Sometimes faith in something comes before belief. Other times belief comes before faith. If you have not already thoroughly researched the cold fusion technology controversy, you might try an experiment out on yourself to see whether you see faith or belief, or something else is arising in your own psyche when someone on the Internet tries to convince you of something that is basically unbelievable, or miraculous whether or not you are a scientist. See New Scientist story.
If what you see below is true, it may have enormous implications for the future of the planet we live on, and may result in amazing savings. The alternative research work reaps many hundreds of millions of dollars. After you see the video, it would be interesting to know whether you would have faith in the future of such revolutionary technology. Is there something holding you back from being convinced. Do you think that more money should be given to cold fusion.
They say that belief comes with seeing something with your own eyes. The question arises whether you will believe that cold fusion is a potential energy source if you see it through a video or images on the Internet. Jean-Louis Naudin, a bilingual french speaking scientist has an uncanny way of making you think more deeply about specific technological projects. If you wish to see cold fusion energy being produced then view the French nuclear lab experiments and wonder why the French have more faith. See French and other nuclear labs that have tested for cold fusion reactions and seem to have have been successful. Favourable results were even obtained by a high school student, see.
When a US Government panel from its Department of Energy investigated the cold fusion research, it had very interesting results to report, see what the DOE panel thought. Afraid of being associated with a low prestige or the much maligned name of cold fusion research after strong criticism from MIT, Harwell, and CalTec some researchers sought to rename their area of research.
Probably what surprised everyone was the haste with which these authoritative institutions pounced on the Pons - Fleischman work, suggesting that they were not able to reproduce the same results. To some it appeared that they had not tried hard enough given the potential winnings for the world community.
The American Press was very interested in the possibilities, but the DOE was not so forthcoming. In a later review of the discovery, in 1984, it did little as to publicize the review discussions and the event it had staged. After all, some the best and authoritative names in energy physics were to take part in the process of reexamining 'alchemy' as a possible future science.
Does this seem possible to you!? In all fairness, its something any brilliant scientist might reasonably risk given the potential rewards for everyone. Can one imagine an Einstein turning down participation in such an event. A gutsy scientist with tenure might be expected to present perhaps a theory or two as to what was actually happening, i.e. beyond straight forward disbelief, for the potentials beyond imaginings were there. However, the judgment coming from these quarters was highly negative when some glimmer of understanding about what was occuring might have been expected to have evolved by this stage! Was the idea of cold fusion so off the wall. Yes! It seems so. The story is complicated because people do not behave the way they are expected to, see.
The problem is that all scientists were getting hung up on the difference between what is normally called basic research and development research. In the case of cold fusion, the whole subject matter was new, threatening to established thinking, revolutionary, extremely promising and highly risky at the same time. Now normally in science and knowledge creation, there is a good case for governments, such as those of the OECD group under the Directorate of Science and Technology to encourage and to sponsor 'basic research' so that private and public interests from many schools and universities of different countries could then provide development research when promising avenues of research arise.
The results of Pons and Fleischman are so close to applied and development research that there is almost no basic or theoretical research presently available. Moreover, there is a taboo on nuclear research against 'risky' information that could widen the world of nuclear science to the peoples in areas of the world where it is considered dangerous because of potential military applications. The phenomenon of cold fusion is such an easily reproduced and basic result that can be conducted in some high school laboratory. Its simplicity has produced a wave of disbelief and a staggering response enormous confusion and misunderstanding throughout the scientific and technological communities world wide.
The potential rewards to discovery of such a technology would make it the most valuable technology ever discovered any time. It could literally transform earth. An estimate puts the amount of water available for such reactions on earth could produce enough energy for future generations to travel across all the known and observable galaxies.
Energy from small amounts of water on this scale is staggering, so why on earth would anyone want to put a stop to such basic research work unless they were thinking mainly of themselves. Sure the discovery of a cold fusion technology that could be scaled up sounds like winning the lottery, but that is what people try to do each day. Ask the public and this writer suggests that a majority would feel that the risks are worth taking. Now as to hot fusion, that research work could also be undertaken and continue along its present path. Perhaps there may be synergies found between the two approaches. We can only hope so!
On one side, those who potentially would lose valuable contracts if cold fusion gained respectability have almost unanimous lined up against the very notion of cold fusion. But, there have been cracks emerging from such quarters, as more and more evidence continues to stream forward that perhaps the chemists have a role to play in nuclear reactions and perhaps a joining of effort between advanced chemistry and advanced physics is needed if the world is ever able to move beyond its obvious present ignorance. It is probably fair to say that cold fusion seems much like alchemy and that is something science has long sought to progress beyond. We must all wonder why such a phenomenon has been hidden within the world of chemical reactions.
When we examine the history of science and technology, we see that discoveries are often made under the strangest of conditions. It stretches my belief that Pons and Fleischman intended to deceive the public or scientific communities, or had serious failings in their work. Rather they are to be highly congratulated for their sharing of their discovery with us. I, for one, am very grateful that they did. It took guts! I am reminded about the English author James Burke whose presentation efforts and books to show connections between technologies are so noteworthy.
If you are curious about the actual results of simple experiments then See data result for cold fusion reproduction. Having viewed the video, do you think that the scientific method for the Ponds and Fleischman experiments have been observed, or do you think that MIT is correct in thinking the experiment was too flawed and possibly embarassing to serious science.