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Scientists get death threats over Large Hadron Collider,

Large Hadron Collider: We Might Not all Die, Says BBC
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Separating Science fact, from science fiction hype.

What hype have you heard?

What advancements are you looking forward to?

Do you feel the Doom sayers are getting more coverage then the actual project?

Others working in this field say “a 76.4 percent chance that it will create a MBH, or miniature black hole.”

"if a black hole is created the following series of events will happen, all of them unbeknown to us at first.

“What will happen is the MBH will drop down to the center of the earth, eating up matter as it goes. When it gets to the center, it will continue to go in the same direction due to its increased mass that it’s picked up on the way. Eventually it will reach a point where gravity will overpower momentum, and it will slow down, stop, and reverse direction back to the core.

“Because it will be constantly increasing in mass it will never stop at the middle, because momentum is speed times mass. It will continue to swing like a pendulum inside the earth, eating it up until it gets to critical mass.

“Unfortunately, from the point that the gravitational pull of the MBH will be noticeable by even the most sensitive instruments, will will be about three days from critical mass. Critical mass is defined as the point that the gravitational pull of the MBH will influence every piece of matter on earth or in its atmosphere.

“Less than five minutes after critical mass is achieved, all of the earth’s matter will be in a ball the size of a basketball, which will continue to orbit the sun as normal.”

The writer notes that if the collider is operated on Sept. 10, and a black hole is created, he estimates a timeline for all of this to happen to take approximately four years, three months and seven days to reach critical mass. This, he wrote, “puts it on December 17, 2012 . . . with an error ratio of approximately 10 days plus or minus.” This means, he said, that the date of the end of everything for everybody could fall on December 21, 2012. This, in case you are unaware, is the very date when the Mayan Calendar comes to an end."...
http://perdurabo10.tripod.com/warehousee/id92.html

Catchy Tie in the writer has used. To great Taste that go great together.. world doom, and science paranoia. Thank you for the post.. along with the link. I must look and see what else the writer has written on. So I can see his actual prediction success rat, the extremist come out of the wood work that is for sure, yet I notice that some are likely to accept UFO theories.

I've heard about the supposed danger of creating a tiny black hole with the LHC. I've also researched the commentary from the other side who admit that there is perhaps a very slight possibility that it could happen. Of course they also point out that such a black hole is very unlikely to be sustained even to the point of damaging the equipment, let alone consuming the planet.

Speaking only for myself, I think they should move forth and I say that realizing that it exposes a double-standard for me. When I heard that the first test of an atom bomb was predicted by about half of the working science community (aware of the work), to have the potential to ignite the atmosphere in a sustained chain reaction, I was more than a bit ticked off. It just didn't seem worthy of the risk.

I guess I just don't see scientific research as the enemy and after reading about the LHC for years, I'm rather anxious to see if it will live up to the claims. I can't wait to see what new discoveries arise from its use. If it turns out that it actually produces a black hole and that black hole actually sustains itself, well...

...oops.

Lets not forget all the doomgivers who first predicted the absolute horrors of delving into atomic power,it would run away with itsself devouring the entire planet as soon as it was unleashed, personally im curious to see further research on this topic, good thread

Haven't particle colliders been around for years?

grievousangel61,

You are correct. The Tevatron at Fermilab began construction in 1978 to replace the collider already in place. And the Tevatron has to its credit the discovery of the quark. There is, however, a very substantial difference with the Large Hadron Collider. The Tevatron accelerates particles to a maximum of about 1TeV (1 Tera electron-Volt), which is about the same energy exerted by a mosquito in flight. Of course the particles infused with this power are millions of time smaller than a mosquito. When two of them collide, the combined energy is on the order of 2 TeV. This occurs in a circular tunnel which is 4-miles long. The longer the tunnel, the less the curve tends to slow the particles.

The Large Hadron Collider utilizes a tunnel about 17-miles in circumference and the collider can accelerates a particle to an energy level of 7 TeV for a total collision energy of 14 TeV. That's a whole new level and that, of course, is the whole point of the LHC. More power means more information can be extracted from the collision of the particles. The promise it holds is to reproduce the state of matter at around one-billionth of a second after the Big Bang as well as to reveal the very nature of matter and energy. It is thought that it may finally confirm the existence of the Higgs boson as well as confirming the most finite structure of matter which may well confirm M-theory. If M-theory were confirmed, we would then move to assurance that we live in a universe with at least eleven dimensions rather than the 4-dimensional universe of today's models.

I prefer a black hole eating up the earths matter much more then some war destroying everything.Im not worried about what will happen.perhaps this world is ready for a dimensional shift lol

idont know much about it but it fascinates me to no end.

hey if they rumours and slander is true about the accidental creation of an out of control black hole we could learn so much from the mistake.

wouldnt the black hole have to be pretty massive to pull everything to it? i dont know but i am eager to learn more about it and see the results. im not scared of it at all i think the general uneasiness toward it is the basic fear of the unknown.

As I understand it (and I understand very little about it), as things begin to approach the speed of light, gravitational force of a particle has more to do with the velocity than the mass. Things grow more massive as they approach the speed of light. If objects with mass could actually achieve the speed of light, their mass would exceed that of the universe or some such thing.

I agree with you completely that most of the fear people hold over the LHC has to do with it being a relative unknown.

I hope they discover the higgs boson

I want to play with one.

*drools over the alchemic constructs which could be created*

From wikipedia:

In physics, the electron volt (eV) is a unit of energy. By definition, it is equal to the amount of energy gained by a single unbound electron when it accelerates through an electrostatic potential difference of one volt.

I guess time will tell. Anything new and untried has risks and there will always be those who think it has dangers and obviously it does to a degree but it seems minimal to me. They aren't going to put off testing this unless some court stops them. I should have paid more attention when my roommate was talking about working on a particle accelerator a few years ago before I met him in Switzerland and Texas. He never went into detail about it but was always making drawings. He had a degree in Physics. It wasn't something to talk about over coffee, lol. I was much more interested in his computer skills which were far beyond anyone I had ever met prior.

BLOODdripingFANGS,

You don't think what is real? The Large Hadron Collider, the potential for a black hole or an electron-volt?

DeMONic314,

I'm sure that's a far more accurate definition for an electron volt. For my purposes, it's easier to simply think of a TeV (Tera electron-volt / 1 trillion electron-volts), as being roughly equivalent to the force a mosquito exerts while flying. The LHC is supposed to be capable of accelerating a particle to 7-TeV which is an incredible amount of energy to impart to a sub-atomic particle. When two collide, the combined energy is equal to 14-TeV. If I recall correctly, a new linear accelerator is in the works which is targeting 64-TeV.

well I just expect the worst and hope for the best and only time will really tell now won't it .. I mean anything is possible to happen or not happen I do not see where anyone predicted 9 / 11 so why worry until it happens is how I see it and then we dearl with it just as we have forever on this existing planet.

Kryptlove,

Well, time might tell. Unfortunately, there is a group who has sought and been awarded a court injunction to postpone the initial use of the machine. Scientists don't seem overly concerned. Apparently, the injunction is only to provide the objectors a bit of time to gather their evidence. But I find it sad that the ill-informed and paranoid are allowed to stand in the way of scientific progress.

As for the prediction of 9/11, it's another topic but it was most certainly predicted. Not in the usual mystical, eerie, paranormal sense of the word "predict" but in the real-world, solid, evidence-based sense. The president was warned of a plot to use hijacked aircraft as missiles against strategic buildings on U.S. soil. The government even practiced for just such a scenario as evidenced by a FEMA document which shows the World Trade Center towers with a large cross-hair on them. With all of the attacks in the past, to believe there would be no future attacks would be a belief of pure ignorance -- ignoring the evidence and the obvious. It's little wonder that the president and his staff quickly began claiming that no one in government could have foreseen the potential for such an event (despite the fact that NORAD admitted they'd practiced for such an event), since they did less than nothing to prevent it.

There are, of course, reasoned explanations for why security for the towers was reduced 2-weeks prior to the attack and to why bomb-sniffing dogs were pulled out of the building. But because it differs from the official report, which admittedly doesn't fit the evidence, most people will simply hand-wave the explanations that do fit the evidence.

well said, I agree that the ill informed may postpone scientific things yet, would you rather be sure of something than to go ahead with something that could have far more ill effect than one may propose.

and well as for pres. Bush and his antics that is another subject all together, I have no problem saying I do not care at all for the man..

Scientists get death threats over Large Hadron Collider
By Roger Highfield, Science Editor
Last Updated: 12:01am BST 05/09/2008


Scientists working on the world's biggest machine are being besieged by phone calls and emails from people who fear the world will end next Wednesday, when the gigantic atom smasher starts up.

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The Large Hadron Collider near Geneva, where particles will begin to circulate around its 17 mile circumference tunnel next week, will recreate energies not seen since the universe was very young, when particles smash together at near the speed of light.


Hadron Collider: The final pieces slot into place
Such is the angst that the American Nobel prize winning physicist Frank Wilczek of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has even had death threats, said Prof Brian Cox of Manchester University, adding: "Anyone who thinks the LHC will destroy the world is a t---."

The head of public relations, James Gillies, says he gets tearful phone calls, pleading for the £4.5 billion machine to stop.

"They phone me and say: "I am seriously worried. Please tell me that my children are safe," said Gillies.

Emails also arrive every day that beg for reassurance that the world will not end, he explained.

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Others are more aggressive. "There are a number who say: "You are evil and dangerous and you are going to destroy the world."

"I find myself getting slightly angry, not because people are getting in touch but the fact they have been driven to do that by what is nonsense. What we are doing is enriching humanity, not putting it at risk."

There have also been legal attempts to halt the start up.

The remarkable outpouring of concern about turning on the experiment, the most ambitious in history, comes as a new report concludes that it poses no threat to mankind.

Since 1994, when the collider was first mooted by the multi-national European nuclear research organisation (CERN), dogged doomsayers have claimed that there would be a small but real risk that an unstoppable cataclysm would take place.

Many of the emails received by Gillies cite a gloomy book - Our Final Century?: Will the Human Race Survive the Twenty-first Century? - written by Lord Rees, astronomer royal and president of the Royal Society.

"My book has been misquoted in one or two places," Lord Rees said yesterday. "I would refer you to the up-to-date safety study."

The new report published today provides the most comprehensive evidence available to confirm that nature's own cosmic rays regularly produce more powerful particle collisions than those planned within the LHC.

The LHC Safety Assessment Group has reviewed and updated a study first completed in 2003, which dispels fears of universe-gobbling black holes and of other possibly dangerous new forms of matter, and confirms that the switch-on will be safe.

The report, 'Review of the Safety of LHC Collisions', published in the Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics, proves that if particle collisions at the LHC had the power to destroy the Earth, we would never have been given the chance to worry about the LHC, because regular interactions with more energetic cosmic rays would already have destroyed the Earth.

The Safety Assessment Group writes, "Nature has already conducted the equivalent of about a hundred thousand LHC experimental programmes on Earth - and the planet still exists."

The Group compares the rates of cosmic rays that bombard Earth to show that hypothetical black holes or strangelets, that have raised fears in some, will pose no threat.

As the Group writes, "Each collision of a pair of protons in the LHC will release an amount of energy comparable to that of two colliding mosquitoes, so any black hole produced would be much smaller than those known to astrophysicists." They also say that such microscopic black holes could not grow dangerously.

As for the equally hypothetical strangelets, the review uses recent experimental measurements at the Brookhaven National Laboratory's Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider, New York, to prove that they will not be produced in the LHC.

The collider is designed to seek out new particles including the long-awaited Higgs boson responsible for making things weigh what they do, the possible source of gravity called dark matter, as well as probe the differences between matter and antimatter.


Web Address

Once the world was the center of the universe.

Then the world was flat. Best not explore two far, or else you might fall off.

Then with the first atom bomb, some thought that all the atmosphere of the planet would be incerated, others thought all of New Mexico would be devestated.


Then the sound barrier could not be broken, it would kill anybody who attempted it.

Now this. Just one more doomsayer in a long historical line, of ignorant people fearing what they don't understand.


Personally the potential for new types of energy are nigh limetless with research like this. Let the people do their thing. And yes, bad press always get's more attention/coverage than good press.

Nature of the beast.

its almost time!~

hey in my town there is a few apocalypse parties i hear. people getting so smashed cuz they think they wont be alive to feel the hangover. when they go to work tomorrow im sure they will likely regret it. lol.

Don't think particle collisions are planned until after 21 October 2008

I'm all for discovering what really makes the universe tick, but i get the strange feeling its something that Human's should be...messing about it >.< I'm not a doomsayer, i honestly believe that the media has blown it completely out of protortion But i accept that it WILL go ahead as planned, because thats how governments work. Lol.

Hope they do find that God particle, i bet it would bring many revelations.

I donot believe that we shall blow up or a black hole will swallow us, i think they reported the tests have started last night so lets see, maybe something may occur, Thinking of the movie the mist, lol naaaaaaaaaah

Well as I was analysing the aliens and ufo phenomena this task was given to me by my elder M'Lord Hawkmoor,
from those time I did have experience that if worlds big nations such as USA, Japan, India and Russia jointly doing such a big project at govt level as well as institution level, they are not fool to carry the threat to the planet. my curiocity was to what extent its successful.

now the science too progressing very fast with this LHC,

Eight Nations equally contributed over this project and my nation India too. the photon readers and many things built in Indian laboratories too. the level was what a high you can read with this and how can we expect the threat from our leaders? Its never been.

Photon bombardment is most fierce from sun and the cosmaic rays are most fierce than every man collided photon rays. even human also collide the energy and produce photon in its body.

the scale may be different. How can the human match the sun which have the core blasting the energies to whole solar system.

here the level of participation you may find in this my post :


John Ellis: From (India and) Russia with love:

This week we had contacts with high-level representatives of a couple of non-member countries that are participating strongly in the LHC programme. Last Wednesday CERN was visited by the President of India, Avul Pakir Jainulabdeen Abdul Kalam. Born into a modest fishing family, he studied science, then became a rocket engineer and the father of the Indian missile and satellite programmes. He met Indian teams working at CERN to test LHC magnets and on Grid software, as well as the usual CERN bigwigs. He is the first head of state I have met who knows about the Standard Model of elementary particles! The first picture shows yours truly with (from right to left) Archana Sharma, an Indian staff member of CERN, Diether Blechschmidt who has been handling India-CERN relations, Anil Kakodkar, the head of the Indian Department of Atomic Energy and several Indians working at CERN on the LHC project.




The next morning, I was off to Moscow as a member of a CERN delegation for one of our regular six-monthly coordination meetings with the Russian Minister of Education and Science, A. Fursenko. From our hotel, we had a good view of the Kremlin (left), St Basil's church (right) and an exhibition of construction equipment (foreground). The third picture was sent to me by my good colleague Vladimir Kadyshevsky, the Director of the Dubna Laboratory, with the heading 'From Russia with love'. Over the Minister's head (at the left) you see the CERN delegation, with our Director-General Robert Aymar in full flow. Several Russian Institutes, notably the Budker Institute of Nuclear Physics in Novosibirsk, are participating in the construction of the LHC accelerator as well as its detectors. Progress is generally good: for example, Novosibirsk has provided the magnets for the lines that will transfer protons between CERN’s existing SPS accelerator and the LHC. For years, several magnets were arriving by truck every month from central Siberia. After their installation, these magnets worked perfectly the first time a beam was sent through them along the transfer line to the LHC tunnel.




This CERN-Russia meeting provided the opportunity for a bit of tourism and a convivial dinner with our Russian partners, as seen in the last picture. That's Minister Fursenko sitting on my right: do not be misled by the impressive array of bottles of mineral water in the foreground!


USA:

24
Worldwide LHC Collaborations
International collaborations will conduct experiments
using the LHC. They include:
ALICE 98 institutions, 29 countries
ATLAS 158 institutions, 35 countries
CMS182 institutions, 38 countries
LHCb 48 institutions,15 countries
TOTEM11institutions, 8 countries
US Institutions Participating in LHC
88 institutions from across the United States participate
in five LHC experiments, and four US national laboratories
belong to the US LHC Accelerator Research Program
(LARP). They are listed to the right:
High-tech magnets from the US
To expose the mysteries of matter, space, and time, the
LHC will produce hundreds of millions of collisions per second.
The exact collision rate depends on the performance
of special magnets that focus the particle beams into the
centers of the large collider detectors. Collaborating with
CERN and the Japanese laboratory KEK, three DOE
national laboratories—Fermilab, Brookhaven, and Lawrence
Berkeley—have developed and built nine sets of beamfocusing
systems for the LHC, each 40 meters long.
“It’s great to see international collaborators making
a large contribution to the construction of an accelerator,”
says Fermilab’s Jim Kerby, the project manager of the
US LHC Accelerator Project. “It provided us the opportunity
to push magnet technology, to learn, and to train
the next generation of skilled people. You don’t have an
opportunity like this very often.”
About one third of the US-built focusing magnets have
already been installed in the LHC tunnel, and the rest
will be in place by March. When the LHC turns on in 2007,
the magnets will “squeeze” the width of the two proton
beams to less than the diameter of a hair. They will focus
the beams on the collision points at the center of the
detectors, maximizing the number of head-on protonproton
collisions.
Ongoing R&D
Although the start-up of the LHC is about a year away,
accelerator experts are already exploring options of making
the LHC even better. To maximize the number of collisions—
and hence the scientific productivity of the LHC—physicists
anticipate upgrades to various parts of the machine.
Scientists from Brookhaven, Fermilab, Lawrence
Berkeley, and Stanford Linear Accelerator Center are
members of the US LHC Accelerator Research Program
(LARP), which receives approximately $10 million of
funding per year. A key aspect of the program is to train
the next generation of accelerator experts in the United
States. Just as the work on previous accelerators laid
the foundation for the LHC, the current efforts will set
the stage for the next generation of colliders.
“The United States is looking to future projects at
CERN and is already participating in the CLIC [advanced
accelerator] R&D,” says Tsesmelis. “The collaboration
between US and European laboratories on the ILC
[International Linear Collider] is also strong, opening up
opportunities for the globalization of the project. All
this bodes well for a continued and robust collaboration
between CERN and the United States in the future.”
For now, experimenters are focusing on the great discoveries
at the LHC that have become the topic of
numerous science stories in newspapers and magazines.
In turn, the number of graduate students interested in
a career in particle physics is going up.
“The buzz is out there,” says Tuts. “At US universities, we
have a large number of incoming students who say,
‘I want to do LHC physics.’ They are hearing that there
will be tremendously exciting physics.”
Top: Engineer Dean White (right) and technician Kirsten Affolder operate
a gantry robot at the University of California, Santa Barbara, to assemble
silicon detector modules for the CMS detector. Bottom: In May 2004,
Fermilab celebrated the shipment of the first Fermilab-KEK focusing
magnet to CERN.
Photos: UC Santa Barbara, Fermilab
Page 22: The giant CMS detector takes shape at CERN. The US CMS
collaboration designed the $44-million hadron calorimeter, which will
measure the energy of particles produced in collisions at the center of
the detector.
Photo: Fred Ullrich, Fermilab
symmetry |
volume 03 |
issue 06 |
august 06
25
Arizona
University of Arizona, Tucson (ATLAS)
California
California Institute of Technology, Pasadena (CMS)
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley (ATLAS, LARP)
Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, Livermore (CMS)
Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Menlo Park (ATLAS, LARP)
University of California, Berkeley (ATLAS)
University of California, Davis (CMS)
University of California, Irvine (ATLAS)
University of California, Los Angeles (CMS)
University of California, Riverside (CMS)
University of California, San Diego (CMS)
University of California, Santa Barbara (CMS)
University of California, Santa Cruz (ATLAS)
Colorado
University of Colorado, Boulder (CMS)
Connecticut
Fairfield University, Fairfield (CMS)
Yale University, New Haven (ATLAS, CMS)
Florida
Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne (CMS)
Florida International University, Miami (CMS)
Florida State University, Tallahassee (CMS)
University of Florida, Gainesville (CMS)
Illinois
Argonne National Laboratory, Argonne (ATLAS)
Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia (CMS, LARP)
Northwestern University, Evanston (CMS)
University of Chicago, Chicago (ATLAS)
University of Illinois at Chicago (CMS)
University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign (ATLAS)
Indiana
Indiana University, Bloomington (ATLAS)
Purdue University, West Lafayette (CMS)
Purdue University Calumet, Hammond (CMS)
University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame (CMS)
Iowa
Iowa State University, Ames (ATLAS, CMS)
University of Iowa, Iowa City (CMS)
Kansas
Kansas State University, Manhattan (CMS)
University of Kansas, Lawrence (CMS)
Maryland
Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore (CMS)
University of Maryland, College Park (CMS)
Massachusetts
Boston University, Boston (ATLAS, CMS)
Brandeis University, Waltham (ATLAS)
Harvard University, Cambridge (ATLAS)
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge (ATLAS, CMS)
Northeastern University, Boston (CMS)
Tufts University, Medford (ATLAS)
University of Massachusetts, Amherst (ATLAS)
Michigan
Michigan State University, East Lansing (ATLAS)
University of Michigan, Ann Arbor (ATLAS)
Minnesota
University of Minnesota, Minneapolis (CMS)
Mississippi
University of Mississippi, Oxford (CMS)
Nebraska
Creighton University, Omaha (ALICE)
University of Nebraska, Lincoln (CMS)
New Jersey
Princeton University, Princeton (CMS)
Rutgers State University of New Jersey, Piscataway (CMS)
New Mexico
New Mexico University, Albuquerque (ATLAS)
New York
Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton (ATLAS, LARP)
Columbia University, New York (ATLAS)
Cornell University, Ithaca (CMS)
New York University, New York (ATLAS)
Rockefeller University, New York (CMS)
State University of New York at Albany (ATLAS)
State University of New York at Buffalo (CMS)
State University of New York at Stony Brook (ATLAS)
Syracuse University, Syracuse (LHCb)
University of Rochester, Rochester (CMS)
North Carolina
Duke University, Durham (ATLAS)
Ohio
Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland (TOTEM)
Ohio State University, Columbus (ALICE, ATLAS, CMS)
Ohio Supercomputer Center, Columbus (ALICE)
Oklahoma
Oklahoma State University, Oklahoma (ATLAS)
University of Oklahoma, Oklahoma (ATLAS)
Oregon
University of Oregon, Eugene (ATLAS)
Pennsylvania
Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh (CMS)
Penn State University, University Park (TOTEM)
University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia (ATLAS)
University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh (ATLAS)
Puerto Rico
University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez (CMS)
Rhode Island
Brown University, Providence (CMS)
Tennessee
Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge (ALICE)
Vanderbilt University, Nashville (CMS)
Texas
Rice University, Houston (CMS)
Southern Methodist University, Dallas (ATLAS)
Texas A&M University, College Station (CMS)
Texas Tech University, Lubbock (CMS)
University of Texas at Arlington (ATLAS)
Virginia
Hampton University, Hampton (ATLAS)
University of Virginia, Charlottesville (CMS)
Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, Blacksburg (CMS)
Washington
University of Washington, Seattle (ATLAS)
Wisconsin
University of Wisconsin, Madison (ATLAS, CMS)
US institutions participating in the Large Hadron Collider

Let me explain you what is the LHC Project, This project involve scientists over the world ( more than 45 nations ) but govt level 15 govts did attach to this project, but nations leading this project equally contributed to the project with brain and or economy.

you can see the simple explaation of the project which satisfy each one who suspect this project.

Sci. & Tech.:

Indian scientists part of studies on creation of universe
New Delhi, Feb 12. (PTI): Indian scientists are testing magnets for carrying out experiments to understand the creation of the universe in the world's most powerful particle accelerator in Switzerland that will be commissioned in November.

The 27-km underground tunnel of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) will smash protons at very high speeds to recreate the conditions encountered in the first few billionths of a second of the creation of the universe.

"Indian scientists are testing magnets for one of the four detectors being built for the LHC," Robert Aymar, Director General of the European Organisation For Nuclear Research (CERN) told PTI.

By December-end last year, nearly 80 per cent of the LHC's magnets, the main components of the machine, were installed underground in a facility built close to the Swiss-France border near Geneva.

A huge layered particle detector built using cutting-edge technology, involving both hardware and software, will be used to track and identify the particles produced in collisions.

Computer simulations based on information from all the layers reconstruct the particle track and identify its momentum, energy, and speed.

Aymar said, Indian scientists are also involved in developing the computing software for the LHC grid.

Scientists from Tata Institute of Fundamental Research (TIFR), Bhabha Atomic Research Center (BARC), Delhi University and Panjab University are involved in the two experiments -- Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) and A Large Ion Collider Experiment (ALICE) -- given to India.

Scientists believe that when the universe originated about 3.7 billion years ago, equal amounts of matter and anti- matter were created. The anti-matter, which is not found in the universe, has puzzled scientists and prompted them to take up ambitious projects like the LHC to trace it.

In the LHC, high-energy protons in two counter-rotating beams will be smashed together in search of signatures of super symmetry, dark matter and the origins of mass.

Travelling nearly at the speed of light, the beams, made up of bunches containing billions of protons, will be injected, accelerated and kept circulating for hours, guided by powerful super conducting magnets in the 27-km tunnel.

The beams, travelling in two separate vacuum pipes, will collide in the hearts of the main experiments -- CMS, ALICE, A Toroidal LHC Apparatus (ATLAS) and LHC-beauty (LHCb).

The experiments' detectors will watch carefully as the energy of the colliding protons transforms fleetingly into a plethora of exotic particles.

"Progress on all four experiments is impressive and we are striving to be ready for the first collisions in November," said Aymar, who was here to attend the first India- EU Science Summit last week.

I'm sure that if the particles themselves were going to eat us all, it would have come to pass naturally a long time ago.

I'm not much of a physicist, but I think this thing is going to be a benefit, not a risk.

my this above post is related to our darkness. Is not it beautiful?

they trying to find antimatter which is lying in the space and become the space for matters and still prevailing everywhere in the matters or out of matter. you dont call the space as matter. its only the platform for Gigantic Creation and Jujbed the matters.

is not this collider useful for human race ?

if one come to know how the particles grown and came to formation, if short frmulation on dna bring them superthing or slight change in the matter turn dust to gold, why to cry on the matter... Govts never run risk bearing projects.

The truth is the we have more advanced kins far from our planet and this will lead us to compete with them.

the cathod rays too produce photons and photons always travel at the speed of light and if photon not exist how come the light is seen, the eyes have vision at the speed of photon. but the difference is concentration of energy due to compression in the core matter ad none other thing matter. the colliding is done in the core of earth that much extent human can not do from machines even in next thousand years. and dont compare with the sun, sun is the sun and its the star. the core and sphere always says you have mini core dont think of comparing it with the massed. coz such mass you will never acquire. yet you can gain the cosmin force and due to that you can get the help of these elements. cosmic force is the main energy of the framtion and its due to darkenss (antimatter).

Well Black Holes are balancing factors and it happe naturally on larger scale than the LHC in our earth. but t do vanish immediately coz not able to compress the matter (elements) to nonmatter (zero). its not as easy as the matter centrifusion or fission in atomic research center. If it was easy, the neutons and eisteins would used it in their era. yet possibility is the name of science. it can bring this to happen but when it confirmed at controlled level to use it as weapon.

Well this simply european union project, the ventured non CERN members ( non european union members).

its all nicely given post in wikipedia, dont forget to read the term dark matter and dark energy there.

This is the notes useful to me to think over.

these are as good as ascension (activity in the light).

When we all die and go *poof*, let me know. I always seem to miss the excitement. :(

Nice thread. I have extensively read up on this fascinating subject and also read Blasphemy - by Douglas Preston which is a fictional book based on the collider (as it was origianally suppose to be built by Regan here in the good old USA many years ago).

Quite frankly, if Steven Hawkings believes there is no chance of sustaining a black hole long enough for it to not implode upon itself - I doubt we have anything to worry about.

Even if they are able to "recreate the Big-bang" I don't see what the big deal is. I suppose some may state that man is playing God - but, quite frankly - if God didn't want us to know - we wouldn't have the ability to find out! This is also being used to see if there are ways to create a new enrgy source, which I am all for.

Lastly, my dears, if we are all getting sucked into the black hole - the government will NEVER tell us its coming. If that is to be the end of all things - I look forward to the new things I will experience in the afterlife.

Inherent Risk.
Life, every moment, contains risk. The sky could fall, we could be struck by a meteor, or the Loch Ness monster could eat us.
I feel life is all about calculated risk taking. If you run a cost v benefits analysis of this topic, it is clear that the benefits outweigh the possible costs.

I think it fair and supportable to say that if we don't play God, the role will remain unfulfilled. We've always played God. It's what we do. When we killed people for toiling on the Sabbath, we were playing God. When we tortured people and killed them for not worshiping as we worshiped we were playing God. The way I see it, someone has to so it might as well be scientists who are at least, not unable to handle seeing reality for what it is.

I find it terribly sad that the U.S. has forfeited it's ability to remain at the fore-front of technology and is instead, happy to remain in the dark ages until it comes to building that next hot-to-trot missile.

Compare the price of the LHC to one year's investment into the Iraq war. Now compare the potential for new knowledge.

psst we still can't feed all the ppl that we breed..
we still cant cure the common cold...
we still cant help someone open a door most of the time.

Hell, most people dont even know their neighbors name

We think we are SO advanced as americans..
to miss out on this chance at furthering our knowledge.. maybe it is happening to help us see our short commings

People are rarely quick to see their own short-comings (even when they're pointed out in great detail). Do you see most people recognizing their own short-comings?

I applaud your attempt to find a less devious angle but I think the reality shines through -- we're letting our lead go in order to push all of our financial power into the pockets of a very few. Those corporations that make "war toys", have been taking in most of $200 billion some-odd dollars a year for many years now. Meanwhile, we can't spare less than 4-billion for the world's most promising collider ever to be built. We'd actually broken ground and had a substantial investment into the LHC (in Texas, if I remember correctly), before government pulled the plug. Our values are not where they should be which is something upon which we can agree.

As far as feeding the people of the world; we could. But first we would have to give up practices of barbarity in exchange for greater health, and greater food production. It's not likely to happen with or without the advent of billions of available dollars.

Sidenote: Fermilab also lost a great deal of funding recently, to the hands of government who have other agendas for upon which to invest the money that had already been approved for Fermilab -- America's largest physics research facility.

so you mean to say that the hooplah about the world ending was all for a test run?

if so i am quite amused by it all. POP QUIZ: how fast do the particles go? if the proton were to do laps how many laps would it do in a second? well thats presumptuous of me, the things what 27km, maybe minutes... nah speed of light.. . . now i am confusing myself.

sure i could google it but you guys say you have researched this topic to the max so take the pop quiz, won't ya?

hottubmolly,

Re: "how fast do the particles go? if the proton were to do laps how many laps would it do in a second? well thats presumptuous of me, the things what 27km, maybe minutes... nah speed of light.. . . now i am confusing myself."

The speed of the particles is a bit different wherever you look. A common speed listed is 99.99999% of the speed of light. Light travels at about 186,122 miles per second (300,000 kilometers per second) which applies to "empty" space. In nearly every figure given, the only variance is the number of "9"s to the right of the decimal place. Objects with matter cannot accelerate to the speed of light but they can come very close.
---

Re: "sure i could google it but you guys say you have researched this topic to the max so take the pop quiz, won't ya?"

I would never imlpy that I've researched this topic "to the max". My feeble brain is barely able to grasp even the most fundamental concepts employed. But I do enjoy bumping up against my limitations in attempting to understand it further.


(Armstrong! - 2009 TdF)

Yea, I mean look how stupid they where when they made solar panels, and computers, I mean nothing science does helps us. Unlike all those metaphysical people, I mean they are really advancing society.

Thank you dabbler, Just what i was thinking. If everyone has that kind of mind set I believe we would still be stuck in the dark ages.

Personally i'm looking forward the the conclusion of this experiment and the knowledge we could potentially gain about the start of our universe, dark matter and dimensions. It could mean the start of a whole new era.

JuggaletteOfSin,

For anyone to utilize a computer on the Internet to suggest that science or scientists "dumb" is much like debarking your luxury accommodations in first class aboard a Boeing 747-400 to attend a meeting where you intend to speak on the absurdity of mechanical flight.

I grant you that you have provided your opinion but must such opinions are born of ignorance (lack of knowledge specific to the topic in question). So perhaps it would help if you would be kind enough to answer some questions.

1. What does a collider do?

2. What experiment are the scientist using the collider for?

3. What do you think could happen if "something goes wrong"?

4. What is a hadron?

5. What makes this collider different from others which have been operating for years?

6. What is the speed of the processor on the computer which you're currently using?

7. What is the storage capacity of the (main) hard drive on the computer you're using?

Maybe if you would answer these questions for us, we might begin to understand the disparity of opinion between most of us posting here and the few who believe that science has over-stepped and failed to use sufficient caution.

Thank you in advance.

(Armstrong - 2009 Tdf!)

why... what would be the point of trying to creat the damn black hole no good comes from it... they say all this crap would happen then if you know that why would u have to test it? why not use ur brainy ways to try to fin a cure to save lives instead of trying to end all life as we know it?

and then the other probel I have is half the crap they creat have long term affects in the end like they wont see the bad in the beginning give it a few years and then their children have deformities and wind up dying at birth or mothers can't have children b/c of what they did, or what about the atmosphere I just hate that they have to test the fabric of life you only get to live the way u are once.

No one is trying to create a black hole. The collider is used to accelerate particles and then smash them together to examine the debris. If a black hole resulted as a consequence of accelerating the particles, it wouldn't be the intention of the experiment.


(Armstrong 2009 TdF)

Birth defects from smashing protons? In case you forgot we're made up of protons, among other things :)

The sun and cosmic rays kill more people than those crazy scientists.

Ever close your eyes and see big poof of bright light? Thats an iron atom smashing through your retina from a supernova millions of light years away. (Some times not every light you see with your eyes closed is from cosmic rays).

Lightning is caused by the Sun, how many people are hurt/killed by it each year?...

Besides the LHC doesn't create dangerous waste and the radiation that it produces during operation can't get out of the tunnel and once the LHC stops firring all the radiation goes away.

Gotta remember that no one is in the tunnel during operation thus kept totally safe.

I'm no expert but if they did create a stable black hole then we wouldn't be around to know about it, right?

The black hole created would most likely (as you've alluded to), not be stable. But if it were, it would be a very slowly progressing black hole at first. It might likely sink to the core of the Earth (due to the gravitational attraction), and could remain there for years. But once it passes a critical mass it's growth (as I understand it), would accelerate very dramatically. From that point, I doubt we would have more than just long enough to notice that something was wrong before we became residents of the black hole.

for those that believe in metaphysical interfacing with physical splitting that veil is something that is seldom mentioned in the metaphysical forums. A rift could be imagined to open. Now then where is the fear of this universe (non-metaphysical) being effected by the metaphysical world, every time the veil is parted.. as per the claims of Life After Death Based religions? I await your reply?

Well if LHC Project gves success, the quantum science will be on the boost, many doors will be opened to scientists, the HC project were conducted by many nations in their own labs at small level. but this joint venture will give universal sharing of this advance science. it if sucessful, I think there can be a nice change in the total future by having changes in the dna formulations and certain life saving properites of substances. This will lead human to explore other similer planets too. each stream of science is inter-connected to each other.

This is one of those things that I find very interesting. I have very scientific knowledge...gonna be honest...but someone would have done it at some point in time.

It does open up huge possibilities and gives humanity a chance to explore more...

But the fact that it could cause a black hole here on earth...not gonna lie is kinda terrifying

I can only guess that there would be much worse ways to go and certainly, no one would have to feel they were alone. Every advancement carries with it a measure of risk. This one just uses a cosmic-size ruler. ;)

I did hear that a girl in India watched a news reel on the atom smasher. the news reel claimed that it is going to be the end of the world and so on. She killed herself because of it. they need to quit scaring people. And saying it is going to cause the end of the world! That is ridiculous because you really can't know that until it actually happens. All I have heard is that the atom smashers purpose is to prove the "big bang theory" to be correct. Thanks for posting this thread Dabbler very informative. You rock!

I actually heard that they started it up a few days ago however the first major collision isnt meant to occur until a month after it started... so I believe we will have to just wait and see

Perhaps the Universe is a black hole already and we live within it?

Supposition runs rampant before anything is actually "done" - and mostly worse case scenarios - but then, sometimes that is a good thing.

Waiting on my father to get back into town to discuss this - we have before, and since he is a nuclear physicist, he'd have some valuable information to give me on this wonderous event. I'm excited for it and all the data that will be gleaned from it.

There is nothing a human being can create that will destroy this whole planet and every single person instantly. We all underestimate Earth and it's people greatly. Sure, this thing might cause some defects, but destroy the planet? Unlikely

It was supposed that the exploding of the a-bombs would burn up the atmosphere but did it?

Wow dark Whispers please post a link to that story, I have to read that, and check the sources as well.

Hi Dabbler,

Don't mean to barge in but i've found the story here, it's heartbreaking:(

a href="http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26641652/target="_blank">Text here

Sorry, still can't do the links.


Here's one of the address':

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26641652/

Thank you for posting that article, a very strong point is made about dooms day forecasters, and the effect they have especially if they have a forum on a major broadcast. I am really hit by that story. One can figure that someone would be likely to transfer other problems his daughter had to the news story, but I would not in this case.. The power of doom forecast on very superstitious people, I would bet that the speaker had sway as well, to be on a public forum.. if only the braod cast was preceded by the science forum. Thank you DW.

I was under the impression that this wasn't going to take place until 2012. At least that's what they were saying a few months ago. I read about it first on that list of why the world is going to end in 2012.

OK. I forgot too add this. but according to a few pages I read, if this machine doesn't work, or goes wrong. it can somehow cause the world to implode to the size of a perfectly round basketball? huh!? is it just me or is that idea a little far fetched! lol

Looks like the Earth didn't end after all (told ya so!) :P

Granted it won't be fully operational until next year but at least the calibrations went well.

Until it is fully operational, we cannot know the consequences of using it. However, I believe that the matter quantity is too small to generate any gravity fluctuation. So far it seem safe. I mean, I'm still alive.

The tests carried out so far on the LHC were single beams going in opposite directions around the ring, but not at the same time.

The hysteria surrounding this machine is amuzing at best and a sad statment regarding the scientific illiteracy of the average person at worst.

The lack of understanding as well as the proliferation of lawsuits and negative PR is the major reason so many past scientific discoveries were cloaked in secrecy and the results not made public for years after the work was actually done.

The benefits of the discoveries regarding the fundamental makeup of the universe, of matter itself so greatly out weight the miniscule risk of some minor negative outcome to make opposition to the experiments to be carried out in the LHC to be laughable.

It is a sad statement that our society is composed of far more avid followers of the glitterati than the litterati

Well i do agree that people fear the unknown, that is common sense. But the reason a lot of people are freaking over it is because they don't want or need a change.

I have tried to contain myself and not post this... really I have...

*sigh I fail*

For those that are completely lost with what is being talked about- perhaps hearing it to music will help:

They main flaw: they are in a reactionary mode now because of panic.

What should have been done is mass-media education of the public. Fear of the unknown is the greatest fear the public has and if they had invested a little bit of money into PR and educating the harmlessness of this, the public wouldn't be in a panic right now.

The collider at Stanford has been there for years.

As a side note, what really ticks me off about this is the 4.5 billion dollars spent on it. 4.5 billion dollars would solve not only our country's homeless problem, but the world's homeless problem.

I'm all for scientific advancement, but not at the sacrifice of your fellow human beings. Let's "fix" us first, then we can expirement all we want. :)

Indian girl commits suicide over 'Big Bang' fear
In India, fears about the experiment spread rapidly through the media

A teenage girl in central India killed herself on Wednesday after being traumatized by media reports that a "Big Bang" experiment in Europe could bring about the end of the world, her father said.

The 16-year old girl from the state of Madhya Pradesh drank pesticide and was rushed to the hospital but later died, police said.

Her father, identified on local television as Biharilal, said that his daughter, Chayya, killed herself after watching doomsday predictions made on Indian news programs.

"In the past two days, Chayya had asked me and other relatives about the world coming to an end on September 10," Biharilal was quoted as saying.

"We tried to divert her attention and told her she should not worry about such things, but to no avail," he said.

For the past two days, many Indian news channels held discussions airing doomsday predictions over a huge particle-smashing machine buried under the Swiss-French border.

The machine, called the Large Hadron Collider, was switched on on Wednesday, at the start of what experts say is the largest scientific experiment in human history.

The machine smashes particles together to achieve, on a small-scale, re-enactments of the "Big Bang" that created the universe.

Leading scientists and researchers at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, said the experiment was safe. They dismissed as "pure fiction" doomsday predictions that the experiment could create anti-matter, or black holes.

But in deeply religious and superstitious India, fears about the experiment and the minor risks associated with it spread rapidly through the media.

In east India, thousands of people rushed to temples to pray and fast while others savored their favorite foods in anticipation of the world's end.

"There were a thousand more devotees yesterday as well as today compared to (any) other normal day," Benudhara Sahu, a temple official in Orissa state, told Reuters.

Many women and children rushed to temples and observed fasts as they prayed for deliverance, officials and witnesses said.

Assurances by scientists and the media that nothing would happen counted for nothing for housewife Rukmini Moharana.

"I visited temple, prayed to god," Moharana said. "I am observing the fast for safety because god can only save us."


SOURCE:
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26641652/

No logical sense there. If the world is going to blow up, why would you kill yourself? At least with the world option, you have a 50/50 chance. There was obviously more mentally going on with her than we know.

$4.5 billion wouldn't solve the worlds anything. It may seem like a lot of money to an individual but it is really a pathetically small amount.

In the words of Hawkings "If we can't invest less than 1% of the global GDP to advance we deserve to have a black hole form."

CERN gave us the internet, the LHC will give us greater control over quantum computers (silicone computing will be obsolete and maxed out within 20 years), insight into possible time travel and a host of many other things.

We can afford to both feed the worlds hungry and smash protons together, besides getting rid of poverty is nothing but a pipe dream, advancing humanity to the stars is not.

The seeds of Doom forecast, is a high profit field, it is also worth noting that those that claim 2012 tie-ins also advocate "unclassifying alien technology, so in motive they have plenty, To attack actual science, the same science that scoffs their psuedo-science, as I have stated look at the effects that these people (doom forecasters) are having on people, little girl watches some whack job on a hype forum and she dispares to kill her self, what would / could have been so hard about putting a public education (like PBS) show about the LHC? How many things have these people Fore Cast? I assure you if you looked into these Psuedo scientific Hacks you would sweep their garbage out of your Open Mind.

Dabbler your theory is fine for a child raised in the US or similar European culture. This child was not born in such they were born in India where despite the education; they also have very strong religious beliefs. To those that have superstitions, and then have them amplified by their cultural news media is sad, but it happens. Heck I remember when people thought 1999 was going to be the "end of the world"... and look we're still here and not cloned yet.

Personally I think that part of the problem is people don't really understand the purpose is not to create a big bang but to figure out some of the gaps that our science currently has. Either they will be proven or disproven.

To what extent, well that still is being waited on.

And while they have been building the LHC for years, it has not had as much attention, because they are just now getting ready to start. I remember the "buzz" with mapping the human genome. That actually took less time than they had expected. Perhaps the results from this endeavor will also be found as quickly- perhaps it will fail.

Point is not that the point is that we will learn from the entire process. Either what is or what isn't and then ask the next set of questions to either prove or disprove.

When we went to the moon, there was people who "(without a sread of reasoning) insisted that their would be contamination returning, a sci-fi book was eventually found to be the source, it was also found that a "Psuedo science hack, had been selling sealing chambers to rural country folk. The brother of the guy that started the "doom fore cast."

I am not sure what you are addressing, I am removed from the hype.. I addressed the doom forecasters effect on the genral public, that hype that paniced this little girl, and sent people in mass to temple.. How easily they could have put on an educational program, yet people like the doom, and the programers need ratings, and there will always be a doom forecaster to stir mass hysteria, they will always claim they are scientist as well.

KCRC,

Re: "The tests carried out so far on the LHC were single beams going in opposite directions around the ring, but not at the same time."

I absolutely agree with everything you said; especially where you address the lack of understanding behind people's hysteria over the LHC. A lack of understanding always seems to lead to unreasonable fears. Knowledge clears those fears (usually).

To flesh out what you've stated concerning the test; the test beams were substantially below the maximum power capability of the LHC. While it should be able to achieve 7 TeV (Tera-electron Volts) per particle, the test utilized only 450-GeV (Giga-electron Volts). So people who want to be hysterical/concerned still get to be hysterical but the hysteria is largely unfounded. Plans are in the works for a new linear collider which should achieve 64 TeV (I need to double-check references on that), so they'll get their chance all over again if they choose to a "wait and see approach" here.
---

bloodharvest,

Re: "However, I believe that the matter quantity is too small to generate any gravity fluctuation."

I was a bit baffled by this as well but I think it has to do with a concept which is generally stated that mass increases as you approach the speed of light. The LHC will accelerate particles to very near the speed of light (approx. 99.9999%), so this principle of physics should come into play. While my grasp of this remains very tenuous at best, it has to do with the fact that how space-time is perceived or experienced is relative to the motion of the object from which the observation takes place. At those velocities, there is a warping of space-time in the frame reference of the particle. Since gravity itself is but the warping of space-time, it appears that the potential for a black hole is theoretically present.

But the idea that the black hole could attain a state of stability seems to be an issue of intense debate. Most of the top minds seem to believe there is no cause for concern. Any mini black hole created will vanish almost as quickly as it appears. It will never have a chance to devour anything.

I've also noted a few referring to the LHC as an "atom smasher" and it is very similar to one. However, it's referred to as a "hadron collider" because it isn't intended to accelerate whole atoms. Instead it will be accelerating sub-atomic particles such as protons and neutrons (hadron particles).

Hopefully, as the work progresses with this machine, I can have some feeble hope of understanding some small percentage of the new information it will reveal.

As far as the cost, I'd rather spend the 4.5 billion on this than the 200+ billion being spent annually on a war. I haven't seen any positive results from that so far and, in my opinion, none are promised.

As I see it, there is much cause to rejoice but little credible cause for concern where the LHC or even the LLC are concerned.

sahahria,

Re: "Personally I think that part of the problem is people don't really understand the purpose is not to create a big bang but to figure out some of the gaps that our science currently has. Either they will be proven or disproven."

You've totally nailed it here and this goes back to what KCRC was saying. People simply lack an understanding of the purpose and intent. Some hold just enough information to generate intense concern where no such concern is warranted. And the lack of understanding is leading to much undue anxiety and a few outright tragedies. We should note that tragedies attributable to ignorance (a lack of understanding), is simply another good argument for attempting to keep people informed.

One of the major expectations is that the collision of two hadrons at the energies generated in the LHC will break them down to their most basic components -- the point at which further division to smaller units simply isn't possible. This is the theoretical state of the universe about a billionth of a second after the big bang. If successful, it will reveal the fundamental unit of the entirety of the physical realm. When it comes to understanding matter/energy, such knowledge is HUGE! Physicists refer to such knowledge as "the answer to everything". Of course that's to be taken from a physics perspective rather than a philosophical one.

Scientists theorized that in several billion years our galaxy will collide with the andromeda galaxy and we'd all be swallowed by a black hole anyway......
at least this way we get to see the excitement, and may profit from it if it doesn't happen now.

See? In worse case scenario it's only speeding up the inevitable... lol

That's a good observation.

Fortunately, for those of us alive today, the event isn't expected for about 2.8 billion years. So there is an assumption among those who worry about it that humans will still exist in 2.8 billion years. The dinosaurs didn't last that long and we've not been overly loving in the treatment of the planet upon which our existence relies.

If humans are still around in 2.8 billion years, the collision of the two galaxies may or may not bring that to an end. Stars in a galaxy are spaced so far apart, that on the scale of the total number of cosmic objects, there may be very few collisions. When you consider that the nearest star to our solar system (excluding our sun), is 4.3 light years away, it helps to recognize how little substance there is in a galaxy as compared to the overall size of the galaxy. Much like an atom, the vast majority of a galaxy is made up of the absence of anything other than space-time itself. The two galaxies may well pass through each other with little consequence from a universal perspective. Then again, if Earth ends up on a collision course with another planet, star or solar system, it will be of major consequence to anything living on Earth.

If we're still here and we survive the merging of the two galaxies, then we can look another 2.2 billion years into the future to the exhaustion of the hydrogen stores in the sun. Despite the ultimate conclusion that the Earth, will at some point, cease to exist; I'm not running to the phone to increase my life insurance. :)

I believe the children are our future. Teach them well and let them lead the way. Oh wait...no, that was a Whitney Houston song that Jack Black's character in 'School of Rock' used to schmooze the faculty of the private school he's was teaching at fraudfully... guess it still applies though.

People should charge forward with science. *Very personal view here (that is a an I believe statement and not what I think everyone else must buy into, but thinks would be nice)* I think intellect is a gift from God and He himself an imaginative creative being created us in His image... so why wouldn't we keep marching forward in life?

Excellent points all. I believe we’ve established the main problem with a large majority of the population over this matter to the total lack of knowledge that is being given to the public in a form that people can understand. Most of them hear ‘we are going to re-create the big bang’ and stop listening at that.

Ignorance is the bane of human existence, it’s one of the main reasons for the ‘The Spanish inquisition’, ‘The Salem witch trails’ and now, it’s turning out to be the main reason that most of the planet is in a state of panic instead of excitement as we head into the possible dawn of a new age of scientific knowledge

Perhaps it's more accurate to say the children are their future. But we most certainly can have a hand in shaping that future. So one of the things upon which we should remained focused is to see that they are well-informed by those adults who are themselves, well-informed with information which is well-evidenced. Had that occurred in the case of the LHC, perhaps one unnecessary death would have already been avoided.

As to the latter. Well...

For the most part, you continue to impress me. We all have much to learn. I hope that we all do, and that none of us ever runs out of things to learn.

or settle on the most flattering conclusion offered us.

Thanks for the compliment beast17, I only hope that the poeple with the power will begin to see some sense and stop this madness before more innocent people die over ignorance which is not even by their choice. It's driving me completley insane.

The mentality of doom forecasters allows them to think, and project themselves as a majority, like everybody accepts this, but you.. and then if you don't except the fad then it is because you are closed minded, which when it comes to accepting things that cause mass hysteria, is a good way to be.. it is hard to settle in a peace of mind about something when "everyone" seems to be pitching, or freaking out about some doom forecast, especially when one notices that actual social threats are being over sited and marginalized in the face of imagined dooms..

Point of fact- Colliding galaxies rarely "collide." A galaxy is made up of 90% empty space and the rest has gravity. Stars, planets etc. will gravitationally bounce off each other, there are very few actual collisions. If we're still on this little planet our night sky will change and there will be an increased risk of gamma ray bursts but other than that we'll be just fine.

There have been many experiments from bio to atomic and so forth, none have finished us off yet …… this collider was a lot of money for it to not work, I do think the reasons for it’s invention goes much farther than the doom and gloom smoke screen, I would like to know why this was given the ok?
On a scientific side I wander if this will show god didn’t make the big bang.
Funny thought maybe a race of beings made a collider n boom a rather big bang and it all starts again lol

The math behing this is sound. Something you can always count on, mathematics is a constant you can count on. And if it does create a black hole, it will be atomic in size and not able to grow. Harmless.

Yes maths being right based on the limited knowledge we have so far, sorry lol
They feel we might answer some superstring theories which would be nice. And yes early reports on this collider made a black hole and more, antimatter was the one that made me sweat …. Ok it forms and eats all till it ends due to mass and speed of collision.
Now there cranking up the power a lot …. They know what’s going to happen lol

Good points, Xzavier. That's likely why we didn't even notice until recently that our Milky Way galaxy is currently colliding with two other small galaxies. It's kind of like standing back 20 yards and throwing a handful of gravel at a point which intersects the path of another thrown handful of gravel. But in this case, it should probably be 20-miles rather than 20 yards and the pieces of gravel should be reduced to grains of sand.

I think the black hole thread we had here helped to show the wide variance of concepts people hold about such cosmic entities. Until that majority of people begin to hold a better understanding of the concepts involved, we can probably expect a bit more of this dramatic hysteria, attributable to a general lack of knowledge and lack of desire to gain knowledge.

Every one of these threads helps in a small way to increase the knowledge for a few people here who will likely have the opportunity to help non-VR friends gain a better understanding as well. And they tell two friends... and so on, and so on....

If a seed of panic breeds panic, then a seed of knowledge creates knowledge. How we fertalize that seed is important. If eveybody took a moment to seek a counter point before excepting something as sound information, the spread of doom forecast would choke earlier. We will never do away with Mass hysteria, yet we can reduce the impact of such a Social Phenomena.

What motive is served by doom forecasters? Some perhaps are under threat from people questioning their fringe claims, in light of actual discovery, discovery that carries application to this modern world, and create a threshold to the near future, something that all psuedo-science fields have yet to do.. applying their "research" to some existing condition.

The biggest hindrance to science isn't money or difficult experiments but the lack of adequate public opinion.

We, in the physics community, have done just about all we can to educate people and break things down in a way that easy to understand. In the end it comes down to the lack of personal interest which is really sad and unfortunate.

For example, this year alone my company lost over $5 million in funding because one of our investors felt that particle physics had little relevance, despite being told about the end of silicone.

I don't need people to understand exactly what we're doing but I do need people to get over their misconceptions and stop thinking that scientists are going to blow up the world or secretly creating a super 'zombie' virus.

When all is said and done, if humanity can't see that without further exploration, experiments etc. we as a species will die then perhaps that end is deserved.

I believe the old adage ‘people fear what they don’t understand and hate what they fear’ springs to mind here, Dabbler. Or perhaps there is some other motivation from another agency/government that doesn’t want this kind of knowledge to become too widespread for some unknown and completely unfathomable purpose. I just cannot believe people would deliberately leave the vast majority of the general public this ignorant about the possible implications of this wonderful experiment.

As for Xzavier’s post regarding the possible halt of experiments, & further exploration into all fields of science, that is just pure madness as it’s a well known fact that as a species you either evolve or die.

A god that can destroy is excepted, and has been unchallenged, yet if man hints at being able to create something grand then it must be "evil" right? Then there are those that call medical advancement "playing god, well I for one have been waiting for gods replacement, I mean what has that super being, and the minion of that being done so far?

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