THE MEANING OF LIFE, THE ESSENCE OF LENR

MOTTOs

“I create the sense of my life” (Mesenchytraeus solifugus)

My favorite metasport is climbing counter-stream.
(Sicyopterus stimpsoni)

It is my privilege to be sincere in my writings on this Blog. Not chasing popularity, being contented with few readers and page-views, not trying to impose my opinions on others, accepting contrary opinions but fighting dishonesty and vicious lies- all these  give me the freedom to tell what I think, how I think.
And the possibility to give personal answers to the unanswerable questions.
For example now I can discuss about the sense of life (human life, my own life) in a synergetic combination with the essence of the
LENR/HENI energy source- just because this problem is a defining component of the meaning of my life so long I remain mentally functional and rational, and also alive.

I still don’t know better definition of life than:
“Life is hungry matter and edible too” (Valeriu Butulescu)
A wise friend has noticed that this is good for defining a cannibal too; it is not my fault that life is…as it is. The problem is what is actually life eating – we can realize that it is a consumer of matter, energy and information- and human life is supposed to be an advanced gourmet consuming high quality stuff of these all- let’s define later what this means and say in which extent it is purely subjective..
Before starting to discuss about the sense and/or meaning of life let’s insert two “helpful messages” I have received yesterday evening and today morning from the ever benevolent WWW...

Internet intermezzo 

Suddenly, while trying to find something visually and audibly palatable among the myriads of advertisements released by TV I have heard a really nice melody and I knew immediately; it was the Georgian song “Suliko”- I remembered this was Stalin’s favorite.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5YIESsb6p2c
Immediately I have realized that the sense of human life is so much crippled, stolen, destroyed in a dictatorship; the sense of life of the dictator is to take away the sense of life of the people he successfully oppresses. It strike me- the sense or meaning of life is very much like an asset and you can lose it, many times irreversibly even before getting or finding it. Freedom is a necessary condition for the wholeness of the sense of a life. And both poor and overly greedy people cannot be free. Moneytheism is an inner dictator.
All wise thinkers try to suggest than the sense of life has to be created, but you can do this only in favorable circumstances
We, here in Romania have lived in dictatorial societies from my birth, 1937 to 1989 and during the last 24 years Ceausescu was convinced he “is” the sense of the lives of all his people.\
Add to this the tragedy of my ill son, I have found the sense of my professional life, but the sense of my personal, life was merely survival. Almost as sad and hopeless as Suliko. But perhaps the
professional life of anybody is more specific and more memorable than his personal life. Or. it has to be.

This morning I got standard posts as dissecting old CF stories and asking if some newer results are encouraging or discouraging or both or undecided- but also a very direct warning to the field.
It is coming from the high art of IT management and does not say a word about LENR. It is:

Handle complexity with evidence, not opinion
http://www.gerrymcgovern.com/new-thinking/handle-complexity-evidence-not-opinion

Gerry- one of my favorite thinkers says we need new tests and facts not old opinions to be able to predict what happens. And mentions a principle of research I have also discovered long ago:”never trust a single piece of data”
Those who forget history will repeat it, perhaps better. But over-discussing the past will surely not contribute much to solve the problems of present and to remove the barriers on the way to real progress in the future. We need facts and tests at any price.
Intermezzo finished.

More about the sense of life,

When exploring a phenomenon, it is always useful to examine what happens in the most extreme conditions, ergo now let’s see what can say us life, in its most miserable, seemingly senseless form from this Planet- about its meaning, its raison d’etre.

See the first Motto please! I have met the author on the day when I have received a farewell message from my generous cold fusion partner Akira Kawasaki who said he is so lethargic like being frozen and has a constellation of fatal illnesses has lost his force, power and wish to live.
http://newenergytimes.com/v2/views/Group1/Kawasaki.shtml
A great loss for our community, a noble and good friend disappeared for ever.
My deep sadness has inspired me to write an editorial about Lethargy the status when the sense of life becomes evanescent and it is no return, only very rarely. (I vaguely remember an episode in Moby Dick)
I have discovered the mysterious ice worm, see:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_worm
http://www.nichols.edu/departments/glacier/iceworm.htm

it lives in the ice of some North-American glaciers. It is an animal that should not exist, but some 7 billions (relevant number, isn’t it?) ice worms inhabit only one of these glaciers. The whole day it is buried in ice- I find this dreadful, worse than even our last Ceausescu years. Only during night, the ice worm comes out to feed on ice: snow algae, bacteria and probably pollen carried by wind from hundreds of miles distances. Where it is food, it will be life soon. I was quite shocked by the unhappy existence of this creature. Stupid enough, the trivial and lowly relatives- earthworms are living much better? It was only a primitive reaction of cryophobia see this list http://phobialist.com/
there are two other names for fear of ice. The ice worm has taught me that life is both an aim and a means and we must give sense to it. And life is powerful.  Due to thinking we can find our sense of life and we have to protect this sense against what other people, cultures or memes try to instill in it.
I am not a religious man; however I try to be moral and honest. Honesty in this means to listen carefully to other opinions and this includes religion/faith. My good friend G., who is a well known and highly appreciated preacher, has explained me the point of view of faith re the sense of life. A Godless life has no sense at all- this is the shortest formulation possible That means sense is extrinsic to life; however true faith gives you a second, infinite, perfect life. I wish he is right but I do not believe it. However I think life is just an opportunity and Homo discontentus has the possibility and the duty to create a meaning of his life – under the sign of the only seemingly egotistic self-accomplishment and of the genuinely altruistic “to make the world just a bit better”. This is the ideal case, in real life constrains and dominant memes add or subtract to the best human life sense. Perhaps at this point you could read the quotations re. sense of life appended to this paper.

In this blog I have described, more or less explicitly how LENR due to its strong correlation with problem solving, basic technology, correct and creative thinking and deep understanding became a generative component of the meaning of my life. I will consider my life as a success only if I will depart from it having solid proofs that LENR will also fulfill its sense becoming a valuable source of high quality energy. It is revealed here about the sense of a good life- it has to comprise some great achievement.
Take a look to the second Motto. The author is a humbly fish
one that is able to climb very high waterfalls. something incredible and impossible for the common sense- but real:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sicyopterus_stimpsoni
http://www.practicalfishkeeping.co.uk/content.php?sid=3942

An other real creature that cannot exist and an other model offered by Nature both to the sense of life and to the essence of LENR. This rock-climbing fish does one amazingly great deed in its life, driven by sex and hunger- we have to do something similar based by ambition and the desire to be the first or the best.

In LENR Fleischmann and Pons were the pioneers but they could not convert their great discovery in an energy source- as they have wished and have stated from the first day. The amazing fish can climb a waterfall 100 meters high. Unfortunately, it is now obvious that LENR is as high as the Mont Blanc (Everest is already taken by one of the papers mentioned above) and there are many obstacles- I have described them in my “barrier” papers.
Anyway, analogies are like good servants, useful but not dangerously intelligent. (Though analogy is often misleading, it is the least misleading thing we have. (Samuel Butler))

The essence is that LENR is a wickedly wicked problem, real but not well understood and still not manageable. However as Defkalion – the goby high on the top has revealed last year at NIWeek- LENR is like the meaning of life, it has to be created with great effort and radical changes of the reactants. The sense of LENR has a technical name- upscalability. Everything else is just interesting science generating a lot of hot disputes, fresh questions and just a bit of heat, challenging the most sensitive measuring instruments. The first step is to accept complexity and to treat it as Gerry McGovern says in his paper.
LENR adds sense to my life but I know well that I am an “uomo finito” I cannot do or organize experiments; all I have is a PC and an Internet connection, good and fast thanks the series of ISPs where I have worked more than 10 years.
Hopefully I can achieve some deeper understanding of LENR before my little grey cells retire. Sincerely, despite lack of success and impact, I enjoy the process and I will, continue to write with or without feedback...

Peter




Sense of life quotations

http://www.goodreads.com/quotes/tag/meaning-of-life

Prime numbers are what is left when you have taken all the patterns away. I think prime numbers are like life. They are very logical but you could never work out the rules, even if you spent all your time thinking about them. (Mark Haddon)

Life has no meaning. Each of us has meaning and we bring it to life. It is a waste to be asking the question when you are the answer. (Joseph Campbell)

There is not one big cosmic meaning for all; there is only the meaning we each give to our life, an individual meaning, an individual plot, like an individual novel, a book for each person.”
(Anaïs Nin)

Life is problems. Living is solving problems. (Raymond E. Feist)

I believe that I am not responsible for the meaningfulness or meaninglessness of life, but that I am responsible for what I do with the life I've got. (Hermann Hesse)

Beyond work and love, I would add two other ingredients that give meaning to life. First, to fulfill whatever talents we are born with. However blessed we are by fate with different abilities and strengths, we should try to develop them to the fullest, rather than allow them to atrophy and decay. We all know individuals who did not fulfill the promise they showed in childhood. Many of them became haunted by the image of what they might have become. Instead of blaming fate, I think we should accept ourselves as we are and try to fulfill whatever dreams are within our capability.
Second, we should try to leave the world a better place than when we entered it. As individuals, we can make a difference, whether it is to probe the secrets of Nature, to clean up the environment and work for peace and social justice, or to nurture the inquisitive, vibrant spirit of the young by being a mentor and a guide. (Michio Kaku)

To be what we are, and to become what we are capable of becoming, is the only end of life. (Robert Louis Stevenson)

The purpose of life is to stay alive. Watch any animal in nature--all it tries to do is stay alive. It doesn't care about beliefs or philosophy. Whenever any animal's behavior puts it out of touch with the realities of its existence, it becomes extinct. (Michael Crichton)

As soon as you look at the world through an ideology you are finished. No reality fits an ideology. Life is beyond that. … That is why people are always searching for a meaning to life… Meaning is only found when you go beyond meaning. Life only makes sense when you perceive it as mystery and it makes no sense to the conceptualizing mind. (Anthony de Mello)

Life has to be given a meaning because of the obvious fact that it has no meaning. ( Henry Miller)