🚀 go-pugleaf

WHAT'S NEW   Robert L. Park   Friday, 2 April 04   Washington, DC

1. COLD FUSION: TRUE BELIEVERS SEE DOE REVIEW AS "VINDICATION."
There hasn�t been much to celebrate in the 15 years since the University of Utah
held a press conference in Salt Lake City to announce the discovery of "cold
fusion." Although a brave little band of true believers continued to trumpet
cold fusion, the band leader was publishing "Infinite Energy Magazine." That
made it pretty hard to take this stuff seriously. Although there was no press
release or announcement, DOE has apparently agreed to take a second look. That�s
not really too surprising; not since the Reagan administration has unbridled
technological optimism so dominated Washington decision making: missile defense,
hydrogen cars, hafnium bombs, manned missions to Mars. How are these other
ventures doing? Let�s take a look at one. 

2. THE HAFNIUM BOMB: THE DARPA MOTTO IS "HIGH RISK, HIGH PAYOFF."
With DARPA support, a group led by Carl Collins at the U. of Texas at Dallas
claimed to be able to trigger energy release from a hafnium-178 isomer using a
dental X-ray machine. As What�s New reported last October, a group using the
Advanced Photon Source at Argonne found no sign of the hafnium-178
isomer-triggering effect (WN 24 Oct 03). We thought that would be the end of it,
but Sunday there was a long cover story on the hafnium-178 bomb in the
Washington Post Magazine. The people at DARPA seem to have the "high risk" thing
down pretty well, but "high payoff" still seems to be a problem. 

3. ANTI-TERRORISM: PSYCHIC TIP PROMPTS BOMB SEARCH OF AIRLINER.
Last Friday, American Airlines Flight 1304 from Fort Myers, FL to Dallas was
scrubbed. The plane was searched with bomb-sniffing dogs. A self-described
psychic had called to say a bomb might be on the plane. Should the psychic be
charged with making a false police report? The psychic no doubt acted out of a
sense of concern for the lives of innocent passengers. Being crazy is only
crazy. The Transportation Security Administration official who acted on the
fantasy of a psychic was terminally stupid. 

4. MANAGING THE NEWS: HOW LIBYA�S NUCLEAR EFFORT WAS EXAGGERATED.
By any measure, Libya�s unilateral decision to drop its nuclear weapons program
was very good news, but spin doctors are never satisfied. Two weeks ago 45
journalists were flown by chartered jet to DOE�s Y-12 complex in Oak Ridge to
listen to DOE Secretary Abraham, who stood beside a pile of centrifuge
components from Libya. Guards with weapons at the ready stood by. The
implication was that Libya was close to making a bomb. A week later, the New
York Times disclosed that the casings lacked the finely tooled rotors to make
them useful. A DOE spokesperson shrugged, "Libya has tons of steel to make
rotors." Of course, and sculpting is just a matter of removing the unnecessary
part of the stone.
 



THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
Opinions are the author's and are not necessarily shared by the University, but
they should be.


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