INSPIRED BY DEFKALION: THE TORTUOUS WAY TOWARD LENR STANDARDS,.

This writing has two parts; if you are busy or you don’t like my style, feel free to go directly to the second.

FIRST PART: NEGATIVE

My former Global Problem Solving Consultancy Bureau had a great variety of customers. Our successes are easy to explain: we repeated slogan-like that we solve each and all the problems. A candidate dictator from a troubled African country wrote:

“My problem is how to manipulate my people, in this age when even here information is circulating much too freely making my work so difficult"
We have prepared a good Modern Mass Manipulation Manual for the customer, however unfortunately before paying he was arrested, emasculated and hanged by the militia of a rival, therefore his chances to become a dictator have practically disappeared and my Bureau has lost money. Highly disturbing, we cannot apply the perfect bordello business model (Payment First, Service After Payment) to protect us against such a malheur.
Anyway, here is the:
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Executive Summary of the Modern Mass Manipulation Manual

Mass Manipulation is actually easy. Masses enjoy manipulation because it replaces thinking with the own brains an effort very few humans can afford. Use killer memes to install memecracy (see our former report MM 24/0037829) and the following three main actions:

DIVIDE and Rule
Divide and rule, convert the differences in disagreement and disputes, weaken the brains by provoking the reptile and the proto-rat brains against the neo-cortex, show it enemies and dangers and horrible risks everywhere and overall- even in the mirror. Make the people to be eternally suspicious, terrified, and vigilant , learn them to fear their own ideas, make them to hate actively anybody with other opinions and develop in them criminal attitudes toward those on the opposite sides of everything. Discourage original, creative or personal thinking incessantly and fiercely! Divide the World in “Us” and “They”

CONNECT and Stupefy
Connect and stupefy, connect many brains from a group, a crowd, from a room, a hall, a marching column, an Internet forum/group force them to practice groupthink and no think and you will state with satisfaction that intelligences are not additive; on the contrary they are mutually weakening and slowing down, up to total blockage, A great, lazy and coward Big Brain – fictive – will completely replace all the real brains that are functionally annihilated. Connect people to celebrities and mythomaniacal populist politicians (like you!) and degrade them to fans. Fanatize them!
Disconnect people from reason, decency, kindness, goodwill, human feelings, and especially from altruism! Eradicate empathy!

COMBINE and Confuse
Combine and confuse, abundantly mix truths, half-truths, outright lies, real, false and useless data, weird superstitions and obsolete myths, plausible but inexistent correlations, crippled and unsustainable metaphors, poisoned fantasies, fragments of cultural slogans and many other such things and when this mixtura miserabilis is ready, inject it in brains. Any cognitive or intellectual activity of the poor grey cells will stop except a perpetual signaling of Fatal Error.
The Test of success is- if after all these manipulations the people are grateful to you, admire and idolize you.
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Obviously we are serious professionals: the Manual also comprises over 300 pages of practical examples, it outperforms Machiavelli’s The Prince by orders of magnitude. Old Niccolo is of no help when the young dictator-in-spe decides to use the Internet in his actions.
Despite the fact that today it is increasingly risky to become a dictator and the more fragile ones are weeded out fast, we have succeeded to sell more – always up-to-dated variants of this fine Manual to new customers and two of them have used it in the effective mode. They rule over millions of people and the word democracy has disappeared from the local vocabularies.
However it still has to be forgotten irreversibly and this is a challenging task.

SECOND PART POSITIVE (about LENR!)

Problem solving is a great art, and, modesty apart, I am a guru of it- (see my 20 Rules of Problem Solving in this Blog.) A practical principle is that a very good solution is applicable for surprisingly broad range of things. Take in consideration that: “The Good and Evil are Siamese twins”- ergo the Manual, in an adapted form. can be used for other problems too even if these are essentially good, positive, constructive.
In my former writing it was stated that LENR needs a Definition.
At the Panel of LENR theory at ICCF-17 it was minimum of superposition or concordance between the basic ideas of the brightest 5 theorists, their assumptions are different and their logic and mathematics do not intersect. I conclude that prior to a definition, for LENR it will be necessary to have a lot of more mutual understanding, less Babelization, a bit of conceptual harmony, a good inner taxonomy. and even standards. The standards have to be accessible and acceptable for the LENR people but also for those outside the field who take the decisions.
The MMM manual can be used to help to make these tasks more clear...

DIVIDE and Solve 
Divide- and the other two basic MMMM verbs/actions are poly-semantic here.
Even huge works, plans, tasks (says the science of Project Management and also the common sense) can be fulfilled if they are divided, in small sub-tasks. Sometimes, this is the unique possibility to make a mega-task manageable. Other times it is a trick to get time till the task becomes obsolete or ceases to be interesting or important.
Wicked problems must be split in small steps, actions and tasks. Tasks have to be smartly segmented. Logical schemes with alternative ways have to be created; careful good planning is essential.
We have to divide the great field of LENR in sub-domains, select those with the best scientific and technological (if!) perspectives
and focus on those with the highest expectations. I am using a rather simple approach; when I speak about dividing, the “knife” I am using is technology. I repeat- the main criteria for dividing is: what is good for technology and is potentially commercially valuable, from what cannot lead to a technology and is merely a lab curiosity. But this thinking too must avoid logical rigidity.  Divide ideas in those that are possible, those that can be made possible and those that are not possible. These three categories are overlapping dynamically, will remain in evolution.
If, in LERN you try to divide the things in simple and complicated, then in practice you will state soon that actually they are very complex and amazingly complex.
Everything I know in LENR I have learned from my colleagues via their writings and messages, however today it is a sharp division between my opinion and the LENR opinions of other people. This is due to my focusing on technology and on the future – perhaps most people will consider I am anticipating some facts. Only the future can show if I am too optimistic regarding the present situation of the field. It will also show if I am too pessimistic regarding the technological future (lack of it, actually)of the classic, pre-revolutionary part of LENR.
Yes, when it is about dividing the entire LENR field, it seems only I am speaking about LENR and LENR+ following a technical and scientific revelation caused by the Defkalion process. It is described as:

LENR - unexpected, not controllable nuclear reactions in a hydrogen isotope plus transition metal system.

LENR+- designed and controllable nuclear reactions in a hydrogen plus transition metal system enhanced by making hydrogen reactive and the metal more receptive.

If this division/classification will be ever accepted, this depends on the industrial success of the Hyperions and of the E-cats- if they become heaters as usual and are sold as other older energy generators.
It is a great pity and delay that this simple and powerful principle “make hydrogen reactive and nickel more receptive” is not recognized; this is in a way present in Piantelli’s process (hydrogen negative ion and nano-clusters of nickel). I bet that Rossi’s E-cats- he had more variants of them thin and fat, are all also based on this generic “best practice” or “core understanding”  Rossi speaks so many times about  the necessity to use atomic hydrogen and to apply some special proprietary treatments to the micrometric Ni powder that this is a case where we can believe him.

It is also regrettable that in the present time, the LENR+ deniers and LENR+ ignoranti are so predominant, the qualitative difference between the classical LENR systems and the fledgling LENR+ technologies remain merely unknown. 
By the way, my Open Letter was accepted very politely by the organizers of the ICCF-17, but as far I could state its impact on the participants was zero or less. It could be worse.
However despite the fact that I have predicted the technological failure of palladium and deuterium in wet systems these are continuing to be popular and the pre-formed nanometric complex powders are participating in many scientific orgies with both deuterium and hydrogen.
So it is a sharp division between my opinion and the opinions of my colleagues and friends, however one of the first slogans I created says; “Differences in opinions attract smart people and repel only those who are not so” Sometimes this is almost true, however it sounds fine, isn’t it?
I have now the typical behavior of a theorist speaking my own language, own concepts and very personal presumptions and specific approach; and I am not the fan of anybody, even not of myself because I do not claim my inerrancy.
For a standard we have to analyze the similarities and the differences between LENR and LENR+. In practice only LENR+ as Defkalion says- needs a standard and a definition, and only LENR+ has to be and can be standardized.

CONNECT and Understand
First of all, LENR has to be connected to reality, this is usually a
painful and shocking experience and it is especially difficult when it is about the technological reality. Defkalion’s experience (see their paper at ICCF-17) shows that even if LENR is the cause of many natural phenomena, hydrogen and nickel in their “almost” natural-technological state are very far from being ready to initiate/enter a low energy nuclear reaction, have no real chances, and their physico-chemical status has to be radically and deeply transformed.
This explains the extreme difficulty of experimental LRNR and shows the way to LENR+ as an energy source.
Connect with pragmatism and disconnect from theoretical idealism, re-connect theory and experiment. Connect as strongly possible, LENR and the Scientific Method (principles of Galileo).
Without this connection any progress in understanding and in making LENR useful, is illusory.
Few people will agree with me that the time is ripe for LENR’s weaning from palladium, therefore I will not say that perhaps it is time to invest less (money, time, hopes) in wet systems (yes I know about Brillouin!), electrolysis, deuterium. The great LENR community is free and democratic, everybody does something resulting from what he/she has already done, likes to do and affords to do. Global LENR management and strategy are inexistent or just happen. Perhaps a better connection between the teams could help.
Connect in stronger and more powerful networks of researchers, but include good engineers and materials scientists. Connect to the essence and disconnect from the fuzzy halo of ideas around it. This is a problem of subjectivity and of definitions.
Connect with more and more remote scientific and technical ideas trying to create creative bisociations.
Connect better- smarter, more diplomatically with the press, develop empathy for their points of view and try to convince the journalists that a working LENR is a better source of interesting sellable information than a failed LENR.
Special- National Instruments has connected with the best LENR warriors and has established a very valuable model. In the near future, the place where LENR+ Truth can be revealed is Defkalion’s on-line real time mass spectrometry plus the other systematic and instrumental analyses- a unique window of opportunity. I hope DGTG will connect with an excellent strategic partner as good in instrumental analysis as National Instruments is in instrumental measurements, for his task of paramount importance. Goddess Athena, help us!
May I add some highly desirable but rather idealistic connections?
Develop more connected professional networks, include engineers, managers, specialists in materials science, IT people, clever businessmen, nice politicians...
Make friends, make demos, make positive noise. Develop empathy for skeptics. Stop infighting. Develop strong solidarity in the LENR community and do not let it to degrade to liquidarity or even gasidarity.
Disconnect from the cursed word “anomalous” use ‘unexpected’ or ‘surprising’ instead.
LENR is at least as natural as combustion, nuclear fission or hot fusion but much more environment friendly as these.
LENR is more concentrated, practical and reliable as solar or wind energy. It has to be developed in harmony with the other forms of energy, connected with these by complementarity not by senseless rivalry.

COMBINE and Enhance
First of all, combine the best modes of thinking for understanding the generative essence and spirit of LENR+.
Combine and unite the good things and eliminate the bad things
Combine the best theories, more precisely the fragments of truth from these to develop real understanding and ideas for the technological development of this science. Accept that theories if not combined and confronted with solid experimental data are uselessly incomplete...
Accept that only combinations of theories are able to explain LENR that is a very puzzling combination of a broad range of branches of physics and chemistry.
LENR+ uses secret combinations of chemicals that enhance some of the critical (bottleneck) stages of the set of reactions that lead to LENR+. Rossi calls in a populistic manner these combinations "Catalyst” and calls his generator E-cats- a misnomer taking profit from the general sympathy toward the household felines.
The combination of words “cold fusion” is an other misnomer. (for ‘fusion’-ask Steve Krivit) , ‘cold’ is also not true/real. LENR+ is not as hot as Hot Fusion (at millions of degrees) but it is very hot for earthly conditions. It seems that as Defkalion says, LENR+ takes place only in the dynamic vacancies – miniature workshops of Hephaistos with Hell- like conditions.

Conclusion: for the success of LENR, we have to divide it in LENR+ that is both interesting and valuable and LENR classic that is only interesting, we have connect it to good things and disconnect it from harmful things; and, eventually we have to combine what we already know with what we still have to discover- all these in order to create the best energy source of the near future.
Peter

GOOD PAPERS

The Oxford English Fictionary
http://oefictionary.tumblr.com/

List of lists of lists:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_lists_of_lists

Google Fiber: Ultra-Fast Internet: http://askbobrankin.com/google_fiber_ultrafast_internet.html?awt_l=4jAx_&awt_m=JKhRi.o0h8P6SL

Panasonic develops highly efficient artificial photosynthesis system generating organic materials from carbon dioxide and water :  http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20120730005402/en/Panasonic-Develops-Highly-Efficient-Artificial-Photosynthesis-System

Toilet Paper: A History:  http://thefrailestthing.com/2012/07/25/toilet-paper-a-history/

The Weakness of Positive Thinking:
http://www.strategy-business.com/article/re00199?pg=all

Cuckoo Tricks to Beat the Neighborhood Watch:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120802141525.htm

The Positive Power of Negative Thinking:
http://bigthink.com/ideafeed/the-positive-power-of-negative-thinking

New Google Tools to Make the Search Engine More All-Knowing::                                                     http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/08/08/new-google-tools-to-make-the-search-engine-more-all-knowing/

Stop bad email but not all email:
http://www.greatleadershipbydan.com/2012/08/stop-bad-email-but-not-all-email.html

You Know the Placebo Effect. Now There's the Nocebo Effect: http://bigthink.com/ideafeed/you-know-the-placebo-effect-now-theres-the-nocebo-effect

Google Works to Make Search Smarter
Google shows off improvements to its Voice Search, and adds Gmail to Web search results:
http://www.technologyreview.com/view/428805/google-works-to-make-search-smarter/?nlid=nldly&nld=2012-08-13

Scientists' Gold Discovery Sheds Light On Catalysis:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120812151610.htm?goback=%2Egde_1807453_member_145933572

Do Americans Really Envy Sweden's Egalitarianism?:
http://bigthink.com/praxis/how-much-equality-would-you-like

False Wisdom of Crowds:
http://www.futuristspeaker.com/2012/08/false-wisdom-of-crowds/

Evolutionary Increase in Size of the Human Brain Explained: Part of a Protein Linked to Rapid Change in Cognitive Ability:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/08/120816141537.htm

DEFKALION: THE BIG BAD PROBLEM IS DEFINITION OF LENR.

(Comments regarding Defkalion’s ICCF presentation-2)
In anticipation of Theory Panel Discussion lead by Michael McKubre at ICCF-17, Wednesday August 15.

Defkalion’s preoccupation with a proper definition of LENR- the useful kind of it- is obvious. See please the first part of their National Instruments Week technical presentation and also the part entitled “Towards an industrialization path of LENR products” of their ICCF-17 paper. Their motivation is not curiosity – they are in a very close contact with reality, they have a marketing problem and are facing even more obstacles due to their planned manufacture and selling of a product with a functionality and potential risks- still unknown- in part.

John Hadjichristos says: “The lack of any common defined definition is an obstacle (which we face already) towards LENR Industrialization”
Undefined, unknown, unexplained- all these sound badly and generate fear, suspicion, and rejection.
Please do not ignore my problem solving rule no. 17:
 “NOT always the existent, real problems, but many times the fictive, imaginary ones are the most difficult to be solved.”
Imagination beats reality when it is about producing bad problems.(An other dreadful example for that is the phobia of genetically engineered food, but I will not enter any polemics on this).

LENR has nuclear in it and nuclear is a very negative anti-catchword today. One of the tasks of our community is to demonstrate that LENR is an almost completely harmless nuclear process, much more eco-friendly than nuclear fission or hot fusion. - as it really is. The definition has to tell how and why it is so.
While the other LENR scientists are seeking, searching, studying LENR, industrialists as DGTG have to sell it and they must tell the customers what the product/process is, what it does (good) and what it will not do. (bad).
A definition, in our case is a proto-theory! The problems of definition and of theories cannot be separated for LENR.
.
See please what I have told about theory in my Open letter to ICCF-17 http://egooutpeters.blogspot.ro/2012/08/open-letter-to-iccf-17.html
Simple theories do not work, all the systems of LENR are complex and those LENR+ that give energy in useful amounts are surely overly complex. They are actually “prefix theories” and the prefixes can be; hyper-, trans-, multi-, trans-, pragma- or as Defkalion’s theory is: -active, -interactive. Resembling more “How Stuff Works” http://www.howstuffworks.com/ than a simple or simplified theory based, say, on an elegant Hamiltonian treated in a bright way. Theorists can afford to focus on a single barrier, a real and effective explanation comprises a lot of barriers that have to be penetrated, overcome, removed or even cheated in some way.
When we eventually will have a good theory, it will be a fine and noble and essential task to condense it in a definition acceptable and understandable for any user of the LENR generators- Hyperion, E-Cat or else.
It is not easy to discuss with theorists, they usually are very dedicated to their mental products, “married “to it, defend it fiercely and want to apply it much beyond the normal area of validity. They are not playing God, but are frequently playing Nature- they try to tell Mother/Stepmother Nature what to do.
An example, if a theorist has decided that what happens in the Pd-D system is D + D, than he extends this to the Ni-H system, it is surely H + H- it must be so. Defkalion’s results show that this is not true, or it is a side-reaction (what about nucleosynthesys, it has to be found out!?).
A theorist can decide that the explanation must be straight and simple, but the experiment will contradict him/her- so many compounds, parameters, isotopes etc.  are present and so many of these are (inter)active. Who offers a guarantee that the same things happen at 250 and at 650 C?
I am not a theorist but I am a very bad example of theoretical closed-mindedness. I have postulated in 1991-1992 that the surface dynamics of the metal (Pd mainly) is a decisive factor in Cold Fusion:
http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/GluckPunderstand.pdf,
It stimulates the appearance of “active sites”- later renamed more specifically Nuclear Active Environment. I still consider “environment’ not the best word here but NAE became a meme-
Unfortunately it is not a universal LENR meme.
With the advent of the “some like it hot” LENR+ - the process is seen to be enhanced orders of magnitude at very high temperatures, I have concluded quite ‘linearly’- it is normal, the dynamics of surface atoms is much greater at 400-800 C than at room temperature, surface dynamics is a part of the story.
Now, Defkalion shows that “the common nuclear active environment in which LENR occurs is proposed to be the vacancies in the crystal lattice of a heavy metal of a critical size and geometry where excited atoms of hydrogen interact”  However they also say: “nothing happens unless the vacancies “open and close” changing their dimensions” An easy tasks for a subjective, prejudiced mind- it is possible to say that the vacancies performing LENR are dynamic inner surfaces ‘sui generis’. This does not change much for anybody else than me. However I am thinking that I was kind of prophet but that’s just imagination.
What kind of theory (prefix-theory) needs LENR in order to work?
Classic science distinguishes 3 categories:

Third class theories are Explicative- they explain what has happened after the experiment.
Second class theories are Prohibitive- they say what is not allowed or cannot be done.
First class theories are Predictive they say what has to be done for the success of the experiment, process whatever.

It is a sad truth that LENR had no first class theories and even the other theories were of limited use for the experimenters who had many troubles.
However now this is changing quite surprisingly, Defkalion’s theory defines a new class:

Premium class theories are Productive they are effectively part of a new process and make scale-up, improvements and development possible.

OK, let’s the theory of LENR theories for other occasions and try to not forget an other very fundamental issue: bureaucracy: the definition of LENR has to be standardized and legally accepted.
I have lived a half of century in an idiotic oppressive bureaucracy; one of my most stupid and sadistic bosses used to say “A good researcher is first of all a good bureaucrat” And still I am convinced that in context, bureaucracy is a great thing, is order is rules, is discipline, standards; intelligent bureaucracy is not an oxymoron.
The Definition has to become official and universally accepted and used to protect the generators that will change the situation of energy worldwide.
Today (Aug 14) at ICCF-17 Lawrence P.G. Forsley has presented a very interesting and documented paper re. official and legal issues of LENR. Unfortunately I still do not have the text but I have listened at Skype to it…and it is a part of the solution, inclusive the bureaucratic solution.
Defkalion has a strategy for solving the definition- bureaucracy problem. Quoting John Hadjichristos:
We think that a new International Independent Institution, as the main body on standards and industrial support references, is the best we can expect at the moment. This could play a serious role against using Nuclear/Atomic agencies for licensing LENR products, which are not nuclear (following the old definitions) but related with energy from nuclei interactions. An Organization, with similar structure as IAEA, is yet not possible, as far as it will require national formation of relevant bodies and multinational agreements. So an Institution could be a helpful interim solution.

Important clues for the definition will come from the analytical works of DGTG – especially the on-line mass spectrometer and this needs collaboration and cooperation. But it is a problem of the LENR community.
In order to enter the Industrial Era, the LENR army- has to pass the Definition Barrier too. Together.
Peter

DEFKALION’ S LENR- from Discovery to Invention

These are my first comments re the paper
”Defining a New Source of Energy”
presented by John Hadjichristos, CTO of Defkalion Green Technologies, at the National Instruments Week, Austin, TX August 8, 2012

I take full responsibility for the statement that this is a landmark publication in LENR and that things and thinking will be different when the LENR researchers will understand the very spirit of this paper. Some people will accept this fast, some very slowly- Inertia is name of the game for many.
The essence is that LENR is converted now from a Discovery (smart, surprising, confusing) to an Invention (very smart, creative, radical, controlled). It is a change of attitude from try and wait to change in a planned manner.
This paper represents a new orientation and is the start of a New Wave in LENR. It has a great value “per se” but an even greater value as an example. It is a new scientific-technological strategy.
In the present state of affairs it is more important HOW they are doing it than WHAT they are doing specifically, there are probably more alternatives to the technology.-having the aim of abundant generation of vacancies that act as NAE at high temperatures.
LENR is about the relationship between pairs- nuclear marriages of a metal and a gas; initially the mutual attraction between these is not high enough for a success, the participants have be changed in nature and in properties in order to become perfectly compatible. Obviously, not Defkalion has discovered this, from the ancient CF times, the metal (mainly palladium) was treated by very inventive methods. Admirable creativity was demonstrated by Arata. Ahern and many others in using nanotechnology for making palladium and alloys a better nuclear partner for deuterium and by Piantelli who has made a better choice of metal- nickel and has applied the highest science and even art of nanotechnology to force nickel to reveal its best properties and virtues in his process.
But now, Defkalion goes more steps further, makes a complete job. They consider that the gaseous participant of LENR, hydrogen, must be also brought in a very special status in order…to follow the order: Unite!
And instead of a simple theory- LENR+ will be explained and understood by an aggregate of more theories combined with elements of know-how. In a sense, a realistic and useful LENR + theory cannot be separated from actions having the purpose to enhance the effect and from pragmatic engineering. “Pure” theories are beautiful and simple but do not work.
And it is LENR+ because at high temperatures the generation of NAE- vacancies is orders of magnitude more intense than in the case of classic LENR.
The paper demonstrates that DGTG has worked out an original process and has not taken it from Andrea Rossi.
I hope the Hadjichristos paper will be thoroughly discussed because the LENR community can learn a lot of it. I hope the professional detractors and the fans of Detailitis will focus on other subjects.
I had the privilege to read this paper in raw form and to make some corrections. I had the impression that I am like a guy who sees for the first time the Venus of Milo and his first remark is that she has a small wart on her ass. I have found two typos.
This paper has to be understood. But this will not be easy.
It is of symbolic importance that DGTG was the only group to honor Martin Fleischmann during the NI Week with a small call for a moment of silence during the technical presentation. They belong to our community and are not some aliens. LENR+ is a natural, vitally necessary continuation of LENR that has to grow up if it wants to survive and prosper.
Peter

WAYS 2 – THE LESSONS

Always when judging
Who people are,
Remember to footnote
The words "So far."
~Robert Brault, www.robertbrault.com

Last month I took a 3-day trip to Barcelona. Nice town on the seaside, where the landing happens from… the sea side. Also most of the flying happens above the sea, thing which made me quite nervous, because I do not like flying over deep waters. I know it is silly, as I would presume that crashing over water brings more probability of survival than crashing over mountains, but anyway… my complete lack of swimming know-how just turns my stomach into the home of a hundred ants when I fly over water. While we were coming close to the city, I started to relax and tried to enjoy a bit the view –exquisite otherwise.

I will not get into details about Barcelona and my holidays as I suppose no one is interested in this so I will get to the return flight. This time I was really nervous, that ‘kind-of-I-have-a-bad-feeling-nervousness’. Just in front of me while boarding there was a Russian family with a little daughter. At the entry, the door to the pilot’s cabin was opened and a nice voice from inside invited the little lady to look in without being shy. The father was impressed and thanking the pilot for this and the immediate effect was that … the whole family got invited to look in. I started to wonder if the pilot was some terrorist who was planning to blow the plane up and this was his last good deed before the final gesture…

We settled in, and then the plane started to move. While we were still on the runway, the captain started to talk to us. He welcomed us on board, told us that we are flying to Vienna (good-at least I was on the right plane…) and then informed us that there is a storm ahead and that he will try to go around it. Also good, so perhaps my bad feeling is not connected to the bomb but to a storm… this one is better, I already survived some of those…

Then the same voice invited us all to look to the left immediately after the take off, as we will fly along the coast and have the chance to say good-bye to the nice beaches of Barcelona. I thought to myself ‘ok, nice relaxing exercise’ and prepared to extend my neck as far as socially acceptable without biting into my left neighbor’s right ear. And then the funniest thing happened – the guy actually turned the big plane to the left so suddenly after we rose from the ground, that I thought for a second he will dip the wing into the water and we will actually shake hands with the people on the beach to say an official goodbye. And then another funny thing happened – after we did the grand tour of the beaches, he turned again … to the right! This time really heading home…

Well, now I started to wonder whether next he will tell us his wife dumped him, this is his last flight and he wanted to let us die with a nice memory of Barcelona beaches in our heads. But then quite soon after this, the nice voice started to talk to us again. This time he was mentioning the fact that the travelers can actually see the day – night limit line on one side. Then he told us on which side we can see Nice. By that time I was already more than relaxed, thinking that as long as he is flying that plane nothing wrong can happen, as he obviously loves to do it. I started to feel like in a hop-on / hop-off trip only nicer and wondered if we shouldn't tip the pilot on our way out.

Later on he apologized that we will feel a little shaky, kindly asked us to buckle up and at the same time pointed out that to the left there is the big black nasty storm that he told us about, with nice lightning illuminating the clouds from within, a unique spectacle under which (unfortunately not possible to see) there was another nice town (cannot remember which). Interesting was also that I felt no real shaking compared to what I have experienced in some other cases on clear weather …

And so, he kept on showing us amazing things out of the window until we arrived in Vienna, and the flight attendant said her routine ‘thank you, hope you fly Austrian again and goodbye’. Then, immediately after landing, his smiling voice also added simple but warm “thank you, wish you good night and a nice stay in Vienna”. I must say that night I saw a complete different face of Austrian pilots - even thou I should not use the plural. I am not sure I will have a similar flight again soon.

I was not surprised at all (I almost expected) to see the cabin door opened when we left the plane, him standing with a big smile on his face in the door and saying goodbye to each of us. I did not expect him to be so young and tall, suntanned and blue eyed (or maybe not blue but nicely eyed anyway...), but I managed to close my mouth and put my eyes back in their respective eyeballs rather elegantly, probably I also shared a smile in return (even if I could not swear to that...).

I arrived home late at night, with a big smile on my face and with some lessons learned.

There are still people that can do their ‘routine’ job, without forgetting that for others the same sequence of events is nothing short of a miracle. And so someone can make the best of it – not only focus on delivering highest professional standards in their work, but going one step forward and bringing a human dimension, care about the smiles on people’s faces and the drops of happiness in their blood.

The second lesson was that we can fly through life at high speed, not looking left or right and believing that reaching the destination is enough; sure way to miss a lot of spectacular views…

Third - that sometimes we cannot see for ourselves, so there is a need for someone else to guide our eyes to the right picture.

The fourth lesson was that 'detour' one: the shortest way between two points and the nicest way between two points are very different things. Taking the time to see the beauty of a place (or in case of relationships of a person) enriches the life, no matter if the detour is short or long. Sometimes a nice detour may prove to be the actual way. From the detour I also learned a secondary lesson, to always expect the unexpected (why on Earth did I assume that the beaches were in the direction of our way home?...). So, whenever you find yourself somewhere else than intended please regard this as a 'detour' and enjoy - it usually comes in nice packages. Or at least with good lessons.

And finally the fifth lesson was that one hundred ants in the stomach can also predict something nice or cannot predict anything at all. The feeling can be related to the pure fact that I must have probably just swallowed one hundred ants over dinner.

And those were only one afternoon lessons.

I will now take you to another place - a nice quiet restaurant in Bucharest, where I was with a dear friend of mine. She told me that the ‘most beautiful age’ from her point of view was 43. I immediately perceived it as good news, as it is still slightly ahead of me; then the question popped up rather quickly – why 43 and not 40 or 45 or 36? … The answer: because that was exactly the age when she became really comfortable with everything about herself – inside and outside. Well, perhaps the words were not exactly those, but anyway…

And then I started to wonder if I have not already passed the best age, as I realized it had nothing to do with the calendar. The lesson I learned that day was that the sooner you reach the most beautiful age, the longer it may last. It can be a couple of years, a decade or even more. I started to better understand why women tend to omit mentioning their age as they grow older, and it seems to me is because they try to avoid labels and conventional judgment. Then they reach the beautiful age and it does not matter anymore, obviously until… it starts mattering again. Because everything in life is cyclical and so I come to the second lesson at the same table: the link between personal life and career.

She made me open my eyes to the fact that if you live a long life (which I wish to all of my readers) then you will inherently encounter ups and downs. Career path brings you challenges followed sometimes by satisfaction, other times by disappointment; sometimes you just get good money out of it, other times status or just peace; sometimes respect, other times humiliation; sometimes power, other times endurance. The most important part is to take the lesson out of each of those phases and to move on, which may very well mean enjoying some periods of quietness, taking some steps back, recharging your batteries from the other side – the personal one.

Even from the school years, but most strongly in university and after that in our professional life, we learn that in this global economy the most valuable features of a winner are cold head (for thinking clearly), decorated with big eyes and even bigger ears, small mouth and educated nose, two strong feet (for stepping over others) and agile hands (for grabbing opportunities).

On the other hand, most undesirable features for managers are usually connected to everything which is soft, sensitive and oversized, such as the chest (may be fostering a big heart…), and the behind (it is difficult to cover your a.s if it is oversized…). 

There are of course exceptions, like in every rule, and I have been professionally blessed to work with many of them, while I also like to believe I have grown into one of those exceptions, by learning as much as possible from my past bosses and experiences.

Putting a piece of your heart and soul into day to day work, adding passion, strong beliefs and ethical principles usually make the difference between management and leadership. At the same time, such approach may have unexpected outcome bordering to professional self-endangerment, as you gradually create an eye of a storm, in which others may easily push you or you can even get pulled all by yourself. In any case you get exposed to changes in career that have greater amplitude and lower predictability than the average, such as going to sleep in Kansas with a promising career and waking up next day away from Kansas and without your red shoes. Therefore, if you build your whole life around Kansas dreams, all those storms may have a tribute on your health, ability to give and accept love, to forgive and forget, to accept and embrace.

The holidays actually ended with one of the greatest lessons in life. While preparing to go to the airport on Sunday evening, a sweet beautiful dog that was safely playing during the day got somehow out of the comfort of her courtyard and the next thing we knew was we had to find a place to bury her. Very sad, I got on the plane and got back to Vienna. I could not think about holiday ending any more, as it seemed so petty compared to a life stolen from us in one second.

However I did not want to let this week pass without sharing with you this holiday’s lessons. They made me realize this is also one of the ways ahead. I started to count the number of lessons I get in a day. The good news is that it is hard, as they are so many. Usually they come associated with physical sensations and the memory of hits or hugs (imaginary but feeling so real).

So, the way which I want to share with you today is: take the time to learn some lessons every day, apply as much as possible from them starting tomorrow. Recognition for being the pettiest and meanest will always be subject to harsh competition, while for wise and kind people the world is always big enough. Look out the window, upon that part of the human kind which is good and beautiful. Join them and trust that together we can overcome any crisis and then also take care of healing the wounds of those who are now so busy competing against each other…

Georgina Popescu

ANSWER TO MY OPEN LETTER TO ICCF-17

I am very happy to report you that Prof. Sunwon Park and Dr. Frank Gordon, the leader-organizers of ICCF-17 have answered very politely, nicely but firmly to my provocative Open Letter addressed to the conference. I am very grateful to them and I am honored that my ideas were analyzed seriously.

First, they have made the following essential statements about the Conference:

"ICCF-17 promises to be a very exciting conference.  Most of the groups who are known to be working toward commercial products will attend the conference and make presentations.  In most cases, this conference will be the first public presentation of their results and plans for the future.
In addition, leaders in the development of theories to explain the phenomenon will present their theories in individual presentations and as participants in a panel discussion.  More than 80 abstracts were received from scientists in 15 countries for presentation in both oral and poster sessions.  The conference schedule was adjusted to maximize the number of presentations and provide time for interaction between scientists.

The first objective of ICCF-17 is to carry on the tradition of the previous ICCF conferences to allow international groups of scientists to present their data to further the collective understanding of scientists working in the field.

The second objective is to end the misunderstanding and the skepticism on the cold fusion of the main stream scientific community, the media, and the public by showing the evidence that "cold fusion" is real.
And the final objective is to start an international concerted effort to expedite the commercialization of energy generation devices based on LENR to solve the immediate energy and environmental problems of the world and to prevent the possibility of misusing the LENR for the destructive purposes.”
Each sentence of my Open Letter was read and I got answer, opinion re each idea. I am enchanted to tell that for many of them
the answer was “we agree”

Some of my exaggerated worries were confronted with positive facts.
“Many companies will present their data or demo to show that we can use LENR as an energy source”
Because I was really desperate due to bad reproducibility:

“Unpredictability and low reproducibility may have been solved. Many presentations at ICCF-17 will show reproducibility of their experiments, lack of understanding and control seem to be remaining until we can have a LENR theory accepted by the people in cold fusion community”

How fine it would be to get rid from this many years long obsession and scientific humiliation! I will drink the equivalent of a glass of champagne for any team reporting reproducible results.
I liked very much this:

"The Pd-D system has completed its mission by showing the possibility of cold fusion, and opened the cold fusion field.  Now the Ni-H system will be developed and its technology."

The following statement has determined me to re-consider with deep empathy and maximum openness the papers of Dr. Mitchell Swartz:

"Yes, Pd-D based LENR system is difficult to be used for energy generating technology as is. We agree that those defects are detrimental to being any useful technology. However, people like Swartz could make it work by separating the deposition of D to Pd from generation of energy. His papers will be presented at ICCF-17."

I feel guilty (really) for being convinced that nanostructure-enhanced LENR has too low energy density limits to be industrialized.
. But perhaps it will be shown that this is simply not true:

"This can be debatable. Many researchers are already working in this direction and reporting very positive results. Many people are using different nano composite materials and claiming a success, Preloaded ZrO2-PdNi-D Nanostructured CF/LANR Quantum Electronic Components by Swartz is a good example."

I am very pleased that the leaders of ICCF-17 say this:

“We agree that we need radical changes in the cold fusion community and very good strategy considering the enormous magnitude of impact cold fusion can bring.”

In my next writing I will try to show how the new approach of Defkalion to LENR can be start point for revolutionary changes in LENR.

I am indebted to Prof. Park and Dr. Frank Gordon for these good answers and I wish that ICCF-17 should be our most efficient and most successful CF conference ever!
Peter

OPEN LETTER TO ICCF-17

Motto
I will believe you that Cold Fusion exists when you will show
me a boiler for two eggs, working with Cold Fusion.
(Prof Ioan Silberg, R.I.P!)

It’s vain to deny that our field, LENR, has wicked problems of development and of acceptance scientifically and it is nowhere technologically... However I dare to think these problems can and have to be solved.
In this Open Letter I am presenting some ideas/implicit suggestions that, in my opinion, could be used in the frame of a solution. I am fully aware that some of the ideas can be considered as non-conformist even heretical or simply erroneous.
However my desire to solve the problems – after more than 23 years of waiting, hopes and disillusions in the field, is perhaps stronger than even my fallibility.
These are the personal opinions of a technologist and do not refer to LENR science, scientific discoveries and development-a realm of richness and diversity, only to LENR as an energy source.My secret hope is that the coming experimental data will demonstrate that great part these ideas are simply false/idiotic, but these demonstration need facts not words.

The list of ideas.

To change from an idealistic view to a realistic, pragmatic, materialistic one…

It is not about the existence of LENR, it is about its usability;

We have to accept that we are in deep trouble and this is not only the fault (guilt) and effect of the skeptics.

We have to accept that a failure is a failure only when you start to blame others for it; the skeptics are only a smaller part of our problem

We cannot accept endlessly and candidly what is unacceptable for others; the Scientific Method has no exceptions. Unpredictability, low reproducibility, lack of understanding and control cannot be tolerated for a small eternity.

To examine seriously the idea that the cradle system of Cold Fusion, Pd – D, electrolysis is a dead-end for technology…

The inherent weaknesses of the Pd-D based LENR systems, low intensity, bad reproducibility, ephemerality, are not curable. As long as my poisoning hypothesis is not accepted and thoroughly tested we will persist in error. It says that any gaseous impurity is blocking, deactivating the nuclearly active sites and makes the reaction chaotic. Pragmatically seen the Pd-D electrolysis system is unmanageable, uncontrollable and partially incognoscible.

The classic CF system Pd-D via electrolysis is hopeless technologically and inconclusive scientifically, it is vital to spend the available funding preponderantly with gas phase systems. As regarding palladium perhaps we have to realize (metaphorically speaking) that cradles and cars are made from different materials;

To examine the limits of the smartest nanotechnology-based methods to enhance LENR...

Preformed nanostructures can enhance the nuclear reactions only to certain limits, seemingly not sufficient for large scale, long time, energy generation.
This is the most dangerous and risky idea of all, however I feel it is my duty to present it to the LENR community for fast falsification.

LENR cannot be understood by simple theories or explanations…

We have to fully accept the complexity of LENR, both theoretically and in experimental practice. Chris Tinsley has told: “Cold Fusion is to Hot Fusion what biochemistry is to chemistry” and really it seems that LENR is similar in complexity to photosynthesis or nitrogen fixation.

Ideal LENR has one barrier (Coulomb’s), real LENR has more barriers.

LENR cannot be explained by a single theory; I have stated this very clearly in my paper: “Cold Fusion- a wicked problem to solve” New Energy Times No 17, June 10, 2006:

From the understanding/theoretical point of view, it seems to be a fatal error to attempt to explain a multiphase, multi-step, multilevel aggregate of phenomena by a single theory -- without considering adequately where they take place, how and what they are…

I know only one LENR theory based on this basic principle- that of Prof Francesco Piantelli. (Pontignano Poster 2010)
A similar broad and advanced vision of LENR has Defkalion Green Energy Global: “LENR- a dynamic system of the multi-stage set of reactions.” Hopefully we will learn more about their theoretical understanding at this Conference.
These type of theories need a trans-disciplinary approach in application.

To acknowledge the dichotomy LENR vs. LENR+…

It seems that all the “classical:” LENR systems tested till now, as such, are not technologizable
We have to accept that the scale-up of LENR systems needs a radical change, to LENR+ systems, that have, first of all a different mechanism of generating nuclearly active sites (NAE).
LENR+ works at very high temperatures at which active nanostructures are destroyed very fast,

LENR that works- is an active LENR based on smart, systematic, modifications of the participant materials both metal and gas; everything depends on these complex preparations, before and during operation.
Andrea Rossi has invented the first such system and Defkalion, present at this symposium, has solved the most complex and difficult problems of engineering of a similar but different system.
We have to acknowledge that LENR is like a caterpillar that has to be metamorphosed in LENR+- a butterfly able to fly (i.e. to generate useful energy).

. Instead of conclusions…

I think the best option is for radical changes, first of all in the mode(s) of thinking in/re LENR.

Peter Gluck
Aug 1, 2012