A Christmas Carol? In Prose Being a Ghost Story of Fusion

My favorite Christmas movie by far is A Christmas Carol. 179 years after it was written, advertising agencies still drag the “Scrooge”-the-miser trope though our yearly Christmas spending rituals. Would Dickens’s be proud??Hardly! I’d even wager he might have preferred to have been boiled with his own Christmas pudding and buried with a stake of holly through his heart than to see the message of his miraculous novella so spectacularly missed.

A Christmas Carol is certainly not a simple criticism of spend thrifts. Yes, it is a reminder to be charitable and kind. But foremost it is a warning against the worship of money and the many cruelties and wrongs that such worship breeds.

At the story’s outset Ebeneezer Scrooge is well down the path of ruthless capitalism that he and his long deceased business partner, Jacob Marley had begun long ago. In the afterlife Marley is tortured to realize the evils of his ways and procures a chance of redemption for Scrooge. Scrooge is initially confused and oblivious when Marley’s ghost laments his own life’s work:

"But you were always a good man of business, Jacob", faltered Scrooge.

“Business!” cried the Ghost... “Mankind was my business!”

Lest the Fusion community miss Dickens’ message, I have endeavored here to raise the ghosts of Fusion Past, Present & Future. May these spirits haunt all private fusion laboratories pleasantly over the coming year.

The Spirit of Fusion Past

Fusion energy research has made great, albeit lurching progress for many decades. Punctuated by a series of great promises, and spectacular failures, fusion research has long been a bit of a laughingstock. And yet here we are going into 2023 with Tokamak science ready for fusion demonstration plant and Stellarator science no longer so far behind. Good job fusion researchers! Fortunately for all, the spirit of Fusion Past was plucky Spirit.?

Standing on the Shoulders of Giants?

The fusion industry association would have you believe that what fusion desperately needs now are entrepreneurs. Businessmen standing on the shoulders of fusion research giants to reach for what exactly?

I have met many of the ‘giants of fusion’ and written of others. They all have my great respect. But I have also met many who might have been giants, but for the lack of opportunity. For every giant of fusion, there are scores of former graduate students drawn by the hope of contributing to something bigger than themselves. These legions were unwittingly led into a pyramid scheme whose membership?drive was slowing by the time I arrived. Fusion-kind stands now, not so much on the shoulders of giants, but upon a precious few pyramids of plasma science knowledge. And surely the most difficult thing about pyramids is not the idea but the decades of labor to build them. I am proud member of the fusion research diaspora. I did my small part to build the biggest pyramid of fusion science knowledge around: that of tokamaks. While today’s fusion businessmen argue that they are standing on the shoulders of giants, care should be taken to check to see if that they aren’t in fact standing on the necks of the those that would let you know how much work remains to be done.?

The ghost of Christmas Past gave Scrooge a timely reminder of how far astray his pursuit of business had taken him when his long estranged fiancée laments:

I have seen your nobler aspirations fall off one by one, until the master-passion, Gain, engrosses you. Have I not?

The capitalization is Dickens’, not mine. And I assure you than neither he nor I are referring to fusion energy Gain.

The Spirit of Fusion Present

My whole family delighted in watching a Christmas Carol every year. Our favorite (and the definitive) version is the 1951 classic with Alastair Sim.?As a boy I was spooked by the admonitions of Marley's ghost and the sorrow-filled shadows revealed by the Ghost of Christmas Past.?So, I was always relieved by the jolly appearance of the Ghost of Christmas Present. ?As in the Dickens tale, the Spirit of Fusion Present is also outwardly jolly and surrounded by riches and plenty. Fusion investments are through the roof and the NIF announcement of last week has the world press as giddy as a drunken man over fusion. I think someone has been spiking the fusion Cool-Aid for Christmas. Even Neil De Grasse Tyson seems loopy. Oh Neil!

What do I think of how the incremental progress at NIF has being socialized? Bah Humbug! The plucky Spirit of Fusion Past and the recent breakthrough in Magnet technology alone are what makes the Fusion Present a hopeful Spirit. Hopeful but uncertain.

The Spirit of Christmas Present introduces Scrooge to Tiny Tim, the heart and soul of the Christmas Carol. Tiny Tim is the disabled son of Scrooge’s exploited employee, Bob Cratchit. Tiny Tim’s own plucky spirit and his undoubtable concern for others make him everyone’s favorite. Come to think of it, Fusion Energy is like the Tiny Tim of renewable energy!

Dickens’ Ghost of Christmas Present gives Ebeneezer a glimpse of the enormous struggles that Tiny Tim still faces. While these appear to stir Scrooge with some pangs of urgency and regret, the Spirit knows just how far good intentions make it in the free market. A sterner warning is needed.

Children of Mankind

The most jarring moment in the movie is when Scrooge notices the filthy limbs small creatures hiding under the cloak of the otherwise merry Spirit. When asked, the Ghost opens his cloak to show two hollow faced children. Horrified, Scrooge can only ask to whom they belong:

“They are Man’s,” said the Spirit, looking down upon them. “…This boy is Ignorance. This girl is Want. Beware them both, but most of all beware this boy, for on his brow I see that written which is Doom, unless the writing be erased.”

There you have it. Ignorance hides among us, even in these heady times for fusion. Doom is the price for ignoring it. “God bless us, everyone” indeed! Somebody get Neil deGrasse Tyson some strong coffee!!

The Spirit of Fusion Yet to Come

In the Christmas Carol, the Spirit of Christmas Present only warns of doom. The Spirit of Christmas Yet to Come actually shows it to us. Scrooge is shown the future in which Tiny Tim’s dies unnecessarily. Scrooge finally freaks out. He seeks reassurance that it’s not too late to change his ways by desperately suggesting:

Men’s courses will foreshadow certain ends, to which, if persevered in, they must lead,” said Scrooge. “But if the courses be departed from, the ends will change.

He is given no such reassurance. Notwithstanding Scrooge does change. Tiny Tim lives. Roll credits!

Meanwhile, Back to Our Fusion Reality

It is just possible that the foresight and wisdom of private industry has brought us to the brink of a global climate catastrophe. It has also come to pass in the last decade that much of the responsibility for the welfare of Tiny Tim, err, fusion energy now lies in the hands of private industry. Am I crazy to point out that this is reason for concern? We risk a future where our favored son, Fusion Energy, dies.

The business of any private company is to make money for investors. Private fusion companies are no different. And despite what the press and the fusion industry association would have you believe about last week’s NIF announcement, fusion energy is a LONG way off. In an ‘industry’ without a product, all you really need to make money is a good story. Fusion rhetoric is far easy to generate than fusion energy. So why the Dickens is the press regurgitating fusion hype largely unchecked? Ask questions!?

Reaching for What?

Fusion entrepreneurs would have you believe that they are standing on the shoulders giants and are reaching for fusion energy. Since when has any businessman reached for anything but your wallet? If fusion-generated electricity was an actual product today, then one might expect competition to drive innovation. But we don't have fusion energy. All potential paths to fusion involve unsolved science and technology challenges. The relative magnitudes of these remaining challenges SHOULD be the grounds upon which private fusion companies are competing. Science and engineering should be are roaring battleground where the fusion champions are selected and the pretenders are sent home. Instead there is a giggling silence. Something is going on, but it does not feel like free market competition. If I were you, I'd hang onto your wallet folks. Or hire a scientist.

I am no businessman, but I have lived through a technology bubble. Like other fusion experts I expect that a day of reckoning is coming for private fusion. Like other physicists, I feel that many leaders within the fusion community have abandoned a duty to educate, critique and help set informed expectations. Today’s all-fusion-is-good-for-fusion-energy messaging is an abandonment of the scientific method. When the predictable failures of private fusion companies begin to mount and the fickle winds of PR begin to howl, those rules of science will be the only thing that legitimate fusion endeavors can cling to.

Learning from the Past: Always Demand Proof

If the Spirit of Fusion Past teaches us anything, it is that fusion has ALWAYS looked good on paper! Can we please STOP giving a free pass to every companies who claims they have fusion licked? They may even have calculations/simulations to back it up their speil. Fusion science is unfathomably complex. The only valid currency of progress is EXERIMENTAL proof. Always ask for proof. Nay, demand it!?And since the proof is in the pudding. Sing after me dear people:?

Oh, bring us some figgy pudding,

We won’t go until we get some,

So, bring some out here!!

This isn't the Hollywood Christmas message that you may have wanted. But, when it comes to Fusion Energy, "Sorry Virginia, their is no Santa Claus". And as for Miracles on 37th street?, I'm not expecting any. If Dickens' tale can reinvigorate a dedication to good science and clear communication among the scientists in the fusion energy community, then I'm will gladly admit I'm wrong. More realistically, I hope that this take on a classic yarn inspires investigative journalists to look beyond the flashy wrapping paper and become critics in this largely un-scrutinized field. After all, even Scrooge didn't change his ways until bright lights were shone upon his past and present dealings.

A peaceful, contemplative holiday season to you all from your reluctant fusion critic,

Peter O'Shea