Fox News, MSNBC, Wired and other mainstream media outlets based their recent stories on “Energy Catalyzer” inventor Andrea Rossi on information they obtained from Sterling Allan.
Fox News called Allan the CEO of an “alternative energy news agency.” Here is another example of the news reported by Allan:
“All this was inspired by the principle–which is quite true in itself–that in the big lie there is always a certain force of credibility; because the broad masses of a nation are always more easily corrupted in the deeper strata of their emotional nature than consciously or voluntarily; and thus in the primitive simplicity of their minds they more readily fall victims to the big lie than the small lie, since they themselves often tell small lies in little matters but would be ashamed to resort to large-scale falsehoods. It would never come into their heads to fabricate colossal untruths, and they would not believe that others could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously. Even though the facts which prove this to be so may be brought clearly to their minds, they will still doubt and waver and will continue to think that there may be some other explanation. For the grossly impudent lie always leaves traces behind it, even after it has been nailed down, a fact which is known to all expert liars in this world and to all who conspire together in the art of lying. These people know only too well how to use falsehood for the basest purposes.”
Source: http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks02/0200601.txt
Title: Mein Kampf
Author: Adolf Hitler (1889-1945)
Translated into English by James Murphy (died 1946).
* A Project Gutenberg of Australia eBook *
eBook No.: 0200601.txt
Language: English
Date first posted: September 2002
Date most recently updated: September 2002
eBook produced by: Colin Choat
Sterling Allan, the “CEO” of a free energy Web site called Pure Energy Systems – which purports to be a news source – is seeking a business relationship with “Energy Catalyzer” promoter Andrea Rossi.
Andrea Rossi and Sterling Allan
Fox News, MSNBC, Wired and other mainstream media outlets based their recent stories on Rossi on information they obtained from Allan.
Swedish-American Peter Svensson, a technology journalist with the Associated Press went to see the Rossi show but either he or his editors decided against writing a story on Rossi’s extraordinary device.
Peter Svensson and Sterling Allan
The Rossi spectacle owes much of its success to the promotional journalism by Swedish technology journalist Mats Lewan of Ny Teknik.
Sterling Allan and Mats Lewan
From Allan’s Web site: “I am seeking a business relationship with Andrea Rossi. My trip was sponsored by Farlie Paynter of Canada, as well as by Mike Spitzauer, CEO of Green Power Inc (GPI), the Waste-to-Diesel Fuel company in Pasco, Washington.”(Source image)
From Allan’s Web site: “If you are a qualified and serious customer, you can contact Leonardo Corporation (Rossi’s company), and reserve your spot in line for one of these plants. By being one of the first customers in the world to purchase a one megawatt E-Cat plant, you will be showing your savvy and refined business sense, which led you to purchase the most attractive energy production method on the planet.
“Your dedication to helping move human civilization forward, into a new scientific era. The introduction of the E-Cat technology will be a sign that humanity can engineer a solution to any problem we have. There is no longer anything that is impossible!” (Source image)
On Nov. 2, John Brandon published a story on Andrea Rossi and his claim of an “energy catalyzer” on Fox News.
I will address a few issues and obvious factual errors.
Rossi is not a physicist. He earned a bachelor’s degree in 1973 in the philosophy of science and engineering from the University of Milan’s School of Philosophy.
In 1979, Rossi obtained a bachelor’s degree in chemical engineering from the University of Kensington, in California. That university was determined to be a diploma mill and was shut down by officials in California and Hawaii, according to CBS News.
Rossi did not demonstrate his device at the University of Bologna. All of his demonstrations have taken place at an empty industrial suite behind a tire repair shop in Bologna.
Brandon obtained a lot of his information from Sterling Allan. Brandon writes that Allan is the CEO of an “alternative energy news agency.” Allan is the “CEO” of a free energy Web site. Allan, a self-proclaimed “Ambassador of Jesus Christ: First and Second comings,” also believed a prophecy in the Bible Code that he should run for president of the United States.
Brandon quoted Allan’s claim that Rossi claimed he generated a 470 kilowatt energy output. But Brandon neglected to mention the 400 kilowatt generator outside the building connected to and used to “pre-heat” Rossi’s device.
Brandon used a two-year old quote from Pamela Mosier-Boss, a researcher at the U.S. Navy’s Space and Naval Warfare Systems Center San Diego, from an entirely different experiment that gives the appearance she is supporting Rossi’s claim.
Brandon wrote that Rossi told him that researcher Paul Swanson with SPAWAR San Diego could vouch for Rossi’s demonstration. Brandon spoke with Swanson. He couldn’t.
Brandon speculated, based on what he read on Allan’s blog, that SPAWAR San Diego was Rossi’s mysterious customer and that they measured and verified Rossi’s test.
I asked James Fallin, the director of public affairs at SPAWAR San Diego, “is there any truth to the suggestion published on Fox News that SPAWAR is, or is considering purchasing any device from Andrea Rossi?”
“No truth at all,” Fallin wrote.
On Nov. 8, Lisa Zyga published a story on Andrea Rossi and his claim of an “energy catalyzer” on Physorg.
Lisa wrote in her article, “Meanwhile, other journalists have been criticizing each other’s coverage for being too accepting or too harsh of Rossi’s claims.”
Not wanting to exclude Lisa, I posted the following comments:
Lisa,
Some journalists – including yourself – are being careless about how they are reporting this story and in doing so, are inadvertently contributing to this grand scam. The most obvious evidence for the scam is the exit velocity I showed on videotape and Rossi’s claim five minutes later that he had just shown me proof of kilowatts of heat. Please read my Report #3, there is no ambiguity about this matter unless you suggest that Rossi intended to deceive me.
Correction [to your article]: The experiment did not take place at the University of Bologna. The first media outlet to report that was Fox News. Perhaps Fox is not the best source?
The experiment took place at a virtually empty commercial suite that Rossi has been using to demonstrate his device since December.
Another example of how some journalists have helped to perpetuate potentially false information is your text “Impressed with these results, the unknown US customer accepted delivery.”
There is no evidence for the existence of any customer. But your readers may not know this. They assume that you have based this statement on facts. And that is a disservice to the public and it is poor journalism.
[Lisa responded to me in a private e-mail. I then responded to her in second public comment.]
Thanks for your e-mail. So you got some information from the MSNBC site either as well or instead of the Fox site. Fine. But where did Natalie Wolchover of MSNBC get her information from? Or the incorrect information that Rossi is a physicist? She didn’t go to Bologna. She has never done any firsthand reporting on the subject. Wolchover’s story appeared one day after the Fox story. Fox got their story from Sterling Allen. Do you see the problem with how you and Wolchover are doing journalism?
I don’t care if you come off optimistic or pessimistic. That’s not my point. You didn’t get some of your facts correct, but that is secondary. The primary issue is that you omitted to report that your crucial “facts” on this story originate from what *Rossi says* rather than any kind of journalistic process which would normally include identifying sources and/or your attempts to perform any fact-checking. You owe your readers better than this.
You cannot call Rossi a fraud and neither can I because we will never know Rossi’s true intentions and we will never be able to prove a negative. But we can identify whether the facts he presents are consistent with the physical laws of the universe. I and two dozen contributors have done this in Report 3. Rossi’s claims are inconsistent with the scientific evidence he has attempted to sell to the public, not for its money, but for their support to help him advertise his claim.
[I posted a third comment.]
There are at least three reasons [why] this story got its legs. The first is because Rossi is a master at appealing to people. He adorns his fans with praise but makes (e)catcalls at his critics. Very early on, when I knew less, he told me, “You help me now, I will help you forever.”
A second thing Rossi had going for him is that he was able to capitalize on the dreams and hopes of good people who have good intentions for a better world. They are frustrated with the lack of viable options for clean energy and by domination from the petrocacy. Some of the cold fusion believers, who can’t seem to understand the difference between the strong force and the weak force also fit into this category. They have been waiting a long time for big news that is real. Waiting for their cold fusion messiah. My experience in telling them that Rossi is not it has been like telling children that Santa Claus is not real.
A third thing Rossi had going for him is the atrocious journalism done by Mats Lewan; turning a blind eye to lack of control experiments, [a blind eye ] to perpetually overly-complicated experiments, [a blind eye ] to the lack of steam exit velocity and volume, [a blind eye ] to Rossi’s hand on the controls when it shouldn’t have been, writing Rossi’s reports for him and then writing news stories based on his own technical reports, writing scientific-sounding news stories about Levi’s 18-hour test without a single piece of documented evidence. Mats is an experienced journalist. He should have known better.
As the POC@NASA Marshall told me, he had a difficult time believing Rossi, but Rossi’s claim was so big and so bold that he couldn’t believe that Rossi would have the audacity to run a scam of this magnitude.
Lisa, try to find any credible data that supports Rossi’s claim. Trace it to source and identify source. It’s all about the data. Not belief. Not fantasy. What can you do for your readers?
[Response from Lisa:]
As for finding credible data, the lack of it is what makes writing about this issue so difficult! It does seem like most if not all of the content comes from Rossi with no verification; however, most scientists whose work I cover would be appalled to say something even slightly misleading. They are obsessive about getting every detail correct. In contrast, covering Rossi’s device doesn’t even seem like science reporting. I’m not used to [redacted] (maybe political journalists could handle this better!). If there’s another update to this saga, I hope it does involve some credible data, but you’re right, now I don’t know of any truly credible sources. Wouldn’t it be nice if a team of mainstream scientists could dissect this and write a real paper? Or has critiquing science in such detail become the journalist’s job now? Anyway, thanks for your information on Rossi, which I will keep in mind.
[Response to Lisa:]
Lisa,
Your statement “most scientists whose work I cover would be appalled to say something even slightly misleading”is absolutely crucial.
You assume that scientists or people making scientific-sounding claims maitain such a level of ethical behavior. This is what I expect and hope too. And this assumption makes some unsuspecting journalists easy prey for sources who operate under different ethics.
Talk about ” slightly misleading” — just look at Rossi’s own statements for the best example. In his 2010 self-published paper, he claimed an energy gain of 213 times. Yet, in January 2011, Rossi downgraded the claim to a 30 times energy gain. In April, he downgraded his claim again, to 6 times.
You wrote “Wouldn’t it be nice if a team of mainstream scientists could dissect this and write a real paper? Or has critiquing science in such detail become the journalist’s job now?”
That would be nice, but it will never happen. No mainstream science journalist will even waste their time on this (and for good reason,) though some mainstream technology journalists will and have.
I’m putting the question back to you: Using this case as an example, what can you do to help elevate the quality, or at least the awareness of quality science journalism?
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