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Comment by pierrefar | Hacker News Reader

It's one of those hoax stories that keeps popping up, along with energy from water.

Try this copy/paste from the story: "He is the 38th independent amateur physicist in the world to achieve nuclear fusion from a homemade reactor, according to community site Fusor.net. Others on the list include a 15-year-old from Michigan...

Some experts are sceptical that all these people are producing fusion reactions, but when he demonstrates his device, Mr Suppes says a bubble meter placed next to the reactor indicates that a fast neutron, a by-product of fusion, has been produced."

I'm not impressed with the BS-checking of the BBC in this case.

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It's one of those hoax stories that keeps popping up, along with energy from water.

Since Farnsworth Fusors are used commercially for neutron production, I'm sure those using them would be flummoxed to find that said neutrons are generated via hoax. :)

OK, you're right, hoax is the wrong word. Sorry about that.

What irked me is this kind of hyped up story of "little guy in a workshop makes amazingly complex device and look, he's going to beat all these scientists supported by billions of $". It is way too common and, frankly, bad reporting. Neil Calder, quoted in the article, summed it up nicely: we look forward to your ideas, but good luck.

Not once did the BBC mention Farnsworth. It would have been a much better article if they explained a bit what the science was.

Also, go to Fusor.net and read a bit. For example, question 1 on the right hand side column near the top under "welcome newbies" has scientific gems such as "It is God's own way of powering the universe" and uses the word "impossible" (in quotes) often. It's the typical bad science writing that is too common these days, and IMHO the BBC shouldn't be supporting it.

So, not a hoax, but written up like one.

A table top device that produces enough electricity to microwave your coffee is going to release enough fast neutrons to kill everyone in the room inside a week.

Having said that these are fairly safe toys that look cool and can get you written up in the paper. IMO, the really problem is simply bad reporting.

So, not a hoax, but written up like one.

No argument there. Most science reporting appears to be done as "Find a narrative; look for a sciencey story that can be made to fit the narrative; write article".

Well, unless the concept of the Farnsworth Fusor is complete BS (IANAP!) it looks reasonably plausible (if rather unlikely to achieve break even or better).

As long as what they are doing is reasonably safe I would applaud these people for trying, it's not like they are taking billions of dollars from taxpayers to pay for this stuff.

Thanks, I wish the BBC had added that part (though the article does explain that it takes more energy than it generates).

Here's a simple explanation for non-phycisists: http://www.wisegeek.com/what-is-the-farnsworth-fusor.htm

Making a fusor looks like a pretty interesting project:

http://brian-mcdermott.com/what_it_takes.htm

I'm not impressed with the BS-checking of the BBC in this case.

I'm not impressed with yours. Producing fusion reactions is just an advanced backyard project. Getting a net energy gain is the hard part. Did you label this as a hoax because it "sounds" like one? Your filter needs refining, as it would seem to suffer from false negatives. (Or false positives, depending on which meaning you're giving to "positive.")

Point taken. See my reply to randallsquared in this thread.

The problem is that none of these amateur physicists are generating any power. I guess the holy grail is not fusion, but generating power from it.

The Fusor produces interesting byproducts as well:

" He was absolutely convinced that he had observed the fusion of deuterium into tritium and/or helium 3 in his equipment. "

from: http://itseasyto.com/farnsworth.htm

...it's a good source of neutrons.

Yeah, i was wondering about that. Neutrons are a very hard particle to stop, being uncharged, and are a pretty dangerous type of radiation. Does he keep his fusion reactor surrounded by tons of water all day? The article mentions this reactor is perfectly legal, but i know radiation sources are a very regulated thing. On one hand, his reactor probably only produces afew neutrons a minute, and so probably wouldn't be regulated or be a danger to anybody. On the other hand, im just speculating, how do i know the neutron production of this guys reactor? Has anybody measured it to determine it is safe? Why was the BBC so lazy in researching this article?

This breakeven point wasn't hit for solar cells until the 1990s.

Yea.. And we have fission, a proven power source over the last 50 years but nooooo, we need to invent something even better. Fusion is possible, but actually getting it to reliably generate power is a long ways off.

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