DISQUS

VentureBeat: Blacklight Power claims nearly-free energy from water — is this for real?

  • VC Watcher · 1 year ago
    No, Matt, it isn't real. It would be more believable to use quantum entanglement to achieve a triple state in the 1s than this nonsense. Note that the announcement used statements like "independent scientists" and "financial institutions" reviewing the work, but no names. If it was so truly incredible in an energy-starved world, wouldn't someone reputable want to put their name to it (and a bunch of senile has-beens from the Reagan administration really don't count).

    All I can say is you should get a hold of that sucker, er, investor list, Matt! It could be worth more than all the rest of Blacklight Power's technology and assets (including laptops and Aaron chairs) put together.
  • VC Watcher · 1 year ago
    Oh, I mean Chris, not Matt. I've met Matt, but not you - not yet. Keep up the good work.
  • Neil Ferguson · 1 year ago
    A complete hoax? Unlikely. More likely it turns out to be uneconomic. Even if the latter is so, Dr. Mills will have made three generations of nuclear physicists and cosmologists look like mentally masturbating monkeys, as he will dear VC Watcher, who is apparently an escaped BDS patient. I am giving 3:2 odds that it is ABSOLUTELY TRUE.
  • Philippe Bradley · 1 year ago
    I'll take those odds!
  • Neil Ferguson · 1 year ago
    Still willing to bet?

    I refer you to "BLP Announces Rowan University Validation of New Energy Source" and "Water Flow Calorimetry Experiments, Validation Tests and Chemical Analysis of Reactants for BlackLight Power Inc." Both documents have links at http://www.blacklightpower.com/new.shtml.
  • shane · 1 year ago
    And both are pure hokum. No spectroscopist in the world will accept their interpretation of the IR and XPS results, they are laughably bad.
  • Paul Scott · 1 year ago
    What evidence do you have the spectroscopy is not valid?
  • Proffesor Crulank · 1 year ago
    I think VC Watcher needs to open his eyes. It's poeple like you that allow bad people to do bad things. Your the type of person that would say something like "well if it's real than would'nt our government do something about it". Your just like every small minded american who cant think outside the box because you have been trained to follow the masses. To answer your question; Just because somthing works does not mean somebody reputable is going to do something about it. As a matter of fact it's quite the opposite. The so-called reputable people you speak of are the very poeple who are so entertwined in the infrastructure of an oil-based economy that they are willing to do anything to keep there product neccessary in the modern world.

    Reasearch: Stanley Meyer's water powered car
    + funny that the government would work so hard in making life difficult for this man if his invention was not real; Funny that his plant in India blew up for no reason; Funny that he died of food pisoning.

    That is just one example of the many people being active in making this world a better place and the poeple who hold them back to satisfy personal interest. It is ignorance not to recognizing that major corporations activly try to make progress impossible if it imposses on profits.

    Now I really cant comment on this because I have not properly resaerched it but I can say that I am not going to read one article then start commenting like I already know all about this. The fact is we as humans need to stay open minded and not be affraid of change or progression. A hundred years ago a person flying was a thought which was laghed at, every household having a gas powered automobile was not a possibility, and spliting the atom was unthinkable. The great thing about science is that no matter how much we think we know, theirs always more. If we think we know everything, we are doomed to never progress. Accepting that we no nothing gives us nothing but potential. VC Watcher and Neil Fuguson will sit and make poor comments because of their closed mindedness and unwillingness to accept change, but the rest of us need to be open to new suggestion. Though Blacklight Power may or may not be the right path for human beings, it is a step in the right direction.
  • Maureen · 1 year ago
    Well said!! Thinking OUTSIDE the box is where inventions come from. How many Stanley Meyer's have been silenced? These are the true heros of the scientific world. If American science and the western world doesn't want new technology it is doomed to implode. There is a third world that is ready to embrace change.
  • Neil Ferguson · 1 year ago
    Well said?? The Proffesor's [sic] spelling is atrocious, including my name. And actually, if he'd read the comments carefully, he'd find out I'm on his side.

    I'm just teasing though. I'll never condemn for broken language non-typists who are conversing in good faith. Besides, my post was unnecessarily vulgar, for which I apologize.
  • To Crulank · 1 year ago
    While I agree with most of what you have said, i would thank you to keep your opinions on americans to yourself...Were not all small minded and trained to follow the masses, Unfortunate incidents like Stanley Meyers have happened all over the world unnoticed, i doubt its all due to us small minded americans refusing to think outside the box...
    also, for an unfounded comment like that may i reference the internet your using to type that bigotist comment? it was pretty radical thinking, some might say outside the box even
    I usually dont get into personal snits on these things, but from somone claiming to be a professor, that type of thing just shouldnt be brought up in decent conversation.
  • Don Jones - VentureDeal · 1 year ago
    If it's too good to be true, it probably is...
  • Neil Ferguson · 1 year ago
    Like penicillin, for example?
  • Evan B. · 1 year ago
    Penicillin turned out to be too good to be true, once almost everything we killed it with ended up resistant to it.
  • Neil Ferguson · 1 year ago
    Your glib rejoinder is simply stupid.
  • TomB · 1 year ago
    Funny, I prescribe VCillinK to my patients every day, and for most common oral infections I deal with, it is still wonderfully effective.
  • Sanjong Thapa · 1 year ago
    wasn't this an X-Files episode from 1995 called "Soft Light", guest starring Tony Shaloub?
  • Chris Morrison · 1 year ago
    I don't think so, but who could complain at being played by Tony Shalhoub?
  • Sanjong Thapa · 1 year ago
  • Sanjong Thapa · 1 year ago
  • pritchet1 · 1 year ago
    Chris Morrison and readers;

    We have been monitoring this company for some time at Pure Energy Systems Network and this is our page on the company -
    http://peswiki.com/index.php/Directory:Blacklig...

    I was asked by Sterling Allan (owner of Pure Energy Systems network) to contact you to register in our wiki so you can add content there as well on this page (and on others). All I need is to have you provide a username/password combo and I'll take it from there. Send request to webmaster@pureenergysystems.com

    Yes, this is a great writeup!
  • Neil Ferguson · 1 year ago
    "...the company fell more or less silent, with the exception of scientific papers released by Mills and others, and an updated version of his book..." Sheesh, what more do you want?
  • Chris Morrison · 1 year ago
    As in, they stopped looking for public attention, or at least appeared to. No press releases, etc. The community that reads those sorts of papers isn't exactly enormous.
  • shane · 1 year ago
    These are not peer reviewed papers. Thus, labelling them "scientific" papers is totally misleading. They haven't submitted this paper to any reputable journal. If it is science, let's treat it like such and review it.
  • David · 1 year ago
    Wasn't this the power source from the Elizbeth Shue / Val Kilmner movie...cold fusion? (I think is was called The Saint).
  • Chris Morrison · 1 year ago
    Not sure about the movie, but Blacklight's claims are at least vaguely similar to the cold fusion claims of the late 80s. As far as I can tell that's one of the reasons a lot of researchers won't take a close look at the hydrino theory. Plenty of them got burned by believing in cold fusion.
  • David Hamilton · 1 year ago
    Actually, it's not at all uncommon for physicists to turn up their noses at purported "breakthroughs" that violate the known laws of physics. To say physicists "deny" that hydrinos exist overstates the case -- there's simply no good published evidence that they do, and most physicists understandably think they have better things to do than to knock down nutty claims that have no proof. Issued patents don't come close -- hell, the PTO has issued patents for antigravity and perpetual-motion machines, so why not one for a seemingly impossible low-energy state of hydrogen? (Given the understaffed and overpressured way the PTO does its business, it's no wonder stuff like this slips through from time to time.)

    All this means is that someone like Mills has a huge uphill battle to convince anyone remotely familiar with quantum theory that he's anything but a nut. The relevant phrases here are "Harvard medical doctor" and "grand unified theory of classical physics." I'm all for outside-the-box thinkers finding ways to prove scientific orthodoxy wrong, but the day a doctor overturns the century-old -- and thoroughly tested -- understanding of the hydrogen atom is the day we can all turn in our skeptics' cards and sign up for free antigravity trips to Alpha Centauri. Because of course there's nothing about a Harvard degree that inoculates the holder against quackery.

    As for Mills' "scientific publications," it's telling that all but one listed on Blacklight's Web site supposedly appeared in Physics Essays, a dubious publication whose editorial board members aren't even listed in full and which has an "impact factor" of 0.081. Impact factor is a measure of how frequently a journal's papers are cited by other researchers -- for comparison, the topflight physics journal Physical Review A has an impact factor of 2.28.

    In any event, Physics Essays claims to be peer-reviewed, but it also doesn't appear to have published anything since 2006, which is not a problem most reputable physics journals have :-).

    I also can't help wondering what verification there is for Blacklight's claim to have raised $60 million. We have two named investors and a bunch of shadowy hedge funds and the like who, to the outside observer, may or may not exist. Even if they do, that probably says more about the scientific acumen of your average hedge-fund manager -- or at least the sums of money they needed to get invested -- than anything else.
  • Chris Morrison · 1 year ago
    Thanks, David. You've got a good start on the laundry list of concerns, there. I could add a few. Digging back into old articles about the company, it looks like they've claimed they would have something on the market before, yet we're still waiting. That's not too weird (most companies don't release on time) but they also can't or won't offer anyone as a witness to this generator they claim to have now who isn't on the payroll, in one form or another.

    About the funding -- the old VentureWire article has more of the individual backers by name. They've got plenty of those. There are also the two utilities, although I couldn't dig up anyone at them for comment -- one was acquired, and the other is split into two companies / territories. But the big question mark is who the unnamed hedge funds that supposedly invested are. Those guys tend to give this sort of thing a wide berth.

    Hopefully, someone else will follow up on this article and get more of the full story, whatever it may be. I get the feeling there are more little details than I'll ever be able to dig up.
  • G · 1 year ago
    Dr. Mills was awarded a Bachelor of Arts Degree in Chemistry, summa cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa, from Franklin & Marshall College in 1982, and a Doctor of Medicine Degree from Harvard Medical School in 1986. Following a year of graduate work in electrical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Dr. Mills began his research in the field of energy technology.

    He has been published in many different scientific publications other than Physics Essays. These include the International Journal of Hydrogen Energy, Journal of Plasma Physics, Plasma Sources Science and Technology, Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, IEEE Transactions on Plasma Science, The European Physical Journal - Applied Physics, International Journal of Global Energy Issues, Journal of Applied Physics, Thermochimica Acta, Electrochimica Acta, Annales de la Fondation Louis de Broglie, Journal of Molecular Structure, Thin Solid Films, Solar Energy Materials & Solar Cells, Materials Chemistry and Physics, American Chemical Society Conference Division of Fuel Chemistry, Journal of Optical Materials, Chemistry of Materials, Vibrational Spectroscopy, Journal of New Materials for Electrochemical Systems, New Journal of Physics, Fusion Technology, and Applied Physics Letters.

    BlackLight has established a 53,000-square-foot modern research and development facility in Cranbury, NJ, equipped with over 10 million dollars worth of laboratory equipment. Currently, BlackLight has 22 full-time employees, 2 part-time employees, and 20 consultants. The majority of the employees are scientists, including 8 PhDs.

    The Company's analytical equipment and means include the ESITOFMS, TOFSIMS, XPS, UV and EUV spectroscopy, high-resolution visible spectroscopy, cryogenically cooled column gas chromatography, thermal decomposition/ cryogenically cooled column gas chromatography, liquid chromatography, solids probe quadrapole mass spectroscopy, and Calvet, heat loss, waterflow, and waterbath calorimetry.

    At this facility, the Company's scientists are engaged in developing a vast class of proprietary chemical compounds, via the BlackLight Process, which have far-reaching applications in many industries including chemical, lighting, computer, energy, battery, propellant, telecommunications, aerospace, and automotive industries.

    Publishing 70+ research papers, raising $60 million in venture capital, employing 8 PhD scientists, running a state of the art manufacturing facility that used to make satellites for Lockheed Martin, networking with major utilities, and getting the heads of industry to manage his company...What more do you want? All I have to say is thank god there are people like him who don't let naysayers like you hold them back from creating innovative new technologies.
  • MikeSMD · 1 year ago
    Finally, someone (G) who actually looks at the facts rather than speculates negatively. I am a medical doctor and have known Randy since college (Franklin & Marshall). Randy is a farmboy from Chester County, PA and stayed close to home for college so he could help back at the farm. Ever since college, I've recognized Randy as the most brilliant person I've ever or ever will meet; second is not even close. Since those days, I felt someday Randy would do something great, and when he did, I wanted to be in on it. I caught up with him a decade later around the time he was starting Blacklight (then called Hydrocatalysis Power Corp.). Had I not known Randy personally, I'm sure I would have reacted the same way as all the skeptics on this blog. Knowing him for 30 years, however, I have no doubt that what he is doing is real. A number of independent labs have verified various aspects of Randy's work and I'm sure Blacklight would be happy to provide that data and the names of the labs to anyone who requested it. Not one of his critics have ever gone into the lab and demonstrated his claims as false or inaccurate. These critics summarily dismiss his work, usually saying: "We know all there is to know about the hydrogen atom and this can't be." Their ancestors were the ones who maintained the earth is flat. Blacklight has had about 6 rounds of private equity offerings and I have had the opportunity to invest in several of those rounds. Initial "units" sold for $600/unit and the most recent offering a few months ago sold out at $6000/unit.

    Preceding posters have questioned the credibility of the $60 million thus far backing Blacklight. I have followed the progress of BLP (Blacklight Power) closely since the early '90's and can verify this number. I would also submit that the board of directors is a very qualified and sharp group, including former members of the Reagan administration (see www.blacklightpower.com for their backgrounds), despite a previous posting questioning their competence.

    BLP has always been extremely cautious in what they release to the public as they are aware of the negative reaction their spectacular claims elicit. They're finally at the stage where they can "talk the talk" (see their 5/28/08 press release) as with recent advancements in their energy yield, they are now at commercializable levels and so can now fully "walk the walk" and are in the process of doing so. If they can't, they won't be in business for long. I'd advise everyone to follow closely; Randy is on the verge of big things for all of us.
  • AndreasP · 1 year ago
    Thank you for your insights on Blacklight Power. You are obviously closer to the company than most people.

    It would be truly great if Dr. Mills was on to something real here - just think of the energy problems that can be addressed with such a discovery.

    Still, without debating or questioning the validity or correctness of his theory, I just wonder whether the CQM theory can be transformed into a valid scientific theory, so that or will be accepted by the scientific community.

    Several critical comments have pointed to some inconsistencies in CQM theory, so if there is something real, it should be possible to achive this goal. If not, than perhaps this is the reason why.

    For example: Can CQM be modified to become Lorentz-invariant? Can it be modified so that it also predicts the quantum states that standard quantum mechanics predicts and which are experimentally verified? Can it predict some entirely new phenomena that can be verified experimentally by independept lbs?
  • MikeSMD · 1 year ago
    Your understanding of physics is logarithms beyond mine so I can't address your questions. I will, however, forward your comments to Randy. He's working about 100 hours per week now but maybe he can address the questions in this forum in his "spare time"!
  • AndreasÜ · 1 year ago
    Thank you. I have always wanted to get in touch with someone who is close to Blacklight Power, and perhaps get involved in the energy space in general (ps: in the past I have been an angel investor in a number of technology companies and served on a few boards, but I haven't really made any move yet in the energy space yet - nothing that really triggered my interest enough).
  • Robert Stahl · 1 year ago
    G, you rock! And then, there are those with rocks, like me, who have to carry them around for the lack of sense in every other form of physical apparatus used to explain something about the world we live in, let alone in an idealistic fashion. The mean spirited approach to resolving the issues of this day is very alarming, tending toward the red guard. For what it is worth, I have found over the last two years of reading Mills text, that the metaphorical meanings that come from the inductive reasoning process applied to Mills work, like "common sense," a "middle" spectrum of energy, the "simplest approach" to understanding the electron by interpreting the hydrogen atom using only physical assumptions rather than mathematical ones, thus "stability," "efficient" stuctural coupling, "conservation," translational dynamic transformations in geometric space, and so on and so forth (lets not ignore the fifth force) all are consistent with every form of informed literature I have come across (e.g. the Lindisfarne Association) leading up to a knowlege of the math of dynamics, and of a paradigm shift of equal proportion. Dynamics is the direct descendent of all forms of math prior to it, for what that is worth.
  • Kat · 1 year ago
    Looking at the animations on some of the sites, I don't see where the oxygen is first split from the hydrogen in order to access the hydrogen atoms. At what point is this done, how is it done, and what happens to the freed oxygen atoms? Also, is there any way to check on whether the liberated heat and energy comes simply from the alteration of the rate of a chemical reaction via the Raney Nickel or is truly from pushing the ground state of the hydrogen atom to a lower level? I mean, is there a way to observe if the electron orbit of the hydrogen atom has truly been pushed to a lower state, releasing energy, or if this is merely a speculation that that is what has occurred?

    Thanks....anyone?
  • andrew moore · 1 year ago
    I guess if and when this product fly's the physisists will have to look the other way. One thing is certain what physists think they know today will be viewed as nonsense in afew hundred years - what they really need to learn is that the map is not the territory. I hope Randall MIlls makes them choke but if not some one else will - hopefully sooner rather than later.

    I'll have more respect when they can actually explain mass, inertial mass, gravity and the strucutre of the electron - fact - they have descriptive theorires but no understanding of how or why.
  • Johnny · 1 year ago
    See Randy's book for the answers to your last paragraph--it describes these fully.
  • andrew moore · 1 year ago
    my point exactly Johnny - big money follows what works and Randall Mills has proved to his backers that this is viable. looking at the board and investors plus the timelines for going from test tubes to scaleable technology I'm pretty certain this is for real.

    Scientists are always deceiving themselves because they have invested so much time and energy in their paradigm. They can handle incremental steps but not revolutionary ones. This is why most dismiss Mills without actually getting their hands dirty in the Lab.
  • lcs · 1 year ago
    The disdain crackpots have for scientists has always amused me. I suspect they all flunked out of high school physics and have harbored resentments ever since. Obviously Andrew is easily impressed by 'boards' and 'investors' but is easily intimidated by people who have actual knowledge.
  • test · 1 year ago
    they have been saying this for years...and nothing!!!!
  • CQM Theory · 1 year ago
    I have also been following the progress of Millsian for some time. Since his initial work in 1991, Randell Mills has made significant and impressive progress, refining his CQM Theory and releasing molecular modeling software which can easily render the exact 3-D molecular structure of many compounds and organic molecules which can only be closely approximated by way of "traditional quantum mechanics".

    So far as his BlackLight Power division is concerned, this process has been verified by a number of independent scientists around the world. His management team reads like a who's who of science and industry. His major initial investors include Connectiv and PacifiCorp electrical utilities, RS Funds, Eastbourne Capital Management and several top-level retired Morgan Stanley executives. By the late 90's, BlackLight Power was turning away private investors, with Mills holding on to controlling shares of stock in the company. Morgan Stanley Dean Witter was considering offering public stock in 2000 and BLP has discussed the possibility of joint ventures with several major corporations, including Daimler Chrysler. Research labs who have examined the hydrino-hydride compounds, which are the bi-products of the BLP catalytic reaction, are unable to explain these compounds using conventional theory, and among these, the Naval Air Warfare Center and the Naval Surface Warfare Center, have expressed great interest in signing R & D agreements to produce energy and develop compounds for use in their own industries. Mills has intentionally taken a deliberate and thoughtful tact, accepting no government monies and maintaining controlling shares in his company, in an effort to prevent his technology from being shelved or taken into the "black" by way of a national security declaration. As far as I can tell, his theory has been verified to the extent that it is applicable to the commercial development of this technology and it would appear that this technology is now ready, in it's initial 50 KW design, for the commercial market. Mills intent has always been to take this technology to the marketplace rather than profit from his theory, and in spite of the thoughts of cheap electrical energy and hydrogen production, Mills believes that the hydrino compounds will be the main profit base in his company, with the electrical energy being more of a side product, of lesser value.

    As for the CQM Theory, it is both elegant and logical, neither of which can be said for current Quantum Theory. It is a fact that no practical applications have ever been developed from current Quantum Theory and Mills is the first since Einstein to put forth a usable and practical theory, which can be backed up with valid research and experimentation. In my opinion, current String Theory, Probability Waves and Virtual Particles and the like, are an Alice in Wonderland interpretation of sub-molecular physics which are both illogical and improbable. It is not uncommon in science to have skepticism towards new theory, as science is by it's very nature, a political process which very much depends upon the peer review process, to question, refine, and test by experimentation, new scientific theory.

    I'll put my money on Mills and his CQM Theory.

    A quote by Carl Sagan:
    " But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo The Clown."
  • Neil · 1 year ago
    And why did they laugh at Bozo? Because they were surprised!
  • CQM Theory · 1 year ago
    Postscript:

    Yes, I know that there are several notable physicists who have not been throwing stones, but rather, heaving boulders at Mills and his CQM Theory.

    According to them, Mills is an idiot who knows not the least about complex Quantum Physics, and they are the true experts in their field.

    I would point out that some of these same Quantum Physicists have helped to spend billions of your tax dollars in an unsuccessful attempt to develop controlled fusion.

    I think that this kind of debate in the scientific community is good and will lead to more study and experimentation which will help to revise, refine and validate this theory.

    I suppose that one might say that Einstein's Relativity was validated with the atomic bomb.

    Here's an interesting discussion on Mill's CQM Theory which might help to clarify some of the questions regarding the finer points of this theory:
    http://www.hydrino.org/
  • Archetype · 1 year ago
    the best things are always true

    unfortunately, being as the technology is going to be "licensed out" it seems this will not be our solution to free energy which the likes of Nikola Tesla originally dreamed of. Perhaps Kiril Chukanov will decide not to "license out" his Quantum Free Energy technology from Excited Ball Lightning. But I am placing more of my bets on John Searl to do what is right. Or some inventor will have to take matters into their own hands.

    energy be not divided
  • Jeff Smathers · 1 year ago
    I would also like to add that many of the 'debunkers' of Mill's are of the same group and type of people who strongly disagreed with Pons and Fleishman with the LENR effect which is now showing that there is an unknown but measureable output by many independent labs.
  • philip · 1 year ago
    Well if its true we are going to use up all the water in the ocean getting as much free energy as we want and then no water left.
  • CQM Theory · 1 year ago
    Philip,

    It has been extimated that it would take thousands of years just to use up the water which has been added to our eco-system by the combustion of fossil fuels.

    To literally exhaust out resources of water on this planet is a process which would take billions of years.

    Mills has stated that an electric car running on a BLP converter which produces the equivalent of 200 horsepower, running at 60 MPH, would get 100,000 miles to the tank of water.

    In the next billion years, there will be more pressing concerns which will address the survival of the human race than depletion of water resources.

    Fortunately, hydrogen is the most plentiful element in the universe.
  • DC · 1 year ago
    LENR operations for 1000 years would consume 1 mm of of ocean water at best. We experience 8 times this loss per seasonal evaporation before the ice-melt is factored in.
  • Rodrigo Castro · 1 year ago
    i`d rather unite the thinking of a new revolutionary idea of non-contaminant endless energy than only put dr mills idea to the ground doing nothing about de planet.
    I believe you are killing this new galileo and burning him at the stake like the old times.
    open your minds, maybe a century of physics were wrong.
  • Daniel M Robbins BA.AA · 1 year ago
    the scientic elite have always refused to accept new concepts,because they stay in the box(classrooms)..
  • Pollack Boyd · 1 year ago
    Yes, Matt it is real. Our group has spent over a million dollars on due diligence confirming BLP claims. It is just a matter of time now.
  • Andreas · 1 year ago
    Here are my comments on the work done by Blacklight Power Inc. Just a personal view.

    1) I accept the possibility that an entirely new theory exists that explains nature better than existing ones

    - we know that general relativity and quantum mechanics cannot both be right
    - so there must be a modification to one or both theories, possibly even a complete replacement
    - the new theory could/should match the results of existing theories, at least with a certain precision
    - just like Newtonian physics matches the results of the theory of relativity for low velocities

    2) It is possible that Mills' CQM has some flaws but still makes the right predictions about nature

    - several critical reviews of CQM have pointed to a number of inconsistencies and potentially flaws
    - for example the wave equation is not Lorenty-invariant
    - that in and by itself doesn't mean these can't be "fixed up"
    - perhaps a fixed-up theory still leads to the same predictions that Mills makes
    - so someone out there to fix the issues (incidentally I think the fact that Mills wave equation is
    not Lorentz-invariant may not be a big isse for the hydrogen atom, since there the velocity of the
    electron is only about 1/137th that of the speed of light); so I suspect that a relativistically correct
    version of Mills' wave equation would make predictions very close to his currently published one

    3) It is possible that a "fixed-up" CQM is a valid scientific theory, e.g. it may be self-consistent, is in line with experimental evidence, makes new predictions that can be verified experimentally, and is falsifiable

    - just like Einstein "fixed up" the Lorentzian length contraction theory to also introduce a local time
    and time dilation, leading to special relativity
    - Maxwell's theory is not a fully self-consistent theory because it leads to difficulties when one
    considers an electron to be a point charge, leading to infinite self-energy. Yet it is an extremely
    successful - and accepted - model for describing electromagnetic phenomena. The point here
    simply is that a theory doesn't HAVE to be fully self-consistent to make good predictions

    4) The fact that there is lots of resistance to MIlls' theory or the fact that quantum mechanics is
    already such such a successful theory for describing the hydrogen atom, means
    ABSOLUTELY NOTHING to me

    - The Earth was believed to be at the center of the universe for 1000s of years, remember?
    - The Newtonian theory was believed to be absolutely correct for over 200 years, remember?
    - Space and time once were believed to be both absolute and Eucledian, remember?
    - Electrons were believed to be particles, light was believed to be a wave, remember?
    - All these were good descriptions of nature at the time, but then came even better, more
    precise theories which however were slow to be accepted

    It could well be that Mills' theory predicts all the energy states of the hydrogen atom, PLUS MORE.
    That would imply that quantum mechanics is at least incomplete (not necessarily wrong). Just
    like Newtonian mechanics describes the motion of the earth around the sun very well, but cannot
    explain the perihelion shift of the planet Mercury.

    The point is: Physical theories so far have NEVER been final description. So far, they have ALWAYS
    been some kind of work in progress. A final theory of everything may not exist. Personally, I can
    image a "final" description of the universe only if it was shown that everything in the universe is
    completely discrete (space, time, matter, energy, etc, are ALL quantized and thus describable
    by a discrete theory, as opposed to a continuous field theory).


    I think the ultimate test of CQM will therefore be the following:

    1) Can it be be made into a self-consistent theory?
    2) Is it in agreement with experimental evidence of the last century of quantum mechanics?
    3) Does it predict new phenomena that can be experimentally verified/falsified?
  • MikeSMD · 1 year ago
    Heard back from Randy with regard to your questions. He does not get involved with blogs anymore but I'm copying and pasting his response:

    "there are over 1000 calculated observables covering the basic problems of chemistry and physics that match the data to the limit of measurement

    some of the predicted and subsequently confirmed phenomena are

    the mass of the top quark

    the acceleration of the expansion of the universe

    the prediction of the existence of hydrinos

    and close to confirmation

    hydrinos as the identity of dark matter and the corresponding transition energy as the source of ionization of the intergalactic medium"


    Hope this sheds some light.
  • Andreas · 1 year ago
    Thank you for your response.

    I guess I should re-read the CQM theory once more, to see and verify these points.

    But one basic thing has always bothered me from the very beginning: I just don't see from the CQM theory how it predicts the already known quantum states of the hydrogen atom, ie the ones also predicted by the Schrödinger equation - which have all been experimentally verified.

    The derivation of the energy states from the Schrödinger equation can be found in any standard text book on quantum mechanics, and is a beautifully simple, elegant and very short (only 3-5 pages in most text books). It directly leads to all the energy levels, starting with the ground state of -13eV.

    I would like to see a similar derivation using CQM, starting with first principles, where at the end I can see two things:
    (a) the energy states of the hydrogen atom already known, ie the ones also
    predicted by the Schrödinger equation
    (b) plus the additional energy states claimed to exist (by Dr. Mills).

    So, where is such a derivation that an independent scienties can follow by himself. I don't see it anywhere in his book?

    BTW, it does no good to have a system or theory which only predicts the states (b). Even if those states existed, the theory predicting them cannot be considered complete because it does not predict the known states (a). It's all or nothing.
  • MikeSMD · 1 year ago
    Again, your knowledge of physics is far beyond mine. My entries here are intended as "character witness" from my knowing Randy since college. What I can tell you definitively is that the proof is in the proverbial pudding, and the pudding is on the table.
  • Andreas · 1 year ago
    Anyway, thank you, Mike, for your honesty and for at leasting making an effort to try to get through to Randy.

    Next time I am in the Jersey, I should perhaps make an effort to stop by and get more first-hand information.

    Again, it would be fabulous if there is something real in the CQM theory. I have always thought that there is something mysterious and unelegant about the current formulation of quantum mechanics. Especially the Heisenberg principle always seemed like "artificalial" construct to me, not derived from first principles, but invented be Heisenberg in his struggle to "explain away" the stability of the hydrogen atom and other weird phenomena of quantum mechanics. But physicists, for lack of a more elegant principle, became pragmatic and came to accept this principle as a basic law of nature. Personally, I would sleep well only if I could derive it from a more elegant set of basic rules and principles.

    But after some trying on my own, I have to admit that I am not sure whether I really want to dig through this massive "pudding" as you call it, to find out myself... ;-)

    On the other hand, a simple five-pager deriving the known energy states of the hydrogen atom from CQM first principles, step by step verififable by any grad student in physics, would get me A LOT closer to believing it.

    Best,
    Andreas
  • MikeSMD · 1 year ago
    One thing I can tell you is that Randy has always maintained exactly what
    you are alluding to: that many of the current fundamental laws of physics are
    predicated on "fudge factors" that make things "fit" the equations. The
    Grand Unified Theory, as has been explained to me, is completely based on
    measurable phenomenon, no "fudge factors", which I believe relates to your "first
    principles".



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  • Andreas · 1 year ago
    Yes, you are right. By first principles I simple refer to basic laws of physics, that cannot be derived from something else, but which also describe physical reality.

    Another way of putting it is that one ideally should always try to make it a requirement that the basic laws of physics, or first principles, be a description of reality, in the sense that it should describe observable and measurable phenomena, not some abstract mathematical construct.

    For example, the Schrödinger equation is not a description of reality in this strict sense. Because its result is a complex number Psi. That's all, a number, not more. The square of that number is a real number that *can* be *interpreted* as the probability that a certain event occurs, for example the probability to find the hydrogen atom in its ground state.

    So, the unforuntate situation we are in today is that all we have is probablities for "detector clicks" in an macroscopic measurement apparatus. Period. Not more. Today's quantum mechanics does not describe physical reality per se, but only probabilities.

    That is what Einstein disliked so much. He just couldn't believe that nature is this crayz. God doesn't play dice are his now famous words.

    Now, it may well be that nature is just that, namely "not really real". I do not a priori exclude that possibility. In fact, you may be aware that recent experiments hint that one might have to give up at least certain aspects of realism, as reported in a recent article in the magazine Nature (Nature 446, 871-875, 19 April 2007, "An experimental test of non-local realism").

    That makes it at least thinkable that an external reality may indeed not exist independent of observation.

    But perhaps Einstein was (and Dr Mills is) indeed right. Perhaps there is a fully deterministic description of nature. That would be wonderful. It would do away with all mysteries of quantum mechanics in one go. And that is why I got intrigued so much by CQM.
  • glennK · 1 year ago
    Sounds to good to be true. Unfortunately, right now there are so many scams circulating around I find it hard to believe something this simple would have escaped the attention of the entire scientific community. If he presents his finding to peer review then maybe I'd made a believer. Sounds like a repeat of the 1989 cold fusion scandal too me.
  • artimus · 1 year ago
    Glad to read the more cogent and sober analysis of Dr. Mill's work. Considering the many independent studies of exothermic reactions in electrolytic cells utilizing a variety of catalysts - and recent confirmation of charged particles released by those reactions - hydrino theory appears to provide a reasonable explanation. But theory aside, there are so many labs that have confirmed excess heat reactions, someone - Blacklight or otherwise will bring this technology to the public.

    Will it be an energy panacea? Probably not. At least not near term. A disruptive technology such as Dr. Mills' has enormous hurdles to transcend. Not the least come from traditional academia, invested energy business players and the federal government. What is clear today is there is an unexplainable phenomenon happening in laboratories all over the world experimenting with low temperature nuclear reactions. Blacklight is but one approach. Those who summarily dismiss this work or ridicule it by crying fraud - are most likely those who are threatened. As was the Church by Galileo.
  • Allen Braun · 1 year ago
    While I suspect the lower energy state is bogus, like most, there is one simple test: blackbox. Measure the energy going in; measure the energy coming out.

    That is the only sensible thing to do to establish the claim.
  • Dan · 1 year ago
    I'm pretty confused by the specifics of the reaction going on here. It seems to be described as a chemical reaction in the diagram on the website (NaH -> Na + hydrino) but all other descriptions are talking about water and Raney nickel. NaH is a high energy compound which would react exothermically with water, producing regular hydrogen gas. On a small scale, Raney nickel doped with sodium hydride instead of sodium hydroxide would react exothermically with water, explaining the energy busts. What really needs to be published is an experimental procedure. Until BLP puts that out, they really aren't free to say that any scientist in any lab is free to replicate the experiment and verify the results.
  • lcs · 1 year ago
    The reason you are pretty confused is that this is all crackpot science. Take some time and read about the history of armchair physicists who get it all mixed up and go off on unprovable tangents. I've read Mills papers. Believe me he is completely confused.
  • Carl White · 1 year ago
    All the debate seems to center around whether the process works or not. But what if it does? What happens to the hydrogen that is put into this state? Does it become inert or altered permanently in some way? If not permanently, how does it revert to its original state?

    Is this dangerous somehow? Will there be an accumulation of an enviromentally unfriendly form of hydrogen? Are these concerns, naive as they might be, addressed somewhere?
  • Jeff Glauner · 1 year ago
    Please don't mistake me for a physicist nor for a scientist of any kind. Even so, as a philosopher, I have experienced discomfort with a few of the nonrational qualities of both Eisntein's Relativity theory and Quantum Physics (e.g., the minute that is less than a minute in a cosmos wherein time is but a "simple" abstract construct of the finite mind; the "Big Bang" as beginning in a beginningless cosmos; or the same "big bang" containing "all "of the matter in an unquantifiably "infinite " cosmos). It would gratify my curiosity significantly if Mills' theory could help to sort out some of the distracting chaff from the edible wheat of contemporary physics.
  • Itasca · 11 months ago
    Having only recently discovered Mills and his "theory", I am intrigued by all I have learned thus far. I have read nearly 200 pages of the book, but had to return it to the library yesterday! It is fascinating and seems to make much sense to me. When I read the intricacies of the electron orbitsphere, etc., I was struck by the realization that anyone who understands this to any degree must know that there is a Designer of this universe in which we reside! To continue to deny this with all of the amazing scientific discoveries that illuminate deeper and deeper into the microcosm we and the rest of matter represent, e.g. cell biology, DNA, etc., one must base one's denials in psychology and philosophy(of which I know a bit, along with engineering), in refusing to assign control to our Creator. I am also fascinated by the dark matter and big bang associations by Mills' theory. As soon as I can afford it, I will be buying my own copy of the book; and reading it through!
  • Itasca · 11 months ago
    I just posted "ICS". I'm not adept at this blogging game. My user name should show as, "Itasca"! Thanks!