I think we should it's small group and an
informal group. Before I introduced him let me just say
a techinal comment. After the lecture We're going to have reception for
Mr. Tauber and everybody in the audience is
invited to stay and have some cookies and
coffee or punch. So please stay and visit with
Mr. Taubes when he's finshed with his lecture and with each other. Okay now
our speaker today is Gary Taubes, a science
writer from New York he has a degree from
Harvard in Physics, a degree from Stanford in
engineering, and a degree from Columbia in journalism.
So scientific background is broad and
deep and he's the author of magazines such
as the Atlantic and Discover magazine and
also in scholarly Journal such as Science
magazine. He's the author of a book called Nobel Dreams which was
published in 1987 and this is about the 1985
Nobel Prize which was awarded to Carlo rubia
and Simon Van Der Meer for the discovery of
the wnc particles. I'm sure that all Nobel
prizes are a big deal, especially to the recipients,  but this was one of
the more brilliant of the Nobel Prize is because
the wnc's are critical particles in the electroweak
theory and electro electric what we consider
to be sophisticated modern theory of the structure
of the universe so this was a very important
Nobel Prize and this is a story. So so this
was an important and it was interesting also
because it was one of the first of the really large collaborations. So what Mr.
Taubes did in his first book,
Nobel dreams, was to actually go and live
inside this collaboration and find out how
very large, modern, big science experiments
are done. So there's a tremendous amount of Sociology of
Science in this book and it's extremely entertaining
as well as a very fine discussion of the physics
involved.
Now in his second book that we're going to hear about tonight,which I have not yet read, is called
Bad Science: the Short life and Weird Times of Cold Fusion. And as i said to
him earlier, your first book is really
a triumphal book. So I will let him tell us
how he feels about his second book. Mr. Taubes [Applause].
That's about the most technical this nights gonna get.[pause] This is what my lecture used to be called. Back before
I gave it to an audience, including my family,
and they fell asleep. I just put it up because
I'm a journalist and I write about science and sometimes scientists have trouble dealing with this.
And I gave a lecture at the Gordon conference. Which a very exclusive conference held
in New Hampshire every year.  They don't even allow journalists in
let alone have them lecture. And so when I
put up this as a topic they listen to the dilution of cold fusion.
[inaudible] [laughter]
Another forgetting notice, in order to do
my book. I wrote this book, it took me 3 years,
I thought it would take me 9 months, just like underestimation. In the process of
doing this I interviewed 260 some scientists. and now I lecture on it and wherever I
go I meet physicist who want to tell me what
really happened. Because they're sure they
know and I don't, so I also put up a list
of the people I interviewed so you get an
idea would like 260 people look like. [laughter] and then
I tell these guys I know a thing or 2. No to refresh your memory
cold fusion, that's the remaining of [inaudible] This is the Wall Street Journal article
of March 24th 1989, front page. Two scientists claim
breakthrough in quest for fusion energy. These two
fellows at the University of Utah, Stan Ponds
and Martin Fleischmann, claimed that they can essentially take the power
of a hydrogen bomb nuclear fusion and control
it and do it with batteries in plating wire
in a glass of water, okay. this is a a picture
of a cold fusion reactor ala Stan Ponds
and Martin Fleischmann. This was actually drawn
by them and it looks very impressive and they made it look very impressive. 
Basically it is a glass filled with heavy
water, which is a kind of water. and it's got
a couple of electrodes in it. This wire they
crisscross is an electrode this things comes down the electrode, they plug it
into the wall. So essentially what you got is a glass of water plugged into the wall with two electrodes in it.
They claim you can get nuclear fusion out of this.Now, three years later,
what I'm gonna explain to you, basically, what happened with nuclear fusion to understand just a
little bit about the weirdness of it.
Last October there was the third International
Conference on cold fusion, held in Japan. This is a summary
of the conference and basically you can get the hint
from the last chapter since. In the last paragraph it says cold fusion will be come the most important subjects in science.
and it not a matter to be studied by one single enterprise or nation, but will become the greatest asset as
an eventual energy for mankind that will be shared among the world
It sounds very impressive. This is a list of the countries that
participated in the 3rd international conference on cold fusion. The number of people, and there were 300
scientists and business people there, and cold fusion is still a very viable science. People are doing it their lobbying
congress for funding. The Canadians recently did a CVC television show about how real cold fusion is.
And the amusing thing about it is that of cold fusion as a phenomenon is non existent,
okay. That's how I'm gonna explain it to you, there's no such thing as cold fusion
never has been never will be. So how did these people discover it? It was on front pages of newsapapers
and now people are still doing it. And now all 300 of those people would say I'm crazy.
Including the fellow who drew up this diagram. This is a primer on fusion.
Two kinds of nuclear energy that we are aware of. Nuclear efficient
when you take a huge Adam like uranium and it splits apart into two equally, almost, two very radioactive elements and they give off energy.
In the process you have nuclear fission. 
Nuclear fusion you take two small, very small,
atoms, protons in hydrogen atoms witch are
one proton, or deuteron, to the heavy form
of hydrogen which is a proton and a neutron
and you fuse them together and in the process
you get more energy out. Um Einstein took mc squared energy to the speed of light squared which is not as heavy as the original product [inaudible].
This is like the basic primer of nuclear fusion. It takes place in
it takes place under extraordinary BE power and the reason being. Hold on these are my
favorite charts. Force is at work and infusion acts
you start off with the Deuteron, 1 proton
and one Neutron. they're both positive charge
that repel each other by electromagnetism
and they attract each other by the strong
force is strong but it's very very short range
so you've got these two things from far apart
are repelling each other and don't want to
get together and clothes together. If they close
enough the strong force will take over and pull them together in the fuse so what happens
in the sun if you got extraordinary decompression
these things are zinging around when they
smash into each other there's enough energy
there to push him close enough in strong force and fuse them
together. so how close they have to get to fuse? And the answer is the answer is .0001 nano-meters.
A nano meter is a billionth of a meter. So they have get .0001 billionth of a meter
together to fuse. How close it this? The answer is very close. Deterrent gas which is D2 or 2 of these deuterons
locked together. They're separated by a distance of 2.074
nanometers would you can see 740 * this distance.
Playdium lattice ala cold fusion, I forgot to explain cold fusion because I'm operating on a full stomach. How this thing worked. We're back to cold fusion. that water
you got to bladium electrode and a platinum electrode they put a current hit in the heavy
water is made of deuterium and hydrogen is
breaks up and then determine is sucked into the palladium lattice
attitude with such extraordinary approximately
0.3 atoms. Which is 4 times greater than the separation between
gas, and 30000 times greater than the separation of fusion
we're saying by the way is basic nuclear physics
very well-established okay so How likely is
Fusion occur under the circumstances 4 - 64
fusions per second per molecule this was a
calculation of my fellow account hacked if
you just expect these things to fuse spontaneous
closer together it's number 10 entirely out
of Return of gas it would be okay so how does
this explain contemplations results explained
that they were getting noticed nuclear energy
out of these cells regenerate should I give
you in the short course physics is the fact
that with pond supplies for claiming was 54
orders of magnitude greater than Fillmore
choosing fax how big is 54 magnitude not on
the reception decillion but under numbers
okay the difference between the diameter of
a proton that they're probably like 
South Africans okay so why does contemplation
believe the bed and uses their Fusion because
we now working
they believe that the pressure induced inside
the playthings 10th and 27th Avenue a billion
billion 10 million billion times greater than
the pressure at the sun center of the Sun
what they did is they took a they had to figure
out something like pressure and suck the circumstance
play music but said they decide they really
work for this great inside Electro think about
every action has an equal and opposite reaction
they just called and they testify in Congress
that it's wrong by Keb the 23rd orders of
magnitude and a fellow from Lawrence Livermore
laboratory point out that lying about something
in Congress figure out how much what the pressure
is inside of lading lattice easiest way to
do it if you stick the lattice and a canister
15000 which is a lot but it's not enough what
we have 54 is a magnitude wave everything
Brothers press conference theoretical okay
that means they pump in a certain amount of
energy I got plugged into the wall going to
the electrodes in their measuring temperature
coming out the temperature and they figure
generation of excess Anthem p.m. lady in Rod
cap has expressed as percentage of break-even
values and people saw this chart and they
said this is excess hitting percentage of
rain I saw these numbers 286% of Breakeven
1224 percent of break-even it's 12 hunts Montana
what's going in today times nobody in America
turn down to me these numbers convince the
world of chemistry they calculated what would
happen if they had a perfect cell the laws
of thermodynamics such thing as a free lunch
these were the numbers
Text Gamma ray Photon particle of light very
high-end and they're all around the glass
samurais coming out of concrete in nature
that are mildly Radioactive and this was saying
is they have another little detector like
a geiger counter and then a few more Spectrum
turns out all around us that are in matched
passing 40 so do you set up a detector in
this room and you get the Spectrum you can
see gamma rays coming out of exactly this
energy from a test in 4 days and then there's
bismuth-214 and so what happened he saw this
original chart he said this is my business
so one of the things you did there was a camera
Spectrum I realize I should be happy there
wasn't it how to play with Robaxin atraso
was a scoundrel Spectrum and another letter
to Nature provoking them even more this is
proof this is the real Spectrum this is their
Spectra they really do see gamma rays and
here is a valley and the password for tp-link
and they said here's the peak for their gamma
rays at 2.22 and Evie and this they identified
is out of what despite fear this is what happened
and this is awesome these are noise and by
this time the world can read this back and
forth the Nature music video yeah what happened
was I convicted family protected until Spanish
Scott Flo Progressive Siri what's 54 + 2 and
no experimental however after they went nuclear
fusion in a glass of water heavy water Charles
Martin the guy who called Stand two best friends
are Sam cons you time they Lewis and what
does calorimetry uses measure are people who
actually measure heat in and out of experiments
in chemistry measuring Friday night in Kuwait
April way tonight you start seeing more heat
coming out of the stuff and he starts his
birthday party goes back to my laboratory
triple checks experiment the next morning
they decide they going to write a paper mate
write a paper on Saturday the next one the
next one first confirmation cold fusion Sunday
afternoon I was up his buddy are you doing
this account active trolls and I need to have
you wanted me to play for that's what gets
me through Fusion exactly what they should
guess what and if you go big brother press
touch the experiment start running other controller
pick up play music 8 hours going public turns
out it's foolproof electronic and they were
so James McCann Georgia Tech Research Institute
Buddy's ground clearance what are the causes
for humidity sensor I have to realize today
New York Times cover much better cold fusion
and that one reporter Jerry Bishop he was
coming and faithful a getting it all right
at least atoms with an atomic mass of 564
proton and a neutron 6 with carrier and
they went public and it got in the Wall Street
Journal headline was graduate students fill
in missing puzzle and within an hour after
they were Terraria what's the score anyway
didn't they come in all different shapes and
sizes doesn't post electric current through
heavy water if you'd suck more how does an
increase in cases he convinced right he also
has a Sanford put it back program 80% wax
let it dry so they discharged the
water Dick's store they said they were trying
to get General Electric financier research
of Utah to buy into cold fusion General Electric
said
they do it if they let the General Electric
cameras check play take it back to Schenectady
Hugo Rossi wizard first record had to report
to the Utah State Legislature Utah legislature
and so he wrote scientist General Electric
after login when they went public March 23rd
1989 step it Protonix controversy around electromagnetic
New York Los Alamos Texas A&M a pointed out
to me this
is
a size 12 expected to what is cascara Republic
how can we afford an okapi does God exist
this is the application form
for fourth International I have several conversations
best friend about how much money is being
spent annually on future America I got to
go back to but if
it had not how to cross somebody there
are
other princesses press wants to throw one
time stop the
Wall Street Journal reporter 99 Honda princess
Cosmic balance turn the
is
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