WB-8 article

Point out news stories, on the net or in mainstream media, related to polywell fusion.

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Kahuna
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Location: CA

Post by Kahuna »

If Rick can't talk because of contractual restrictions, what makes you think he will talk at a retirement party?

rjaypeters
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Post by rjaypeters »

I am so glad you asked! See, you (hypothetically) fly into Chicago? Urbana-Champlain? and drive to a local modeling agency and hire two beautiful, intelligent women to accompany you to the party. All these women need to do is listen attentively to the Drs. while the Pessimist, Moderate and Optimist ask respectful questions.

Whatever the Drs. say, the ladies respond appreciatively. It would be better if the women were primed with questions and knew some physics, but that's probably not necessary...See, everybody wins! The Drs. enjoy the attention of attractive women, the Three learn, maybe, what we want to know and the ladies earn some guilt-free cash.

'Course, we'd not dare publish the results of these conversations because the Drs. would probably get in a lot of trouble and we don't want that!

Did I mention the alcohol?

Now, it's going to take a little money...
"Aqaba! By Land!" T. E. Lawrence

R. Peters

Tom Ligon
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Post by Tom Ligon »

The mention of "what mean 'we', paleface?" made me smile.

Back when I started with the project, Dr. Bussard once jokingly told me that as soon as he had a demo machine running DD at "demonstrated breakeven" on diluted fuel, he wanted to take it out in the middle of the desert on an indian reservation and light it off with pure deuterium. He said he would cut the indians (friends of his) in on the deal in exchange for leaving a radioactive memorial on their land. He figured they'd be the richest indians around.

For transport, he said he intended to use my pickup truck, which he figured was expendable. I hoped I would get a new one out of the deal, but that was unspecified.

Anyway, this suggests the indians might know, and us palefaces would still be in the dark.

Rick, if you are monitoring, I still have the pickup truck. Let me know.

mvanwink5
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Post by mvanwink5 »

ladajo wrote:Ahh, true, but it should give a percentage completion. And given the project is complete for "April" according to the contract, the Jan-Mar update should reflect that they are on schedule or not, as required by recovery act reporting requirements. Note, that previous reports stated on schedule, until the latest. Which dropped this, but did say plasma in November.
Looking the timelines inferred in the contract, as well as testing timelines from WB6 and 7, it would seem that they should have had plasma before November.
Anytime a factor of 10 change in anything is made big surprises should be expected. An example of a surprise would be that precision alignment in the ion or electron guns requires significant engineering and fabrication changes.

First plasma, in my mind, must be a milestone that would include everything including diagnostics, computer control, hardware, coil cooling systems are complete and debugged. Significant, but would not imply having started tackling the possible 10x surprises. April update will be very interesting in that it might give us a window to the lay of the land. Just thinking...
Counting the days to commercial fusion. It is not that long now.

KitemanSA
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Post by KitemanSA »

chrismb wrote: Public results for Polywell, if you please, else the whole calamitous nonsense is, in my eyes, proven to be a big fat dud.
How can a lack of evidence "prove" anything? Rediculous!

If you must send a "pessimist" Try Dr. C. At least he was honest about his reasoning.

chrismb
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Post by chrismb »

KitemanSA wrote:
chrismb wrote: Public results for Polywell, if you please, else the whole calamitous nonsense is, in my eyes, proven to be a big fat dud.
Note the criterion I stated; 'in my eyes'. My opinion is my own.

chrismb
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Post by chrismb »

Let's just look up M-W definition;
Definition of PROVE
transitive verb
1 archaic : to learn or find out by experience
2 a : to test the truth, validity, or genuineness of <the exception proves the rule> <prove a will at probate> b : to test the worth or quality of; specifically : to compare against a standard —sometimes used with up or out c : to check the correctness of (as an arithmetic result)
3 a : to establish the existence, truth, or validity of (as by evidence or logic) <prove a theorem> <the charges were never proved in court> b : to demonstrate as having a particular quality or worth <the vaccine has been proven effective after years of tests> <proved herself a great actress>
4: to show (oneself) to be worthy or capable <eager to prove myself in the new job>
1: No experience. Nothing to learn. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
2a: "test truth and validity". My view is that 'we'll know in N months'. That won't have been the truth, if so. Ambiguity ("we'll know, but you won't") is not veracious enough to qualify as 'truth'. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
2b: "to compare against a standard". Nothing to compare, if no results. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
2c: "to check correctness". If no results, nothing to check. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
3a: "to establish the existence of"... don't start me off..
etc.
etc.

I'm getting bored with this. 30 years and at least $30 million of publically funded research, and here we are being lead up a path where we bicker about what 'proven' means because squat has been forthcoming due to a dubious claim of 'commercial interest'.

rjaypeters
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Post by rjaypeters »

Easy, gentles! I am joking about this whole thing (?) and was boldly nominating chrismb for The Pessimist after I asked everyone to nominate themselves.

In slightly more seriousness, anyone who talks with Dr. Nebel, at a party, no less, probably has a snowball's chance in you-know-where to learn anything of interest to us, but we can dream, right?

I nominate myself as The Moderate.
"Aqaba! By Land!" T. E. Lawrence

R. Peters

Maui
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Location: Madison, WI

Post by Maui »

Professor Science wrote:
Giorgio wrote:Well, see the bright side of it... at least you didn't waste your time while waiting ;)
pssh, like i was gonna do anything else with the time, a physics degree is practically a license to print money. I can take things as lazy as I want since I'm pretty much guaranteed a job as something. Course I'm going to try getting into the University of Iowa's grad school program first, nab a PhD in plasma physics. Might make a focus of doing diagnostics on dense plasma foci, or IEC reactors.
Hawkeye's rock.

My dad's a research scientist there; he's works with the space probe instruments for measuring plasma waves from the planets. Don't know if this is enough a connection to help you in any way... but if you claim to be a Hawkeye fan, it couldn't hurt. I actually didn't know they did anything with IEC reactors there... do they?

You can email me at snkurth [a_t] yahoo if you want to discuss.

KitemanSA
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Post by KitemanSA »

Just as a starting point, my comments have been related to the lack of proof that "IT", i.e., Polywell, is a dud.
chrismb wrote: Let's just look up M-W definition;
1: No experience. Nothing to learn. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
That is the point. You have not proven it to be a dud because you have NO experience that it is a dud. You have no data, thus no proof.
chrismb wrote: 2a: "test truth and validity". My view is that 'we'll know in N months'. That won't have been the truth, if so. Ambiguity ("we'll know, but you won't") is not veracious enough to qualify as 'truth'. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
I repeat "what mean WE, paleface?" We have lots of experience that YOU don't have truth or veracity, so maybe YOUR desires have been proven a dud, but the jury is still out on EMC2 and Polywell.
chrismb wrote: 2b: "to compare against a standard". Nothing to compare, if no results. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
2c: "to check correctness". If no results, nothing to check. So it'll be proven to be a dud.
Since you have no data to compare to a dud (like ITER?), you hve no proof that it is.
chrismb wrote: 3a: "to establish the existence of"... don't start me off..
Show me the existance of a dud! Demonstrate to me that it IS a dud. No proof, dude (or is that dud?)
chrismb wrote: I'm getting bored with this. 30 years and at least $30 million of publically funded research, and here we are being lead up a path where we bicker about what 'proven' means because squat has been forthcoming due to a dubious claim of 'commercial interest'.
Now we are geting somewhere. As a public results research project, this may in fact be a dud. But no one ever said this would be a "public results" research project.
It is easy to build and condemn a straw-man, but not very useful.

dch24
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Post by dch24 »

Can we tone down the shrillness of the conversation, chrismb?

KitemanSA
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Post by KitemanSA »

Me too. Sorry. :oops:

Giorgio
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Location: China, Italy

Post by Giorgio »

KitemanSA wrote:Me too. Sorry. :oops:
So, I am not the only one who over reacts from time to time ;)

Ivy Matt
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Joined: Sat May 01, 2010 6:43 am

Post by Ivy Matt »

I have a hard time believing those who enter into the fusion field aren't at least as disappointed as the rest of us when they reach the end of their careers and net power from fusion is still beyond the horizon. Sometimes I'm glad I'm not in that field. Other times I wish I was right in the middle of it. Either way, I'm glad I haven't been waiting around for a fusion reactor since 1951. I'd probably have long since turned a pessimist.

Betruger
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Post by Betruger »

Bussard didn't seem that pessimistic even at the end.

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