EVERYTHING I KNEW ABOUT COLD FUSION WAS WRONG

(Note- this is a stereotypical title, more exactly almost everything was wrong and not so necessarily what I knew about it)

We must re-think completely CF/LENR because it has problems and it is very different from how we know it today. 

We must re-write radically the history of CF/LENR in order to re-build a good future for it.

The real cause of all the problems of CF/LENR is that it was discovered BEFORE ITS TIME in the worst system possible, with the less adequate metal. Knowledge and tools missing, CF/LENR was too complex, too new, too unexpected, too messy, too multifaceted, too dynamic, too non-linear and too weird to be really understood and controlled at the time of its discovery. CF/LENR proved to be really at the far right side of the Medawar Zone . http://www.geocities.jp/hjrfq930/FTEssay/Essays/Gluck.htm

The discovery of CF has happened in such unfortunate circumstances that I considered a new word has to be coined for it: “miscovery”  

The Fleischmann- Pons Cell was the cradle of CF/LENR but it almost became its coffin, and continues to be its bed of Procrustes, limiting its development and making the process almost unmanageable, irreproducible and not scalable..

The connection of CF/LENR with electrochemistry was absolutely fortuitous and does not generate a single advantage for the field; on the contrary, wet systems annihilate the chances of CF/LENR to become an energy technology. (functional LENR needs temperatures at which the pressure of water is too high for practical electrolysis). The dominant but false electrochemical model of CF/LENR has defeated the catalytic model.

The discovery of heat excess in palladium was the most unfortunate event possible, because due to the very high solubility of deuterium in this metal, the bulk is competing with the active sites for the gas, that leads to the necessity to achieve and maintain high loading D/Pd. We can speak about the Pdisaster of the field.

The merits of the Founding Fathers are really exceptional and  because the have discovered the phenomenon in pessim circumstances. They were able to see profound connection where nobody has dared to think.

In the long perspective, in the case of CF/LENR, we were barking not at the wrong tree, we were barking at a dwarf, weakling bush…

However, because for so many years the conditions and tools

for solving the problem of a commercial LENR based energy source were not discovered or were not available, it is not fair and not justified to speak about errors, the experiments made by the supporters of the field have helped it to survive in conditions of extreme hostility.

In time we have discovered that there are formidable obstacles on the way to an energy source and the much feared Coulomb Barrier is not the most difficult of those.

Under the stressing pressure of weak results and due to the impossibility to find an acceptable explanation- both of the results and of the failures the collective orientation in the field became non-optimal:

-         CF/LENR has lost its original, definitory aim (to be a competitive  energy source and claimed to be a promising scientific issue, despite the unreliable and unrepeatable  experimental results;

-         it was more and more suggested that the Scientific  Method alone is able to make us to understand CF/LENR and to solve its problems

Noble ideas, however only strictly controllable/manageable experiments can yield genuinely scientific knowledge and only a hybrid, technological and scientific approach can generate progress. Scientism is damaging for CF/LENR due to its inefficiency.

Cold fusion is too complex a matter to be left to physicists. More exactly- “to physicists alone” being a really multi-disciplinar and trans-disciplinary issue. Systems thinking and understanding complexity are vital. LENR, I believe, is a movie, not a photo, an opera, not a song- to use ~artistic metaphors.

CF/LENR is oppressed, pariah science due to its bad reputation management in its early period; due to its claim to be fusion it contradicted the ruling theories of the mainstream science. The experimental results were not sufficiently strong to demonstrate more than the very existence of excess heat release- however at low intensity, scaringly bad reproducibility and for very limited duration, not convincingly enough. The situation is clear- “no mercy”- only a commercial device generating plenty of energy, able to replace the existing sources can change the general opnion about CF/LANR.

.

From what we start to learn now, “no mercy” will be equally valid for many, if not all sacred cows and pet memes of CF/LENR. First, palladium will become 4-letter word.

The field has serious problems due to the fact that the scarce sources are always managed inefficiently; this is the Matthew Effect and CF/LENR suffers due to an external Matthew Effect (being considered bad science gets no funding) and an internal

Matthew Effect (chanceless palladium based systems get the greatest part of the money invested in the field); palladium still remains a cultic metal.

A few personal thoughts

I have concluded relatively early that CF happens similarly to heterogeneous catalysis in small areas- active sites and this explains the great bad problem of the field, irreproducibility.

See: http://www.lenr-canr.org/acrobat/GluckPunderstand.pdf

As I wrote in my message from the right site of the Medawar Zone:

“I personally think that the root of troubles and the start point of the final solution for Cold Fusion is its inherent catalytic nature: all the unexpected and highly desirable phenomena take place in very limited active areas, and the research strategy is to breed and multiply and reinforce and enhance these active areas.”

Knowing how disastrous can be poisons for catalysts, I easily deduced that CF functions so faulty because the active sites of CF are also poisoned, blocked by polar gaseous impurities from air. Later I have learned that nitrogen and argon are also competing with deuterium/hydrogen for the active sites, so the name of enemy is “alien gases.” Deep degassing or…death!

I had plenty of failures in my life, however this was the most unsuccessful idea I ever had. Actually it is nasty and dangerous; in case I am right, then all my colleagues who have rejected it sometimes with contempt due to its triviality and implausibility have made a huge error!

If true, the FP Cell that cannot be degassed (deeply) is sentenced to eternal irreproducibility.

I have proposed a strategy for building a good future for LENR:

The main principles are:

LENR is in essence technology, a practical energy source.

LENR is much more complex, dynamic and diversified as usually accepted now.

LENR is now in a deep creative crisis and in a “grow or die” (scale-up or perish) situation

LENR has a huge potential as new energy source.

These principles can be understood and applied only after a radical paradigm change in the field.

The critical “to be or not to be” issue is accepting the following:

in the “classic” LENR systems, even if the poisoning problem is solved, the density of the pre-formed active sites remains low and the energy density and production too small for applications.. New methods have to be found by which the active sites are generated in-situ continuously; thus enhanced excess heat is obtained. This process, called LENR+ can be scaled up and, using good and creative engineering can be transformed in an energy source.

LENR+ is the way, the truth and the unique hope because classic LENR systems are lost for technology.

LENR is static, LENR+ is dynamic, metaphorically LENR is the caterpillar, LENR+ is the butterfly.

But LENR+ is a mode of thinking and it is based on scientific concepts, disciplines and methods very different from those tried, with limited success, for LENR classic.

Peter

ALAIN COETMEUR ABOUT NASSIM NICHOLAS TALEB AND COLD FUSION IN FRENCH!

Nassim Nicholas Taleb et la fusion froide

Introduction

Peter Gluck a bien noté le fait que je cite fréquemment Nassim Nicholas Taleb lors des conversations, et c'est pourquoi il m'a proposé d'écrire ce petit article qui décline la philosophie de Taleb dans le contexte de la fusion froide (LENR).

Je ne prétends pas avoir tout compris de Taleb, et cet article est donc une base de discussion. Je ne doute pas non plus que la philosophie assez radicale de Taleb ne convainque pas tout le monde.

Antifragile, comme les précédents livres de Nassim Nicholas Taleb est un livre riche, mais basé sur quelques idées simples. Taleb, un ancien trader de volatilité, d'origine levantine (Liban, Syrie), orthodoxe, éduqué en France et aux USA, écrit de façon acérée, parfois brutale et agressive contre ceux qu'il juge responsable de mettre notre société en danger de mort. Son profil me rappelle plus ou moins Nouriel Roubini, Jean-Paul Biberian, Martin Fleischmann, Dan Shetchman, et ils correspondent tous à la description de « l'étranger » dont parle Norbert Alter, cet homme ayant vécu dans une autre culture (que ce soit un autre pays, un autre métier, une autre technologie, un autre type d'organisation) qui peut comprendre que la façon dont les choses se font n'est pas la seule possible.

Voici quelques notes de lectures de Antifragile, mais aucune qui ne retient toute la substance de ce livre : [antifragile-wsj], [antifragile-continuations] , [antifragile-nytimes] , [antifragile-dunbar]. Mais le mieux reste de lire ce livre, et d'éviter le café, car ce livre peut choquer.

Les cygnes noirs (Blackswan)

Le livre « Antifragile » est un développement de l’œuvre de Taleb concernant le concept de « cygne noir », et l'importance du hasard radical, les « inconnus inconnus » voir « inconnaissables ».

Un « cygne noir » est un événement qui était supposé impossible,  car il n'avait été jamais observé. Ces cygnes noirs portent historiquement l’essentiel des catastrophes, des révolutions, des découvertes radicales, des bénéfices et des pertes financières. Ils sont ignorés, imprévisible par définition, mais dominent les événements prévisibles en importance.

Il n'y a rien de magique dans leur existence, car étant rare, mais très nombreux, il est probable que nous ne les ayons jamais vu le jour où on les observe. Toute prévision basée sur le passé est donc absurde, car elle ignore ce qui a l'impact le plus fort, les cygnes noirs. Taleb parle ainsi de l'histoire de la dinde de « Thanksgiving », qui pourrait penser que les humains sont adorables et la nourrissent bien pour son confort. Jusqu’au jour où elle sera servie au dîner. C'est ainsi que pour Taleb, l'analyse du passé trop récent avec trop de détail est dangereuse, car il donne une fausse confiance.

La prédiction des cygnes noirs du passé ?

Taleb rappelle malgré tout que « a posteriori » nous sommes souvent tentés de retrouver des raisons de prévoir les cygnes noirs dans le passé. Par exemple le tsunami de Sendai qui a tué 20000 personnes et ravagé la centrale de Fukushima, était prévisible depuis quelques dizaines d'années, car la faille sismique que l'on pensait coulissante (et donc limitée à des séismes de force 7) apparaissait finalement comme accumulant des contraintes (permettant des séisme de force 9). Dans la zone, malgré une amnésie collective, on a trouvé il y a plusieurs siècles, des traces de tsunami comparable. Mais c'est une réécriture de l'histoire, et le fait est que personne n'avait réellement intégré ces faits scientifiques.

Un autre exemple est la prévision détaille de la crise des « subprime » par Nouriel Roubini, qui comme Taleb, Fleischmann, Shechtman, Wegener, Wright, Semmelweis a été raillé par le consensus, malgré les preuves rétrospectivement évidentes.

En ce sens la fusion froide est un cygne noir caché en pleine vue, comme le séisme de Sendai. La fusion-froide va désintégrer, vitrifier, anéantir toutes les planifications, toutes les prévisions, détruire des milliers de milliards d'investissements, en en créant bien plus encore, en donnant le pouvoir à certains et en le reprenant à d'autres, vidant de leur sens des milliers de pages de réglementation et de loi. Elle redistribuera les cartes géopolitiques, les cartes sociologiques, les cartes démographiques, écologiques, scientifiques, académiques, politiques... Pourtant ce risque enthousiasmant et terrifiant, n'est même pas considéré par ceux qui pourraient en souffrir ou en bénéficier. Je ne parle pas de se positionner en pensant que la fusion froide existe forcément (comme je le fait), mais simplement de se protéger au cas improbable où la fusion froide soit réelle... comme on cherche à se protéger des astéroïdes, d'un défaut sur la dette souveraine de la France, ou du réchauffement/refroidissement climatique catastrophique. Ce fait simple, comme d'autres situations similaires me semble terrifiant d'aveuglement. C'est malheureusement un cas général, qui me désespère.

Hors du message de Taleb, cette cécité cognitive est à rapprocher des travaux de deux auteurs que j'ai découvert et qui m'ont permis de formaliser ce que j'avais observé.

D'un côté Thomas Kuhn (un résumé en anglais:  [kuhn-sj] , en français : [kuhn-cnam] ) dans « Structure of Scientific Revolutions » explique bien cette incapacité à convaincre les tenants de l'ancien paradigme. Ils sont incapables de voir les anomalies dans leurs paradigmes, incapables de considérer les preuves qui ne sont pas de leur monde. Ils sont daltoniens sur une mer de drapeaux rouges. Pour Kuhn cette cécité est à rapprocher de la transition cognitive observée durant l'observation du canard-lapin ([canard-lapin]). Une évidence quand on a accepté le point de vue, invisible avant.

De l'autre côté Roland Benabou lui présente un modèle économétrique simple qui explique rationnellement les illusions collectives et la pensée de groupe observée dans les bulles financières, certaines  catastrophes industrielles ou financières. Son modèle (voir : [benabou-delusion], et pour des exemples l'appendice « patterns of denial ») est basé sur l'observation que les humains peuvent ignorer des faits pour protéger leurs estimation de richesse, plutôt que leur richesse. Cela se produit quand les individus ne peuvent échapper aux conséquences négatives de l'illusion collective par une lucidité individuelle. Un mécanisme d'illusion collective assuré (« Mutual Assured Delusion ») stabilise le système dans une ignorance des faits dérangeants, assurée par une violence brutale contre les dissidents qui augmente quand la vérité se rapproche. L'illusion descend la chaîne hiérarchique.

Sans véritablement être poussé par Taleb ces deux concepts de cécité cognitive, soit une cécité « d'incompétence paradigmatique » pour Kuhn, soit une cécité « mutuellement assurée » pour Benabou, expliquent qu'il puisse exister des cygnes noirs alors que les informations sont publiques et les probabilités facilement estimables. D'une certaine manière c'est ce qu'en France on appelle « un éléphant dans le salon ». Un fait clair que tout le monde refuse de voir, et qui surprendra le jour où on ne pourra plus ignorer son existence.

La fusion froide sera donc un cygne noir, malgré le fait qu'elle est prouvée depuis 20 ans, et qu'il y a de fortes suspicions qu'elle soit industrialisable depuis 3 ans. C'est un éléphant dans le salon, comme la crise des « subprimes » en 2005, l'explosion de la bulle internet en 2000, et d'autres que je ne citerais pas mais qui commencent à faire du bruit dans le salon de la science consensuelle, sans que l'on ne comprenne d’où cela vient. Ce serait hilarant si ce n'était pas tragique.

Concavité, convexité, fragilité, robustesse et antifragilité

Antifragile va au-delà du concept de cygne noir pour s'attaquer à la question de comment les systèmes, financiers, biologiques, techniques, se comportent face à un cygne noir, où plus généralement à un imprévu ou à un changement d'environnement quelconque.

Taleb était trader de volatilité, et son métier lui a permis de comprendre que certaines entreprises souffrent, et d'autres profitent des surprises. C'est tout le sujet du livre que d'introduire ce concept, et notamment le mot « antifragile » qui n’existait pas, décrivant les systèmes qui profitent des surprises. Il est d'ailleurs bien instructif d'observer que ce mot n'existait pas alors que nous connaissons tous des gens, des entreprises, des communautés, des animaux, qui profitent des changements, des catastrophes, des révolutions, pour se développer. Taleb explique biens que le monde n'est pas contraint par les dictionnaires.

Il introduit un concept mathématique, celui de convexité et de concavité (voir [taleb-medconvexity]) pour expliquer comment les changements peuvent causer des effets très différents selon le système. Un système convexe va souffrir un peu de certain changements, mais va profiter beaucoup d'autres changements. Il sera « antifragile » et se développera d'autant plus vite que le monde change et le surprend. A l'opposé un système concave va profiter un peu de certains changements, mais souffrira beaucoup d'autres changements. Il sera « fragile ». Entre les deux il y aura les systèmes robustes, qui sont assez linéaires, et sans grand intérêt ici, sauf qu'il s'agit des hypothèses linéaires sur laquelle se basent les théories et les planifications de notre monde moderne.

Taleb explique ainsi que les organisations qui se basent sur des prévisions du futur, se rendent de plus en plus fragile, pour des gains de plus en plus faibles. C'est ce que font les institution financières utilisant des modèles de gestion de risques compliqués, ou les installations industrielles qui modélisent tous les risques apparemment possibles. A la première surprise, tout s'effondre. C'est aussi ce qui se produit pour tout système que l'on essaye de maintenir dans un état trop stable, humains, économies, machines. Tout a tendance à devenir instables avec le temps et les imprévus, et là les transitions sont brutales, ingérables, et les acteurs n'ont aucune expérience pour les gérer. Il dénonce ainsi le travail de la banque centrale américaine, et je ne peux que faire le parallèle avec le système français, que j'aime mais qui nous rend si fragile.

A l'opposé il parle des systèmes antifragiles. Les systèmes vivants sont naturellement antifragiles (dans des limites raisonnables). Il explique aussi que les systèmes antifragiles sont composés de composants fragiles individuellement, qui lui permette de se reconfigurer. Il parle ainsi des restaurants, des taxis, des marchés traditionnels, des espèces, des civilisations... J'y vois aussi l'économie informelle des pays en développement, qui résiste bien aux crises financières.

Maintenant en quoi la fusion froide est-elle concernée.

Quand j'ai lu l'état des papiers vers 1993, j'avais été frappé par le fait que la fusion froide apparaissait dans des situations « hors-équilibre », et bénéficiait des changements de l'environnement. J'ai aussi vu comment la méthode scientifique luttait contre ces changements au lieu d'essayer de les contrôler. La fusion froide serait donc « anti-fragile » dans une certaine mesure. Et le comportement de la science académique serait donc très « fragile ». La vision de Kozima que la fusion froide est sensible de façon « chaotique » aux paramètres confirme cette vision.

Pourtant, la communauté scientifique de la fusion froide semble grâce à sa grande variété, et à la manie  de chaque chercheur d'ajouter sa petite touche personnelle, se comporter comme un système antifragile. Elle viole la méthode scientifique en ne reproduisant pas les expériences à l'identique, pas plus que la reproduction animale n'est exacte. Cela donne à la communauté des scientifiques « non-planifiés », « non-orthodoxe » une richesse de comportement antifragile, malgré des acteurs individuels tentant désespérément de suivre leur théorie préférée, et de contraindre la réaction LENR dans un environnement stable qui ne lui convient pas, mais qui facilite la construction théorique.

Un autre point, si on suit le modèle de Thomas Kuhn, est que la science quand elle se « normalise » (au sens de Kuhn) en établissant un paradigme confortable, devient de plus en plus fragile, car elle devient incapable de profiter de ce qui sort de ses prévisions.

Une piste pour créer une version « antifragile » de la fusion froide, est évoquée dans la communauté. C'est que le manque de reproductibilité de la fusion froide lors des électrolyses, pourrait être contrôlée par l'usage d'une poudre ou mousse (ou autre composant, comme la surface du fil de Celani) dont chaque composant à une efficacité variable, et dépends des paramètres de façon variable. On peut même imaginer que les grains réactifs puissent aléatoirement activer les inactifs, ou les désactiver... Dans ce cadre, les changements pourraient réactiver une réaction dans une logique de contrôle « antifragile ». L'essentiel serait donc de maintenir une variété dans la population de grains.

Optionalité : l'essai-erreur est le secret de l'innovation

Taleb explique que le secret de l'antifragilité est « l'optionalité ». Étant financier, Taleb connaît bien le concept d'option financière, un contrat qui pour un prix modique permet d'acheter ou de vendre un bien à un prix donné, et que l'on peut ou pas utiliser selon que c'est avantageux ou pas.

Il explique que ce concept peut s'appliquer aux choix de la vie, et qu'il faut rechercher ce genre de situation où l'on peut gagner beaucoup, mais refuser de perdre si ça ne marche pas.

Il propose aussi un style d'exposition aux risques. Le but est de prendre des petits risques, sous formes d'options pour des gains illimités improbables et des pertes modestes. Il conseille aussi d'éviter les risques « contrôlés » qui ne sont jamais vraiment contrôlés, mais sous-estimés. Au final il conseille un mode de vie entre un socle de survie très solides (une épargne sûre, un métier confortable), et des prises de risques sous forme d'options sans limite de gain, mais avec des pertes acceptables.

Il explique que c'est ce que font les inventeur, les innovateurs, lors qu'il recherchent selon la méthode des « essais-erreurs »( voir [thesis-innov]). Pour lui le mieux est d'essayer tout ce qui est improbable, mais peu coûteux d’expérimenter. Il y aura un nombre important d'échecs peux coûteux, mais bien plus de réussites que prévu, et les réussites produiront des bénéfices parfois gigantesques. Il note que beaucoup de grands scientifiques et inventeurs mélangeaient un bon métier tranquille, et des recherches spéculatives (Einstein, Lavoisier,…).

Il s'attaque donc à la science planifiée, qui tente de trouver des innovations là où cela semble probable, même quand cela est coûteux. Je ne peux m'empêcher de penser à la fusion chaude (Tokamak, confinement inertiel). Il s'oppose plus généralement à tout ce qui est gros, « too big to fail », et j'y vois un rejet général de la « big physics », au profit de recherches hétéroclites. Il dénonce aussi le financement public centralisé, qui se fait au détriment du financement privé.

A l'opposé je le vois bien avoir poussé la recherche peu coûteuse sur la fusion froide, soutenir l'équipe chinoise qui teste l'EmDrive de Shaywer, soutenir les tests de fusion par cavitation, à la condition de ne pas s'entêter dans des voies sans issue. L'approche edisonienne de Rossi devrait lui plaire tout autant. Il ne serait pas plus surpris qu'une percée majeure soit faite par une bande d'ingénieurs entreprenant tentant de sauver un pays en faillite, et l'aidant à regagner sa fierté antique.

Sa position rejoint diverses positions de spécialiste de l'innovation comme Norbert Alter ([alter-innov-fr])

Enseigner aux oiseaux à voler (Lecturing birds how to fly)

Taleb est très dur envers le monde académique qui de son point de vue, tente de faire croire que la théorie permet est essentielle à la pratique des technologies.

Sur la fusion froide, je vois l'expression de ce problème dans le mépris bien visible des détenteurs de la grande physique, envers les praticiens de l'électrochimie, la radiochimie, voir récemment le mépris des inventeurs de garage, des ingénieurs.

J'observe sur la fusion froide que la focalisation sur la théorie au détriment de l'acceptation des faits expérimentaux, a fait un tort infini à la fusion froide. Cela a créé une incapacité pathologique pour les physiciens dominants d'accepter les faits. Cela a poussé les revues dominantes à exiger des positions théoriques, qui n'étaient pas encore possibles de façon solides. Cela a poussé les physiciens de la fusion froide à proposer des théories plus ou moins révolutionnaires, mais jamais irréprochables, qui ont ridiculisé le domaine. Cela a poussé, un temps, la communauté de chercheurs de la fusion froide à moquer les chercheurs comme Miley qui expérimentaient avec de l'hydrogène légère et du nickel.

Il est clair que les plus enthousiastes des supporters de la fusion froide (dont moi au début), se sont fait piéger en croyant que la fusion froide ne pouvait pas voler si on ne lui faisait pas un cours d'aérodynamique.

Comme d'habitude, l'histoire a démontré que ce sont des inventeurs de garages, des pratiquants, les chercheurs de terrain, qui ont fait les percées. D'abord de fantastiques expérimentateurs de classe internationale comme Fleischmann, McKubre ou Bockris (j'en oublie), puis pour les percées le plus folles, les plus inimaginables : un italien têtu et fantasque, blessé profondément par une injustice judiciaire, et des grec expatriés désespéré par l'effondrement de leur patrie.

L'histoire est écrite par les perdants (History being written by the losers)

Dans la suite de sa diatribe contre le monde académique, Taleb explique comment le monde académique parvient à réécrire l’histoire des innovations, pour justifier de sa propre dominance, et celle de la théorie, face aux vrais inventeurs praticiens. Il reprend divers exemples, donc celui des calculs de prix d'options financières, mais aussi le réacteur d'avion. Je pourrais compléter la liste avec les semi-conducteurs, l'avion, le réacteur nucléaire.

A chaque fois, l'histoire officielle fait croire que c'est par une percée théorique qu'une invention a vu le jour. On cache aussi l'importance des actes de harcèlement immondes, les insultes, les débats ridicules « a posteriori », et on sème le doute sur la compétence, la rigueur des inventeurs, et sur l'importance de leurs découvertes.

J'ai contacté une telle réécriture de l'histoire en France sur des sites d'information scientifique à propos de Dan Shechtman. Sur la fusion froide il semble que le film « The Believers » se prépare à accuser Fleischmann et les autres chercheurs de manque de rigueur, pour faire passer l'incompréhensible incrédulité. La façon dont l'histoire des frères Wright continue à être réécrite est édifiante.

Je m'attend donc à ce que dans les mois qui viennent, après une période de déni ridicule et de terreur désespérée contre les dissidents de la dernière heure, les média scientifiques académiques (« SciAm », « La Recherche », « Nature », « Science » « MIT », « Futura-Science ») inventent une fable ridicule pour nous, expliquant comment un laboratoire académique à découvert le moyen de prouver la fusion froide et de l'industrialiser, malgré le travail lamentables de pionniers ridicules et d'industriels incompétents.

Moins c'est plus (Less is more)

Un concept clé de la vision de Taleb est que l’information n'est pas bénéfique, mais cache les faits. Elle donne une confiance fallacieuse dans une modélisation du futur qui sera d'autant plus surprenante que le modèle est précis. Je me souviens sur le sujet de la finance, et sur un sujet scientifique controversé avoir ainsi entendu parler du concept de « modèle précisément faux ». Ce concept me parle d'autant plus que l'ai optimisé les moteurs de calculs de tels modèles, et que j'ai pu être sensibilisé aux limites des modèles (ce qui explique pourquoi Taleb ne me surprend pas).

La conclusion est qu'il ne faut pas chercher à tout comprendre et modéliser, mais qu'il faut concevoir un système qui s'adapte, se réorganise, malgré ou grâce aux imprévus. Les modèles simples et phénoménologiques, avec de bonnes marges de sécurité sont à préférer aux modèles « full physics ». Ces modèles « esthétiques », malheureusement calculables aujourd'hui, que l'on promeut et sont responsable de grandes erreurs, assez difficile à accepter, vu l'investissement énorme effectué.

C'est une vision qui peut inspirer les innovateurs en vision froide, et les rendre moins timides face à l'absence de théorie. Il faut probablement prévoir à s'adapter à l'incertitude de la réaction, à en profiter, à la défier par des changements, via des politiques de contrôle-commande dynamiques.

Il avance aussi une autre heuristique utile à la prévision du futur. Il soutient que les prévisions du futur quand elles annoncent des nouveautés ne sont jamais réalisées. Par contre pour lui, ce qui est prévisible c'est la disparition de caractéristiques déplaisantes. On pourrait ainsi prévoir la disparition du fil du téléphone, du carburant et de la fumée des automobiles, du conducteurs automobile, du travail ennuyeux, du trajet domicile-travail, des achats ennuyeux en magasin, les aéroports, les gares, les lignes de chemin de fer, les autoroutes, le bruit... comment ? On ne sait pas, c'est parfois fait, mais il est clair que dès que ce sera possible, ce sera fait. Pour le reste, c'est un cygne noir... et qui nous dit que dans 20 ans un EmDrive alimenté par un réacteur LENR en conversion thermoïonique directe, dans un sac à dos léger, ne nous permettra pas d'aller voler tranquillement chez nos amis, ou vers le Tibet, protégé de la pluie par un champ de force inimaginable aujourd'hui.

Pour prévoir l'avenir que va changer la fusion froide, il faut donc d'abord voir ce que la fusion froide pourra ENLEVER. La fumée des voitures des cheminées ;  les lignes à haute tensions ;  les pompes à essences ; les gares et aéroports ; les voitures dangereuses pour les enfants en ville, pour les vélos à la campagne ; la connexion au réseau électrique, au réseau de gaz, voir à l'eau potable ; les fils électriques des fours, des radiateurs, des fers à repasser, des machines à laver, des télévisions ; les chargeurs des téléphones, des ordinateurs...

L'effet « Lindy »

Il ajoute une autre heuristique complémentaire, « l'effet Lindy » qui est que comme les espèces antifragiles, les inventions ont une espérance de vie future égale à leur âge. Si elles ont survécu, c'est qu'elles ont de bonnes raisons et résistent bien aux changements. Ce qui est ancien, comme la chaussure, va durer longtemps probablement. Ce qui est jeune, comme le clavier, ne vivra probablement pas vieux.

On peut donc estimer que la voiture, l'avion, le téléphone devraient persister. La prise de courant, même si elle est vouée à disparaître pourrait survivre plus longtemps qu'on ne l'imagine.

Taleb donc apporte une méthodologie pour prévoir le futur, en complément d'autres approches.

Sa peau en jeu (« skin in the game »)

Taleb avance aussi un concept intéressant, le besoin que les preneurs de risques, souffrent de leurs erreurs. Le code d'Hammourabi imposait ainsi que si une maison s'écroulait et tuait son propriétaire, le bâtisseur était condamné à mort. On est loin des cadres exécutifs « antifragiles » qui rebondissent d'entreprises coulées en entreprises fragilisées... Pour connecter les prises de risques à la réalité, sans être suffisant, il est nécessaire que ceux qui fragilisent le système, soient lourdement sanctionnés si leur confiance infondée détruit le système (lire [skin-proj]).

En fusion froide, les acteurs se sont souvent lourdement investis et ont souvent payé cher leur dissidence. Le problème est que je ne vois pas comment la plupart pourraient bénéficier du développement de la fusion froide. Pire encore, connaissant le comportement du monde académique, je soupçonne qu''ils soient enterrés pour cacher la tragédie au public, au bénéfice de héros bien propres et bien académiques.

En face certains acteurs comme Huizenga ou Shanahan se sont investis publiquement, et pourrait risquer une sanction. Dans le même style, comme pour les banquiers, je soupçonne qu’ils soient sauvés de la faillite par le monde académique, et tout au plus enterrés proprement dans la discrétion et le confort, après une vie de gloire.

On voit ainsi l'antifragilité du monde académique, qui profite de tout, vrai ou faux, tant que c'est consensuel. Via des comités de lecture et des comités de financement, des jurys de prix scientifiques, le consensus s'alimente lui-même malgré la réalité. A l'opposé, hors entreprise, il n'y a rien de réel qui pousse des chercheurs à risquer leur carrière face à un monde académique en rang serré, qui bloque la réalité aussi longtemps que possible, c'est à dire jusqu'à ce qu'une application soit développée et vendue. Seul l'irrationalité a sauvé le système, ou comme certains le disent des calculs imparfaits similaires à l'erreur de Christophe Colomb. J'imagine que les héros de la fusion froide ont pensé que le chemin serait plus court, et couronné de gloire.

Au final, ce sont les industriels et inventeurs qui eux ont mis « leur peau en jeu », pour les pertes, mais aussi pour les gains. Il est donc logique que ce soit par eux que le progrès arrive, et la réalité apparaisse. Ils n'ont aucun bénéfice à soutenir un mythe consensuel comme le monde académique, ni aucun intérêt à cacher une réalité féconde.

Épilogue

Le livre de Taleb est dix fois plus riche que ces quelques points, mais déjà on voit bien comment l'histoire de la fusion froide prend un sens évident, et naturel dans ce cadre.

On peut déjà prévoir le futur proche :

·       Une réécriture de l'histoire pour blâmer les pionniers, et récompenser un académique bien propre.

·       L'utilisation de la fusion froide pour faire disparaître des éléments superflus, comme le carburant, la pollution, les fils et lignes électriques, les accidents, le temps perdu...

·       Des innovations inimaginables, et pas les mythes habituels

Références

Pour la traduction des textes entre français, et anglais, n'hésitez pas à utiliser Google Translation, et Bing translation.

·       [antifragile-wsj] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323353204578128872051100906.html

·       [antifragile-continuations] http://continuations.com/post/51065634453/antifragile-by-nassim-taleb-book-review

·       [antifragile-nytimes] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/books/antifragile-by-nassim-nicholas-taleb.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

·       [antifragile-dunbar] http://www.nickdunbar.net/articles-and-reviews/book-review-antifragile/

·       [kuhn-sj] http://fr.slideshare.net/sandhyajohnson/the-structure-of-scientific-revolutions-thomas-kuhn-book-summary

·       [kuhn-cnam] (fr) http://www.cnam.fr/servlet/com.univ.collaboratif.utils.LectureFichiergw?ID_FICHIER=1295877018064

·       [canard-lapin] (fr) http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canard-lapin (en) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit%E2%80%93duck_illusion

·       [benabou-delusion] http://www.princeton.edu/~rbenabou/papers/Groupthink%20IOM%202012_07_02%20BW.pdf

·       [taleb-medconvexity] http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/medconvex

·       [thesis-innov] http://fr.slideshare.net/hervelegenvre/thesis-history-of-inventors

·       [alter-innov-fr] (fr) http://www.cnam.fr/servlet/com.univ.collaboratif.utils.LectureFichiergw?ID_FICHIER=1295877017789

·       [skin-proj] (fr)http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/improving-managers--incentives-by-nassim-nicholas-taleb/french (en) http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/improving-managers--incentives-by-nassim-nicholas-taleb

NASSIM NICHOLAS TALEB AND COLD FUSION by ALAIN COETMEUR

Foreword

Peter Gluck has observed that I am frequently citing and referring to the author Nassim Nicholas Taleb at our Forums. Now I have decided to write a small essay about the possible applications of Taleb’s philosophy to Cold Fusion (LENR)

I don’t claim that I have achieved a complete, thorough or deep understanding of Taleb; this paper is merely just a start-point for discussions. I also have no doubts that the rather radical philosophy of Taleb has convinced everybody.

His recent book ‘”ANTIFRAGILE” similarly to the previous ones, is rich in content, however based on a few simple ideas.

 Taleb has spent 20 years as trader of derivatives, he is originar from Levant (Liban, Syria), was educated in France and the US, writes in a very sharp style sometimes even brutal and aggressive against all those who, in his judgment, are responsible for putting our Society in danger of death.

His profile reminds me, more or less, personalities as Nouriel Roubini, Jean-Paul Biberian, Martin Fleischmann, Dan Schechtman, and it is in accordance so well with the “stranger” as shown by the French sociologist Norbert Alter. Being a stranger i.e. coming from an other culture- and this can be an other country, an other profession, an other technology, other type of organization facilitates the stranger to understand that the things don’t need to be in a unique, standard manner. This says Alter can be sometimes a great competitive advantage.

Here are some links to notes of the readers of “Antifragile”- see References: [antifragile-wsj], [antifragile-continuations], [antifragile-nytimes], [antifragile-dunbar]. However no one comprises the entire substance and spirit of this opus, therefore the best is to read the book, perhaps avoiding coffee because you can find it shocking.

The Black Swans

 The ‘”Antifragile” book is a development of Taleb’s work regarding the concept of ‘black swans’ and the importance of radical hazard, the ‘unknown unknowns’ see the “not cognoscible”.

A “black swan” is an event supposed to be impossible and that has been never observed before...  Historically, the black swans carry the essence of catastrophes, revolutions, of radical discoveries, of the financial gains and losses. They are ignored, are unpredictable by definition however they are dominating over the predictable and important events.

It is nothing magic in their existence; even if they are rare, they are also numerous; it is probable we cannot know the day when they appear. All the predictions based on the past are absurd because they ignore the most powerful impact of the black swans.

Taleb also tells us the story of the Thanksgivings turkey that can think that humans are so nice and feed it just for its comfort. Than one day, a surprise comes for the turkey- it will be served for dinner. Similarly, says Taleb, the analysis of the most recent past with too many details is dangerous because it instills false confidence.

Predictions of the Black Swans from the past?

Taleb reminds us that despite everything, we are many times trying to find out “a posteriori”- after the event the reasons why Black Swans have happened in the past. For example the tsunami from Sendai which Has killed 20000 people and has ravaged the nuclear central of Fukushima had been actually predictable

For some tens of years, given that the seismic fault line which was believed to be sliding (and thus limited to earthquakes of force 7) has been de facto eventually accumulating constrains, tensions (and thus permitting an earthquake of force 9). In that area, despite a collective amnesia, you can easily find the traces of tsunamis of comparable force that have happened centuries ago. But it has happened some rewriting of history and fact is that nobody has really integrated these scientific facts.

An other example is the prediction, in detail, of the ‘subprime’ crisis by Nouriel Roubini, who like Taleb, Fleischmann, Shechtman, Wegener, Wright was radicalized by the owners of consensus despite obvious retrospective proofs.

In this sense, cold fusion is a black swan hidden in plain sight as the Sendai earthquake. Cold Fusion will disintegrate, melt, annihilate all the planifications, all the predictions, will destroy thousands of billions of investments, by creating other ones, will take the power and give it to others making senseless myriads of pages of regulations and laws. Cold Fusion will redistribute the geopolitical maps, the sociological maps, the demographic, ecological, scientific, academic maps. However this risk, both exciting and terrifying is not taken seriously in consideration by those who could suffer or benefit from to it.

 I am not speaking about putting yourself in the position to believe that Cold Fusion really exists (as I do) just simply about protection in the improbable case that cold fusion can be real... as you seek protection against the asteroids, an attack against France’s sovereign debt, or catastrophic climate change by heating/cooling. This simple fact as well as many similar ones seems me to be terrifying blindness. Unfortunately this is a general case that leads me to desperation.

Except of Taleb’s message, this cognitive blindness is also reported closely in the work of two other authors whom I have discovered and this has allowed me to describe formally more exactly what I have observed.

At one side, it was Thomas Kuhn (see a summary in English:  [kuhn-sj] ,

 and in French: [kuhn-cnam]) who in the “Structure of Scientific Revolutions” explains the incapacity to convince a supporter of an old paradigm. They are unable to see the anomalies in their own paradigm; they cannot take in consideration proofs not supporting their “world”. They are daltonists in a sea of red flags. For Kuhn, that blindness can be brought closer by the cognitive transition observed when viewing the duck-rabbit/ rabbit-duck optical illusion. A proof of accepting a point of view that was Finvisible before.

On the other side, Roland Benabou has presented a numerical model that explains rationally the collective illusions and group-think observed in financial bubbles, in some industrial or financial catastrophes. His model (see: [benabou-delusion] and its appendix “patterns of denial” is based on the observation that humans can ignore the facts for protecting their estimation of richness, rather than their richness. This is produced when the individuals cannot get rid of the negative consequences of a collective delusion by individual lucidity. A mechanism of Mutual Assured Delusion is stabilizing the system by ignorance of the perturbing facts, by a violent brutality against the dissidents and this is increased when the moment of truth is nearing. The delusion trickles down the hierarchical chain.

Despite not being actually cited by Taleb, these two concepts of cognitive blindness i.e. the paradigmatic blindness for Kun and the mutually assured blindness for Benabou, explain how black swans can exist even if the information is public and the probabilities can be easily evaluated.

In a way, this is what we call “an elephant in the room’ i.e. an obvious

fact that everybody refuses to see and it will be a surprise when its existence cannot be more ignored.

Cold Fusion will thus be a black swan, despite the fact that it is known for over 20 years and there are strong signs that it will be industrialized within 3 years. It is an elephant in the room as was the subprime crisis in 2005, the explosion of the Internet bubble in 2000 and others.  I will not cite but these all start to make noise in the room of consensual science but it is not understood from where the noise comes. This would seem hilarious but it is tragic.

Concavity, convexity, fragility, robustness and antifragility

Taleb is a trader of derivatives and his profession allows him to understand that some enterprises suffer, while others take profit of surprises. This is the subject of this book that introduces the concept and the word “antifragile” that has not existed till now, describing the systems that take profit of surprises. Among other things, it is very instructive to observe that this word was not used despite the fact that we all know the people, the enterprises, the communities, the animals taking profit of changes, catastrophes, revolutions for developing. Taleb explains that the world is not constrained/ruled by the dictionaries.

He introduces the mathematical concept of convexity/concavity see [taleb-medconvexity] for explaining how the changes can have so different effects on the systems. A convex system will suffer a bit due to some changes but will profit much due to other changes. It will be antifragile and will develop as faster as the world changes and will furnish surprises to it. In contrast, a concave system will take a small profit from some changes and will suffer much due to other changes. It will be fragile. Between the two, there will be the robust systems which are quite linear and of lower interest for us here and now, despite the fact that the theories and planifications of our modern world are based on linear hypotheses.

Taleb explains that the organizations that are based on the predictions for the future are becoming more and more fragile and their gains are diminishing. Thus, the financial institutes using complicated models of risk management, or the industrial installations that are modeling all the possible risks, will perish. At the first surprise, everything collapses. This also happens to all the systems we are trying to keep very stable- humans, economies, machines. All are tending to become instable due to time and the impredictables and the transitions are sudden, unmanageable and the players have no experience for managing them. He also debunks the American central bank; -"I can compare it to our French system that I like but that makes us so fragile.

In opposition, Taleb speaks about the antifragile systems. The living systems are naturally antifragile in reasonable limits. He also explains that the antifragile systems are made of fragile components individually as this allows them to reconfiguration. He also speaks about restaurants, the taxis, the traditional markets, the species, and the civilizations.

I see that here belong also the non-formal economies of the developing countries that cope well with the financial crises.

And now about what concerns cold fusion.

When I have read about the status of the papers around 1993, I was amazed by the fact that cold fusion appears in situations far from equilibrium. And is favorised by changing of its environment. I also have seen that the scientific method is fighting against the changes instead of trying to control them. Cold Fusion will be antifragile in some extent. And the behavior of the academic science was quite fragile. The vision of Kozima is sensitive in a chaotic manner to the parameters has been confirmed...

However, the scientific community of cold fusion seemed to behave quite as an antifragile system due to its variety and the mania of each researcher to add his small personal contribution.

The community disregards the scientific method by not reproducing identical experiments and because the reproductions are not done exactly. This gives to the community of scientists non-planed and non-orthodox a plethora of antifragile behaviors, despite the fact that the individual players are trying desperately to follow their pet theory and to enforce the LENR reaction in a stable environment not convenient to it however helping the building of theory.

An other point, if we follow the model of Thomas Kuhn, is that the science

when it is ‘

“normalised” (as Kuhn defines it) by establishing a convenient paradigm becomes more and more fragile being unable to take profit of its predictions.

A path for creating an antifragile version of cold fusion is called up in the literature. The lack of reproducibility of cold fusion via electrolysis can be controlled by the use of a powder or foam or an other structure as the surface of the Celani wires all these having a variable efficiency depending on the parameters in variable manner.

You even can imagine that the reactive particles might activate in the

aleatory mode the inactive ones or deactivating others. In this frame,

the changes can reactivate a reaction in an ‘antifragile’ logic of control.

The essential will to maintain a variety in the population of particles

Optionality : trial and error is the secret of innovation

Taleb explains that the secret of antifragility is “optionality”. Being a financist, Taleb knows well the concept of financial option, a contract that for a modest price allows you to buy or sell one asset at a given price and that you can use this only when this is advantageous for you...

He explains how this concept can be applied for the choices in life and that we have to search for the kind of situations in which you can gain a lot but you refuse to loss if this does not work.

He also proposes a style of exposition to risks. The goal is to catch the small risks in the form of non-limited improbable gains and modest losses. He recommends avoiding controlled risks because these are never really truly, controlled, just under-estimated. Eventually he advises a mode of life in the form of very solid options (sure savings, a comfortable profession) and those risks without limits to gains but with acceptable losses.

He says that the inventors, the innovators are doing this being given that they are searching using the trial-and-error method, see:  [thesis-innov]). For them, the best is to try what is improbable, however not costly for experimenting. He will have many failures, but not so expensive, but also more successes than predicted and these are producing the gains, sometimes quite gigantic ones. He remarks that most of the great scientists are combining a good, quiet profession with speculative researches (Einstein, Lavoisier)

If the research is done by the planed science, this tends to make innovations that are of higher probability even if more expensive. I cannot avoid to think about Hot Fusion (Tokamak, Laser) He is opposed more generally to everything that is too big to fail. And I see a general rejection of big physics in the favor of heterogeneous researches.

He also debunks the centralized public financing that is made to the detriment of the private financing

In opposition, I favor the less expensive research for cold fusion, supporting the Chinese team that is testing  the EmDrive of Shaywer, also supporting the tests of fusion by cavitation- but taking care to not lead these on paths with no outlets. The edisonian approach of Rossi should appeal to him also much. He would not be surprised that a major breakthrough was made ​​by an enterprising group of engineers trying to save a bankrupt country, and helping to regain its ancient pride.

His position is joining those of other specialists in innovation as Norbert Alter ([alter-innov-fr])

Lecturing birds how to fly.

Taleb is quite harsh towards the academic world, which according to his point of view tends to believe that the theory is essential for the practice of technologies

For cold fusion, this problem is visible in the contempt of the holders of the great physics toward the practicians of electrochemistry, radiochemistry or more recently toward the inventors or the garage engineers.

I see for cold fusion that the focus on theory in the detriment of acceptance of the experimental facts has done endless harm to the field It has created a pathological inability for the dominant physicists to accept the facts. This has determined the dominant journals to require theoretical positions that can be well supported; therefore the cold fusion physicists are proposing theories that are more or less revolutionary but never flawless and this leads to radicalization of the field.  Those who perform experiments with light hydrogen and nickel are still not very popular yet...  

It is clear that the most enthusiastic supporters of cold fusion (me too at the start) are falling in the trap to believe that cold fusion would not fly if it is not taught about aerodynamics.

As usual, history has demonstrated that there are the inventors, the men of practice, and the researchers of the field who make the breakthroughs. First, fantastic international class experimenters as Fleischmann, McKubre or Bockris, then came even crazier breakthroughs, the most unimaginable as a stubborn Italian wounded by a legal injustice or Greeks desperate due to the collapse of their country.

History being written by the losers.                                                     

During his diatribe against the academic world, Taleb explains how this world manages to re-write the history of innovations for justifying its dominance, as well as the ruling of theory opposing to the true practicians. He gives diverse examples as the calculus of the financial options, but also the aircraft reactors. The list can be completed with the semiconductors, the airplanes and the nuclear reactors.

Each time the official history tries to convince us that inventions are due to some theoretical breakthroughs. It also tries to hide the importance of filthy harassments, of the insults, the ridiculous debates and retro-actively tries to disseminate doubts regarding the competence and the rigurosity of the true inventors, as well as regarding the importance of their discoveries.

I have met such re-writings of the history in France at the sites of scientific information regarding Dan Schechtman. For cold fusion, it seems that the movie “The Believers” was prepared for accusing Fleischmann and other researchers of their lack of scientific rigor thus promoting the unjustified skepticism. The manner in which the history of the Wright brothers is re-written is also edifying.

I am waiting now to see how, after a period of ridiculous denying and desperate terror against the last hour dissidents, the academic scientific media (SciAm, La Recherche, Nature, Futura-Science) are inventing a hilarious story for us, explaining how an academic laboratory has discovered a means to prove cold fusion and to commercialize it, despite the lamentable work of the laughable pioneers and some incompetent people from the industry.

Less is more

A key concept of the vision of Taleb is that information is not beneficial, because it hides the facts. Information gives a fallacious confidence in the modelisation of the future; the future will be so more surprising as the model is more precise. I recall the subject of finance and a controversial scientific subject for which I heard the expression of “a precisely false model”. This concept is telling me so much more because I have optimized the calculus for such models (this explains why Taleb is not surprising me)

The conclusion of this that we must not try to understand and modelise but we have to conceive a system which adapts, re-organizes, despite or due to the impredictibles. The simple phenomenological models with good security margins are preferable to models based on full physics. These aesthetical models unfortunately calculable too, are responsible for many great errors very difficult to accept considering the huge investments made.

This is a vision that could inspire the innovators in cold fusion, and make them less shy due to the absence of a theory. Probably it has to be predicted how to adapt to the uncertainty of the reaction and to take profit from changes by using dynamic methods of control- ruling.

Taleb also describes an other useful method for predicting the future. He affirms that the predictions of the future announcing new things are never realized. Contradicting him, what can be predicted is the disappearance of the unpleasant characteristics. It also can be predicted the disappearance of the telephone wire, of the fuels and the toxic gases from the car, of the annoying work, of commuting, of unpleasant shopping, of airports, railway stations and railways, of the roads for cars, of noise. How ? It is not known but I am sure it can be done, it will be done. The rest is a black swan and this tells us that within 20 years an EmDrive fed by an LENR reactor with direct thermodynamic conversion in a light backpack will allow us to walk or fly peacefully with our friends. Or to Tibet being protected against rain by a field of forces not imaginably yet today.

For predicting the future what will be changed by cold fusion, it has to be understood that cold fusion can REMOVE : the smoke of automobiles, the stoves, the high tension electric lines, the pumps, the railway stations, the cars that are dangerous for the children in the town for the bikes in the country, the connections to the electrical grid, to the pipes of natural gas, to drinking water, to the wires of heaters, to the credit cards, the TV, the chargers of the phones, the PCs.

The Lindy Effect

Add to this a complementary heuristics the Lindy Effect that says that the antifragile species, the inventions have a life expectation equal with their age. If these have survived, this is because they have good reasons and are resistant to the changes. If it is ancient as the shoe probably it will last still very long time. If it is younger that the piano it will not live so long. It can be estimated that the car, the airplane, the telephone will persist. The outlet to electrical current even if it seems it will disappear, actually can survive for longer time than we imagine.

Taleb thus gives here a methodology for predicting the future complementing other approaches.

Skin in the game.

Taleb also presents an other interesting concept, the necessity that the risk takers should suffer for their errors. The Hammurabi code says that if a house collapses and kills its owner, the builder of the house should be sentenced to death.  We need to enforce skin in the game for “evil antifragile” executives who are able to rebound fallen enterprises to fragilize new enterprises. "
For connecting the risk taking to reality it is necessary, but not sufficient that those who are fragilizing the system should be severely punished if their confidence is destroying the system. Read  [skin-proj]).

In cold fusion, the players are many times heavily investing and are paying a high price for their dissent. The problem is- I cannot see how most of them will benefit from the development of cold fusion. What’s even worse knowing the behavior of the academic world, I suspect that they will be buried in order to hide the tragedy to the public for the benefit to some good mannerd and conveniently conformist academician.

Some of the players as Huizenga and Shanahan who have spoken in public perhaps are risking some penalty. But in the same style as the bankers they will be saved from failure  by the academic world and buried  -really- with discretion and comfort-as if they have been lived a life of glory. We can thus state the antifragility of the academic world that profits both from the true and the false, as long it is consensus. The committees of lecture and those of financing, of giving prizes are feeding themselves well despite the reality. Contrary to this, there is nothing real that pushes/motivates indeed the researchers to risk their careers confronting an academic world with a closed ranking that blocks the reality as long as it is possible, that is- till an application can be developed and sold. Only irrationality can save the system as some imperfect calculations similar to the error of Christopher Columb. I can imagine that the heros of cold fusion have imagined that the way will be much shorter and they will be crowned with glory

Eventually we have the people from industry and the inventors  who put their skin to risk by losses but who also can have big gains.

. It is therefore logical that that progress can happen and reality will prevail. They have no income to support a consensual myth as the academic world, and no interest in hiding a fruitful reality.They have no incentive to support a consensual myth as the academic world"

Epilog

Taleb’s book is 10 times more richer in content than the  few pointa shown

here, however it can be already seen that the history of cold fusion gets its

obvious and natural sense in this frame:

It can be already predicted for the near future:

- a re-writing of the history for blaming the pioneers and recompensating some conventional academician                                                                                 - using cold fusion for making some useless or harmful elements as the fuels and pollution to disappear;

- unimaginable innovations, not the usual myths.

References.

Please do not hesitate to use Google Translate and/or Bing translation for the French and the English texts

·        [antifragile-wsj] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323353204578128872051100906.html

·       [antifragile-continuations] http://continuations.com/post/51065634453/antifragile-by-nassim-taleb-book-review

·       [antifragile-nytimes] http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/17/books/antifragile-by-nassim-nicholas-taleb.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0

·       [antifragile-dunbar] http://www.nickdunbar.net/articles-and-reviews/book-review-antifragile/

·       [kuhn-sj] http://fr.slideshare.net/sandhyajohnson/the-structure-of-scientific-revolutions-thomas-kuhn-book-summary

·       [kuhn-cnam] (fr) http://www.cnam.fr/servlet/com.univ.collaboratif.utils.LectureFichiergw?ID_FICHIER=1295877018064

·       [canard-lapin] (fr) http://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Canard-lapin (en) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rabbit%E2%80%93duck_illusion

·       [benabou-delusion] http://www.princeton.edu/~rbenabou/papers/Groupthink%20IOM%202012_07_02%20BW.pdf

·       [taleb-medconvexity] http://www.fooledbyrandomness.com/medconvex

·       [thesis-innov] http://fr.slideshare.net/hervelegenvre/thesis-history-of-inventors

·       [alter-innov-fr] (fr) http://www.cnam.fr/servlet/com.univ.collaboratif.utils.LectureFichiergw?ID_FICHIER=1295877017789

·       [skin-proj] (fr)http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/improving-managers--incentives-by-nassim-nicholas-taleb/french (en) http://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/improving-managers--incentives-by-nassim-nicholas-taleb

WAYS 5 – THE WAY HOME

Motto: All men should strive to learn before they die, what they are running from, and to, and why.

James Thurber

More than ten years ago I have read ‘The Alchemist’ by Paolo Coelho. I remember the hero’s excitement about taking life into his own hands, in search for something important. The peace and comfort he got when finally finding it, together of course with the message that it was actually in the very place he left in search of adventure – his original home.

There is one question which comes back to my mind from time to time: could the hero have recognized the happiness in his own home, unless he left it behind for a while, and embarked in his travel around the world? I would suspect that probably he could have not. He needed to search for answers and calm down his restlessness before he could find his peace.

More recently, I have read one of the many wise thoughts of Robert Brault: "Sometimes we don't find the thing that will make us happy because we can't give up the thing that was supposed to."

I liked it so much that I shared it with some close friends. One of the receivers raised several questions in response to me: why do we think people should be happy at all? Isn’t the need for happiness somehow over-stated?

It was not the first time when I was confronted with somehow similar rhetorical questions (as the people asking usually do not actually expect me to answer ...). I have come in contact with such dilemas three times over the past year, coming from separate cultures and triggered by different contexts.

One person was purely wondering if we deserve to be happy in general. He seemed to feel that because of our imperfections, flaws, bad thoughts or purely lack of focus in the pursuit of happiness, we should be realistic and not expect that someone just gives themselves away to us (you know… to have and to hold… with or without proper documentation these days).

The other was more inclined to say that some people are just unable to be happy, no matter how hard others strive to make them happy. They are ‘programmed’ in such a manner that they are permanently unsatisfied with the world around them, or suspicious about people's intentions or at least this is how their life evolves in the world they live in.

Finally, a more complex but rather similar question popped up in connection to one of the youngest and dearest members of my family. The question was whether a kid should learn from a very young age how to act, with intent to correct his unhappiness. Whether he should strive to change things, make them different, so that he becomes happy with the results (or at least “happier”, by comparison)?

As all life’s great dilemmas, also this one should be answered under consideration of reasonable balance: yes, I believe people should strive to change whatever makes them unhappy, they should address the pain and the hardship with the aim to improve the situation. However at the same time they should be careful how far they go in the pursuit of their own well-being, take care not to hurt others, recognize responsibility and not give up on certain things to soon, just because they may be unhappy for a while. They should learn how to set ambitious yet achievable goals, learn to differentiate as early as possible between things they can and things they cannot change, when to act and when to accept.

Recently I have also learned (from here) that human abilities for issuing moral judgment regarding other people’s actions and feelings are based into a certain area of our brains, which is gradually forming while we are young, from childhood throughout as far as our teenage period. Therefore children’s ability to correlate happiness with moral criteria about how their actions affect others does not have to do only with education. It is also correlated with the physical development of their brain, which needs to reach a certain maturity before being able to issue sound moral judgments.

This being said, I wish parents good luck and a lot of patience while guiding their kids through nice moral dilemmas! Those steps are really important if they want them to grow being ready for a fulfilling and happy life.

And so… tonight I started to wonder again how come that some people grow up with so different expectation and even perception about happiness. We know now that childhood sets the frame for our physical and emotional readiness for life, for happiness and empathy, for integrity and success. We also know that during our adult life, experience is the one that keeps on shaping our behaviour. I believe it is safe to say that character is formed in our childhood and wisdom is gained throughout the entire life. Intelligence?... it has partially to do with genetic endowment, partially with access to education and partially with personality (as curiosity and intelligence are somehow similar to the egg-hen dilema...).

You may intelligently wonder by now what does this have to do with the idea of 'home'. Well... kind-of everything!

There is a common saying that home is where your heart is. I can add to that a large number of hints about what ‘home’ should ideally represent. One hint that you are home is when you feel that the place makes you happy and serene, comfortable and safe. In that place you can share your sorrows and find courage to confront your inner demons. You can re-charge your batteries and mend your wounds. You can dream happy dreams and start building your way towards achieving those dreams. You can have nightmares and wake up knowing they will go away. Home is where you can create special rules and games for shared living, happily mixing the right proportion of freedom and dependency which define that small (or big) circle called family.

There are many individuals in our world today that are living mostly driven by adrenaline rush – no matter from where they draw this energy (career focus, dependencies of different sorts, moneyteism, power fights, intrigues and gossiping, fierce competition, episodic love and so on). Wasting time, money, energy and innocence may seem painless and easy when you are young, as it still seems that all those are inexhaustible. They are not. And every individual needs to find his way home while still young enough to dream. Then start building the comfort associated with that chosen home, in order to prepare for the next phase of life – the one where the resources become obviously limited.

I sometimes wonder why I am so childishly determined to be happy. Even more, why I am so inclined to see myself as being already happy. Just because… a myriad of things happen around me and I am grateful to witness their happening (no matter if they are little or big things). Finally, I wonder why I am so determined to try anything in my power to make other people happy around me (or at least convince them that being happy may be good for them in the long run…).

One thing I have learned from the last three years of my live. Geography has gradually less to say about where home is, in our contemporary word. We have become more dynamic and the idea of home basically is given by other less material elements that keep a family together.

Once we find our way home, we can also accept that we can be comfortably happy, for as long as we are. And then some…

Have a nice Home!

Georgina Popescu