[Rezwan]

zapkitty wrote:
As for the thread concept I, myself, find it pretty meaningless. The X megawatts for X persons for X aeons is too displaced and too subject to gaming.
…

And the answer will be measured in MW per person per millennium.

I hereby call this number the Zap.

I like it! The Zap. Has an electric feel to it as well.

Now to get widespread use of the metric.

[Rezwan]

vansig wrote: If you do fusion research,
people will say you are a dreamer, that fusion wont happen for another fifty years, that you will upset the balance of power, and that other energy companies will kill you.

do fusion research anyway

This is perfectly concise – great for an inspirational poster. Add visuals and we’ll add it to our poster collection.

[Rezwan]

I like the way Jon put it (the “some of that is accurate” part):

If we do good, people will accuse us of selfish ulterior motives and some
of that is accurate.
We’re doing good anyway.

There is, indeed a healthy selfish streak running through the endeavor.

[Rezwan]

Going back to Kent Keith’s original version, I see he says:

“I told them that if they were going to change the world, they had to really love people, and if they did, that love would sustain them. I also told them that they couldn’t be in it for fame or glory.

So, what should the focus of paradoxical fusion commandments be on? Is it really loving people (the beneficiaries of the technology), or is it really loving research/knowledge? This makes for two different command sets.

[Rezwan]

Tulse wrote: Are MacKay’s numbers for energy released, or [em]usable[/em] energy released?

Good question. Is he minding his Q’s?

I think an important graphical indication for each energy source would include the maximum theoretical energy available in the source, compared to the amount we can extract from that supply – the effective Q.

[Rezwan]

I’m thinking about the commandments because of September 11. The 8th command is:

What you spend years building may be destroyed overnight. Build anyway.

So, taking some thoughts from Jon, here’s another attempt:

When it comes to energy, people are insatiable consumers, NIMBY-ous, and take harsh “wait and see” stance towards research.
Do the research to get them fusion energy anyway.

If you do fusion research, people will accuse you of wishful thinking.
Do fusion research anyway.

If you are unsuccessful in your fusion experiments, people will ridicule you and accuse you of fraud and waste.
Do the experiments anyway.

If you are successful, people may attempt to steal or stifle your inventions.
Succeed anyway.

Fusion is “oversold” but underfunded.
Fight for fusion funding anyway.

Honesty and frankness about the uncertainties of research make you vulnerable to defunding and derision.
Be honest and frank anyway.

The biggest scale ideas with the biggest budgets may or may not be outperformed by the simplest ideas with the smallest budgets.
Pursue a diverse range of fusion experiments.

What fusion researchers spend years building may be successful overnight. It’s a cliff edge phenomenon.
Keep calm and fuse on!

People really need energy breakthroughs but attack you with budget cuts and contempt if you attempt them.
Attempt fusion breakthroughs anyway.

Give the world the best you have and you’ll get swarmed by ungrateful people with pitchforks saying “what took you so long?”
Give the world the best you have anyway.

[Rezwan]

Thanks to @NeilBrainstrong for this reply:

@focusfusion I just did a nifty little back of the envelope calculation concerning the aneutronic #fusion reaction p + 11B -> 3 4He + 8.7 MeV.

In each ton of seawater, there are 4.4 g 11B. (Source: http://www.webelements.com/boron/geology.html)

Of these, 81% are 11B.

Mass of the World Ocean is 1.332 * 10^30 t. This corresponds to:
1.332*10^30 t * (0.81 * 0.0044 kg/t) = 4.75 kg of 11B.

Which again gives a number of 11B atoms of:
4.75*10^27 kg / (11.01 * 1.66 * 10^-27 kg) = 2.6 * 10^53

If we extract 10% of these (2.6 * 10^52) and each reaction gives an Energy amount of: 8.7 * 1.6*10^-19 J = 1.4 * 10^-18 J,
and the energy is split between 10 billion people and distributed over 5 billion years (~1.6 * 10^17 s) – until the sun turns into a red giant – each person can use as much as:

(2.6 * 10^52 * 1.4 * 10^-18 J) / (10^10 * 1.6*10^17 s) = 22.75 MW.

This means, using the aneutronic boron reaction, everyone on earth (assuming 10 billion people) can use 22.75 MW individually until the earth is burned to cinders by the expanding sun.

For comparison: Presently, in Germany the individual primary energy consumption is around 6000 W, in the US 11000 W and in the Arabic Emirates around 22000 W.

And for Kardachev level calculation;

@focusfusion This, by the way, would put us at a Kardachev Level of:

1 + 0.1 * log10 [(22.75 MW * 10^10) / 10^16 W] = 1.13

Presently, we are at about:

1 + 0.1 * log10 [1.5 * 10^13 W / 10^16 W] = 0.71.

[Rezwan]

Something Shiningstar600 sent a while back:

Paradoxical Fusion Commandments – Research Anyway

People say fusion can’t be done.
Love them anyway.

If we do good, people will accuse us of selfish ulterior motives and some
of that is accurate.
We’re doing good anyway.

If fusion is successful, our enemies may use it to hurt people.
Succeed anyway.

The good that comes from fusion will not be forgotten.
Do it good.

Honesty and frankness make us vulnerable and provide our best protection.
Be honest and frank.

The biggest ideas with the biggest budgets can be beaten by the simplest
ideas with the smallest budgets.
Think Focus Fusion.

Without more water soon, we will be eating dogs.
Fight for fusion.

What we’ve spent years building may be successful overnight.
There’s always a way. Ya gotta wanta.

People really need help and we’re going to help them.
Help us help them.

Get exposed to too much radiation and you’ll get rotten teeth.
Give the world Aneutronic Fusion.

Jon Martin, Engineer
2010
Please enter these for me.

[Rezwan]

Also reported in “Geekosystem.com“

[Rezwan]

Re, criteria #2, What’s “short”? I’m thinking that means it has a discrete end in sight. They do say, “bite size” somewhere. Simulations wouldn’t work here, as that is specialized, long term work.

But you want people to take a data set and an algorithm for cleaning it up, and develop a javascript around that. Right? That could be “bite size” for a java programmer.

If they need to develop the algorithm, too, then not.

More info on microvolunteering vs. virtual volunteering:

Virtual volunteering, as it has been done to date,* is exactly like in-person volunteering, but the work takes place remotely. It’s like telecommuting to work.

So, all of the same management rules are in place. You will usually be trained, vetted, and accepted for a volunteer position. You will have a direct manager. You will do work and will send it to your manager for review. The manager will approve the work or ask for revisions. The manager will tell you that you’ve done an amazing job – or that you could stand a little more training. Communication will happen via email, typically. But it could also happen via a phone call – or via a project management web site like Basecamp. This is volunteering, remotely, from a more convenient location.

If you review my definition of microvolunteering, you can see that virtual volunteering checks off only one of the four key defining characteristics: convenience. Just to review those points briefly, microvolunteering is: convenient, bite-sized, crowdsourced, and network-managed.

Virtual volunteering is convenient, small or large sized, and managed via a traditional one-to-one or one-to-many hierarchical management method.

Why are these distinctions so important? Because they lead to a process of work that is wildly different. And yet, the result of the work may be precisely the same! How’s that for interesting?

Does this apply here? I’m thinking ABD Reece has cleared away some of the thornier obstacles, and it may now be down to a “bite size” thing for those Java scripters who are over the learning curve.

[Rezwan]

OK, any modifications to the below, or shall I post as is:

We need people with java skills! In particular, we need help improving a java program to reduce some of the data of a fusion research experiment. We need this help because the PhD student who was doing this for us has gone back to concentrating on his PhD, so he can’t help anymore (Thanks again to Reece for his contributions!). The program is already written to:

* take raw output from our detectors, such as our photomultiplier tubes;
* filter out the noise;
* detect the real peaks and measure their height, width, area, etc.

We need to modify Reece’s program for some of our other instruments. All the resulting programs, after neatening-up will be available online as open source applications available to other researchers to speed up the advancement of fusion.

Here’s our website: https://focusfusion.org – this Java project is an open source collaboration with the LPP experiment.

Here’s some info about us and what we’re doing:
The Focus Fusion Society (FFS) is a 501(c)(3) tax-exempt membership organization located in South Bound Brook, New Jersey.

Our mission is to bring people together to pursue the dream of safe, clean, affordable, abundant energy from aneutronic fusion, to ensure that the ensuing technology is made available to everyone, and to foster a pro-research ethic and pro-fusion culture.

Thanks a bunch!

[Rezwan]

Hello Eric,

I’m thinking of posting this on http://sparked.com to get volunteers with java expertise who are up for a challenge.

I’ve gotten to the project page. They have 3 criteria. For this project:

1) Can the work be done entirely online?
2) Can it be completed in a short amount of time?
3) Does it have a clear deliverable or result?

You can break this up into sub projects. Can each step be done in a short amount of time?

Let me know! I shall then post.

[Rezwan]

Ah! Looks like I didn’t post on the site after sending out in the newsletter. The advantages of being a member!

They are on the site now. Enjoy!

[Rezwan]

Ah! Yes, I tried to hit the vote button to no avail. But I signed up as a supporter!

[Rezwan]

dennisp wrote: I wrote about focus fusion and other alternative fusion projects here:
http://climatecolab.org/web/guest/plans/-/plans/contestId/5/planId/14629

Thanks! It looks good. A lot of info there on the various flavors of fission. This is the kind of info that could go into our Energy Brackets Campaign. I must print out and peruse.

MIT is running a contest to crowdsource solutions to global warming. Last year I was one of three contest winners with the “carbon rights” proposal:
http://climatecolab.org/web/guest/plans/-/plans/contestId/3

As a result, I got to present my proposal to congressional staffers and to the U.N. Secretary General’s personal advisory team on climate issues. The latter was especially gratifying…after the formal presentation we sat around a conference and discussed the ideas for another twenty minutes. So, there’s a chance that if I were lucky enough to be a winner again this year, the SecGen will end up aware of FF.

Congratulations! That’s so cool! Does the public get a vote as well?

[Author]

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