Recently, the letters pages of the Guardian have featured conflicting accounts of cold fusion, otherwise known as low-energy nuclear reactions (LENR). On the one hand, the Nobel laureate Prof Brian Josephson and his co-authors argue (27 January) that cold fusion’s time has come: companies can “make these reactions work quite reliably”, with the promise of “ending reliance on fossil fuels”. In response, Dr Philip Thomas, a researcher at the University of Exeter, proclaims (2 February) that cold fusion is a “pseudo-scientific fringe theory” in violation of the “laws of nature”. Which laws, in particular, Dr Thomas does not say.
There is, however, a constructive middle ground between Josephson’s fervour and Thomas’s denigration. LENR advocates often fail to appreciate the evidentiary standard required to demonstrate novel nuclear effects. Overzealous critics are generally not well read on the LENR literature and lack perspective on the emergence of new fields from anomalous effects in science. As a result, they contribute to the palpable stigma that the Cambridge emeritus professor Huw Price calls the “reputation trap”. Regardless, there is compelling experimental data and strong theoretical motivations to study cold fusion.
