Quote:
Originally Posted by Sparkle
For a more recent example of research dismissed by scientists as not fitting in with the "scientific expectations of the era", consider the example of cold fusion.
Remember cold fusion? Gained notoriety in 1989 when brought to the worlds attention by two of the world's leading electrochemists Martin Fleishchmann and Stanely Pons. Later found to be unproven.
Ridiculed and jeered at by science folk ever since. Snake oil, touch it and your career in science might just be over.
Remember?
Well, have a read here
The E-Cat is Andrea Rossi's cold fusion reactor. Andrea has a rather dubious past, but his work has attracted a lot of interest, though not from mainstream science.
Research has continued into cold fusion, and some physicists are saying its a genuine phenomenon, just one that's still not understood. If true its the scientific breakthrough of the century. What is being claimed, is that nickel catalyst is being transmuted into copper, through an unknown nuclear process (involving H+ protons) resulting in the release of megawatts of heat, and causing the formation of copper inside the reactor (allegedly).
If this turns out to be true, then this will be quite an embarrassment for the established scientific "method", but an exciting breakthrough nonetheless.
---------- Post added at 14:45 ---------- Previous post was at 14:36 ----------
Just having a read, it now seems that Andrea Rossi has recently sold the intellectual property rights to a US energy firm.
http://www.anthropower.com/nuclear-news-5
I wonder if they'll actually develop it or just sit on it? |
The guy's secrecy is the rub. A single non-peer-reviewed paper, refusal to allow independent 3rd party testing beyond this, and then results from a test where he allowed the end products to be analysed
which were dubious to say the least.
Notable that in the academic paper published the end products were
not analysed. Wonder why.
EDIT: Another link -
http://arxiv.org/vc/arxiv/papers/1306/1306.6364v1.pdf Noteworthy that this 'third party testing' was done under conditions carefully controlled by Rossi and some of these 'third parties' were involved with the project before this, hence not independent.
I'd say the fact the scientific concensus is against this is an indication of how robust the scientific method is. Until this guy starts playing by the rules, allowing proper independent testing and appropriate review which complies with frankly basic scientific standards he'll continue to be reviewed with suspicion. Fantastic claims require a fantastically high standard of evidence and what has been presented so far hasn't come close.