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Politics : Formerly About Advanced Micro Devices -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: TimF who wrote (322927)	1/25/2007 12:19:41 PM
From: combjelly	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1576467

"1 - I didn't assert any such influence, and in fact was arguing against the claim of a hoax." Ok. Shorty, Taro and Harris often make this claim. But they seem to be unable to come up with who is behind that vast pool of money. There are no businesses that benefit, which leaves government grants. And the grant process doesn't allow for throwing much money at things without a solid, scientific basis. Pons-Fleischman is a perfect example. Pons and Fleischman had a small grant to investigate some properties of platinum(I think that was the metal). When they published, there was a flood of papers on the subject, but there weren't any grants. "I don't think its as much money as much as it is, for lack of a better term, politics within the scientific community." Politics? You do get that, but the more solid the science, the less of an effect it has. You don't get a grant unless the consensus of the grant committee is that there is some potential. If it is pretty speculative, then the reputation of the researcher does come into play. But it is hard to sway the committee if even one member thinks it is total nonsense. The process isn't perfect. But it is pretty resistant to fads.