Having just wrapped up the week long 18th International Conference on Cold Fusion, some post thoughts and take-aways are beginning to form, and likely will continue in the days to come, as the decompression from the conference and related travel begin to take shape.
The Hours, Long.
The conference itself was excellent, though in actual execution it was rather brutal. Peter Hagelstein told me it reminded him of a conference in the early 2000’s where after all was said and done he settled in for a full 24 hour sleep. This conference had many of the attendees feeling the same way.
For myself and Ruby, after the 8am to 6 or 7pm lectures and presentations would conclude, it was a quick stop into town for some food and then back to the university dorm room (where most of the attendees stayed) for a complete write up on the days events while downloading photos and video, and transferring over numerous 32gig chips to hard drives. We’d usually wrap up a little before 1 am, then set the alarm for 6 to fix typos and finish up any transfers, before the presentations began at 8am.
Seeing as no one else was doing this, covering the event that is, it became a must do moral imperative that fueled us forward. The television program 60 minutes was apparently there for part of one day and I think there was an AP reporter sitting in front of me during some of the lectures, but most of the time I noticed he was on his laptop looking at Facebook.
There was also a filmmaker named Ken Fox who had attended a previous conference and was working diligently on his own Cold Fusion documentary. We hung out and shared ideas, technical and otherwise. Great guy.
But as far as the day to day coverage went with nightly publishing, ColdFusionNow.org was pretty much it.
The Power of Gathering.
“Human relationships always help us to carry on because they always presuppose further developments, a future — and also because we live as if our only task was precisely to have relationships with other people.” — Albert Camus
What was evident at this conference was the power of gathering. The enthusiasm among the scientists, researchers and attendees was strong. One night we simply selected numerous photos from the day and made them the majority of the post in an attempt to convey the excitement present in the air. While one criticism came in on the lack of coverage for that day, someone else did get what we were visually trying to reveal. I posted it to our Facebook page and this was one of the responses that summed it up nicely:
I was just looking through some ICCF-18 “day three” pics from coldfusionnow.org If you have any confidence in reading body language and facial expressions as an indicator, you would probably agree that the conference and more importantly, it’s content are being received with “warm regards”… https://coldfusionnow.org/iccf-18-day-3-photos/
A leading scientist in the field told me during one of the breaks that the most exciting part of the conference was not actually so much the lectures, but rather the “behind the scenes” activity going on. Many exchanges on experiments and other aspects took place, and some of the information exchanged by presenters was not included in their lectures.
On top of it all was the simple act of friends from across the globe coming together, seeing one another, hanging out, laughing, smiling, socializing, philosophizing and reminiscing. While the same elements of any annual conference on any subject would take place, this being the subject of Cold Fusion and the history this particular endeavor carries, there seems an extra importance in having these conferences and sharing comradery with one another.
THE YOUNG GUNS.
If there was one theme I noticed throughout, one element that according to others separated this conference from those in the past, it was clearly the talk about, The Young Guns.
Heavyweights Mike McKubre and Peter Hagelstein both personally commented how the presence of young people at this conference was astonishing and inspiring.
At Thursday night’s banquet, Peter had young men and women going up to him and requesting photographs. Peter said that his heart got yanked hard when he was being told by some of the young people how his work had really inspired them.
Others as well were surprised by the presence of youth. Many were encouraged by it, seeing as the leaders in the field are getting up there in years (McKubre is nearing 65, and considered the Young Gun of the remaining original ICCF group).
The Young Guns ranged from a high school student attending the conference with her dad (and was now re-considering variations on her experiments after listening to the lectures) to the extremely knowledgeable young men and women from the Sidney Kimmel Institute of Nuclear Renaissance (SKINR). I also met a 20 something guy named Nikita involved with analytical chemistry (pictured in the above top photo with Peter) who was part of the poster session presentations. He had incredible enthusiasm. At one point he stood beaming while carefully looking around the room. He then turned to me and said, “Yeah, these are my people…”
The Martin Fleischmann Memorial Project really made their presence known at this conference and they are definitely creating a pathway for young people to hop on board and get directly involved with Cold Fusion applications and experimentation. They provide a certain “cool” to this field while combining all the important elements from utilizing technology and the internet in relevant ways to taking direct, immediate actions to make things happen, all while backing it with strong and addicting enthusiasm. They made a HUGE mark at ICCF-18.
Overall, it was a long conference, and we agreed with many attendees who said they felt it was weeks and not days that had gone by. However the agreement was also that it was a very positive outcome and an excellent and very uplifting gathering.
The University of Missouri and Rob Duncan organized and put on a tight event that, while overwhelming in nature, was outstanding in outcome, with some very strong take-aways to push this field in the young and enthusiastic direction it needs to go.
It ‘nice to see these faces, smiling and clean.
I’m very happy that LENR is in the hands of these people.
thank you all
Nice wrap-up Eli! From here it really did look overwhelming. You and Ruby did a great job covering the conference. Thank You!
Thanks for the summary. It’s inspiring to hear about the “Young Guns.” At MIT, Peter Hagelstein seems quite discouraged by the lack of young people taking an interest. For his sake I wish he would transfer to the U of Missouri where he would be appreciated and his donated funding wouldn’t get taken away like it did at MIT. It’s good to see him get acknowledged for all he has done.
Congratulations to Dr. Duncan and the University of Missouri!!
Ruby and Eli are heroes! I cannot believe how hard they worked throughout this conference. Not only had they planned an ambitious week’s work to begin with, but they voluntarily doubled their workload once they arrived by electing to record the actual proceedings, in addition to their many planned interviews and other activities.
I hope that everybody will find a way to recognize and support the fantastic work of Cold Fusion Now. It is truly to the lasting shame of the world’s journalism profession that Cold Fusion Now has provided the *only* significant news coverage of this important event.
The world isn’t listening. Perhaps it’s time to give up. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lUV65sV8nu0
Thanks to Eli and Ruby for the incredible hard work and personal attention. You guys are making a difference.
Usually, a demo of LENR is deemed successful if the measured input of electricity is less than the equivqlent energy output. However, there is more input energy than just the electricity from the plug. Whatever the charge is, in Rossi’s case, the energy used in its creation is also input energy. I don’t see that accounted for in most demos.
As followers of this website will know, I was at ICCF-18 as well and am still en route driving back to Ottawa, Canada. But I cannot help but pause in my trip and applaud the work of Ruby and Eli over the past week.
I was astounded after the first day of full proceedings to see the complete and accurate summation of the presentations made by Ruby and Eli on this website. That reporting plus their excellent photography captured the essence of what was going on at this important event. You are both truly fine journalists and not just advocates of this soon hoped-for new world of ColdFusion/LENR energy-rich living.
For the benefit of readers, Ruby and Eli came to the conference with the goal of capturing the stories of as many participants as possible. They videoed most of the “gurus” in the field, capturing their impressions and reminiscences for history.
There were many gray hairs at this conference. It has to be appreciated that the elders attending were young professors and researchers in 1989 when Martin Fleischmann and Stanley Pons first introduced this new science. Many already had positions at universities. Consequently, they have lived-out the past 23 years in conjunction with continuing their careers as academic researchers. But very few new faces joined this original cohort, at least not until this past year. And very few of the newcomers are “on faculty”.
It’s notoriously true that proponents of ColdFusion received a rough handling in university departments over the past two decades. They received little if any grant support and many of them have had to go forward without graduate students, at least without graduate students focusing on the scientific challenge of the Cold Fusion phenomenon. That can be a saddening life experience for a university professor who wants others to follow in his/her footsteps.
There was a vote during the conference on the best prospective initiatives for future developments in the field, and the Martin Fleischmann Memorial Project won overwhelmingly: 63% of those voting chose the MFMP as their first choice to win. And rightly so. The initiators and organizers of this exercise have to be congratulated for creating this scientific equivalent to crowdfunding: “world science sourcing”. They have operated their project on the basis of scientific openness and altruism to a degree perhaps not known in science since the end of the 19th century (please excuse any literary excesses).
With the conference being attended by so many “oldies” it was exceedingly important that Ruby and Eli managed to capture them on computer chips. This conference will be of historical significance if not for any great breakthroughs, then for the recordal that has been made of the ColdFusion pioneers who have gritted their teeth and carried-forward not withstanding criticism in the science community.
The past 20 years have been the dark days. Let’s now look forward to the rising dawn of the final delivery of the promise of ColdFusion: low-cost energy to provide comfort and a decent lifestyle for the bulk of humanity now living on the earth. Thank you Ruby and Eli for recording these beginnings.
Just a quick thanks much for all the comments.. Glad we were able to cover the show… Thanks all for tunin’ in.