Ironically, I suspect that some people reject cold fusion because it does not seem to have a down side. Fossil fuels have pollution problems, including greenhouse gases. Nuclear power (fission) has the nightmare chance of a nuclear accident and the looming problem of how to dispose of nuclear waste. Hydroelectric dams block salmon runs and affect river ecosystems. Wind turbines kill off migrating birds and bats. Everything seems to have an ecological cost, a down side, except cold fusion which promises cheap, clean energy. I suspect that some people reject the possibility of cold fusion, not because technical difficulties nor because of the problems it presents, but because it does not seem to present any problems at all.
Cold fusion seems too good to be true. Please note that I am not saying that cold fusion is too good to be true, I am just saying that people are emotionally wired to believe that our lives have a kind of balance or symmetry to them. Something good is followed by something bad, every benefit has a cost. This is the idea of fairness or justice and as a general view of the world, it serves humanity well.
In this instance though, our imagination because of adherence to this idea is failing to see what cold fusion might become. That does not present us with a failure of the idea of cold fusion; that shows us a failure of imagination and of the idea of fairness. The idea of cold fusion does not seem to have that balance or zero sum game restricting it. Of course, it probably does, but to dig it out requires much more imagination than we have now. Cold fusion seems to be only positive in its implications, and therefore, less real. Because of that I suspect that people will sometimes dismiss cold fusion, not on scientific grounds, but because their emotional wiring and their lack of imagination makes it sound too good to be true.
This emotional wiring says, for example, that, “everyone will get their just desserts,” and because we know that evil bastards sometimes live long lives and die a peaceful death, we add, “in the next life if not in this one.” It tells us, “do good things, good things happen, do bad things, bad things happen” as Earl says, following his karma. We teach our kids that hard work is rewarded, that taking the easy way out will cost more in the end. We teach that everything has a cost, and that you can’t get something for nothing. These are good lessons to learn in that they keep us to consider others as well as ourselves, they moderate our behavior.
These lessons, however, channel the imagination, restricting it to maintain the system already in place, not creating new options or a new system. They limit progress to that within the current closed system, not allowing for new revolutions. They lead to a belief that if I cannot “see” it, then there must be nothing there. These various sayings express a great emotional truth that keeps society chugging along, but that emotional truth is not always factually correct. Sometimes we need to get out of that pattern of business as usual; sometimes we need to change direction. Cold fusion does not present an opportunity of business as usual, but is a game changer in so many different ways. We cannot really imagine a world with cold fusion; it is too big for us, too many ramifications. We are just going to have to make this world so that we can see it for ourselves.
While we cannot really imagine a world with cold fusion, we do know that we need a game changer, and as much as we like believing in fairness, we do not want what we deserve. “Fairness” is something that really we only want for the other guy; mercy is what we prefer for ourselves. There would be a kind of poetic justice if we were trapped in a world of our own creation; a world of declining resources, increasing populations, desertification and increasingly extreme weather. It takes no imagination to get what we deserve; it just takes business as usual.
But maybe, with a little boldness we can get another world, a world that reflects mercy for us in addition to justice. In this world of mercy, where we do not get what deserve, but also get a hand helping us up with what we need, maybe we get to have cold fusion. But maybe cold fusion is a gift. Not everything has to be a trade-off between goods and evils as fairness and balance suggest. Instead of believing that cold fusion is too good to be true, perhaps we can imagine cold fusion as something special, which it is, for it is a gift that by nature is appropriate and needed for where we are today. We shouldn’t worry too much about why it happens, just how it happens Our attitude is that we should be thankful for it and look for the opportunity to put it to good use.
Cold Fusion Now represented at the Humboldt Math Festival in beautiful Humboldt County on the north coast of California this past Saturday April 9 at the area’s Bayshore Mall.
The Humboldt Math Festival is a gathering for the local county’s math instructors from the earliest grades through Humboldt State University. Teachers set up tables and activities for the kids in the community and expose them to different kinds of math and science fun.
I have been teaching part-time as a math instructor at a local community college for the past couple of years, and I have presented exhibits regularly for community events, mostly on the topic money – favorites such as Paper Money and Inflation and Ancient Coinage and Pythagoras, with the occasional space-science topic such as Sounds of Space.
Now, there is little more important than finding another arrangement for living on this planet. And cold fusion is the clean energy that will provide this. This year’s topic had to be nuclear. I decided to try an activity posted on the Lawrence Berkeley Lab site called activity on Marshmallow Nuclei.
We had the kids make nuclei out of marshmallows. The protons were pink and the neutrons were white.
Kids making nuclei out of colored marshmallows.
We had emission spectra tubes and diffraction gratings to view the different elements. A Van der Graff generator demonstrated charge perfectly.
Student get charged over science.
The kids could then shoot the nuclei with a Marshmallow Accelerator operated by math teacher Michael Butler. (That’s two fellows perusing the cold fusion materials in the background!)
Professor operates homemade accelerator.
I had algebra students helping out – for extra credit! – and they did a great job.
Algebra students help out for extra credit.
Of course we had a table of cold fusion info for the parents and older kids. This was our assortment of books to peruse.
Books on display at our table.
We gave out Scott Chubb‘s article reviewing Rossi’s demonstration which many people where happy to hear about. Copies of Robert E. Godes‘ Quantum Fusion Hypothesis went fast.
Free info on science and news were available.
And thanks to Infinite-Energy, we were able to giveaway a some Fire from Water videos, which are posted on their New Energy Foundation Youtube channel and you can watch for free, and a packet of info on energy and other fun stuff with a complimentary magazine.
Magazines were compliments of Infinite Energy.
We thank Infinite-Energy magazine for all your support, and best wishes in this time of transition. Your continued generosity has helped to educate alot of people today, as you have for years, with your rare publication.
I had a number of conversations about LENR technologies with passersby, and the response was overwhelmingly positive. One person said “Boy, I’d like to invest in this!” Many young people had never hear of cold fusion or LENR, and they were excited about the possibilities. I gave away all the info I had, and lots of stickers with the website on it.
All in all, the day was full of communication on an issue that has no parallel in importance. As our world unravels, and adults flounder, kids wake up every morning with an innocent hope, and today, though they don’t require it, we gave them a good reason for it.
Cold Fusion Now!
Related articles:
New Energy Outreach Success on 10/10/10 by Ruby Carat October 10, 2010
Letter to the Secretary of Energy by Ruby Carat October 14, 2010
Keep talking, keep typing by Ruby Carat July 22, 2010
Defined by Wikipedia: “Technocracy is a form of government in which engineers, scientists, health professionals and other technical experts are in control of decision making in their respective fields. The term technocracy derives from the Greek words tekhne meaning skill and kratos meaning power, as in government, or rule. Thus the term technocracy denotes a system of government where those who have knowledge, expertise or skills compose the governing body. In a technocracy decision makers would be selected based upon how highly knowledgeable they are, rather than how much political capital they hold.”
Ron Miller is a retired engineer who now educates about technocracy conducting workshops for kids at schools and colleges. One of his students described technocracy as “a cross between Star Trek and Nova”, which may be as accurate as Wikipedia.
James, whose show looks at issues of money and society, asked about the support shown for a “no money society” from technocracy.org poll participants. Mr. Miller responded:
“What the organization proposed was that the amount of energy that is required to produce every single thing that society needs should be accounted for, and everyone would be given their share, simply by dividing between the population, of the amount of energy over a given budgeting period.
An then when you go into a store, that amount of energy would be deducted so that we could keep track of what’s going where, and so on and so forth. You still have to have a feedback mechanism, for instance, so that the warehouses know that their beginning to run out of a particular product and the warehouse can tell the manufacturer they need more and the reason we chose energy is because energy is the most fundamental constituent of anything physical.
In the universe, there is really only two things, matter and energy, and without energy there is no motion and no movement. It requires energy to dig materials out of the ground, it requires energy to turn them into products, and so forth. Most of the time we don’t measure it, but we certainly could.
One of the real problems, too, that you have when we talk about money, and this is one of the things that I make sure to explain to kids in the classroom, is that money is not wealth. Money is not wealth at all.
Wealth is the chairs they’re sitting in, the buildings they’re sitting in, the houses they go home to, the cars they drive in. That’s wealth. Money is just a pile of paper.”
James asked Mr. Miller what would life look like with this different type of living arrangement, and how would a country operate under this system?
“There would be numbers of things that simply wouldn’t change much,” Mr. Miller said. “People still have to have homes, some place to live, they still have to eat, and so on and so forth, and go about their business.”
“But when you no longer have a price system, there’s a whole bunch of things that you don’t need anymore. You don’t need Wall Street. In fact it becomes worthless, pointless, it can’t exist. Neither can corporations exist. The banking systems becomes obviously non-existent, just an empty building. Most of the financial structure that we have now essentially would disappear.
We certainly wouldn’t need the advertising that we have anymore. There’s going to be huge numbers of things connected with the financial system that we are not going need.
A great deal of what is left can and should be automated, very quickly in some cases. Immediately, what the organization proposed was that a person should start work about the age of 25 and retire by the age of 45. I think that even with a framework of only 20 years of working, I think you’d have trouble finding work for alot of people.
Now, that having been said, we’re going to have to completely rebuild our infra-structure. It’s at a minimum inadequate, if not downright dangerous. It needs to be drastically converted into something that uses far less energy.”
Mr. Miller offers solutions like transportation systems like high-speed magnetically levitated trains, which would replace polluting airplanes. People would work only 4 hours a day, 4 days a week, leaving more time for them to engage in creative pursuits. He describes “an explosion” in the arts and sciences “because people will want something to do with their time and lives of value.”
He believes the transformed society would have personal transports that are diesel-driven, which means there is a huge hole in this model, but he does say overpopulation is the biggest issue that must be dealt with whether or not a technocracy was established.
M. King Hubbert was an original Technocrat. We recently wrote about Mr. King’s interest in nuclear power and his time at the Nuclear Regulatory Commission, then the Atomic Energy Commission. Those who claim Carbon Currency is an outgrowth of the Technocracy, Inc are missing the point by limiting credit to carbon, though perhaps it is not surprising that this is so in a world where governments are indistinguishable from fossil fuel corporations.
A free-energy society operating on energy credits may sound radical, but low-energy nuclear reactionsLENR technology is poised to drop on world culture within the next couple of years, and questions such as how our economy can and should be shaped will be important to stabilizing the effects.
It was Marshall McLuhan whose theories of communication expressed the importance of understanding our technology so that we do not become slaves to it. Laws of Media, written with his son Eric McLuhan, models a system that allows an inventory of effects when new technologies are introduced in society, in order to better mitigate the inevitable disservices.
In the discussion of how to create a new living arrangement on a planet-wide scale using cold fusion technology, one model is proposed by Technocracy, but you decide. In a no-money society, how would we operate with free-energy credits?
[latexpage]
This article organizes information about radiation in three sections.
1 Difference between radioactive materials and radiation. 2 Types of radiation emitted by nuclear processes. 3 No dangerous radiation in cold fusion.
1 Difference between radioactive materials and radiation.
Today’s nuclear fission reactors are more than a poor choice for a primary energy source because of the growing risk of contamination by radioactive materials, which can emit harmful radiation. Humans are not ready to take the responsibility for disaster that could last for geological time, when the amount, and type, of radioactive fuel used in these reactors has the potential to create dead zones for hundreds, if not tens-of-thousands of years.
Why go down this path when there exists an alternative ultra-clean nuclear power? Low-energy nuclear reactions LENR, or cold fusion, is nuclear power from hydrogen, the most common element in the universe, with oceans of it here on Earth. Cold fusion does not use radioactive fuel. Cold fusion does not create harmful radioactive waste. The nuclear reaction occurs inside a tiny piece of metal, like palladium or nickel, in a small device that sits on your tabletop.
Radiation is all around us, everyday, and some radiation of certain kinds can be good and healthy, while other radiation, or too much of the good kind, is bad. For instance, too much solar radiation can cause burns that lead to skin cancers later in life, while too little causes a vitamin D deficiency.
And all radiation is not alike. Of the sunlight reaching Earth’s surface, the ultra-violet portion can burn the skin while the radio-wave portion appears to have left life at the surface unaffected. Both sunlight and X-rays are forms of radiation that are created by nuclear and atomic reactions. But some materials spontaneously and naturally emit radiation, and they are called radioactive. Here is a nice chart about the radiation around us and dosage.
Radioactive materials contain particles of atomic elements that are unstable, and decay, emitting electromagnetic radiation, or photons, as well as other particles, which may themselves also be radioactive.
Radiation describes the particles and photons emitted by a radioactive material.
Hydrogen and its IsotopesAn example of a radioactive material and the radiation emitted from it is given by the simplest element hydrogen. The element hydrogen H is composed of one proton and one electron. Hydrogen has two isotopes, deuterium $^{2}H$ and tritium $^{3}H$. Isotopes are atoms that have extra neutrons in their nucleus. Deuterium has have one extra neutron, making a total of two nucleons, while tritium has two extra neutrons, making a total of three nucleons.
While hydrogen $^{1}H$ and deuterium $^{2}H$ both are found naturally on Earth in abundance, tritium is not, for tritium is unstable, and decays with a half-life of about 12 years, meaning there is only half as much material left as there was 12 years earlier. This decay characterizes radioactivity.
Tritium is an example of a radioactive particle. During radioactive decay for tritium, the nucleus of the tritium atom, called a triton, which has one proton and two neutrons, turns into a Helium-3 atom $^{3}He$, an electron, and another tiny energetic particle called a neutrino, all releasing 18.6 keV of energy.[1]
A triton has one proton and two neutrons. The nucleus of the $^{3}He$ has two protons and one neutron. During radioactive decay of the tritium atom, one of the original neutrons in the triton turned into a proton, along with creating an electron and a neutrino in a process called Beta decay, written β−.
Beta decayBeta decay describes when an electron, called a beta particle, and a neutrino fly out of a neutron, leaving a proton in its place. The radioactive material is the tritium, and the radiation is the electron and neutrino. Many elements that have an abundance of neutrons are radioactive this way, and sometimes decay splitting into two smaller atoms, naturally fissioning.
Electrons are usually thought of as carrying electrical current to power our appliances. But a large charge of current can be deadly. A beta particle (electron) will fly out with a varying kinetic energy averaging 5.7 keV. [1] This particle is incapable of penetrating the skin. External sources of beta decay from tritium will not harm the body.
But if a radioactive particle is inhaled or ingested, then beta-decay can cause damage to the cells of the body. The radioactive particle will eventually decay and emit a Beta particle that can then collide with internal tissue, perhaps ionizing the atoms in cells. If the Beta particle hits a DNA molecule, lasting genetic consequences can ensue.
Tritium and beta decay is used to light red Exit signs and glow-in-the-dark watch hands.As long as you don’t breathe it in, or eat it, tritium decay poses little threat to humans and tritium is used in devices such as betalights, which use the electrons emitted by tritium just like electrons that provide electrical current, to provide power to stand-alone illuminated night signs, as well as provide illumination for watches.
There is little naturally occurring tritium here on Earth because most of it has decayed away. Tritium is manufactured for commercial use and for use in hot fusion reactors selling for \$30,000US a gram.[1]
Tritium is not used in cold fusion research. Cold fusion cells use hydrogen $^{1}H$ and deuterium $^{2}H$, both cheap, plentiful, and evenly distributed around the earth in sea-water. No radioactive fuel is used in the cold fusion process.
2 Types of radiation emitted by nuclear processes.
In the conventional nuclear reactions of fission and hot fusion, the main types of radiation seen are particles like alpha particles, beta particles, and electromagnetic radiation such as gamma rays or x-rays. The three main types of radiation are named in the order that they were discovered and after the first three letters of the Greek alphabet. Conventional nuclear fission which relies on a chain-reaction, also produces neutrons.
Alpha particles are helium nuclei. That is to say that alpha particles are the nucleus of helium atoms, consisting of two protons and two neutrons $^{4}He$. Alpha particles are emitted by the natural radioactivity of the heavier elements and their isotopes. Alpha particles are larger clusters of nucleons and generally have low energy that a piece of paper will shield against alpha particles.
Beta particles β−, are electrons that are emitted during beta decay. Beta-emitting isotopes can have a half-life as long as $10^{16}$ years or as short as milliseconds. Beta particles can also be positively- charged positrons denoted β+. Beta particles can be stopped by ”a few millimeters of aluminum”.[2]
Gamma radiation is made up of light, or high-energy photons, that have an extremely small wavelength. They are similar to x-rays, with gamma rays carrying more energy. ”X-rays result when electrons return to a lower energy by emitting electromagnetic radiation and gamma radiation result when particles in the nucleus return to a lower energy.” [1,153]
The light we see is radiation; radio waves are radiation; the whole electromagnetic spectrum is radiation -- of photons.
Both gamma radiation and x-rays will penetrate the body easily and they can be harmful to living tissue. Only shielding made of lead will stop gamma radiation.
Some nuclear reactions can also create neutrons. Neutrons can be dangerous as they can penetrate the body, ionizing cells and creating genetic damage.
3 No dangerous radiation in cold fusion.
While no source of energy is 100% clean, cold fusion ranks cleaner over oil, gas, coal, today’s nuclear fission, hot fusion, solar and wind. Solar and wind are renewable sources, but the materials and manufacturing of solar panels and wind turbines given their energy density don’t compare to cold fusion.
First of all, LENR is a process of that does not involve today’s nuclear fission power designs, so there is no chain-reaction. A cold fusion cell will not ”runaway” like critical masses and fission bombs. Cold fusion energy devices will turn on and off when you want them to.
Edmund Storms, a nuclear scientist who has researched cold fusion for over two decades wrote a survey of the field called The Science of Low Energy Nuclear Reaction. Published in 2007, it is a technical summary of results for a scientific reader. In it, there are clear statements about the lack of radiation from cold fusion cells.
This table from Storms’ Science provides the general experimental results regarding radiation from LENR experiments.
Table 14 Expected but missing behavior. [1,176]
1. Gamma emission is rare.
2. Neutron emission is rare.
3. Alpha emission rate is not consistent with accumulated helium.
4. X-rays expected when a significant alpha flux is absorbed are missing.
5. The second nuclear product resulting from transformation is frequently missing.
A listing of the reported studies showing radiation detected in LENR experiments can be found in Table 11 of Storms’ Science[1]. Each entry is listed with radiation type and strength, along with the kind of cell that produced it. He writes:
”Fortunately none of this radiation is a health hazard nor is it easy to detect outside of the apparatus, which makes the process sate to study and safe as an eventual source of energy.” [1,105]
Quite simply, the type and quantity of radiation seen in today’s nuclear power does not show up LENR.
Cold fusion cells do not behave at all like conventional theories of nuclear reactions dictate. The fact that dangerous levels are missing from this reaction was in part responsible for many scientists dismissal of this as a nuclear effect. To quote Nobel laureate Julian Schwinger ”The circumstances of cold fusion are not those of hot fusion.”
Infinite Energy magazine published an FAQ containing this question: Why doesn’t cold fusion produce dangerous ionizing radiation and neutrons?
“Nobody knows for certain why the primary signature of cold fusion is excess heat, not deadly radiation. Nevertheless, many LENR theorists have put forth very intriguing proposals for the mechanism of these reactions. There are, in fact, many dozens of competing theories smaller number of which are very well fleshed out. The exact nature of the LENR reactions is one of the many unsolved scientific mysteries surrounding them. Some scientists think that because the effect does not produce intense radiation, it cannot be a nuclear process. Others say the energy is produced, but then somehow absorbed by the metal lattice either as high frequency vibrations, or through coherent processes in which many delocalized vibrations are involved.” [7]
LENR devices do not have any appreciable radiation from alpha particles, beta particles, high- energy neutrons, and there is no danger of a runaway chain reaction. What about the x-rays and gamma radiation, those high-energy photons that could pose a risk to biological life? Storms writes:
”Most X-radiation will be absorbed by the apparatus, thereby making its detection unlikely.”[1,153]
Andrea Rossi’s LENR-powered hot-water boiler, the Energy CatalyzerECat, is expected to be the first commercial application of this new energy science and uses micro-sized nickel particles infused with hydrogen gas to initiate power production. The ECat is currently being tested and evaluated at the University of Bologna in Bologna, Italy. This device will be commercially implemented in a factory in Athens, Greece, where it will undergo further tests on its safety in an industrial setting.[3]
Andrea Rossi's E-Cat prototype. Photo: Daniele Passerini
For wide-spread use of cold fusion technology, these devices must be safe for the public. This was noted by Jed Rothwell in his Cold Fusion and the Future.
“Some people fear there may be a hidden, long term threat to the health of people who work in close proximity to cold fusion reactors. So far, nobody has detected dangerous levels of x-rays or other emissions from a cold fusion cell. The autoradiographs prove that cold fusion does produce low levels of radioactivity, but the levels are so low that scientists have difficulty detecting them with sensitive instruments. Compared to the radiation from televisions and the natural background of radiation from space, radon and other sources, cold fusion radiation seems likely to remain so low as to be nearly undetectable. Still, cold fusion might conceivably produce some unknown form of radiation or some other deleterious effect. We will have to make sure this is not the case, by exposing rats and other laboratory animals to unshielded cold fusion reactors, and by carefully monitoring the health of the first group of people who work with the reactors every day.“[4]
On Rossi’s device, ”about 50 kilograms of lead shielding, about 2 centimeters thick, protects against any gamma radiation.”[6] During an open Q&A after the NyTeknik interview, the question of gamma radiation from the ECat was posed to inventor Rossi by a member of the public, Goran Ericsson. ”If no gammas are observed, what is the reason to believe nuclear reactions are involved?”
“Andrea Rossi: We observed gammas under the 300 keV range. We did not find, so far, the couple at 180 degrees at 511 keV, and the research we are continuing with the University of Bologna is aimed also to better probe the specter of the gamma produced. It will take some month of research, after which we will able to better understand the theory at the root of the thermal effect.
We have to calculate also the recoil energy, integrated with the kinetic energy we produce. We want to correlate the thermal effect with the gamma specter we will define. We also are continuing to analyze the atomic and isotopical transmutation, to correlate it to the gamma and to the thermal effect. I want to know if Cu-59, 60, 61, 62 decay by electron capture, instead of beta plus emission; if so a very interesting consideration can be derived.
This a very difficult research we are investing on (my money). And, at last, if we will not find high energy gamma and 511 keV couples, well, we will have to think about a new rule. It would not be the first time: they have digged a big hole, there in Geneva, to understand things, and they are finding things by the classic physics could not happen, particle that by the classic physics could not exist. But those things, evidently, are not good Physics students, so they insist to exist. Just read the ”Nuclear Models” of Greiner Maruhn to get a taste of this.“[5]
Speculating on what could happen if Rossi’s device broke, Hank Mills of Pure Energy Systems news wrote:
“There could potentially be a very brief spike of radioactivity for a moment if the vessel cracked or failed, but the venting of the hydrogen gas would immediately end the nuclear reactions taking place and any production of radioactivity.” [4]
An additional batch of questions from Ny Teknik’s readers was answered by Mr. Rossi, some of which addressed the question of radiation from beta decay and radioactivity.
“Peter Ekstrm: In the fusion of a proton with Ni-58 a substantial activity of Cu-59 is formed. Cu-59 decays with a half-life of 82 seconds by beta+ decay. In the Focardi and Rossi article it is stated that: ”No radioactivity has been found also in the Nickel residual from the process”. Considering the very high activity of Cu-59 that is produced, it is surprising that no activity is detected. Even ten half-lives after the end of a run the activity should be of the order of 1013 Bq, which is not only easily measurable (with a detector far away from the source) but also deadly for everybody present in the room! (Could you explain?)
Rossi: No radioactivity has been found in the residual metals, it is true, but the day after the stop of the operation. In any case you are right, if 59-Cu is formed from 58-Ni we should have the couples of 511 keV at 180 and we never found them, while we found keV in the range of 100-300 keV. I think no 59Cu is produced, I suppose only stable Cu is produced from the transmutation of the isotopes 62Ni and 64Ni. I desume this from what we find after the operations. Your observation is correct.”
Cold fusion technology is just beginning to emerge from a science into a technology. Much is still unknown about the science, and further testing will be taken over the next several years to ensure the safety of this technology. To date, cold fusion devices have not produced any appreciable dangerous radiation like that of today’s nuclear fission reactors. Scientists who have worked in this field for the past two decades are healthy and safe.
More importantly, LENR reactions produce energy that is cleaner than any source of power used today. Whether it’s hydrocarbons like oil, gas, or coal, or renewable technologies such a solar and wind, the power of cold fusion lies in its incredible energy density, a nuclear power from hydrogen and greener than today’s nuclear fission power plants.
If you have taken a philosophy course, you probably have heard the story of Socrates, who as an old man was convinced of impiety and corrupting the youth in Athens in 399 BC, and was sentenced to drink the poison hemlock. Instead of fleeing Athens to points unknown, Socrates abided by the decision of his homeland and refused attempts to smuggle him out of the country. He argued that as a loyal citizen of Athens, he should abide by her judgment, just as he had obeyed her laws all his life. By doing so, he made himself into a martyr and eventually, the same courts that had persecuted him; persecuted his accusers.
Socrates, armed with his quest to find someone wiser than himself, may have been the gadfly, irritating his fellow citizens and sometimes making them look like fools. However, he also comes across in Plato as the only truly loyal son of Athens, who with the irritation he caused woke up his fellow citizens, allowed them to see the errors in their thinking and correct those errors if they so desired. Socrates, being portrayed as the loyal son of Athens on the one hand, and the quintessential philosopher on the other, is the patron “saint” of philosophy, for he secured the position of philosophy in Athens and thus ultimately, in the world.
But why did philosophy need to be saved? Truth is; that since its beginning, philosophy was not too popular. Think of it, you are the citizen of an average Greek city, happy with the way things are done, which is the same way they have been done for the past thousand years, and here comes some new upstart, criticizing Tradition and Custom, advocating phusis or Nature, talking about the arche (overarching principle) of things. You may not be the high man on the totem pole, but you understand your place in the cosmos and are anxious about whether everything that makes sense is being overturned. You do not understand much of what this new-fangled philosopher is saying, but you do understand that he is not talking about the traditional gods or rather, the gods as they are traditionally understood. The whole entire city; with its political and cultural system are based on that traditional understanding. “Impiety” is a crime against the city.
So while you do not know exactly what the philosopher is saying, you do know that it is bad news and should be nipped off at the bud. Instead of putting up with the impiety and having the whole political and cultural system undermined, it easier to kill or exile or just chase offending fools out of town. That is what they often did, in Athens and elsewhere in the Greek world. Socrates’ treatment, far from being an exception to the normal treatment of philosophers, is merely the most prominent example of what often happened, the persecution of the philosopher.
On the death of Alexander, Aristotle fled Athens, “lest Athens sin against philosophy twice.” Of course, in saying “twice,” Aristotle was not counting the persecutions by Athens of Anaxagoras, Damon, Protagoras and Diagoras. Anaxagoras of Clazomenae was a friend of the Athenian leader Pericles, and was imprisoned and later, expelled from Athens. Damon the sophist, a friend and associate of Pericles and Socrates, was ostracized. Protagoras of Abdera, the sophist, was expelled from Athens and his books were burned in the agora. Diagoras, an atheist, was condemned to death and fled Athens. A talent of silver (26 kg) was offered as a reward to whoever killed him.
Xenophanes of Colophon was exiled. Zeno of Elea died defying a tyrant. Pythagoras, in some accounts, was killed by a mob. He also had left his home city of Samos, moved to Kroton and then moved again to Metapontum. We do not know how urgent these moves were, but they probably were not entirely voluntary. His followers, the Pythagoreans, were persecuted in Sicily, and there were two general uprisings against the Pythagoreans in Magna Graecia. In fact, what happened to Socrates was very much like what had happened to Pythagoreans or Sophists elsewhere before.
There was a general pattern, a philosopher would make himself unwelcome in a town and would either be chased out or thrown out. In many ways, it was easier for the philosopher to leave and perhaps start up somewhere else, than it would be for him to stay and fight the charges. The problem though is that while running, for example, a Pythagorean cell out of town, took care of that particular cell, it did not solve the issue of the underlying conflict between tradition on the one hand, and philosophers and sophists on the other. This kind of scene was repeated over and over again, throughout Greece until the trial of Socrates basically embarrassed people for the conviction of an old man who always had been loyal to his city, even though that loyalty was expressed in rather idiosyncratic ways.
In philosophy’s early days (c. 585-399), philosophers were often persecuted, but also philosophers persecuted other philosophers. Xenophanes and Heraclitus were highly critical of Pythagoras and his followers, while the Pythagoreans expelled and persecuted renegade members such as Hippasus. Plato was told that he should not bother burning Democritus’ books because there were too many to get them all. Plato also avoids any allusions to Democritus and the atomists in his dialogues. While Plato defines and co-opts other philosophers and sophists who preceded him, he wants to annihilate the memory of Democritus. He is not much better for Parmenides of Elea. A character in Plato’s Sophist (241d-242a), the Eleatic Stranger, talks about (theoretically) having to murder his father, Parmenides, in order to make way for a new critique. To the Greeks, patricide was the worst crime.
Of course, for “golden” Plato, all his sins are still nullified today by the quality and character of his writing. But, it is not only a matter of us overlooking the crimes of a man who through his art delights us. Plato’s “crimes” were done in wartime when philosophy was besieged, and in the end Plato’s work legitimatizes philosophy, establishes it and saves it from persecution. Plato’s work saves philosophy, but it also transforms it and in the process it loses something. Philosophy after Plato is not the same kind of beast that it was before Plato came along. Just in the last 150 years have we really started to realize that, showing how complete Plato’s vision is for us, even today.
But what does this have to do with cold fusion? Maybe just this: No matter how frustrating it is, trying to get cold fusion taken seriously as far as funding and publicity is concerned, it could be worse and it has been worse and also, we have gotten through that. The lesson of the persecution of philosophers in ancient Archaic and Classical Greece is that a thing which is an anathema one moment can become accepted and embraced the next. In fact, not only can that thing become embraced, the very existence that there ever was a conflict can become glossed over. Because of that habit of humanity to gloss over past events, we have been here much more often than one might guess. Because of this habit, one should not confuse the “map” (or formal history) of a thing, with the “territory” of the actual phenomena. By “territory,” here I mean cold fusion as a phenomena which has social and eventually, historical significances in addition to its scientific/technological significances.
That is not to say that scientifically cold fusion is “right,” and that it needs to be (socially) accepted as such. That is an issue ultimately for physicists and engineers to settle, as physicists and engineers, not as gatekeepers who protect the scientific status quo because they are strongly invested in it. At the same time, anyone who is curious about cold fusion should use their God given intelligence, and judge the matter for themselves of whether there is potential there and whether it is worth us as a society pursuing. If they decide there is, then welcome. If not, then I thank them for looking and I will trust that they have considered it in good faith. To me there is enough there to amaze about what has been found so far, and to wonder about what more might be possible.
This article benefits from Peter J Ahrensdorf mentioning of persecuted philosophers in his The Death of Socrates and the Life of Philosophy, (State U. of NY Press, Albany). His book is a close reading of Plato’s Phaedo in the light of the persecution.
