LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor • Hacker News Board

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#331

Post by epivosism » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:51 PM UTC

gomox wrote: post #306

alchemist1e9 wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely and people might be interested that in this case the prediction market for LK-99 is reacting in real time to new tweets from people trying to replicate. The “yes” spike to 32c yesterday was in response to a twitter account posting an image of a levitating grain in a tube. The credibility of that replication attempt was then evaluated by many and the market backed off afterwards. There is always a subtle an…

Re: nuclear weapon detonation, the implied probability of 9% (I take it source is: https://polymarket.com/event/will-a-nuclear-weapon-detonate-... ) might be factoring in the premium for the insurance that participants that predict a detonation are interested in acquiring. Let's say that the real odds of detonation are 1% and that everyone participating in the market knows and agrees to this. You would expect the imp…

"Will a nuclear weapon be detonated (including tests and accidents) in 2023?" is at 18%

https://manifold.markets/ACXBot/8-will-a-nuclear-weapon-be-d...

There are some caveats in the description, and this is play money, but people on the site do take their profits seriously.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#332

Post by andersa » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:51 PM UTC

danbruc wrote: post #318

As I learned from the Dave's EEVBlog video [1], their demonstration video [2] says in the description that the material was deposited onto a copper plate which could probably explain the interaction with the magnet. And as I just noticed, the description has since been changed and now says »The sample was thermally deposited on a enriched uranium 235 plate.« EDIT: Correction, I got the link to the video saying deposi…

That's highly suspicious. I guess they're banking on nobody having an enriched uranium 235 plate at hand to verify what happens if you do this without any LK99...

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#333

Post by dspillett » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:51 PM UTC

nmwnmw wrote: post #267

Isn't it sufficient to have another lab confirm that the existing sample is a super conductor? Then we can all sprint to replication.

That would support the existence of a material with the stated properties, which would be important on its own, but not that we can manufacture one. Why not prove both at once? Depending on the size of the sample produced, distributing it around several labs for independent testing may be impractical so you would still get this race as the sample was sent to one lab and the rest rush to try be first to reproduce the processes and test the result. Also transporting what could be a very valuable substance (maybe a fragile one, I've not looked into it) as far as another lab with the relevant equipment, may be difficult/costly to arrange.

Given the finding seems to have been rushed out, perhaps they did plan to send a sample (perhaps producing another themselves) to another lab for confirmation, but those plans have been overtaken by the interest as details slipped out earlier than they intended.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#334

Post by ethbr0 » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:52 PM UTC

gilleain wrote: post #239

ethbr0 wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> most/none of the estimators have any idea of the actual value being estimated. A subtle distinction is who is allowed to participate in a prediction market. "Everyone with $1" is a terrible answer, and produces the bad results people are pointing to. Financial markets avoid this because of their scale, where there's enough smart money to (usually) punish stupid money. Absent that scale, it's just stupid money muddl…

How would you construct such a knowledge barrier? Another prediction market? Also, suggesting that there is such a thing as 'smart' money - presumably due to having more of it? - is amusing. As pointed out elsewhere in this discussion, there has been a lot of smart money acting particularly dumb over the last few years.

A "Do you understand what superconductivity is?" or "Do you have a physics or engineering degree?" barrier?

And the relevant question isn't whether 'smart' money does dumb things: it's whether 'smart' money does dumb things less frequently than a random sample of money.

No one is an oracle, and there are absolutely outlier events that specifically confound experts, but I can't believe that increased expertise is uncorrelated with increased accuracy.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#335

Post by civilitty » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:53 PM UTC

ant6n wrote: post #22

Panzer04 wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Assuming LK99 is legitimate, my hope is that the principles that make it work are more broadly applicable - and with that, refined production processes or newer alloys can be found. Simply knowing that it's possible would lead to a huge amount of research immediately focusing on this kind of thing. There's nothing more revolutionary than a discovery of a new class of materials. After all, we often name eras throughou…

> There's nothing more revolutionary than a discovery of a new class of materials. After all, we often name eras throughout our history after them :) (Stone age, etc) I wonder what was involved in the discovery of stone.

> I wonder what was involved in the discovery of stone.

Mostly archaic humans hitting rocks against each other until they notice that flint knapping [1] creates a sharp edge.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Knapping

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#336

Post by dcow » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:53 PM UTC

lolinder wrote: post #298

dcow wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Desperation? Momentary fame? To get funding to continue research? Any number of reasons humans do silly half-honest things… There are some plausible allegations that the authors were a struggling pair of researchers and essentially stole this research and published a sloppy half baked paper they knew would make waves.

I think you're missing the point: there is no such thing yet as a room temperature superconductor. If they have such a thing, they made it. If they failed to document the process well, that's a separate issue from whether the sample they have actually is a superconductor at the temperatures described.

The data isn't good. They don’t have such a thing. They think they have such a thing. What they think they have is certainly interesting and potentially world changing, but if this (or some other reason like infighting over credit) lead them to rush publication, you have to be ready for the conclusion that whatever they have isn’t a superconductor as we know it.

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#337

Post by andersa » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:55 PM UTC

nmwnmw wrote: post #267

Isn't it sufficient to have another lab confirm that the existing sample is a super conductor? Then we can all sprint to replication.

I'm really confused why everyone is claiming the replication would be easy. The paper specifies very large ranges for both times and temperatures that would take years to try all combinations, and ignores basically all of the details.

The effect could be caused by some incredibly lucky contamination/impurities and then nobody would ever be able to reproduce it at all. Why not reverse engineer this one apparently working sample instead?

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#338

Post by sterlind » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:55 PM UTC

alchemist1e9 wrote: post #87

toth wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This type of instictive negative reaction to prediction markets is, unfortunately, common, but, I think, misguided. Prediction markets are one of the (or just, the?) best ways of aggregating knowledge from multiple sources and producing the best predictions. Having good legible predictions of impactful events such as LK-99 replication is extremely useful for society - it would be an invaluable input for a savvy polic…

Absolutely and people might be interested that in this case the prediction market for LK-99 is reacting in real time to new tweets from people trying to replicate. The “yes” spike to 32c yesterday was in response to a twitter account posting an image of a levitating grain in a tube. The credibility of that replication attempt was then evaluated by many and the market backed off afterwards. There is always a subtle an…

> Is it fascinating the risk of a nuclear weapon detonation by December 31st of 2023 is accessed to be around 9%?

If a nuke goes off, full-scale nuclear war becomes much more likely. In the event of nuclear apocalypse, your money will become worthless. So shouldn't that risk be undervalued?

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#339

Post by 7373737373 » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:55 PM UTC

andersa wrote: post #332

danbruc wrote: post #318

As I learned from the Dave's EEVBlog video [1], their demonstration video [2] says in the description that the material was deposited onto a copper plate which could probably explain the interaction with the magnet. And as I just noticed, the description has since been changed and now says »The sample was thermally deposited on a enriched uranium 235 plate.« EDIT: Correction, I got the link to the video saying deposi…

That's highly suspicious. I guess they're banking on nobody having an enriched uranium 235 plate at hand to verify what happens if you do this without any LK99...

For me, this, and the combination with the name ("Quantum Energy Research Center") is another push in the direction of ignoring everything named "quantum"

too often quacksalver territory

Is this really their channel? Why do they only have 1 video, 8 subscribers, and why is the video unlisted?

Re: LK-99: The live online race for a room-temperature superconductor

#340

Post by jacquesm » Mon, Jul 31, 2023, 2:57 PM UTC

oneshtein wrote: post #146

jacquesm wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It can not ever produce net energy in this setting, so no, it doesn't do the job. It is in a room, but the temperature inside that vessel is anywhere north of 35,000 C. Unless you have a very hot room that isn't 'room temperature' by any stretch of the definition. Note that room temperature is about the temperature of the process not the temperature of the building containing that process.

35kK in this reactor is much closer to room temperature than 150MK in ITER, isn't?

I'm not saying it is 35K, I'm saying it is at least 35K and probably much higher.

Whether it is closer to room temperature or not is not relevant, when someone says 'room temperature' they are talking about 21 degrees Celsius plus or minus a couple, not above the temperature where any kind of solid matter exists. Even tungsten, which melts at 3422 degrees C and boils at the magic number of 5555 C is just vapor at that point. Closer isn't relevant, at all.