Talk:John Kanzius

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[edit] Comments

8-FEB-2008 Perhaps these previously posted items are better placed in this section. RE: Water-related discovery

Philip Ball, a consulting editor at Nature and author of "H2O: A Biography of Water" debunked the concept of water being burned as a fuel. Although he said that Kanzius' discovery itself needs to be verified through careful experiments, he categorically stated that "water is not a fuel" and "[w]ater does not burn". Ball also said that according to the Laws of thermodynamics, it was impossible to extract energy by producing hydrogen from water and then burning it, as this would be a basis for a perpetual motion machine. He was critical of lack of inquiry in the media reports about bogus science.[16] Ball writes "Here, however (for what it is worth) is the definitive verdict of thermodynamics: water is not a fuel."

Counterpoint—Similarly, we must then surmise that in fact mass is not energy; it is a shame Mr. Einstein might not concur. Let not your education get in the way of what nature shows us and then we must later explain. If one carries a brick to the top of a ledge, does it take another person the same amount of work to lightly push it over the edge to release the energy that is stored? It is Naive to think that we must use the same energy or more to release the energy (or components therein) used in the creation of such molecules. Truth is revealed to those who seek it. Surely there must be more ways to achieve similar results; thinking any other way will not reveal such methods.

Counter-Counterpoint: Notwithstanding the direct conversion of matter into energy, water is not a fuel. Current passed through water (radiofrequency or otherwise) will break it apart into its elemental constituents, hydrogen and oxygen. This has been known since the 19th century, possibly earlier. Not surprisingly, hydrogen burns in the presence of oxygen. When you electrolyze water, it requires a certain amount of energy. When you burn the

resulting gases, they revert back to water. You can't get more energy out

than you put in. This is a fundamental theory of thermodynamics, which has never been credibly disproven; indeed, if "x" amount of energy is required to convert water into hydrogen and oxygen, then you will get "x" (actually, less if you consider the real-world situation) energy back to get to the initial state with which you started. Water has a fixed heat of formation; it won't change just to appease you and the scientific illiteracy you clearly seek to perpetuate.

Furthermore, your "brick" analogy is misplaced. While it's true that water has energy contained in it (call this binding energy, if you like), this is

not accessible outside of non-chemical processes.

Perpetual motion machines don't exist, but not for lack of trying. We'll see if his patent application is accepted, as the patent office specifically rejects inventions claiming "perpetual motion".

Re-Counterpoint—no-one stated many of the items that you repeat. You choose to frame the problem in your own terms. An observation of fact does not mean that one observed water being a fuel. Your reference to one very specific (unrelated) inefficient process is a bounding factor for you. Additionally you are fixated with thermodynamics. How much energy does it take to pour a cup of water into quicklime? Once the components exist, Does that exothermic process require more energy than what was put in? Clearly, there is more than thermodynamics here; and there is no absurd talk of perpetual motion; that is a link you choose to make. Thermodynamics is fine just as it is. Further, you have chosen to define only one possibility; thermodynamics : non-chemical process. Finally, you have decided "this is

not accessible outside of non-chemical processes." The natural world is not

bound by decisions. Do not let your passion for the subject matter limit your ability to ask why and how. Those who say everything that can be known is known and everything than can be done has been done have no place in product development nor do they have place in substantive research into yet to be fully understood phenomena. Do not make it personal, scientific literacy was not developed by those who were comfortable with there current understanding of the natural world.

The aforementioned is a further justification to remove the Philip Ball item since the reference is not relevant -further in point. Consider removing paragraph regarding Philip Ball. It simply debates information not claimed by the preceeding entry. There is no claim, at least within the article, that Kanzius is creating a fuel, or perpetual motion machine, or even "burning H2O". This paragraph may be a relevant counterpoint to claims made by imaginative individuals in the blogosphere, but it is not necessary and in fact non sequitur here. Hobga (talk) 03:53, 28 November 2007 (UTC)


Please NOTE, regarding ENERGY:

As of July 5th, 2007 Kanzius doesn't claim this to be an "energy source", "free energy" or "overunity". See ref name="saltwater1". Correspondingly, please don't put such claims in the article, nor add categories indicating such, unless you have a newer reliable source, where he would be making such claims. --Vinsci 15:35, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

This is apparently because Kanzius has stopped making public statements completely. Where are more recent quotes?Charles 15:39, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Point is, the last he spoke on the subject was to admit it consumes energy, as clearly stated in the article. Case closed, what more do you want him to say? --Vinsci

I cannot find any sources that discredit this idea. I am sure that these sources are there, if you find any, please do add them. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:55, 5 July 2007 (UTC)

Two things.

One the "cancer cure" is old stuff. Most of the ideas for this were abandoned back in the ninties. http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/news/media/rel05/holt.htm

The free energy looks like an old hat perpetual motion device. Heat from his microwave oven seperates hydrogen and oxygen, then the hydrogen burns. Would probably be cheaper to use gasoline to burn the water apart than microwaves. Either way, it is hardly better than any other perpetual motion machine.

It is worth noting that like most hawkers of perpetual motion machines, he has a history of taking "donations to perfect his machine" from such things as firedepartments and other groups.

I think this page should be combined with the perpetual motion machines page. —Preceding unsigned comment added by John S Burns (talk • contribs) 19:57, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

Do you have some sources where this "invention" is discredited or described? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:57, 12 July 2007 (UTC)

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Agreed. Perpetual motion and free energy are two sides of the same coin, and this baloney is most definitely a “free energy” machine. — NRen2k5 16:45, 18 July 2007 (UTC)
We don't know how it works , we can't find sites that discredit "water-burning" , Maybe this has been done before? I'll contact this guy for details.
The dismissal of the Australian cancer treatment method above (http://www.nhmrc.gov.au/news/media/rel05/holt.htm) seems to be to an unrelated method and so not really relevant here (although interesting in its own right). Kanzius' proposed using injected metallic nanoparticles that are heated by the RF, in turn killing nearby cells. Several cancer researchers apparently think it's a worthwile method, see the 2005 AP story in the references, as well as the text regarding Curley's work at M.D. Anderson. --Vinsci 17:05, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Just thought some one should change the "not peer verified" line. Rustum Roy, a Penn State University chemist has demonstrated that it is the real deal. http://www.post-gazette.com/pg/07252/815920-85.stm —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.197.3.18 (talk) 21:21, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Rustum Roy himself (nor his team) have not replicated Kanzius' work. They have only observed demonstrations by Kanzius. Go and read Roy's web page...Charles 15:42, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
"peer verified" in most cases refers to being "published in a mainstream scientific peer-reviewed journal" Drewery 17:45, 12 September 2007 (UTC)
the news articles all read like Roy is part of the show and a business partner of Kanzius. It's a far cry from real peer review. Greglor 18:37, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

this article now reads like an advertisement for Kanzius. It's an embarrassment.Greglor 11:51, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Unfortunately, all of the sources available essentially are advertisements for Kanzius. Given that situation, the only two choices are to delete the article (not a bad idea, but already failed), or to make sure it's very clear that his claims are only his own claims, without any particular scientifically valid support. --Reuben 19:35, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
I'm with Reuben. Delete the article, or mark it up to show that his claims are not credible. Greglor 22:43, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] First law of thermodynamics

Beam radio waves into something and it gets hot. Isn't that how a microwave oven works? ~ Infrangible 03:43, 25 July 2007 (UTC)

I've never seen salt water instantly ignite a flame at a flip of a switch in a microwave as he has done with his machine. Big oil is very cunning, and don't think for a second they wouldn't be sending folks to Wikipedia to try and hush anyone who may threaten their profits. They've done much worse, you can take that to the bank. I'd be keeping my cards to my chest as Kanzius is doing, also. (Mind meal 08:13, 14 August 2007 (UTC))

its got nothing to do with big oil. its just bad science on this John Kanzius' part. theres no net change in entropy with the water (its just being split into its elements, then recombined - ie, burnt). theres no such thing as free energy. the ultimate energy source for this little gimmick is the RF source. its a neat trick, but its not a break-through. no oil company exec is going to be losing sleep after reading this article trust me. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 124.171.230.201 (talk) 10:36, 2 September 2007 (UTC)

Trust you? You sure sound like big oil, trying to discredit a new source of cheap hydrogen. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 66.251.101.34 (talk) 00:16, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

At best it's going to break even -- energy in + water + salts ==> energy out + water + salts. Since you have to pump the water in and out, you might not even break even. Sorry. htom 20:39, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

Yep, I second OtterSmith. If it worked at 100% efficiency, it would be a wash and break even (that's the best he could possibly hope for). Given the unlikelihood of actually attaining 100% efficiency, this machine is a fancy, radio-powered bbq, and little else. It's shameful how many news agencies have been fooled. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 162.129.250.4 (talk) 20:41, 11 September 2007 (UTC)

The energy is in the hydrogen. This guy isn't putting the hydrogen into the water, it's already there. That makes this a fuel based invention no different than gasoline. Everyone is looking for cheaper, easier ways to produce hydrogen for a reason. The amount of energy being put in is the amount used to weaken the bonds of the hydrogen and oxygen. The amount of energy released is the amount already stored by the original creation of water. If this guy was creating water then burning it, it would be "perpetual motion" and such. Whether his machine is real and whether the power requirements to loosen the bonds are low enough to equalize with the hydrogen produced is the question. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 68.40.60.241 (talk) 03:52, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

When Hydrogen and Oxygen are combusted, they produce water. If he's able to collect the water, and run it through his machine again (assuming it puts out more energy than it takes in -which is impossible), it *would* be a perpetual motion machine, yes. Drewery 18:00, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

But this is worth pursing. People thought the Earth is flat, but it turned out to be untrue. So don't be too certain on this. Though I suspect this "discovery" as well. Chris! my talk 05:09, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

This is getting embarrassing. He's claiming to violate the conservation of energy/matter, and we should gloss this over? Please. - greglor

You can't do better than break even if you have to make your own fuel, as Kanzius claims to do by breaking down water into hydrogen and oxygen. What do you get when you burn hydrogen? Water. It's a closed cycle. If you get energy out of it, it would violate the first law of thermodynamics. I realize that trying to inject any actual information into this page may be futile; oh, well. --Reuben 22:31, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

People don't need to be overreacted on this issue. This is merely a claim that stirred attention! Chris! my talk 22:49, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Is it overreacting to try to prevent Wikipedia from being used as a platform for promoting pseudoscience? --Reuben 22:57, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Nobody here is trying to promote what you called pseudoscience. I am merely creating an article about this event. Opponents of the idea of global warming often referred it as pseudoscience, then does that mean we shouldn't write about it here. I don't think so. Your statement sounds POV to me. Chris! my talk 01:33, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

This is clearly pseudoscience. Uncritically repeating these claims as if they were at all credible is a matter of false balance. And adding a link here to pages such as seawater is certainly a form of promotion. --Reuben 02:19, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
I am not saying it is not. But saying that I am trying to promote pseudoscience is completely baseless and POV. And I didn't repeat any claims. Chris! my talk 02:29, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
I didn't mean to say you are doing such a thing. You have my apologies for giving that impression. For the record, I don't believe that anybody editing here is deliberately trying to promote pseudoscience. Some editors are definitely trying to promote Kanzius, presumably under the sincere impression that he's discovered something that might be an energy source from salt water, although that's not scientifically credible in this case. But this is something that's being actively promoted by the principals, and reported very uncritically by local reporters without scientific training, and if Wikipedia simply reflects that, we end up with an article that's very misleading. --05:48, 13 September 2007 (UTC) —Preceding unsigned comment added by Reuben (talk • contribs)

The reason I deleted the 76% efficiency bit is that it's not particularly useful for a naive reader. John Kanzius is claiming that his process is a useful energy generation system. It's not. Even if it were running at 100% efficiency, it would not generate energy. It's merely a technique for liberating hydrogen, burning it and creating water again. The efficiency of the system is not central to his claim (and misleads readers into thinking that the efficiency has anything to do with anything). It should not be left in the article. Greglor 13:26, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] What is he actually claiming?

I read the references, couldn't see anything that supports the line he personally "claims to having developed a way to produce energy", though there is what seems to be a quote from someone else talking of fuel (and it still doesn't necessarily follow this is a free energy/perpetual motion claim). A new way of decomposing water would be noteworthy in its own right, especially if it was efficient (is there prior art?). Work on using microwaves to treat cancer also seems notable, even if at least one respected agency concluded the treatment was ineffective/unproven. If the article is to suggest the guy is a charlatan (which may be the case), further references are definitely required. Danja 17:17, 29 August 2007 (UTC)

He's just claiming he found a new way to liberate hydrogen from water with microwaves, after which he can burn it (because hydrogen is flammable). It's been done a million ways before [maybe with and maybe without the actual burning], the real issue [IMO] is if it's more efficient than past methods for getting hydrogen from water. If it is, it might improve the economy of fuel cells- at present, if I recall correctly, the big barrier to their fuel is that most methods of getting hydrogen (among them from water) are ridiculously inefficient and therefore expensive. The news reporting on this is basically science illiterate, though. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 69.29.63.21 (talk) 00:52, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Skeptics immediately dismiss the idea as "perpetual motion machine". That's fine, but don't all power generation activities incur some loss in efficiency? (i.e. coal power, nuclear power, etc... surely these aren't perpetual motion machines as well? To me, this isn't the issue at all. isn't the idea here a potential for a far cheaper means of electrical power generation. Consider the energy wasted in mining, shipping, and burning coal to power turbines. Perhaps it could lead to something 20%-95% cheaper than other power generators? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 74.129.16.76 (talk) 21:40, 12 September 2007 (UTC)

Nope, this is rather different. He is taking energy to crack water into hydrogen and oxygen. Then he is burning the hydrogen and oxygen, to form water. At *best*, this would be a zero energy event. But given that he can't avoid losing energy in the system, it's merely a fancy hydrogen candle. No net energy can possibly be produced here.Greglor 03:43, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
Coal plants are not perpetual motion machines, because the energy of coal comes from somewhere (Plants and algae use sunlight to turn H2O and CO2 into hydrocarbons, which eventually form coal) The amount of sunlight energy needed for plants/algae to create hydrocarbons is more than you get when you burn it, so it's not perpetual motion.
H2O is a low energy state. Hydrogen and Oxygen are high energy states. Theres no way you can go from low energy -> high energy without adding more energy "in" than you get "out". Claiming this invention is a power source is about as ridiculous as claiming you can burn H2O + CO2 to make oil. Drewery 16:42, 13 September 2007 (UTC)


I can't see any reference of Kanzius stating that his method creates more energy than it consumes. It's only a means of extracting hydrogen out of salt water, and apparently an easy one. -Raindog80

Look at his explicit over-unity claims in the PES wiki link, and at his claims that it could be used to power a car in some of the news stories. As for extracting hydrogen from salt water, that's already quite easy - 5V DC will do it. --Reuben 05:50, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
Quote or link please. He definitely has stated that the method uses more energy than it releases. What's all this perpetual motion talk? It's energy conversion efficiency is 76% of Faraday's limit, which is very efficient. -Raindog80 —Preceding unsigned comment added by 81.175.140.251 (talk) 14:28, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
Some examples:
  • John Kanzius write: "Since it appears we now have now achieved more than unity, I am going to do an embargo on releasing all further information. [1].
  • Kanzius admits that is the case now in this very early stage of development. [2] - i.e. not a fundamental limitation of thermodynamics, but something that he hopes to get around
  • "You could take plain salt water out of the sea, put it in containers and produce a violent flame that could heat generators that make electricity, or provide other forms of energy," Kanzius said. [3] - claiming that sea water is the source of energy, not the energy put in
  • "If I were to be bold enough, I think one day you could power an automobile with this, eventually," Kanzius told WPBF. (same link)
You can try to interpret this as just a way of producing hydrogen, but it doesn't match up with what Kanzius is saying. --Reuben 16:55, 13 September 2007 (UTC)
Thanks for summarizing his earlier claims. But these references all predate his retraction published July 5th, in (ref name="saltwater1"). Also upon closer reading, the quote "Kanzius admits that is the case now in this very early stage of development." appears to be the reporter referring to "early stage of development" (indicating things might magically improve beyond thermodynamics), we can't really claim Kanzius said that to begin with for that interview. --Vinsci 16:34, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] How much energy does that radio generator take?

I'd imagine more than the fire puts out. --Johnruble 12:41, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Efficiency

There is a report that the energy conversion efficiency of the process is 76% which would be competitive with the state of the art rectenna technologyJohn Kanzius Produces Hydrogen from Salt Water Using Radio Waves. Charles 13:27, 13 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Long quotes

Long quotes should be summarized. Also, we need to be mindful of balance in a short article. We are not quoting extensively from Kanzius, and we should not quote extensively by his critics. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 22:02, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Only if you're interested in balancing correct info with incorrect info. Most of the details related in the news articles is science fiction. Greglor 22:44, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
Ah, wouldn't we all love it if all journalists understood the relevant issues, but I think I won't hold my breath while I wait for that to happen. I can understand why they go crazy over it, after all, it _appears_ as if the water burned as neither the needed RF energy nor the generated gas is visible. Oh well, mass media will allways be like this. On the other hand, similar critique can be put forward regarding some skeptics who are sometimes all too quick to criticize, failing the skeptic ideal by not performing their investigative duties first (this goes both for comments regarding the retracted overunity claim, apparently passing most commentators by, as well as for the article editors here who regarding the cancer treatment simply ignored the available references and didn't bother to dig up available info on the net). Mr Ball's straw man-attack on Kanzius is just disgraceful, in my humble opinion. Maybe Ball really had not seen/heard of Kanzius' retraction, but that isn't an excuse for not getting in touch with Roy et. al. Anyway, as of now, the article should be in very good shape on the energy bit, at least as long as no new claims are made in contrast with what I view as his retraction of July 5th. Certainly we will in due time get properly published papers on the hydrogen generation, which I'm looking forward to. On the cancer bit, the article is getting there, edit by edit. --Vinsci 18:44, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Quotes from Nature News column being minimized

I added some quotes from Philip Ball's Nature News column which are directly relevant to the topic and clearly from the most reliable source we have so far. See this version. However User:Jossi insists on moving them to the Notes section in small font (see this version). I don't mean to edit war on this issue, and would appreciate other editors to chime in. Abecedare 22:07, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

I presented my arguments above. You are welcome to summarize the quotes if you think that these are useful. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 22:12, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
An article with just a few short paragraphs does not need 30% of it to be plastered with long quotes. 22:13, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
The Nature column is crucial, as nothing else in the article even approximates a reliable source as to the scientific validity of Kanzius's claims. We can use shorter quotes, or describe what Ball wrote, if a too-long direct quotation is a problem. --Reuben 22:35, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
I do not think that this article is about the "scientific validity of Kanzius's claims", Reuben. We are reporting on what he says about his "invention" (as per WP:SELFPUB, and about about other sources say about these claims. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:08, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
That's a bit disingenuous. Simply reporting what Kanzius says implies a judgement that his claims are worth listening to. This is a case of very irresponsible, shoddy journalism that's misleading a lot of people, and Wikipedia needs to do a bit better than that. Please note the last criterion in the self-publication policy, that the article not be primarily based on such material. Also see WP:UNDUE: Minority views can receive attention on pages specifically devoted to them—Wikipedia is not a paper encyclopedia. But on such pages, though a view may be spelled out in great detail, it must make appropriate reference to the majority viewpoint, and must not reflect an attempt to rewrite majority-view content strictly from the perspective of the minority view. An article about a scientific topic has an absolute obligation to represent the actual state of scientific knowledge. You can't get around that by saying that the article is only about the act of making the claim, rather than the claim itself. --Reuben 06:56, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree. Nature quote is the only credible info in the piece. Greglor 22:45, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree, but the quotes need to be summarized. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:03, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
While Nature ought to be a good source, this reference is a blog entry/column rant from someone who is doing a) a straw-man attack on this as an "energy source", even long after Kanzius himself retracted that claim and b) has apparently not bothered to talk to the scientists (Roy et. al) who did validate this method to produce hydrogen gas, nor has he apparently made his own experiment (the skeptics first duties). Further, the blog/column is ridiculing Kanzius by framing him with known hoaxes. As such, I don't think this blog adds anything of scientific value and is certainly not a reference on Kanzius work. I vote for removing it completely, or possibly keeping it as an external link among others (but in light of the WP:BLP guidelines, I prefer removing it; I think I also made a mistake in reintroducing the quote by Sterling D. Allan, and that ought to be removed as well). We are supposed to write an encyclopedia, not a forum for quoting general commentary and rants, by bloggers at Nature or elsewhere. --Vinsci 08:05, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Kanzius didn't retract the claim that this could be an energy source, at most he admitted that it wasn't over unity yet. In the same interviews he talks about using it to power cars. So scratch your objection a. The Nature column is certainly a better source than the TV news reports and local newspaper articles, so if you want to remove it, you'd pretty much have to scrap the entire article. --Reuben 09:49, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Actually, Kanzius doesn't use the word "yet". I don't see him referring to the discovery /invention as an energy source in the recent article (ref name="wkyc-09-12-web"). Instead he uses the word fuel. The difference is important. Just like it takes energy to produce diesel or gas fuel from raw oil, it takes energy to produce the hydrogen gas fuel from the salt water. Water in this process, like raw oil, is just the raw material for the fuel. I think most of the confusion here comes from not distinguishing between "fuel" and "energy source". While one would wish journalists knew the distinction, I don't think we should repeat the mistaken reporting as a claim by Kanzius without a direct source. Hence, we should also refrain from linking to rants like that of Mr Ball. --Vinsci 10:34, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Sorry, that's utter nonsense. Fuel is simply an energy source usable by a particular device: nuclear fuel is the energy source for a nuclear reactor, motor vehicle fuel is the energy source for a motor vehicle. Crude oil is an energy source but may not be suitable fuel for your car. To say that something can be fuel without being an energy source is quite a semantic contortion. --Reuben 20:18, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
So you would consider rocket fuel an energy source? Hardly. Some fuels simply require more energy input to produce than the fuel delivers when used, hydrogen is well known to be one of them. --Vinsci 22:36, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Of course rocket fuel is an energy source. Duh. It contains lots of chemical potential energy, unlike, say, water. That's why you use it to power rockets, and not, say, water. Of course, hydrogen is both a fuel and an energy source. But Kanzius doesn't talk about putting hydrogen in your car. He talks about putting water tanks in your car and using it as fuel, i.e. the energy source that makes it go. Water is not a fuel or an energy source. --Reuben 16:37, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
And although he doesn't say "yet," the article does say "now, at this early stage of development." I'm sorry, but you're trying to rationalize these claims in a way that's just not consistent with the man's own statements. --Reuben 21:03, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Kanzius is hardly responsible for what reporters choose to write and publish. Kanzius retracted, why is this a problem for you? The man built an RF tranceiver, I think he can grasp thermodynamics, which he surely has been told about many times after he made those unfortunate comments in May. Please find a newer reference (after 2007-07-05) where he makes overunity claims and I'll be happy to shoot them down with you. Until such, I think we should let him off the hook for his past mistake, it's certainly not something that needs to be perpetuated ;-). --Vinsci 22:36, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
You're engaging in some seriously selective reading of the sources here. That's why it's a problem for me. The news article says that he admits it's not over unity "now, at this early stage of development," and you want to take one part and ignore the other. The fact that he made over-unity claims at all (and his "retraction" is rather dubious) is not something you can choose to play down. If there's one thing that can be concluded from reading the rather abysmal reporting, it's that no, this man does not understand the laws of thermodynamics. BTW, I see no evidence that he built an RF source rather than buying one. It looks like purchased medical equipment in the videos. --Reuben 16:37, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

how is this article even notable? How come this person is classified as "inventor", or even "researcher"? All he has done is applying for some patents, and demonstrating some basic chemistry experiment of dissolving water by radiation, and then turning it back into water. I am sure this would have been great "research" back in the 1830s. Saying he is "researching" cancer and what not without making clear that he has in fact accomplished nothing is clearly misleading. dab (𒁳) 07:29, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I think you've been proven wrong by now (see article). --Vinsci 22:36, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Rename this article ?

This is not a biographical article on the inventor, John Kanzius, but rather in most parts an article about his two inventions. In prasing/debunking his inventions we should be careful (as per WP:BLP and plain common sense) not to be unduly critical of the person.As such, I think it would be appropriate to rename the article, but I cannot think of an appropriate title myself. Any suggestions ? Abecedare 22:19, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

Delete article? Greglor 22:46, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
See previous AfD at top of this page. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:04, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Kanzius' RF tranceiver has been in cancer research use for two years by now, surely some name has emerged for it, perhaps even something simple such as "The Kanzius RF Tranceiver"? It appears several cancer labs have been involved in this research (the 2005 AP story mentions a couple) and it seems likely that something has been published already. --Vinsci 16:12, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Confused... does this line:

  • "When hydrogen burns, it produces water, thus making this a zero energy producing event"

conflict with the later line:

  • "But later Kanzius admitted that the apparatus "in this very early stage of development" needed more energy to produce the gas, than can be obtained by burning the gas[9]."

What is a zero energy producing event? Blueboar 22:50, 14 September 2007 (UTC)

It means that if he ever got 100% efficiency into his system, he would recover as much energy as he put in. However, given that he loses energy to heat & radio waves that aren't absorbed by water, etc, his system actually requires more energy than it produces. It is impossible to produce energy by cracking water and then burning the resulting hydrogen. It's rather like tearing a one dollar bill in half, and taping it back together. At the end, you have a dollar bill! He's doing the same thing, only he is likely losing a couple pieces of the dollar bill (hence the 76% efficiency). Greglor 22:55, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
Right, but also: we have to be a little bit careful in that so far it's not established that this is really a hydrogen flame at all. It could be something else like an RF plasma, or burning contaminants in the canal water (such as boat fuel!). I think that's how they manage to get water to burn in Cleveland. --Reuben 23:04, 14 September 2007 (UTC)
 :) !! ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 04:09, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
 :-) Well, we can at least rule out the "fuel in the canal water" theory, after the UPenn tests with various waters ("more than 50 different water combinations", according to the reporter, whatever he means by that — see the video, ref name="wkyc-sep-14-video") --Vinsci 16:04, 15 September 2007 (UTC)


as a dyed-in-the-wool mergist, I don't see a reason for outright deletion. But there is nothing of notability here. This article should just redirect to some "fringe science" topic, where Kanzius can figure as a list entry. Once he is miraculously vindicated, we can still recreate this article. As it is, this violates WP:FRINGE. A possible redirect target would be List_of_pseudosciences_and_pseudoscientific_concepts#Health_and_Medicine and/or Fringe_science#Contemporary_examples. More than that isn't warranted. --dab (𒁳) 07:40, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I see your point, but I think that merging to a fringe list may be not the best course of action. We do not really know what this is, if is provable, or if it is wishful thinking. We just don't know.≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:48, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
that's precisely why we should merge it. We don't do articles on "wishful thinking" unless it's really notable in pop culture, and in that case we put it in popculture, not science, categories. --dab (𒁳) 19:08, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
But we do not know anything about these claims besides what has been published. It may be wishful thinking, it may be a scam, it may be the greatest invention in the history of humanity, etc. In WP we report what other sources say about a subject and what the subject say about himself (within the caveats of WP:SELFPUB). ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:21, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Merge this to somewhere else

This man is clearly not notable in his own right, though the work he has done may be. At the moment the article is crafted purely in advertisement form, which is not acceptable, and references to a few local news stories documenting some highly dubious "research" (later debunked) do not an encyclopedia article make. Merge this to elsewhere, perhaps Perpetual motion or Fringe science. Moreschi Talk 10:48, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Are you referring to his novel method of generating hydrogen replicated by Professor Roy, or his idea for how to kill cancer cells, currenctly being researched using his RF device at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, a world renown cancer research and treatment institution? Are you claiming that this way of producing hydrogen doesn't work, or that they are mistaken over at M. D. Anderson? The N in NPOV stands for "neutral" not "negative". --Vinsci 12:31, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
I am not a fan of pseudoscience, but I would agree with Vinsci on this. I also do not see that the article read as as an advert. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 18:49, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
all we have so far are WKYC-TV reports. That makes it a minor topic of local news. If this has received academic attention, where are the publications? In this case, stop citing random media reports and give us the actual literature on the topic. If there is bona fide research behind this, cover it at hydrogen production, with proper academic references, not here. Same goes for the cancer stuff. Once the research is covered in pertinent articles, this could become a proper biography article on a notable inventor. dab (𒁳) 19:14, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Mmmmm... The Google test trows 68,000 hits for this person's name, and as such it may pass the notability test, regardless if there are academic sources on the subject or not. Don't you think? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:25, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Think of the reader... Would it not be strange that there is no article in WP about a person that has 68,000 pages in Google index? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:27, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I would support merging the content of this article into one on Water as fuel (or some better title) where similar claims by Stanley Meyer, and perhaps even Louis Enricht and Ramar Pillai can be discussed. The main reason is that these articles are unlikely to ever be true biographies of the inventors, who are known only for their singular claims (of course if any of these inventions are verified to be true, we can write a fresh article on the newly minted Nobel laureate). In short, it would be better to have an article focussed on the claims, rather than the claimants. John Kanzius will itself redirect to that page, so no information will be lost to the reader. Abecedare 20:45, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

I strongly object to this. Kanzius hasn't made any such claims after 2007-07-05, when he admitted the process is a net consumer of energy. There's no relation to Meyers claims whatsoever. --Vinsci 22:50, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
I support a merge. If this person later became very notable, then we can always recreate a biographical article for this guy. Chris! my talk 23:01, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

look, no number of google hits will justify categorisation of this as "science", so stop reverting the categories. A large number of google hits on their own will only ever be sufficient to keep an article around as a topic of Category:Internet memes. For anything else, we need respectable (in this case, peer-reviewed) sources. --dab (𒁳) 10:01, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

this edit by Vinsci is not acceptable. rather than arguing why this BLP article should be categorized under "science" topics (such as citing a single WP:RS), Vinsci elects to invoke "vandalism". Why don't you report me on WP:VIP then, Vinsci, and put the categories back after I am duly blocked for vandalism? --dab (𒁳) 16:23, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

I think the simplest solution to this is to proceed with the merge. Until then, the only way to categorize the sections in the categories where they belong, is unfortunately to tag the whole BLP article itself. This is of course regrettable, but better than hiding the material that is clearly relevant. Just about every sentence in this article is duly referenced now, please spend a day or two on actaully reading and viewing them, it appears to me you're running on autopilot - given the May/June history on the energy topic, I can understand that, but wake up, already. --Vinsci 16:43, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Arbcom has been pretty clear that non-peer-reviewed, popular-media stories cannot be the sole basis for presentation of scientific topics. To quote:

Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:Reliable sources require that information included in an article have been published in a reliable source which is identified and potentially available to the reader. What constitutes a reliable source varies with the topic of the article, but in the case of a scientific theory, there is a clear expectation that the sources for the theory itself are reputable textbooks or peer-reviewed journals. Scientific theories promulgated outside these media are not properly verifiable as scientific theories and should not be represented as such.

Abecedare 17:20, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Sure, but this article is not about a scientific topic, is it?≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:34, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Sorry I didn't make the context of my comments clear, which was its inclusion in scientific categories that Dab removed. See [4]. Abecedare 18:16, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] More media sources

≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 19:31, 15 September 2007 (UTC)

Interestingly the Foxnews article calls him an "electrical engineer", while CBS says that he doesn't even have a college degree. I guess, because it is not a professional degree (like Law and Medicine) anyone in the US can choose to call themselves electrical engineer (as is the case with "software engineer"). Just wondering if that's true ... not directly relevant to the article though. Abecedare 20:58, 15 September 2007 (UTC)
Actually depending on the context, is not always legally safe in the USA to call yourself an "Engineer". Sometimes even practising Software Engineers must be licensed. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Professional_Engineer#Controversy_over_the_Term_.22Engineer.22_in_the_IT_Industry. Charles 14:47, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Problem with merge proposal

A merge means that after the contents have been merged into specific articles, this page will need to be redirected. But redirected to where? To delete a page we need an AfD, and the previous one failed. I oppose a merge on these grounds. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 16:03, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

the merge proposal concerns a section, not the entire article. If notability is established (and "notability" is not established by a bunch of news report from last week), we can keep this around as a biography article. We do not maintain articles on people who have published one or two articles in a physics journal. Has Kanzius published one or two articles in a physics journal? None are cited. As long as we have no peer-reviewed literature here, just recent news pages, notability is not established, and this belongs on wikinews, not here. This is an encyclopedia, remember? I am not saying there won't be something to report in a couple of weeks. But as of now, there is no literature. We cannot write encyclopedic articles on the basis of TV news reports. --dab (𒁳) 16:34, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree with keeping this BLP article after the sections are merged, with pointers from one-liner descriptions in the BLP to the detailed descriptions of his invention (cancer treatment method) and discovery/invention (hydrogen production). I think you may have missed the fact that many good references has been added in the past few days. Please spend some time reading those and consider what people Kanzius co-operates with. Regarding the hydrogen production, you're way over the top here in demanding peer-reviewed papers a couple of months after this major discovery was first made (recall Rustum Roy called it "the most important discovery in water research in a 100 years ". You may also want to refer to Roys bio at http://www.rustumroy.com/general%20biography%202007.htm). I think the UPenn senior faculty and research personnel are trustworthy enough to take their word for it, until the papers have been duly published (and I trust they will). --Vinsci 17:02, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
A merge doesn't make sense, because nothing here is remotely notable in an article on hydrogen production. --Reuben 17:11, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
I agree that merger with hydrogen production, which is a widely studied (and I mean in scientific/engineering literature) topic, is unwarranted. I think Water as fuel is a better target for these novel, non-peer reviewed claims of Kanzius, Meyer etc. Media statements are no substitute for scientific publications, as even arbcom has clearly stated. Abecedare 17:25, 16 September 2007 (UTC).
On the hydrogen production, the best reference as of now is Professor Rustum Roys first-hand account (see article references) of the confirmation of Kanzius' hydrogen generation process, with the confirmation witnessed by a large number of senior faculty and research staff at UPenn. So we certainly do not rely solely on media reports, just because they are also among the references. Although the video comes in handy as a 2nd path of confirmation that the event took place - just ignore the reporter in the video, if you that's your problem. Some of the facts are backed up by quotes of the intervied scientists (and not the reporter) in the media reports. --Vinsci 18:13, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Even media quotes by Dr. Roy are no substitute for peer-reviewed publications in science journals. Abecedare 18:24, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
We all know that and I'm awaiting that as eagerly as you. For now, we have his written first-person account of an actual experiment, which is the next best thing. See ref name="rustumroy.com-responsetoemail". --Vinsci 18:52, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
To merge the hydrogen generation process section with Water as fuel is an outright silly proposal, as this isn't an energy source, nor does anybody involved claim so, to the best of our current knowledge. --Vinsci 18:13, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Kanzius does claim that: ""To see it burn actually gives me chills because could this be an alternative fuel for a world that's using way to much fossil fuels." Abecedare 18:24, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
This is an outdated quote, from before 2007-07-05, thus now irrelevant. --Vinsci 18:52, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
The article on Hydrogen production lists ways to produce hydrogen. Kanzius new process is such a way, therefore the section should be merged to Hydrogen production. Reuben seems to think that Kanzius new process to produce hydrogen isn't even "remotely notable", despite Professor Roys statement that this is "the most important discovery in water research in a 100 years" (see above). Talk about trolling. --Vinsci 18:13, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
I do not know this could be merged into Water as fuel, when what Kanzius claims is production of hydrogen from water as fuel. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:33, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Really ? I have seen Dr. Roy say that it is not the water that is burning. But the only claim from Kanzius that I have seen, is of water being used as a fuel. Here is a quote from John Kanzius: ""To see it burn actually gives me chills", said Kanzius, "because could this be an alternative fuel for a world that's using way to much fossil fuels." By the way, the same quote ("Seeing it burn gives me chills.") is attributed to Dr. Roy here.
Can you please point me to the source where Kanzius has claimed that his method is for hydrogen production ? Abecedare 17:44, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
I have corrected the article as per Kanzius' own claims. Please feel free to revert me, if there is a source that Kanzius claims his method decomposes salt water into hydrogen and oxygen. Abecedare 17:51, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

It makes more sense to keep this as a BLP. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 17:37, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

But that leaves us with an unsolvable (and apparently to Dbachmann irritating) categorization problem. I'm fine with it either way, though, as long as the categorization stays in. --Vinsci 12:01, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Are Kanzius' own views worth mentioning ?

Vinsci, can you please explain your deletion here ? How are Kanzius' own views about how his invention works, irrelevant or unencyclopedic in this biographical article ?Abecedare 18:47, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Ah, if you're editing it from the point of a WP:BLP article, I can see why you may want to include that (although I wouldn't, as we're likely to see other quotes on it from him as time passes, so avoid recentisms). I'm trying to keep to facts about the invention itself, not speculation on the invention. I could link to a theoretical physicists web page which speculates in this phenomenom (at least one out there), but that is also not encyclopedic or backed up otherwise. Also, I think we can agree that the explanation for this is better left to physicists. That K. can only speculate on his own discovery doesn't detract from the value of the discovery, though. --Vinsci 19:00, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

The section is now organized as follows:

  • Kanzius' view of his own invention.
  • Roy's mainly positive review
  • Ball's mainly negative review.

I don't see why you say that "explanation for this is better left to physicists", since as Jossi has pointed out above this is not an article on scientific topic anyways, but rather one on claims that have gained notability in the media and therefore presumably deserve coverage on wikipedia. We therefore have covered all aspects that the media has covered. Abecedare 19:08, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

Vinsci, can you also please explain why you changed this section heading ? Clearly, in this article, we need to report what Kanzius himself claims , and not what perhaps some of us hope he did. Abecedare 19:16, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Sigh. We can't go on like this, we need to get the merge done, so we can get the science right. --Vinsci 19:29, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
For once, I completely agree with you :-) Currently, since it is a biographical article, Kanzius's views are treated on par with Roy and Ball. If/when a merger is done the article content can be adjusted to reflect the context, depending upon where it is merged to. What do you think the appropriate target is ? Abecedare 19:33, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] "Burning"

One reason we have all this hoopla about "burning", may be that in present language use, the word is used exactly like Kanzius uses it, for burning wood. It's the same thing there: the wood itself doesn't actually burn. Instead, the presence of heat causes the piece of wood to eject gas and the gas in turn burns. Yet nobody seems to have a problem claiming that "wood burns", even though it is clearly not true if we are to split hairs. This is the same situation as with the gas emitted from the saltwater, in the presence of the RF signal. It's likely impossible to change the general publics way of using the word in this way with Kanzius hydrogen production method. Maybe this can be used to help explain the phenomenom to laymen? One can only hope. :-) --Vinsci 19:44, 16 September 2007 (UTC)

To expand on this a bit, there is of course a subtle difference: once wood has started burning after enough heat was originally applied, it thereafter supplies its own heat, keeping the process going. Luckily, when "burning water", this isn't the case: it doesn't generate the needed RF signal to keep the fire going, of course. The other consideration is of course the net energy loss, when "burning water". --Vinsci 20:08, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
To simplify the analogy further when discussing with laymen, I'd suggest discussing candles rather than wood, as in this modern world, more people will be experienced with candles. The same analogy applies, of course. --Vinsci 20:08, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
this isn't the problem. The problem is the continual discussion of "fuel". I know Kanzius himself isn't claiming he found any way to treat cancer, or to produce fuel from water: he's just "trying". but of course the media all pounce on the "fuel" idea, and the way this article is written, the casual reader is very likely to get the idea that there is a "Kanzius method" of treating cancer, and a mysterious possibility that water may be "burned as fuel". Neither is the case. Kanzius may have found a funny effect, notable enough in itself, and maybe useful to demonstrate hydrolysis to high school kids in the future. That appears to be the long and short of it. The whole thing will probably fall into place in a week or two. It doesn't hurt to keep this article around with {{recentism}} and {{expert}} tags, and then we'll quietly transform it into a "BLP on somebody who was on Ohio media for some chemistry experiment in September 2007" type of article. dab (𒁳) 22:42, 16 September 2007 (UTC)
Seems like a good approach, dab. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:03, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Once again, Dbachmann reveals he hasn't bothered to read the sources of this article. In the above comment, he specifically ignores (regarding the cancer treatment method) ref name="mercyhurst-2007-04"[5], which among other things says (my emphasis): "The Kanzius system tags cancer cells with tiny pieces of metal called nanoparticles. When exposed to radiowaves, the nanoparticles heat up and destroy the cancer cells – without damaging healthy cells nearby. Preliminary research at both the Anderson Center and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center has shown promising results. The next step, if federal approval is granted, would be testing on human patients. Three testing centers are envisioned, including one in Erie.". This is coming from one of the worlds leading cancer research insitutions (through Dr Curley), and Kanzius were there in person to appear together with Dr Curley. It's not like Curley is taking credit for coming up with this cancer treatment method. Oh, and the title of that press release was (again my emphasis): 'Hurst hosts Kanzius cancer symposium. So we have here a leading cancer research instituion giving Kanzius credit. I could cite more, but what is the point, if Dbachmann doesn't bother to read the sources before blurting out his opinion? What is your motivation to work on this article at all, when you don't even bother do read the sources? Do your homework, please. --Vinsci 05:01, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Who is Stephen Curley ? ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 20:03, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
I guess you mean Steven A. Curley? Bio here. (Link is from the article references). --Vinsci 00:20, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
That's still nonsense. When wood burns, you're releasing chemical potential energy stored in the wood. In the present case, even in the most charitable interpretation, no energy is stored in the water at all, and none is released from the water. Frankly, your comment is a language game that tries to promote your own interpretation of the claims made by Kanzius. As far as factually verifiable content goes, I see nothing to demonstrate that hydrogen is liberated at all. That's all speculation that seems to have been made first by someone else, and repeated by Kanzius as a possibility. To try to make hydrogen production the core of his claims is not consistent with the sources. --Reuben 20:38, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Rueben, I agree with wat you say but would clarify a point: there is no source which says that Kanzius himself buys the hydrogen production theory, even as a possibility. In fact his own explanation for the phenomenon is diametrically opposite to water decomposition. See [6]
"What is causing the salt water to burn? Kanzius is careful not to answer too many questions while the patent is pending. But he will say that the radio waves force together the normally separated hydrogen and oxygen in the water - a process called "reunification." And that makes the flame."
Abecedare 20:45, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Abecedare, I do agree that it's not clear whether or not he himself subscribes to the idea that water is being dissociated. But in this particular quote it could be Kanzius's own confusion, or the reporter's. --Reuben 20:51, 17 September 2007 (UTC)
Reuben, Your interpretation of confusion may well be right. As this article states:
"He said a chemist told him that the immense heat created from the machine breaks down the hydrogen-oxygen bond in the water, igniting the hydrogen."
which would match the "conventional" explanation. Abecedare 21:19, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Sub-section title

Well, it seems to me that the removal of sub-section title make the entire "invention" section extremely difficult to read. I restored once earlier, but I got reverted. Now I have no intention to argue about the verifiability of those titles, as that is not my purpose. I just want editors to notice that it would cause confusion to readers as the paragraphs of both the "cancer" part and the "water" part are now cluttering together. Please address this issue. Chris! my talk 00:08, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Then, we need to find proper section names that are neutral. "Cancer cure" is POV, as it is not clear if the invention indeed cures cancer. "Burning water" is also POV, as that is not the claim. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:12, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
What about splitting the "invention" section into two separate sections. Then the two sections can be named like "Cancer-related invention" and "Water-related invention." Or comes up with similar titles. Chris! my talk 00:22, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
That would work... ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:23, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I changed the second section heading to "water related dicoverey", which I believe is more accurate. Hope there are no POV issues presented by this ! :-) Abecedare 01:44, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Avoiding editorializing and OR

"Thus far, Rustum Roy is the only person who has corroborated this version of events" ... is editorializing and OR, as that has not been reproted as such.. Let's avoid these type of edits, please, and stick to reporting facts that are verifiable. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 01:05, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

I agree. I removed the statement (before I saw your comment) - it can be readded if there is a secondary source for this, and even then it will need a qualifier such as, "Till September 2007 ..." instead of "Thus far ...". Abecedare 01:41, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Actually, we do have reports from at least two others, albeit through media (with video, though). I'm referring to the managing director (I don't have his name handy) of the company that manufactures the production RF systems for Kanzius' company Med Therm LLC as well as John White and his colleagues at APV. At least White et al can be seen in the WKYC video, not sure right now which video the managing director was in. --Vinsci 02:01, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Cancer: More sources upcoming

I've now made contact with Kanzius through email. In an email Kanzius mentions that "a couple of the manuscripts regarding animal testing are published within the next 4-6 weeks". I also have received a conference presentation (American Society of Climical Oncology, January 2007) by Gannon CJ, Mukherjee P and Curley SA titled "In vitro Gold Nanoparticle (GNP) Targeting Enhances Non-Invasive Radiofrequency Destruction of Human Gastrointestinal Malignancies" abstract here. I don't think I can upload the presentation itself without clearing copyright with the authors though and it may not be worth the trouble if we are to get full papers soon anyway. (Added this reference to the article, 2007-10-31 --Vinsci 11:30, 31 October 2007 (UTC)).

--Vinsci 01:08, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

That abstract just shows that the system isn't toxic in tissue culture. I can show that pingpong balls aren't toxic. Doesn't mean they'll be of any use in curing cancer. The cancer section should be deleted. It's misleading. Greglor 20:14, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

That reference is only intended to go on the phrase "gold nanoparticles (GNP)", once it enters the article. It's just providing a lot more info on GNP's in this context, than Wikipedia itself will provide. SWNT's (single-walled nanotubes) are also being used for the same purpose. I haven't had time to edit the article to reflect either of these yet, but it should be done as not only metal nanoparticles are used as the article currently says. Have some patience, please. --Vinsci 10:29, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

Here's a reference to use regarding SWNT:s (single-walled nanotubes) in this article. (Added this reference to the article, 2007-10-31 --Vinsci 11:30, 31 October 2007 (UTC)).

Paul Cherukuri; Christopher J. Gannon, Tonya K. Leeuw, Howard K. Schmidt, Richard E. Smalley, Steven A. Curley and R. Bruce Weisman (2006-12-12). "Mammalian pharmacokinetics of carbon nanotubes using intrinsic near-infrared fluorescence". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America 103 (50): 18882-18886. doi:10.1073/pnas.0609265103. 

--Vinsci 13:52, 23 September 2007 (UTC)

A video of Dr Curley's presentation at Mercyhurst in April on the cancer research will be available soon, hopefully next week. (This is the talk that the article in reference mercyhurst-2007-04 is about). It's a must see. --Vinsci 10:49, 21 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] RF dissociation of water

It seems that using RF to dissociate water has been done before. As I suspected, it involves RF plasmas, and AFAICT the kinetic energy of the plasma ions provides the energy to break up the H2O. [7] The conditions are quite different, as they are using water vapor in low-flow conditions. I have yet to see evidence that Kanzius is producing H2 (could all be RF plasma), but this shows a precedent for dissociation using RF. --Reuben 01:51, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Interesting! --Vinsci 02:24, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Sure, but it is irrelevant to this article. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:25, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
You may start an article on Water disassociation. Now, that would be interesting :) ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:27, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
What a coincidence - there is an article on water splitting that could use some attention. --Reuben 00:24, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Excellent find... ! ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:30, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Three-revert rule

Just a reminder for everyone to observe the Three-Revert Rule on Wikipedia. You can read about it at the policy page, but the summary is: don't make more than three reverts to the same page in any 24-hour period. Reverting means undoing part of or all of somebody else's edit, and it doesn't matter whether you revert the same thing each time, or something different. Thank you. --Reuben 02:07, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

Yes, that is correct, although when editors are actively engaged in editing an article such as this one, we ought to accept that some edits will correct previous edits, or expand upon previous edits and that is not considered a revert. That is collaborative editing, which is the basis of this project. So, if you edit: "XYZ said ABC" and another editors adds "XYZ said ABC in the context of PQR" that is not a revert. Hope this is clear. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:24, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Also remember, if an admin think that a user's revert is disruptive, he or she can blocked that user even if that user only make one revert. Chris! my talk 02:43, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Yes. A disruptive editor is quite easy to spot, as over time they develop an editing pattern that gives them away as such. I have not observed any editor to this article to be disruptive. Quite the contrary. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 02:51, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Actually, Chrishomingtang suspected me of disruptive editing, due to this edit[8] where I inserted an illustrated sidebox discussing the meaning of "burn" under the headline "Does wood burn?". Old habits from philosophy class on making terminology clear, I'm afraid. Perhaps that broke some policy as well. I really just tried to clarify for the unsuspecting Wikipedia visitor to clarify what's going on here (without actually involving the full discussion; what we see as a flame is really a plasma, the actual oxidation takes place outside the plasma), so it was far from a perfect sidebox in its initial version, anyway. But I wouldn't mind if someone improved it and put it back). --Vinsci 03:42, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Nice work on that sidebox, but not for Wikipedia, I am afraid. That is what WP:NOR warns us about. ≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 03:44, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
I apologized for wrongly accuse you of disruptive editing. But that sidebox doesn't belong here anyway. Chris! my talk 05:13, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Retrieved-on dates

In the references section, we now have nicely formatted links for web versions of articles, with a "retrieved-on" date. If this is primarily to indicate that a link is still live, should they be freely updated? If I click on a link with a retrieved-on date of several months ago, should I change it to today's date to indicate the most recent date that it was verified to work? --Reuben 06:07, 18 September 2007 (UTC)

The purpose of those dates is to allow a hypothetical fact checker to use something like www.theinternetarchive.org to find a copy of the reference in the event that it were to go offline. So there is no real benefit in updating the retrieved-on date...I can't see how it could hurt either.

[edit] Edits by Greglor

This article as of this edit is now total unadulterated nonsense. It's pure and simple an advertisement for John Kanzius' pseudoscientific BS. Can we get some editors in here? Greglor 19:45, 17 September 2007 (UTC)

Hi Greglor, welcome to Wikipedia! (I noticed you've registered recently and that nearly all of your edits are regarding Kanzius). Your comment above prompted me to look at your edits to this article and here's some feedback:
  • In this edit, you inserted text claiming that Rustum Roy is a business partner of Kanzius. You can't just make up accusations like this. If you can provide a reliable source, it needs to be referenced. As it turns out in this case, Roy explicitly says Neither The Pennsylvania State University nor I have any contractual relationship with Mr. Kanzius as of this date." (link from the article references).
In a couple of edits, you make the error of using a logical fallacy known as a Negative proof:
  • In this edit you write "There is no peer-reviewed evidence that this machine could or ever has worled.": as it turns out there was such evidence at the time, but you wasn't aware of it, yet you claimed as a certainty that "There is no...". In this edit you again repeat this mistake, claiming "there are no peer-reviewed demonstrations that this machine does anything.".
In science, if you haven't had your data peer-reviewed, it effectively doesn't exist. Scientists find publication by press release *highly* suspect. I apologize if I've violated a tenet of Wikipedia, but on a scientific basis, if you're dumping your data into a press release before proving it to your peers, you are almost certainly a fraud or deeply mistaken.Greglor 20:28, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
  • In this edit regarding employees at Pennsylvania State University, you replaced the text "senior faculties and research personnels from various departments at the Materials Research Lab employees" with another unsourced statement: "employees of Roy's". You must stop doing edits like this. If you haven't realised it already, Roy is Professor Emeritus there, ie. retired (he's 83 years old, after all).
In several of the news reports, Roy is the one promoting the "invention". I inferred he was a business partner, my bad. Greglor 20:20, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
The only other named research person who is positive about this machine is a research associate. This is in fact a *junior* research position. I assumed that she worked for Roy. My bad. But my assumption was far closer to the mark than " in a demonstration before senior faculties and research personnels from various departments at the Materials Research Lab, using Kanzius' RF tranceiver[12], which Kanzius had brought to the lab for the day." This statement is misleading in that it suggests that senior research faculty have endorsed this pseudoscientific nonsense. It's simply not true.Greglor 20:28, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
  • In this edit, you again try a negative proof, claiming "Thus far, Rustum Roy is the only person who has corroborated this version of events." There was already feedback on this above, under the headline "Avoiding editorializing and OR".
Can you correct me? Has anyone else corroborated? The statement I changed said "senior faculty have corroborated" or something to that effect. I was pointing out that no one else had corroborated, besides *junior* research folk. See above.Greglor 20:28, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
I do hope that these are simply mistakes of an enthusiastic Wikipedia beginner and am looking forward to reading your future improvements, with references, to this and other articles. --Vinsci 15:14, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
What peer-reviewed evidence in there (peer-reviewed meaning published in a mainstream scientific journal) that Kanzius's water machine works? I haven't seen any so far. Drewery 18:33, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Greglor made that statement regarding the cancer treatment, not the water discovery. The water discovery, of course, is far too new for any paper to have been written, let alone made its way through peer-review yet. But in general, negative proofs (see above) like this make no sense, which is why it's a fallacy. --Vinsci 18:52, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
Umm, actually it is *highly* inappropriate to be holding press conferences prior to publishing in a peer-reviewed journal. As such, mentioning there is no proof that the machine works is perfectly reasonable. Any credible scientist/engineer would publish first, then hold a press conference. Greglor 20:20, 20 September 2007 (UTC)
Keep in mind that it is wholly appropriate to label any sort of "scientific discovery" that has not yet passed peer-review as such. Drewery 19:27, 18 September 2007 (UTC)
The lack of peer reviewed publication is very relevant, and in fact, without that we can't report on a scientific topic. Vinsci, although you have a point about negative information, please recognize that the sources available amount to almost zero information as far as reliable sources is concerned. It would be irresponsible and a perverse outcome to report these claims as scientifically promising without noting the lack of peer-reviewed publication. --Reuben 21:01, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Given that it's clear that I don't know how to do this within Wikipedia guidelines, can someone point out to me a way that I can add something along this line to the cancer section: "Though the inventor claims to have built a machine that is useful for curing cancer, there is no evidence that it works". Or do I have to prove it doesn't work? How does one prove a negative? As a scientist, if someone tells me they have a cure for cancer, the onus is *not* on me to prove it doesn't work. It is on them to prove that it does...Greglor 20:34, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] hope vs claim

The article says he has invented a method that he hopes can be used to treat cancer. I changed the word hopes to claims, but another editor disliked it. But there is still something in the word hopes that I don't find right WP:NPOV-wise, albeit I'm not so sure whether I'm truly correct. I would feel more comfortably with something like 'he has invented a method that in his view (or according to his writings) could potentially be used (or be useful) to treat cancer' . Consider this example: If a very aggressive country rages war and their ruler says that he hopes for peace this has leaves certain connotations to the reader, eg that the ruler's primary objective is to make peace and that it is up to the other country to initiate it. However, what the ruler may want can be the annihilation of the other country, so that peace can come in a Pax Romana fashion. What I mean is that the word hopes may affect the underlying assumptions of the reader about the motivations of a person. I would prefer another word. Can you help me find a better word to replace hopes? NerdyNSK 00:07, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

Saying he claims is incorrect, as he does not claim it can cure cancer. "Hope," it is indeed not a good choice. What about:
who has invented a method that he claims has the potential to be used in cancer treatments.
≈ jossi ≈ (talk) 00:33, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
This sounds better. I suggest you to put it into the article. Thanks. NerdyNSK 00:43, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
The article in Journal of Surgical Research 137(2): 263 (ref name="j.surgicalresearch-vol137issue2" in our article references) gives supportive evidence of this as a potential treatment method. Likewise does Gannon et al in In vitro Gold Nanoparticle (GNP) Targeting Enhances Non-Invasive Radiofrequency Destruction of Human Gastrointestinal Malignancies. The two quotes by Dr Curley (see article) certainly are supportive as well, the latter quote being "This is the most exciting new therapy for cancer that I have seen in over 20 years of cancer research,". So the current wording in the intro is misinformative, I think. He's certainly not alone in thinking of this a potential cancer treatment method. --Vinsci 09:24, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
I just wanted to add that just because someone published something in a journal doesn't mean that their findings are correct, even with a peer-review process. See [9]. Errors do happen even in journals. A publication in a journal is, of course, an indication that something may work, but it must be independently verified by many scientists before we can trust a finding. NerdyNSK 15:05, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] kitchen

FOX says that he built his 'device' in his kitchen. This must be mentioned in the article for the following reason: An inventor who invests time and money in acquiring a proper laboratory sounds more credible than a person who builts something in his kitchen and then goes on to say their invention is relevant to the world's major health and energy problems. Wikipedia's reader can form a better opinion on a person if they know what kind of investment they made before or during building their 'device'. We need this info in order to properly inform our readers and enable them to decide for themselves. I put it into the article, please don't remove it. NerdyNSK 00:20, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

You're on thin ice here, I think. Invoking "his wife's kitchen", doesn't improve that. He woke up in the middle of the night with this idea on how to treat cancer, in a period of his life when he was receiving chemotherapy. Surely, had he known beforehand that he would 1) get leukemia 2) come up with this idea at night in his home, he would have prepared himself by setting up a proper lab beforehand. What ideas will you have next year, NerdyNSK? Are you prepared? ;-) As it is, several of the devices are now in active research use at the universities and they are of course since long factory built. --Vinsci 07:45, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Warning: Energy quotes dating issues on web & video

I thought it was very strange that Kanzius, after having retracted his energy source claim in early July, would be saying something different on video in September, so I decided to take a closer look at this. Right now, the article is asserting that "In September, 2007, he expressed his belief that, "this [could] be an alternative fuel for a world that's using way to[o] much fossil fuels.", referencing the wkyc-09-12-web[10] web page. That web page is a word-for-word transcript of the video in reference ref-wkyc-sep-12-video[11], the quote is about 1:16s into the video. Now, when you examine this video side by side with the video from May in reference ref-wkyc-05-22-web[12] (about 2:20 into the video), it is obvious that all of the Kanzius quotes were taped back in May. You can tell this, by noting that everything is the same in the two videos: location, seating, lighting, Kanzius' clothing, voice level etc. Thus, the September 12th broadcast simply used leftover interview material from the May broadcast, but without making it clear to the viewer that they were in fact using archive footage. When the transcript of the video was made, the error spread to the web page transcript[13] In conclusion, the July retraction stands and I'm therefore removing the passage "In September, 2007, he expressed his belief that, "this [could] be an alternative fuel for a world that's using way to[o] much fossil fuels."" from the article, because it is misleading. --Vinsci 12:45, 19 September 2007 (UTC)

In an email message, Kanzius confirms that the September broadcast was from the old interview in May, in his own words:
From: JohnKanzius@[withheld]
Date: Wed, 19 Sep 2007 11:05:09 EDT
...
The quotes you talk about in the latest WKYC story is old footage shot in early May. I did not know they were going to use that footage as I am not privileged to their reporting, There will be additional stories in major newspapers and you will note that I have not pressed the issue of this being a new alternative fuel, but focused on this being a scientific discovery.
--Vinsci 15:22, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Quite simply, we don't have a retraction of his earlier statements that he intends this to be a fuel source. At most, we have a retraction of claims that it was already producing more energy than put in. A retraction would be "I retract my earlier statements that this could be used as a fuel source" or "I no longer believe this could be used as a fuel source." We don't have that. In the news article, we have a statement that it's not currently over unity, and even this e-mail isn't a retraction, it just says that he's not "pressing the issue" of it being a fuel. We do have plenty of documented instances where Kanzius presented this as a way to use water as fuel, and those should be reported. --Reuben 19:35, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
As a side note, pretty much all the articles present this as a potential fuel. Absent that, it's not clear exactly what the "scientific discovery" is supposed to be. You can argue that it's an efficient way to produce hydrogen, but I haven't seen either evidence that it's producing hydrogen, or any story where Kanzius himself presents it that way. --Reuben 19:35, 19 September 2007 (UTC)
Note that this orange flame is a well-known effect. I'm suprised that researchers at a university wouldn't recognize this stuff (but perhaps they needed to talk to plasma physicists.) It goes by the name "plasma torch," where a high voltage splits the N2 and O2 of the air and produces a flame-like electric spark. It's a single-electrode spark, not a flame at all; a high-power corona discharge. The "flame" is colored, no? So pass its light through a spectrometer to identify which elements are present. This is called an "ICP spectrometer," and we have an old one upstairs at the UW chem dept which dates from the early 1970s. And if you want to get specific, this type of weird electrical "flame" involving high frequency at high voltage was produced by Nikola Tesla since the 1890s. If you chop the high-volt signal you get fractal lightning streamers, but if you use a pure sine wave then you get something that looks like a flame. No water burns, and no water is necessary: the corona "flame" can spew from any type of conductor, be it metal or even salt-water. Of course if the plasma was to boil some water, then some water vapor might pass through the spark, be split into H+ and 0- ions, then recombine again (perhaps combining with nitrogen ions from the air.) But you could do the same with a Neon Sign Transformer with some salt-water wetted cloth on its electrodes. I bet his orange flame reeks like a Tesla coil: ozone and nitrogen oxides. --Wjbeaty 07:13, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
I don't recall if they've done spectroscopy for the first paper on the saltwater phenomenom, I hear it will be submitted to Nature today (I don't know what they found out). I did suggest spectroscopy to them last week, but I'm sure they had thought of doing that themselves. I note we have a short article on plasma torches. Kanzius notes that the color and temperature varies with the solution. --Vinsci 08:49, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
I forwarded your comment. They've actually ruled out the plasma torch hypothesis a while back. Can't wait to see that paper. :-) --Vinsci 14:52, 24 September 2007 (UTC)
The color of the flame certainly doesn't indicate hydrogen - because that burns with a colourless flame. However, he uses salt water - it doesn't work with distilled water - so the colour is probably coming from the sodium in the salt - which burns with a strong yellow flame. Both common table salt and rock salt contain sodium iodide as well as sodium chloride - iodine burns with a pinkish violet flame - mix the two and that yellowish pink you see in the videos is plausible. This radio-frequency effect plus the subsequent combustion is clearly doing something interesting to the chemistry - but in terms of "net energy", this is just bogus. SteveBaker (talk) 13:58, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Wrongful invocation of the second law of thermodynamics

"Kanzius admits that this process could not be considered an energy source, as more energy is used to produce the RF signal than can be obtained from the burning gas (that would violate the laws of thermodynamics)"

No it wouldn't. It's not energy used into creating more energy but energy used into transforming matter into allowing us to exploit it to make energy. That would be like saying that setting a fire to a gallon of fuel violates the second law of thermodynamics because it took less energy to light the match that the resulting fire would produce. --89.127.174.214 (talk) 03:23, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

Oh and also this : "impossible to extract energy by producing hydrogen from water and then burning it, as this would be a basis for a perpetual motion machine." I don't have as much science-cred as this guy, but this claim strikes me as bogus. A perpetual motion machine can't use any form of fuel, be it water that is broken down into H2 + O2 or gasoline. Please someone explain to me why separating two chemical components and burning them together would violate any such law. --89.127.174.214 (talk) 03:31, 16 April 2008 (UTC)

So long as the claim is that net energy cannot be produced then there is no obvious violation of thermodynamics. However, in press releases and TV spots about the process, Kanzius has been less than clear over this point. Our article says that he denied that the process produces net energy in July 2007 ("more energy is used to produce the RF signal than can be obtained from the burning gas") - yet we have three references from September 2007 that say otherwise: [14] (for example) says:

"To see it burn actually gives me chills", said Kanzius, "because could this be an alternative fuel for a world that's using way to much fossil fuels."

...if he still believed that no net energy was being produced then why would it be a useful alternative fuel? The guy is being very slippery on this point. In the video [15] they say that Kanzius had been in discussions with the US Department of Energy...why would you talk to the department of energy over a mere scientific curiosity that inefficiently splits water? So I think he IS still claiming to get net energy from the thing and therefore, he's claiming to have violated the laws of thermodynamics - which he clearly understands. We need to be clear in the article that IF there is a claim of net energy THEN it's a violation of thermodynamics - then go on to explain that Kanzius has not been consistent about what he's claiming.

We cannot take his earlier (July'07) statement and use that to say that it's not a violation of thermodynamics - then go on to reference his later statements from September to claim that this is a major breakthrough in free energy technology! Let's get real here...what does he CURRENTLY claim? If he's now claiming that this is an alternative fuel - then we have to employ "WP:Fringe Theory" rules and explain that this is a violation of thermodynamics.

SteveBaker (talk) 13:45, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Read the "Warning" section above. It seems the so-called later statement is indeed an earlier statement. -wshun (talk) 03:54, 20 April 2008 (UTC)

[edit] Arbitration panel ruling over Pseudoscience and published theories.

I thought I should copy over from WP:Fringe theories the following information from the Arbitration panel:

  • Appropriate sources Wikipedia:Verifiability and Wikipedia:Reliable sources require that information included in an article have been published in a reliable source which is identified and potentially available to the reader. What constitutes a reliable source varies with the topic of the article, but in the case of a scientific theory, there is a clear expectation that the sources for the theory itself are reputable textbooks or peer-reviewed journals. Scientific theories promulgated outside these media are not properly verifiable as scientific theories and should not be represented as such.

...which means that the theories of John Kanzius may not be represented as scientific theories in Wikipedia until they have been published in reputable textbooks or peer-reviewed journals - which they clearly have not.

SteveBaker (talk) 13:20, 18 April 2008 (UTC)

Which theories of John Kanzius are represented as scientific theories in Wikipedia? -wshun (talk) 04:31, 20 April 2008 (UTC)
Right now? None. But they have in the past. I just wanted to make sure that we're all aware of the Arb ruling. SteveBaker (talk) 16:18, 22 April 2008 (UTC)