Pathological Science?

After awhile, the label becomes the reality. Without funding, and under seige, cold fusioneers became insulated, and perhaps a bit paranoid. On the other hand, the mainstream scientists stayed clear of cold fusion for fear of being punished for studying it.

It should not come to any surprise that a follow up study by the DOE would only confirm what they already believed, that cold fusion was not really real.  "  In 1994, David Goodstein described cold fusion as:"

"a pariah field, cast out by the scientific establishment. Between cold fusion and respectable science there is virtually no communication at all. Cold fusion papers are almost never published in refereed scientific journals, with the result that those works don't receive the normal critical scrutiny that science requires. On the other hand, because the Cold-Fusioners see themselves as a community under siege, there is little internal criticism. Experiments and theories tend to be accepted at face value, for fear of providing even more fuel for external critics, if anyone outside the group was bothering to listen. In these circumstances, crackpots flourish, making matters worse for those who believe that there is serious science going on here."

 Under that cloud, the second DOE review took place and produced unsurprising results.

While significant progress has been made in the sophistication of calorimeters since the review of this subject in 1989, the conclusions reached by the reviewers today are similar to those found in the 1989 review.

The current reviewers identified a number of basic science research areas that could be helpful in resolving some of the controversies in the field, two of which were: 1) material science aspects of deuterated metals using modern characterization techniques, and 2) the study of particles reportedly emitted from deuterated foils using state-of-the-art apparatus and methods. The reviewers believed that this field would benefit from the peer-review processes associated with proposal submission to agencies and paper submission to archival journals.

– Report of the Review of Low Energy Nuclear Reactions, US Department of Energy, December 2004

There is possibly something pathological going on here, but who is the afflicted party? Going to the government -who itself cannot keep its own house in order- for answers seems an exercise in futility. It is hard to get at the truth when there are so many who seemed determined not to find it.