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ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

bbc.co.uk

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Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#421

Post by [deleted] »

godelski wrote: post #154
landryraccoon wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without giving a strong opinion either way on whether this particular project is a good investment or not : Science, as an institution imo undervalues good marketing and good PR. For profit enterprises are under no illusion that they can succeed without good marketing and public perception. If large expensive projects like this are needed to increase public awareness and support for basic scientific research then I a…

This is why I'm particularly upset about SSC's[0] failure to be built. There are many advantages to housing the smartest scientists in the world within the borders of your country, and those benefits aren't limited to scientific output. After all, a big part of these multi-national projects is the culture war. And let's be real, which is worth more? A super collider that runs for decades or the F35 (which cost more,…

[deleted]

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#422

Post by valuearb »

AnthonyMouse wrote: post #419
phkahler wrote: post #402

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>> The claim was that there is a trade off - which is a pretty common sense assertion... >> It also happens to be wrong. Wow. The startup guy gave an actual example of the tradeoff. Am I correct that you see that not as a tradeoff but as a loss?

Sure, because the trade off wasn't real. There is a whole market full of people who could've done that work, it didn't have to the exact person who did it who happened to be one of the ones who would have gone to the other project, and the market expands when there is more demand because supply comes to meet it. So the trade off wasn't between physics and software. We could've had both of those at the "cost" of fewer…

Gee I sure wish I could have found one of those easily available graphic software geniuses, it would have saved us the $30,000 we spent getting ours a work visa.

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#423

Post by phkahler »

valuearb wrote: post #422
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, because the trade off wasn't real. There is a whole market full of people who could've done that work, it didn't have to the exact person who did it who happened to be one of the ones who would have gone to the other project, and the market expands when there is more demand because supply comes to meet it. So the trade off wasn't between physics and software. We could've had both of those at the "cost" of fewer…

Gee I sure wish I could have found one of those easily available graphic software geniuses, it would have saved us the $30,000 we spent getting ours a work visa.

Resource allocation is still a hard problem. We might be better as a society if we reallocate all the physicists to HR until that is solved.

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#424

Post by AnthonyMouse »

valuearb wrote: post #422
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, because the trade off wasn't real. There is a whole market full of people who could've done that work, it didn't have to the exact person who did it who happened to be one of the ones who would have gone to the other project, and the market expands when there is more demand because supply comes to meet it. So the trade off wasn't between physics and software. We could've had both of those at the "cost" of fewer…

Gee I sure wish I could have found one of those easily available graphic software geniuses, it would have saved us the $30,000 we spent getting ours a work visa.

Nobody said you get to pay below market rate. See how many appear if you offer a salary above it.

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#425

Post by worik »

philipkglass wrote: post #237
worik wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because France was desperate to have its own nuclear weapons. It was not economic for them either (tho back in the day it displaced coal - try having a coal plant next door)

France's nuclear power program actually displaced oil . France had a lot of oil fired electric power plants in the 1960s when it was a cheap fuel. As a reaction to the oil price shocks of the 1970s, France committed to the "Messmer Plan" for nuclear electricity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_France#Messme... France demonstrated its first fission bomb in 1960 and its first thermonuclear bomb in 1968:…

"France's nuclear power program actually displaced oil"

No. Oil is much cheaper

To maintain a nuclear arsenal a nuclear industry is needed.

It is the only economic justification for nuclear power

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#426

Post by worik »

aspenmayer wrote: post #230
worik wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nope. There are other alternatives, and grid scale batteries are viable now. Just cheaper to burn gas/coal and fsck the future! The obvious alternative is pumped hydro, that is well established. Another is demand management, unexplored because the greed heads in control do not believe that our society can work together for the common good. Coming from Aotearoa, as I do, I know that is a fat lie.

I have seen Aoraki with my own eyes, and I understand what you seek to protect.

For the locals Aoraki is a literal ancestor.

So it is not my job, it is taken care of.

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#427

Post by MayeulC »

Jugurtha wrote: post #172
landryraccoon wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without giving a strong opinion either way on whether this particular project is a good investment or not : Science, as an institution imo undervalues good marketing and good PR. For profit enterprises are under no illusion that they can succeed without good marketing and public perception. If large expensive projects like this are needed to increase public awareness and support for basic scientific research then I a…

> Science, as an institution imo undervalues good marketing and good PR. For profit enterprises are under no illusion that they can succeed without good marketing and public perception. Not to mention, this could be an attraction. Sell tickets for guided tours. I would gladly give money to have a guide walk me through that. Granted, at $100 a ticket, and 10,000 people a year, it'll take 20,000 years to recoup the inv…

Well, I did visit ITER back in 2014, it was really nice, we went on a tour, saw the facilities, attended a presentation, saw models of the reactors, etc. It was all for free (but the train ticket). We were a small (6) group of students who asked if a visit would be possible, and we were pleasantly surprised by the answer. There was at least one other family with us, so it's not just students.

Making money isn't really the goal for ITER, though. PR and education is. The tour left us with a pleasant feeling about ITER, but we weren't the ones to convince. I didn't see that kind of tour advertised in any brochure.

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#428

Post by iso8859-1 »

worik wrote: post #425
philipkglass wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

France's nuclear power program actually displaced oil . France had a lot of oil fired electric power plants in the 1960s when it was a cheap fuel. As a reaction to the oil price shocks of the 1970s, France committed to the "Messmer Plan" for nuclear electricity: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nuclear_power_in_France#Messme... France demonstrated its first fission bomb in 1960 and its first thermonuclear bomb in 1968:…

"France's nuclear power program actually displaced oil" No. Oil is much cheaper To maintain a nuclear arsenal a nuclear industry is needed. It is the only economic justification for nuclear power

So you don't think something can be expensive because it is heavily regulated? Or do you just think it is not possible with less regulation?

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#429

Post by Turbots »

Aerroon wrote: post #152
landryraccoon wrote: post #144

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Without giving a strong opinion either way on whether this particular project is a good investment or not : Science, as an institution imo undervalues good marketing and good PR. For profit enterprises are under no illusion that they can succeed without good marketing and public perception. If large expensive projects like this are needed to increase public awareness and support for basic scientific research then I a…

I think a problem with ITER for PR isn't the cost. It's time. I learned about it and got excited more than a decade ago. It'll still take years of time for it to be finished. I'm not really sure how to express this, but the huge amount of time just diminishes the impact of it for me.

I wrote a paper in high school on ITER in 1999 :-)

Re: ITER: World's largest nuclear fusion project begins assembly

#430

Post by pfdietz »

willis936 wrote: post #370
pfdietz wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am allowed to form my own opinion from the evidence we have. The evidence is that fusion is a huge boondoggle that is extremely unlikely to deliver anything useful. Asking people working in a field if it's promising is silly, since they are a biased sample. If they didn't think it was promising, they likely wouldn't be working in the field.

Indeed you are allowed to come to your own conclusions. I object to this statement. >Fusion is an example of sunk cost thinking. The only reason we're working on it is because we had been. This is putting forward the opinions of others. The premise is the people who stay in the field lacked some form of awareness of your arguments. They are aware and they disagree. You can’t assume your argument is accepted in the ar…

No, I'm sure the people in the field are, at some level, well aware of the arguments. They're not new, after all -- look at Lidsky from 1983. But the human power of rationalization is very powerful when your career depends on it. They get a comforting assurance that the argument was wrong, and they don't look too closely to see if the refutation was actually correct. What did Upton Sinclair say? "It is difficult to get a man to understand something when his salary depends upon his not understanding it."
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