Morning Break 6/16- Huizenga Part VII

Some notes from Huizenga's book

1.  p.101 He said he wanted a short and forceful statement
2. p. 104 he answers some of the charges of bias made against his panel
3. p. 105 he gives a description of the usual procedure to get government funding
4. p. 107  the first mention of "pathological science"

Comments:

As to number 1) why the need for a forceful statement?  He claims no bias on page 104, but if that is true, why the need for a strong statement?  I don't get that.   The charge given to the panel was to determine if government should spend any money on it, but a "strong statement" doesn't leave much wiggle room.  Fleischmann and Pons did the original research on their own dime.  Surely the government could afford a small research project if the doubts were too high for a more ambitious project.  Why stifle all spending completely?  The panel did admit some reason for continued research, but it was to be modest.  But the strong statement stigmatized it so much that no one was willing to stick their necks out for it very much. 

As for his panel, he had something to do with chosing the members.  Could they not be biased as well?  "Birds of a feather flock together."

This reminds me of a phenomenon that I once observed while reading an admitted liberal's books.  He claiimed in one of his books that there is no liberal bias in the media.  It struck me that there are some people out there who cannot recognize their own bias and insist that there isn't any.  But in the case of liberal bias in the media. it has been detected by the public according to polls.  I think most people would agree that the media is dominated by Democrats.  Take a poll of media people and see how many of them are Democrats.  The idea that they aren't biased is hard to square with observable fact.

In Huzienga's case, I suspect the bias exists in terms of what he may have at stake himself in the outcome.  His university, the University of Rochester, has some interest in hot fusion research.  To ignore this is to ignore the potential that a conflict of interest could exist and would impair the fairness of the panel itself.

To be fair, the rest of the panel didn't appear to be uniformly biased (according to his account).  However, it is possible that they deferred to Huizenga on the issue of fusion, because that was his area of expertise.  

The use of the term "pathological science" has to be a dead giveaway for bias.  Why stigmatize an idea opponent with such a loaded term if there wasn't bias?  What does idea opponent refer to?   Huizenga was a proponent of hot fusion as opposed to "cold fusion".   An idea opponent is to be in contrast to a visceral opponent, who not only disagrees with your ideas, but also disagrees with you as a human being.  What did he have against Fleischmann and Pons?  He may claim nothing, but the use of that term looks visceral opposition to me.

Therefore, his answers to charges of non bias are not persuasive to me.