is to introduce that presentation. It's not an independent summary prompted by the state of the research changing. The placement of the text makes it very clear. In 30th October the text had a warning saying

"Relevant Presentation:

+ Download presentation given at a LENR Workshop at NASA GRC in 2011 ."

Try to find proof of that text existing before September 2001. Or proof of the text being other than an introduction to that specific presentation. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:50, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

That links fails to prove NASA is behind LENR. It is too weak and unverifiable. Binksternet (talk) 16:53, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Unverifiable ? Where did you get that from ? Please explain how this: "Tests conducted at NASA Glenn Research Center in 1989 and elsewhere consistently show evidence of anomalous heat during gaseous loading and unloading of deuterium into and out of bulk palladium. At one time called “cold fusion,” now called “low-energy nuclear reactions” (LENR), such effects are now published in peer-reviewed journals and are gaining attention and mainstream respectability. The instrumentation expertise of NASA GRC is applied to improve the diagnostics for investigating the anomalous heat in LENR." is "unverifiable". It IS on their website you know ? That bloody well satisfies verifiability, Stop filibustering. --POVbrigand (talk) 17:23, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

Unverifiable in the sense that no proof is demonstrated that NASA is endorsing LENR. Tests were conducted "at" NASA GRC, not by NASA GRC. The only interest NASA has in the project is in the improvement of its instrumentation, and such instrumentation is needed by the LENR guys. The NASA webpage GRC Sensors and Electronics Physical Sensors Instrumentation Research points us to the terribly unscientific powerpoint-y promotional presentation linked here: "Development of techniques to investigate sonoluminescence as a source of energy harvesting". LOL, "A Galaxy of 'Nano-Stars' in a Jar". That's rich. The PDF concludes by telling us that "NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC) is developing instrumentation technologies for the support of the mission to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery, and aeronautics research." That's the whole of their interest. The next sentence is expressed in promotional corporate-ese: "GRC is leveraging expertise in optical and physical instrumentation research to determine if the potential exists for energy harvesting from sonoluminescence." By "leveraging", the researchers intend to tie GRC to their results. The closest connection is, however, that NASA will suddenly be interested if the researchers actually get something worthwhile from one of their many experiments. Binksternet (talk) 18:50, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

(edit conflict) And there is no mention of the NASA Glenn tests in any of the comprehensive reviews by Huizenga, Close, Simon, Seife, Mallove, Beaudette and Storms. I can only find a passing mention of NASA experiments in Biberian's "An update on Condensed Matter Nuclear Science", and it's for the Lewis center, not the Glenn center. Apparently only a technical memorandum was ever published:

• G. C. Fralick, A. J. Decker, and J. W. Blue, Results of an attempt to measure increased rates of the reaction D-2 + D-2 yields He-3 + n in a nonelectrochemical cold fusion experiment NASA Technical Memorandum 102430, 1989.

Were Glenn's tests ever published anywhere? Are there sources saying that they are significant?

(And this text is still clearly an introduction written for a workshop presentation, not an official endorsement from SPAWAR.). --Enric Naval (talk) 18:54, 21 December 2011 (UTC)

@Enric, already forgot this  ? They have LENR on their freaking roadmap. --POVbrigand (talk) 00:17, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

NASA has filed a patent on a LENR system. . --POVbrigand (talk) 01:17, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

September 22 GRC conference

Can someone authenticate , , and ? If they're authentic they show that LENR work is taking place at multiple NASA Centers, and Langley's Chief Scientist has made some pretty extreme claims ("No other single technology even comes close to the potential impacts of LENR upon Agency Missions.") Selery (talk) 01:27, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Ah-HA! Directly from NASA's web site: http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/sensors/PhySen/docs/LENR_at_GRC_2011.pdf -- incontrovertible proof that NASA has not only been working on it at least since 2009, but they've been getting positive results. As reliable a source as they come. Quoting from page 19:

Benefits for NASA:
• Replace 238Pu as power source in deep space missions
-- Currently in short supply
-- Now depend upon foreign sources
-- Perhaps 5 years to supply our own
-- No money in new budget to restart domestic production
• Replace fission reactors as power source for human habitation missions
-- No radioactive waste
-- No radioactive material accident hazard on launch

Selery (talk) 00:29, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Reliable source that NASA performs LENR research

evidence of reliability:

"RBC is one of Russia's largest and dynamic media companies. It operates in the Internet, television and print media segments. RBC occupies a leading position on the business information market in Russia and the CIS, and is expanding its presence in the area of general interest Internet."

"RBC’s Internet-based line of business goes back to 1995, when the business news portal www.rbc.ru was established. Currently, the portal is the leader among other Russian business Internet resources. As of the end of 2010, the Rbc.ru audience topped 15 million users. Apart from the main portal, such web resources as Rbcdaily.ru (a business daily), Cnews.ru (a hi-tech news website), Autonews.ru (an automotive news website), Quote.ru (a financial information portal), and Realty.rbc.ru (a real estate website) also enjoy a high degree of demand and popularity among the business audience."

The sources:

CNEWS.ru - "NASA promises an era of low-energy fusion"

That article was relayed in Gazeta.ru - "NASA once again promises a breakthrough in cold fusion"

The fact that NASA actively performs LENR research should be in the article. Stop defending the deletion by banned VanishedUser314159.

--POVbrigand (talk) 14:23, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

::Sorry, but in no sense does a Russian news website serve as a reliable source for what NASA is funding. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 128.59.171.184 (talk) 17:04, 23 December 2011 (UTC) SOCK of banned user VanishedUser314159 --POVbrigand (talk) 19:05, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Not as reliable as perhaps, but it does count as a secondary news source, which is more important for Misplaced Pages's purposes. Selery (talk) 00:15, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I have edited it all in. --POVbrigand (talk) 23:09, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Another reliable source that NASA performs LENR research

A peer reviewed "review" (ie. NOT primary, but secondary source) paper discussing the NASA results. "Progress in Condensed Matter Nuclear Science " from X.Z. Li - Journal of Fusion Energy - Volume 25, Numbers 3-4, 175-180, DOI: 10.1007/s10894-006-9023-8 --POVbrigand (talk) 01:47, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Enric, what is your problem. You completely disregard these RS. --POVbrigand (talk) 02:23, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

"LENR at GRC" is not WP:RS for the claims made

Currently our article contains...

Some institutions continue to fund cold fusion research, such as the Italian ENEA, the U.S. Navy SPAWAR, and NASA.
...and...
In a recent presentation researchers from NASA Glenn Research Center expressed a great potential for LENR.

Ref is a presentation given at a LENR Workshop at NASA GRC (LENR at GRC) sourced from the Research sub-page of Physical Sensor Instrumentation Research at NASA Glenn Research Center (GRC)...

From the Contacts page...

...snip...

Researchers

• Gus Fralick (216) XXX-XXXX xxxx@nasa.gov
• John Wrbanek (216) XXX-XXXX xxxx@nasa.gov

...snip...

From the Research page (in the footer)...

...snip...

NASA Official: John D. Wrbanek
Curator: John D. Wrbanek
Last Updated: December 16, 2011

From the presentation...

Authors

• Gustave C. Fralick • John D. Wrbanek • Susan Y. Wrbanek • Janis Niedra (ASRC)
  

References

• Fralick, G., Decker, A., Blue, J., “Results of an Attempt to Measure Increased Rates of the Reaction 2D + 2D ? 3He + n in a Non-electrochemical Cold Fusion Experiment,” NASA TM-102430 (1989).
• Niedra, J., Myers, I., Fralick, G., Baldwin, R. “Replication of the Apparent Excess Heat Effect in a Light Water-Potassium Carbonate-Nickel Electrolytic Cell”, NASA TM-107167 (1996)
• Li, Xing Z.; Liu, Bin; Tian, Jian; Wei, Qing M.; Zhou, Rui and Yu, Zhi W.: “Correlation between abnormal deuterium flux and heat flow in a D/PD system,” J. Phys. D: Appl. Phys. 36 3095-3097 (2003).
• Miley, G.H., N. Luo, and A. Lipson, "Proton Transport Through Atomic Layer Coated Thin-films", March Meeting 2003 of the APS, vol. 2, pp.1124, March 3-7, (2003).
• Liu, Bin; Li, Xing Z.; Wei, Qing M.; Mueller, N.; Schoch, P. and Orhre, H. “„Excess Heat? Induced by Deuterium Flux in Palladium Film.” The 12th International Conference on Condensed Matter Nuclear Science, Yokohama, Japan, Nov. 27 – Dec. 2, 2005
• Widom, A., Larsen, L., “Ultra Low Momentum Neutron Catalyzed Nuclear Reactions on Metallic Hydride Surfaces," Eur. Phys. J. C (2006)
• Wrbanek, J., Fralick, G., Wrbanek, S., “Development of Techniques to Investigate Sonoluminescence as a Source of Energy Harvesting”, NASA TM-2007-214982 (2007)
• Biberian, J.P. and Armanet, N.: “Excess Heat Production During Diffusion of Deuterium Through Palladium Tubes” 8th International Workshop on Anomalies in Hydrogen/Deuterium Loaded Metals, Sicily, Italy, 2007.
• Kim, Y. E., “Theory of Bose-Einstein Condensation for Deuteron-Induced Nuclear reactions in Micro/Nano-Scale Metal Grains and Particles”, Naturwissenschaften 96, 803(2009).
• Wrbanek, J., Fralick, G., Wrbanek, S., Hall, N. “Investigating Sonoluminescence as a Means of Energy Harvesting,” Chapter 19, Frontiers of Propulsion Science, Millis & Davis (eds.), AIAA, pp. 605-637, 2009.
• Fralick, G., Wrbanek, J., Wrbanek, S., Niedra, J., Millis, M., “Investigation of Anomalous Heat Observed in Bulk Palladium”, IPP Final Report (2009)

• From WP:PRIMARY (hilites mine)...

• Primary sources are very close to an event, often accounts written by people who are directly involved, offering an insider's view of an event, a period of history, a work of art, a political decision, and so on. An account of a traffic accident written by a witness is a primary source of information about the accident; similarly, a scientific paper documenting a new experiment is a primary source on the outcome of that experiment.(refs ommitted)

Policy: Unless restricted by another policy, primary sources that have been reliably published may be used in Misplaced Pages, but only with care, because it is easy to misuse them. Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation. A primary source may only be used on Misplaced Pages to make straightforward, descriptive statements that any educated person, with access to the source but without specialist knowledge, will be able to verify are supported by the source. For example, an article about a novel may cite passages to describe the plot, but any interpretation needs a secondary source. Do not analyze, synthesize, interpret, or evaluate material found in a primary source yourself; instead, refer to reliable secondary sources that do so. Do not base articles and material entirely on primary sources. Do not add unsourced material from your personal experience, because that would make Misplaced Pages a primary source of that material. Use extra caution when handling primary sources about living people; see WP:BLPPRIMARY, which is policy.

1. Any exceptional claim would require exceptional sources.

1. The claim that NASA continues to "fund cold fusion research" is not supported by the source.
2. Stating in Misplaced Pages's voice that "...researchers from NASA Glenn Research Center expressed a great potential for LENR." is a red-herring used to infer NASA support for cold fusion.

The presentation is not a WP:RS for the two sentences and should be removed. —ArtifexMayhem (talk) 00:09, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Primary sources are allowed for statements that a person or an organization said. Your detail above doesn't suggest anything which would make those statements less authoritative. You should probably ask about this on WP:RSN -- you might find you're straining credulity with this line of argument. If an organization is publishing internal Technical Notes on a topic, they're funding research on it at least at some level. 67.6.132.34 (talk) 07:42, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Hosting a lunch and learn presentation doesn't constitute institutional endorsement or review of the content, even if it was in forthright English prose, which this is not. If the authors did manage to convince the attendees of something, there should be little difficulty getting that published in a real wp:RS. Meanwhile there is wp:NODEADLINE. We can wait. LeadSongDog come howl! 08:03, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

@Artifex:

1) "The claim that NASA continues to "fund cold fusion research" is not supported by the source." The text in the article does not claim that NASA continues to fund anything -> "In April 2011 Dennis M. Bushnell, Chief scientist at NASA Langley Research Center, stated that LENR is a very "interesting and promising" new technology that is likely to advance "fairly rapidly." In a recent presentation researchers from NASA Glenn Research Center expressed a great potential for LENR." Straw man ?

2) Stating in Misplaced Pages's voice that "...researchers from NASA Glenn Research Center expressed a great potential for LENR." -> WP:YESPOV "...Avoid stating opinions as facts. Usually, articles will contain information about the significant opinions that have been expressed about their subjects. However, these opinions should not be stated in Misplaced Pages's voice. Rather, they should be attributed in the text to particular sources, or where justified, described as widespread views, etc. For example, an article should not state that "genocide is an evil action", but it may state that "genocide has been described by John X as the epitome of human evil."..." The line is correctly attributed to the particular source, thus not stated in Misplaced Pages's voice.

@LeadSongDog:

The "lunch and learn" talk "LENR @ Langley" is currently not used in the article. What are you complaining about ? The currently used presentation is titled "LENR at GRC" and is hosted at a NASA server.

--POVbrigand (talk) 13:56, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

NASA work is covered in detail in , a secondary source co-authored by a NASA researcher. 67.6.132.34 (talk) 14:01, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Is there a free convenience link to that book chapter? Selery (talk) 04:57, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

SPAWAR video

Is this video any good for an external link? Selery (talk) 01:33, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

• I think so. As skeptical as I have been—or perhaps still am—that presentation is very interesting and is presented by scientists from the US Navy's Space and Naval Warfare Systems Command, which I would call a most‑reliable primary source. It is certainly *interesting* and I think would properly serve the interests of our readership. If I wanted to know if there was any merit to CF, I would appreciate that Misplaced Pages provided this link. The speaker here, who presents well, addresses the history of the original Fleischmann‑Pons experiments and their non‑reproducibility. Greg L (talk) 02:57, 22 December 2011 (UTC)

Is it edited in yet ? --POVbrigand (talk) 21:57, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Just now. Selery (talk) 00:42, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Move all pathological references to historical footnotes

The Cold Fusion article links create a reverse relevance problem. The links progression should go forward in time from Cold Fusion to the present state of affairs for this subject. LENR and the Widom Larson Theory, and works known as Condensed Matter Nuclear reflect a deeper contemporary understanding of these phenomenon. The NASA patent for a device based on LENR Science provides a clear pointer that Wiki links should progress forward on this subject. Cold Fusion was a historical birth of this initially misunderstood science. The links should progress forward into the Science of LENR. For this to be allowed by Wiki the Wiki Forum needs to: 1)Recognize it as a Science. 2)Recognize quality Peer Review Journals used by department heads of universities and researchers in this field. My hope is to improve the article Cold Fusion. Therefore over the next few weeks I will solicit views of the directors of physics departments of universities. LENR - Low Energy Nuclear Reaction and Widom Larson Theory, Condensed Matter Nuclear 1) Is this science or pathological science? 2) Do you offer a class in this discipline? If so, please provide information. 3) Are you developing a curriculum of this science? If so, when will you offer it? 4) What peer review journals do you source in this field? P>S> Any suggestions before I move forward with this? Is this direction of query able to yield opinions the Wiki Forum may value?--Gregory Goble (talk) 14:52, 25 December 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by Gregory Goble (talk •--Gregory Goble (talk) 15:09, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

NASA has filed a patent on a LENR system.. --POVbrigand (talk) 01:17, 22 December 2011 (UTC)"CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED PATENT APPLICATIONS Thanks POVbrigand for this example of the science of LENR. "Pursuant to 35 U.S.C. .sctn.119, the benefit of priority from U.S. Provisional Patent Application Ser. No. 61/317,379, with a tiling date of Mar. 25, 2010, is claimed for this non-provisional application, the contents of which are hereby incorporated by reference in their entirety.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

1. Field of the Invention

This invention relates to the production of heavy electrons. More specifically, the invention is a method of making a device, the device itself device, and a system using the device to produce heavy electrons via the sustained propagation of surface plasmon polaritons at a selected frequency.

2. Description of the Related Art

Heavy electrons exhibit properties such as unconventional superconductivity, weak antiferromagnetism, and pseudo metamagnetism. More recently, the energy associated with "low energy nuclear reactions" (LENR) has been linked to the production of heavy electrons. Briefly, this theory put forth by Widom and Larsen states that the initiation of LENR activity is due to the coupling of "surface plasmon polaritons" (SPPs) to a proton or deuteron resonance in the lattice of a metal hydride. The theory goes on to describe the production of heavy electron that undergo electron capture by a proton. This activity produces a neutron that is subsequently captured by a nearby atom transmuting it into a new element and releasing positive net energy in the process. See A. Windom et al. "Ultra Low Momentum Neutron Catalyzed Nuclear Reactions on Metallic Hydride Surface," European Physical Journal C-Particles and Fields, 46, pp. 107-112, 2006, and U.S. Pat. No. 7,893,414 issued to Larsen et al. Unfortunately, such heavy electron production has only occurred in small random regions or patches of sample materials/devices. In terms of energy generation or gamma ray shielding, this limits the predictability and effectiveness of the device. Further, random-patch heavy electron production limits the amount of positive net energy that is produced to limit the efficiency of the device in an energy generation application.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

Accordingly, it is an object of the present invention to provide a method of making a device that produces heavy electrons. A method of producing heavy electrons is also disclosed. The steps may include selecting a material system that includes an electrically-conductive material. The material system may have a resonant frequency associated therewith for a given operational environment. The step may further include forming a structure having a surface. The structure may comprise a non-electrically-conductive material and the material system. The structure may incorporate the electrically-conductive material at least at the surface of the structure. Geometry of the structure supports propagation of surface plasmon polaritons at a selected frequency that is approximately equal to the resonant frequency of the material system. The step may further include producing heavy electrons at the electrically-conductive material as the surface plasmon polaritons propagate along the structure. The steps may also include applying energy to a portion of the structure to induce propagation of the surface plasmon polaritons at the portion. The material system may comprise a metal hydride. The electrically-conductive material may be in a form selected from the group consisting of particles and whiskers. The structure may include a solid matrix material with the electrically-conductive material mixed therein. The structure may exist in a state selected from the group consisting of a gas, a liquid, and a plasma. The electrically-conductive material may be mixed in the structure. The structure may comprise a two-dimensional structure or a three-dimensional structure. The geometry may also comprise a fractal geometry. The step of applying further may further comprise the step of impinging the structure with a form of energy selected from the group consisting of electric energy, thermal energy, photonic energy, energy associated with an ion beam, and energy associated with a flow of gas. The step of applying may further comprise the step of altering the geometry of the structure at the portion thereof."--Gregory Goble (talk) 02:58, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Clarification:Pathological science or not? Pseudo-science or science? It seems to me that one must show, in a scholarly manner, that hundreds of researchers take off their scientists 'hat' and don another; reckless abandon departing from all scientific methods... I just do not buy it! Pathological science opinions deserve to be (perhaps temporarily or perhaps permanently) placed as a footnote. Wiki is otherwise purporting that everyone of these scientists are QUACKS! AS requested (and not addressed) is publishable evidence of pathological science. Since science is a present state of affairs quoting past (20 year old) DOE reports and disallowing present DIA reports is ludicrous. This is a controversy site subject. It should not have the flavor of a 'pre-judgment' site or a 'we decide what gets shown' (censorship) site. The DIA report is worthy of Wiki readership. Moving the 'pathological science or not' debate forward will simpify and clarify this article, I predict a 50% improvement in the readability level of the article.--Gregory Goble (talk) 15:34, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Defense Intelligence Report

It seems fair to link the Defense Intelligence Report to the article. They do good scholarship. Who disagrees? Agrees?--Gregory Goble (talk) 02:56, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

I make direct statement and not one of you gives a direct response. The Defense Intelligence Agency does good scholarly work. Who disagrees? Who agrees? Any examples of schlock or poor analysis or poor reporting. If not, This document is worth posting as a good source of current information. Speculation as to it's fraudulency, intent of authors, or it being leaked or not, seems to obfsucate my posting and certainly are not a response to my statement or simple questions.--Gregory Goble (talk) 06:27, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

• Gregory Goble: I took the liberty of moving your 02:56 post, above, to its current position. Where you curiously placed it, and with its indenting, made it appear as if Binksternet’s and my posts were after yours and that Binksternet was replying “no” to your suggestion. As to your question, I think it is entirely fair to link to the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency report. They are a most-reliable, RS. In fact, I would hope we can start improving this article by deleting one item cited to a least-reliable RS for each good one we add. By the time we’re done, there should only be high quality sourcing in this article. Greg L (talk) 03:16, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

  P.S. But first, I just now noted that the “UNCLASSIFIED” “report” by U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency (titled “Technology Forecast: Worldwide Research on Low-Energy Nuclear Reactions Increasing and Gaining Acceptance”) is hosted by LENR-CANR.org. I suggest that it would be wise to validate the document as really the product of the Defense Intelligence Agency. I just googled “DIA-08-0911-003” and didn’t immediately see the original at a dot-mil site. Does anyone know how to validate that “DIA-08-0911-003” is a real document? I hope we don’t find ourselves in a situation where the people at LENR‑CANR point out that their document is an “unclassified” extract of something classified and the original is hush-hush and all that. Greg L (talk) 03:25, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

  P.P.S. Something is smelling a little fishy; maybe my Skept‑O‑Meter®™© is set a bit high, but I see this YouTube video setting “DIA-08-0911-003” off to some hip music with slick promo-style graphics. Moreover, when I read through the document, many of its citations are sloppy and incomplete and don’t adhere to standard scientific conventions, which seems exceedingly unusual for such a document and its purported source. The totality of the whole document and all those oversized, boldface “UNCLASSIFIED”s on both the headers and footers (we could tell you, but then we’d have to kill you) just doesn’t seem right. Someone please show me an original hosted at a dot‑mil or dot‑gov site. It will be interesting to see how this one proves out. If the document is a forgery, it would seem to impeach the website at which it is being hosted. Greg L (talk) 03:36, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

  P.P.P.S. I might add that I just chased down a “citation” in that purported “Defense Intelligence Agency” report and the citation went full-circle back to LENR-CANR.org, where they included a little footer in the document attempting to explain that away. Greg L (talk) 03:45, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

UPDATE: LENR-CANR.org is a website where the registrant and admin is Jed Rothwell of Atlanta, GA. He appears to like to self-publish documents on a diverse range of subjects, such as “Cold Fusion and the Future”, in which he touches upon “Robot Chickens and Other Prodigies”. I also note that the contributions history of Gregory Goble shows him to be a single-purpose editor. I might add that I can’t *prove* that the “Technology Forecast: Worldwide Research on Low-Energy Nuclear Reactions Increasing and Gaining Acceptance” by the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency is a clumsy, amateurish forgery; not any more than I can *prove* aliens from other star systems aren’t buzzing earth. But that’s my take. I look forward to someone locating an original “unclassified” report on a dot‑mil or dot‑gov site and proving that my healthy skepticism was misplaced. Greg L (talk) 04:07, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Greg L, just FYI... here is a search that shows just some of the debates that have gone on about the blacklisting and unblacklisting of lenr-canr.org. Abd (now indefinitely blocked) alone posted about 2000 gigabytes (just a guess, likely an underestimate) of "debate" on this subject. Suffice it to say there are those who doubt that the site is a good place for sourcing anything. Jed Rothwell is also not a new name in relation to this article. I sense that some admin action under the existing ArbCom cases is in the nearish future. Perhaps you can understand how I (and others) became disillusioned about getting this article into a high-quality state. EdChem (talk) 05:03, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

What’s the major malfunction over getting anything done here without judicial intervention by ArbCom???. If I really thought there was any chance of being embroiled in ArbCom anything, I’d butt-out now ‘cause ArbCom in the past has shown that in their effort to seem even-handed, they like to cut out the tongues of parties on both sides of disputes (I think they think it makes them look fatherly, or something like that). All it should take is a consensus here on this article that LENR-CANR.org is not an RS; we just don’t let anyone put us in the position of proving their stuff is forged bunk and instead require proof that the above-mentioned document is real (and I seriously doubt anyone can do that). Did I just write something that makes you laugh at my galactic naïveté? Greg L (talk) 05:24, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Greg L, my apologies, I was unclear. I don't mean that ArbCom themselves will intervene, nor that you have done anything wrong. I suspect that newly-appeared editors will get warned under the existing cases that they may face discretionary sanctions, because I fear that what is happening is the begining of the upslope of another campaign over The Truth. Previous campaigns have involved some exceptionally talented manouvering to ensure that any "adverse" local consensus formation is frustrated and any that may slip through is challenged at as many boards as possible. I'm not suggesting that you are naive, just that you may be unaware of some of the past rounds. Wiki-policy is not well set up to deal with topics like this for reasons including:

• unless I am mistaken, there is no independent reliable review which leaves us having to deal only with summaries written by CF researchers and published in non-mainstream journals
• debates on the reliability of sources like the JCMNS can be made endless
• the fact that many explanations suggested for CF phenomena contradict established science is hard to cover because it is usually dismissed as original research, yet few scientists bother to write papers saying "suggestion X published somewhere obscure contradicts well-established science without good evidence" so we have no sources to use to note what is obvious to scientists (for example, a while back there was an edit war over including in the potassium dichromate article its alleged homeopathic "therapeutic" use despite the compound being a well-known carcinogen... but saying that it isn't safe for medical use is claimed to be synthesis unless we find a source saying that ingesting this carcinogen is unsafe but fortunately the homeopathic solution is so dilute that there isn't any dichromate in it anyway... but I digress)
• when claims like "MIT teaches CF" are deconstructed we end up with arguments about original research and what is "fact" and what is "opinion" / "interpretation"
• the civility policy is a potent weapon if editors can be frustrated into saying something plausibly claimably uncivil
• arguments are recycled and keep re-appearing, like the upcoming one about how relaible lenr-canr.org is
• truly scientifically literate admins are not common... scientifically literate admins willing to put up with the games that go on about articles like this are rarer, and if they do take any action they can look forward to claims of involvement to chase them away - if you want a perspective on this point, just ask WMC

Looking back at these comments, I recognise I am still disillusioned. Please don't just take my word, have a look at the talk page archives, or ask around. I truly would like to see this article improved and I applaud efforts towards this end. Form your own views on suggestions made, keep to your principles, and I wish you well. Regards, EdChem (talk) 06:06, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

FYI, that DIA document has been discussed on this page before: Olorinish (talk) 07:01, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

(not the first time it was discussed, mind you. The striken comments are from someone who pushed any bad-quality source, as soon as it was useful to promote his personal views on CF, global warning and hybrid cars.)

It was never officially published. It was apparently written by some individual researchers inside DIA who decided to write a paper on CF, then followed some internal channel to make it an internal report. We have no idea if it was ever reviewed for accuracy, quality, etc. Never mind that technology forecasts are just speculations about future developments, and authors can get away with very wild speculations. We think that the authors sent it to people outside DIA (thus leaking it). Copies started being circulated. Someone posted the leaked report in their website, causing a lot of buzz. Then some people jumped to the unwarranted conclusion that DIA officially supports CF. Then they complained that wikipedia didn't reflect DIA's official position.

Rinse and repeat for a few more reports, and suddenly half the research institutions in the US give official support to CF. It is left unexplained why none of the institutions has granted a single cent for CF research in the last few years. Or started any sort of official research program.

CF would gain a lot of reputation as science if a) one federal institution started an official federally-funded research program, or b) one center like MIT launched an official course teaching CF as an established science. That's why you have these bitter fights over Langley's supposed official program, and MIT's supposed official course. --Enric Naval (talk) 13:43, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Quoting Enric: It was never officially published. It was apparently written by some individual researchers inside DIA who decided to write a paper on CF, then followed some internal channel to make it an internal report. Why do you say it was “apparently written” by anyone in the DIA? I suspect you have zero evidence for this. BTW, I downloaded that PDF to my hard drive in case it disappears from LENR-CANR.org. Further quoting you: suddenly half the research institutions in the US give official support to CF. Why do you say that? That is an extraordinary claim. Do you have any extraordinary evidence for this? Greg L (talk) 18:33, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

The DIA document was not fake. I posted some comments below.

Sorry, I meant that proponents in the talk page make that claim. In reality, no institution has given official support to CF. They have allowed their scientists to continue the research on their own time and budget, like SPAWAR, or they have allocated place in their conferences, like the ACS and the APS. But none has an official CF program. --Enric Naval (talk) 01:33, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

No institution ? Strange that the president from ENEA in the foreword of their 2009 book on the history of cold fusion research in Italy writes that "the phenomenon is proven". He also writes "Such evidence, all headed towards the nuclear phenomenon, created conditions for the development of two research programs – one Italian, and one U.S. – by means of government funds." --POVbrigand (talk) 02:18, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

I think the proper title for this thread would be DIA not lenr- canr.org for obvious reasons. Please change it for me. Call DIA office of information and verify as I did--Gregory Goble (talk) 17:16, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Easy to check. The report was accessed through a freedom of information suit. Follow the lead. Do not discredit without proper investigation... To falsify a DIA Report is a felony. To suggest it as such without clear evidence is obsfuscation and extremely offensive... please back up your ponderings or disappear it (delete).--Gregory Goble (talk) 14:25, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

In it for the long run... Quote "consensus was never truly a matter of pure logic or pure facts"... Time tells! Controversy by definition is never a "closed" subject. ]There are many philosophical and historical theories as to how scientific consensus changes over time. Because the history of scientific change is extremely complicated, and because there is a tendency to project "winners" and "losers" onto the past in relation to our current scientific consensus, it is very difficult to come up with accurate and rigorous models for scientific change. This is made exceedingly difficult also in part because each of the various branches of science functions in somewhat different ways with different forms of evidence and experimental approaches. Most models of scientific change rely on new data produced by scientific experiment. The philosopher Karl Popper proposed that since no amount of experiments could ever prove a scientific theory, but a single experiment could disprove one, all scientific progress should be based on a process of falsification, where experiments are designed with the hope of finding empirical data that the current theory could not account for, indicating its falseness and the requirement for a new theory.

Among the most influential challengers of this approach was the historian Thomas Kuhn, who argued instead that experimental data always provide some data which cannot fit completely into a theory, and that falsification alone did not result in scientific change or an undermining of scientific consensus. He proposed that scientific consensus worked in the form of "paradigms", which were interconnected theories and underlying assumptions about the nature of the theory itself which connected various researchers in a given field. Kuhn argued that only after the accumulation of many "significant" anomalies would scientific consensus enter a period of "crisis". At this point, new theories would be sought out, and eventually one paradigm would triumph over the old one — a cycle of paradigm shifts rather than a linear progression towards truth. Kuhn's model also emphasized more clearly the social and personal aspects of theory change, demonstrating through historical examples that scientific consensus was never truly a matter of pure logic or pure facts. However, these periods of 'normal' and 'crisis' science are not mutually exclusive. Research shows that these are different modes of practice, more than different historical periods.

To Gregory Goble: Please learn how to post on these talk pages. You persist at inserting mis-indented, out-of-place posts in the middle of threads where they break up others’ posts, change the apparent meaning of others’ responses when they write about disagreeing with you (what are they disagreeing about now?) and make a total mess of things. I just now fixed a post that you inserted right in the middle of one of my posts. I took the liberty of moving your posts to the proper place in the sequence and set them off with horizontal rules since you don’t even properly sign your posts. Posts are signed by adding four tildes (~~~~) at the end of what you write. Please abide by this expectation and courtesy. P.S. Please don’t try to strengthen your position by professing great offense to my suggesting that a ham‑fist forgery is what it appears to be. I guess your point about forging a government document would constitute a felony might be true; perhaps it might must be a gross misdemeanor—I don’t know. But just in case, I’ve saved that apparent forgery to my hard drive, BTW, in case it disappears from that quack site. If it walks, waddles, and quacks like a duck… Greg L (talk) 17:57, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

As I detailed above, the totality and details of this “document” as well as the exceedingly poorly written “citations” it contains, at least some of which just resolve full-circle back to LENR-CANR.org, make it appear to be a clumsy, amateurish forgery. Furthermore, the individual behind that website writes about odd things like robot chickens. Thus, there is nothing about LENR-CANR.org that looks to be an RS and there is reasonable evidence suggesting the whole thing is forgery site by a lone individual with odd ideas. Until proven otherwise, LENR-CANR.org must be presumed to not be an RS.

To spare future waste of time, I motion that a hat box (division) be placed at the top of this discussion page memorializing a number of consensus decisions to guide editors. Among the top ten findings should be that LENR-CANR.org is in no way an RS and appears to be a quack site salted with ham‑fisted forgeries.

To EdChem, do you think it wise to post a divbox at the top of this talk page enumerating consensus findings of fact regarding such things as what sites are not RSs and others rules of the road to guide editors here? Greg L (talk) 17:45, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

:Sorry to jump in, but I will point out that FAQs on other article have been remarkably helpful: Talk:Homeopathy or Talk:Creationism. 128.59.171.184 (talk) 18:13, 23 December 2011 (UTC) SOCK of banned user VanishedUser314159 --POVbrigand (talk) 19:09, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

"Sorry”?? I’m not. Thanks; now EdChem and I have a paradigm upon which to model this talk page’s FAQ. EdChem: Do you want to take the lead in creating a FAQ? You seem to have far more experience in this God-forsaken article than I do. Greg L (talk) 18:17, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Quoting Gregory Goble in his 14:25, 23 December post, in reference to “UNCLASSIFIED” “report” by U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency: The report was accessed through a freedom of information suit. Well, perhaps Jed Rothwell (the fellow behind that pro-CF site hosting that “document”) might think he covered his tracks with mysterious government secrecy that can’t be disproven. But if there was any truth to Jed’s FOF suit, then it would be a discoverable case listed and detailed in a federal registry. I’m guessing he doesn’t have one (except perhaps a document hosted on his own website). The reason for this skepticism is the profoundly clumsy citations, which look nothing whatsoever like real scientific citations, as well as the totality of the document, which looks like a ham-fisted attempt at POV-pushing in the guise of faux astonishment over tantalizing, potentially profound discoveries and observations (strongly) hinting that CF experiments have previously lead to energetic runaway nuclear reactions that made apparatus literally explode. Jed’s soap-boxing on his website about robo‑chickens do nothing to mollify such skepticism.

This all means that until proven otherwise with clear and convincing evidence, WP:COMMONSENSE requires that the document be assumed non-genuine and that the website hosting it (LENR‑CANR.org) assumed to not be an RS. That forging a government document might be a crime of some sort—as you pointed out in your 14:25, 23 December post—is a problem for whomever might have created it… if proven true in a court of law. Until then, the burden of proof is not on those who rightfully evince skepticism over its authenticity; which is to say: one can’t properly hide behind the apron strings of ‘taking great offense’ to the notion that the document is a forgery and by then claiming that it *must be presumed genuine* (notwithstanding it clearly looks like a forgery) because to think otherwise is tantamount to accusing someone of a crime. Criminal consequences and ramifications are their problem. Period. Please think twice before pushing this tact; further attempts to enter-twine legal complexities to suspecting a phony-balloney forgery is what it clearly appears to be could be construed as legal threat if taken too far. All we as mere wikipedians can do is limit ourselves to whether it walks, waddles, and quacks like an RS and therefore may be used as a source for citations in this article. And this one doesn’t; not by a mile. Greg L (talk) 19:00, 23 December 2011 (UTC)

Greg, drop it. We do know that the document is not a fake. I sent an email to DIA's public affairs just so I could end the endless discussions about it. The DIA reply is near the end of Talk:Cold_fusion/Archive_35#Emails_and_a_suggested_edit.

We are also pretty much sure that it got out of DIA when someone (probably the authors) mailed copies to people outside DIA (probably fellow researchers). Nobody has ever mentioned any "freedom of information suit", I have no idea of what Gregory Goble is talking about. (By the way, I just realized that newenergytimes.com quoted my email in the their page about the report. If they had obtained the info via a freedom of information request, then they would have simply published the request.) --Enric Naval (talk) 01:33, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

I make direct statement and not one of you gives a direct response. The Defense Intelligence Agency does good scholarly work. Who disagrees? Who agrees? Any examples of schlock or poor analysis or poor reporting. If not, This document is worth posting as a good source of current information. Speculation as to it's fraudulency, intent of authors, or it being leaked or not, seems to obfsuscate my posting and certainly are not a response to my statement or simple questions.--Gregory Goble (talk) 06:27, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Time for arbitration or can we figure this one out ourselves?--Gregory Goble (talk) 06:27, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

PPS This document was obtained through an information request... not suit... I erroneously thought the Defense Inteligence Agency only gave out info if you sued them. My bad... They are actually fairly open to inquiries. Try it... you'll see for yourself! --Gregory Goble (talk) 06:37, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

"LENR"

LENR redirects here, but this article only defines that abbreviation as "Low Energy Nuclear Reactions" the U.S. Navy uses the same abbreviation for "Lattice Enabled Nuclear Reactions" -- should that also be mentioned? Selery (talk) 00:58, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you... this is rich material you present and I value the fact that if I can squeeze it into this little brain of mine I may be richer for the experiance. The editors who contributed to Cold Fusion have done a good job in that they are correct "Cold Fusion" does not take place.... theoretically... or in nature. The science, theory, experimental phenomenon, and observation of LENR belongs in another article... It's a different puppy. To do this 1) Wiki needs view it(where it is of course)as good science when performed following strict scientific method. 2) Recognize papers submitted from secondary sources (separate institutions) duplicating another scientists experiment and observational data, presented in scientific journals and at conferences by scientists in the disipline of LENR. If Wiki cannot arrive at that minimum acknowledgement of the current state of affairs... That here are scientists in the field of LENR, doing good science presented in peer review journals allowing secondary sources to experiment, verify or not, and publish. Is this a policy problem? If so who do I talk to.... I certainly am not spinning my wheels here... traction is often in the timing, and the time seems right. We have an amazing opportunity here. The "cold fusion" article should stick to cold fusion. I feel this gets to the heart of the matter of this contentious article. The fact is cold fusion does not work. Anyone care to add to this or give me some insight?--Gregory Goble --Gregory Goble (talk) 00:14, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Source questions

Thank each of you for your advice and the review of my Wiki work, criticisms and concerns. I love it that anyone that publishes anything anywhere is most likely being peer reviewed. I have been studying Misplaced Pages, as per your suggestions. You are right, it takes time. I also am researching encyclopedia information on these intertwined subjects, I am almost finished with my compilation of deans of physics departments in the U.S. and coordinating a similiar inquiry of deans in Asia and Europe. Next week we begin correspondence.

• LENR is not Cold Fusion
• CANR is not Cold Fusion
• LANR is not Cold Fusion
• CMNS is not Cold Fusion

The bold implications that these disciplines are asserting, through robust research and intense peer review, is that nuclear reactions, that are neither fission nor fusion, are taking place. The published Widom Larson Theory supports this. Hopefully soon, we will be able to source a paper submitted by a reputable laboratory, from any journal, if it is not original research, i.e. an experiment duplicated by a separate institution publishing results that verify or refute the published results of the original research.

These are the bold assertions being made on Misplaced Pages-Cold Fusion-Ongoing scientific work.

]"Often they prefer to name their field 'Low Energy Nuclear Reaction' (LENR) or 'Chemically Assisted Nuclear Reaction' (), also 'Lattice Assisted Nuclear Reaction' (LANR) and 'Condensed Matter Nuclear Science' (CMNS), one of the reasons being to avoid the negative connotations associated with 'cold fusion'. The new names avoid making bold implications, like implying that fusion is happening on them."--Gregory Goble (talk) 01:35, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Gregory, I understand what you are saying, but I have a different feeling about how we should present that in Misplaced Pages. This WP-article is about "cold fusion", previous articles about "LENR" were regarded as so called POV forking, ie most editors do not think that "cold fusion" is something else than "LENR". I believe that currently there is no opportunity to get the WP community to accept a differentiation between "cold fusion" and "LENR". The way it is currently presented in the article, is IMHO the best we can do. --POVbrigand (talk) 10:45, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

You may be right about that. Perhaps recent developments needs looking into. The device that NASA has filed a patent for (which I thank you for posting) says it's about LENR and sources the (published) Widom Larson Theory (LENR) as the theoretical science behind the device (no mention of cold fusion) and the fact that the Widom Larson Theory is not in any way a theory about fusion or fission are two reasons for separating the two. Editors thoughts or opinions are fluid when presented with new data. Cold fusion is impossible yet low energy nuclear reactions are not. Hence the NASA device and the Widom Larson Theory. Both of which I believe meet Wiki source requirements. Separate the two ('cold' and 'low energy') and the contentions lose grounding in logic.--Gregory Goble (talk) 21:25, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Is this book considered secondary and reputable? I will post this to the noticeboard. Has any one read it or care to read it? I'll pick one up after the new year and see what I can glean from it.--Gregory Goble (talk) 05:16, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

 author    = {J.-P Biberian},
 title     = {Low energy nuclear reactions in gas phase:
              a comprehensive review},
 booktitle = {Low-Energy Nuclear Reactions Sourcebook},
 year      = {2010},
 editor    = {J. Marwan and S. Krivit},
 publisher = {Oxford University Press},
 address   = {Washington, USA},
 volume    = {2},
 pages     = {9--34},
 ISBN      = {9780841224544},
 annote    = {"Low energy nuclear reactions have been demonstrated
experimentally mainly through electrochemical experiments. However, a great
deal of work has been performed in gas phase. The existence of anomalous
excess heat, production of neutrons, tritium, helium-4 and helium-3 as well
as the existence of transmutation of elements has been shown by many
experimentalists. This chapter reviews all the work that has been done during
the past 20 years in low energy nuclear reactions in gas phase." (Abstract
reproduced from the book)}

That looks secondary and peer reviewed, and therefore reliable. Selery (talk) 08:27, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Is the Widom Larson Theory considered primary and not allowed?Widom Larson Ultra Low Momentum Neutron Catalyzed Nuclear Reaction--Gregory Goble (talk) 06:08, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, it's been cited in a couple dozen sources according to Google Scholar, about half of which look peer reviewed, and some of which are clearly secondary, tertiary, or primary literature review sections. Those are better to use, but you should keep it short and to the point (e.g., "Widom and Larson proposed a theory in 2005 which can explain LENR production of helium, heat, x-rays, and transmutations without the problems involved with traditional understanding of fusion.") because there are still half a dozen competing theories, a couple of which might be technically superior when measured by their ability to explain and predict observations. (Check the NASA slides for a list of them all.) Selery (talk) 08:27, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Thank you for sending me into the theoretical realm. You have helped me gain a deeper understanding. I withdraw the suggestion that LENR needs to be separated from Cold Fusion while maintaining that references to both being considered "bad science" be moved to a historic footnotes section. I now hold that LENR (for many and varied reasons) is one name scientists in this field may prefer while the valid popular name Cold Fusion is appropriate; when described as occuring at temperatures that are much colder the sun. I am forming the following as parts of my logical progression. This helps me in forming my questions for the deans of physics departments; see developments to be posted under "pathological science references,,,".

• Sound working theory predicts measurable observable replicable phenomenon.
• Successful experiments are ones that have been replicated by many (more than two) separate institurions. (the more the more successful)
• One of the signs of good science is an increase in the sophistification of instrumentation used to observe phenomenon in a replicated experiment; which decreases the variable of error and provides an increase in hard data for theorists to work with.
• Only the original experiment is considered original research. If an experiment is able to be duplicated and its' observational data confirmed and predicted by theory it becomes working science; which, when applicable, leads to working devices.
• Peer review takes place when a published experiments measurable and observable results undergo critique when looked into (for science this means is attempted) by ones' peers.
• Articles are published in journals where their works are most tikely to be scrutinized by the best of their peers. Hence the tendancy for scientists to publish in the journals of their science.

Which brings me to this question: Is this source and these referances dissallowed on Wiki becauses the writer sources in his bibliography scientists works that are published in journals of LENR/Cold Fusion science? Are the journals he sources places where intense scientific peer review is begun and finished; i.e. duplicated experiments that critique the original, are being done by separate institutions and published for scrutiny by others?

• http://vixra.org/pdf/1112.0043v2.pdf
• Theoretical Feasibility of Cold Fusion According to the BSM - Supergravitation Unified Theory
• Stoyan Sarg Sargoytchev
• York University, Toronto, Canada *
• E-mail: stoyans@yorku.ca
• '8"1. Introduction
• "The scientific research on cold fusion was pioneered by High Flyn (1913-1997), an emeritus professor at the University of Rochester. Being an expert in ultrasonic waves, he advocated a method of cold fusion based on cavitation in liquid metals with injected hydrogen or deuterium and obtained a patent in 1982 . At this time however, little attention was paid since cold fusion was thought to be theoretically impossible.
• "The lack of a theoretical explanation and difficulty in repeatability led to an official denial, but interest in this option for solving the energy crisis never disappeared. Due to opposition from mainly the hot fusion advocates, the field is more often referred to as Low Energy Nuclear Reaction (LENR).”
• “The reported successful experiments from many laboratories around the world (now over 60), however, attracted attention.”
• “In cold fusion research by electrolysis of Pd in heavy water, the experiments of Russian scientist Prof. Kanarev and Japanese researcher Dr. T. Mizuno provided measurable proof of fusion and fission products. In Italy, the cold fusion research pioneered by Francesco Piantelli in 1989 has been extended and supported by the local inter-university centers in Bologna (Focardi, Campari) and Sienna (Piantelli, Gabbani, Montalbano, Veronesi). A detailed report about this research was published by the Italian National Agency for New Technology, Energy and Environment in 2008 . Piantelli filed two patents WO9520816 (1997) and WO2010058288 (2010), describing different methods, and published an article ITSI920002 about cold fusion of nickel with deuterium or hydrogen.”
• “Advances in the field of cold fusion and the recent success of the nickel and hydrogen exothermal reaction, in which the energy release cannot be explained by a chemical process, need a deeper understanding of the nuclear reactions and, more particularly, the possibility for modification of the Coulomb barrier. The current theoretical understanding based on high temperature fusion does not offer an explanation for the cold fusion or LENR. The treatise “Basic Structures of Matter – Supergravitation Unified Theory”, based on an alternative concept of the physical vacuum, provides an explanation from a new point of view by using derived three-dimensional structures of the atomic nuclei. For explanation of the nuclear energy, a hypothesis of a field micro-curvature around the superdense nucleus is suggested. Analysis of some successful cold fusion experiments resulted in practical considerations for modification of the Coulomb barrier. The analysis also predicts the possibility of another cold fusion reaction based on some similarity between the nuclear structures of Ni and Cr.”
• “2.1 Brief introduction
• "The feasibility of cold fusion was theoretically envisioned by Dr. Stoyan Sarg after he developed the BSM-Supergravitation unified theory (BSM-SG). After the first copyright protection in CIPO Canada in 2001 , the BSM-SG theory and related articles were posted in physical archives and reported at a number of international scientific conferences. Scientific papers were published in Physics Essays , Journal of Theoretics and conference proceedings . The complete theory was published as a book in 2004 . The BSM-SG theory is based on an alternative concept of the physical vacuum that has not been investigated before. The models developed as a result of the suggested concept are in excellent agreement with experimental results and observations in different fields of physics. The initial framework is based on two indestructible fundamental particles, FP, with parameters associated with the Planck scale and a fundamental Law of Supergravitation (SG). This law is distinguished from Newton’s law of gravity in that the SG forces, FSG, in pure empty space are inversely proportional to the cube of distance (while the gravitational forces in Newton’s law are inversely proportional to the square of distance).”--Gregory Goble (talk) 12:51, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

That looks like a terrible source to me because I've never seen anyone try to involve gravitation, only the electroweak force. Do you know where it was originally published? I would recommend avoiding it unless it's been peer reviewed by a reputable journal or editorial board -- that's part of the Misplaced Pages reliable source rules. Sonofusion (the lineage of that 1982 patent) has been even more of a fiasco than LENR. Selery (talk) 13:11, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

POV tag

Given the current state of this talk page with new sources including the fact that MIT is offering a course, NASA has been doing research at multiple centers since 2009, and given the poor state of the Navy results in terms of how they are represented in the article, I'm going to add a {{POV}} tag until we can get some agreement on how to proceed with these improvements. Note that I don't intend to add anything about the E-Cat, but I do think that NASA's evaluation of it deserves some sort of a mention. Looking over the history of this article, it seems it's been a very acrimonious fight between very polarized camps in opposition to whether the subject is fraudulent or not. Is that a fair characterization? In any case, that is how it appears and under these conditions I'm not going to edit anything but add the tag -- except to add tags where I think there is bias -- until we can reach some kind of a general agreement on these sources. So, does anyone have any reason to not include:

1. that the U.S. Navy has been working on LENR continuously since 1989 and has never wavered from their claims of positive results;
2. that NASA has been performing research on the topic since 2009 (besides a few investigations earlier with mixed results) and have been reporting positive results and optimistic expectations as described above; and
3. that he US Army has been doing LENR research since at least 2010.
4. that MIT is offering a course on cold fusion?

Selery (talk) 21:22, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

I would not characterize the two possibilities "fraudulent" or not. It is also possible that the researchers claiming positive results are mistaken. On the other topics, keep in mind that you should avoid including unpublished sources and that a series of lectures is not the same as a "course." Olorinish (talk) 23:22, 24 December 2011 (UTC)

Understood. The question about publication is interesting. I see the DIA report discussed above wasn't included because it wasn't published, but are documents released under FOIA requests considered published? Selery (talk) 00:59, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Keep in mind that these are primary sources, and that Misplaced Pages policy states that secondary and tertiary sources are preferred . Also, keep in mind that Misplaced Pages is not a newspaper , so it is not a good idea to list all the news items supporting the existence of cold fusion. In fact, the article currently has lots of news items supporting the existence of cold fusion. Even so, all of those items are not significant enough to change the fact that cold fusion is still considered extremely unlikely by virtually all fusion experts. What is the motivation for including these new ones? Olorinish (talk) 01:33, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

To relate the fact that at least three US agencies, including multiple NASA centers, are not only working in the field (countering the several passages in the article which imply that most scientists think it's bunk) but have been getting positive results, and in the case of NASA at least, have been making explicit claims that, for example, "No other single technology even comes close to the potential impacts of LENR upon Agency Missions," and LENR might, "Replace 238Pu as power source in deep space missions," and, "Replace fission reactors as power source for human habitation missions." It isn't balanced to include several statements saying most scientists think it's mistaken, pathological, or worse, without including NASA's opposing point of view. Selery (talk) 02:01, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Note that NASA supported the Breakthrough Propulsion Physics Program, and that what came out of that was very little. Cardamon (talk) 05:01, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

• A couple of points. First, honest mistakes (whether in calorimetry or something else) are not fraudulent. Also, someone who is self-deluded is not a fraud. So, saying that "it's been a very acrimonious fight between very polarized camps in opposition to whether the subject is fraudulent or not" is not a fair characterization. Second, the course seems to be a non-credit engineering course with a total 10.5 hours of class time. To simply describe it as "course on cold fusion" at MIT would be seriously misleading. Cardamon (talk) 00:09, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

I agree. A "non-credit seminar" is probably more appropriate, but MIT is in the top if not the top engineering school, so I think it would be biased to ignore their activity. Selery (talk) 00:59, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

No. The MIT connection would be overplayed. All they are doing is letting one of their profs use a room to espouse on his interests. That doesn’t mean they endorse what he is saying at all. The whole point this is being raised is because the “MIT”-connection lends credibility to a field that has been tarnished by kooks while real researchers try to get to the bottom of this. It would be highly inappropriate and misleading and making much ado about nothing. If we want to make it truthful without bending the impression (*sound of audience gasp*), it would say MIT allowed one of its professors, who couldn’t get his work cold fusion work published in peer-reviewed journals, to use one of its rooms to give a non-credit lecture with open, unlimited attendance to whoever wanted to listen in. Factual? Yes. Makes CF sound like it has the backing of MIT? No. Are the POV-pushers here still interested? No? Greg L (talk) 03:06, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

I completely agree to Greg's comment. It is interesting that MIT will allow one of it's prof to lecture this in the off hours. To me personally it is another (small) step to acceptance of LENR in the mainstream science world. It shouldn't be mentioned in the article, because most readers would misunderstand it that MIT endorses LENR, which is not the case. How MIT stands to LENR is completely unknown to us. btw. Greg, please cut out the "POV-pusher" phrase. Most of us are trying to represent the current status of cold fusion research in this article without selling any claims for facts. At least _I_ really try to do my best not to over do it. --POVbrigand (talk) 19:51, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Very well; I withdraw my proposal to include any mention of the MIT seminar in the interest of not derailing the discussion about the Navy, NASA, and Army ongoing work. Selery (talk) 22:39, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Why do you say Hagelstein can't get his work published in peer reviewed journals? I count nine articles authored by him in , from 1990 to 2010. Selery (talk) 10:52, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

While some was accepted, much is rejected. Greg L (talk) 16:33, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

What is your source for that assertion? Selery (talk) 22:39, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

Also note that MIT describes what Hagelstein will be teaching as an "activity" rather than a seminar. Cardamon (talk) 04:49, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Pole to see if the POV tag is appropriate

• Delete POV tags may be removed when there is a consensus to do so. They may not be used as a tool to force the community to deal with a hold-out editor; which is to say, the community is not required to retain these tags until the editor who put it there in the first place is fully content that his or her concerns have been fully satisfied.

  User:Selery’s arguments are not persuasive; his statement about the fact that MIT is offering a course is making too much of something because it implies endorsement by MIT when in fact all they are doing is allowing a prof to use a room to lecture about his area of interest to an open-enrolment class (fliers stapled corkboard-stuff).

  He also links to a notice mentioning NASA (an organization that also lends great credibility), but the document is hosed by New Energy Times and we need to first establish that it is an RS. Given what our article says about New Energy Times (one mentioning), it seems that there is healthy skepticism that it is anything but a club for the CF faithful. Accordingly, User:Selery’s objections do not strike me as being sufficiently grounded in the principles of technical writing nor Misplaced Pages’s principles guiding our reliance upon reliable sources. Greg L (talk) 03:18, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

I've agreed to call MIT's offering a "non-credit seminar" instead of a course, and I also think bias is evident from ignoring the Army and Navy, in addition to NASA. Selery (talk) 10:52, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

The only thing we agree on so far is the Navy video. In #SPAWAR video, above, I expressed my opinion that it ought to be included in the article. In fact, I enthusiastically support doing so; that video made me realize that there might be LENR occurring and that genuine scientists are working on this stuff.

As for the MIT, the actuality would be properly written MIT has a professor who is investigates cold fusion. MIT consented to allow that professor to use one of MIT’s lecture rooms in which he can lecture on cold fusion to anyone interested in auditing the class as a non-tuition, non-credit course—just for fun—as a non-paid, unlimited-attendance sorta thing, where the class was advertised via pamphlets on cork boards. It fails WP:NOTABLE and WP:UNDO. Moreover, attempts to recast the facts and trump up the MIT connection to make it seem more than it really is, such as Students at MIT can attend a class… would be misleading.

As for any document hosted only on New Energy Times, the authenticity of such documents must to be authenticated with a link to a NASA (dot‑gov) or military (dot‑mil) website to weed out fabricated documents like this “report” purportedly by U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency, from LENR‑CANR.org. No document from New Energy Times LENR‑CANR.org can be used as a citation in this article because those sites are not RSs and any documents or assertions made at those cites must be authenticated via a reliable secondary source (Nature or The New York Times) or a reliable primary source (NASA, U.S. Navy, etc.). Greg L (talk) 16:02, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/sensors/PhySen/docs/LENR_at_GRC_2011.pdf , http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/sensors/PhySen/research.htm . Are those the links you are looking for? NASA has been working on LENR. I see no reason to hide this fact by excluding it from the article. I don't find the article too terribly biased (a bit maybe). I do find that the bar on what is acceptable as RS in this talk area has been set somewhat higher than for other WP entries. Especially if .gov sites are not considered RS. I am new though - so I am likely missing something.Prospero66 (talk) 14:50, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

I've withdrawn my proposal to say anything about the MIT seminar. I don't think "just for fun" is encyclopedic or even accurate in this case, but I don't want the discussion to lose sight of the fact that at least three separate US government agencies have been reporting positive results for years, or decades in the case of the Navy. What would constitute acceptable proof of the authenticity of the NASA documents with the FOIA cover letters and the Army agenda and slides? There should be a release register on a NASA FOIA web site somewhere, which we can probably find by emailing the NASA FOIA officer who wrote the cover letter. If they are authentic then they can be uploaded to Commons. Do you have any authenticity issues with the Navy slides as referenced in their video description? Please note that I don't intend to use these sources to say anything about LENR directly; only as primary sources to report facts such as "The Chief Scientist of NASA Langley Research Center says ..." and "The US Navy SPAWAR group reports ...." Selery (talk) 22:39, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

I see that POVbrigand has added some of the details about NASA to the body and intro. If we can agree on whether to quote the statements from NASA above regarding their estimation of the prospects and from the Navy presentation about the fact that they stand by the positive results they have been reporting for decades, then I would agree that the bias dispute is resolved and the tag can be removed. Selery (talk) 23:33, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

To be precise, I undid the deletions of the Bushnell quote and the "LENR @ Langley" talk. I edited in the "LENR at GRC" presentation, because two reliable secondary sources mention that presentation. --POVbrigand (talk) 23:50, 25 December 2011 (UTC)

NASA made only one "IPP" "Innovative Partnership Program" in 2009. Bushnell's statements are a Celebrity endorsement. Cold fusion has such endorsement from two Nobel laureates, and that doesn't make it more correct. The source is a powerpoint presentation and a personal interview for the chief of one of the laboratories. There is no RS saying that NASA funds cold fusion research, there is only a talk given at other institution. Let me state that again There is no RS saying that NASA funds cold fusion research, stop trying to insert that information until there is a proper official announcement. --Enric Naval (talk) 01:30, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Read the Cnews article, read the Gazeta article, read the peer reviewed paper "Progress in Condensed Matter Nuclear Science" by XZ Li . Read the TM-102430 and TM-107167. celebrity endorsement is a weak argument, as it implies that any claim from anyone with status cannot be used on WP. Bushnell said that, you don't like it, but that is your problem. Nobody said that NASA is endorsing anything, those are your words. --POVbrigand (talk) 02:02, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Read User:Enric_Naval/pathological_science#sources_added_later. Cold fusion is still widely considered pathological science and incorrect. The article reflects current scientific consensus quite correctly. Bushnell is a celebrity endorsement, to try to counter multiple scholar sources. I still don't see any official announcement from NASA that they are funding any research. --Enric Naval (talk) 02:37, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

The "work on LENR" by a handful of NASA scientists does not change the fact that "Cold fusion is still widely considered pathological science and incorrect." You say that you are not able to see an official announcement. I don't know of a WP-policy that requires "official announcements" before RS can be included in an article. I see plenty of RS that call for a mentioning of NASA in the article: 2 Technical Memoranda, A quote from a leading NASA scientist, 2 news articles, at least 1 peer reviewed paper mentioning the work (2006 XZ Li), a "LENR @ Langley" lunch break talk describing the work on LENR at Langley, a patent application for a LENR device, self published (on their website) presentation material from a NASA organized LENR workshop at GRC. And this list is not conclusive. --POVbrigand (talk) 10:37, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

There are several reliable primary sources saying NASA funds cold fusion research, e.g.:

1. "Tests conducted at NASA Glenn Research Center in 1989 and elsewhere consistently show evidence of anomalous heat during gaseous loading and unloading of deuterium into and out of bulk palladium. At one time called “cold fusion,” now called “low-energy nuclear reactions” (LENR), such effects are now published in peer-reviewed journals and are gaining attention and mainstream respectability. The instrumentation expertise of NASA GRC is applied to improve the diagnostics for investigating the anomalous heat in LENR."
2. "The Contractor shall investigate properties of electromagnetic materials (EM) in support of the LENR (Low Energy Nuclear Reactions) project."
3. "Anomalous Heat Effect: De-hyping and Deciphering ‘Cold Fusion’.... Millis has been asked to lead Glenn’s research team this is investigating the viability of the anomalous heat effects for NASA applications."
4. "In 1989, Pons and Fleischman made their infamous "Cold Fusion" announcement promptly ending their careers. Despite this the study of the Pons-Fleischmann Effect continues to this day. This talk will cover some selected historical highlights from the past 20+ years that gave rise to the emerging field called Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (LENR). The body of evidence strongly suggest that the LENR effect is real, increasingly understood, and most recently, may actually be useful. The experimental approaches and evidence along with several theories will be presented. One theory, Widom-Larsen Theory (WLT), will be discussed in detail. The practical application of LENR to aerospace will transform virtually every aspect of system design."

There are plenty more available from a simple search of the NASA website. Selery (talk) 11:14, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

1) the introduction to a powerpoint presentation, discussed in Talk:Cold_fusion#NASA

2) one unassigned task inside a bigger contract for testing aircrafts. "in support of the LENR (Low Energy Nuclear Reactions) project". No reference number for such a project.

3) a book presentation, makes a reference to a team researching LENR, might be a reference to the 2009 IPP partnership.

4) a LENR talk given by an individual scientist in a workshop.

Sorry, but these are all low-quality references. Saying that NASA researches LENR is an extraordinary claim, you need extraordinary proof.

Mind you, I wouldn't be surprised if you could source that individual researchers inside NASA have managed to force LENR into projects that are not about LENR. Or that there have been short-lived programs with no followup. --Enric Naval (talk) 14:30, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

What would you consider a "high quality" source, and why exactly do (1) and (2) not qualify? (3) is not a book presentation. Selery (talk) 01:09, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

The sources used to give cold fusion the smear of credibility seem undue. IRWolfie- (talk) 10:53, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

In what way? The fact that a current NASA web site describing their work on it says LENR is gaining "mainstream respectability" would seem to imply that the sources from the early 1990s saying it lacks mainstream acceptance are the ones being given undue weight by inclusion in the article. Selery (talk) 16:46, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Selery, there are 3 books on cold fusion from Huizenga, Taubes and Close from the early 1990s that the anti-CF crowd thinks are the ONLY RS for the whole freaking article. Anything new they just won't accept, because it is not mentioned in those books. There are also pro-CF books published by reputable publishers (some of the authors are listed here User:POVbrigand/list#List_of_LENR_researchers_.28work_in_progress.29). But the anti CF crowd argues that, as those books are written by "adherents of fringe" those books are not RS. It is a perversion of WP-policy. But keep cool, don't give them an opportunity to have you blocked. Keep cool, make small edits, stay out of trouble and enjoy the ride. --POVbrigand (talk) 19:43, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

• This article is an embarrassing steaming pile and I can see why it has proven to be essentially impossible to improve it over the years. I think I’ll follow the lead of other wise editors like EdChem—who is obviously deeply discouraged—and find more sensible places. Goodbye and happy editing. Greg L (talk) 02:21, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

There seems the possibility of some admin involvement so I wouldn't give up quite yet. IRWolfie- (talk) 10:53, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

newenergytimes

This source is not reliable and so should not be treated as one. IRWolfie- (talk) 12:18, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

Where is it used now ? I can't find it, let's discuss --POVbrigand (talk) 13:49, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

I have found your delete: "They have continued to publish numerous papers in peer-reviewed journals."

As I stated when I edited this in. The existence of each of those papers is easily verifiable. The list happens to be compiled at newenergytimes. Including this is fully in line with WP:V. --POVbrigand (talk) 16:51, 26 December 2011 (UTC)

You can probably replace that source with which is already in the external links. Selery (talk) 00:12, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

I'm suprised you have no issue with the weasel word "numerous papers" which is not mentioned in any reliable source. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:05, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

It is original research to look at a list of papers and claim that there is numerous papers in peer-reviewed journals. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:05, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Why not specify the actual count? Selery (talk) 12:46, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

In the 2009 - University of Missouri LENR Seminar presentation "Twenty year history in LENR research using Pd/D Co-deposition", SPAWAR scientists talk about 23 publications. --POVbrigand (talk) 13:14, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

I mean the count from , i.e., over a thousand peer reviewed papers. Selery (talk) 14:01, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

dieterbritz.dk is a personal website and a seminar presentation is not reliable either. IRWolfie- (talk) 14:31, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

that publication is Self-published source. "Self-published and questionable sources may be used as sources of information about themselves," They say about themselves that they have published 23 peer reviewed papers. It is perfectly verifiable. --POVbrigand (talk) 16:30, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

Counting the number of peer reviewed papers in a bibliography which has been in the external links for years is the kind of simple math inference allowed by WP:CALC. Selery (talk) 16:36, 27 December 2011 (UTC)

So, you want to say "23" instead of "numerous". But, what is the significance of this? Why are we mentioning it? What is the secondary source saying that this is relevant? --Enric Naval (talk) 23:32, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

It's more specific and not an unencyclopedic WP:VAGUE weasel word. I don't know whether the bibliography counts as a primary or a secondary source for the number of publications from a source, but I guess it's secondary. Selery (talk) 23:56, 28 December 2011 (UTC)

Because it is adding valuable information to the lead which is saying that "... cold fusion articles are rarely published in refereed scientific journals" And it also tells us something about the level of work at SPAWAR. --POVbrigand (talk) 12:47, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

But we can't conclude anything about the level of work at SPAWAR. 23 papers over 20 years seems very low. IRWolfie- (talk) 15:40, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

it seems, it seems, it seems. Everything always seems. 23 papers in 20 years is more than 1 paper per year, it seems quite a lot to me. --POVbrigand (talk) 22:41, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Can somebody provide a link to the list of the 23 papers?...please. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 09:57, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

http://newenergytimes.com/v2/reports/SSC-SD-Refereed-Journal-Articles.shtml http://www.dieterbritz.dk/fusweb/papers . IRWolfie- (talk) 11:06, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

23 papers would be the output of roughly one person over 20 years. IRWolfie- (talk) 11:01, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Well, there are recent secondary sources analysing the publications in the field:

• "the terminal date is less clear, as papers are still being published on the subject (...), though in gradually decreasing numbers. (...) journal literatures exhibit episodes of epidemic growth and decline. (...) There was no overall increase in journal publication multi-authorship in either the Polywater or Cold Nuclear Fusion journal literatures (...) " Ackermann 2006
• "All fields with conceptual or experimental frameworks grow and densify (i.e., show ˛> 1), whereas fields in search of breakthroughs do not (˛∼1), such as cold fusion (meaning that the networks of collaboration in CF research have not grown, the authors still work as isolated as when they started working in the field) (...) It is noteworthy that research areas that do not possess a high degree of shared concepts or practices tend to densify more slowly, if at all. (...) Finally, nuclear cold fusion is a field that never found a solid experimental or conceptual proof of principle, and as such has never become a field of collaboration and exchange. It shows α =1, manifesting the fact that it is mostly the product of small, disparate, and often incommensurate efforts." Bettencourt 2009.

Both point out the lack of collaboration of authors in the field, a characteristic of fields that don't grow or grow very slowly at most. None of them seems to consider the SPAWAR publication level a notable event.

Additionally:

• "But not cold fusion. Research has continued at a moderate level of activity right up to the present day. A good deal of the work has been published in nonmainstream journals (some created for the purpose) or electronically; but occasionally papers have appeared in prestigious prestigious locations, such as the 1993 paper by Pons and Fleischmanns on calorimetry, which was accepted by Physics Letters A. This publication merits notice on further grounds: it reports what appears to be the last joint experimental work by Fleischmann and Pons on cold fusion. Perhaps more importantly, it is one of the last reports to be formally challenged on technical grounds by a cold fusion skeptic. Subsequent claims have been almost completely ignored by the scientific mainstream, and the popular media has generally followed suit, with a few exceptions. (...) Bart Simon, who proposes a new model for understanding how and why research persists beyond the point where the vast majority of the community considers the field finished: he calls it “Undead Science”" Simon 2005.

--Enric Naval (talk) 12:39, 30 December 2011 (UTC) (Enric's sig moved down by ArtifexMayhem (talk) 18:08, 1 January 2012 (UTC))

Good sources Enric. The "23" papers are all WP:PRIMARY and don't tell us anything about "level of work at SPAWAR".

"Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation."

—ArtifexMayhem (talk) 18:08, 1 January 2012 (UTC)

Counting the number of primary sources is not prohibited, it is not an "interpretation". see Misplaced Pages:SYNTHNOT#SYNTH_is_not_just_any_synthesis. If you still find that difficult to understand than maybe Misplaced Pages:SYNTHNOT#SYNTH_is_not_a_secondary-school_question will help you. --POVbrigand (talk) 14:19, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Take your thinly veiled personal attacks elsewhere. The point is "None of them seems to consider the SPAWAR publication level a notable event." ArtifexMayhem (talk) 16:30, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

"a notable event" -> WP:NNC. Adding the number of publications that SPAWAR self publicizes in their recent presentation is completely in line with WP-policy. Please read the policies and then comment. Thank you so much --POVbrigand (talk) 17:19, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Why is it due any weight in the article? It is not discussed in reliable secondary sources. (side: Where does SPAWAR self publicise?) IRWolfie- (talk) 11:35, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

The problem with just pasting in the number of primary sources is that it is a contextless number. Is it a lot? Is it a little? More important, will the lay reader interpret it as being a lot, or a little, or more or less significant than it ought to be? A few weeks ago, we had a similar problem at thiomersal; a fringe conspiracy theorist felt that it was important to add the number of atoms of mercury in a vaccine dose to the article, the idea being to encourage the perception of danger by displaying a contextless large number. At first blush, 23 might sound like a fair number of publications. It would make a pretty thick stack if you printed them all out. But is it really?

A typical sciences graduate student at a good university is expected to turn out two or three publishable units of work in the course of a four-to-six-year Ph.D. program; 23 publications in 20 years is therefore the full scientific output of...two graduate students. Active university researchers publishing mostly low-impact papers probably need to be producing two or more papers per year as senior author if they want to have a prayer of hanging on to their jobs or continuing to secure funding; again, 23 publications in 20 years is the work product of half of one full-time principle investigator.

If we were to infer anything from this number, it would be that SPAWAR has had a few guys fiddling with this stuff as a hobby and doesn't have any full-time researchers in this area—or that their work has been remarkably unproductive. Regardless, hanging the bare number out there without context isn't a good idea. Unless there has been reliable secondary commentary on the interpretation of this (or other similar) figures, we shouldn't be throwing it our readers. TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:36, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

That is the first reasonable argument why not to include "23". I can go with that. --POVbrigand (talk) 19:10, 3 January 2012 (UTC)

deleted per Misplaced Pages:No personal attacks TenOfAllTrades(talk) 01:01, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I was actually ready to WP:CONCEDE. But you are right, instead of writing "first reasonable argument" I should have written "first well explained argument". But as you highligted that so much, I would like to take the opportunity to explain something too.

1) IRWolfie started the thread for his deletion of the line "They have continued to publish numerous papers in peer-reviewed journals" including a link to a list of papers by SPAWAR. His reason was that the list is hosted on newenergytimes and therefore not reliable. -> The list of papers is verifiable by looking them up one by one on google scholar. The list of papers is not unreliable just because it is hosted on newenergytimes. The entries on the list are all, one by one, verifiable from RS, see google.scholar.com.

2) IRWolfie then stated that "It is original research to look at a list of papers and claim that there is numerous papers in peer-reviewed journals." That is a different approach, a new argument to back up his deletion. So after WP:RS he brings in WP:OR. (later he also brings in WP:DUE) -> Maybe "numerous" is indeed a wrong quantifier for 23 papers, but not necessarily: In a field where the scientists are struggeling to get funded or have to perform the experiments in the off hours, 23 may be "numerous".

The discussion then changes to specifying the actual count, ie "23" instead of numerous.

3) IRWolfie then writes that: "dieterbritz.dk is a personal website and a seminar presentation is not reliable either". Now I think he is really pushing his point with that. a) dieterbritz.dk is a personal website, but the Dieter Britz collection is known within the field as a reliable list of cold fusion publications. And again, each of the entries in that list is by itself easily verifiable. b) a seminar presentation presented by the scientists themselves is WP:SPS and that is a valid source for claims of the scientists about themselves. In this case they state: "We have published 23 papers in peer reviewed journals"

You see that the 3 comments from IRWolfie are not acceptable for me.

The comments from Enric are the ones I normally listen to very carefully, because they are generally well thought. Enric writes: "So, you want to say "23" instead of "numerous". But, what is the significance of this? Why are we mentioning it? What is the secondary source saying that this is relevant?" -> That was not what I was originally arguing. I wanted to add to the SPAWAR section in the article, the fact that SPAWAR has published more than just 1 peer reviewed paper. The involved scientists at SPAWAR themselves mention in a presentation that they have published 23 papers. It seems reasonable to me to include that

Please excuse me, but after IRWolfie's reasoning in point 1), 2) and 3) I didn't think that his statement: "But we can't conclude anything about the level of work at SPAWAR. 23 papers over 20 years seems very low." had any merit.

Enric brings 3 sources and states that "None of them seems to consider the SPAWAR publication level a notable event.". I don't know if that is a valid point to make based on three tiny pieces of text.

Artifex writes: "Good sources Enric. The "23" papers are all WP:PRIMARY and don't tell us anything about "level of work at SPAWAR". "Any interpretation of primary source material requires a reliable secondary source for that interpretation." -> I really couldn't make anything out of this comment.: Counting the number of papers has nothing to do with WP:PRIMARY. "level of work" was only a part of one of my comments on the talk page. And his last BOLDed piece of policy misses the point.

Artifex continues about a notable event -> WP:NCC is all I can say to that

IRWolfie brings in WP:UNDUE -> after bringing in WP:RS and WP:OR that seems a bit policy shopping to me.

So again, I will WP:CONCEDE, but don't start rubbing in that I don't listen. I do my best to listen to what you are saying, but sifting through many not very carefully picked (IHMO "shot from the hip") arguments is not always easy.

And to conclude your comment with "There may be certain parallels to cold fusion research" is a veiled personal attack. --POVbrigand (talk) 14:56, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

deleted per Misplaced Pages:No personal attacks TenOfAllTrades(talk) 15:24, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

If we were following best practices, the secondary sources from both points of view would be fairly represented in the article. At present, that is not the case. What makes your judgement superior to that of the scores of editorial boards and peer reviewers who have included LENR articles in dozens of unquestionably reputable journals? Or superior to that of the the NASA, Navy, and Army scientists who put their careers on the line to work on a controversial subject they say will have a larger impact than any other energy technology? Do you have some special expertise pertaining to electroweak interactions which allows you to absolutely rule out the hundreds of reports of anomalous effects? Or any evidence that the proponents are lying? Or deluded?

Why are so many people on this issue unable to deal with the uncertainly inherent in the controversy? We have some people trying to deny the controversy even exists while at the same time referring to its two sides, and now these heavy duty personal attacks. What is it about this subject that makes so many editors absolutist, exclusionist, and advocates of bias instead of NPOV adherents? Selery (talk) 18:35, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

WP:NPA. Stop that ! --POVbrigand (talk) 18:33, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

I bring different arguments to different points, it would be a case of Misplaced Pages:Don't stuff beans up your nose if I attempted to antipate every point which is raised. I raised the points in response to arguments put forward as in any normal discussion. IRWolfie- (talk) 16:53, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

presenting a public demonstration as scientific work

"In May 2008 Japanese researcher Yoshiaki Arata (Osaka University) demonstrated a device which produced heat when deuterium gas was introduced into a cell containing a mixture of palladium and zirconium oxide."

• "Physicist Claims First Real Demonstration of Cold Fusion", Physorg.com, 2008-05-27

This was a public demonstration in a press conference convoked by Arata himself. Quote: " claims to have made the first successful demonstration of cold fusion."

It doesn't qualify as not "ongoing scientific work": it was not presented in a scientific conference, no paper was published, no details were provided for replication by other scientists, no examination or testing of device was allowed.

If you have sources explaining Arata's scientific work, then use them to add that to the article. But let's not try to pass a public demonstration as scientific work. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:24, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

That appears to be a demonstration of the device described in this peer reviewed primary source:

@article{Arat2008,
author    = {Y. Arata and Y. Zhang},
title     = {The establishment of solid nuclear fusion reactor},
note      = {In Japanese, Engl. abstr.},
journal   = {J. High Temp. Soc.},
volume    = {34},
year      = {2008},
pages     = {85--96},
keywords  = {Experimental, Pd, gas phase, res+},
published = {02/2008},
annote    = {This time they used a material containing 20\% Pd nano-particles
(10 nm) in a matrix consisting of ZrO2, previously (P.Yama2002) found to
absorb large amounts of hydrogen, and applied highly pure D2 gas. There is a
temperature spike upon onset of the D2 stream, and the abstract says that
there is evidence of a nuclear reaction in the comparatively slow temperature
decline upon full loading. The nuclear reactor thus produced can act both as
a generator of 4He (the fusion product) and heat.}}

I can't find that paper's original English abstract, but there are diagrams and output data in . Selery (talk) 01:40, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

This is probably eonugh to add ongoing work by Arata, + using palladium sheets instead of rods. --Enric Naval (talk) 00:29, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

OK, I can follow that reasoning. The demonstration by Arata is just the most visible results of his work. What I do not agree with is to put the scientific devices (which are not commercial devices) together with the commercial "ready for the market" stuff. I think it is important to keep them apart, because many of the readers might not be able to distiguish between the wild claims and the scientific work.

The Arata experiment was replicated, we must be able to find RS for that.

Great book btw. --POVbrigand (talk) 10:22, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

Suggest a Rewrite of the following from the introduction

At present it reads:

Many scientists tried to replicate the experiment with the few details available, some to prove it wrong, and some because they wanted to be part of this new exciting discovery. Hopes fell with the big number of negative replications, the withdrawal of many positive replications, the discovery of flaws and sources of experimental error in the original experiment, and finally the discovery that Fleischmann and Pons had not actually detected nuclear reaction byproducts.

Would read better as: Many scientists tried to replicate the experiment with the few details available. Hopes fell with a large number of negative results and the withdrawal of many positive replications, the discovery of experimental flaws and sources of experimental error in the original experiment. Finally it was concluded that Fleischmann and Pons had not actually detected nuclear reaction byproducts. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Zedshort (talk • contribs) 15:03, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

It may come as a surprise but the article is not about Pons or Fleischman.84.106.26.81 (talk) 15:46, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

It may come as a surprise but the article is about the work of Pons and Fleischman. From the top of the article: This article is about the Fleischmann–Pons claims of nuclear fusion at room temperature. IRWolfie- (talk) 16:16, 29 December 2011 (UTC)

The second version has "many positive replications", a sheer fabrication. Not acceptable. Binksternet (talk) 00:34, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Are you saying that you think there weren't many positive replications to begin with, or that there weren't many positive replications subsequently withdrawn by their authors? My understanding is that there were at least six of the latter, and dozens of the former to present, counting only peer reviewed sources. (This confusion, perhaps concerning "many," is one of the reasons I have been asking people to {{quantify}} instead of being WP:VAGUE.) Selery (talk) 05:55, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Sources please. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 09:50, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

@Binsternet, you are misreading, you are pulling it out of context. The first (current) version also reads "many positive replications". What is meant is that of the positive replications many were later retracted. Not all, mind you. --POVbrigand (talk) 16:14, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

The key word is "positive". What do you mean by a positive replication? Let's see sources regarding the replications. Binksternet (talk) 17:48, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

See Table 1 on page 8569 of for a list of ten separate laboratories reporting positive results which were not retracted. Is that what you were asking for? Selery (talk) 18:03, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

Binksternet, "positive" as per Browne 1989, Close 1992, Huizenga 1993, Taubes 1993. Read the sources and you'll find that suddenly you know what you are talking about. Or ask Enric. --POVbrigand (talk) 18:43, 30 December 2011 (UTC)

After looking at the Hubler source (look here) I only come up with four sources that might satisfy WP:RS (ref numbers are from table 1 in Hubler)...

Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1016/0022-0728(90)80009-U, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1016/0022-0728(90)80009-U instead. full-text

Arata, Yoshiaki; Zhang, Yue-Chang (1994). "A New Energy caused by "Spillover-Deuterium"". Proceedings of the Japan Academy Ser. B. 70 (7): 106–111.

Attention: This template ({{cite doi}}) is deprecated. To cite the publication identified by doi:10.1016/S0022-0728(97)00634-7, please use {{cite journal}} (if it was published in a bona fide academic journal, otherwise {{cite report}} with |doi=10.1016/S0022-0728(97)00634-7 instead. full-text

Oriani, R.A.; Nelson, J.C.; Lee, S.K.; Broadhurst, J.H. (1990). "Calorimetric measurements of excess power output during the cathodic charging of deuterium into palladium". Fusion Technology. 18 (4): 652–658. full-text

Even ignoring that they are all primary sources (including Hubler); They don't support "many positive replications". —ArtifexMayhem (talk) 09:23, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Why do you think Hubler is a primary source? It's a secondary review. Note that there is no requirement that primary sources cited by a peer reviewed secondary source need to be themselves peer reviewed in order for the secondary source to be considered reliable. It does indeed support the fact that there are many successful replications which have not been retracted. Selery (talk) 14:32, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

we are not talking about "many positive replications", we are talking about "many of the positive replication were retracted" --POVbrigand (talk) 09:47, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

ArtifexMayhem clearly wants the peer reviewed sources which haven't been retracted. All of those are necessarily going to be primary. (Hubler 2007 is a secondary review source.) The Britz bibliography is best for those. I'm not sure what Binksternet wants but given that there are "many" which have persisted for 20 years, I don't think anyone should care about the early retractions given that Hubler explains why they happen. Since there are more than 1,000 sources in the Britz bibliography I suppose the best way would be to go backwards by year and look for retrospectives. There are probably better bibliographies for this on Krivit's or Rothwell's site. I'll look. Selery (talk) 11:48, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

How about this Biberian 2007 peer reviewed secondary update? It's easily accessible at just 12 pages and 16 references, with this conclusion: "After 15 years of intense work by hundreds of scientists in 15 countries, the proof that nuclear reactions not predicted by current theories occur in solids, during electrolysis, gas loading and gas discharge, has been established. This presentation is an overview of the field that gives convincing experimental data proving excess heat and helium production, tritium and neutron detection, X-rays and transmutation." Selery (talk) 14:10, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

A secondary source would be much more helpful. Hubler and Biberian are really weak as "review" articles. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 14:58, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Neither of them report original results. They both summarize other primary sources. If you say what it is that you see as their weaknesses, I may be able to find something more suitable. Selery (talk) 16:07, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Neither of them do much of anything except cite a bunch of non-published/self-published/non-peer reviewed and conclude the "...occasionally experienced significant events..." add up to "proof". In nine pages (with a rather large font) Biberian concludes "This presentation is an overview of the field that gives convincing experimental data proving excess heat and helium production, tritium and neutron detection, X-rays and transmutation." Really? Neither are cited and Hubler is published in Surface and Coatings Technology "he principal forum for the interchange of information on the science, technology and applications of thin films, coatings and surface treatments." Er....WP:REDFLAG. Calling it a "review" does not make it so. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 17:46, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

The Biberian paper is an update, briefly summarizing 15 years of work in as many countries by hundreds of researchers, as it says. The Hubler review is limited, as it states, to investigating replication success criteria. Neither are a complete review of the field's peer reviewed literature which exceeds 1,000 primary sources at present. However, both of them meet the WP:SECONDARY criteria because they summarize other research instead of reporting original work. Are there any such criteria you believe they do not meet? Furthermore, you contradict yourself because above you indicated you believe at least four of the ten sources in Hubler's Table 1 meet the reliable source criteria for primary sources on their own. What do you mean by "neither are cited"? Are you familiar with thin film physics, to which much if not most surface science applies? Selery (talk) 19:59, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

They barely meet WP:RS and even then they are only good for "in-universe" claims. Neither of the papers have been cited more than once or twice by other researchers in relevant fields. As for Hubler's table I said might as in "depending on what we use them for". Regardless, WP:SECONDARY is not a binary that gets flipped "because they summarize other research" (or claim to). Also...the "field's peer reviewed literature" has an extremely limited place on Misplaced Pages. Extremely limited. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 21:05, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Why do you say they haven't been cited more than twice? You should probably check with Google Scholar before you make up citation counts. You're off by at least 100% or 400% in one case and at least 120% or 500% in the other. Selery (talk) 22:11, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Because they haven't been and go easy on the making stuff up accusations.

Gs gives Biberian 5 of which one is a dup and two are not germane or micheal.

• Boson induced nuclear fusion in crystalline solids
• Loss-mechanism and favourable deuteron concentrations of boson induced nuclear fusion
• PHY 320: Modern Physics Fall 2008
• Towards a Critical Philosophy of Science: Continental Beginnings and Bugbears, Whigs, and Waterbears

—ArtifexMayhem (talk) 22:56, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Biberian's 2007 secondary source is also misrepresented by the article

If statements in individual sources require that the introduction says cold fusion researchers are "a small community" and that "mainstream scientists" perceive the field as the remains of controversy, without specific quantification or any of the abundant opposing points of view, then why aren't we required to report the conclusions of Biberian 2007 which says, "proof that nuclear reactions not predicted by current theories occur ... has been established"? Selery (talk) 14:17, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Primarily WP:UNDUE. The "proof" has no support in mainstream sources. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 21:44, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Which aspects of the evidence of nuclear reactions do you think don't appear in mainstream sources? Evidence of excess heat, helium, tritium, neutrons, transmutations, and x-rays all occur in established peer reviewed journals. Excluding the statement biases the article violating WP:NPOV. Selery (talk) 22:04, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

A giant stack of "evidence" does not make a case and a high number of miscellaneous sources claiming excess heat, helium, tritium, neutrons, et al. is no different.

Getting "proof that nuclear reactions not predicted by current theories occur ... has been established" or the like into this article requires more than Biberian and Hubler. Much more. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 22:30, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Artifex: "..The "proof" has no support in mainstream sources.". The problem with a fringe article is that you won't find many explanations in mainstream scientific sources to support the fringe side. That why it is fringe ! WP policy does not prohibit representing the fringe side in an article about a fringe topic. We can write, by careful attribution, that the scientists within the fringe field claim that the effect has been reproduced many times and that many peer reviewed papers describe such experiments. As verification we have a peer reviewed paper in a non-fringe peer reviewed journal Int. J. Nuclear Energy Science and Technology. --POVbrigand (talk) 09:03, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Cold fusion is hardly a "fringe topic" in need of special pleading. The claim made in the OP's opening statement needs more than an attribution for inclusion. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 09:54, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

The article already says that nuclear reactions not predicted by current theories occur, according to multiple reliable sources. Other sources disagree, but the idea is already in the article, as the central point on one side of the controversy. 67.6.132.34 (talk) 10:06, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

That what I like about pathological science. One side thinks there is a controversy. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 11:20, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

One side of what? 67.6.132.34 (talk) 13:44, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Exactly. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 16:21, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Seriously, you are saying there are two conflicting sides but no controversy? Reliable sources on both sides explicitly refer to the controversy. 67.6.146.20 (talk) 23:34, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Artifex, haven't you read any of the sources ? We are talking about the controversy that Michael J. Schaffer mentions in . I bet there are many mainstream scientists that talk about "cold fusion" as a controversy. Maybe you should just read some sources first. --POVbrigand (talk) 21:20, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

In the same sense as Creation–evolution controversy; not controversial in the sense there is any real debate in the scientific community about it anymore. IRWolfie- (talk) 00:35, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Creationists don't regularly get published in reputable academic journals or university publishing houses. Nor do they have dozens of government scientist advocates. There are no reliable sources which agree with this absurd characterization. Selery (talk) 00:45, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

There are a similar number of scientists who believe in creationism. i.e 700 signed a petition in favour of creationism. There is no controversy in the scientific community on cold fusion. Dozens of scientists, even if true, is a pitifully small amount. IRWolfie- (talk) 17:01, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

There are dozens of peer reviewed sources which refer to the controversy as real and as yet unresolved. Are there any reliable sources which agree with your opinion that there is actually no controversy? Selery (talk) 02:23, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

giving deuterium loading as a definitive proved reason for non-replicability

Proponents claim that high-loading of deuteurium is the reason that the cells didn't work back in 1989. However, reliable replicability is still unachieved, and there is still no accepted theory that can explain how the high-loading affects the experiment. Our article should give high-loading as the proposed explanation, not as the explanation. --Enric Naval (talk) 18:41, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Are there any alternative explanations? I have no problem calling it proposed, as long as we include alternative explanations if there are any. All viable theories must require high loading -- and all of the contending theories do -- because no anomalous effects are seen at low loading and all anomalous effects are observed at high loading. Selery (talk) 20:04, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

What sources are you using for "All viable theories..." and "contending theories"? ArtifexMayhem (talk) 20:24, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

By "all viable theories" I mean any theory which purports to fit the published observations. For "contending theories" I am relying on multiple sources, meaning all that I have read about thus far, but for an informal overview one of the NASA slide decks had the most complete set I have yet seen; in particular, page 14 of this one and from page 10 on these. I understand that those do not meet the reliable source criteria, but I am not proposing to add my reply to Enric to the article. Selery (talk) 20:38, 31 December 2011 (UTC)

Our article should not give an explanation, because there is no mainstream accepted explanation. Our article should mention that scientists offer the high loading issue as one of the reasons why so many experiments failed to produce the effect. An other issue that is offered, would be the cathode material which only sometimes produces the effect. Scientists offer explanations that it is a surface effect and lattice defects play a role and that yet unknown "conditioning" can influence (make or break) the experiment. It appears that ENEA is able to produce "good working" cathode material, which still doesn't mean the effect happens each and every time, even when the loading is over 95%. --POVbrigand (talk) 08:51, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Our article should not mention claims based entirely on primary sources. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 16:34, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Wrong: read WP:Primary. And if you would read my comment carefully you would see that I am agreeing with Enric. So what are you complaining about ? --POVbrigand (talk) 17:14, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

1)Ok, read it. Your point? 2)Nothing you would agree with so I won't bother. ArtifexMayhem (talk) 18:37, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Misplaced Pages policy: Do not base articles and material entirely on primary sources. IRWolfie- (talk) 19:00, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I agree with Enric. What is your problem ? --POVbrigand (talk) 19:08, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

I have no issue, I am merely highlighting something which is important for future contributions to the article. IRWolfie- (talk) 19:13, 2 January 2012 (UTC)

Scientific American "Ask the Experts" October 1999

This column is neither peer reviewed nor secondary, and is therefore not a reliable source. It is merely a collection of the brief personal opinions from a variety of researchers, none of whom have any apparent familiarity with the subject. Unreviewed personal opinions are less reliable than news stories. But this source ("Schaffer 1999", "Schaffer and Morrison 1999" etc.) is used no less than twenty times in the article to support absolutist statements contradicted by reliable sources, such as, "there are no theoretical explanations for how such elemental transmutations could occur, and the provided evidence is not strong enough to overthrow standard nuclear physics." Are there any reasons that this source and the statements attributed to it should not be removed from the article? Selery (talk) 18:48, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Selery, the article was published by Scientific American. It can be used. I think Michael J. Schaffer's comments are very good also to present the "other side", ie he talks about Tadahiko Mizuno and George Miley. I don't know where "there are no theoretical explanations for how such elemental transmutations could occur, and the provided evidence is not strong enough to overthrow standard nuclear physics." comes from, maybe the source is this: "Production of such heavy nuclei is so unexpected from our present understanding of low-energy nuclear reactions, that extraordinary experimental proof will be needed to convince the scientific community.", maybe it is this: "Even so, given the extraordinary nature of the claimed cold fusion results, it will take extraordinarily high quality, conclusive data to convince most scientists, unless a compelling theoretical explanation is found first." But both are a completely different wording.

I have no problem with the source per se. Maybe the attribution can be improved. --POVbrigand (talk) 21:47, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Publication in SciAm does not constitute the article being a wp:RS, though it is certainly wp:V. No source published that long ago should be used to support "There is no..." statements. At most they could support "As of 1999, there was no..." However, this discussion seems to have been of questionable value even at the time. I certainly was not a review of peer-reviewed literature. If some of the assertions made solely on the strength of that source are in doubt, I'd suggest tagging them with {{dubious}} to focus discussion on those specific assertions.LeadSongDog come howl! 22:06, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Agreed, I'll go through them all and tag the dubious uses. Selery (talk) 22:36, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Dubious

Only eight of the twenty uses of that Sci Am Schaffer et al 1999 source could be considered to bias the article or be otherwise controversial. I tagged those eight with {{dubious}} per the suggestion above, but that tag wants a "Dubious" section here on talk, hence this subsection. If anyone has any objections to the removal of the eight disputed statements, please find a better source for them in a week or so, because I intend to remove them unless they are sourced to reliable secondary peer reviewed publications. Selery (talk) 14:15, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

It may take more than a week to sort that out, but there's wp:NODEADLINE. I'm also troubled by the statements which are referenced to refs 7, 47, 135, 137, etc. These references each cite multiple sources, making it unnecessarily obscure which source is being cited to support of the statement. LeadSongDog come howl! 20:16, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

Fair enough; I'll move the text here on the talk page in a few days so those who wish can scrutinize the details. Selery (talk) 02:25, 7 January 2012 (UTC)

NASA mention in intro

This deletion of NASA from the intro has the edit summary, "NASA funding not supported by source." I propose to restore the deleted text, with references from this secondary book chapter: , these primary NASA Technical Memoranda: and , these primary NASA website sources: , , and , these primary slide presentation sources: , , , and , this patent application: , and these secondary news sources: and . Selery (talk) 21:16, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Enric came up with the "funding" wording . But Enric is not to "blame", because NASA was added in later, possibly by me by Selery . Now Artifex deletes the mentioning of NASA because "funding not supported by source". Artifex may be right about the "funding" wording, but research has been going on at NASA. So we just have to work on a wording that is in line with the sources and then we put NASA back in. --POVbrigand (talk) 21:59, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

"Performing"? Selery (talk) 22:33, 4 January 2012 (UTC)

Similarly with the Navy

Diff deleting Navy SPAWAR from the intro. Anyone with a passing familiarity with the subject understands that the Navy has been working on LENR continuously since 1989, publishing in peer reviewed journals, never wavering in their claims of positive research results, and never the subject of any substantial controversy -- indeed garnering praise from detractors of other LENR work as explained e.g. in the first two minutes of . Is there any reason to hide these facts other than blatant POV pushing? Selery (talk) 07:04, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Proposal: "At (some/several/a few) institutions (some) research is taking place, such as the Italian ENEA, the U.S. Navy SPAWAR, and NASA." --POVbrigand (talk) 07:36, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

How about "LENR research has been performed at the US Navy SPAWAR from 1989 to the present, at ENEA in Italy from ____ to the present, at NASA in 1989, 1996, and 2009 to the present, and at the US Army from 2009 to the present" ? Selery (talk) 14:24, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

I tried to separate the closed research programs from the affiliated scientists. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:25, 5 January 2012 (UTC)

Thanks for the edit . I think that it is not completely correct, in Japan and ENEA research is still ongoing. The japanese "New Hydrogen Energy" project was stopped, but other research efforts continues. For ENEA I cannot find RS that research is discontinued, afaik De Ninno and her coleagues are still at it. It is also clear that at NASA some research is being done, see the two russian RS that I have provided. --POVbrigand (talk) 08:36, 6 January 2012 (UTC)

1. List of SPAWAR refereed papers on LENR up to July 2010
2. "Physicist Claims First Real Demonstration of Cold Fusion", Physorg.com, 2008-05-27
3. Cite error: The named reference ENEAbook was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
4. "Effetto Fleischmann e Pons: il punto della situazione", Energia Ambiente e Innovazione (in Italian) (3), ENEA, May–June 2011{{citation}}: CS1 maint: date format (link)
5. Cite error: The named reference NASAGRC2011 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

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