3 ms·

Do people cite journals anymore or is that too 20th-century? Who did this work, where, and how? The tendency to use the passive voice has always been a bit ann

Do people cite journals anymore or is that too 20th-century? Who did this work, where, and how? The tendency to use the passive voice has always been a bit annoying, but here's it's criminal: This discovery is being released into the public domain without patent protection in order to encourage additional research. Released by whom? By one E. Joe Eck, working alone in his basement with no funding, no students, no assistants, no institutional support, and exactly one reference to earlier literature? Citations please.

jacquesm 17y ago
Well, either he's got a Nobel in Physics coming his way or he's going to look pretty silly. Not much standing room in between there.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
anigbrowl 17y ago
It does indeed seem to be just Mr. Eck (presumably working in his garage?) but there's more stuff at http://www.superconductors.org/news.htm http://www.superconductors.org/news.htm, including journal papers that confirm previous work apparently from the same person. More on Eck: http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/view_profile.php?userid=4422 http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/view_profile.php?userid=4422 ...sounds like a crank, but also seems to have some affiliation with Wichita State U. in KS.
- mechanical_fish 17y ago
  From that link: Since outer space is full of superconducting elements and compounds, I think they could help explain the increasing expansion rate of the universe (through strong diamagnetism). Oooooo-kay! (He said, backing away and suddenly remembering a previous engagement.) Unfortunately, being affiliated with a university is no guarantee that you are not a crank, nor is it a guarantee that you are immune to the danger of misinterpreting your own data. I've met Ivy-League cranks; it is a condition that can arise at any time. And falling hopelessly in love with an optimistic appraisal of your own data is something that happens to everyone, Nobel laureates and freshmen alike.
  - jacquesm 17y ago
    How about this then: "I think there is a strong possibility of extraterrestrial life based on a passage in the Bible. The Lord talks about gathering His creation from the ends of the Universe. As ham radio operator, I sent some radio signals into space on my own over 40 years ago. Of course, they were on frequencies not likely to be tuned in by another civilization. But, they're on their way! I am disappointed we are not putting the same effort into transmitting that we are into receiving signals."
RK 17y ago
My limited experience with people like this is that they actually believe what they are doing. My question is, where does he get these plots, etc. Is he just wildly misinterpreting it or is he in fact just making it up?
- mechanical_fish 17y ago
  It is entirely possible that he is just making it up. Far more high-profile cases of deliberate fiction have happened. But it is more likely that the plots are real, that he really did make some high Tc material in his personal lab and do some measurements. It's not rocket surgery, to someone with a bit of training. It's just chemistry, electronic equipment, and liquid nitrogen, none of which is especially expensive. The problem arises in the interpretation. He points at some random squiggles and calls them a Meissner transition. I see squiggles. It would sure be nice to have a control, yes? A curve traced from a piece of boring commercially-available YBCO, plugged into the same apparatus, and showing similar squiggles at the known transition temperature of commercially-available YBCO? Similarly, if you take any data enough times you will get some odd discontinuities now and then. Your chart recorder software will glitch, you'll leave a switch in the wrong position, your sample temperature is changing during the measurement in a way that is being missed by your apparatus, your sample is in the middle of disintegrating, etc. The initial impulse is always to suspect that each glitch is an amazing new discovery, but they almost never are. So it would be nice to know if the results were repeatable. How many samples did he make? Can he show me the data from all the samples? Where did the stoichiometry data and the structural data come from? Mixing up a batch of a compound is one thing, but analyzing it is something else: That actually does require equipment, and money. How was it done? Where was it done, and by whom? What is the margin of error in the results? Has this material really never been made before? If someone else has made it before, why didn't they publish this first? I should stress that, compared to many cranky projects (cough cold fusion cough) this is a highly believable report. It's not as if high-Tc superconductors are unattested in the literature. It's not as if this guy's results require throwing out established theory. It's not as if he couldn't have gotten lucky and built a one-off sample with an amazingly high Tc in his basement -- most good physics is done in someone's basement, and most reproducible results start their lives as barely reproducible results. But, because he's an incredibly sloppy publisher, the author forces us to assume that he is a crank until proven otherwise.

jacquesm 17y ago

Well, either he's got a Nobel in Physics coming his way or he's going to look pretty silly. Not much standing room in between there.

deleted 17y ago
[deleted]

anigbrowl 17y ago

It does indeed seem to be just Mr. Eck (presumably working in his garage?) but there's more stuff at http://www.superconductors.org/news.htm http://www.superconductors.org/news.htm, including journal papers that confirm previous work apparently from the same person. More on Eck: http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/view_profile.php?userid=4422 http://setiathome.berkeley.edu/view_profile.php?userid=4422 ...sounds like a crank, but also seems to have some affiliation with Wichita State U. in KS.

mechanical_fish 17y ago
From that link: Since outer space is full of superconducting elements and compounds, I think they could help explain the increasing expansion rate of the universe (through strong diamagnetism). Oooooo-kay! (He said, backing away and suddenly remembering a previous engagement.) Unfortunately, being affiliated with a university is no guarantee that you are not a crank, nor is it a guarantee that you are immune to the danger of misinterpreting your own data. I've met Ivy-League cranks; it is a condition that can arise at any time. And falling hopelessly in love with an optimistic appraisal of your own data is something that happens to everyone, Nobel laureates and freshmen alike.
- jacquesm 17y ago
  How about this then: "I think there is a strong possibility of extraterrestrial life based on a passage in the Bible. The Lord talks about gathering His creation from the ends of the Universe. As ham radio operator, I sent some radio signals into space on my own over 40 years ago. Of course, they were on frequencies not likely to be tuned in by another civilization. But, they're on their way! I am disappointed we are not putting the same effort into transmitting that we are into receiving signals."

RK 17y ago

My limited experience with people like this is that they actually believe what they are doing. My question is, where does he get these plots, etc. Is he just wildly misinterpreting it or is he in fact just making it up?

mechanical_fish 17y ago
It is entirely possible that he is just making it up. Far more high-profile cases of deliberate fiction have happened. But it is more likely that the plots are real, that he really did make some high Tc material in his personal lab and do some measurements. It's not rocket surgery, to someone with a bit of training. It's just chemistry, electronic equipment, and liquid nitrogen, none of which is especially expensive. The problem arises in the interpretation. He points at some random squiggles and calls them a Meissner transition. I see squiggles. It would sure be nice to have a control, yes? A curve traced from a piece of boring commercially-available YBCO, plugged into the same apparatus, and showing similar squiggles at the known transition temperature of commercially-available YBCO? Similarly, if you take any data enough times you will get some odd discontinuities now and then. Your chart recorder software will glitch, you'll leave a switch in the wrong position, your sample temperature is changing during the measurement in a way that is being missed by your apparatus, your sample is in the middle of disintegrating, etc. The initial impulse is always to suspect that each glitch is an amazing new discovery, but they almost never are. So it would be nice to know if the results were repeatable. How many samples did he make? Can he show me the data from all the samples? Where did the stoichiometry data and the structural data come from? Mixing up a batch of a compound is one thing, but analyzing it is something else: That actually does require equipment, and money. How was it done? Where was it done, and by whom? What is the margin of error in the results? Has this material really never been made before? If someone else has made it before, why didn't they publish this first? I should stress that, compared to many cranky projects (cough cold fusion cough) this is a highly believable report. It's not as if high-Tc superconductors are unattested in the literature. It's not as if this guy's results require throwing out established theory. It's not as if he couldn't have gotten lucky and built a one-off sample with an amazingly high Tc in his basement -- most good physics is done in someone's basement, and most reproducible results start their lives as barely reproducible results. But, because he's an incredibly sloppy publisher, the author forces us to assume that he is a crank until proven otherwise.