quack science gets picked up by major news outlets

I love "carbon footsteps (sic)" instead of footprints.

I am with New Yorker on this, though I've got a slightly different take in parts. There might be something vaguely new here, but just for those studying water.

Basically, this demonstrates that the science branch of the media is even more dead than the rest of the gang.

Agree that the dude's former idea for radio waves for cancer therapy is batsh*t nuts, going against tons of observations and experiments of the last 100+ years.

 

I thought those were sound waves?
Radio waves cannot be heard with the human ear


Maybe 'Real' Science needs a better publicist.

QUESTION: What real Science Projects out there hold your interest?

Rocket River

 

Radio waves can't penetrate your skin? Wow. Glad to know that NewYorker.

Yes, you're not going to use saltwater as a fuel. BUT, there are plenty of applications.

For example, assuming (as you do) that what this process does is separate saline water into gaseous hydrogen and oxygen and then burn it, it would be very useful if you needed to weld or solder something in a low oxygen environment. I'm sure even you can see that.

As I said earlier, a lot depends on whether this thing can be made efficient. Which is why it needs more research. Those of you who say this is quack science because of his sketchy electronics background are sidestepping the issue: this is a verifiable phenomena that has many potential uses. Why not make dead certain it isn't possible to refine the process into a much more efficient one than what we have today (in terms of electrolysis)?

Anyway water electrolysis is limited, if you apply too much current the electrodes oxidize.

 

HE DOESN'T HAVE A PhD !! TECHNICAL COLLEGE !! NO PREVIOUS STUDIES !!

If true there could be many applications for this 'burning water' discovery ~ some of these ideas have worked out...

Penicillin
Photography
Current Electricity
Vulcanized rubber
Prolongation of heartbeat after death
X rays
Radioactivity
Safety Glass
Cellophane

 

Somebody already asked this before, and I asked before, so for the third time: where was it said that this process begins with water and ends with water? I haven't read that anywhere. If I had read that I'd think it's bull***t too.

I'm still not understanding where NewYorker and Pest_Ctrl got these claims of thermodynamics violating "energy from nowhere." I see this quote:

And I still don't get it. If it is used as a fuel, how is it creating free energy from nowhere?

The articles I read claimed that it was likely burning hydrogen, and that the radio energy was greater than the energy produced by the burn.

Now I can see why y'all are annoyed that he went straight to the press with "OMG burning water!" instead of investigating further what the heck is going on, and then submitting a peer-reviewed paper. He just put some salt water in front of radio waves, and it burned, and maybe called someone to take a look.

 

Peer Review would have probably shot him down like newyorker
without giving it a second look
may have been squashed in its infancy
now
he gets some $$$ . . maybe for him . . maybe for more research

it is unfortunate but . . . hate him or not. . he got the result i think he wanted
also
We have spent how many pages on this . . .
The folx b*Tching about this need to make sure they give equal time to 'legit' [sic] science in here
cause
they continuing to give pub to this. . while their 'legit' science isn't getting any

Rocket River

 

This is my understanding (and I'm not a physicist or chemist, so I could be way off):

• Radio waves applied to the sea water weakens the bonds, releasing the H2 and O2.
  
• The "energy" from the radio waves causes some of the released hydrogen to burn, while the rest eventually recombine with the oxygen (so you get water back).
  
• The hydrogen isn't expended like a fuel. It just burns -- what causes it to burn is the energy from the radio waves, not energy being released from the sea water itself.
  
• Therefore, it isn't accurate to say the water is being used as fuel. The "fuel" is whatever is being used to power the radio wave emitter.

Now, what I'm wondering is whether there is any energy actually being released from the water itself (e.g. the bonds holding the molecules in water intact). If some of that energy could harnessed with this process, somehow, then maybe this is worthwhile. Maybe that's what the research is looking at.

 

"real science" is spending billions of dollars and decades in search of the so-called Higg's Boson which may or may not "exist"....what if CERN and the particle accelerators being built don't turn up jack crap? Will the standard model of physics be "quack science"?

You guys can make all the straw man arguments you want based on this guy's "credibility as a scientist" or whatever, but unless that guy is actually putting alcohol in his test tube instead of saltwater, you have no reason to downplay the fact that he found a novel way to split water.

I say that it merits further research (doesn't even have to be by this guy, just in general).

 

"Burning" is just another way to say that the oxidation reaction is exothermic (releases heat) and self-sustaining. The sea water doesn't release energy, the hydrogen + oxygen -> water reaction does. The radio waves also contribute in the sense that it produces a steady supply of hydrogen and oxygen from the water (and the hydrogen and oxygen have enough kinetic energy to overcome the activation energy of the oxidation reaction).

Water is stable. That's why the radio waves are required, you need an energy input to break the bonds. That energy will always be greater than what you get back when the hydrogen and oxygen burn.

However, just because you can't get a net positive in energy doesn't mean that the burning saltwater has no potential uses.

 

Well, here's some stuff that's not quack science... more like fish science...

 

Why is that? If there is potential energy in the bonds holding the molecules together, is not possible to harness some of that energy, in addition to the energy input from the radio waves? Or does that not make any sense?

 

Are you saying that people shouldn't waste any time exploring applications for this phenomenon, or that the media shouldn't treat it as a great scientific discovery. I agree with the latter, disagree with the former.

 

There is potential energy in those bonds, but unless there is a lower energy state available, you cannot get the potential energy out of it. The reason water is "stable" is because there isn't any chemical configuration of hydrogen and oxygen that would give the molecule a lower energy state.

Look at it this way, Let's say there are two wells right next to each other and you're sitting at the bottom of the well, inside the bucket. Now let's say this bucket is attached to a rope which goes through a pulley, and over to the bucket in the next well. If someone throws a really heavy rock into the bucket of the 2nd well, your bucket would rise. If the other well is as deep as yours, your bucket will reach the top of the well and you can jump out (if not, you won't reach the top, the bucket in the other well will hit the bottom and break, and you'll fall to your death).

That's how it is if you're a hydrogen attached to water. You're stuck at the bottom of a potential energy well (you can view the hydrogen bond as that, anyway). Unless there's a deeper well next to you, there's no way you're going to be able to get extra energy out of that well.

 

Just for the record, here's some media that gives opposing opinions as well as glowing ones:

http://www.wkyc.com/news/news_artic...=zk4SwIKSnGIds9hUfynnp+AmKjjOke5Fp+37lHLYo9Q=

Highlights: