Talk:Brilliant Light Power/Archive 4

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Ref needed on New Mexico demonstrations

I've been trying to track down any indication that the two New Mexico projects that BLPI have saturated the news agencies with are acknowledged in some fashion by the purported customers. They appear to be real albeit small electric utility cooperatives, but their websites don't show any sign of BLPI that I can find. Can someone turn up a reference that isn't based on a BPLI press release? LeadSongDog (talk) 18:57, 21 January 2009 (UTC)

I am a customer of Farmers' Electric Cooperative, Inc. of New Mexico (FEC). I have never heard of BLPI. To my knowledge, it has never been mentioned in any of the communications I've received from FEC. →Wordbuilder (talk) 21:11, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Interesting. The 250 Megawatt plant for Farmers' that BLPI announced this month would seem to be newsworthy, if only for its novel purported nature. Something has a distinct odor.LeadSongDog (talk) 21:41, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
Getting a license to use the patented technology is one thing. Being in the right time in the development stage to announce the project public is another. If only the two times could be the same would see no need for feelings of disgrace.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 22:05, 21 January 2009 (UTC)
I'm sorry Kmarinas86, but I'm not able to understand that paragraph. Could you please rephrase?LeadSongDog (talk) 05:58, 28 January 2009 (UTC)
I believe Kmarinas86 is saying that just because a company gets a license to use patented technology does not necessarily mean the logistics of implementing the technology have been worked out. A company that does not know exactly when they are going to begin using a licensed technology are not likely to announce it since there is really nothing to announce. These press releases by Blacklight are attempts to show that there is interest in there technology because without knowing the content of the license such as timelines and cost it does not say much more than that. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 24.71.233.179 (talk) 06:09, 30 August 2009 (UTC)

Patents?

I was wondering why references to Blacklight Power's inability to get patents on their technology have been deleted. Apparently this was done around 29 December 2008. Is there any good reason why this information should not be reinstated? Mr pheasant (talk) 08:28, 12 February 2009 (UTC)

  • I can't think of any.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 12:04, 12 February 2009 (UTC)
  • It might be worth putting in a separate section, titled 'patents', to separate it from the controversy bit. It should be quite straightforward to stick to the facts. Blacklight have so far failed to get any patent protection, as far as I understand. There are several perfectly credible sources for this. Mr pheasant (talk) 08:14, 13 February 2009 (UTC)
It appears to have been this edit that deleted the patent case refs.LeadSongDog (talk) 18:54, 6 March 2009 (UTC)
Since the article is now about the company, I have re-added the patents and other corporate info stuff under a new "corporate history" section. --Enric Naval (talk) 22:03, 17 May 2009 (UTC)
Ugh, I had to partially rewrite the patents section after reading this post in science.physics.hydrino. It would seem that, after all, 6,024,935 was withdrawn before being granted. The one that was granted had the fee paid but never reached the final issuance part and then withdrawn and then brought to court was 09/009,294 and not the other one. Just read the text that I finally wrote. --Enric Naval (talk) 20:04, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Can I just point out that Blacklight's UK applications were in fact finally refused after being remitted to the IPO. Can someone more experienced with editing than me add this? More details at http://www.ipo.gov.uk/pro-types/pro-patent/pro-p-os/p-challenge-decision-results-bl?BL_Number=O/170/09 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.155.215.229 (talk) 21:24, 18 November 2009 (UTC)

I added the June 2009 refusal to the article. --Enric Naval (talk) 23:30, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

The implication of Mills discovery, and I am quite confident it is real based on its consistency with western history and western literature (e.g. mathematics), but across many disciplines, is structurally consistent (i.e. it is among many similar discoveries in our day that have found structure, as well...), and it is changing the tide of history forever. This is, provided formal deduction has any say-so along the way (see Bertrand Russell, Introduction to Mathematical Philosophy, Incompatibility and the Theory of Deduction). So, why would a judge deny a process leading to formal deduction? Why?! Incompatibility, maybe?

In any event, there will be 'forces of nature' in opposition to their own extinction in any process leading to such an altered landscape, one example being the Old Guard, especially if the current process (of the legal system) doesn't lead anywhere to begin with which is too often the case, blocking it if it so chooses. Mills had a similar road block in the landscape or the current paradigm of modern acedemia which is why he went public, for what that is worth. Ward Churchill should have been so lucky. People can't do research for themselves.

In any event, deduction, which comes down to, in this day, a conflict between the unconscious, covert behavior of the psyche of moderns, and the outright rejection of this approach to those who treat science and art with compassion and respect, and with the true intent of learning rather than parroting former behavior, has to be focused on a minimal use of formal relationships to get to what is implied, or deduced, an efficiency. This is not a never ending process! There is something structural being introduced to mankind collectively across disciplines, like a truth-function more important than truth itself, or which will never be found to be greater than its user, the truth that is. But, where are the users in a public forum?

This truth-function must be working in the landscape of civilization, which might be a high hope at this time for the 'value of it' to be distributed. Repeating, there will be 'forces of nature' in opposition to their own extinction in any process leading to an altered landscape, especially if the current process doesn't lead anywhere to begin with. Take the ease of which a calculator in your hand adds 2 plus 2, and understand that this self-same logic, or its ability follows money in electronic form around the planet with equal ease to 2 plus 2, and then you will see who is programming it today. Yes, the Old Guard, not the commonwealth. Why did Viet Nam happen, people?! This is not WWII, nor even WWIII, but a IV of some strange or, maybe, not so strange variety, leaving us as 'the strange.'

One step further, not desiring to digress so much nor able to go into so many far ranging fabulous issues stemming off this single idea having, each, their own proofs, or leaving them aside for the moment, what are some of the hurdles that are being faced with regard to Mills' patents, to which, he himself stated at the Hyatt in NYC recently are far reaching and numerous? The patents, I mean! He seems very satisfied. Why is this UK judge even on this page? What would a UK judge know about paradigms shifting in physics to begin with, or to claim as he does so much knowlege he is certain of based on his interpretation of the current (modern) paradigm of Physics (i.e. not Law), negating any opportunity for attaining professionals in the field to prove Mills' assertions false in the first place, or, for that matter, his proofs? RobertMStahl (talk) 22:40, 7 January 2010 (UTC)

Responses by independent researchers in chronological order

Rowan university has done two recent (2008) studies which are not listed, these studies claim experimental verification and would offset the overly negative tone of this section. It seems to me that independent researchers fall into two categories, the ones willing to rip apart the mathematics, and the ones willing to actually try the experiments. The first are uncategorically negative since Blacklight flies int he face of conventional wisdom (as did Galileo). I don't think anyone who has performed the actual experiments has reported negative results. DavesPlanet (talk) 13:01, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

Water Flow Calorimetry Experiments, Validation Tests and Chemical Analysis of Reactantsfor BlackLight Power Inc. Experiments and Analytical Testing Performed at Rowan University, 21 July – 24 September 2008 direct link This report is included in direct link 79.161.33.17 (talk) 11:23, 7 December 2010 (UTC)

Page 7 of the Rowan University report direct link shows the peak power for the 50 kW reactor being c.200 W. I propose therefore that the part of the article referring to the '50 kW' test be re-written as it's inaccurate and misleading as it stands. I wanted to ask someone else to look over the report and confirm it before making the change though. The 50 kW refers to the peak thermal power the test unit is able to drain, it's important to avoid the outlet water becoming too hot though as unwanted heat transfer to the environment would result, hence why a small (e.g. 5 kW) unit was not used. On a different point, surely 'alleged' findings is bad English and 'claimed' findings would be far better? --92.20.252.220 (talk) 16:21, 7 May 2009 (UTC)

Agreed, 'alleged,' is bad English. But it's fine here at WP Discussion Forum, where the self-appointed 'gatekeepers of knowledge' can pick apart a paradigm-shifting discovery in clean, renewable energy. Alleged, is the right term since to them Mills is well on his way to trial and conviction for daring to try to explain (ie., theorize) the basis for something so fantastic (in it's implications if it is confirmed) since it flies in the face of their mainstream science icons (read: religion-of-obsolete-science idols). JRSlack (talk) 06:41, 13 March 2010 (UTC)

Use a WP:SECONDARY source to write the text, instead of using directly the study results (a primary source) or using the company's press releases (a self-published source).
I see that that the article has a NYT article which would be a very good fit. It says that only a burst of energy was detected (claimed to be due to Mills keeping secret the methods for achieving a continuous output), and that "[although] Mills calls [the evidence] 'totally unequivocal,' it seems prudent to wait for more independent verifications to emerge (...)" --Enric Naval (talk) 18:07, 7 May 2009 (UTC)
The claim that the Rowan tests are "independent" is a stretch. See here how BPL funds support the work of at least three related post-docs at Rowan. LeadSongDog come howl 18:41, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
It obviously is not fully independent. But this time, unlike before, the Rowan researchers, it's claimed, used off-the-shelf materials, they did do the work independently in that sense. Previously, the replication was with reactive material supplied by BlackLight. BlackLight is now claiming to have available description of how anyone can replicate the demonstration. I agree it seems prudent to wait. A BlackLight press release does not establish notability. Reliable secondary source, even if just media, comment on it, more than some media web site just putting up, uncritically, the press release, would establish it. They've had that kind of coverage in the past, so it will probably appear. Until then.... not too much to do. --Abd (talk) 19:43, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Use of press releases

It seems that BLPI or their agents Hill & Knowlton have some rather unusual publicity practices.

  1. The announcements they made of the "replication" and of the "license agreements" went out on many news wires more or less simultaneously, presumably in order to generate more 'buzz'
  2. The announced agreements provided only their contact information, omitting contact info for the purported new partner (e.g. Farmers' Cooperative Power), presumably to steer fact-checkers to their publicity agent

I don't expect to find a WP:RS discussing this behaviour, but editors should still be aware that they are actively spinning the media coverage.LeadSongDog come howl 14:37, 6 May 2009 (UTC)

I've noticed that, so far, all possibly RS coverage of the announcement has been more or less repetition of the announcement, with no critical analysis, not usable yet. Still, Rowan University did make the announcement, I believe it is confirmed on the Rowan web site, and I think likely that this will show up in ordinary and more substantial RS. By the way, if hydrino theory is correct, the reactor is not a "cold fusion" reactor, but is based on a novel form of chemistry or chemical catalysis. Hydrinos could possibly explain cold fusion, because, like muons, they might be able to shield the Coulomb barrier, if the orbits have collapsed sufficiently, but fusion is not involved in the Blacklight process. --Abd (talk) 18:07, 14 August 2009 (UTC)
Got a link to a Rowan announcement that isn't via BLP? LeadSongDog come howl 18:43, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
Well, I saw something. It seems to be gone. This google search came up with this link. The quoted text was "BlackLight Power (BLP) Inc. today announced the successful independent ... BlackLight Power Inc. is the inventor of a new primary energy source and a new ..." But it's gone. There is plenty of primary source on BlackLight funding research there. That report wasn't technically an announcement by Rowan, it was a mention of the Blacklight announcement. I think LSD is correct to point out that there is no official Rowan University announcement, at least as far as I've seen. I've seen the video of a Rowan University researcher describing what they did, but that video was provided by BlackLight. It's all pretty weird. As I said, this seems to be either something very significant or a very strange end game. My crystal ball (Wikipedia doesn't have one, but I do) says that we should know within about a year. --Abd (talk) 19:38, 15 August 2009 (UTC)
I've just removed from the lead yet another claimed license deal supported only by a BLP press release. "and sold numerous licences to use its technology."[1] Yet again, the PR machine is at work. Note that Ackridge has no corresponding announcement.LeadSongDog come howl 19:43, 17 September 2009 (UTC)
My thanks to Kmarinas86. I had indeed overlooked/forgotten that the article used several other press releases. In general such releases are somewhat questionable primary sources that need to be treated with great caution, but as noted above, the Hill & Knowlton press releases are particularly suspect. If in doubt, however, I would encourage editors to inquire at the Reliable Sources Noticeboard for wider perspective. LeadSongDog come howl! 06:06, 21 December 2010 (UTC)
Wait, you removed the unreliable sources, but you didn't remove the probably-unreliable information that they were sourcing? :-/ --Enric Naval (talk) 17:32, 21 December 2010 (UTC)

New Mills paper published in a peer-reviewed journal.

Spectroscopic observation of helium-ion- and hydrogen-catalyzed hydrino transitions. I have no opinion on the validity of hydrino theory, only that (1) it is totally unexpected from long-established understanding of the ground state for electrons, and (2) it's been getting a certain level of peer-reviewed publication. From other recent news, Mills and Blacklight have either found something very significant, or it is a complex end-game. --Abd (talk) 18:00, 14 August 2009 (UTC)

Note that CEJP only gets an Impact factor of 0.448 as of 2008.[2] A very interesting choice for a supposed breakthrough paper.LeadSongDog come howl 19:04, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

Does that mean that I can alter the Central European Journal of Physics Wikipedia entry to say ... The CEJP is a lowly regarded rarely accepted form of peer review and the highly qualified board members integrity is open to question. Why not? However, if the journal is reputable then Mills has quality peer review and Hydrinos are a verifiable fact. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.187.178.38 (talk) 06:01, 3 September 2009 (UTC)

Central European Journal of Physics already says that the impact factor was 0.448 in 2008. That says this journal is rarely cited compared to others. I read this as meaning in effect that the cumulative judgement of authors in the field is that the journal is either not reliable or not interesting, but it would be a good question to put to WP:RSN. I'm happy to do so.LeadSongDog come howl 15:59, 3 September 2009 (UTC)
"Breakthrough papers" can have difficulty finding publishers, there is no question but that hydrino theory challenges very established understanding. The publisher is Springer, and the paper apparently made it through their peer review, as have other papers from these researchers. Sure. I certainly wouldn't claim that this paper means that hydrino theory has been accepted! It's notable, however, there is secondary source on the theory. But nothing sufficiently reliable yet on this publication. --Abd (talk) 19:25, 15 August 2009 (UTC)

This paper seems to be published by Rowan University (it has a Rowan logo on it)and although available on the BLP website, certainly looks to be an independant confirmation of Hydrino existence. http://www.blacklightpower.com/pdf/RowanHydrinoReport2009.pdf

If you feel it is still not enough to say that the Hydrino in fact does exist then can I do the same for Rowan University Wikipedia entry, that is mention that some Wikipedia articles and contributors do not accept that Rowan is a reputable source of scientific research? Oh, I forgot, Wikipedia is not a reliable source of information either!

I added the article to #Published material. I am not sure that we need to say anything else about it, but the mention certainly should be in the article. The DOI link currently does not take me anywhere useful - can one of our library-savvy folks look into it? Is it just an issue of a recent (two weeks, though) paper percolating through the system? - 2/0 (cont.) 16:49, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

Mills' use of non-radiation condition not well-explained

Without taking a position on whether the theory is bunk or not, I think the theory section might do a better job of explaining how the Mills model makes use of the non-radiation condition. In particular, Mills links the non-radiation condition explicitly to the ground state by supposedly showing mathematically that the "orbitsphere" that corresponds to the ground state has the smallest radius possible that could contain "light-like" components and therefore is the smallest radius orbitsphere that could emit a photon - as per Haus. In Mills' view, the ground state is only the limit on photonic radiation, but not necessarily non-photonic radiation, which he then proceeds to describe in gory detail as the so-called "Blacklight process". Again, I take no position on whether he's right or not but if we're going to explain the theory, I believe we should make his arguments as accessible as possible. Any objections to making this change to the theory section? Ronnotel (talk) 18:18, 17 August 2009 (UTC)

  • Object - One would have to characterize his arguments in prose understandable to mainstream scientist, which is not easy or next to impossible. Simply too many things would be glossed over. Why stop at the non-radiation condition? If we do not want to be misleading, we should at least explain the whole thing. As much as I am in favor for putting as many technical "gory" details on Wikipedia, I do not believe it will stick on the article. Also, it will take too much space to do it right, so it would need its own article. So until this non-radiation condition is referred to explicitly by mainstream science in a formal manner (i.e. scientific peer-reviewed journals) we should not to try elucidate the arguments of Mills.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 21:25, 19 August 2009 (UTC)
  • if one has a thorough understanding of the subject matter anything can be explained in a very simple and intuitive way and be summarized in a small paragraph by that person. One thing is clear, noone (including Mills?) have shown a thorough understanding of the subject. Which leads to a question whether or not it's possible to achieve the results without a full understanding of the phenomena? And unfortunately the answer is yes it's possible.
"if one has a thorough understanding of the subject matter anything can be explained in a very simple and intuitive way and be summarized in a small paragraph by that person." I couldn't disagree more. I can think of many examples where this cannot be done (at least with any language known to human beings). I have encountered many situations where it is quite certain that particular ideas are simply too complex to reduce to simpler statements without dumbing down the material, creating inconsistencies in translation, manipulating context, or complete and utter misrepresentation of the idea. Such ideas are often taken 100% out of context if some a priori assumption is made by a reader, or if some a priori assumption cannot be made by the reader, for reason of incomprehensibility according to one's finite intellect.
"Which leads to a question whether or not it's possible to achieve the results without a full understanding of the phenomena?" Of course. We can achieve results with approximations.
"And unfortunately the answer is yes it's possible." Not unfortunately. Fortunately.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 20:00, 19 May 2010 (UTC)

A little bit of irony

I just added the following edit. Does anyone wonder when the Bob Park quote was first introduced into this article? I did just a few minutes ago. After clicking through through much of the history, I found that it was exactly 5 years ago on July 14, 2005 when user User:Theresa knott made this edit. Time sure does fly by.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 17:12, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Google StreetView

Related Edits ["8 intermediate revisions" by User:Kmarinas86]: http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Blacklight_Power&action=historysubmit&diff=373512763&oldid=373496049

Google StreetView is notoriously unreliable about lining up actual numeric address within a block. In this context, I'm not sure the information in the recently added footnote is all that notable. Yes, there appears to be a building with appropriate signage at approximately the location that is stated in various BLP materials. Is there something else we should infer? Ronnotel (talk) 21:49, 14 July 2010 (UTC)

Yes there is. Google street view should not be used to infer that the building does not actually exist. That's what User:LeadSongDog tried to do. Google street view proves that the building exists, but it does not label it properly. Consider that proven.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 16:06, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
I think we can simply list the address (as is done). If someone wants to add a reliable source that verifies the address (perhaps the county tax assessor web page, etc.) - or alternatively proves that the building is not what is seems - then that *might* be reasonable. However, I don't think StreetView should be used in this way - there's just too many pit falls. Ronnotel (talk) 16:11, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
I don't see anything wrong with using the county tax assessor web page (whatever that might be). It's already proven that the building exists ("pitfalls" notwithstanding). Now a single link might just do, and if someone thinks otherwise and edits this page again, I will send them a link to this section.Kmarinas86 (6sin8karma) 16:24, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
Perhaps Ronnotel can find a ref to support the assertion that Google Street View is notoriously unreliable about lining up numeric street addresses and add that comment to that article. Kmarinas86's OR comparison of various images is sufficiently persuasive to me that the address corresponds to the Google Maps indicated building, which does differ from the position indicated on Google Street View. I'm unable to read the entrance signage in any of the images, but that hardly matters. I'll willingly concede the point that the address isn't the empty field I thought it was. Perhaps someone at WP:WikiProject New Jersey could be persuaded to provide a usable photo. LeadSongDog come howl! 16:32, 15 July 2010 (UTC)
@Lead - I don't have a reliable source - only my own personal knowledge of how Google collects address data in it's sweeps. One of the most common techniques is to sniff MAC addresses as they drive by and cross-reference any hit to a geo-database that links to a street address. This technique works pretty well in suburbs and cities, but not so well when there aren't as many WiFis to sniff. Of course all this sniffery is what got them in hot water with the Euros and elsewhere. Ronnotel (talk) 17:08, 15 July 2010 (UTC)

Comments by an anonymous visitor

This whole article on Blacklight Power is not accepted by mainstream scientists and regarded as pseudoscience. It should be removed. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 184.15.42.91 (talk) 13:39, 21 August 2010 (UTC)

I disagree. I dont think it needs to be removed, but set as an example of Bogus Science. --69.232.209.57 (talk) 06:24, 1 September 2010 (UTC)
On the issue of whether the article should be removed or not: I think there is an argument for removing it and an argument for keeping it. It is obviously a sufficiently noteworthy topic and deserves an article based on that. However, the problem is that there is almost no information available that isn't sourced by the company except the highly skeptical views expressed by almost every main stream scientist that has bothered to offer an opinion. Almost all the information that seems to be independent isn't. There are never clear cut statements by the companies allegedly doing business with BLP about the projects, the actual independence of "independent" studies about BLP claims is highly suspect. The claims remain similar through the years and yet there never are any real products and there never is any real independent test data for the claims. It is likely at this point that the company is promulgating a fraud, perhaps as the result of a delusional leader. But that fact is difficult to source because there just isn't enough interest in BLP to have driven reliable source type investigations of the company.--Davefoc (talk) 08:54, 30 December 2010 (UTC)

Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics validation, team leader Alexander Bykanov, PhD under contract with GEN3 Partners

Replication by Alexander Bykanov of anomalous spectra in the 10-30nm range from pure hydrogen was reported on Nov 29 and new papers were posted on Blacklight Powers website. I am not sure where these papers would fit into the article but it would seem to lend some credibility to Mill's older papers since this paper also reports short wavelength cutoff at 10nm and 23nm without being able to offer any conventional explanation for them.0WhatWhat0 (talk) 09:47, 30 November 2010 (UTC)

So far, none of this is being reported in reliable sources. If it is then it can be considered for the article. Ronnotel (talk) 13:07, 30 November 2010 (UTC)
There's no mention of Bykanov, Mills, Hydrino, GEN3, or BlackLight Power on the Harvard CfA website. There's no reliable journal publishing this. So all we've got is yet another BLP/Hill & Knowlton press release and commentary on it. LeadSongDog come howl! 07:41, 19 December 2010 (UTC)

This paragraph was added to the "Responses by outside researchers in chronological order" section:

November 29, 2010: According to Gen3 Paertners, an evaluation study conducted for Gen3 Partners by by Dr. Alexander Bykanov, using spectroscopists at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, validates elements of the Mills hydrino theory by spectroscopic obervation of predicted emissions from beneath the ground state of hyrdrogen that are unexplainable by other means."

Issues:
1. The article says according to Gen3 Partners, but the only citation is a paper with GEN3 logo on the front of it. So what is the source for "according to GEN3 Partners". The GEN3 Partners website doesn't mention Blacklight Power or this paper.
2. The CEO of GEN3 partners seems to have been at one time Jim Sims and there is a James K. Sims listed as a director of Blacklight Power on their website.
3. There is a minor spelling issue and what appears to be a citation is just a link to the paper.
4. The problems mentioned by Ronnotel and LeadSongDog above with the paper.

I don't know how this sort of thing should be handled. Nothing about BLP research or press releases is exactly what it seems. There are no sources beyond BLP for most of its apparent linkages to other companies. Including the fact of the release of this paper without also mentioning that BLP is the sole source of information about it gives undo weight to the credibility of the paper and the facts surrounding it. --Davefoc (talk) 10:39, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

I modified the paragraph in question. The sources of information for the new paragraph are entirely the BLP press release and the associated paper. I removed the information that the research was was done at Harvard CfA. It appears that the only CfA involvement was to lease their lab. This is supported by a letter from a Harvard PR person (posted to a blog) that this was the case . At least some of the research described in the paper was done at BLP. I also didn't mention that in the paragraph as I thought it was excessive detail. I did attempt to balance the claims of the press release by including the information that the study was funded by BLP and that the paper did not seem to have been submitted for peer review. The CV for Bykanov is available on the web and it does not mention this research or any association with BLP. The failure of Bykanov to mention an association with what would be one of the most significant scientific discoveries of the decade in his CV provides further circumstantial evidence that the BLP claims with regard to this are not credible. However, this article is about BLP, and what they claim even if it is not credible is relevant to the article I think. --Davefoc (talk) 19:13, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Reliability of sources for this article in general

It is difficult to determine what of the information in this article does not trace back to Blacklight power as the original source.

The claim that Blacklight Power has contracts with any utilities for power generation is suspect. No entity that Blacklight power claims to have a contract with seems to have published an acknowledgment of that contract. One of the utilities that BLP has announced a relationship with is Akridge Energy LLC. Akridge Energy does not seem to be a functioning business. Akridge Energy seems to be associated with the Akridge real estate company which does not publically acknowledge the existence of Akridge Energy on its web site.

The claim that Blacklight Power has raised any money does not seem to be independently verifiable. It is a claim repeated in various articles that do not provide any source for the information.

The claim that there is any independent validation of any Blacklight Power results does not seem to be verifiable. On closer inspection, alleged independent test results are only published by Blacklight Power and rely on people that have or have had relationships with Blacklight power.

The article contains this sentence: "A small group of experimental scientists from NASA and the US Navy research labs have expressed mild support for the claims of Blacklight Power.[2]" Who are these scientists? The article that is a source for this statement lists only Shelby Brewer who seems to have been on the BLP board and seems to have served as president of BLP for a time although the BLP site does not list him in either capacity today.

In general, it does not seem to be possible to find independent verification of any information concerning BLP and what independent information there is available concerning BLP is of a nature that tends to make BLP claims look even more suspicious. As such, I think that consideration should be given to a complete review of this article with an eye to eliminating statements that are based on sources that seem to be just repetitions of data from BLP press releases.--Davefoc (talk) 17:39, 5 January 2011 (UTC)

There has been independent commentary about the subject nevertheless. A key example:
  • "There is no independent scientific confirmation of the hydrino, and BLP has a patent problem. So they have nothing to sell but bull shit. The company is therefore dependent on investors with deep pockets and shallow brains." - Bob Park (famed intellectual)
Kmarinas86 (Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia) 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk = 86 11:17, 16 January 2011 (UTC)

FWIW, I'm sorry I wrote this. When I first read the article, I noticed a lot of stuff that seemed to trace back only to information posted by BLP and I thought I'd mention it. Now that I have become more familiar with the article and the discussion I realize that much of the article is written in such a way as to deal with this issue. I believe questionable material still remains in the article, but I think the appropriate way to deal with that is on a case by case basis in the discussion section. --Davefoc (talk) 23:30, 20 January 2011 (UTC)

Deliveries?

According to the article, BLP claimed that they would deliver a 50KW plant in 12 to 18 months - and that was back in 2008. So did they deliver something - or did they default on that contract?

Seems like it should have made news either way. Does anyone know who they claimed to be delivering this system to?

SteveBaker (talk) 19:58, 25 January 2011 (UTC)

I don't think Estacado Energy Services ever acknowledged that Hill & Knowlton press release. More BS, I'm afraid.LeadSongDog come howl! 22:52, 25 January 2011 (UTC)
By my count BLP has announced seven of these "contracts" beginning with the December 11, 2008 contract with Estacado, but not counting previous agreements of some sort with Thermacore and Connectiv. The only one that seems to have any public confirmation beyond BLP announcements is the sixth one with Akridge Energy. I saw an interview on the net where Akridge acknowledged it, but didn't provide any details. I sent the second one, Farmer's Electric Cooperative, an email asking if there was any public information available about the status of the power plant or the relationship with BLP. They haven't responded as of yet.
As to the 50KW question. The announced utility contracts are all in the 250 mw to 450 mw range I think. Perhaps you are thinking of what CNN said Mills said in a July 8, 2008 article: "For the first time in his company's 19 years of persistent trial and error, Mills says he has a market-ready product: a fuel cell that produces a chemical reaction to alter hydrogen atoms. The fuel cell releases heat that turns water into steam, which drives electric turbines. The working models in his lab generate 50 kilowatts of electricity - enough to power six or seven houses. But these, Mills says, can be scaled to drive a large, electric power plant. The inventor claims this electricity will cost less than 2 cents per kilowatt-hour, which compares to a national average of 8.9 cents." .
If this 50KW generator is the same one used in the Rowan "Anomalous Heat Gains ..." experiments, all that seems to be 50KW about it is the name. Rowan reported a maximum net heat gain (from the reactants and BLP magic but excluding electricity used to heat reactants) of 577 KJ. This translates to about 160 watts for an hour. I believe Mills claims somewhere else that BLP can actually run the reactor continuously so maybe the reactor could actually produce 50KW for some significant period of time. Of course, that seems to be very unlikely at this point.--Davefoc (talk) 08:29, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
Ah - interesting. So I tried to look a little deeper - and you're right, it's all a bit "odd". The wording in their "Business presentation" PDF is a really carefully phrased non-statement:
  • "To date, it has entered into contracts with seven utilities firms for up to 8,250MW of power" -- Ah, yes, that phrase "up to" - beloved of advertisers the world over. Meaning "any number less than the number we gave...including zero". I particularly like the use of a super-vague phrase like "up to" with a megawatt number specified to three decimal places!
  • "Collectively these firms own, purchase, or manage electric power production of approximately 7,600 MW and service nearly 1 million customers" -- but not necessarily using Blacklight equipment to do so! The choice of that 7,600 number (just a little less than the 8,250 in the previous line) makes one jump to the conclusion that this 7,600 MW is generated with Blacklight equipment - but this is clearly not the case. Also, we're only told that these firms "own, purchase or manage" those resources. "Manage" could mean almost anything.
  • "Maximum potential revenue under these contracts alone is approximately $500 million per year" -- So "up to" $500 million per year then?!
That's definitely one of the most carefully vague statements I've seen in a business presentation in a long while.
But still - seven actual "utility companies" signed up. But if these are like the Estacado Energy Services company - it is a tiny company! It's corporate records say that it has less than 25 employees and under $100,000 a year turnover...which is to say that nobody actually works there - it's a "shell company" who clearly don't "own" or "purchase" anything with that kind of a turnover! Four officers of the company are also officers of Roosevelt County Electric Cooperative, Inc. - so perhaps they "manage" something, yet get paid less than $100,000 a year for doing so?!? But interestingly, several of the names on record as officers the two companies are subtly different. Who the heck uses a shortened version of their name when filing legal documents to start a company?! eg:
  • Billy Cathey ==> Bill Cathey
  • Jerry W Partin ==> Jerry Partin
  • Patrick H Boone ==> Pat Boone
Are they trying to avoid people making the connection? So we know that another of these seven companies is a farmer's collective. I wonder who the other five are? It's odd that they'd keep so quiet about it. You'd think that they'd be trumpeting their green credentials to the world!
SteveBaker (talk) 13:50, 26 January 2011 (UTC)
Saying that one may "own, purchase or manage" something alludes to the fact that you can "manage" something without actually owning or purchasing it. The whole "up to" wording has to do with the fact that it is a cap. There's nothing alarming about that. Any reasonably intelligent person can see the points you have made (about vagueness) without becoming a cynic about it.Kmarinas86 (Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia) 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk = 86 12:36, 27 January 2011 (UTC)
Steve Baker said, "It's odd that they'd keep so quiet about it. You'd think that they'd be trumpeting their green credentials to the world!" Actually, it would be foolish to do so, whether Blacklight power is real or not. It's benefits vs. costs. So far, the benefits of advertising their connection with BLP is outweighed by the costs. But of course, the reverse appears to be the case for BLP, where the benefits of implying this connection exceed the costs of doing so.Kmarinas86 (Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia) 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk = 86 13:05, 27 January 2011 (UTC)

Joe Shea socks...probably.

There have two recent efforts by anon users: 79.36.206.98 and 95.245.215.94 to add a reference to the Joe Shea CNN iReport (which is not a true CNN report - more like a blog entry). Anything you see in Wikipedia that is promoting anything written by Joe Shea is almost certainly the man himself doing a bit of shameless self-promotion. He's wannabe journalist and a repeated violator of COI rules who typically uses the approach of first trying to post something under his own name - then resorting to widely-separated (and hence hard to block) anon IP accounts. This time is no different User:Joeshea modified the article on Jan 15th and is (in all likelyhood) behind these two anon efforts to do the same thing. Revert on sight folks. SteveBaker (talk) 21:15, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for this SteveBaker. I saw the linked article and grimaced a bit, but I thought it was from CNN and decided to not get involved. Alas, it seems that CNN iReport is a site that CNN created to allow individuals a place to publish their own articles. Clearly not an appropriate link for this article. --Davefoc (talk) 22:33, 9 February 2011 (UTC)

Trimming

Is there really a need to publish every press release this company sends out? I suggest we remove most. There's only so much "The company claims that..." that an article should have.. Guyonthesubway (talk) 03:17, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

I sympathize with this view and I have become one of the culprits since I just added more "The company claims that..." stuff today. The problem, as I see it, is that the company has been claiming stuff for a very long time. At first glance it seems like other sources have done independent reporting or testing about and of those claims. Mostly they haven't, at the underlying reality is that the source of most information about BLP is what BLP claims. At least some of the discussions above are about why such and such isn't in the article. I think the response is to put the information in the article but make it clear that the source is principally or completely BLP. Maybe I've gone overboard. --Davefoc (talk) 09:35, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
The difficulty is one of reliably sourcing a secondary analysis of these press releases. They leave a fascinating trail for what certainly appears to be a long-running deception, but we cannot violate wp:SYNTH to say that. But we are not publishing the press releases, they have already been published (and unfortunately uncritically republished). Until we find a secondary analysis, I think we need to retain them to convey the shell game. LeadSongDog come howl! 14:17, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
Press releases are not "published". You send them yourself to journalists, or to websites that publicize press releases for a fee, or to websites that display them for free in order to earn money from ads displayed in their website. A press release in prwire.com is not a "published" information, it's wholly self-published. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:47, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
Would that were the case, but it is not. When BLP's flacks at H&K spew these forth on the wire services, supposedly respectable papers pick them up and run them, usually with no real fact checking (though they will sometimes do their own translations). Check the google news archives, you'll see what I mean, e.g. "BlackLight Power, Inc. Announces Production of Electricity..." Financial Post Nov 29, 2010 (though to be fair to FP, they've now taken that article down... Sometimes, the paper will add a bit of content, e.g. "Akridge bets on early, potentially ‘game-changing’ hydrogen power" Washington Business Journal Dec 10, 2010 LeadSongDog come howl! 20:08, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
Ugh. I love the smell of regurgitated press releases in the morning. Usually I dismiss those sources and treat them as self-published sources.--Enric Naval (talk) 21:02, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
We could always add more of this stuff.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 14:21, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
I guess I see it more as giving those press releases more weight by mentioning them here. But I see the point that listing them and showing how stale they are makes the point that the company has made a lot of noise without any results. I just dont agree with it. If we were to take the independant view, in short, sources say they're full of it, the company says its not. I'm not sure we're giving each view the correct weight. To me it should be more verifiable independant sources and a lot fewer press releases. Guyonthesubway (talk) 16:37, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
We could create a section "Unsubstantiated claims on behalf of Blacklight" - and dump all of their press releases that are not backed up by 3rd parties in there as simple bullet-points with the press release as a reference. That way we only have to say "The company claims..." just once at the top of the section. That allows us to explain all of the things that they say they have done - and move them out of that section if/when there is evidence that they actually did what they said they did. The size of that list (in terms of lines of text in the article) will thus be rather short - but the large number of items on the list would be sufficient to let our readers decide for themselves whether the company makes an undue number of unsubstantiated claims. That would minimize the 'weight' we accord to these claims without unduly curtailing the underlying message - which is that they really do make a heck of a lot of unsubstantiated claims. Furthermore, if someone from Blacklight or elsewhere comes along to protest that this is unfair, all they have to do is to produce reliable sources to show that one or more of these claims can in fact be confirmed - and we can move that item out into the body of the article and write about it more fully. Failing that, we have reliable sources that say that they made those claims - so we're on solid ground. SteveBaker (talk) 18:44, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

CNN Ireport

"iReport is a user-generated section of CNN.com. The stories here come from users. CNN has vetted only the stories marked with the "CNN" badge. " Guyonthesubway (talk) 17:41, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Yeah - I can't think why a respectable organization like CNN, who stand or fall on the quality of their reporting, would lend their name to what is really just a glorified blog. They abandon their usual standards of fact-checking and a number of other editorial rules - yet allow the resulting web page to look pretty much like a "real" CNN news report to the untrained eye. It really shakes my faith in them as a news source. If it says "CNN" on the page (badge or no badge) - I expect it to be up to their standards...and clearly it isn't. SteveBaker (talk) 18:36, 11 February 2011 (UTC)
Sorry Steve, your error. The publication of unpaid stringers, letters to the editor, etc has a long history, but in recent years virtually the entire industry has adopted some amount of open blogging. It is hard to find a significant publisher or news network that doesn't do it. For most of them, there is little if any quality control on the content. Some don't even require traceable attribution. But it does often get them footage they otherwise wouldn't get. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:31, 11 February 2011 (UTC)

Proposed expansion of the information about the Hans-Joachim Kunze article about errors in the spectroscopy results supporting novel hydrogen spectral lines

The article contains this statement currently:

May 1, 2008: Hans-Jürgen Kunze suggests "that spectral lines, on which the fiction of fractional principal quantum numbers in the hydrogen atom is based, are nothing else but artefacts."

The referenced article seems to be one of the most relevant critiques of the techniques used by BLP to detect novel spectrum lines for hydrogen. As such I thought some expansion of the information about it was justified. However, I would like to get responses from others before I made any change to the article in this area. The change I propose is below:

May 1, 2008: An article by Hans-Joachim Kunze was published that criticized the techniques used to observe novel spectral lines reported in a 2003 paper authored by R. Mills and P. Ray, Extreme ultraviolet spectroscopy of helium–hydrogen. Hans-Joachim Kunze is professor emeritus at the Institute for Experimental Physics V Ruhr University Bochum, Germany. The abstract of the article is: "It is suggested that spectral lines, on which the fiction of fractional principal quantum numbers in the hydrogen atom is based, are nothing else but artefacts."

Kunze stated that it was impossible to detect the novel lines below 30nm reported by Mills and Ray because the equipment they used did not have the capability to detect them as per the manufacturer and as per "every book on vacuum-UV spectroscopy" and "therefore the observed lines must be artefacts". Kunze also stated that: "The enormous spectral widths of the novel lines point to artefacts, too."

Link to Kunze paper: http://iopscience.iop.org/0022-3727/41/10/108001/pdf/0022-3727_41_10_108001.pdf Link to information about Kunze: http://www.ep5.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/en/emeriti_en.html

Small issue: I don't know why the article uses Hans-Jürgen Kunze. His name seems to be Hans-Joachim Kunze.

Hans-Jürgen(or Joachim) Kunze apparently did not account for the use of the CEM (Channel Electron Multiplier) which would have made such lines visible. A case in point: "With the development of photographic film, the more accurate spectrograph was created. It was based on the same principle as the spectroscope, but it had a camera in place of the viewing tube. In recent years the electronic circuits built around the photomultiplier tube have replaced the camera, allowing real-time spectrographic analysis with far greater accuracy." (From the article "spectrometer"). Spectrometer ratings appear to be conservative in that they do not assume that one uses technology that could multiply the visibility of a phenomenon. The spectrometer rating is not gospel.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 12:06, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the response Kmarinas86. What is the source for the criticism of Kunze's critique of the Mills/Ray experiment? I couldn't find a response to Kunze but I did look over the issue that you raised a bit. The minimum detectable wavelength of the spectrometer used in the experiment (Model 302 Vacuum Ultraviolet Monochromator) is specified an 30nm (as Kunze says) by the manufacturer (http://www.mcphersoninc.com/spectrometers/vuvuvvis/model234302.htm). I did not find any information on line that this range could be expanded by using a channel electron multipler. Perhaps the most significant point that Kunze made was that the observations of the novel lines were done with the normal incident spectroscopy equipment that he claims was inappropriate for the detection of sub 30 nm wavelengths but that the control observations of helium emissions were done with a grazing incident instrument that he felt was appropriate for detecting the sub 30 nm emissions. That strikes me as very strange. Why was the control experiment done with a completely different experimental setup? Regardless, this is just my non-expert musings about all this. Kunze is an expert and his article is relevant to this article as would a published critique of his article by another expert or BLP.

My main question is with regard to the summary I proposed of Kunze's article. Is the proposed summary too long, incorrect or could the wording be improved? Is there a published response to Kunze's article that would be appropriate to mention? --Davefoc (talk) 19:14, 12 February 2011 (UTC)

Dr. Melvin H. Miles

Dr. Melvin H. Miles was quoted as a source of mild support for BLP technology presumably as an example of support from the US Navy research labs. He also seems to be a supporter and was at least previously an investigator of cold fusion. Is this an appropriate fact to mention in the article if Miles is going to be quoted? It is also interesting that despite his support for BLP in 1999, Blacklight Power is not mentioned on his website today.--Davefoc (talk) 08:45, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

If there's no more recent reference, I would support removing it. When did the cold fusion claims end up being disproven? Guyonthesubway (talk) 19:47, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the response Guyonthesubway. Did you mean you favor removing the Melvin Miles quote entirely? If that was what you meant, I tend to agree. This seems like an offhand comment by Miles in response to his belief that BLP claims of having an actual product were true (although he expressed skepticism about the BLP theory as to why their product worked) and that put the BLP research ahead of cold fusion research at the time. I was not able to find any other connection between Miles and BLP. --Davefoc (talk) 21:23, 20 February 2011 (UTC)

I meant the reference, but if that removes him from the article, so be it. Guyonthesubway (talk) 18:21, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
The article had a who? tag after the claim of mild support from scientists at Navy research labs. Since Miles worked for the Navy's China Lake facility, I think it's good to have his quote in the article, as it provides at least a partial answer to the who? tag. 199.46.199.232 (talk) 21:09, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Repeated set of sentences

Regarding these three sentences,

Mills has met general skepticism in the academic community since the founding of BLP in 1991. CQM and hydrinos have been criticised by mainstream physicists who consider it to be pseudoscience. These physicists reject it due to its inconsistencies with the quantum theory.

they now appear in two places in the article, which is not a sign of a quality article. If my fellow editors insist on keeping them in the lede, please delete them from the "Reactions from various scientists" section.
I continue to maintain that inconsistencies with quantum theory are not sufficient reason to criticize the theory. This theory has its own set of successes, separate and distinct from quantum theory's successes (such as the Millsian software's uncanny ability to closely predict experimental results). Mills intends it as a replacement for quantum theory, and if it had no inconsistencies with quantum theory, it would make for a poor replacement indeed. 199.46.245.231 (talk) 21:22, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

To replace one theory with another, it is not sufficient that the new one be more convenient to use, it also has to consistently generate more accurate testable predictions of real physical phenomena. This is particularly so when attempting to supplant a theory that has been as spectacularly successful in generating such predictions as has quantum mechanics.
Please also read wp:LEDE. It is quite proper for the lede to summarize content that is also found in the body of the article.LeadSongDog come howl! 22:01, 22 February 2011 (UTC)


(edit conflict) The lede is supposed to summarize the rest of the article - so it's not entirely unreasonable for there to be some repetition. This may be too much though...I'm not sure.
As for the Millsian software being able to predict results - we have to be extremely careful. Firstly because correlation does not equal causation and secondly because it takes an infinite number of successes to conclusively prove a theory - but only one failure to disprove it. Look at it like this: We could use the hydraulic analogy to "uncannily" predict the results of connecting up basic electrical circuits - but that doesn't mean that electricity is a liquid. SteveBaker (talk) 22:04, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Correlation is not causation, but so what? You can deduce a reason model for causation using trial and error statistical data and deriving observations values for unknown parameters which are calculated estimated via the relationships implied inferred between variables. That is uncommon common practice in science. No conclusion working hypothesis of "causality" in science goes without comparing correlating some phenomenon with another.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 00:08, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

The company and corporate history

These sections should be combined. Now should the combination be notably ahead of the "Rejection of mainstream particle physics"? The company has higher order relevance to this article. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 22:06, 22 February 2011 (UTC)


"Theory" mind as well be orders with "rejection" Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 22:08, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Yes, but....

William M. Connolley hath decreed, "A ref to two newsgroup postings, neither by connett, isn't even close to good enough"

Yes, but in fact this statement was made by Jeconnett

William M. Connolley deleted the following (http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Blacklight_Power&curid=452779&diff=415484861&oldid=415480386):


Hydrino.org discussions in text files.zip (256 KB) 12/3/10 by Kmarinas86 https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B4C1RIYfRPYtNmM5OGUzYTAtYmFkZC00MDM3LWIyYTctMjNiNmJjY2IwNzIy&sort=name&layout=list&num=50

Description: Text files I have saved regarding some of my posts on the forum.hydrino.org message board.

Hydrino.org discussions in htm.rar (3 MB) 12/3/10 by Kmarinas86 https://docs.google.com/leaf?id=0B4C1RIYfRPYtYjg3YWIxMjctZGEyMC00MzIxLTg2YzMtMzllMzcyZTYyNjU3&sort=name&layout=list&num=50

Description: A few select web pages that have been saved for historical and verification purposes.

Meeting of the Johns.txt

Date created: August 3rd, 2010 4:24PM
Last modified: August 3rd, 2010 6:13PM

My comments are highlighted in blue. The rest are Jeconnett's quotations and commentary.

[quote="jeconnett"][quote][b]John EB quoted Randell Mills' post in SCQM: [/b]

It is improper to integrate the time-averaged power over time as insisted on by Dr. Connett. It is a number not a function of time. There is nothing to contest here and Dr. Connett is clearly wrong.

[/quote]

I disagree. The expression for a_M(l, m) in Equation (23) of the paper includes an integral with respect to s of cos(m k s).

[snip]

John C.[/quote]

Equation 16.74 of John DJ's [i]Classical Electrodynamics, Second Edition[/i]:

[url=http://books.google.com/books?ei=k5RYTM3xIqO-9gTWqpG5BA&ct=result&id=_7rvAAAAMAAJ&dq=classical+electrodynamics&q=%22am%28l%2Cm%29%22#search_anchor]dP/dΩ[/url] - [b]Summation [u]precedes[/u] squaring.[/b]

Equation 16.89 of John DJ's [i]Classical Electrodynamics, Second Edition[/i]:

[url=http://books.google.com/books?ei=k5RYTM3xIqO-9gTWqpG5BA&ct=result&id=_7rvAAAAMAAJ&dq=classical+electrodynamics&q=j+l+kr#search_anchor]a_E(l,m) and a_M(l,m) (solutions for a source)[/url] - [b][i]Corresponds to Eq. (1.7) and Eq. (1.8) of the August 2, 2010 update of Mills' book.[/i][/b]

Equation 16.47 of John DJ's [i]Classical Electrodynamics, Second Edition[/i]:

[url=http://books.google.com/books?ei=k5RYTM3xIqO-9gTWqpG5BA&ct=result&id=_7rvAAAAMAAJ&dq=classical+electrodynamics&q=%22am%28l%2Cm%29%22#search_anchor]a_M(l,m) and a_E(l,m) (general formulae)[/url] - [b]Integration with respect to [u]angle[/u].[/b]

So which John is correct? Clearly only one John is correct, and that John is John David Jackson.




[b]The link has been updated:

Former title: [url=http://www.blacklightpower.com/papers/21cm-1%20paper072210S.pdf]21cm-1 paper072210S.pdf[/url] (link does not work anymore)

New title: [url=http://www.blacklightpower.com/papers/21cm-1%20paper%20080210S.pdf]21cm-1 paper 080210S.pdf[/url][/b]




[quote="jeconnett"][quote][b]John EB quoted Randell Mills' post in SCQM: [/b]

It is improper to integrate the time-averaged power over time as insisted on by Dr. Connett. It is a number not a function of time. There is nothing to contest here and Dr. Connett is clearly wrong.

[/quote]

I disagree. The expression for a_M(l, m) in Equation (23) of the paper includes an integral with respect to s of cos(m k s). The limits on this integral are clearly closely related to time. A key question is: how did that cosine expression get there in the first place? It is clear that its origin, as seen in Equation (11) of the paper, is in the factor exp(-i omega t) which in this case represents rotation of the sphere, and is similarly in Equation (20), exp(-i omega_n t), where t is [b]time[/b]. The text after Equation (20) shows that the real part of this factor is cos(m*phi + m*omega_n*t). The previous version of the paper indicated this by noting explicitly that s is a function of t, s(t). (In fact by the previous statement, it is clear that s(t) = phi + omega_n*t, i.e. the relationship of s(t) to time is linear.) This description is now omitted, but it is clear that s, the 'angular displacement', is a direct function, essentially a surrogate, of time. The "ds" in the integral in Equation (23) of the paper could easily be written as s'(t) dt.

What is being done in the paper to some extent emulates what Jackson carries out for multipole sources, where there is a factor of Re(exp(-i omega t) = cos(omega t). Jackson however first squares the expression for time-dependent power per solid angle, then integrates. It is the fact that (cos(omega t))^2 is always nonnegative which results in nonzero power. Dr. Mills' argument here is that he first claims to show that the time-dependent power is zero, i.e., a_M(l, m, t) = 0 for all t, so the square of this quantity in the expression for time-dependent power is zero. What I am saying is that in his argument to show that the time-dependent power is zero, he has unwittingly already averaged over time because s as an angle is linearly related to time, and that integrating in Equation (23) with respect to s (hence the "ds" in Equation (23)) unfortunately obscures this fact. The integration in Equation (23) is actually being done over time.

[quote][b]Dr. Mills continued: [/b] Next, as shown by Eq. (11), the magnetic coefficient is derived as an integral over the three spatial dimensions and not time as incorrectly claimed by Dr. Connett. Based on the spherical symmetry of the source current, it was integrated over distance r, angle theta, and azimuthal angle phi, not time.

[/quote]

Despite saying this, there is no indication whatsoever in Equation (23) of the paper that that integration is over any variable other than s. In both Equation (11) and Equation (23), the expression on the left side of the equations is exactly the same: a_M(l, m). As noted in the comments following Equation (24), the integration with respect to s (which is essentially integration with respect to t) is crucial to showing that a_M(l, m) is zero. The problem being, what should be integrated here is the [b]square[/b] of this expression, as is done in Jackson's text.

I have advanced three other arguments indicating that a rotating orbitsphere with a nonuniform charge distribution must radiate. I think the simplest of these is the following:

1. Dr. Mills asserts that the orbitsphere has angular momentum hbar / 2 (nonzero is all that's important) due to his meshwork of great-circle current loops.

2. The magnetic moment of such a system is proportional to the angular momentum (Jackson, e.g.). Hence the magnetic moment is also nonzero.

3. Thus the orbitsphere is basically a permanent magnet.

4. A rotating permanent magnet transfers energy to its surroundings. If there is a pickup coil-circuit nearby with a resistor in the circuit, current will flow in the coil and the resistor will heat up. Ultimately the energy transferred by the changing magnetic field is supplied by the motive force that is rotating the magnet. This is why for example hydroelectric power generators work. There need not be a coil in the vicinity; electrons in conducting materials will move, and atoms nearby will be caused to jiggle a bit by the changing magnetic field, and the energy for jiggling them again comes from the motive force that is rotating the magnet. The changing magnetic field is propagated through space at the speed of light.

5. Therefore the rotating orbitsphere loses energy to its surroundings. Whether this constitutes 'radiation' may be a matter of definition. It does qualify as radiation according to the definition given by Wikipedia:

In physics, radiation describes any process in which energy travels through a medium or through space, ultimately to be absorbed by another body.


Another (intuitive) way of viewing this: a rotating orbitsphere with a nonuniform charge, in many configurations, is highly similar to a rotating dipole. This is made clear by a number of color illustrations and movies in the BLP presentation materials. As such it will exhibit ED (electric dipole) radiation. This is not necessarily identical to classical EM radiation. The important thing is that a transfer of energy occurs and the orbitsphere must lose kinetic energy. The orbitsphere in this configuration cannot be stable.

[quote][b]Randell Mills continued as follows: [/b]

If Dr. John Connett, University of Minnesota, is academically honest and is not acting in malice, he will admit these indisputable facts, retract his false conclusions, and apologize for his unprofessional conduct and personal insults. Some recent examples are given below.

[/quote]

I am not acting out of malice. I remain convinced that the a rotating orbitsphere with a nonuniform charge density (as depicted in a number of BLP presentations) must, according to classical laws of physics, radiate. My arguments are sincere. It would not be honest of me at this point to retract the views and arguments that I have expressed here on this.

At times I have been intemperate and uncomplimentary in my references to Dr. Mills. I sincerely apologize for this. I will strictly refrain from such characterizations in the future.

John C.[/quote]

The retraction

Hydrino Study Group Forum • View topic - Question about Delusions and GUT-CP 1.htm

Re: Question about Delusions and GUT-CP by JohnEB on October 22nd, 2010, 12:10 pm

Hydrino Study Group Forum • View topic - Proposal for a New Section 1.htm

Re: Proposal for a New Section by Lynn Kurtz on August 11th, 2010, 9:28 pm

Hydrino Study Group Forum • View topic - The Hydrino Spectrum.htm

Re: The Hydrino Spectrum by JohnEB on September 26th, 2010, 3:23 pm

Hydrino Study Group Forum • View topic - What Would Reverse Your View.htm

Re: What Would Reverse Your View? by schroedinger's_cat on August 18th, 2010, 3:55 pm
Re: What Would Reverse Your View? by schroedinger's_cat on August 10th, 2010, 11:54 am

http://www.mail-archive.com/vortex-l@eskimo.com/msg39812.html

Re: [Vo]:A prominent CQM (BL) critic capitulates

OrionWorks - Steven V Johnson Mon, 09 Aug 2010 07:46:54 -0700

The original retraction from John Connett appears to be out at HSG Hydrino Study Group Forum, maintained by Luke Setzer (my apologies for misspelling Luke's last name):

http://forum.hydrino.org/viewtopic.php?f=5&t=312&sid=851e1815295c5d93648887358ed4869f


Luke replied:

"I am locking and stickying this topic to make it a standalone document."

;-)

Regards Steven Vincent Johnson www.OrionWorks.com www.zazzle.com/orionworks

siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 12:53, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

My, what a lot of text. I'm not at all convinced that even if you could provide reliable attribution, the statement would belong. But I don't think you can. Your own archive of some newsgroup clearly isn't good enough. Nor does this text seem to be sufficiently exciting to need inclusion. All it says is that one of the crits was overblown; and that crit was hardly central William M. Connolley (talk) 13:53, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
WP:NOTRELIABLE makes it pretty clear that we can't use this in the article. Blogs, emails, newsgroups and forums are all unacceptable sources of material for our articles - except in tightly defined situations, which this case doesn't come within a mile of being. As WP:NOTRELIABLE points out - if this is indeed notable, true and verifiable (after all, it could be just anyone with an internet connection who is posting that stuff) - then it'll show up in the mainstream and we'll be able to quote it from there. If a well-respected scientist suddenly finds he must believe this stuff - and that most of what we know about physics is therefore incorrect - then his first reaction will be to write a paper about it and get it published in a respectable peer-reviewed journal. At that point, we can write about it. We have all the time in the world...Wikipedia isn't a newspaper! SteveBaker (talk) 15:18, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
"I'm not at all convinced that even if you could provide reliable attribution, the statement would belong." This was the meaning of my "yes", and I share your point of view about it not being acceptable in the article. I just didn't want to leave the impression that the "retraction" was fabricated by someone else other than Jeconnett.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 20:02, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
That would be part of the point of newsgroups not being allowable sources. You have no evidence in those posts that those postings actually originated from anyone. I'm not saying he didn't say it, I'm just saying you've no convincing evidence here that he did. Guyonthesubway (talk) 20:17, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Unattributed quote in the "Theory" section.

Blacklight_Power#Theory has an indented section of text that looks like it's trying to be a quotation. Since it has neither quotation marks - nor any indication of who said it and where - it tends to look like a part of the article that we've written - which is bad because it's really complete nonsense.

We need to either attribute this carefully - or remove it.

SteveBaker (talk) 15:43, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

It was from the paper cited immediately before it.

 Fixed LeadSongDog come howl! 17:23, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

oh fun!

I just noticed that their latest claims include a direct to electricity conversion, getting rid of that pesky steam generator. Plus a claim that they anticipate getting 1500 miles to the litre of water. Holy shades of Meyer! [[3]] I would strongly support inclusion of this claim in the article. Guyonthesubway (talk) 17:14, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Sure include it. Waiting for their claim to get energy from "bull shit" so that Maryland guy will be happy, if that's even possible. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 17:46, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
You must be referring to the guy from TMNT university a.k.a. Mr. Park.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 20:06, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

Chop: why?

I don't see a good explanation for [4] William M. Connolley (talk) 18:30, 21 February 2011 (UTC)

I think the change was made just for grammatical reasons, fuse can be a verb, fusion is not normally used as a verb in standard English. However, in a brief review of the sentence in question, I wondered if it was correct at all. Did Mills or BLP ever claim that the hydrino theories might be an explanation for the fusion claimed in the cold fusion experiments or did they just suggest that their hydrino theories might be an explanation for the excess heat? --Davefoc (talk) 20:12, 21 February 2011 (UTC)
From the article:
E. Sheldon (September–October 2008). "An overview of almost 20 years' research on cold fusion". Contemporary Physics. 49 (5): 375–378. doi:10.1080/00107510802465229. [Mill's paper], which involves a nowadays widely discredited 'hydrino' model that was proposed in 1991 to account for the excess heat observations in 'cold fusion' studies. (...) [the notion that there are electron orbital states that are less energetic than the ground state], is contrary to conventional quantum principles and unacceptable to me or to the general theoretical-physics community.
Robert L. Park (26 April 1991). "What's New Friday, 26 April 1991 Washington, DC". and Robert L. Park (31 October 2008). "What's New Friday, October 31, 2008". "The explanation, (...) is that there wasn't much fusion going on to begin with. Big news, you are probably saying! So where did the heat come from? That's the surprising part; it comes from shrinking the hydrogen atoms! This is done by getting the atoms into a state BELOW the ground state. If the shrunken atoms are deuterons, of course, they may fuse from time to time, which explains why cold fusion results are erratic."
So, according to Mills, the excess heat is explained by the atoms shrinking below the ground state, giving away energy in the process. Those shrunk atoms are called "hydrinos". Also from Mills: the nuclear fusion is just an sporadic side effect that happens once in a while because the shrunken state brings the atoms closer. Does this help? --Enric Naval (talk) 11:43, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Thanks for the response Enric Naval. After I wrote the above I tried to find evidence that Mills actually proposed hydrinos could fuse. (please note I'm not claiming hydrinos exist). I think at one point he may have. Your link and a review of an earlier version of his book posted on the BLP website refer to Mills' claims on this. However, Mills may have distanced himself from this. I didn't find any reference to the idea in any of his on-line papers or his book and I did find a statement where Mills seems to be directly repudiating any connection between his theories and cold fusion. So bottom line, I think Mills did claim some sort of fusion might occur but I am not sure he still claims this and I didn't find exact sources on point to verify exactly what Mills did believe and what he believes now with regard to this. --Davefoc (talk) 17:52, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
"Cold fusion" has always seemed like a red hearing dropped in by Mill's detractors. I suspect, there is a complex number hiccup in mainstream quantum mechanics standing the way of negative electron states, which is the claimed heat source, not fusion. If anything, fusion is taking the energy back out, (and the real waste product risk), preventing a stable net positive process. Expanding the claimed process, with diagrams, is exactly what this article could benefit from. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 19:07, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Relevance and weight of Mill's theories

See Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Randell Mills. Randell Mills has been redirected here, so this is the proper article to discuss his theories. other pages redirecting here are "Hydrino", "Hydrino power", "Hydrino theory" and "Randell Mills' Classical Quantum Theory" (what links here).

Note that the company success completely depends of the success of Mill's ideas and on the existance of hydrinos, so we should cover them in enough detail.

Also, we need to cover well the mainstream acceptance of hydrinos. It affects the abilities of getting private funding, getting published in journals, and having other scientists replicate your work and posting confirmations that should bring in turn more acceptance and funding. --Enric Naval (talk) 12:06, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks for the background. I've followed this company since inception. Its success depends on economically generating heat, the rest is an afterthought which may improve effectiveness. For example, heat was pressed into economic service long before thermodynamics, which then helped improve heat conversion efficiency. The theories could be covered better in this article. Why there seems to be such violent objection to them has always interested me. How the energy is conserved, (ie. the waste products danger), has puzzled me too. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 15:19, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
To say that an energy company's success is based on them suceeding to create energy is kind of circular, isn't it?. Thus far they don't appear to have shown they can, and expanding and promoting the unpublished theories they claim to use should remain on their website not here. Guyonthesubway (talk) 21:18, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

Undone

I've undone the chop, still not seeing why it was done. I think the anon had largely done so, but in a different order, and it seemed cleaner to just revert to the pre-chop version, keeping only the fusion -> fuse fix William M. Connolley (talk) 12:55, 22 February 2011 (UTC)

I added back in a small paragraph (that I wrote) on an article critical of calormetric techniques used to provide evidence for BLP theories. I think it may have been removed unintentionally as the result of other fixups. If it was removed for cause, then my apologies. I don't want to be part of an edit war over this. I thought the mention of the article was appropriate because it was the work of a mainstream scientist describing mechanisms that might have caused misleading results in experiments that underpin a lot of the BLP claims.--Davefoc (talk) 17:37, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Sorry, that was probably my fault. I noticed you had edited but was too lazy to check what you'd done - I assumed it was part of the other stuff William M. Connolley (talk) 18:10, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
In general the article is a giant press release for a barely notable company. It's chief scientist isn't notable enought to warrent his own article and neither are his theories. Why are we republishing endless chunks of their website. The article should get the point out that "there's a company that claims to have an energy technology, and probably raised some venture capital. Its based on claims that are either ignored or called bunk by the scientific world. They claim to have made some contracts." The end. I see no reason to discuss their claims as extensively as they are here. Guyonthesubway (talk) 19:11, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Perhaps you missed See the earlier discussions here on that very question. If we can find a published wp:RS that directly supports those statements, then we can make them. So far, we've not been able to do so, as it would be wp:SYNTH. Meanwhile, the littany of preposterous claims stands on its own. The reader can easily see they've been vaguely promising commercial application "next year" for a long time. LeadSongDog come howl! 19:51, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
I have asked myself the same kind of question Guyonthesubway. My thoughts which may be of limited value:
  1. Although BLP is not widely known it is known well enough that it has generated news in national publications and it has been widely discussed for years on the internet. All that generates a group of people looking for balanced information about what they've read. A Wikipedia article that provides some objective information about the claims and links to more detailed independent reviews of the theories and experiments seems of value to me.
  2. Assuming that this is a scam and/or the work of a deluded individual it may be the most sophisticated one ever. Documenting the history of that is interesting to many people as this unfolds. I have followed the story for years. Although there are obvious credibility problems the nature of what has gone on here is unusual. No information has ever emerged over the 20 years or so that BLP has existed as to what is actually going on in that company. No ex employees or officers have come forth, no investors (the early ones have probably written off their investment by now) have ever come forth, and no employees in the companies that BLP has formed alliances with have ever come forth. I am intrigued by that and look forward over time to finding out what the internal working of BLP were like.
  3. The lack of clearly negative results that would clearly disprove the work is interesting. I have read through several of the papers and some of them seem to be written by sincere skeptical people that have results they just can't quite explain. You might think that all the experiments that have been done on this are home grown BLP schlock. I don't think this is quite the case. I was reading though a 1996 paper last night by Janis Niedra et.al. produced for NASA. They couldn't duplicate the purported BLP results but they also had anomalous heat gains that they could not explain. It is an interesting technology issue as to what causes these kind of experimental results even if it is just caused by experimental error.--Davefoc (talk) 20:29, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
Err, the company is clearly nonsense and the article should make that clear. The best way to do so is to quote from the company itself, since it comdemns itself. Hiding what it says is bad, for that reason William M. Connolley (talk) 23:32, 22 February 2011 (UTC)
As for "The lack of clearly negative results" - the negative results are: that despite years of claims to have sold power plants and signed up all of these big contracts - not one erg of power seems to have been generated by them - and not one of the companies allegedly involved has written one single word on the subject of the success or otherwise of Blacklight's products. If that isn't a "clearly negative result" - I don't know what is! Just as an "Unidentified Flying Object" isn't always a space ship from an alien planet - so an "Unexplained Experimental Result" isn't a always a radical new theory for physics to explain. Sometimes a perfectly mundane flying object isn't identified and most often, the experimental result is just a mundane artifact of a method that's not easy to explain. SteveBaker (talk) 15:30, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
I have to wonder if the company exists at all. Outside of press releases and articles that appear to be based on those press releases, we have no evidence at all that the entire company isn't a giant web-based fabrication. The 1500 mile per litre car claims clearly put us well into water for gas pure nonsense. Guyonthesubway (talk) 17:18, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Yep - it's a sure sign. Claiming to have invented a water fuelled car is #5 in my You know you're a crank when... list. I'll leave it as an exercise for the reader to discover how many other points Blacklight can score from that list!  :-) SteveBaker (talk) 14:14, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Merge responses and reactions

These sections can be merged.

They are about the same thing, just presented differently. They could be merged to better attribute with less confusion. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 18:28, 23 February 2011 (UTC)

I agree. What I believe should happen is that the "Reactions from various scientists" section should be reduced in scope and serve as an introduction to what is now the "Response by outside researchers in chronological order" section. --Davefoc (talk) 22:57, 23 February 2011 (UTC)
Below is a rough cut at what I had in mind as the introduction/summary part of a revamped "Reactions from various scientists" section:
---------------
Mill's claims have largely been ignored by mainstream science. There have been a few articles in peer reviewed journals published that are critical of BLP theories and claims. Two Noble Larueates in Physics, Wolfgang Ketterle and Anthony Leggett, have made statements strongly critical of the idea of hydrino energy. Ketterle characterized Mills claims as "scientific nonsense", and Leggett asserted that Blacklight Power is unable to prove its claims about Quantum physics. The most prominent critic of BLP is Bob Park who has written a few articles that are highly critical of BLP claims.
In addition to the negative critiques described above, NASA did some experiments on BLP claims in 1996. The results were not consistent with BLP claims however the article describing the experiments reported some anomalous unexplained heat gains.
There have been some articles written supportive of BLP theories or claims that have been described as providing "independent confirmation" for BLP claims. The research reported by these articles and the articles themselves rely to various degrees on BLP and thus do not represent fully independent research and the articles have not been published in peer reviewed journals.
See below for a chronologically arranged list of outside responses to BLP claims and theories:
------------------
If there was a consensus that this was the right direction I would incorporate suggestions, clean it up a bit and insert it into the article.--Davefoc (talk) 00:31, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
The draft you have above is not bad at all.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 00:38, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Yeah - that's pretty good. I dislike seeing both "anomalous" and "unexplained"...seems like a bit of a tautology. If the head were explained, it wouldn't be anomalous - and if it weren't anomalous, there would be nothing to explain. Pick either word...but not both. SteveBaker (talk) 03:10, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
I did it for better or worse. Of course, feel free to criticize or improve. For one thing the NASA experiment should be mentioned in the Chronology section and the referencing might be improved. Alas, the quote from Mr. Miles didn't make the cut. He can always be added back in if somebody feels his quote was significant. Thx to SteveBaker the heat gain at NASA is now only unexplained. --Davefoc (talk) 09:22, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Good work! I don't mind losing the Miles quote - I was getting concerned about WP:UNDUE in the context of WP:FRINGE anyway. SteveBaker (talk) 14:08, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Thanks! Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 14:33, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Company section has too many sub-sections

The company series of sub-sections is far too long, and needs to be trimmed William M. Connolley (talk) 19:02, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

I tend to disagree. Which sections should be trimmed? The most likely candidate right now would be the "Involvement with Rowan University" sub-section. As it is now it just repeats information provided elsewhere in the article. What I would like to see in that section is a description of the long term relationship between some of the people at Rowan and BLP and other details about this connection. I favor keeping two other perhaps questionable sections on patents and the utility licenses. The patent and utility licenses are key parts of the BLP claims and a discussion of the facts surrounding them seems important to the article to me. --Davefoc (talk) 20:23, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
The Corporate Governance section might be a candidate for trimming or incorporation into some other section. I think the point that section makes is that BLP has and has had board members with impressive credentials and that seems like an important part of the BLP story to me. Although exactly what the significance of that is not clear.--Davefoc (talk) 20:29, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
I don't see it as too long, however; some sections can be combined into maybe one Developments (licensing, patents, rowan) section. Maybe just demote some sections . The issue for me is all the chronological information showing up in different sections. It gets confusing to see chronologies in different sections. To me, it's all notable information, just an organization and reading style issue. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 04:35, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Made some changes, hope I didn't move to fast for folks. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 14:45, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
I disagree with a few of your changes Zulu.--Davefoc (talk) 21:27, 25 February 2011 (UTC) They are a bit spread out so I am going to just list my objections here.
  1. Gen3 partners was only involved in the paper by Bykanov and not all five papers as your revised text implies.
  2. Rowan was involved in the other four papers
  3. The reason I included the title of the press release into what I wrote is that I have seen specific comments to the effect that BLP has now generated electricity directly (as implied by the titl--Davefoc (talk) 21:27, 25 February 2011 (UTC)e of the press release) and therefore the power output measurements were straightforward which thereby gave more credence to the idea that BLP had unequivocally demonstrated their energy production claims. I thought it was an important point that the title of the press release was misleading and BLP was not actually claiming the generation of electricity.
  4. If the Rowan University section is to remain under the Company section I think consideration should be given to making it a general description of the long term connection between Rowan and BLP. Perhaps including information about Peter Jansson's role in all this. He wrote his master's thesis on Hydrocatalys, he was an executive at Atlantic Electric when they invested in BLP and now he seems to be leading the charge on all these Rowan papers. If the Rowan University section remains just a list of Rowan research related to BLP I am not sure it is appropriate to keep it in the company section.
  5. We don't seem to have a standard for what the BLP acronym is. Is it BLPI or BLP?--Davefoc (talk) 15:47, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Ok, would you like me to try and fix, or feel free to go at it your self? Seems clear Rowan is working as a company contractor, since there may be little funding for this by other grant means. I prefer BLPI to BLP (ala Bio. Living Person, confusion). Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 18:44, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
The easy one is the BLPI thing. I have absolutely no preference except for consistency, so moving to make BLPI the standard throughout the article is fine with me. Other than that I think it would be nice to just fix the factually inaccurate issue of the five reports right away and then take a little more time to think about the changes and maybe get some more feedback on what if any changes should be made to what you have done. Davefoc (talk) 19:25, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Zulu, I have been thinking about the change you made to consolidate the Rowan research under its own heading. I think that was a good idea. I propose that it be one of three sub-sections in the Theory and Claims section. The Theory and Claims section would be divided into "BLPI theories and research", "Rowan research", and "Mainstream scientists reaction". The Rowan research section would begin with a small discussion of the relationship between Rowan and BLPI and include some explanation as to why Rowan research results do not provide independent confirmation of BLPI claims.
On the BLP/BLPI thing I think I spoke a little hastily, before BLPI is adopted as the standard I think we need to determine a consensus, since people seem to have been using both. As I said above my only preference is that we are consistent. --Davefoc (talk) 21:27, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Sure, let's try to keep the (xxxx)science organized under one section. I mean, we must have good faith that all these folks (company, contractors and critics) are attempting to apply the scientific method in their endeavors. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 04:16, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
William M. Connolley's edits to reduce the size of the Company section - They mostly looked good to me. Thank you. I quibbled a bit with removing the patent table. It provided a very quick way to immediately see that claims about a lot of patents were suspect. That information is available in the paragraph that is left but the paragraph is a little slow in making that point.--Davefoc (talk) 00:47, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

The reorg seems to be going well to me. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 02:17, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

BLP or BLPI

I prefer BLPI to BLP (ala Bio. Living Person, confusion). Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 18:44, 25 February 2011 (UTC)

The "Incorporated" part is almost never incorporated into the initials of a company.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 21:14, 26 February 2011 (UTC)

That sounds like a good argument to me. I vote for standardizing on BLP.--Davefoc (talk) 23:11, 26 February 2011 (UTC)
I was hoping for a few more responses before I did anything. I notice that when Blacklight Power is referred to with an acronym any place except in this article BLP is always used. I propose to change BLPI to BLP throughout the article tomorrow unless there is disagreement. This will also make usage consistent with the opening paragraph.--Davefoc (talk) 00:36, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Alleged_experimental_findings

Blacklight_Power#Alleged_experimental_findings .... seems like this section should be earlier in the article, at least before all the outsiders huff and puff. It's the insiders huff and puff right? Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 14:37, 24 February 2011 (UTC)

Seems right to me.--Davefoc (talk) 17:08, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Maybe the "Theory" section should be renamed to "Theory and Claims" and the "Alleged experimental findings" section could be moved to the end of it?--Davefoc (talk) 17:13, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Seemed like it was it was clearly the right thing to do, so I just did it.--Davefoc (talk) 17:27, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Looks better. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 18:30, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Wouldn't "Claimed" rather than "Alleged" be less likely to be read as if the allegation was from an independent reporter? LeadSongDog come howl! 19:01, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
I've never liked the usage of alleged as part of the title for the section. Perhaps "Experimental Findings" would be better with a sentence underneath that the list is about experimental findings reported by BLP.--Davefoc (talk) 20:16, 24 February 2011 (UTC)
Putting all the Experimental findings together, company and outsiders, might be better so as to distinguish folks that are arguing on theory vs those arguments based on observations (which of course can be properly attributed). Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 04:53, 25 February 2011 (UTC)
Zulu changed the title of this section to BLP reported experimental findings. That seemed like a good change to me. I think this issue is closed--Davefoc (talk) 20:57, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

Chemical process mystery

My reading between the lines, is that the Mill's process excess heat is highly dependent on the the hydrinos finding a new home in some yet unclear chemical process, else they go back from whence they come, with no net energy gain. I would like to research and include content on the likely chemical processes which have been proposed for these hydrino things. My view, if there is a sham, it is in assuming the dependent chemical process has the market scale to support wide spread energy benefits. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 02:34, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

The company claims 1500 miles on a liter of water. That'd make it more than 100 times as energy dense as gasoline, and you think market scale is the problem? Guyonthesubway (talk) 02:57, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
I think the bottom line message is that they claim that by squishing hydrogen atoms into this magical super-low energy state, they get energy out and convert hydrogen atoms into hydrinos...and then, Blacklight are claiming all of these bizarre uses for hydrino-based chemicals (preventing corrosion in the hulls of navy ships, for example) - so even the "waste product" is full of magical rainbow unicorn dust. It's all bullshit because it depends on the supposed ease of getting the hydrogen into this state (using apparatus small enough and safe enough that it could be stuffed under the hood of a car) - if it were that simple, and if energy were liberated in the process - then we'd see hydrino compounds all over the place in nature - and we just don't. SteveBaker (talk) 03:33, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Could be, or maybe we don't know how to look. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 05:44, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
On older BLP web sites there were a raft of claims about super coatings, super batteries, and other stuff I've forgotten. I looked for some of that stuff in the current web site and didn't find it, but I thought it would be a good idea to include some of those claims in the article if we can document them. Assuming the claims have been removed from the current web site it may have been for a good reason. If they had anything like super batteries or super coatings they wouldn't need to be messing around with crafty press releases and questionable research to prove their case. They would just take their product to any test lab, publish the results and just about instantly become billionaires. The don't seem to have done that and the reason seems obvious. --Davefoc (talk) 04:43, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
I remeber that stuff, that's what's stuck in my craw ... cause if the process is highly dependent on feeding a chemical process, then the economic equations would change significantly. I am provoked by the energy company who licensed it, then is trying to find the right place to work it into their network. All this could be supported a view that they must advance their chemistry before advancing the energy benefits, hence the software company release. Just looking into the tea leaves, better to look for some sources. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 05:36, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
http://www.blacklightpower.com/applications.shtml The fallacy of this "the reason"-type thinking is the assumption that there is only one reason why something doesn't happen. It is amazing the kind of negation of claims one can speculate about for lacking the ability to find a certain page on the internet. Should this be an indication of your level of competence in navigating websites? BLP is interested in patents and licensing, not manufacturing and associated installation and running costs. This gives them a reduced need for staff. This gives them more time to think and not worry about plant construction and other things.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 05:39, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
"It's all bullshit because it depends on the supposed ease of getting the hydrogen into this state (using apparatus small enough and safe enough that it could be stuffed under the hood of a car) - if it were that simple, and if energy were liberated in the process - then we'd see hydrino compounds all over the place in nature - and we just don't." You wouldn't find hydrino gas in our atmosphere because, theoretically, they are supposed to have 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, etc. the diameter of a stand-alone hydrogen atom (though not much lighter than the hydrogen atom). Also, if they are not by themselves, hydrinos would mix in with other chemicals through a strong bonding, and they would be easily ignored. Even if hydrino gas were trapped inside rocks, if you tried exciting it back into a higher state so that it could emit photons spontaneously, so that, for once, you could actually try to observe the rare amounts of hydrinos on the Earth, then it becomes just plain hydrogen before you have "found" it. Too late. Then, there is the point that the only time the electron transition states associated with hydrinos can be observed is either when they are formed or through high-energy spectroscopy. So if hydrinos are in crystals, their identity and nature cannot be ascertained directly through spectroscopic measurements by simply shining just any light on it. XPS as well as other non-trivial analyses are needed. Then there are many types of inter-body interactions that involve other elements which help catalyze hydrinos into existence (though obviously much smaller in number than the countless chemical reactions that may be conceived at all), so it would seem that instead of attributing certain phenomenon to hydrinos, it is attributed to other elements that are involved in these inter-body interactions. And then, when hydrinos are formed, electrical and high-frequency phenomenon are involved - period. Electrical and high-frequency phenomenon are unlikely to occur in enough quantities on this terrestrial planet to accumulate hydrino deposits on the surface. I would think that as soon as the hydrino forms during a lightning strike, then it is already off into space. What is the volume of a lighting strike as a percentage of the volume of the Earth's atmosphere? Let me guess - next to zero? However, on the Sun you can expect this formation to occur more readily. And again, since the formation of hydrinos involves inter-body interactions between known elements, of course the cause of the coronal spectra will be attributed to those elements and/or complicated inhomogeneous magnetic field behavior and not hydrinos. And then, if for the fact that the majority of hydrinos must form in stars in the first place, what then are the chances that hydrino gas would be trapped inside rocks, or for that matter, merged with other elements in a crystalline lattice, inside planets throughout the process of planet formation, considering that these hydrinos are supposed to have 1/2, 1/3, 1/4, etc. the diameter of a stand-alone hydrogen atom? How would they overcome the simple force of buoyancy then? This is more than just one reason why hydrinos can evade detection even if they did exist.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 05:39, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
(Removed by self) SteveBaker (talk) 18:46, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Both OR and PA have their limits. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 16:54, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Yeah - you're right. I've self-reverted. SteveBaker (talk) 18:46, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
I guess I deserved some of this criticism for not looking more carefully before I made the comment about the current web site not having some of the same claims that the old web site had. I remember the claims being a little more specific about products that were closer to fruition than this general speculation in the current web site but I could be wrong about that also. Your point about BLP only being interested in patents is a stretch though. Any one of those super products would generate a ton of incredibly valuable patents if it was real. And yet the company has only two patents (the status for which one of them is in doubt and the other is a software patent). So if they're being driven by patents as a source of income they might need to reconsider that strategy.Davefoc (talk) 08:39, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Patents may be the number one reason why they are trying to prove the technology through researchers first. If they tried to sell the technology to satisfied customers in order to then prove the technology, which is required for some skeptics, it might lead to enough disclosure to where someone could beat them to a patent. The proof must come before the patent, and the patent must come before the sale of the technology - period. If they have no patent, then investors will have wasted their money if some other company patents the technology first. Having patent protection is no option for BLP. It is a requirement whether or not it becomes its main source of income. Whether BLP is manufacturing company or a licensing company, this requirement does not change.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 12:45, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
Right on, and it's in academics interests to bust them, cause they would be subject to licensing fees too. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 14:09, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

Wikipedia self-awareness

This source seems relevant [5] for a note in this article. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 22:11, 28 February 2011 (UTC)

That magazine article mentioned a number of WP articles. The normal response is for the talkpages of those WP articles to get {{press}} added at the talkpage header. See WP:PRESS for details. LeadSongDog come howl! 23:07, 28 February 2011 (UTC)
The page on hydrino theory is no more. There is no dispute that since my proposal made over one year ago to move the article to Blacklight Power that the value of the article has substantially increased.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 00:07, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
I added a link to the article in the talk header as LeadSongDog mentioned. It is more specifically about the hydrino article that was consolidated into this one, but I thought it was close enough. Of course, feel free to delete it. It is not about this article explicitly. --Davefoc (talk) 00:36, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
That article is dated 2007 - it's a solid 4 years out of date. We have much stronger policies about stuff like WP:FRINGE these days than we once did - and our standards are pursued more aggressively than they were back then. This can occasionally be frustrating - but overall, it lets us have articles like this and give editors the teeth they need to keep the nut-jobs at bay and tell it like it is. IMHO, it's better to have an article like this that uses reliable sourced information to give our readers a solid idea of just how ridiculous some of these pseudo-scientific claims are than it is to simply delete the article and say nothing. It's harder work - but it makes for a better encyclopedia. SteveBaker (talk) 02:58, 1 March 2011 (UTC)
"We have much stronger policies about stuff like WP:FRINGE these days than we once did - and our standards are pursued more aggressively than they were back then. This can occasionally be frustrating - but overall, it lets us have articles like this and give editors the teeth they need to keep the nut-jobs at bay and tell it like it is. IMHO, it's better to have an article like this that uses reliable sourced information to give our readers a solid idea of just how ridiculous some of these pseudo-scientific claims are...." Then we must have more quotes from Bob Park. He is clearest when it comes to telling it "like it is" and highlighting the "ridiculous" nature of Mills' claims. Though don't confuse being clear with having attention to details. I'm just saying.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 02:09, 2 March 2011 (UTC)

In the article, did anyone notice Mr Park's good faith in Wikipedia openness? Seems like he had as much faith as he has in Mills. It would be worth a mention in his criticisms, that Wikipedia may have gone to far .... back then in 2007. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 03:04, 1 March 2011 (UTC)

What about the latest validation by Gen3/ Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics?

This is now 4 months old yet I do not see it reflected on the wiki page here at all:

GEN3 Partners and Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics (CfA) Scientists have confirmed the light signature of hydrino formation, high-energy radiation emitted as the electron of the hydrogen atom undergoes a transition below what was previously considered the lowest energy state. Read the results in the GEN3 and CfA Report "Validation of the Observation of Soft X-ray Continuum Radiation from Low-Energy Pinch Discharges in the Presence of Molecular Hydrogen." 96.44.175.206 (talk) 00:58, 13 March 2011 (UTC)

Hi 96.44.175.206,
The "GEN3" research is discussed in the opening section. There are a few things that you may not be aware of with regard to this research. The paper was not submitted for publication in a peer reviewed journal, so it is essentially just BLP self published stuff. 2. The replication of an experimental result is not the same thing as a validation of a theory. In this case there is research published in a peer reviewed journal that disagrees with the interpretation of earlier BLP spectrogaphic results as proof of BLP hydrino theories. 3. GEN3 is a consulting company that BLP contracted to hire a consultant to do these experiments. 4. The consultant didn't think enough of his work on what would be the scientific finding of the decade if it was true to mention his BLP work on the CV he publishes on line. 5. The work was done at CfA in space rented by BLP but Harvard was not involved in the research beyond renting the space to BLP and perhaps providing some technician support for the equipment. Davefoc (talk) 02:27, 13 March 2011 (UTC)
Yeah - this has "carefully fabricated" written all over it. The word "independent" in "independent validation" means that the person doing the validation must have no interest in the outcome...especially no financial interest - and none of the equipment used can come from the original proponent of the idea.
Someone who is being paid by BLP to do the work using a BLP-provided radiation source is in no way independent. The respectability gained by adding "Harvard Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics" is undermined by the fact that scientists at the center were merely operating the spectrometer - not overseeing the production of whatever light was being measured. Since BLP provided the source...how do we know that it didn't contain some other sneaky source of 10 and 22nm radiation? A truly independent experiment would absolutely have to use a light source built (possibly from BLP specifications) by a truly independent organization.
If this were a less outrageous claim, one might allow some tolerance for such matters - but this is far from that. BLP have made claims that violate the laws of thermodynamics - they had been doing this with a measure of respectability - but they truly jumped the shark when they made the classic free-energy-scam-artist claim that they can power a car using only water. At that instant, any credibility they ever had evaporated. They claim to have sold entire power stations based on this technology to companies who seem to make no recognition of having done that - and who have reported no results either way. A company with such a low level of credibility has to go a long way to gain any sort of respectability. So we have to regard this paper with extreme skepticism.
This email from the Center for Astrophysics in response to a question about this paper has been widely reported:
Dear <name withheld>:
The company Gen3 (representing Blacklight Power) paid for the use of one of our spectrometers and the technicians to operate it to make standard measurements of a supplied hydrogen sample. The results of those measurements were submitted to Gen3. A. Bykanov has no affiliation with the CfA and the Center for Astrophysics makes no claims nor did it participate in any research involving “hydrino transitions”.
Sadly, we have no way to prove that this email is genuine...but there is absolutely no mention of any research done with Bykanov, BLP or GEN3 on the CfA website - so I'm inclined to believe it.
BLP are pushing the CfA connection to give these results an air of respectability - they imply that CfA "scientists" did the work. It seems likely that this simply isn't the case. They also suggest that GEN3 did the work - but GEN3 only act as an intermediary and a "finder service" between companies like BLP who need some work done and a network of freelance scientists looking to make some money for short studies like this one. GEN3 really have no role in this.
So honestly, all we really know is that BLP paid Bykanov to take a BLP-supplied radiation source and measure it's output using a spectrometer that happens to be owned by CfA.
Even if we trust Bykanov completely - all we can really say is that some mysterious black box made by BLP produces radiation in the range that they claim. Without some independent observer taking their radiation source apart and examining it carefully - we have no way to know whether it produces that radiation from "hydrinos" or by some other mechanism entirely. Bykanov's paper makes no claim to have done that - so it really doesn't tell us all that much.
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. Without doubt BLP's claims are extraordinary - but this evidence could so easily have been rigged or compromised that we can't possibly regard it as acceptable - and especially not as "extraordinary evidence". BLP promote this as research done by the Center for Astrophysics, when clearly they had little or nothing to do with it. This dishonesty really throws the entire paper into doubt.
The Hydrino hypothesis needs much more testing by truly independent scientists - or it should simply be dismissed.
SteveBaker (talk) 15:11, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
"BLP have made claims that violate the laws of thermodynamics - they had been doing this with a measure of respectability - but they truly jumped the shark when they made the classic free-energy-scam-artist claim that they can power a car using only water." Obviously this is a misrepresentation of their message. It's like claiming that people who have spent billions of dollars trying to get more from hydrogen than they put into it by trying to fuse them into helium have proven themselves to be cranks when saying things like, "Water in the sea has enough energy to power humanity for millions of years."siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 20:18, 14 March 2011 (UTC)
No! They have written a detailed paper on the subject here. This is not some kind of offhand comment - their paper breaks down the cost of the components, arrives at a concrete price ($9,800) at which the car can be manufactured. It compares many alternative ways of powering vehicles and so forth. This is much more than just an offhand claim. Considering the flakey, unsubstantiated claims of BLP to be in any way comparable to the proven (if inadequate) results from actual, existing Fusion reactors is nuts! There are thousands of published, peer reviewed papers on hydrogen fusion - and the principles fit precisely with what we know of the nuclear reactions and quantum effects from other experiments. BLP's claims have in no way been demonstrated - and require overturning much of known science. Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence. Flakey free-energy claims require a water-fuelled car. SteveBaker (talk) 04:10, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
Here's where you made your mistake. You said, "only water". That is wrong.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 11:15, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
Nope - no mistake. Please read the document I linked to - there is no mention of any other fuel input than water. SteveBaker (talk) 13:42, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
Water by itself is not processed.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 16:38, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

BLP electricity production claims

BLP claims production of electricity in at least two places on their web site:

Title of November 29, 2010 press release:
BlackLight Power, Inc. Announces Production of Electricity from a New Form of Hydrogen
Text from Flash sequence announcing New Validation Studies:
Rowan University Professor Dr. K.V. Ramanujachary has generated electricity using CIHT technology. In a supporting study, a team of scientists at Rowan have completed the validation and chemical characterization of thermal systems.

However, none of the BLP reports reference any form of electric generation. Apparently the only information about the electrical generation is the fact that BLP claims that it has happened. The BLP text seems like it was written to be intentionally misleading, however based on a careful reading of the text, it seems that BLP is not actually claiming that they are providing any reports about the generation of electricity.

I don't know what, if anything, the article should do with regard to the above. Some people have interpreted BLP releases to mean that direct generation of electricity has occurred in a meaningful proof of concept way. There is zero evidence from BLP, other than their misleading claims, to suggest that anything like that has happened. However this conclusion is bordering on OR and may not be appropriate for the article.

The deceptive use of Rowan University, CfA, GEN3 partners as indication of independent verification, the dodgy claims of electric utility contracts and the misleading claims about electric generation create the suggestion of a pattern that is an important part of the BLP story, but perhaps the article has gone as far as it should in describing this aspect of the story.

As an aside, it seems like BLP is claiming that a new report, dated November 2010, was generated to support their 2010 claims of independent validation by Rowan: http://www.blacklightpower.com/pdf/Rowan2010.pdf The new report is titled:

Anomalous Heat Gains from Regenerative Chemical
Characterization of BLP Chemistries Used for Energy Generation and Regeneration Reactions

The title and listed authors are very similar to the third of the four Rowan reports that were put forth to support their 2009 claims of independent validation by Rowan.

The Wikipedia article is not quite correct with regard to this and it should be updated to be precise on this point I think.--Davefoc (talk) 20:40, 19 March 2011 (UTC)

I'd caution people against putting too much weight on this paper. It's talking about a complex reaction involving a dozen or more reagents - many of them listed at only 93% purity - producing a claimed 30% anomalous heat gain. The paper talks about the range of possible reactions in this complex system without making claims about what actually happened. There is plenty of scope for explaining that heat gain without resorting to the kinds of dramatic rewriting of science that BLP claims. Nobody could reasonably proclaim that there is a "below ground state" energy level for hydrogen on the basis of this paper. If the paper is eventually published in a reasonably prestigious journal - then we could talk about it in our article - but until it is...Meh. SteveBaker (talk) 03:38, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
Heat goes to electricity, how trivial and misleading is that? Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 07:25, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
The paper we are discussing isn't talking bout electricity - it's talking about a complex chemical reaction that (it is claimed) produces more heat energy than it theoretically should. BLP claim that this is due to some new mechanism in which hydrogen atoms collapse into things they call "Hydrinos" - which (sadly) nobody else has ever properly observed and which goes against all "known science". It's just barely possible that they could be correct - but such a claim is a really, deeply "extraordinary" claim - and claims that are so dramatic have to be backed by a truly astounding amount of evidence - which has yet to be provided.
Here is an analogy: It's as if I said that I had learned how to fly by flapping my arms and force of mind alone (that's a claim that's about as outrageous as BLP are making with their Hydrino theory). Your immediate reaction would be to think I was lying (and rightly so). If I then showed you a letter, written by a friend of mine whom I paid $100 to just recently, that said "Yes, indeed, I saw Steve flying by flapping his arms" - then you'd say "Well, he would say that - you gave him a hundred bucks!"...and that's roughly our reaction to these various self-published papers that BLP are putting out. If I said that this guy who works for NASA had seen me do it - and then you checked and found out that his job there was cleaning the toilets at mission control - then you might suspect that I was faking something! If I then put on my web site that I'd sold the rights to this kind of flight to Guatamalan Airlines for $10,000,000 - then you might check to see what Guatamalan airlines had to say about this...when you find no reference whatever to this deal on their website - and no mention in the press about this breakthrough in air travel - you'd naturally assume that there was something "fishy" going on...and it's the same deal with BLP's claim to have sold functional power plants to some agricultural cooperative in New Mexico - who don't mention a thing about it on their website. If I then went on to say that you could power a car by flapping your arms - you'd just write me off as a lunatic...same deal here.
If, on the other hand - there were three Nobel prize winning scientists, attesting to having observed me flying in this way - and they'd all written papers for Nature magazine - and there was actual footage of me swooping elegantly through the air shown live on CNN - and your next door neighbor learned the technique and could demonstrate it to you...then you'd be forced to believe me. But BLP isn't remotely close to having done ANY of those kinds of thing. All there is is to "prove" this is their increasingly wild and crazy claims (water fuelled cars...sheesh!) - and papers from very obscure scientists at very low-rent institutions that don't actually SAY that BLP are right - but kinda/sorta hint in that direction.
The paper above is saying something analogous to: "We've measured Steve's height and waistline and knowing the average body density of male humans, we estimate from that that he probably weighs 100kg - but when he stood on our bathroom scale and flapped his arms, it read only 98kg!! These results are consistent with him being able to fly.". The term "consistent with" means that I didn't actually get heavier than they thought...so maybe there is something going on here. Now you're not going to accept such a fuzzy set of evidence for such a dramatic claim. If I'd merely claimed to have found a new low-calorie diet - then this evidence might convince you - but for a claim of being able to fly, you'd need much more than that. You'd want to find other ways to weigh me before and after arm-flapping. You'd want to ask whether I'd kicked my shoes off before standing on the bathroom scales. You'd want to make sure that the scales were calibrated properly...heck you'd certainly want to try this for yourself before you believed me!
Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence. SteveBaker (talk) 14:08, 20 March 2011 (UTC)
Extraordinary does not mean outrageous.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 16:40, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

With regard to Zulu's question above "Heat goes to electricity, how trivial and misleading is that?" Very misleading I think. The press release suggests that BLP has a functioning prototype that produced electricity from a continuous reaction in excess of that predicted by standard physics. Validation of their claims would be trivial with such a device but beyond the title of the press release BLP did not produce any evidence for such a device. The reports cited by BLP claim that a pulse of heat has been detected in excess of what can be explained by standard physics. This is essentially the same claim that BLP has been making for years and there was nothing new in that. There are at least three possible problems associated with this evidence: 1. The experiments may be flawed. 2. The analysis may be flawed. 3. Even if a previously unknown reaction was detected it is not clear that it could be exploited for useful energy generation. So without the claim of electricity production they had nothing to claim except the same sketchy stuff that they had been claiming for years and, in fact, they didn't supply any information about their electricity production so despite the implication of the press release title the information released was nothing new and it was at least as problematic as what had come before. --Davefoc (talk) 17:48, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

http://www.blacklightpower.com/Press%20Releases/BlackLightHydrinoElectricity112910.htm
The key words are "additionally" and "also". By reading the press release, there should be no impression that the papers in question say anything about CIHT cells or the electricity. The only reason why anyone would be misled to thinking otherwise is the reader him/herself. There is no reason to assign blame to the author.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 18:24, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

The type of content in the papers is not all that new, however Blacklight Power seems to be disclosing some details years after the fact. Check out http://www.blacklightpower.com/pdf/GEN3_SolidFuel.pdf. It's a 2009 paper in connection with GEN3 Partners. The file was uploaded/modified into http://www.blacklightpower.com/pdf/ on March 10, 2011.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 18:24, 20 March 2011 (UTC)

I guess misleading is in the eye of the beholder. The only thing significantly different in this press release from what BLP has been claiming for years is the claim of electrical production. There are no details on this other than some unsubstantiated blathering, so essentially there is no new information here from what has gone on before and that seems to be pretty misleading to me. If BLP has a device that generates electricity in a way that provides a simple validation of their claims all they need to do is send it to a local independent lab, release the reports and they're done. They can just start spending the billions of dollars that will flow their way. If they have that device no tricky press releases are necessary. The fact that they are still producing tricky press releases strongly suggests that they don't have such a device.--Davefoc (talk) 19:09, 20 March 2011 (UTC).

This article needs serious rewriting!

I contested your prod[6]. Please note that crackpot theories also get their own articles (just take a look at Category:Pseudophysics). They just need to be notable. I think that the lead of the article already makes it clear that mainstream science just plain out rejects Mill's ideas. About being a scam, you need reliable sources to make such a claim about a company in a wikipedia article. --Enric Naval (talk) 08:46, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

I would second that. So long as our article is clear that this is not mainstream science - which I believe it is - then notability and verifiability are the main concerns. I think we're good on both grounds. Also, when an article is being actively worked upon, it is a little rude to just stick a prod template in there without any prior discussion on the talk page. SteveBaker (talk) 20:38, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

Well okay, here's how I see it. The scientific content of the article is exactly zero, so on this ground it does not make a positive contribution to Wikipedia. However, as Enric pointed out, crackpot ideas can get their pages if they're notable enough. Which brings us to the notability issue. Apart from some media brouhaha around 2005-2007, I really don't see any notability this idea has. Their company may of course put out press releases every once in a while on their website to try and keep interest alive, but just because they make enough noise doesn't mean they should get their own Wikipedia entry. This was my reasoning behind proposing the article for deletion, and I still stand by it. However, in the meantime I realized there is a good reason for not deleting the article - to provide some information to those who may occasionally run across this company. I guess this is also some form of notability, albeit a different one from the one I had in mind when proposing the article for deletion. Which brings us to the quality of the article.

I think the article is very poorly written/potentially misleading. Yes, it does state at the beginning of some sections that the ideas presented are not mainstream physics, but this is not further explained in the body of the sections. In other places sections of criticism are mixed with sections defending the theory, and with legitimate buzzwords/institutions, so that a casual reader may be confused into believing the legitimacy of the crank concepts. The same is true of the references - papers which are legitimate but have nothing to do with these crackpot ideas are cited alongside crackpot papers, creating a mishmash in which it is hard to discern what is legitimate and what is not. Etc.

So in conclusion, I think the article should stay. But with significant rewriting. Crackpot ideas do belong on Wikipedia if they're "notorious" enough, but they should be clearly labeled as such. I'm going to stick a couple of templates in until my concerns are addressed. Bstoica (talk) 21:56, 21 May 2011 (UTC)

They have actually been in and out of the news for much of the last two decades, though I agree that much of the coverage has consisted of press releases and repackaged press releases. I doubt that anything here will have any impact on actual physics, but it is a verifiable historical footnote. The relevant guideline is at Wikipedia:Notability; see especially the first section. Mixing the refutations with the assertions is a stylistic choice made to avoid having an article structure that gives the appearance of saying here is this stuff, it sure is great, they are going to change the world ... oh, and as an aside a few other individuals have some other opinions; the Wikipedia:Criticism essay explains the point better.
As for everything else - by all means improve it! The Neutral point of view policy, a core principle of the site, actually requires that we present the material as it is generally presented in the most reliable sources. Since the overwhelming opinion of the physics community has been to dismiss it, this should be reflected in the article (while still explaining the history and what it is that they actually claim, of course). The current text shows the scars of the consensus-building process, and a clear logical presentation would be most welcome. - 2/0 (cont.) 06:23, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
Most of the people who have edited this article are skeptical of BLP claims and it is surprising to see such strong criticism of the article coming from a BLP skeptic. I don't see much supportive of BLP in the article beyond the straightforward description of their claims in the section on that. If you (Bstoica) have found errors in the article, or you believe that relevant information is missing for which reliable sources exist or you could explain which sections are misleading and how you think they should be improved I hope you will share your thoughts on that with us.--Davefoc (talk) 07:12, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
It's rare to see a BLP skeptic complain about the article at all. 100% of our complaints so far have been from the free-energy/pseudoscience side of things. So pushing things yet further into the skeptical realms cannot reasonably be managed under the "NPOV" banner. I think the balance of the article is OK - and I'm quite sure that BLP qualify for an article under notability guidelines. But, hey "be bold". If there is stuff in here that needs improvement, then go for it! SteveBaker (talk) 16:42, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
Okay, here's some suggestions. Perhaps it would be better to state in a more elaborate manner at the beginning of the article that it's not dealing w/ mainstream physics. I don't think the one sentence that is currently there quite cuts it, and going into the company section one can be left with the idea that this is legitimate science. Ideally, it might be better if there were a small paragraph of criticism right at the beginning, though I'm not sure this can be done without damaging the flow of the article somewhat. Then going into the "Theory and Claims" section, another such warning right at the beginning might be appropriate. The Rowan University research section can probably be merged into the theory and claims one - as it stands now it is very short, and may give the reader the impression that this theory deserves more legitimacy than it actually does or that it has been independently verified. Moving on, perhaps "Mainstream science BLP related research and analysis", could be changed into something a bit stronger, such as "Mainstream criticism of..." or "Incompatibility of BLP with the laws of physics" or etc. It would be ideal to let the reader know straight from the title of the section that something is not right here. I would also say that the three "Independent..." subsections can be merged into one big chronology. And perhaps the Jan Naudts paper entry could be edited a little: "Rathke did not take into account complexities introduced by relativistic quantum mechanics" doesn't mean anything, and the paper appeared in the General Physics section of the arxiv. This should be mentioned. Also, in the 2007 cold fusion bulletpoint, perhaps a bit of clarification is required: could fusion isn't really mainstream research, so some more background on Edmund Storms might be warranted - "Cold fusion researcher," as it is now, is weasel wording. And perhaps the references should also be organized into a more coherent format, ideally separating between the crackpot references, the ones criticizing the crackpot references and legitimate scientific papers/articles - as the article is now, it may be confusing for a layperson to make the distinctions. I guess these are my main points for now. There are other (smaller?) edits that could be made, such as inserting some caveats that the Hermann Haus paper has nothing to do with these crank ideas, editing/removing some sentences in places, editing Mills' criticism of the standard particle physics (it's out of place as it is now, so either it should be put in some context or it should go) etc., but maybe these should be addressed later. Bstoica (talk) 17:43, 22 May 2011 (UTC)
Bstoica has criticized the article in a variety of ways. I propose that a separate section should be created for each of his criticisms that are discussed. I am going to start a new section on his first criticism below.--Davefoc (talk) 05:20, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
To be honest - rather than go though protracted and complicated discussions - why not have Bstoica simply write something - either directly into the article (Be Bold) - or in a sub-page somewhere under User:Bstoica. Then we'd have something concrete to talk about...maybe we all like it and just take that as our new version. SteveBaker (talk) 13:34, 23 May 2011 (UTC)
That sounds reasonable to me.--Davefoc (talk) 16:57, 23 May 2011 (UTC)


Article Needs Deletion

This article is good in that it shows how scammers can gain $ for idiotic and completely Wrong ideas.. But.. There needs to be clear demarcation about what is real and what is pseudoscience (fantasy-fiction).. This article is TOO NEUTRAL and needs to be clearer about the fringe-fantasy-idiocy aspects of the 'theory'/BS.. As the person says above, Wikipedia is complicit and encouraging FRAUD by publicizing this BS .. MAKE THIS ABSOLUTELY CLEAR or delete the article.. PARTICIPATE IN FRAUD or make ABSOLUTELY CLEAR IT'S FRAUD - only ONE OR THE OTHERPhoenix-antiscammer (talk) 23:02, 9 August 2011 (UTC)

Encyclopedias aren't tools which may promote or claim fraud, provided that the content is encyclopedic. It may describe such however, so as long as appopriate sources are used. Objectivity and depth of coverage should meet or exceed what is seen in the mainstream media. Regards, siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 01:49, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

State more explicitly that the article is not about a mainstream physics theory.

Bstoica said above: "Perhaps it would be better to state in a more elaborate manner at the beginning of the article that it's not dealing w/ mainstream physics. I don't think the one sentence that is currently there quite cuts it, and going into the company section one can be left with the idea that this is legitimate science."

I see two related issues here:
1. Does the introductory sections makes it sufficiently clear that BLP theories are generally rejected by mainstream physics?
2. Should the "Company" section be more explicit about the fact that Mills' theories are not accepted by the mainstream physics comunnity?

Issue 1: The second sentence of the two sentence introductory section is:
"Where Mills has not been ignored he has met general skepticism in the academic community since the founding of BLP in 1991. Mills' ideas of "CQM" and "hydrinos" have been criticised by mainstream physicists[5][6][7][8] as "pseudoscience" and rejected as "just silliness".

That seems clear to me. I am not sure how it could be made more explicit and remain consistent within the spirit of NPOV. Perhaps there is a case to be made for including Dr. Phillip Anderson's thoughts on the matter to liven up the section a bit.

Issue 2: There may be some issues with the clarity of the writing in the "Company" section but two of the four paragraphs provide substantial negative information with regard to BLP. The point of the two paragraphs is that BLP theories have been rejected by respected scientists and no practical devices have been built based on BLP technology. I think perhaps there is room for improvement here in that perhaps the section could more clearly make that point. However, overall I think the general tone and approach of the section is correct.
--Davefoc (talk) 05:58, 23 May 2011 (UTC)

Bstoica is clearly asking that 1 out of every 5 sentences, if not more, should be written this way. All there needs to be is to have similar such sentences be repeated 10 times as much or so in a myriad of different ways. Bstoica won't be satisfied until the article Blacklight Power is water-downed in the same way as The Energy Machine of Joseph Newman was. Check out this guy's extensive edit history, spanning 39 hours and 47 minutes with a record-shattering two edits to Wikipedia article space. This guy is committed! (reality-check: I wouldn't even bet that he still bothers to check Wikipedia - much less this talk space! Don't expect him to remove the recently-added tags either!)siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 02:50, 3 June 2011 (UTC)
Indeed, there seem to be two separate issues here. I agree that the "Company" section is probably okay as it is now, as it provides sufficient information on BLP. But the Issue 1 could perhaps be improved - it is most important that BLP is at odds with the known laws of physics, not that Mills' theories have been ridiculed. That is what the first sentences of the article should emphasize. Anyways, I am indeed going to stop trying to fix this article, as it's too big of a waste of time. And siNkarma86, until at least until the 3rd and 4th sections (Rowan University research and Mainstream...) are brushed up the two tags should stay. --- Bstoica (talk) 05:56, 6 June 2011 (UTC)

Randell Mills is a Scammer

Collapsed under Talk Page Guidelines. Talk pages are not a forum for editors to argue their personal point of view about a controversial issue.
this article is such BS .. if he garnered 25M, it's only because investors are Idiots.. if there is any true Science, it's chemistry.. Randell Mills is trying to rewrite the laws of chemistry.. he's so full of cow-manure.. Wikipedia is a scam-promoter by posting anything relating to Randell Mills.. Wikipedia and Randell Mills are both Scammers Prime. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.48.156.21 (talk) 22:39, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
Wikipedia does not allow original research. Feel free to find documented evidence of a scam. Doing so has legal implications and can be rewarding for the plaintiff. Regards, siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 01:55, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Article Needs Deletion

Collapsed under Talk Page Guidelines. Talk pages are not a forum for editors to argue their personal point of view about a controversial issue.
This article is good in that it shows how scammers can gain $ for idiotic and completely Wrong ideas.. But.. There needs to be clear demarcation about what is real and what is pseudoscience (fantasy-fiction).. This article is TOO NEUTRAL and needs to be clearer about the fringe-fantasy-idiocy aspects of the 'theory'/BS.. As the person says above, Wikipedia is complicit and encouraging FRAUD by publicizing this BS .. MAKE THIS ABSOLUTELY CLEAR or delete the article.. PARTICIPATE IN FRAUD or make ABSOLUTELY CLEAR IT'S FRAUD - only ONE OR THE OTHERPhoenix-antiscammer (talk) 23:02, 9 August 2011 (UTC)
Encyclopedias aren't tools which may promote or claim fraud, provided that the content is encyclopedic. It may describe such however, so as long as appopriate sources are used. Objectivity and depth of coverage should meet or exceed what is seen in the mainstream media. Regards, siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 01:49, 10 August 2011 (UTC)

Prediction of acceleration of the expansion and updates references

I added mention in the theory section to the 1995 edition of the GUTCQM where RLM first predicts acceleration of the expansion of the universe in 1995 which was before it was observed and then later confirmed in 1998. This is significant and verifiable from the references provided.

Additionally, I updated BLP's publication references to 84 peer-reviewed publications and provided an updated link to the publication list. The last peer-reviewed citation was from 2009.

Both of these edits were undone by WMC on the basis of "restore useful info". How is it possibly restoring useful info by removing factually significant, more accurate and updated information? This seems biased. I would like to argue for restoring my edits.

Johnnycpis (talk) 14:02, 31 August 2011 (UTC)

The useful info you lost (purely by accident, I've no doubt) was some peer-reviewed, mostly in low-impact journals William M. Connolley (talk) 14:35, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
Only significant papers should be listed, the significance being provided by mentions in secondary sources, review. Additionally, if you are talking about a dispute over a paper, you can add the paper along the secondary sources that document the dispute. Dumping every single paper written by the subject is not good Sorry, your edit didn't do this. When providing an analysis of every paper written by the subject, the analysis should be sourced to secondary sources (reviews of the field, etc), which explain the weight of those papers in the field. Some time ago, I added to this article that Mills had published, but only in "speculative physics" journals, and it was sourced to a secondary source that I found. I see that it is no longer in the article. We should recover that bit of info and its source. --Enric Naval (talk) 15:31, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
Ah, here it is:
"Although Mills has published CQM theory papers in peer-reviewed journals, he has published only in those dealing with speculative work."[1]
1. Erico Guizzo (January 2009). "Loser: Hot or Not?". IEEE Spectrum. Why it's a loser: Most experts don't believe such lower states exist, and they say the experiments don't present convincing evidence. (part of Winners & Losers VI, by Philip E. Ross in the same publication)
--Enric Naval (talk) 15:45, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
This paper could also be useful, but it's behind a paywall[7].
The rejection of Blacklight's patent also analyzes the publications and its impact, but it should be used only if we can't find any better review, and only because of falling back to WP:PARITY.
WP:PARITY being used because Mill has almost zero coverage in mainstream books about the field of physics. I think that the only one mentioning is The role of neutrinos, which describes the theory in painstaking details but makes no analysis of its weight. Park wrote about the initial reception of the theory, about how his theory compares to mainstream science, and about the significance of his analysis by NASA (he says that it's simply Pascal's wager) [8]. Popular Science wrote about the initial reception[9]. --Enric Naval (talk) 16:25, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
1) For the acceleration of the expansion edit: I am correct in understanding, then, that we need a secondary source which discusses this prediction before being able to include it here? Even if it is plainly obvious from the referenced primary source which made the claim? Does a secondary source need to discuss that this is significant for it to be included here?
2) William: saying Mills et. al. have published a number [35] of papers, some peer-reviewed, mostly in low-impact journals ... is misleading in that it sounds as if few of the papers published by BLP are peer reviewed--at least to me. Since the information is available, rather than use a subjective term, let's be factual and re-word this to something like: Mills et. al. have published a number of papers, 84 of which are peer-reviewed[35], mostly in low-impact journals ... or Mills et. al. have published 84 peer-reviewed papers[35], mostly in low-impact journals. Let's update the reference link too since I don't see the point in including an outdated publication list.
3) Enric: I don't see where you are going with the comments above; It doesn't seem unreasonable to mention in passing the volume of work published in peer-review along with some of the claims in those publications, which is what the --BLP reported experimental findings-- section is. I'm just further quantifying a statement that was already there. Are you suggesting removing this statement and/or changing it to something else (ie: you are not ok with my suggestion in (2))?Johnnycpis (talk) 17:15, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
Paul Steinhardt predicted the accelerated expansion of the universe as a part of the quintessence hypothesis a couple of years before RLM. Bruno Zumino talked about it as early as 1978 in his work on modulii. Georges Lemaître talked about vacuum energy powering such an accelerating expansion way back in 1934. Many others have postulated the possibility of Hubble's expansion being of an accelerating rather than decelerating nature. You could even argue that Einstein made allowance for the possibility by including the cosmological constant into his field equations. RLM certainly was neither the first nor the last to think of this possibility. So this is all kinda moot. SteveBaker (talk) 21:14, 31 August 2011 (UTC)
@Johnnycpis, 1) yes, you need a source discussing the acceleration of the expansion discovery. As Carl Sagan said, extraordinary claims in articles require extraordinary proof from reliable (secondary) sources. The more extraordinary the claim, the more proof and higher-quality the proof that you will have to provide for the edit to stick in the article.
2) (I have updated the PDF link) That edit looks good, but I don't know about saying exactly 84, since it's based in a secondary source but in a wikipedia editor counting the papers and deciding which are peer-reviewed and which not. Looking at the list, how about we put "80+" (and we don't have to update the count every time he publishes one paper). Mills et. al. have published 80+ peer-reviewed papers[35], mostly in low-impact journals..
3) Personally, I would remove all that whole sentence and replace with statements from high-quality secondary sources. But Mills doesn't have enough coverage to do that. So I'm saying that we'll have to resort to lower-quality sources and to some amount of primary sources in order to cover gaps. (for example, counting the number of papers in a self-published list is using a primary source). Anyways, let's address 2) first. Is 80+ OK with you? --Enric Naval (talk) 11:40, 1 September 2011 (UTC)
Hi Enric -- your suggestion in (2) sounds good, thank you. Johnnycpis (talk) 01:26, 2 September 2011 (UTC)
I have gone ahead and done it. Now we should at finding secondary sources that evaluate the impact of Mills' work. --Enric Naval (talk) 06:20, 2 September 2011 (UTC)
I revised. The list at BLP doesn't characterize the journals as low-impact of course, so that is either OR or uncited: it certainly shouldn't be attributed to BLP. If we do have a source for the characterization, we should cite it. LeadSongDog come howl! 13:02, 2 September 2011 (UTC)
I have grave misgivings about this. If these really are low-impact journals (and from what I can see, they certainly are) then this is a case of WP:UNDUE - and we should simply delete all mention of those articles and stick only with those that are noteworthy enough to be used as references. We don't routinely list papers published by companies like this - the only reason we're doing it here (IMHO) is because of the controversial nature of the "junk science" presented by BLP. Inflating the importance of that nonsense is a really bad idea and turning a statement that used to basically say "They wrote a lot of junk papers" into one that says "Look at all of the important papers they wrote" is a gross distortion of the facts. IMHO, we should do what we do for other companies of this size and simply not mention these papers unless they are needed to reference points made in our article (in which case, they have to pass the WP:RS test). SteveBaker (talk) 15:37, 2 September 2011 (UTC)
Are these 80+ publications in top-tier journals? No. Have these publications been academically and independently peer-reviewed by related subject matter academic members of various respected institutions who decided the material was worth publishing? Yes. I find a statement such as "Look at all the important papers they wrote", to be just as much a distortion as one which says "They wrote a lot of junk papers/nonsense". The fact is that 80+ independently peer reviewed papers have been published by Mills. If you or anybody else want to read into it "look at all these important papers" or, "look at how much junk science is published in peer-reviewed journals", that is your choice. I don't believe that undue weight is assigned to a simple statement of fact when your point of contention is only that the peer-reviewed publications are not in top-tier journals. I admit I'm far from a knowledgeable Wikipedia editor and don't know the rules well (very little, in fact), so if consensus is that the 80+ edit should be removed to better follow the rules/spirit/precendence of Wiki editing, then I yield.Johnnycpis (talk) 17:27, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

These 95 (as of July 2011) publications have been a topic of debate here for years now, as has how to characterize them. I suppose we may need an archive section on this question alone, and a FAQ. Simply put, the nature of modern junk science is to create reams of papers (that go largely unread) to create a semblance of credibility. Low impact journals are those with little reputation for quality in their field: science and publishing are both competitive fields, so authors/editors each want to get the best journals/papers they can. An author's consistent inability to get published in high-impact journals is strong evidence that the best editors are unconvinced of the work's merits. However that is only my analysis and has no place in the article. If we are to provide characterization, it should come from published and hence wp:V wp:RS. LeadSongDog come howl! 18:16, 2 September 2011 (UTC)

That sounds alot like OR to me. Do you have a reliable source to back up your assertions that "the nature of modern junk science is to create reams of papers (that go largely unread) to create a semblance of credibility" or are you just making it up off the top of your head? By the way here is another peer review article: http://www.springerlink.com/content/x604u4634548p705/ Is "The European Physical Journal D - Atomic, Molecular, Optical and Plasma Physics" another low impact journal that supports scammers so as to give them a "semblance of credibility" in your opinion? — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.4.22.216 (talk) 08:07, 26 September 2011 (UTC)
See the erratum by the editors of that journal. LeadSongDog come howl! 13:23, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
That appears to be a dead link. SteveBaker (talk) 14:18, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
I think he means this editorial. --Enric Naval (talk) 14:54, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
Right. Who knew that the doi resolver can't cope with a terminal period? LeadSongDog come howl! 20:20, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
And your point is...what exactly. Are they publishing a scammer's paper to give them "a semblance of credibility" or not? Why are they publishing what many people call pseudoscience? The fact that they wrote the editorial tells me the paper was published in spite of the publishers misgivings, if anything I would say that means that the observations were strong enough to override the editors first instinct and to publish in spite of them. To me that appears to be a mark in Blacklight's favor not a mark against them. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 174.4.22.216 (talk) 00:56, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Clearly the editors of Eur Phys J D were willing to publish the paper but not willing to endorse the hydrino theory used in it. But all that is irrelevant. The paper is in any case a primary source discussing observations, and Mills is hardly independent of those observations, so I don't see on what basis we can possibly characterize it as "another peer review article". LeadSongDog come howl! 05:42, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Corporate governance section dispute

Should this article include a list of prominent individuals that have been part of the corporate governance of BLP?

The section has been added and removed a few times.

The issue seems difficult to me. LeadSongDog has suggested that there is insufficient references to support it, but they now at least seem to be reasonably referenced.

The issue for me is whether the list is of sufficient interest and relevance to justify its inclusion. Part of the BLP story is the fact that the company has attracted prominent people to be part of its corporate governance. Right now that is about all that is publically known about this. None of these people have said anything about the company after they have left it and none of these people have provided any information about their motivation in joining the company other than some rosy statements around the time they join.

I think a similar issue exists with regard to the list of companies that BLP allegedly had contracts with. We know nothing about the nature of the contracts and mostly we don't know what the expectations of the people who signed these agreements was. In fact, the companies are almost all tiny entities the purpose of which is not clear and listing those companies may imply undo weight as to the significance of the contracts.

I don't know that there is an objective answer as to what is appropriate here. My own thought is that the corporate governance list is too long relative to the information value it supplies. I think what might be more appropriate is a short statement that the corporate governance of BLP has included prominent individuals with a few of the people on the list provided as examples. However an argument can be made that this is a kind of documentation that might be useful to somebody in the future trying to unravel what went on at BLP. --Davefoc (talk) 16:35, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I have to say that my inclination is to remove it. It doesn't seem sufficiently notable for us to care out it. That said, I see that these lists are not unusual for businesses in general - so perhaps it's OK. I'm not sure. SteveBaker (talk) 19:30, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
IIRC, it was I that added it in the first place, but the sources were not very credible, and when WMC removed it I was persuaded. I don't see any evidence that the sources do anything more than mirror BLP's press releases. As a private company they don't file with the SEC, so the usual level of documentation is not publicly available. If we are falsely attributing offices to living people we have a BLP problem. Of course any of these individuals could confirm the membership, but I see no evidence that they have done so. It is not unlike all the contract announcements (via H&K press releases) that don't seem to be backed up by corresponding information by the other parties in the "contracts". LeadSongDog come howl! 20:18, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
Oh dear, did I start this? Looking back: I first removed those who were redlinks [10] (note: at that point they were indeed linked, and red) and then removed the rest with "why do we care"? [11]. And indeed, the question remains: why do we care? The obvious answer is: because having "notable" people on your board conveys respectability. Which is why such a list is entirely appropriate for a corporate website, but less appropriate for wikipedia. Also note the word "notable": that is someone's judgement. In what sense are they notable? The current board [12] (only including directors, not sec) appear to be Scott W. Doyle, H. McIntyre Gardner, John J. Gillen, William R. Good (Assistant Corporate Secretary, Vice President - Administration), Sverre Prytz, Jeffrey C. Petherick, James K. Sims. If we list anyone, it should be the current directors - not former ones. In summary, I agree with Df: more appropriate is a short statement that the corporate governance of BLP has included prominent individuals with a few of the people on the list provided as examples William M. Connolley (talk) 21:23, 28 September 2011 (UTC)
Can we find a source more reliable than the BLP website to confirm any of these people other than Mills and Good are still involved? Looking at Doyle, it looks here that he does not mention it if he is. LeadSongDog come howl! 22:41, 28 September 2011 (UTC)

I looked at a few of the references and they seem to be other than BLP. My guess is that most of the references are legit and non-BLP or could be made so. The real issue, I think, is whether the list belongs or not and if so should it remain in its current form. I would not feel bad about any decision, but I think the best would be to convert the list to a short paragraph stating that some prominent people have participated in BLP corporate governance and list a few examples. This is interesting information whether BLP is eventually shown to be a complete scam or if BLP releases technology that transforms the world. Perhaps a corporate governance section that lists a few current corporate officers and a brief mention of previous prominent individuals that have served in corporate governance would be best. The most interesting thing and the most useful thing would be to include something about what past board members had to say about what went on in the company. I have never seen even the tiniest indication that anything like that exists. The lack of any information from people that have worked in the company or served in its corporate governance about the nature of the company is an interesting part of the story, but I'm not sure what to make of it and at any rate it is hard to document the absence of something.--Davefoc (talk) 05:25, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Strong Keep. In question is whether this list is of sufficient interest. Are you kidding me? It's the most interesting thing in the whole article! That business, government, and military leaders of this magnitude have been persuaded to become Directors is extremely notable. Every reader is free to draw their own conclusion about whether or not it conveys respectability.
Each listed person has held high office in at least one organization or enterprise that's notable enough to have its own Wikipedia article. That, in turn, lends a great deal of notability to these individuals.
I've never before seen Forbes or Businessweek questioned as to whether they are reliable enough sources.
The current Directors are not necessarily the most notable Directors. We can probably concur that Jordan was one of the most notable Directors, and it's likely that his death is the only reason he's no longer a Director.
It's true that many articles about businesses have a Corporate Governance section. Those who target this particular Corporate Governance section, while tolerating all the others, seem to "have it out" for Blacklight Power... definitely non-neutral behavior.
To answer the question of "Who cares?" I, for one, care, as must everyone else who ever contributed to this section of the article.
(On the subject of redlinks: I thought Wikipedia encourages redlinks, because they spur the creation of additional articles. Is that not the case? I know that Michael H. Jordan started out as a redlink, and look at it now... a fairly robust article that's in seven categories.) 174.24.123.239 (talk) 06:16, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
On the unimportant subject of redlinks: yes. But that means at the moment (or rather back then, and now) those people were not "notable" by the standard of having an article about them. I wouldn't delete just the brackets round the name; I'd delete the whole name as NN.
On the "keep": the arguments you are giving are exactly why I think the section is dubious: it is promo, and that is why you want it in. At the very least, those people who are former directors should be removed, because the section doesn't make it clear that we are mixing past and present; and for all we know those "former" people left because of a deliberate decision not to be involved with BLP William M. Connolley (talk) 12:48, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
On the topic of redlinks, the WP:REDLINK guideline is pretty clear: "Sometimes it is useful in editing article text to create a red link to indicate that a page will be created soon or that an article should be created for the topic because the subject is notable and verifiable."...so in a nutshell - you could only create a redlink if the article that it would hypothetically link to could be a valid article. So redlinking the name of someone who is currently non-notable or for whom too little has been written in WP:RS, is clearly incorrect. But redlinking to the name of a clearly notable person who does not yet have an article written about them is strongly encouraged because it helps Wikipedia to grow. Many people patrol the Special:WantedPages list in search of ideas for new articles - and that list is filled from redlinks in other articles. SteveBaker (talk) 13:57, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Remove. OK - so I was somewhat agnostic about this - but following the discussions above, I have definitely swung around to the "Remove" point of view. Certainly listing past directors is unjustified - that information is simply not notable enough. This is a tiny company, with very little economic impact - it's really borderline whether there should be an article here at all. Past directors certainly don't warrant an exhaustive list even for gigantic corporations. Take a look at ExxonMobil for example...their "Corporate Affairs" section lists the present board of directors - but aside from that, there is only occasional mention of past directors who had some specific impact on the company. Hence, if we have WP:RS that one or more of those past Blacklight directors had had a notable impact on BLP then we could mention them in some kind of corporate history prose section.
Listing the present directors seems more valid - that is the practice in many other articles about companies. But if the only source of that information is the Blacklight website - then I'm strongly dubious. This company has often wrapped itself in the notability of others (eg in claiming that various scientific studies were performed by prestigious universities when in truth, Blacklight only rented time on their equipment)...so it is not beyond belief that they'd do something similar in describing their "directors". They aren't a publicly traded company - so there is no oversight and little legal responsibility in that regard. Hence we must be concerned over WP:BLP issues (that is the Wikipedia policies surrounding "Biographies of Living Persons", not "Black Light Power"!). If we have no independent confirmation that these people truly do actively direct the company - and especially if those people don't admit any such association in any of their public records - then I think we must tread very carefully. WP:BLP is a sensitive matter and must always be handled by erring on the side of caution.
Hence, I feel that we should remove this section - it was only ever a borderline matter, and the lack of third-party confirmation leaves me feeling very uncomfortable about including it in the article. SteveBaker (talk) 13:48, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
"it is promo, and that is why you want it in."
Wrong. I'm just looking for consistency. If you delete all of the following, I promise to shut up and never say another word about it:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blacklight_Power#Corporate_governance
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Honeywell#Corporate_governance
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Monsanto#Corporate_governance
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rexel#Corporate_governance
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BAE_Systems#Corporate_governance
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lockheed_Martin#Corporate_governance
"the section doesn't make it clear that we are mixing past and present"
WMC, you seem increasingly desperate to send this information down the memory hole. The current wording, "Notable directors of the company have included," makes it quite clear that we are mixing past and present. If it said "Current directors are," then we would have a problem. 174.24.123.239 (talk) 14:33, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
"if the only source of that information is the Blacklight website - then I'm strongly dubious."
That means you're not dubious... because none of the cited sources in the Corporate Governance section are the Blacklight website. 174.24.123.239 (talk) 14:33, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
Re "Down the memory hole"? We have article history, don't we?
Re "Consistency" the examples are all public companies with regular SEC filings required by law, hence no real doubt about the people named. BLPI is private, with a history of using Hill & Knowlton scattergun press releases to mislead media outlets into believing things which are not really credible. See anything from the purported licensees, for instance, to indicate otherwise?
Re the business intelligence aggregator cites you like, we have no reason to think they've been through fact checking, but if you like, feel free to take the question to both wp:RSN and wp:BLPN, or if you prefer I'm perfectly willing do so.LeadSongDog come howl! 15:42, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

Keep, but with some changesThe sources for the list of directors may not be perfect, but on a practical basis it seems very likely that they are correct. I doubt even the moderately prominent people in the list would allow their names to be used in this way if it weren't true. Although I don't seem to be able to build a consensus for this idea, I think the correct action here is to modify the section so that it begins with a statement about who a few of the highest ranking members of the corporate governance are, followed by a statement that the company has had some prominent board members in the past with the two or three most prominent listed. One way to maintain the documentation benefit of the list without unnecessarily increasing the size of the article would be to list the prominent members as references to the claim that prominent people have been part of BLP corporate governance in the past. Consideration might be given to pointing out board members that were previously were with Connectiv when it entered into its agreement with BLP.--Davefoc (talk) 18:26, 29 September 2011 (UTC)

By a long coincidence, wikipedia:Reliable sources/Noticeboard#Reliability of Executive Biographies on BusinessWeek.com asked about the same Michael Jordan. It's a sad example of why they can't always be trusted. LeadSongDog come howl! 04:06, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
Not sure if you're being facetious with the "long coincidence" thing, but it wasn't a coincidence, it was me going to RSN and asking the question, just like you challenged me to. Of course I changed the name of the company, to prevent the controversial nature of Blacklight from tainting their answer. It's amusing that you challenged me to go there, but when they didn't give the answer you were hoping for, you call it a sad example of why they can't always be trusted. Sorry they didn't rule in your favor... it happens sometimes. 174.24.123.239 ([[User

talk:174.24.123.239|talk]]) 22:40, 30 September 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.46.200.232 (talk • contribs) 22:45, 30 September 2011 (UTC)

Silly me, I didn't recognize that it was you using multiple IPs. Please don't do that without making it clear, the practice is frowned upon. Showing a dead man as an active board member is as clear an example as I can imagine of sloppy fact checking. If you look closer at the comments (not rulings) on WP:RSN you will see the phrase "absent conflicting information" in Collect's comment. Clearly the NYTimes obit is conflicting information. Quaint though it may be, I still find early death to be rather sad. So yes, for me at least it was a "sad example".LeadSongDog come howl! 05:12, 1 October 2011 (UTC)
"a history of using Hill & Knowlton scattergun press releases to mislead media outlets into believing things which are not really credible. See anything from the purported licensees, for instance, to indicate otherwise?"
I don't know of anything misleading in the press releases, and I don't know of any obligation the licensees have to make further statements. There is probably no downside to becoming a licensee. As far as we know, the licensees will not be asked for any funds until actionable intellectual property is made available. If I were a licensee, I would just quietly and patiently wait for something actionable to come out of BLP. 174.24.123.239 (talk) 22:59, 30 September 2011 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 199.46.200.232 (talk • contribs) 23:01, 30 September 2011 (UTC)
The Hill & Knowlton practices are discussed in the archives, see for yourself, I see no reason to rehash it. LeadSongDog come howl! 05:12, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Keep as notable and good form to improve the article. The Directors have a fiduciary duty, just as we have a duty to peacefully improve articles with relevant and sourced content. Zulu Papa 5 * (talk) 00:47, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Please read the discussion above. Dead or former directors have no fiduciary duty William M. Connolley (talk) 09:01, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Reworked

There is a lot of talk above; I've hacked the section in an effort to see where consensus lies. I found it interesting that one of the few notable-in-the-sense-of-having-an-article people, Jordan, is (a) dead and (b) known as a turn-around expert; that seems very relevant. I deleted all the former non-notable people. That the founder is CEO, prez and chair is significant (showing how much of the power is in one set of hands). I left the only other former who had an article William M. Connolley (talk) 08:53, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

BTW, http://people.forbes.com/profile/merrill-a-mcpeak/51565 didn't work for me William M. Connolley (talk) 09:00, 1 October 2011 (UTC)
I always like it when somebody does something instead of more conversation. Alas I'm more the conversing type. As to your edits: I think Shelby T. Brewer, former assistant secretary of energy was prominent enough to deserve a mention. He also headed up a substantial company and as I recall he attempted a bit of synergy between BLP and his former company. He also had some of the more glowing quotes about the wonderfulness of BLP attested to him. The most interesting thing would be if some of these former cheerleaders had something to say about why their rosy ideas about BLP went nowhere. It is a bit strange that after twenty years of this nobody previously associated with BLP or any of its investors has had anything to say about the company.--Davefoc (talk) 21:05, 1 October 2011 (UTC)

Rowan University

84.106.26.81 recently edited the article in a variety of places. I believe many of these edits are inappropriate and it is a lot of work to undo them unless they are all undone which I tend to favor. The apparent goal of the edits is not vandalism or I would have just undone them completely. However the purpose of some of the edits seems to be to put a more positive BLP spin on facts than is justified. For instance, this sentence was changed from:

"In 2008,[41] 2009[42] and 2010[43] BLP news releases cited research by Rowan University staff as independent verification of BLP claims."

"In 2008,[42] 2009[43] and in 2010[44] Rowan University independently verified the claims.[45]"

This seems to be a clear cut attempt to misrepresent the facts. I do not believe 84.106.26.81 is a good faith editor and this example is egregious enough that it is my intention to undo it within 12 hours if there is not a consensus to keep it.--Davefoc (talk) 12:25, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

The source I added was not the BLP new release. end of story. I've added an extra source that should satisfy the issue.[13]

note: "Comment on content, not on the contributor: Keep the discussions focused upon the topic of the talk page, rather than on the personalities of the editors contributing to the talk page." Wikipedia:Talk_page#Good_practices 84.106.26.81 (talk) 18:01, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

http://www.rowan.edu/colleges/engineering/clinics/cleanenergy/pv/papers/pdf/files/paper6.pdf

  • "This particular project served to validate a company’s test set-up and that the results of their tests with a proprietary catalyst can be replicated by third party teams."
  • "the proprietary catalyst can be said to be generating 700-750kJ of excess heat for these tests."

84.106.26.81 (talk) 18:29, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

At the best your source can be said to be a claim by Rowan University of independent research. As the subsequent portion of that section explains claiming that Rowan University provides independent validation might be misleading because of some of the factors listed. The article needs to be very careful with claims of independent validation by Rowan or by BLP. These claims are not peer reviewed. Rowan clearly has a long standing relationship with BLP. The article you referenced in this section is titled UNDERGRADUATE VALIDATION OF CUTTING-EDGE CALORIMETRY OF AN INDUSTRIAL AFFILIATE’S NOVEL ENERGY SOURCE. There are huge red flags there. First it calls BLP an affiliate. Secondly it is research done by undergraduates. Thirdly there is not the slightest indication that this is peer reviewed or supported by outside researchers. I have not included this in the article because I think it goes into personal opinion and OR but what seems to be going on here is that BLP does an experiment and passes it over to Rowan that repeats what BLP did often with the same equipment and says they have independently validated something. Please read what legitimate physics papers sound like when they are attempting to validate a theory or result. They develop independent experiments and reasoning to validate or not validate a theory. In a nutshell they are trying to provide independent confirmation of a theory. Rowan University is merely playing the role of advanced technicians that duplicate BLP specified experiments. Independent validation is not what is going on here regardless of claims to the contrary and your edits to the section in question imply that it is. If you want to claim independent verification find any research done by a respected university or research lab that has used their own equipment that is not an affiliate of BLP that supports BLP claims and reference that. Meanwhile until you can demonstrate something like that your edits will continue to look like something done by somebody with a non neutral agenda and it therefore my intention to undo them unless other editors of this article disagree with me.--Davefoc (talk) 21:37, 6 November 2011 (UTC)

note: "Comment on content, not on the contributor: Keep the discussions focused upon the topic of the talk page, rather than on the personalities of the editors contributing to the talk page." Wikipedia:Talk_page#Good_practices 84.106.26.81 (talk) 00:31, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
He is commenting on the content...and FWIW, I agree with him. SteveBaker (talk) 20:43, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Restoration of the section

The section was restored to what it had been before the 84.106.26.81|84.106.26.81 edits. Some of the reasons are described below:
Title restored The title of the Rowan related BLP research section was deleted. The title served the purpose of providing a header to distinguish sections on BLP research, Rowan University BLP related research and mainstream science related BLP related research. It was therefore restored to make that distinction clear.

Topic sentence restored The topic sentence of the section was changed to this by 84.106.26.81|84.106.26.81: "In 2008,[19] 2009[20] and in 2010[4] Rowan University verified the claims." The new sentence is ambiguous. What are the claims Rowan University verified? It may refer in some way to what was written in the paragraph above it, but that is not clear. If it refers to verification of BLP theoretical claims then it is just wrong. Rowan University papers do not seem to ever claim proof or belief in BLP theories. If it refers to verification of BLP experiments then it does not meet reasonable standards for such a strong claim. Rowan University and BLP are the only source of this claim and they do not rise to the level of credibility that the article should state what they claim as fact. What is clear and true is that BLP claims that Rowan University provided independent verification of BLP claims and that is exactly what the original section said. A new source was added to the article that was put forth as justification for the change of the topic sentence. The new source does not validate the change to the topic sentence in the least. From the Reuters article cited: "Last month New Jersey-based Rowan University engineers said the BlackLight process in the lab had produced heat some 1.6-6.5 times beyond levels that can be easily explained." This source is consistent with what the article said before the edits and does not provide any independent confirmation that BLP claims were verified by Rowan as the edits suggest. --Davefoc (talk) 17:41, 9 November 2011 (UTC)

Harvard

http://ireport.cnn.com/docs/DOC-530712?ref=feeds%2Flatest December 2010

  • Working with a team headed by Dr. Alexander Bykanov at Harvard's Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics under contract with GEN3 Partners, "the device showed hydrogen spectral emissions below 80 nanometers, the previously known "ground state" of hydrogen. Scientists formerly believed there could be no parts of the hydrogen atom smaller than the atom itself."
  • In a joint statement, Dr. Bykanov and Dr. Sam Kogan, chief operating officer of GEN3 Partners, said "[BlackLight Power's] spectral results were identically [and] independently reproduced, and we could find no conventional explanation for the emission of bright light from hydrogen in this very high energy region. We believe that this confirms hydrino emission."
  • GEN3 Partners is a Boston-based a company that evaluates new technologies and helps bring them to market.84.106.26.81 (talk) 01:02, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
With all due respect, what are you doing? There is no connection between BLP and Harvard other than that they rented some laboratory space from them. Gen3 is a consulting company that seems to offer services to companies doing research or that would like research done. I believe the head of Gen3 was on the board of BLP at the time that BLP contracted with them to supply a consultant. Dr. Bykanov thought so little of his work with BLP that he neither mentions it in his CV nor published anything on it outside of BLP paid for test reports. You can keep saying not to comment on the poster all you want, but your edits show either an uninformed view or a biased view. Note that is a comment about your edits and not you. --Davefoc (talk) 01:22, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
OHHHHH Look how uninformed you are! And such negative bias. But enough about you, lets talk about the article.
  • It's Chairman James K. Sims and Michael Treacy founded GEN3 in 1999. Mr. Sims was elected to the Blacklight Power Board of Directors in April 2009.[14]
Our article pretty much describes them as an independent organization. Epic fail 84.106.26.81 (talk) 03:20, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
We've checked the salient facts here - which is that BLP claims that their research is backed by Harvard - Harvard denies this and states that B LP merely rented time in their labs. This has been discussed at length before. Unless you have some new evidence, I don't see a reason to change the article. SteveBaker (talk) 03:53, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
What does "our article" refer to? BLP hired GEN3 Partners to supply a scientist to do BLP work at a laboratory that BLP rented from Harvard. That does not constitute independent validation by any normal use of the term. I don't know "how uninformed you are!" means when what you posted confirms what I wrote. --Davefoc (talk) 05:42, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
It was even worse than that actually. The GEN3 team were supplied with a 'source' from BLP that they merely tested - they didn't peek inside to see what it was made of. There could easily have been a bunch of conventional batteries in there...who knows what? SteveBaker (talk) 20:40, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

note: "Comment on content, not on the contributor: Keep the discussions focused upon the topic of the talk page, rather than on the personalities of the editors contributing to the talk page." Wikipedia:Talk_page#Good_practices

84.106.26.81 (talk) 06:30, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

What people forgot to mention is that "independent validation" is an oxymoron. All validation is dependent on prior research. What really matters here is any "conflict of interest". Of course, those too more or less exist when something is being verified. Even if Harvard itself were doing the test, there would be conflicts of interest in the very fact that they must consult Blacklight Power on how the experiment is even going to be set up. It's all shades of gray you people.siNkarma86—Expert Sectioneer of Wikipedia
86 = 19+9+14 + karma = 19+9+14 + talk 06:48, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Err, that of course is why the practice of science depends on publication: if the publication was accurate and complete, the work described could be replicated by anyone competent to do so, and BLP isn't going to entrust its fate to people that aren't under contract. We've previously discussed Joe Shea (aka user:Joeshea) and his blog. His iReport is not a useful source for this article. Pumping things out on a CNN iReport doesn't gain any extra journalistic credibility, as they don't normally get any systematic fact checking prior to publication.
We need to exercise great care in handling news reports in this article, as most of them have been simply rehashed from BLP's press releases through spindoctor H&K."Hill & Knowlton" "BlackLight Power" announce. LeadSongDog come howl! 17:01, 7 November 2011 (UTC)
Joe Shea (aka User:Joeshea) is not a remotely reliable journalist.
  1. He has on at least one occasion vandalized Wikipedia (He changed "Steve Krakauer" to "Steve Krakpot" - and when I complained, he said "Your outrage is absurd. You are being pedantic.").
  2. He repeatedly edits the article about himself in contravention of WP:Autobiography.
  3. He violates WP:COI by inserting references to his own writings into every article he can find that even tangentially might need it.
  4. He lied - claiming that his COI changes have been 'grandfathered in' to Wikipedia (like that's likely!!)
...and so forth. IMHO, this lowers his reputation to the point where I don't think we should consider anything he writes to be a 'reliable source'. SteveBaker (talk) 20:40, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

(FYI: The business with GEN3 and Harvard was discussed previously here. It's worth reading before rehashing this debate. SteveBaker (talk) 20:46, 7 November 2011 (UTC)

Change in position of the Company section of the article

The Company section was moved down in the article with the explanation that people were interested in the technology and not the company. This article is about the company and as such I think the Company section belongs at the top of the article below the lede where it was. I suggest that it be returned to its original position. --Davefoc (talk) 07:01, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

Support - Indeed, this is an article about a company - there is a company called "Blacklight Power" - but nobody calls their technology "Blacklight". If it were about the technology, the article would have a different title and in all likelyhood, we'd remove all but the most fleeting mention of the company. However, the technology is non-notable since it hasn't achieved mainstream acceptance...so if we're going to have an article here at all, then it should be about the company. SteveBaker (talk) 14:40, 10 November 2011 (UTC)

The article exists because of the controversy around the "technology" they claim to have discovered. This marvelous technology that was going to be ready to be mass produced 6 months from now 10 years ago. Your idea to bore people with company statistics no one cares about isn't a constructive suggestion. 84.106.26.81 (talk) 02:42, 28 November 2011 (UTC)

The information provided in the article regarding activity of Alexander Bykanov is absolutely incorrect. Alexander Bykanov received the PDDF files with spectra taken by Harvard team where some continuum spectra in EUV band were observed in H2 plasma and werte not observed in He plasma. Then Alexander went to BLP and did measurements himself. He found WEAK spectra with He exactly same as in H2, whiche were not observable on the PDF scans. These spectra belong to metal of the electrodes. H2 makes reacts with the anode metal (Mo, Ta...) and creates fairly high concentration of metal in plasma. The inert He may cause only ion erosion and concentration is significanlly lower. This was not mentioned anywhere by BLP team, but no Hydrino explanation is required for the observed spectra. Alexander Bykanov. PhD.2600:8801:D50A:7000:28A1:7C1E:8353:BD82 (talk) 23:26, 8 October 2021 (UTC)

  1. ^ http://groups.google.com/group/sci.physics.electromag/msg/b3fea16b052c33c9
  2. ^ http://tech.groups.yahoo.com/group/SocietyforClassicalPhysics/message/831
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