> If nuclear scientists goof like this, it does not inspire confidence to the public and all we will end up is projects like Shoreham.
To be fair, the claims were made by grad students. Good on them for experimenting, hoping, testing, and failing. The true calamity would have never been to test.
Their failure is not a reflection of their character, ambition, or talent. Well perhaps a little bit their talent. But they could've done like many (most, arguably) grad students and worked on some fundamentally useless but "safe" path to ongoing work in the Ivory tower.
So let's hope they keep trying to identify and test the hard problems whose resolution would improve life for humans, and do better next time.
>Smith thought the claims for the technology were bogus, based on the physics, notified the MIT hierarchy, and launched an inquiry. The magazine quoted him, “I said this is obviously incorrect based on basic physics.”
Grad students should know the basic physics of their respective subfields.
At the very least, if it doesn't match up with the basic physics, to do the legwork to show why they are right and the apparent contradictions with basic physics are incorrect.
To be fair, the claims were made by grad students. Good on them for experimenting, hoping, testing, and failing. The true calamity would have never been to test.
Their failure is not a reflection of their character, ambition, or talent. Well perhaps a little bit their talent. But they could've done like many (most, arguably) grad students and worked on some fundamentally useless but "safe" path to ongoing work in the Ivory tower.
So let's hope they keep trying to identify and test the hard problems whose resolution would improve life for humans, and do better next time.