Fusion as a “Quest”

Posted by Rezwan on Nov 23, 2009 at 10:32 AM
Tools: Print | | (0) Comments

Here we are, then, smack dab in the middle of a classic promethean 100 electron volt “Theft of Fire” Quest.

The logistics of a Quest are straightforward. 

• “Stealing fire from the gods” aka “capturing the sun in a bottle” aka “developing a fusion reactor” is the Object of the quest. 
• The people who are committed to making this happen are the Subjects of the quest (aka “Heroes” aka “us”).
• Heroes confront Threshold Guardians in a variety of incidents along the way. If we overcome the TG’s, we prove our worth & our wits, and bring fusion down to earth.

Object of the Quest

The quest for fire from the gods gets a modern update in our search to harness the energy that runs the stars.  Despite our supercomputers, this object has eluded scientists for 60 years, and the event horizon for obtaining it continues to slip back, always hovering about 30-50 years away.  As far as quests go, this one mocks us the most. 

The functional, elegant, safe, clean, cheap aneutronic fusion reactor is an object that lies at the end of the quest. 

Subject-Hero-Members of Quest

Like any quest story, the quest isn’t just about its object, it’s about what happens to the people on the quest (the subjects), and how they change and grow. 

“A hero goes “on the road” in search of one thing and winds up discovering something else – himself”. 

“Like the twists of any story, the milestones of the [quest] are the people and incidents that our hero or heroes encounter along the way.  Because it’s episodic it seems to not be connected.  But it must be.  The theme of every [quest] is internal growth; how the incidents affect the hero is, in fact, the plot. 

-  Save the Cat – pp. 28

How will we grow and change?  Who knows.  We have to continue along the quest to find out.  As we have embarked on this quest, we have indeed encountered many incidents, individuals and reactions along the way, which reveal a lot about our own nature, and the environment in which humanity pursues knowledge. 

Threshold Guardians (TG’s)

While developing the quest for fusion, we have come across many barriers to fusion.  Some were expected, and some were unexpected.
 
It is possible to personify these barriers as “threshold guardians.” 

In a quest, the heroes encounter “threshhold guardians” (TG’s) who block the way.  Each TG requires the heroes to prove themselves in one way or another.  TG’s test your will, character, cunning, maturity.  There are many ways to defeat a TG.  Mostly, you have to be wise and have a lot of friends.  You have to know something, have some inherent talent.  Sometimes you defeat TG’s in hand to hand combat.  Sometimes you outwit the TG, sometimes you camoflage yourself as one of them to get past.  Sometimes you face an inner demon alone, sometimes you overcome your own flaws to work better with your quest-mates. 

Here are some of aneutronic fusion’s Tgs (AFTGs):
 
Technical TG: The laws of science.  Proof of concept.  This threshhold has mocked scientists for decades, and continues to stand, undefeated. 

How to defeat it?  Either the hypotheses you come up with will work, or they won’t.  The only way to beat this TG is to be right about your science.  As a strategy, you could systematically work to solve the problem, trying one thing after another.  It’s doubtful a “lucky accident” will help you here.  There is no shortcut or emotional appeal or magical resolution to this TG.  You can’t outwit it.  You can’t cheat.  You can’t lobby.  You can’t get a bunch of PhD’s to vote on it and make it so.  You can’t wish really hard.  It has to be empirically right, and you have to prove it.  This is hand to hand combat.  Hard work and perseverance, experimental skill.

If this were the only TG facing aneutronic fusion, things would be straightforward.  Mankind would come together to systematically defeat this TG.  There would be no petty squabbling among academics or vested interests.  No weird political vibes or paranoia that energy giants might shut us down.  There would be quick funding for fusion alternatives and open collaboration.  And we wouldn’t be getting the feeling that some people don’t want this problem solved and seem to want humanity to wallow in limited resources and energy shortages. 

Since things are not straightforward, we know that there are other TG’s in the mix.  So let’s try to identify them:

Entrenched Interests TG:  Some people don’t want a real solution to the energy crisis.  They are happy with a few changes at the periphery that don’t really affect market share…

Fear of Consumption TG:  This is the person that says, “I think unlimited energy is a TERRIBLE idea!  People will consume like rabbits!”  Not sure how prevalent this is.  This is an emotional TG that preys on fears of environmental destruction and doubts about the worth of human beings. 

Competition TG:  This TG is actually good, but sometimes gets perverted into an “antitrust” TG.  It might need to be leveraged into something more constructive like collaboration.  Sometimes, someone is messing with the playing field and trying to shut out alternatives…

Think of it!  Out there be global warming dragons and nefarious oil interests, and impossible scientific problems, and yet, we boldly seek the energy of the stars.  How cool is that? 

Why should we sit around twiddling our thumbs, dismissing a quest as quixotic and wishful?  Why not engage in the search, discover ways to support it, and meet friends and characters along the way? 

We’ve got the internet and social media to play with.  Gadgets and creative commons licenses to leverage!  Multiple related issues and themes to explore!  Witty people to explore and spar with!  Grumpy people to laugh at! 

This is not to trivialize the pursuit of fusion.  Science is serious.  Peer review is essential.  But science can also be fun.  And all the ancillary activities in support of science that we will engage in can definitely be fun.  Douglas Rushkoff says it well: 

The language and logic of business are organized around the survival instinct, even when survival is not in question. This is inefficient, unprofitable, and, perhaps worst of all, depressing…Instead of relentlessly pursuing survival even after our survival needs are met, we must learn how to do things because they fulfill us - because they are, in a word, fun.  Fun is not a distraction from work or a drain on our revenue; it is the very source of both our inspiration and our value. A genuine sense of play ignites our creativity, eases communication, promotes goodwill and engenders loyalty, yet we tend to shun it as detrimental to the seriousness with which we think we need to approach our businesses and careers…

…and, I might add, quests for aneutronic fusion.

Activities

What we do is build a community around a quest.  How we do it involves the following: 

Improving the Network:  We explore, expand and support the network of people who are connected to the quest for fusion.  This is ongoing and is mostly done via improvements in our website and outreach activities, including developing a plasma focus network. 

Creating Awareness:  We suspect that most people who would be partners with us on the quest for fusion are simply unaware of the existence & advantages of aneutronic fusion or the possibility of focus fusion.  Thus one of our primary activities is creating awareness. 

Dealing with barriers, aka threshhold guardians: There are many barriers to fusion.  There are technological, psychological, social, economic and political barriers.  We tackle them all.

Developing the Cultural Dimension of Fusion  Through film, theater, dance, and many other creative and collaborative projects, we will engage people of all ages in the concepts of fusion.  Many projects are planned here.  For example, we will work with drill teams to bring depictions of fusion reactions to sporting events throughout the country.  We will develop museum exhibits in collaboration with related museums (nuclear museums, science museums, the boron museum, etc.) that explicitly address fusion and aneutronic fusion.  We will develop films of not simply scientific value, but cultural value that tap into cultural issues related to fusion.

Documentation and Education:  We document the LPP Experiment with photography, film and articles.  We develop educational materials and write think pieces on focus fusion, plasma physics and socio-ecomonic issues related to the quest for fusion. 

Advocacy, lobbying, prize: We advocate for aneutronic fusion, we lobby for it, in order to create a better funding and research climate.  We also lobby for a fusion prize. 

Daydreaming, “think-tanking”, scenario based planning:  What if we’re successful?  What will the world be like then?  Can we handle it?  This requires some active, strategic daydreaming!  What will “fusion world” be like?  How will mankind transition to it, given all the entrenched energy interests and so forth?  We need compelling scenarios, visions, strategies to be prepared for the best.