Wikipedia:Featured article removal candidates/Cold fusion

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[edit] Cold fusion

Article is no longer a featured article

This page has been radically transformed since it became a feature article. The fringe view that this phenomenon actually exists has been extremely active, while the scientific mainstream that does not believe it exists has been relatively absent. The article as is clearly fails at 2(d)- it is neither uncontroversial nor neutral and 2(e)- it is rapidly changing, with over [600 edits] since it became featured in August 2004- more than a hundred of which were in the last two weeks. It also fails at criterion 5 - it is far too long (currently 60kb) and it repeats itself often. Finally, I would argue that the prose is not of adequate quality to satisfy criteria 1 and 2(a), and the sources used in much of it are too disreputable to well qualify for 2(c). --Noren 18:05, 27 December 2005 (UTC)

  • Remove or Revert and Keep - FrancisTyers 18:06, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove I don't think there are any well informed cold fusion skeptics editing this page to keep it NPOV. –Joke 18:45, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove or revert. Lunatics running the asylum. Mark1 18:50, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove or keep and revert. This is a case where the article was better before. So lets go back to the version that was featured. This is an unfortunate example where a determined POV pusher (or possibly one posing as two) can be successful, at least in the short run. I fear the article may be removed anyway, but I'd like people to try improve/resolve issues with the article instead of voting remove. - Taxman Talk 21:11, 27 December 2005 (UTC)
    • That's not a realistic suggestion. The cold fusion advocates would just revert it. Nathan J. Yoder 16:51, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
      • Sure it is. It appears we are already establishing consensus the recent changes are ruining the article. Consensus can be enforced since reverting in violation of consensus is a blockable offense. A sockcheck may be in order here too. - Taxman Talk 02:50, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
      • Nonsense. The cold fusion advocates have reverted NOTHING. Not one sentence. They have written some rebuttals to the skeptical claims, and they added material drawn from the experimental literature. Only the skeptics have erased and reverted material, (and only a few of them do that). What you want is a one sided diatribe against cold fusion without a single reference to objective, peer-reviewed science. You want to see only your own point of view, and your unsupported opinions and biases. Stop being a crybaby. We have left your opinions and fantasies intact, and added only a few well-documented facts to counteract them. --JedRothwell 21:34, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
Please remain civil and refrain from making personal attacks. - FrancisTyers 15:12, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
FrancisTyers writes: "Please remain civil . . ." I suggest you redirect that comment to people who claim that cold fusion researchers are "lunatics running the asylum." and that I am a "pusher" posing as two people. As the Japanese say, "hotoke no kao mo san-do made." (roughly: 'That would try the patience of a Buddha.') --JedRothwell 16:58, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
No-one referred to you as a lunatic. You referred to Taxman as a crybaby. Please be careful in making assumptions. - FrancisTyers 17:15, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
You wrote: "No-one referred to you as a lunatic." Ah, I see what you mean. Mark1 wrote: "Lunatics running the asylum." Since he favors reversion, he means that all supporters are lunatics, not only me. It is okay to insult opponents en mass, but not individually. And it is okay to make insinuations about "pushers" "posing as two people," as long as you do not say specifically who you have in mind. Okay, let me apologize and rephrase: "Don't be one of several unspecified crybabies."
Let me suggest that you stop splitting hairs. --JedRothwell 18:41, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Actually, I haven't the faintest idea who you are. Mark1 18:45, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Greetings. I am one of the people you referred to as lunatics. Whether you know me personally or not, you have still violated the Wikipedia rules regarding civility. See: [1]. You are forgiven, and have a Happy New Year. --JedRothwell 18:54, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Jed, first of all, thanks for the apology, although I am not entirely convinced of its sincerity. Secondly, please remember that Wikipedia is not a battleground. If you would like to swap insults please keep it to private communication, not a Wikipedia talk page. Thanks :) - FrancisTyers 18:55, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep. One only has to go to the LENR website to recognise that this is far from being pseudo science. Frank Grimer
  • Remove or Revert absurd changes have gutted this article. --Ryan Delaney talk 00:23, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment which particular revision of the article would be reverted to in this case? - FrancisTyers 00:36, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove For now. Until this article in no longer being stalked by POV warriors, I fear it will continue it's slide into the realm of the bizarre. Ronabop 02:29, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove Suffers from serious POV issues. One of the main editors of the article has even admitted that he doesn't abide by NPOV policy and that he doesn't even think it's possible, despite not having even READ WP:NPOV. I agree with Joke137's sentiment. I don't think there even is a single well informed skeptic editing the article anywhere near as much as the cold fusion supporters are. Even I haven't bothered to do any edits because I know it's not worth the effort. Nathan J. Yoder 16:03, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Replace entire article with the new version written by E. Storms. (See Discussion) I think this version fixes many of the problems described by people on both sides of this debate. I will upload it in a few days unless someone objects. I have temporarily uploaded an unformatted version to the Discussion section. --JedRothwell 17:06, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
  • (Was "Keep and expand" -- this vote deleted. See above.) The article finally has some real science based on actual, credible, mainstream journals. Before it was nothing but unorganized "skeptical" POV hot air written by people who have not even read the literature. --JedRothwell 20:59, 28 December 2005 (UTC)
  • You should reallize that expand doesn't even make sense considering that expanding an article that is already too long would only make it further not meet the FA criteria. Also the problem is that you have no credibility because your POV and that you want to promote it is so obvious. - Taxman Talk 02:50, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
You lack perspective. Most cold fusion researchers say that I am unbiased and I am merely reporting their results without commenting on them or inserting my own opinions, whereas they believe that people like you are highly biased, and you are writing only your own opinion, without any reference to the experimental literature. Naturally, you disagree, but you should at least be aware of the fact that my views are a mirror image of yours, and I consider you every bit as biased as you consider me. You see the mote which is in your brother's eye; but you do not see the beam which is in your own eye.
As a practical matter, if an article describing experimental results and quoting theorists such as Schwinger is biased, what would you suggest the article consist of, instead? What would be unbiased? --JedRothwell 16:16, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
That's humorous. Most people that agree with my views think I'm unbiased too. We have a unique situation where few bother to report results negative on cold fusion because that is the accepted scientific position. It's fine to disagree with that, but as it is a minority position it should get only a minority of coverage in the article. In other words there isn't space in this article to describe the results of each of 237 (just throwing out an example number) papers that claim to have found something because they are generally not accepted. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence and that has not so far been demonstrated to the satisfaction of the scientific community. The reason that's easy to see is that if a cold fusion result really was beyond reproach it would make major waves. That has not happened, and the theories proposed by cold fusion advocates are not accepted yet. Again that's fine to disagree with the establishment and history may show the cold fusion proponent's view to be correct, but that's not our job right now. If this were 1900 we would need to characterize Newton's laws as dominant and that they model reality to a very high degree of accuracy. History would later show there to be more to the story, but the story can only change with conclusive evidence. There is not that conclusive evidence for CF to the satisfaction of the scientific community and that is what we need to report. Right now we need only to accurately describe the debate in a balanced way. - Taxman Talk 18:16, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep and expand. The article seems fair and balanced enough. The opening paragraph makes it abundently clear to the uninformed reader that cold fusion is still highly controversial and not accepted by the mainstream of science, so the tone is set front and center, not hidden. The rest of the articel just goes on to inform of developments in the controversial field of cold fusion. Seems fair enough to me, anyone looking for information about cold fusion would find the page very useful and informative. --Rock_nj 20:59, 28 December 2005 (UTC) User has a total of 8 edits.
  • Remove. I don't think reverting it will do any good. I do not presume to know whether cold fusion is real or not, but I do know that my college class that covered it was "Fraud and Error in Science", and this article fails to show that side well.--Prosfilaes 00:05, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • (Was Keep and expand). Remove. Short term: replace with Storms version. Long term: rewrite from scratch, then go through the process to make it featured again. Especially after the recent major revert going to a version more than a year old, and in view of the major omissions and generally poor writing and lack of sources for claims in the text, I cannot in good conscience recommend keeping this as a featured article. It will take considerable work to get it to that level of quality. If it is removed from featured status, it can and should be nominated for an Article Improvement Drive WP:AID. I have also listed it as an RfC in order to get more people involved. ObsidianOrder 01:38, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep There is far too little good information on cold fusion available, and very little that's actually balanced. Far too many people hear about it only in the context of articles and classes on pathological science, and get the impression the field died in 1990. The field is controversial, and the article makes that clear; the field is not dead, however, and the article makes that clear, too. Far too few people are aware of this. -- Salaw 03:06, 29 December 2005 (UTC) User has a total of 10 edits.
  • Remove. Fails Criterion 2(a) miserably. Let's take a look at the second sentence in the lead, which would fail at high-school level:
The most well known claim in this area is one that cold fusion can occur in palladium electrodes in electrochemical cells under the correct conditions. In a recent review of the topic by the US DoE was mixed, mainly negative. (See 2004 DoE Review below.) The majority of professional chemists and physicists do not believe this phenomenon exists, referring to it as pseudoscience, while some regard the subject to be an example of pathological science.

The most well[-]known claim in this area is one that cold fusion can occur in palladium electrodes in electrochemical cells under the correct [certain] conditions. In [The findings of] a recent review of the topic by the US DoE [spell it out] was [were] mixed, [and] mainly negative [(see the] 2004 DoE Review below). The majority of [Most] professional chemists and physicists do not believe [deny that] this phenomenon exists, referring to it as pseudoscience, while some regard the subject to be an example of pathological science. Any reason for the itty-bitty paragraphing?

The itty-bitty paragraphing is caused by two things: 1. The controversy and 2. People being polite. Most people, both supporters and skeptics, take pains to avoid deleting text written by the opposition, so the article becomes fragmented. That is unfortunate. The changes you recommend to the paragraph above are good, but I would not implement them because this paragraph is skeptical, and I would not want to step on the skeptics' toes. --JedRothwell 16:17, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
JedRothwell did edit that paragraph, adding the false statement that ', and only a third found it "somewhat convincing."' I corrected it, and a third party had changed it again prior to the revision quoted in green above. This instability does not inspire quality prose, both directly and because editors will tend to take less care when aware that their contributions are likely to be hacked to pieces. --Noren 20:10, 1 January 2006 (UTC)
Noren wrote: "Jed Rothwell did edit this paragraph, adding the false statement that ', and only a third found it "somewhat convincing."' I corrected it, and a third party had changed it again prior to the revision quoted in green above." Well, if I did edit this, it was an accident. I moved it to the new section on the DoE review. The part about "two thirds" is a direct quote from the DoE summary, and it is intact, so I do not see what you are complaining about. Please note that there are two separate documents: 1. The DoE's own summary; 2. The DoE review panel reviewer's remarks. You were writing about #1, and you correctly noted that it says "two thirds . . ." I mentioned that #2 seems be split more evenly. (You may disagree.) Let us not confuse the two. --JedRothwell 18:35, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
I linked above to the edit you made, you may follow the link if you do not recall making it. It is clear that you have not refrained from editing paragraphs that you label skeptical. In reference to the statement you added, I quote from the summary document: "Two-thirds of the reviewers commenting on Charge Element 1 did not feel the evidence was conclusive for low energy nuclear reactions, one found the evidence convincing, and the remainder indicated they were somewhat convinced." As there were 18 reviewers, this sentence means that 12 of 18 found it inconclusive, 1 found it convincing, and the remaining 5 were somewhat convinced. The clause you added that ', and only a third found it "somewhat convincing."' is false, as 5/18 is not equal to 1/3. Let us not confuse the true '2/3 were unconvinced' statement with your false 'and 1/3 were somewhat convinced' claim. --Noren 04:21, 3 January 2006 (UTC)


Noren wrote:
I linked above to the edit you made, you may follow the link if you do not recall making it.
I will take your word for it! As I said: Sorry about that! It won't happen again. I encourage you to put back the exact phrase you had before, in a 35 KB introduction to cold fusion written entirely from the skeptical point of view. Then I will add in the 15 KB Storms draft, and everyone will be satisfied. --JedRothwell 02:28, 4 January 2006 (UTC)


Will those who assert that it should be kept, reverted, and/or expanded please be more specific and perhaps lend a hand to implement what are mostly their vague directions? Tony 03:53, 29 December 2005 (UTC)

I have uploaded a completely new draft written by an expert that I think addresses all of the issues raised here. See the Discussion section. --JedRothwell 18:35, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
    • To clarify my position: revert to the featured version, with enough neutral editors involved in the long term to keep it neutral. No, I'm not volunteering. Failing that, remove. Mark1 11:24, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove. The historical narrative about the original experiment has very few citations, and is very much in need of them, at practically every sentence. Where are the links to the announced agreements with the original results, where are the retractions? What's the source of all the quotes? I'm a graduate student in particle physics, for what that's worth, but I'm not really able to bring whatever expertise I have into reviewing the article because of the lack of citations. I think the article, which has other problems as well (see above), needs a major cleanup, and would benefit from being re-reviewed and re-nominated for FA status. -- SCZenz 05:18, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
SCZenz writes: "The historical narrative about the original experiment has very few citations . . ." Good point. I have no idea where most it came from, and I have read a lot about the early history of cold fusion. The whole history section should be chopped, in my opinion. ". . . where are the retractions?" What retractions do you have in mind? The only one mentioned in the article was Paneth & Peters. Paneth wrote a letter to Nature in 1927 "partially retracting" their 1926 paper in Berichte der Deutschen Chemischen Gesellschaft. I am not aware of any other retractions. --JedRothwell 15:36, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
    • I'd also like to note that lenr-canr.org, which is extensively and repeatedly used as a source of documents and arguments, does not appear to be an even remotely unbiased source. -- SCZenz 05:26, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
    • LENR-CANR has original, peer-reviewed source material: reprints of the research papers and data. When you judge a scientific issue, you are supposed to look at original sources. Calling them "biased" is a novel, new-age take on the scientific method. What would you suggest people look at, if not the actual research results? --JedRothwell 15:36, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
    • My issue is that the article currently, in parts, draws from LENR-CANR exclusively. The papers, scientific and peer-reviewed though they may be, are chosen selectively, as far as I can tell. We need sources on both sides, and we need to be sure that they reflect the scientific consensus. I've not been able to verify that, so I don't think the article is up to featured standards at the moment. -- SCZenz 20:06, 29 December 2005 (UTC)


With all due respect, you have it backward: LENR-CANR is drawn exclusively from the literature. It is a library open to any author, skeptic or supporter. The skeptics have contributed some papers, and they are welcome to contribute more. If the selection of papers is unbalanced it is up to them to make it right.
Our master list was put together by Britz and Storms and it includes over 3,000 papers. There are hundreds more, especially in Chinese and Japanese, but I doubt there are thousands more. If this is unbalanced, where are the missing papers? Send me the titles. Better yet, have the authors send me the papers!
Of course the comments that I have added to the article are selective; I cannot summarize hundreds of papers in a few paragraphs. It is the skeptics' job to read these papers and add statements reflecting their point of view. I cannot do that for them. Frankly, I think they have a tough job. I have read HUNDREDS of cold fusion papers, and I do not know of many by skeptics. Please suggest a few titles. The skeptical papers I have seen are of such low quality, they would embarrass me if I were a skeptic. If you think the skeptical viewpoint needs beefing up, I encourage you read whatever literature you can find and beef it up. --JedRothwell 21:13, 29 December 2005 (UTC)


  • Keep. Just because some people can't understand the work does not mean that it is invalid. Science is not about neutrality it is about truth. The truth is that cold fusion and its related discoveries are an expanding field of science and that ongoing work exists and will in all probability result in significant technology. The debate will not end until we reach commercialisation. Wiki handles well theology debates (many of which will never be finished) but seems to think it can judge science debates before they are ended. If cold fusion is wrong then it should be dead. The fact that there is on-going work means that we aren’t finished yet. If any of the sceptics can tell us conclusively what is going wrong in these experiments then they should submit papers to the relevant journals. So far every proposed error has been countered with an experimental proof that CF did not make such errors.-- Wesleybruce 13:33, 29 December 2005 (UTC) User has a total of 1 edit.
  • Hello? Don't mention 'sockpuppet'. Tony 14:00, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove. Biased sources and a major article dispute doth not maketh a featured article. Ambi 14:03, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Keep but Edit. Good material but clearly English was the first language of most contributors. -Hohlraum User has a total of 1 edit
  • Keep and modify What is the point of this exchange? As any intellegent person can discover by reading the extensive literature, the phenomenon called cold fusion is real. The issue here is how best to describe the subject. Of course any description of any subject can be improved. The problem is, can any description provided here survive the changes made by people who know nothing about the subject? Apparently not, so what is the point of making an effort?--((User:EdmundStorms|EdmundStorms)) —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.35.57.25 (talk • contribs) 18:08, 29 December 2005 User has a total of 1 edit.
    This is not a discussion of the subject; this is a discussion of the article, which as it is appears to be biased and not terribly well-written. Thus we're just removing it from "featured article" status, not doing anything else to it. -- SCZenz 20:09, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
You wrote that the article ". . .appears to be biased and not terribly well-written" so it should be unfeatured. Your solution seems counter-productive. If you think it is biased, I suggest you add material to make it less biased. Do something to counteract the bias. (But please refrain from simply erasing statements you consider biased.) If you think it is poorly written, I suggest you rewrite it. This article attacts a lot of attention and revisions, so it is noteworthy. --JedRothwell 22:11, 29 December 2005 (UTC)
You misunderstand the critera for featured articles. See Wikipedia:Featured article criteria. The article must be more than noteworthy; it must be an excellent article already. If it's not good, it shouldn't be featured until it is. I've made specific suggestions on how to fix it, but I personally don't have the time or motivation for the extensive research needed to do so myself at the moment. -- SCZenz 02:59, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Well I think parts of the article are excellent, so I think we should keep it. Excellence is a matter of opinion, after all. The only parts that should be cut out are the skeptical assertions that are not referenced to any scientific literature. Ed Storms is working on a revision of this article that will make it even better. --JedRothwell 17:11, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. Now, we need to clarify something here: there's no expectation that reviewers should fix what they criticise in an article. On the other hand, those who want to keep an article will improve the likelihood that it will be retained as a FA by picking up a spade and getting to it, directly, before the crunch comes. Tony 04:00, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
I do not think that the critics arguments' have any merit. I cannot think of any way to "fix" the nonexistent problems they point to. The critics claim that papers have not been written, but I have uploaded hundreds of papers. The critics claim that plasma fusion theory overrules replicated experimental evidence, but I think that violates the scientific method. Do you expect me to defend invalid, irrational and factually incorrect points of view? If you agree with them, it is up to you to defend them. Their skeptical arguments are, in any case, fully represented in this article, and supporters have not touched them or altered them in any way as far as I know. --JedRothwell 17:11, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove, pooly written, not adequately referenced, and clearly unstable.--nixie 11:12, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
nixie says this article is "not adequately referenced." I can fix that! The article contains over 40 references to peer-reviewed, mainstream journal papers (whereas the article on plasma fusion contains only three such references). But if that is not enough to suit you, please let me know how many more references we need. I can add hundreds more. I agree that parts of this article are poorly written, but only the parts written by skeptics. I cannot help that. --JedRothwell 19:09, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Jed, I think you're confusing creating an article through consensus with a battle. There are no sides, we are all here to make a high quality article. If the parts written by the sceptics are not well referenced then why don't you reference them? Go the extra mile. This isn't a fight; skeptics vs. you. You don't have to take sides and refuse to work with certain parts of the article just because you don't agree with them, that there is a recipe for disaster which has resulted in this FARC. I can see that cold fusion is a very emotive subject for you, but please try and help make the article better as a whole not just represent your point of view :) - FrancisTyers 19:19, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Please do not think I am being sarcastic here! I am sincere. Nixie says this article is not adequately referenced. I take him (or her) at his word, and I stand ready to correct this fault. I personally think it is adequately referenced, but perhaps because this is such a controversial subject, more footnotes are called for. If nixie and others want to see more, and if they will revise their opinion of the article, I can add more easily with the EndNote program. For example, I can insert footnotes here: ". . . similar autoradiographs have been published by the China Lake Naval Air Warfare Center Weapons Division [FOOTNOTE], Iwate U. [FOOTNOTE], SRI [FOOTNOTE] and many others [THREE MORE]." That is what I would do in a formal paper. It is not unusual for a scientific paper to have many footnotes. At this moment, I am working on a cold fusion review written in 1991 that has 174 footnotes. (See the article's ref. 1, which I will upload soon.) Actually, Ed Storms is working on a revised version of this Wikipedia article, and he just asked me whether to include many footnotes or not. He typically adds hundreds. I told him 40 or 50 would be enough, but I will tell him to go all out if that is what the readers here want.
"If the parts written by the sceptics are not well referenced then why don't you reference them? Go the extra mile."
As far as I know, their claims are not in evidence. In other words, I do know of any experimental evidence or published papers to back up what they say. Actually, most of their claims appear to violate the laws of physics. So I cannot help them. Please note that I have added what might be considered backup to some "skeptical" claims. Just yesterday, for example, someone wrote: "Their results proved difficult to replicate {needs reference} . . ." I added 14 references confirming that the results were difficult to replicate. (Actually, I do not think that "difficult to replicate" is a "skeptical" claim. Fleischmann and other researchers have made it several times.)
I suppose I could add some "skeptical" papers I know of by Morrison, Hoffman, Jones and Shanahan [see the LENR-CANR index], but the quality of these papers is so abysmal that if I were a skeptic, I would prefer to see them buried instead. I do not know of any worthwhile or convincing skeptical papers. --JedRothwell 19:49, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • keep, the article looks balanced to me. The sceptical parts look more to be mindlessly parroting opinions of those who feel themselves to be the great and the good - the sceptics here are obviously trying to bathe in this reflected glory. The non sceptical parts look to be based on many published scientific papers. Extraordinary claims do not require extraordinary evidence - that is just silly rhetoric - all that is required is ordinary evidence replicated and not falsified. For Gods sake, can we see some of the objectivity that is supposed to be displayed by those of a scientific bent? Nick Palmer User has a total of 1 edit
  • Remove or Revert. It's true that most physicists are very conservative. But I think this is for a good reason (at least nowadays). If someone comes to you saying he can transmit information with a speed faster than $c$, you'd be rather skeptical because SR has proven itself over the years. Now, whenever you hear about cold fusion the first reaction is "what ? not again!", although it's sometimes quite hard to dismiss some publications in that field, in the end something is always found to dismiss cold fusion. And the fact is that no experiment has so far convinced most physicists that cold fusion is real. In my humble opinion, the article should be kept ONLY if it will be made much smaller briefly explaining the main ideas. --Just a tag 22:37, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
Just a tag writes: ". . . in the end something is always found to dismiss cold fusion." I doubt it! There are ~40 papers referenced in this aricle. If you can find a reason to dismiss one of these papers, I suggest you add it to the article, and also please inform me. I will inform the author (if he is still in contact). I also invite you to write a critique and upload it to LENR-CANR.org. Frankly, with all due respect, I do not think you are capable of doing this, because people have had 16 years to find significant errors and dismiss these papers, but in my opinion they have failed. Bear in mind, these papers survive extra tough peer review. Here is an example of someone who tried [2] (see "Reviewer #7). I think this is mere handwaving. Perhaps you disagree.
I think you should not make assertions such as "something is always found" unless you are willing to back them up with specific statements about what is found regarding specific papers.--JedRothwell 23:18, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Comment. Who's going to do the work to restore it to featured quality? I don't know anyone who will, so I think all these 'keep and revert' votes are a bit counterproductive. -- SCZenz 22:40, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
SCZenz writes "Who's going to do the work to restore it to featured quality?" No work is needed to "restore" this article. All of the skeptical content that you think made it a good article previously is still incorporated in the article. The only change is the addition of new material by supporters, and this information is based on papers in peer-reviewed, mainstream journals. Why do you think this has degraded the quality? Do you have some objection to the use of such information? --JedRothwell 23:18, 30 December 2005 (UTC)
They are valuable, SCZenz because they are establishing a consensus that Jed's edits are degrading the article. That can be used to return the article to a better state and even improve it. - Taxman Talk 04:50, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
But they raise the possibility that the article will not be fully improved, but will be kept as featured anyway. That would be a big problem. -- SCZenz 05:02, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
That's true, so the revert or remove is a better point then. I think I was the only keep and revert the rest were remove or revert. - Taxman Talk 08:41, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove, badly written, "Cold fusion in fiction" section, bad "see also", no inline cites except external links, references badly-formatted and don't all appear to have been used in the writing of this article. Tuf-Kat 16:09, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove or revert as per Taxman. Anville 19:53, 31 December 2005 (UTC)
  • Remove: It is not stable, comprehensive, nor neutral at this point. Questions of reversion and revert and protect would belong on an RFC. Since "revert and lock" isn't a thing FARC should consider, the minimal step and the mandated step is to assess whether the article is now FA quality. It isn't. Geogre 23:52, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep When seeking consensus there is bound to be POV disagreement. I remain relatively neutral on the subject as I am a Biologist and Chemist not a physicist howwever what one reads in actually peer reviewed journals makes it clear that the "supposed" mainstream on this issue is not nerely as black and white as some would believe. The article as it is presented seems to address both sides to me. — Falerin<talk>,<contrib> 23:59, 2 January 2006 (UTC)
As far as I can tell, there has not been a publication in a top flight physics or fusion journal (Science, Nature, the Physical Review, Nuclear Physics etc...) since 1991, two years after the discovery was initially claimed. (This is not to claim they don't exist, but I haven't seen any references.) Information is disseminated in the field entirely through conference proceedings and the decidedly unskeptical Infinite Energy magazine as well as a handful of other cold fusion journals. –Joke 19:26, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
Might be worth looking at the impact factor of the Journals cited? Of course it isn't infalliable. - FrancisTyers 19:36, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
I've just looked at Infinite Energy, New Energy Times and Cold Fusion Times. None of them even appear in the ISI citation index, let alone have a credible ranking. They are non peer-reviewed journals. They are junk. J Electro Anal (the original F+P publ) is an unimpressive 2.228. William M. Connolley 20:22, 3 January 2006 (UTC).
I did a more detailed publication search at the lenr-canr.org webpage. I searched for all the major physics and fusion journals, and found some publication in Phys. Lett. A in the 90's (most recently 1999), one in Phys. Rev. C (in 1993), one in J. Fusion Energy since 1990 (in 2004), one in JETP since 1993 (it was in 1998), three in Europhys. Lett. (including one in 2002) and nothing in other major fusion and physics journals. For a claimed groundbreaking discovery in physics, this is nothing at all. –Joke 21:01, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Revert and keep or remove, as per Taxman. In addition: I don't see why leaving this one to the loonies is acceptable: reverting to sanity should be no problem in a well-conducted encyclopedia. William M. Connolley 19:58, 3 January 2006 (UTC).
    There being no obvious reason not to, I've done the said revert. William M. Connolley 20:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC).
    The reason I think it needs to be removed, not just reverted, as there is a big problem here that I have trouble seeing how the encyclopedia can deal with. The editors JedRothwell and ObsidianOrder are very well informed, motivated cold fusion advocates. There are no well informed skeptics currently editing the page, just a bunch of people, such as myself, who don't know anything about calorimetry or cold fusion, but know that the publication record amounts to squat, that there is no known mechanism for cold fusion, and that the physics community as a whole is doubtful. –Joke 20:51, 3 January 2006 (UTC)


Joke writes: ". . . just a bunch of people, such as myself, who don't know anything about calorimetry or cold fusion . . ." With all due respect, if you do not know anything about calorimetry or cold fusion, why do you think you can pass judgement on the subject with such assurance? You should at least hesitate before dismissing them. Dozens of the world's top electrochemists have done the experiment and are convinced the effect is real. You agree that you have not studied their work in detail. So why are you certain they are wrong? It seems unscientific to me.
". . . but know that the publication record amounts to squat . . ." I think that publications such as Jap. J. Applied Physics and J. Fusion Energy are pretty impressive, but I suppose it is a matter of opinion.
". . . that there is no known mechanism for cold fusion . . ." Since the discovery is experimental, no mechanism is called for. There is no known mechanism for high temperature superconducting, and before 1952 there was no known mechanism for cellular reproduction.
". . . and that the physics community as a whole is doubtful." The article makes that abundantly clear. How much clearer can we make it? Why are you complaining about this? It seems to me that none of your objections has any merit. --JedRothwell 02:46, 4 January 2006 (UTC)
  • I think this is unduly pessimistic. And anyway, dropping the FAC status won't of itself stop them editing it. Umm... does this remind you of Reddi at all, or am I being unfair? William M. Connolley 21:11, 3 January 2006 (UTC).
    No, you are not being unfair. –Joke 21:46, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
    Joke - I do not consider myself to be an advocate (although thanks for the "well-informed" compliment). I do have quite a bit of graduate physics under my belt, and I am somewhat familiar with the cold fusion literature (i.e. I've read maybe 2% of it). I believe that the phenomenon is real, based on the fact that a number of scientists with impecable reputations have performed the experiments and described something which pretty much has to be fusion. That said, there are obvious problems with the field. Please have a look at my outline for a rewrite of the article at User:ObsidianOrder/Cold fusion redux and then see if your opinion that I'm an advocate changes. ObsidianOrder 21:42, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Remove or revert to featured version. --Pjacobi 20:02, 3 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Remove as FA, continue to improve. Enough apparent shades of PV that it should be looked at more carefully by a broader range of editors before continuing to represent WP at its best. Still a good article, though. Martinp 02:26, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
Above is needlessly wordy. Fails 2(e) and maybe also 2(d), not sure. Martinp 02:43, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Keep. If you have a look at the LENR-CANR site, you'll see that the problem is that the effect was difficult to reproduce because it is so faint. It will never amount to a useful energy source; it took twelve years before it could be reliably reproduced. Some people still believe that it's not reproducable. Look at the LENR site. —James S. 10:32, 5 January 2006 (UTC)
  • Remove. The article has deteriorated, and the FA standards have increased greatly since August 2004. It needs to be run through FAC again. — 0918BRIAN • 2006-01-6 06:32
  • Remove--not stable. Chick Bowen 18:42, 6 January 2006 (UTC)