People do seem to be getting emotional about fusion, and pointing that out is hardly edgy.
Once fusion achieves more output than input, I’ll be celebrating right there with you. But until then, ignoring the Doberman in the room is a worse look, from a scientific standpoint.
I even cited a source from someone with a phd in mathematical physics, who is likely far more qualified to be talking about this than most of us here. So in terms of dismissing criticism, the stack seems to be in the other direction.
Scientific reporting matters. Reporting something false is generally a bad idea. Saying “we got more energy out than we put in” is false. Which link in this chain of reasoning is invalid?
> It just seems a little strange to take credit for a milestone when the milestone everyone cares about is yet to be reached. (More energy out than in.)
That comment/criticism is a little strange in and of itself. I would say it's the oddness or seeming petulance of the above comment that brought on boc's comment.
A silly, but illustrative analogy:
Kid: Dad, look! I scored a home-run!
Father: Who cares? Have you won the game yet? Stop celebrating until you do something that everyone cares about!
I agree.
To explain further, my post and the included (noted silly) analogy were made with respect to explaining the aspect of sillysaurusx's post(s) that boc seemed to be criticizing.
Your "honest feedback" is nothing more than naked insults.
Sillysaurusx is right. The "impossibly complex" matter is actually quite simple, Q=1 is little more than a psychological milestone, not some sort of technical tipping point where further progress becomes easier. And they haven't even gotten to Q=1 unless you buy into the justifications they give for dodgy accounting of the energy they put into it. The "impossibly complex" matter of commercial fusion is actually quite simple, it needs to put out a lot more energy than you put into it after you fully account for all the energy you put in. They aren't even close to this.
When a baseball batter hits a ball at a record 120mph, you calculate the impulse of force (∆p) they put into the swing to cause that result, not the total calories the player consumed during the past year in order to build their muscles.
You're arguing that the process of charging some inefficient lasers (aka eating food throughout the year) is invalidating this entire result. That was never part of the experiment, nor is it relevant to this test.
I understand exactly what you wrote above, and I'm telling you that it's not relevant to this discovery. You're arguing a non-sequitur in the classic definition.
Just as a note, since I made the same mistake initially, the person you're replying to didn't make the post from which you are quoting "impossibly complex".
It seems, to me, that boc was criticizing the unnecessarily dour tone of sillysaurusx's previous comment and not the technical aspect of the achievement.
The whole thing seems to come down to whether one interprets the announcement as an attempt to deceive the public at large or simply a celebration of a milestone that many in the fusion research community have been trying to achieve for a long time. I can understand it being interpreted both ways, but I think the more charitable interpretation is that science reporting, in general, doesn't usually properly explain the levels of nuance of various achievements and, as such, something that is genuinely exciting for those in the community is not necessarily as exciting for those outside of it - which comes across as deceptive.
You are entirely correct. I'll just add that it's not only about the energy put in, but ultimately about the cost.
Net positive energy output is the absolute basic requirement. We're not there, we're not close, and even if we were, the hurdle would be to make it economically viable.
