Speaking as a member of psychotic loners union, I must protest. Aren’t “end of the world” announcements supposed to be our job?

Ray in Texas

This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but a whimper.
T. S. Eliot, The Hollow Men
British (US-born) critic, dramatist & poet (1888 – 1965)

I am not a physicist myself, though I consider myself well-informed as a lay-physicist. I teach in the public high school of my hometown and try to incorporate certain principles and ideas of Newtonian and the New Physics into my English and Social Studies curricula whenever appropriate to bridge the disciplines so they students will make larger connections. I am not sure how to respond to those Chicken-Littles out there with little or no understanding of particle physics. When Galileo argued that the universe was not perfect, people shut him down because otherwise the heavens would crumble. When Einstein argued that energy and matter were the same thing, the Victorian world could not get its head around it. When the New Physics crowd went beyond Einstein, even Einstein could not get his head around it. Then there were baseless fears that the testing of the first atomic bomb would lead to a chain reaction of surrounding atoms being destroyed leading to the annihilation of the planet at least! Well, as much as some people might hope that 1+1 does not equal 2, the fact is that 1+1 = 2. If the black holes that will conceivably be produced will have a life of only fractions of a second and a dimension absurdly small, then nothing of any great moment is going to happen like it would in a movie. Sorry. I am anxious to say Hi to Higgs!

Being killed by a Black Hole would be so very cool. Not like the old boring method.

9/11 was an inside job.

People should watch less TV.

There is no risk. Particle collisions this powerful and more have happened countless times already on earth, the moon and other planets from cosmic rays, and nothing like this has happened.

people do not worry nothing will happen the worst that could happen is that more questions and more theories will come that is all plain and simple

What if it opens a portal to hell?

If you are so sure, then answer this 54321Question!

Life on Earth as we know it is about 5 billion years old, while actual civilization is only about 4 thousand years old as in The Incas, The ancient Egyptians, the civilization in Mesopotamia and others. But real civilization is only about 3 hundred years old including Leonardo Da Vinci, Mozart and The Industrial Revolution. Now let us look at the last “2-Ten� years and compare that to the past 300 hundred years. The things that we have and invented in the past twenty years make everything before that look primitive. This includes computers, The Hubble telescope, DNA, cloning and many others.

Do you notice a pattern? Do you notice the laser exponential progress of technology?
Here is a summary:

5 Billion : Age of Life on Earth
4 Thousand : Civilization
3 Hundred : Real Civilization
2 Ten :Technology Explosion

Do you now notice the sequence? We can not deny facts. It took 5 billion years to get to civilization, but then it only took 4 thousand years to jump to real civilization. Later it only took 300 hundred years to leap into the explosion of technology which occurred in the last “2-Ten� years.

It is obvious that the next line is “1-One�.

If the previous “2-Ten� years were an explosion of technology that dwarfed the technology of the past 300 hundred years, then what is the technology that is going to be in the “NOW� that is going to make cloning, the Hubble telescope and the current computer power not just look mediocre but “PRIMITIVE�.

Is it The Large Hardon Collider?

If so, then what is the next line in the above logic?

Sam Bandak
Santa Clara, CA.
54321Answer@comcast.net

Thanks Sam. And it’s the Large Hadron Collider. I’m surprised that other word got through Spellcheck.

If this thing follows the naysayer’s idea, then the mega-black holes in space would have already eaten the entire known universe. Yet, the possibility of an extremely tiny, momentary appearance of something that looks like or acts like a black hole will suddenly expand “greater than thee” and swallow everything up?

Logic 101 wasn’t an elective when I went to college.

what if they accidentaly the whole thing?

Many of the people who are panicking about the experiment are the same people who would sign a petition to ban hydrogen dioxide (because it can and has caused death).

These people working on this experiment are experts and well educated in their field… not someone who’s assembling it out of Legos.

^ What if it gives us some actual answers? Cool stuff!

I am not particularly worried, however we are dealing with forces we do not yet fully understand (which is why we do the experiments) so I’m not convinced any of the “experts” know exactly what is going to happen. If they could say exactly what the outcome would be, they wouldn’t have spend billions on the experiment. I think it is healthy to be a little worried.

Well, if they fire it up, we’ll know for certain.

Will it happen…….probably not. Can it happen……….absolutely. OK, the statistical chance of this are EXTREMELY slim but since we don’t know everything there is about black holes AND we know it’s one of the (if not the) most powerful force in the universe then we can’t say to 100% probability that it won’t happen. These things are tiny but it’s mysterious nature and insane gravitational pull COULD swallow the universe into itself. We as humans DO NOT know the true power of these things. That being said, I think that this experiment will reap many benefits with just the sheer fact of knowing more about the universe, therefore I’m all for it. I think this paranoia is completely unfounded and ridiculous.

@ Mike

We would probably have a real life version of Hellgate London or Doom. Although Doom was on Mars if I remeber right.

Just equip your BFG9000 and go…

Honestly though, I don’t see anything happening. Just like most issues, there are those that take it way to far. I am sure we will see much more of this as 12-21-12 comes closer too. This one will be worse than Y2K.

I’m kind of hoping it opens up a wormhole to a parallel universe. A universe in which the people protesting this experiment don’t exist and I am very very rich and surrounded by half naked women.

To Mike: If it does indeed open up a portal to Hell, I’ve played Doom. I’ll be ready.

No matter what spin you put on it. When an experiment puts the whole world and everyone in it in danger I think we need to rethink a bit. A handful of mad scientists don’t have the right to take this big a risk with so much at stake. They should be stopped and if they must try USE A COMPUTER!

A portal to Hell? Really, Mike? If that happened, then that would settle one debate: whether or not God exists. After all, if the Judeo-Christian Hell was proven, then there likely is a Heaven and therefore God. I really doubt that will happen though.

The Chicken-Littles of the world don’t want any innovation to happen ever again. Innovation involves risk. There are far too many sissies out there that don’t want to take a chance of there being any change in their world whatsoever. Tough. The world deems you of no concern and rightly so.

Our society as a whole is bored. Just let things be. I dont care how good of a chance it is we survive, stop searching for things. Stop trying to be God!

We don’t fear the known we fear the unknown. When dynamite was invented it’s creator didn’t know it’s inherint instability leading to tragedy. When German scientists experimented with radiation in WWII they didn’t understand it’s lethal effects to the human body, leading to tragedy. In both cases the risk was containted to the immediate area. In this case, the risk is to the planet. In some ways it’s a metaphor for death itself. The great unknown that will eventually engulf us all.

I am totally against this “project” or “game” as they call it. God does tell us in His Living Word that man shall destroy himself. And it is so. We have been doing from the start in a very slow, methodical, hard way. However, the closer we get to the final day, the more rapid it shall be. The bible teaches us this, as well. So may prayer is that WHATEVER happens, that my loved ones, enemies, neighbors and myself are prepared to me our MAKER.
I know that I am not worthy, but Dear God, please take me in Thy bosom when you come. Glory to God! Amen!

to allof those idiots that think that you guys r so stupid and pathetic

The man who throws the switch should in all good conscience give a loud maniacal evil laugh when he does it. The end of the world should be preceded with a hearty “BWA HA HA HAAAA”. It is the only right thing to do. A thin mustache and goatee would be a plus as well.

Tonight’s fire up is really just a “make sure it’s running” test. As far as I’ve heard it told, there’s nothing that is even capable of blowing us up going on tonight.

Come October 21st, though, things will get a little more exciting.

Read the Bible! Christ has yet to come and when he does, he sets up his kingdom on this Earth and reigns for a thousand years. Nothing is about to happen to this planet for quite a long time.

I am horrified at the amount of money spent on this project which has NO practical applications. There is a whole lot of suffering in this world that could be alleviated with 8 billion dollars…instead we’ve built a machine to smash protons together just to see what happens…it just makes no sense to me.

BUT WHAT IF YOU’RE WRONG ?!?! WE’RE ALL GOING TO D-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-I-E ! ! ! !

If the world ends, do I have to go to work that day?

does anyone know if cnn or any other large media company will broadcoast cerns LHC. i know eurovision is i just hope i will be able to see it.

Typical scientists, so obsessed with being able to do something that they fail to stop and think if they should.

What holds a “black hole” together is gravity. Gravity is manifested by an amount of mass. In comparison to short range nuclear forces, gravity is an extremely weak and negligible force. Any atomic nucleus larger than Iron has a greater and greater tendency to break, or “disintegrate”, up to very heavy nuclei like Uranium, which with a little push, will disintegrate with enough energy that we make bombs out of it. It takes a tremendous amount of gravity and hence mass to overcome the short range nuclear forces and make large bunches of subatomic particles even hold together, let alone make a black hole. The new, and all other colliders, only work with very tiny subatomic particles like protons and neutrons, whose gravity is so tiny that even if a theoretical miniature “black hole” were created, it would immediately disintegrate. This happens because there are particular short range nuclear forces which tend to break large atomic nuclei apart. Due to the lack of enough gravity to hold the particle together to overcome the short range nuclear forces, a black hole, at atomic dimensions, would just fall apart. For the layman, a black hole just cannot be created by a subatomic particle, or any microscopic particle, collider experiment.

im a 17 year old girl and im 5 months pregnant. im getting really ticked off about all this fuss as ive stopped eating because im so scared that the world is going to end !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

don’t worry, Sarah Palin says its in God’s hands.

Let’s try to sensible and understand this. The Higgs Bosun particle although as yet unobserved, I believe is thought to be the reason atoms, and therefore everything, has mass. If the experiment at Cerns does produce these particles, it only proves their existence. Demonstration of their existence then suggests that everything that has mass, the Earth, that tree, and you and I, also contain Higgs Bosun particles. Now, over the years I have taken on more mass, but I don’t think it’s due to the uncountable number of “Tiny Black Holes” that exist in my body, should their existence be proven. I have to admit though, it may be an acceptable excuse for my doctor who insists I eat too much and exercise to little. If a cascade of Higgs Bosun particles does occur in Cerns, even if they do persist, they will have a long line to stand in as the other Higgs Bosun particles here on Earth compete to suck up the entire Universe. And don’t get me started about the comparison of a collapsed star and a sub-atomic particle, both of which are now being called black holes. ? I wonder if this argument is meant as bait. Sensational, catastrophic results of a science experiment would be raw meat for the media and great publicity for the Large Hadron Collider starting up.

Why take the chance?

They must feel it very uncertain if they put it underground. Why chance it if there is nothing to gain.

(If only to answer how).

God is how!……………………………..Why chance destruction of our world?

My “take” on all this is that lunatics should not have access to the US court system. I’m no expert in particle physics (or botany), but considering that the Sun isn’t massive enough to create a black hole, it’s simply not going to happen on the surface of Earth either.

Not a problem the world is slowly being destroyed by its population. This will take some of the wait out of it.

People are ridiculous. These same worries happened when the RHIC started up in NY, and nothing happened. And even so, on the 10th they are just going to shoot a beam to make sure that all is well with it. They are not going to start smashing protons together until the end of the year when the machine is up to its max temp.

Well, here we go – the Flat Earther’s once AGAIN attempt to scare the Rounders!

Any event horizons (black holes) produced (and there will be) will be of dimensions approximating attometers in size (that is, one BILLIONTH the size of an atom, and one MILLIONTH the size of a proton).

Inter-event horizon distance (that is, the spacing between adjacent singularies) will be in the tenths of millimeters – or one MILLION BILLION times LARGER than the physical sizes of the singularities themselves.

Gravity is a 1/r squared function: thus at these distances each black hole exibits a gravitational attraction upon its nearest neighbors roughly equivalent to MY gravitational influence on the Crab Nebula.

Even though I am heavy, the Crab ISN”T responding to my influence all that rapidly……and these distances are such the holes will never “know” of each other’s existence.

Couple THAT with the fact these will only exist for femtoseconds….even if their gravitational attraction were an r to the 500th dependence (i.e. not inverse) the holes wouldn’t move one trillionth of an attometer closer to one another in their lifetimes.

Nice science fiction, the whole black-hole thing, but like most holes this fiction is full of……holes.

It is disappointing that you trot out these worries under the guise of exploring what people think.

In any event if you were at all informed about the LHC you would know that Wednesday’s experiment will only accelerate particles in one direction- later on the scientists will try the other direction. Any collisions of the particle beams will not take place for over a month.

Yikes, Carol, you caught me red-handed on “exploring what people think.” I won’t let it happen again, it’s the first step on the slippery slope toward a full-fledged democracy …….

Seriously, thanks for reading this carefully; I didn’t make it clear in the original post that this is only the first in a series of tests leading to the Real Thing next month. I’ve amended the blog. But since you’ve read my post carefully, can you please tell me where I’ve endorsed the “worries” that have been trotted out? It’s a blog, for goodness sakes, where opinions are welcome: Mine, yours, and the ones you or I don’t agree with. Oh, and thanks for letting me know what you think. PD

It’s not 2012 yet, the world can’t end now.

On a serious note though: I don’t have a degree in this field, but I was under the assumption that the theory of black holes forming, growing, and consuming more as it grew was dismissed some time ago. Isn’t their gravitational “boundary” limited to the size that the star once was? So the whole “crash, form, and poof” theory is much more realistic.

I’m not concerned about this at all… I’m actually really interested to hear what results because of these tests.

We are making a very big mistake. This time we scientists have gone too far.

As I said on another post:

Lets put up a billboard on the moon with a message warning any passing aliens, that if they don’t see a pretty blue planet over there (arrow pointing), they should probably not build one of these things, as it was a very bad idea….

Just kidding. Hope they find what they are looking for, and that the thing will actually power up (that in itself is worthy of applause).

These people have no right to take Mother Earth and plant such a huge (GOD KNOWS WHAT) into our planet and then think it may not do anything to our earth. Who do they think they are messing with everyone’s life? What is the long term effect? they don’t know, they only speculate. They don’t have this right and should be stop ASAP!! I can’t even imagine that our US Gov has condone this insanity, You people don’t have the right as earth does not just belong to you science fools!! Armagendon is coming fast enough, you are expediting what is coming. BACK OFF!!!!!!

If the wind kicks up on Wednesday, I’m seriously gonna freak out. If it does create a black hole, everyones invited to stay with me in my bombshelter.(first come first serve)

Nothing ventured, nothing gained. If it does swallow us up we won’t have to worry about the gas prices anymore

Ha! the ‘real’ danger is the tremendous magnetic vortex that will be created by this instrument. 30k tones and the power of the magnets throw it around! No one considers the impact that such a vortex could have on the Earths natural magnetic field! It could trigger a pole reversal! It could cause a shift in the magnetic dynamo alignment! These would be slower forms of global death, but devistating none the less.

Gloom! DOOM! and T.E.O.L.A.W.K.I. !!

Once again the worlds most ignorant nation tries to stop progress! Good for you America, just stay under your rock!

The fact that mini black holes are constantly forming and disappearing in our atmosphere and we haven’t got sucked up yet… so no, our world will not get sucked in tomorrow. Besides, in theory, if we do all get sucked up we are then One again & would be like Heaven anyways, so it wouldn’t be a bad thing anyway:) But by saying this 8 billion dollar experiment has no practical use??? If these theories are more certified and proven, then practical use for this experiment is even beyond our comprehension in the many ways we can “upgrade” technology. Not to mention the simple practical uses to getting closer to the practical “meaning of life” and a chance to make the global community aware of the more conscious atmosphere and chance to enhance the global well-being. This is more than practical. If you know the possibilities of this experiment, then you know what the theory implies…that we are all One and are all connected

This educational tool explains everything about how scientists with sharp eyes and quick reflexes can keep particle collisions under control. Observe:

http://www.kongregate.com/games/cgortz/fuz-ion

8 Billion dollars for a science experiment?

Great way to spend $$

12-21-12 has nothing to do with “End of the world” scenarios…

It follows the rest of the pattern on that Myan Long Count Calender, in that, in coincides with revolutionary events. Only in this case, the Mayans stopped keeping track and so their calender ended. People take that ending as assuming that it means the world is going to end.

At the most however, the world will not end, but it could see the rise of a massive revolution on or near that date, a revolution so profound that it could potentionally trigger the next World War; and bring an end to modern day Politics.

Such a Revolution is already taking shape in the United States right now as people are finding themselves more and more disillusioned with the constant idiocy of corrupt Politicians, bad Congressional track records (the Congress has a lower approval rating then the President by the way!) and constant lies, lies, and more lies…

Depending on who becomes the next President, in 2009, such a Revolution in 2012/2013 could go either way… Either it is a President who will do a bad job and people will say enough is enough and come the 2012 Elections, things start changing… Or it is a President who does a good job, and their next term (2012 Elections) marks the beginning of a new “golden era”…

Either way, by that time, many economists predict that the Middle East, China and India will become the dominant ecomonic super powers in the world and that the United States will be bowing to them, instead of the other way around.

2012 will see a massive shift in global wealth and economic control over the globe… and that, has the potential for triggering another major War, one the likes of which this world has yet never seen.

Nothing happens on 12-21-12.

That is just the date that is supposed to coincide with a period in which these things start happening, or become obviously apparent.

But first…

Its all going to start with that Large Hadron Converter!

When they turn that thing on, its massive magnetic field is going to magnetically realign the chemical balances of our brains and turn us all into super geniuses! But before that happens, its magnetic field is going to align with the magnetic field of the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider, at Brookhaven National Labs! Its gonna make this huge magnetic field that’ll create a time warp displacement anomaly that’ll suck that entire part of Europe through a tiny, microscopic rift in time, and drop it all back onto the Earth; 500 million years in the past, and it’ll become a new island that gives birth to the modern day legends of Atlantis!

Yay right…

I honestly don’t think anything is going to happen at all when they turn on that LHC; not one damn thing other then…

At the end of the day, they’ll be left with more questions, then answers…

After reading this post I posit the following question…

Why has there been no research into the greatest challenge facing humanity today? When and why did it become cool to display an IQ the same as the outside temperature in Wisconsin in January?

When a star collapses into a black hole, the star’s gravitational pull on surrounding objects does not increase. Similarly, if the earth were to collapse into a black hole, the moon woud stay just where it is, 240,00 miles from earth–because the gravity of the new black hole would be no larger than that of the earth.

So if a couple of protons do create a black hole in the LHC, that will hardly increase the gravity of the protons themselves. Thus, the gravitational threat to earth and human life has not increased.

Hello Everyone!

Where did they get all of this money to fund this project?
Did some of it come out of taxpayer’s money?
If so, I think people should have been allowed
to vote on whether or not they wanted this project
to take place. Moreover, I do not think the average
citzen has been given enough detailed information on
this project or its possible dangers.
There is no guarantee ensuring us that the magnetic
chamber will not spontaneously explode and
cause havoc on the planet and possibly throwing
it off of its axis. These so-called scientific geniuses
do not seem to know how to come up with a cure for
diseases or to stop hunger on the planet.
They live in dreamland.

Barak Obama has declared that he will personally step inside the Large Hadron Collidor and destroy all the Black Holes with his bare hands!

Just like he does when he Lays Hands on the sick and infirm during his rallies and Heals them!

The Hadron Collider is impressive, and I’m glad to say that the BEST in the WORLD are working on the project, there’s no need to fear the LHC.
I firmly believe that this paranoia is due to the media making groundless claims to gain attention, and it was probably told to do so by the government to back up their lawsuits in court over the LHC.

No Jason. You are partly right….the guy in charge should do a manic laugh but have an underling turn it on after he says “Igor, throw the switch” with a dramatic wave of his hand.

Actually, in all seriousness, we need people to cast doubt and ask questions just to keep people in check. History has shown that, from time to time, the unexpected and unforeseen happens. Even the monarchs of old had their jesters to sit beside them to whisper in their ears “remember thou art mortal” if they got too full of themselves. I dont believe anything bad will happen but I cannot say I wont be sitting with closed eyes at the time of turn on, lol.

They’re looking for the answer? I have the answer. It’s 42. Now, what was the question?

im not very worried as a christian.

i am a high school student and i think that common sense tells us that there have been many times that the world was supposedly gonna end and it obviously hasnt happened…..so i am just gonna go to bed as usual knowing that tomorrow is just a normal day

The last big thing that was similar to this was the splitting of atoms which led to modern nuclear weapons or weapons of mass destruction. It always starts as some noble cause but where does it end? Today we are constantly worried about these weapons falling in the wrong hands namely terrorists and countries that promote terrorism. We spend billions of dollars to protect us, yet the news is not a question of if, but when! What will this experiment produce? Will they produce a weapon that will make WMD’s obsolete?Unfortunately, we don’t know the evil it creates until it is too late. Is this the price that man must pay to “be like God” and know all??Or put another way, Those who don’t learn from history are condemned to repeat it! It kind of reminds me of the movie Jurassic Park which also started with good intentions, instead of a dinosaur eating us it is a black hole!

I’ll bet you $1,000,000 that world doesn’t end!

Hey you NERDS!!!…. I have my own super collider. It’s called a “toilet”. Throw a little matter into it and watch it swirl. WHEEEEE!!!…

What is evolution?

Evolution is technically defined as: “a gradual process in which something changes into a different and usually more complex or better form.” As it is most famously used, “evolution” is the process by which an organism becomes more sophisticated over time and in response to its environment. The Theory of Evolution is currently the most popular concept of how life reached its current state. Evolution as a biological mechanism is driven by natural selection. This theory is favored by many scientists to explain phenomena in nature, so much so that it is generally assumed as factual in most studies.

If we fail then we fail, but not to try would be a fate worst then death itself.

I say “Drive on ……Drive on”

Fire it up

K

It’s not important it gobbles up the earth, or even the universe. What’s important, is that it gets Obama.

And I’m with you, Brad.

smilodon —-6 x 7 I read it , too!

Just to let everyone know… The amount of energy that these tiny black holes that may or may not occur will be equivalent to about the energy produced by a fly flapping its wings. So if for any reason you know someone who has been adversely effected by flys and there flapping wings advise them to stay inside, for everyone else we should be ok. And on a side note stop being so afraid of things that you don’t understand, its very 1800s Thanks

Alot of you people who are against this experiment have not been taught the true benefits of what this experiment implies…First, we all know, and it’s been proven that the smallest particles make up the next particle and so on to make a whole. Your body for instance is made up of billions of atomic particles so you see the whole. Science has also proven that the smallest particles make the biggest bang, like the atomic bomb. Therefore, this 8 billion dollar experiment is on its path to find the cure for cancer, for hunger, for humanity. There is a reason so many of the world’s job scientist and colleges are spending billions for this, to find a closer cure to EVERTHING. If we fiqure out what mass is made of, what “cancer” is made of, we then bring us closer to finding the cure. 8 billion dollars going towards starving people or to people with cancer not will cure them. As with everything, you start with the source and work your way up, and that’s what these scientist are trying to do. This experiment will give us the starting point to cure diseases & enhance technology. And as with any technology, its depends whose hands it is in to use it for good or bad. This experiment reaps so many positive results for the global communities well being that it is unforseen by you non-believers. Have faith in something. It seems alot of you are God-fearing and have no Faith if your own God that this “supposed” evil will end the world as we know it, do you think your God will allow that to happen? Have faith…

This is the problem with news these days. “Let’s ask a bunch of people who don’t know what they’re talking about what they think and report it as news.” We pay people in white coats to know or to come up with these answers, so why not defer to them? They’re the experts.

As for what I think, there’s too much possibility of discovery to worry about extreme, borderline sci-fi theories about what could happen. And if it does destroy the human race, so what? We’re already embarking on a path of self-destruction (global warming) with little indication that we care what happens. Oh wait, that’s for future generations to deal with, and this could happen to ME.

As for Mr. Bandak’s conundrum, that’s too silly to even bother with. Next you’ll be going on about end of the world theories regarding the year 2012.

Perhaps with so much speculation as to this or that happening, the organizations running this show have done a pretty poor job of including we unwashed masses in on what the heck they hope to achieve. But any involvement by the US and it’s primary allies will be of course to look for back doors to new and better weapons technologies. Never be so naive as to think that the hand that supplies the money isn’t going to waiting around in the wings to collect…

Sounds like someone’s been reading James P. Hogan’s SF novel “Thrice Upon a Time” in which a fusion powerplant creates tiny black holes that eat the Earth – stopped only by our intrepid heroes and their time communication device!

Of course, the science at the time Hogan wrote the book suggested such things were possible, but Black Hole knowledge has evolved a great deal since the late 70s!

End of the world? I think not.

My take: I don’t think it will fully work tonight as alot of the elements to be used have been laying around for use for the last ten years(some longer), the expectation is it may not fully work. IF it does work this time, it would take at least four or five years before you would see physical effect on the planet, such as black holes (and not tiny ones).

From a faith issue: I too believe the Lord is setting his foot on this earth onto Mount Zion. Those in the faith know the signs are there for his coming as we are now in the 70th out of 70 prophices made. As chlldren of God we don’t need to fear man. So deep breathe, God is all powerful and if he doesn’t want this to happen it won’t.

From a Science persepctive: I think it is selfish to think there are not consequences to this in the hope of trying to jump deminsions or seek the God partical. You are not just going into the element of Science but into the sacred element of things. I am not against venturing into the unknown but it should be done with caution. The atom bomb still has consequences with people who have suffered cancers; and it’s still not clear just how widespread the effect really is, or was, with the known winds that spread across US and more .It is reported dust went far including north into New York State at that time (see historical facts) .
I know my God created this earth in seven days (God’s time) and not the millons as supposed and perhaps this experiment will give you a glimpse of that. If it does, I expect the Scientist to come forward and acknowledge God’s existence as truth (real).

Ok the world…well only God will know when the world is gonna end and to the people who dont believe in God well i dont know and these scientist are never gonna know exactly when the world is gonna end i mean c’mon have some since people. Seriously even my family agrees the only person that knows when the world is gonna end is God…THINK…if these scientist are wrong then im just gonna say i told you so. Well i rest my case…

I just read that Barak Obama has stated just now, that he shall personally stop the World from Ending!

He will walk into the LHC Control Room, throw his hands into the air and proclaim his omnipotence over mankind! Everyone in the control room will be caught up in the shock and awe over this proclamation, they’ll all get out of their seats and bow to him, and then they will cancel all their experiments with the LHC because Barak Obama’s newly proclaimed omnipotence will be seen as the perfect answer to all their questions!

But then, after he leaves the LHC…

…and a new Question will then form and be asked… for they all shall sit there, and suddenly ask themselves…

“WTF?”

Then they’ll turn on the LHC anyway, and…

Nothing happens!

Interestingly enough, he admits below that the collider will in fact create black holes. As far as I know, we can only infer the existence of black holes be the behavior of objects near them. I seriously doubt there will be a calamity, but who’s to say it’s impossible? The ‘God Particle’ might not appreciate being found.

Sleep sound tonight; I’ll wake you if we all vaporize into deep space…

Where do some of you people think we would be without years and years and years of spending on “science experiments”? It is like people think that everything is okay right now.

No need for advancement. No need to broaden your horizons. Let’s forget that the computer you are typing on is the result of experiments going back HUNDREDS of years, that at the time no one could have predicted would lead to a way to have instantaneous information

Just because you don’t understand something doesn’t mean that it is wrong or bad. The lack of science understanding, and even basic reading comprehension about science in this country is truly appalling. And then the news media plays on that ignorance to stir up fake controversy and worry about things that there is no legitimate, reasonable reason to be worried about.

Holy Cra*,

The number of you bible thumpers that actually believe this will destroy the world is utterly astonishing. Tell you what, let;s ban all forms of science and go back to living in caves.

Well done to the entire LHC team, let’s hope they get some answers!

Oh…and how do we know that the smaller partical colliders haven’t already done damage? The bees are disappearing at alarming rates and no one knows why. And maybe this is one of those freaky quantum thingies that will react differently to observation. Wave particle distribution in quantum mechanics works that way, right. Don’t any of you guys read Fantastic Four?

The newest recent theory is that the “Big Bang” started with just one atom and created the entire universe. It would be funny if mankind’s only purpose in this life was to evolve to the point of technology that we could “re-create” the Big Bang, wipe out everything and start a new universe all over again. Interesting.

So much misinformation here! First of all the real experiment is not tomorrow…but in a month or so. Then if by any chance we get swallowed by mini blackholes…i will be kind of glad…we humans are so stupid )

If you believe in God then you have nothing to fear.

I typed a huge response but it said the server was not working..hmmm

Nothing will happen that God does not allow, including consequences.

Haven’t we been in a black hole during the last 8 years of Bush? What can be worse than that?

OBAMA WILL SAVE US.

In all seriousness, I’m just scured because I don’t understand.
It’s human nature, our natural instincts to react to a possibility that our survival will be interrupted. We’re still only animals on a sense.

Just don’t call us idiots for being against it. Those who don’t understand are just scared of the unknown possibilities.

Yea we wanna know if this is gonna be broadcasted anywhere.

@ Jason: I agree 100% lol

Raymonth, leave B.Obama out of this….he is just a man trying to make the world a little brighter..he is not God, he knows he is not God………you’re awfully obssessed with him…shame….do you feel the same way about S. Plain?

WERE ALL GOING TO DIE
black holes are ballin
dipset holllllaaaaaaa

As one born and raised Catholic, it embarasses me to see so many people using faith as a shield to hide behind or a rock to throw, rather than as a light to illuminate. As a scientist, it saddens me further that mankind refuses to use its greatest gift – intellect – to solve the problems of this world. I hope the LHC accomplishes precisely what it has set out to do – provide insight to the mysteries of the universe.

I have been around the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider for 8 years now and as far as i can see i have not been sucked into a black hole (I think).

Thanks Tom — if you see a Black Hole pulling into the parking lot at Brookhaven, drop us an email and I’ll publish your farewell blog PD

I think it’s very sad that the country with the longest recent history of scientific achievement — the United States — now leads the world in chicken-littles who want this project to end now.

We are no longer the world’s leader in sciences. We have seced to Japan, China, France, England, Germany, Canada, India, Russia… The attitudes we display now will come back to haunt us, when we stop making progress, and owe the existence of every consumer good we buy to inventions made somewhere else.

The reason they bury colliders isn’t to supress black holes. It’s to shield the colliders, and their extremely expensive and sensitive sensors from outside influence (gamma rays, etc.). If a black hole got large enough to where it started consuming everything, it wouldn’t matter if it was 100 feet or 100 miles under the earth’s surface.

Personally, I think it’d be a pretty cool way to off ourselves. We’d never feel a thing. Just, poof, and you’d be part of the soup. You’d never know what hit you.

By the way, Sam Bandak: ten thousand; hundred thousand; million; ten million; hundred million. Is that 4.1, 4.2, .4.3, 4.4 and 4.5?

Just asking.

I am a theoretical particle physicist in the U.S. My research is directly related to the LHC, and I assure you the LHC poses no threat to our planet. I have been rather disappointed by the media for the attention this story has been receiving. The continued insistence on the possibility of an LHC apocalypse, given the carefully scrutinized analyses by particle physicists who fully understand these issues, is simply bad science which should be filtered by other scientists before reaching the public through the press.

The LHC is a technological masterpiece of a machine, which collides protons into other protons at speeds close to the speed of light. The LHC is designed to answer some fundamental questions about how the universe works, questions which today are truly puzzling to particle physicists like why the electron has mass. The Higgs boson has been discussed quite a bit recently, as it provides one answer to that question. But the Higgs boson raises an embarassing problem, namely that the theory of the Higgs boson requires nature to have tuned a parameter to a part in 10^-32 or so in order for the theory to make sense. That’s where the trouble starts.

Since we don’t really believe that nature is so precarious, theoretical physicists have spent some time dreaming up alternatives to the Standard Model of particle physics. If certain kinds of additional particles exist (which would be discovered at the LHC), then the tuning of the Standard Model could disappear. One version of this story is known as supersymmetry, and there are alternatives in a similar spirit. Or, if there are extra dimensions of space, the tuning could also disappear. Ah, but then there might also be microscopic black holes produced at the LHC, an unlikely scenario which would be incredibly exciting if confirmed.

Most LHC end-of-the-world scenarios are focused on these microscopic black holes. The proponents of these scenarios argue that, since we have not created an LHC before, we don’t really know what will happen. The general theoretical framework of how particle physics and gravity work together, which we would learn much more about if micro-black holes are produced, implies that micro-black holes would almost immediately disappear in a micro-explosion of elementary particles that will light up computer screens at the LHC and the imagination of scientists everywhere. But there would be no apocalyptic fireworks.

It is true that we don’t know for sure that our theoretical framework is correct. So they hand us alternative pseudo-scientific “theories” in which the micro-black holes would not decay but would eventually eat up the Earth. So we respond by a scientific study of events similar to those produced in the LHC, but in the Earth’s atmosphere or in dense stars which we argue would be happening all the time, yet there has been no evidence of any nightmare scenario. So they say those situations are not precisely what would happen in the LHC. And they are correct. We have not built an LHC before, and there is not one sitting out in space. There are collisions between fast-moving particles that would be creating micro-black holes all the time, but not in a controlled environment like the LHC. So we cannot be absolutely 100% sure that nothing crazy will happen since we have never done this before.

But, the universe would have to have been designed extremely carefully to bend physical law so that precisely the collisions of particles in the LHC would lead to death by a hungry black hole, but not similar collisions occuring all the time in the atmosphere or in stars. It would be as if, while experimenting on the design for a new microwave oven, a situation is produced in which a portal to a new dimension is opened through which an endless stream of Teletubbies enters our universe. (And what could be more frightening than that?) We cannot really prove that this nightmarish scenario will not happen because we have not created this precise style of microwave oven before. But, the laws of physics would have to bend in just such a way that the construction of precisely that design of microwave oven would lead to death by Teletubby invasion. Trust me, we are safe from Teletubbies. And from the LHC.

I get the feeling that those of you who think yourselves so enlightened and progressive snicker at this story and yet are the same people who bemoan the ending of earth because we evil humans are causing a climate change.

Sure, there is probability of anything at any time. Could this create a mini-black hole? Sure. (Picture Dr. Evil saying that!! LOL) Could an asteroid hit the earth obliterating life as we know it? Odds are better that it will. Could humans grow a brain and think for themselves? Not likely.
The experiment could change the way we think about matter and why it has mass. The risks are so minuscule it’s not even worth talking about and there is only theory about what would happen if something were to go wrong. And if it does, well you won’t really care anymore, will you?

Oh, and I’ll have my double-barrel shotgun and chainsaw just in case a Cyberdemon walks through. HEHEHEH!!! (Doom reference for those of you who haven’t had the pleasure of playing the greatest video game ever created.)

There are some who say if the universe were to end, something more complex and inexplicable would immediately take its place… there are, of course, others who say this has already happened.

I hold a degree in physics, and I’ve worked on that ATLAS project at the LHC. If this thing creates a black hole it will be nothing new for this planet. Although this is the first time humans have wielded this kind of energy the universe certainly has been producing collisions this powerful for a while in the form of cosmic rays; cosmic rays can get up to 10^20 eV pretty easily, while the protons in the LHC are going to cruise in around 10^12 eV. If it was possible that something with the amount of energy of the collisions at the LHC could create a micro black hole cosmic ray particle decay would have destroyed this planet, and all matter in the universe, very shortly after the big bang. The assertion that the LHC could destroy much of anything with what it produces is patently absurd.

just pray and have hope that this experiment will no cause major damages or any minors.

Im all for science, ive loved it all my life, a full 15 years of life, in my view, taking a risk this big is not somthing a person or people should do, its not up to a few people to gamble the life of the rest of the people on the world, think of the risk. We have information to gain if it goes as planed…if something goes wrong, we have millions of lives to lose, it just dont add up. People need to learn to let things be, and stop messing with the unknown when the stakes are this high.

The same kind of nonsense accompanied the first tests of the atomic bomb. Some scientists said the test would “burn away the Earth’s atmosphere”. Hey, it didn’t happen, and look what we were left with, the atomic and then the hydrogen bomb.

I am as in favor of the advancement of scientific knowledge as the next person, but I don’t think the risk here is worth the reward. A black hole is a black hole. It doesn’t matter if it is atom sized, country sized, or world sized. It will, by it’s very theoretical nature, suck in surrounding matter and grow exponentially.

Why can’t we wait a few more months for improvements to the Hubble Space Telescope to possibly reveal the “God particle”? Or, how about waiting until we have the technology to build a collider in space (distant) or on some other world?

Anyway, its probably too late to stop or postpone it. Good luck to everyone and I hope I am sound asleep when it happens.

[...] Department of Energy is a participant in the collider experiment)." Cited and found here at: SciTechBlog: Blog Archive – The world will not end this week « – Blogs from CNN.com [...]

Even if the potential of ending the world is 1/10 billion, I don’t think this project should proceed. As a scientist with a PhD in Cancer Genetics, I know that things can sometimes go wrong. I also understand that risks are necessary to have real scientific progress. But, why would anyone want to experiment in something that could cause the end of the world? I am currently a medical student and I see patients consent to procedures that have much higher potential risks than building this collider. While they may risk their lives for a procedure that could help their health, I doubt they would risk the fate of the world for the potential to replicate the big bang.

>> Even if the potential of ending the world is 1/10 billion,
>> I don’t think this project should proceed. As a scientist
with a PhD in Cancer Genetics, I know that things can
>> sometimes go wrong.
>

DESPINA…

If you’ve got a PhD then do the math and figure out for yourself how small the amounts of energy that will be released are.

I can’t help but think of the Rocky Horror Picture Show when Tim Curry goes thru that long dialoge explaining his machine and how it will result in “the spark of life”. Pretty cool stuff if it works

Chances are we will all be fine. But what troubles me about all this is that, once again, science seems to be forging forward on its own accord without feeling the need to fully explore or explain the possible conesequences of the experiments. To me, if there were even a one in a billion chance of destroying the planet, I’d make damned sure that the probability would be reduced to absolute zero before proceeding.

I find the same level of arrogance present in the genetic modification community. The scientists involved find it’s okay to tinker with the fundamental blueprints of life. Splice it, dice it, copyright it and market it, with little or no consideration to what might be created or destroyed, on purpose or by accident. It’s frightning, although understandable in this case, since we all know the longterm goal of the genetics companies it to make huge profits.

But it’s just puzzling when it comes to the LCH. It’s been stated the experiments are being done for the “benefit of scientific knowledge” and not for immediate profit. So why exactly are we charging forward so recklessly in this case? Surely man’s appetite for knowledge is not as hungry as his appetite for profits, is it?

I consider myself somewhat of an expert on black holes because of my knowledge gained about them by watching numerous science fiction movies. The most important thing I have learned is that black holes are ALWAYS BAD!!! We should avoid creating them at all costs. Even if it means giving up our quest for more knowledge of the universe. Why take a chance? Most science fiction is based on facts and should not be ignored.

Despina,
the risk is so small that it is not worth taking into account. You take a larger risk going to work each day than this project poses to the whole world combined.

As far as the practical application and the amount of money spent on the project, that is a more valid argument, but still flawed. Even if 8 billion dollars were to be given to other arguably more worthy causes we would still not be able to answer a fundamental question that scientists have been trying to answer for decades. We may not know of a practical use for this theoretical particle now, but we may be able to find one as we learn more about its properties.

http://btv.bg/news/news_details.pcgi?cont_id=118013

As an 11 year old in school, I believe this is highly dangerous no matter what the outcome.

Despina…Do you know what this experiment will show in the study of cancer? Do you really? It will change the way doctors in the field of cancer even perceive cancer. It will point people like you, doctors, etc in the correct directional to further your research. As you are a doctor in the field on cancer, you know that cancer is very small is size and has the potential to create death. As I think you would know, you would know that this experiment will help your field of study tremendously. Did you do any research on what this experiment says if they catch this glimpse at what they are looking for? Coming from a PHD from someone as smart as yourself, I would think you would recognize this. Are you going to live by fear and have no faith & go against the “mss/energy” that makes up cancer? Or are you going to realize that when we get a better idea of what makes up the mass/energy of cancer that this experiment will be a great thing afterall? I say don’t live in fear. I believe that if anyone lives in fear there will always be fear. We are meant to take chances with faith, without faith you will gain nothing. C’mon despina, you know this experiment will not end earth…besides whats the point when we just sit back and do nothing? Like not furthering our research drastically and eventually before we know it cancer will always be there. Take a chance and have some faith and common sense

Why in the world does this need to be done? The time, energy, and especially the cost should have been used to help with the problems our world faces now…………not just to check out a theory! We should be researching alternative fuel sources, a cure for cancer, etc instead of something like this. Not to mention that even the physicists and scientists working on this project admit that they are not sure what will happen until they start it up. Suppose it does cause some disturbance to our earth? It is not worth the risk, NO MATTER HOW SMALL IT MAY BE. Regardless of planning, sometimes things can go wrong… Sometimes we just need to leave well enough alone!

For those of you calling opposers chickens, bible thumpers, etc.
Just because we oppose something and believe it is wrong, does not mean that we are terrified or mindless robots who follow the Bible. Maybe we care about the earth and the people on it and don’t want to take any chances just to try and prove someone’s idea.

Besides, I don’t believe in the Big Bang theory anyway.
You can’t tell me that things collide and then just accidently form a wonderful planet like earth. It took a Creator to make something so intricate and I firmly believe that. What we need to be doing is working on solving some of the problems that affect us now and quit tampering with things that we don’t need to be tampering with.

I dont understand yall idiots yall aint nothing but a bunch of none believers. What do yall gain from this tell me yall havent said anything about it on the news. Yall are so stupid spending 6 billion dollars on this why dont yall do something like find a cure for aids or cancer?? If yall do this the rath of god will come down and get yall and you know it!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

A black hole that swallows up the solar system? How about a more perfect vacuum that swallows up the universe?
Nine years ago Pubic Radio ran an article, saying space is an imperfect vacuum. Some mathmetician calculated that if two particles collided at a high enough speed, they could create a more perfect vacuum, which would expand at a rate faster than the speed of light, consuming everything in its path.
At least we wont know what hit us.

Larakens.

…I don’t think you see the benefits of this experiment. It’s not just to prove a theory. It is to point us in the right direction to cure some of earth’s problems. The experiment is not to find the answer to God, it is to further the understanding to point the world into a correct path, and that path is to know the basics of what EVERYTHING is made of. When we know this, possibilites for global warming, cancer, disease, hunger, can all be decreased or cured. You can’t just put $9 billion into cancer research, autism research, global warming research, etc. That;s the way research has always been done…and is cancer, hunger, global warming or any other major disease been decreased. We need to devote our attention to what makes up the mass of everything, and we have a good starting point to point us in the right direction. This experiment has the possibilities beyond what we can imagine. I believe in God and that God creates everything the same as you. I believe God is everything and is everything. This human life we are in currently does have these basic laws like particles collide and create big bangs, etc. The smallest things create the biggest bang, and thats what this experiment is trying to fiqure out, why and what is it made of. When we get a better idea of this, we can then get a good direction to try to find cures for cancer, disease, global warming, etc. I believe God gave us two great gifts, everything that exists and Faith. So lets have some faith and believe in this experiment for a better cause. Great is going to come out of this, not the end of the world.

The world will only end by fire. Its in the bible

I cant believe people have been planning an experiment to replicate the big bang theory of the world’s largest particle accelerator. The 13-mile long circular tunnel runs through Switzerland, and a bit of France. Just can’t believe they have planned this for so long. The object of the game (the $8 billion game, by the way) is to smash protons into each other, replicating the conditions an instant after the Big Bang. Which will take place tomorrow. Why didn’t we know about this sooner, more publicly. Well God created the Earth/Universe/everything & thats all you need to know. Why do we have to know about some search for the Higgs boson, a particle that was left after the big bang theory. Don’t make sense at all. Why aren’t these people/governments/world leaders spending these moneys on our Earth the people of the Earth, we don’t live in space we live on Earth, isn’t that more important. Spending $8,000,000, on this project is just unbelievable. The poor people of the world need our help more. I just don’t understand, why we have to know these things. I want more done from our world leaders to help people who need help, not cause’s that we don’t really have to know or will ever help us in the long run. More needs to be done to help the Earth & the people of the Earth. That is a greater truth…Don’t you agree??????. Aaron.

we are in the safe zone?……. and STOP CONDUCTING YOUR Sophisticated INVENTIONS, LEAVE US LIVE IN PEACE. I am 12 years old. A son of a physicist.

I would like to propose a search for something like a particle that may or may not exist and get $8 billion dollars! How much of the $8 billion dollars is the U.S. (i.e. my tax money)contributing? Are we not in the middle of a war with billions of dollars of deficit…where’s the logic!? Of course, I guess if the world ends, that’s the least of our problems. And for all those scientists who have argued against God all this time, they’ll finally get all the answers to their “theories”. Better be hopin’ you’re right!!

Aaron I strongly disagree. Read above what I had written previously, again, the point of this experiment is not to try and replicate the big bang. I suggest you do alot of research to see what this experiment is actually doing. This experiment will show that if you start with the smallest things in life, you can cure the larger things in life. Like gas shortage, cancer, poor people, disease, people with disabilities. You have to start small to get big results, and that’s what this experiment is doing. Just like anything else in life, you have to start with the smallest basics to understand the larger picture. Everyone will see the results of this experiment in 10, 20, 60, 100 years to come. Do your research and you’ll see what this experiment actually implies and what it’s doing.

what the hell, it sounds at least a bit less slow and painful than nuclear fallout! Point being: maybe we’ll be fortunate enough to be killed quickly by the LHC as opposed to the slow death given to us by the Bush administration, Russia, China (in coming years), etc.

go ahead CERN! Fire it up and save us all!!!

If the world ends and you believe in a God, you will be welcome in to his arms, right? For those who don’t believe in the big man up stairs, you die and nothing happens. I don’t see why everyone is so scared. But if i was a 17 year old prego, the last think i would worry about is the stuff people right in witch they know nothing about and eat something(VICKY).

My favorite part of all of these comments is the same reason this discussion is so pointless. NO ONE READS!!! Almost no one has read enough about this situation so they say “oh the world is going to end�. Then someone who knows what they are talking about writes about how there is no danger and for some reason the next comment is that the world is going to end. Why don’t all of the people who think the world is going to end just make up whatever they want to happen and go spend time with your family because you obviously have no reason to be online not enlightening yourself anyway.

For anyone who would like to write a comment in the future… please read a few of the comments before you write so you can actually try to learn something and maybe in turn add something relevant to the discussion.

Thanks

Damn—and I was worried about second hand smoke.

For those of you who haven’t yet heard, the Large Hardon Collider, better known as LHC, is a massive $8B (that’s right B=Billion) project almost in completion along the Switzerland/France border deep within the Earth. The purpose of this grand machine is to re-create the very beginning of time itself. -By smashing together two atoms at unfathomable speeds. Scientist hope this will create the Higgs Boson effect, or better known as the “God particle”. They believe that once they locate this elusive particle it will solve all of the mysteries of the Universe. (sneaker sneaker…) Also the project is believed to be capable of producing black holes. (Which in case you never knew, they eat everything…. including light in the blink of an eye.) So with that in consideration, scientist are going ahead with the project, even though it has the potential to perhaps eat the Universe… (gobble).

OK. So with that out of the way, here’s the Truth:

1st off: If you are concerned about the black holes that very well may be created during the function of this machine, eating you alive… :Read your Holy Bible:
-In the end times (Which I DO believe we are coming to) most people will actually come to a much slower death than a black hole could provide (so rest easy). So I don’t believe that part is a major concern. However, it very well could create environmental situations like those spoken of in Bible Prophecy.

But what is most concerning to me is this:

Over 2,000 scientist from all over the globe are participating in this fiasco. A project to test theories that could NEVER be proven. $8 Billion has been spent to attempt to prove to (?) someone (?) that we are “nothing” (geez…). Strange how an endless supply of money is being thrust at finding this God particle, when it’s so obvious that He is everywhere. The problem isn’t that they can’t find Him.. the problem is that they can’t simplify Him to suit their justifications for sin. If they would just open their eyes, they could see God in the clearness of every breath-consuming moment. But who knew there was $8 Billion just floating around out there anyway? I always assumed that if an organization “for the betterment of society” came into that kind of excessive funding that they might, o.. I dunno…. -feed the hungry, clothe the needy, house the homeless.. etc. -With so much devastation, who would’ve thought the world’s “smartest” would opt to poor salt in the wounds by announcing “o yea, by the way, we are all meaningless!”. How sad this day truly is.

What a crazy waste of money….

No one here on Earth, can re-create the beginning of time. And the more we attempt to exclude God from His very own creation, the more plagues, natural disasters, and flagrant dismiss for life we will see.

How astounding it is that also when we turn to our newscasts, and watch the horror of thrill-kill murders, the natural disasters like never before, the violence, and the chaos, that we have the audacity to ask ourselves “what’s really going on with the world?”

Isn’t it obvious?

-If you teach a child that they are nothing, do you expect that child to grow up believing they have any worth?
-If you tell a man he has no one to answer to, do you expect him to obey the laws?
-If you tell a woman her womb can become a discreet tomb because that baby is meaningless, do you expect her to cherish and care for her remaining offspring?

What do you expect? -You can simply NOT teach a person they have no conscious but expect them to act consciously!

We did not occur here by mere chance. -No matter what a man with a plaque on his wall tells you. He is just a man with the same bodily functions as you!

Our public schools are teaching our children theories that the following year must be replaced with new theories. While our morals and worldly standards are being replaced with sci-fi imaginations of youth.
What’s this have to do with the LHC project you ask?
-My answer is this: The LHC project is the largest, most expensive, physical manifestation of all that is wrong in the human error. It is a $8 Billion dollar monster created to attempt the feat of poving God’s non-existence. More textbooks will be rewritten, more LHC’s erected, more spirit-absorbing theories will be suggested. But when all is said in done : Those of you who deny Him, will have to answer to Him, just like us who believe.

Because God wouldn’t fit into our boxes, we denied Him altogether.

We have left the Father’s path to follow our own.

Lost sheep indeed.

For the record: I find it frightenly upsetting how little the majority of the posters on this site care about their precious lives. It is an upsetting confirmation that so many people are prepared to humorously “bring on” death. This is the only chance at life we get people!

well right now im thinking and reading some of your comments and im thinking in our time in there were supposed to be alot of things happening but most of them never happened and most of them are about the world ending and im really nervous about the black hole stuff and some ppls comments say that the media has made such a big deal and turned it into the message im not sure that is true but i am christian so lets jus pray and hope everythings good…. and if the world does come to an end i say we all convert into christians =]

This is exciting news, because of a new theory by Dr. Garrett Lisi. The new theory purports to be the long-awaited Unified Field Theory, in that it predicts the behavior of all known particles. In addition, the theory predicts the discovery of 20 new particles. If the CERN collider discovers these new particles, then Lisi is our generation’s Einstein. A video explaining the theory for the layman can be found here:

This is a concern for all of us. That’s why this experiment is just pure nonsense. All we need to do is to improve the way of life and not on discovering things that can just destroy ourselves just because of thinking that this could be the answer for a better tomorrow. We experience a lot of issues regarding diseases,war,hunger in some countries,and global warming. If that’s the case then FOCUS directly on those concerns not into some other money wasting idea..Just because your smart enough to do it… It’s “our” planet,our only home,,not mine,not yours but “ours”…we should take care of it.

OH MY LANTA.
WE ARE ALL GUNNA DIEEEE.

…DANGIT.

UHM YEAH I HAVE PLANS FOR TOMORROW
CAN THE WORLD END LIKE…NEXT WEEK DURING MY PHYSICS EXAM?
LIEK, THAT WOULD BE LIEK SO MUCH BETTER
…
YEAH.

8D

No, the world really is going to end soon, just not by this thing, but by God Himself. http://www.familyradio.com May 21,2011 to Oct 21, 2011.

>> Damn—and I was worried about second hand smoke.
>
Paul —

Never get your smoke second hand… you don’t know where it’s been!!!

No one on this earth has the power to end the world!
God himself will end this world..
and if scientist themself are so smart. Don’t you think they’d be smart enough no to do something like this….duh..
There are somethings in this world that we can’t understand an they should stay that way

This is out of control! Crazy and I do not approve of it….What is this world coming too! Whatever happens happens….no need to mess up the world more than it already is! Leave it in God’s hands….

If the world ended this week would that REALLY be a BAD thing? All problems would go out the window and be compacted into an infinitesimally small space of infinite mass. Those last few seconds would look amazing.

More seriously, while science must be conducted with caution, forever standing still for fear of negative results will never improve anything. My sincerest delight would be not only to have no negative results from the LHC but to have positive results in less than a week.

Before early explorers crossed the Atlantic, Europeans claimed that they were mad, and would be devoured by monsters, or sail off the edge of the world into… something bad.

Remember part of the Manhattan project was conducted on a college campus. ^_^ Look where THAT got us!

I happen to be one who thinks we’ll survive this but I do think it’s foolish to approach things like this without some reverence. However small we think the likelihood of doom is, we don’t know the outcome is until we have the results, period. Doesn’t all science proceed in that manner?

Goodbye cruel world.

Do we really need to know this? Will it really change anything? Why take the risk at all? Scientist seem to have a ‘need to know’ on how we all were created. While God above must be looking down laughing “all you need is a little faith”.

This is safer than it sounds. The tiny black holes will be short lived. Black holes aren’t really points of no return. Hawkins descovered that they radiate energy that’s determined by their surface area, not their mass. Large black holes are stable because a large sphere has a high ratio of mass to surface. But tiny black holes have to much surface area compared to their mass/energy. They radiate down to nothing instantly before they can grow. But who knows… add a little quantum chance and maybe our diminished 401K’s really become worthless. But I wouldn’t cash it and spend it just yet.

Well the way I see it, there is always something that someone thinks will end the world as we know it, it was disease, meteors, greenhouse gases, nuclear energy, war, President Bush, Al Qaida, humans, the end of the Mayan Calendar, the list goes on and on.

Reality and history dictate that we would never have evolved as a society, without taking risks, calculated risks, to further our knowledge. If and when something bad does happen as a result of this Particle Collider, rest assured …it will be over in the blink of an eye, and no one will know the difference.

Really, with the state of our human race what it is, and this planet we call home being destroyed and abused the way we are doing, perhaps it wouldn’t be such a bad thing, if we actually destroyed ourselves as a result of our pursuit for knowledge.

However, I highly doubt this will happen. But I do think that the answers that we will glean from this experiment may give us the answers to solve our more troubling problems and save our planet and our race from self destruction.

This is just a media frenzy that is making someone else very rich, so sit back and carry on with your lives, we will all be awakening this Thursday and Friday to the same world we know and live in.

Pleeeeaaasssse don’t do this little science experiment of yours.The world and my family do not want to pay the consequences of something that doesn’t even have a purpose in life but to destroy life itself.please think about it,and come to realization that what you are about to do is not necessary.

LOL at someone who said “Large HARDON collider” i laughed so hard, HAHAH

A recent story said something like if this black hole does occur then in about 4 years somebody would be wondering why a beam of light was coming out of the Indian Ocean. Everyone knows that the end of the world, per the Aztec calendar, ends in about 4 years. Is this a coincidence?

I am not a physicist, im a high shcool student. But even I have enough of an understanding about what the whole ” Big Bang Theory” meant, exactly what it says, A Big Bang. So using my understanding of this, and the fact that if something is named that, then it must be the biggest bang the ever, then I would assume that it is not a very smart idea to re-create it! I mean if the original ” Big Bang” created the entire of space, by the smashing of two huge bodies of protons together, then wouldnt reacreating it on a smaller scale possibly make a ” Big Bang” focused in a smaller space, like our solar system? Now I dont now much about the project, but im pretty sure that no amount of protection is going to control the reaction of these particles colliding. On another note, this project, cost a grand total of 8 billion dollars. Thats enough to feed all the homeless people in the world for the rest of their lives. But instead, a group of physicist, spend it on what? proving that God doesnt exist, that is truely the only point to this experperiment.

okay, as i understand we are going to get sucked up into a black hole, if this doesn’t work. What i would love to know is, why in the world would anyone let scientist experiment this when there is a chance we could all die. Its not me i’m worried about, its the people have don’t know where they are going if they die. I seriously think who ever is letting scientist do this should think long, and hard about what they are taking responsabilty for.

EYEOPENER112:

What makes you believe that this experiment is meaningless? That it will make people think they are worth nothing. You are totally off on that point. It actually in science brings us closer to God, this experiment is going to reassure theories that we are all One, that God is everything and God is everywhere. Where did you get that meaningless from? If you do your research you’ll see the theories behind the experiement, and that being we are all connected in one. This experiment will bring science and religion together. This experiment isn’t about the big bang and to prove that we are “nothing”. It is the opposite of that. The theory says we have a creator, and that creator is everyhting and everywhere, even you and I. This experiment will bring [people together by way of science mixed with God. People who are strictly science and don’t believe in God will actually see the magnificience of life created by God. And as for that we should use the money for other problems, well if you did more research, you will see that to get big results you have to start with the small things in life, like what cancer is made of, disease is made of,….by understanding the small it points us into a better direction to help eliminate disease, cancer, starvation, etc. This will point us into a more understanding of God as a whole society pointed by way of science rather than fear or forced by way of religion. Religion and science finally converge to understand good for a positive outcome.

God will take care of us……….

Why do we have to know? What good will it do if we find what it is they’re looking for? What will they do with that info? I know I’m not losing sleep wondering about the Boson particle. Seems like the cons outweigh the pros. Astronomically so.

Did anyone ever think to ask the rest of us if this is okay? Is this acceptable behavior?

I would like to know who approved this? Why are we just now finding out about this HUGE news story? I think I have some answers.

1. If this had been news to the general public before the 8 BILLION dollars was spent I think the whole project would have been scrapped due to public outcry of wasted money.

2. Now that the secret has been released to the public, if it fails, scientists have just found a way to ensure more money is thrown at the Non-Problem?

3. Another reason, can you imagine the politicians that approved this spending trying to justify this budgetary debacle? They would have all guaranteed themselves a one term career. And, obviously, if the US Dept. of Energy had a hand in it, so did all of our wallets.

I am not putting down science. Gazing at the stars with the love of my life has always been one of our favorite pastimes. However, come on, 8 billion dollars? Could that not have been spent somewhere else? Of all the problems facing the world today, the only thing we could find to spend 8 BILLION (sorry, I just can’t get over it) on something that does nothing for the greeater good of the people.

All this, and I haven’t even contemplated the effects of this turning out to be our “End of Days�….

Many have belittled the cautious. Some articles have compared this experiment to Columbus sailing into the unknown, or the first man to subject himself to high speed travel (Thank you, BBC…). However, it’s apples to oranges. Those experiments only endangered the individuals taking the risk. The collider, however, is on a whole new level. Sure, the risk may be small, but there are a lot of unknowns. The possible danger is on a global scale. Certain individuals may be willing to risk it all in the pursuit of theoretical knowledge and the advancement of their careers, but I am not. The advancement of science is good. Scientific theory is good. But this project is a most dangerous gamble.

Personally, I’m not willing to place my trust in safety assurances from the very people instigating the project, and that is all I have seen offered up to the public in the form of a CERN safety review. (Not to mention condescending and dismissive comments quoted from “rock star” scientists involved with the project, also courtesy the BBC.) Where is the truly independent review? Where are the emergency contingency plans? Think of it this way, would people trust an ambitious General Motors to produce a safe car without independent oversight? The Insurance Institute for Highway Safety, J.D. Powers, Consumer Reports and the US government’s safety testing and mandating say we don’t. Would people trust our ambitious government to make the right choices without checks and balances inherent in the system? Of course not.

I don’t know everything that has gone into this project via very ambitious people, but I do know that I’m not reassured. Particularly because nobody appears to have been paying much attention until it’s “too late” to say or do anything about it.

Everything could go right, but it could also go very, very wrong. Are we willing to risk the planet, and the lives every person walking its surface, to satiate the minds and egos of a few?

I’m not a physicist. I’m not particularly religious. But I bristle at the thought that “enlightened” people driven by unchecked ambition would both belittle my right to continue existing and dismiss words of caution without deeply and realistically probing into the possible implications of their actions.

WHAT THE HELL I NEVER GAVE AN OK TO THIS CRAP WHO THE HELL TOLD THEM TO TRY TO BE GOD

DAMN WE VOTE FOR LAWS AND PRESIDENTS

WHY THE HELL CANT A DANGEROUS EXPERIMENT THAT MIGHT DESTROY THE WORLD BE PUT UP FOR A VOTE

LIKE OK IF YOU WANNA RISK SOME DUMB ASS TEST AND DIE VOTE YES FOR THE TEST

IF YOU DONT WANNA BE A DUMB AZZ TRYING TO PLAY GOD AND LIVE A LITTLE LONGER VOTE NO FOR THIS STUPID AZZ TEST

Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether or not they could, they didn’t stop to think if they should.

I think I still have some duct tape and plastic left over from 12/31/99.

Whoever supports this crap is a moron. Why would you put a percentage of the world’s population at risk let alone all of it you’re just stupid. We should all grab our pitchforks and flaming torches and go burn the thing. I for one don’t want to die nor my family because of some experiment. That’s my theory on the Atom Smasher you want your atoms split cut your turd in half see what’s in there smart guy. That is my conclusion so there………………….

People You all need to start reading the bible more and watching less TV.. In case you all didn’t know God and only god can destroy the world… Not no scientist… Get a life

Humanity must take risks in order to reach the next great milestone. Not to mention, all the people bitching about the LHC seem to have zero background knowledge on anything other than religion (by the way, went to a Christian school, very boring.)

To the person asking why it’s underground… do you see how big that thing is? Underground its safe from weather and outsiders tampering with it, it also stretches underneath TWO countries.

Some of you need to use some god damn common sense before opening your traps. I could go on with some more points and flaws in peoples posts but I have no desire as some doofus will arrive in a minute to dissect my post and some how turn everything I said against myself and or the the O.P.

i don’t know wheter to worry or not. on the one hand…all of these people are much msarter than me and i doubt they would do this if they thought there was a real chance of mishap.

on the other hand…what do we REALLY know about black holes? it’s all just THEORIES, right? no one knows for sure. so, using this logic, they really have no idea what will happen. anything could happen. how many discoveries in science have been made by accident? by something happening that wasn’t expected? it is a little scary.

i, too, think that there are some things maybe we were never meant to know. just imagine what we could have done with the 6 or 8 BILLION dollars we spent on this thing. heck, we could have spent 3 billion on space and undersea exploration, 2 billion on medical research and the last billion or 2 could have gone to feeding the hungry and housing for the homeless.

i kinda hope it just doesn’t work when they flip the switch and they can never figure out why.

There has to be a reason why people think this Collider is going to destroy the planet. Had one of these scientist at one said that destruction is possible from the starting of this? Are they saying that it won’t destroy anything in order to keep people quiet? This is like Dr. Octavius in the Spiderman movie where he continued to allow the nuclear fusion to continue saying that it wouldn’t do any harm, but in reality it began to form a massive black hole in the middle of New York City. If these scientists know that that risk is there, why continue with it??

If it worries you so much do something about it instead of waiting for some judge or court to toss it aside like a useless piece of trash, which is exactly what your words are when you cry to people and places like that. Take it into your own hands.

This reminds me of an Austin Powers movie except that it’s not very funny. How many other “projects” are ongoing that we haven’t heard about? Can any state or group with the money and means try any experiment they want? Where is the control? Why haven’t we heard more about this? Just wondering …

P.S. I feel exactly the same way about cloning and genetically altered foods. I vote no to both .. if I have a vote !!!

i am so glad i am not going to die. i was totally freaked out.

i’m soooooooooooooooooooooooo happy the worlds not going to blow up!!!!!!!! yey

i am so glad to hear that were not going to die
!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Okay I feel two ways about this. I feel that there is always a risk when it comes to experiments. That’s why they are called expeiments. If everyone knew what was going to happen they wouldn’t do it. I say go for it. I really don’t think that anything is going to happen. However the fact that not everyone knows about this and that they haven’t really informed the entire public makes people question it. If people where more informed about science and the need to experiment there would be more understanding. Oh and then there is the whole fact that if this is true and it works there goes the whole “God” created earth thing. Which in it’s own scares a lot of people. Honestly It would be kind of scary to think what people would do if it was proven there is no God.

I am frankly offended by the lack of due diligence being done by the news outlets prior to publishing “news” about the end of the world caused by the LHC due to grossly uneducated people such as Mr. Wagner. His credentials, either a Radiation Safety Officer or a Nuclear Physicst, depending on the source, in no way qualify him to comment on the high energy, particle physics at CERN. Radiation Safety Officers working in the Nuclear Medicine department of the VA do not constitute experts in particle and theoretical physics. I hold a Masters in Physics and am ABR certified in Medical Physics (degrees and certifications that as far as I can tell, Mr. Wagner does not hold) and I can attest that the knowledge base between Nuclear Medicine and CERN-type physics are entirely different in scope. These stories need to be vetted prior to publishing. CNN should be ashamed of providing exposure to such a person.

Anybody here played Half-Life? This is it, people. Combine’s coming. I for one will be doing as much procreation as possible before the suppression fields kick in.

Do you think gas prices will be cheaper in the black hole?

Wonder if Dems will rule in there…or if a new party will form.

Quote:
“the $8 billion game… + …The practical applications for this? None.”

IMO = Human stupidity

This money would be much better spent for health / hunger / education etc.

A number of interesting issues have been raised in these blog posts. Why should we spend so much money on a project designed only to further human knowledge? There are many reasons. For the scientist the reason is simple: we feel an insatiable need to better understand the universe in which we live. Many other arguments have been levied, from technological spinoffs to support of industries that are required to produce the equipment. Many arguments can be made for big science, but for me the joy of discovery is enough of a motivation. Also, the cost is spread over many years, and over many countries. The U.S. has been significantly less supportive of the LHC financially than some bloggers apparently believe.

LHC scientists have been painted by some bloggers as arrogant heathens willing to threaten lives for their personal scientific gratification. One blogger suggested that LHC scientists are the same people who deny that humans are responsible for global warming. WHAT??? These accusations are just plain silly.

And the “God particle” has NOTHING to do with God!!! The LHC is not trying to recreate a Big Bang like the one that began the universe. LHC scientists do not have the intent, nor the ability, to disprove the existence of God. And there is no chance the LHC will destroy the planet. I am saddened by the total misunderstanding of what science is about by many who have made an effort to express their opinions here. As for me, I’m as excited as a kid on Christmas morning, awaiting the discoveries the LHC will shower upon us.

Can you say, “man-made tsunami”? I mean, what are they expecting? A new life form to emerge from the chaos?

Why they are taking risk to do that ?
Does it be helpful to us in any way ?
If they want to do the experiment,can they guarantee that
nothing is going to happen for us?
I want them to answer these before they start?

everybody r crazy!!!!!what if really something went wrong????what they r going to do then?is there some plan how to stop it???anyway i think that ONLY GOD CAN DESTROY THIS PLANET NOT SOME CRAZY SCIENTIST WHO DOESNT HAVE ANYTHING ELSE TO DO IN LIFE THAN DESTROYING OUR LIFES!!!!!
SO STOP WHATEVER U R DOING!!!!
DONT U SEE THAT U R SCARING THE WHOLE POPULATION ON EARTH?
IDIOTS!!!1

Scott in PA

Thank you for your response. I truly hope that this is for the good, but it worries me that man tries to go places that he may not necessarily need to go. God did give us a mind, I just hope we’re not trying to “outsmart” Him. I guess like you……..I’ll have to just have faith. I know whatever happens…….He’s in control.
Have a good night everyone!

guys guys guys!
This just like twister. If the black hole starts up(IF), simply tie yourself to a pole sticking out of the ground.
And hey! If anyone else wants to spend the last hours full of action, let me know i have hook ups for sky diving!!!

One thing I know is that God is his own lawyer and he will have justice in all things.

It just floors me that most people don’t want this and yet multiple governments are allowing it.

The USA is currently in billions of dollars in debt yet is supportive of this $8 billion project yet we can’t get a Mother of five health insuarnce to care for her children. Where is the sense in this?
The argument is that Scientists want to save lives. Well, if that is true why not get on the picket line and help to stop the wars as that is what most earthly citizens want. You want to prevent cancer then stop using chemicals that aren’t supportive to our enviroment. The list can go on and on.
God directs us to live with the Ten Commandments not for his sake but for man to live in harmony with his creation and it’s intent. The emphasis of loving God with all our heart, mind, and soul and loving our neighbor (our fellow man) can honestly change the world and eliminate most of the problems that Science argues this experiment is for. Of course that takes politics and or power out of the equation so the minority continue to rule whlie the masses protest. Something is terribly unbalanced with that.

I am not afraid of this experiment. I’m more afraid that people do not take God as truth and in essence mock him by doing this experiment.
Please forgive us God and have mercy on all of us.

What if the universe we’re enjoying now came about through an identical experiment performed millions of years ago by a similarly advanced civilization? That means we’re about to create the next universe, that will in turn evolve a species that will create the subsequent universe. And so on, and so on….

I do not understand why to spend such a money for a project which does not have practical use for us. What is the necessity, practicality of this project?
Why it is so important to know how universe started, I want to know how to preserve life on this planet, not to jeopardize it.
All this money could be spent wisely for all of us, not for some irresponsible, ridiculous project – and maybe fame of the people.

Hey Josh,
Read the comments. They’re all about GOD!!! When people see or even read what little they can about this they jump to God. When people don’t understand they put their faith in God. Well there will be that group that will say if it is done that God didn’t create the earth due to lack of understanding. If it gets big enough I for one don’t really want to be around a world where people lose their faith. Honestly it scares me more then the earth being sucked up in a black hole. The thought of people living their lives by something that was made up. People would go crazy. Thats what scares me. As long as people don’t take the time to learn about things anything that is done in science in turns deals with God.

good now i don’t have to see Mc Bush win the election

You would serve your audience far better by writing serious, informed articles. This kind of blogging is not news, and the resulting discussions, while they may bring traffic and ad revenue to your employer’s website, do little to educate your readers. Ignorance of science is a serious and frightening problem, far more so than the “threat” posed by the LHC. What are you doing — really — to help?

My argument has nothing to do the big G. It’s simple, really: Man is fail-able. Many theories involved lean heavily to the theoretical side of the realm. And I, for one, am not up for the risk of having my perfectly happy life possibly sucked into nothingness due to a bad equation just so we can collectively experience the “joy” of discovery and the “beauty” of physics in its most violent form.

Mistakes are part of discovery. Uncorrectable mistakes with the potential to obliterate the planet are a different animal entirely.

Is it possible that the idea that we could destroy our only life raft in this universal sea simply to big to contemplate? Is that why we fail to even consider the alternate consequences? I wouldn’t play Russian Roulette with a gun… Why do so with the Earth.

I don’t see what we can learn if black holes start to destroy the world. We will only have several years or less to learn anything while these holes are growing and then what? We die of course, which means you just wasted your time learning anything you did. World wide panic may even occur, but if this doesn’t happen, you just risked the lives of everyone on this planet which might be a form murder in some ways. I don’t know though. I guess people can’t just enjoy life the way it is. It always has to be better, faster, stronger. I think we waste to much of our time asking and trying to find out why we are here. Instead of worrying about it, why don’t we just enjoy living in the here-and-now knowing everything is fine?

can anyone prove God exists? if so, I’d like to speak with him directly about not ending the world.

wasn’t the world supposed to end back in July? and back in 2000? and weren’t there a bunch of people in Russia in a cave expecting the end of the world and didn’t they all get admitted to the psych ward?

anyway, i wish all luck on avoiding death through a scientific experiment. wait! isn’t that what happens to us everyday? “scientific experiments” to see if we can avoid death?

Laragans have a goodnight!

And to everyone else out to get a couple things straight…first, the money is NOT from the Government. Your tax paying money is not going towards this experiment. This money has been raised over a decade by scientists all over the world, colleges all over the world, and organization donations. As most of you can’t see with your own eyes because of the lack of research before blogging, this money is being well spent as it will get a closer look into what the universe is made of to point us in the right direction to quickly find cures for cancer, diseases, hunger, oil, etc. You have to start with small to get big, and that’s exactly what this experiment is doing. This experiment does not say that God doesn’t exist, it actually proves that everything is connected and we are all one thru God. That everything is made of the same substance. And that is God. It does not disprove God in anyway. And to all of you that are paranoid the world is going to end…it’s not! If there were a serious risk, don’t you think it would be all over every televised, newspaper, and event? The only reason it is in the news is because two crazed scientist brought it to court to say it will swallow us! That’s not true lol, relax. The money was raised personally by scientists and colleges all over the world, so you don’t get a vote and this experiment has been in the works for over 10 years, it was never secret! If you feel you want to complain about where money is being spent than start your own organization and raise the money yourself for whatever your cause is. CERN should be appreciated for the feats it overcame to get to today to make a better tomorrow for everybody. This experiment will lead to much greater things like possible cures for cancer, energy alternatives, cures for diseases. Thats the reason for this experiment, not to dispriove God exist or to reassure the big bang. Do yuour research before complaining. Especially the money aspect, raise your own if you care so much.

Shameful , how many ppl can we feed with 9 billion dollars ?? What a waste of money to proof if a particle exists or not , and the risk it that we might create a blackhole which we cannot control

Like as if we controlled how the nuclear bomb will explode or what it will do

I usually leave my thoughts with string theory, but I have been following Higgs theory (the theory being tested in said experiment) for over 10 years now. The scale of this collision is daunting when compared with our present means of observation. If the experiment DOES prove the existence of the Higgs boson, the cultured physicists will be in awe and the scientific communtity will be in an uproar. But to the layman the effects will be negligible.
The black holes people usually picture in their heads are the product of stars hundreds of times the size of our own sun collapsing and every single atom in that star losing its ability to sustain itself. When this happens you’ll be lucky to see the genesis of a black hole. More often though we see the birth of supernovas. To put it bluntly, we don’t have the technology or the resources yet to create and sustain a black hole the size of a tennis ball. If the Large Hadron Collider were say… the size of the Milky Way and we were ramming two suns together, we may have a fighting chance.
For those wondering what we’ll see, my own assumptions are this: If the Higgs particle is proved existential we may see a complete curvature of space (black hole) for a few nanoseconds, or we may see a ‘micronova’ (a miniscule portion of space becoming VERY dense) for a few nanoseconds. If the Higgs particle is NOT proven existential we will probably see the same good old cornucopia of subatomic particles we’ve seen in prior collisions.
Sorry for the rant. Hope this clears up questions or at least clarifies what exactly is going on. C~

Curious killed the cat did it not. Well i no one thing the nerds are playing god and trust me when I say we will not be the ones to be punished but it is they who will so trust in God my friends and pray and stand up for what is right my fellow CHRISTIANS!

Everything can happen and everything is possible…If this black hole will be the reason that will makes the end of the world. so be it!.. that’s our faith..

[...] WPIX reporter Katy Tur yesterday filed a report on the $8 billion particle accelerator that may end the world today. [...]

Science is full of lunatics out to destroy the world and all that live therein. They’ve been trying since the beginning of time… whenever that was. Fools like Aristotle, Ferdinand Magellan, Galileo Galilei… trying to disprove that we already know everything and that you can’t sail around the world, so don’t try, etc… Just a bunch of random risk takers who don’t think of the consequences!

Oh, and what happens if we smash two protons together and find God?

Before you go off, I’m a card carrying, church going Christian too. I’m just one who things scientists are a little bit smarter than me and generally have things well thought out…

God Created Man… Man Created LCH… God Created LCH Simple math my friends.

YEAH YEAH YEAH WHEN IT GOES BOOM THE EARTH STARTS SHAKEING SHYT STARTS GOING UP IN SMOKE THEN YOULL SAY DAMN WHY DID THEY TRY THE EXPERIMENT SOMETHINGS CANT BE UNDONE YOU ONLY GET ONE CHANCE TO GO WRONG IF THIS GOES WRONG WE CAN ALL DIE DONT YOU GET IT RIGHT NOW ITS FIFTY FIFTY CHANCE THE TEST WILL CREATE A BLACK HOLE THERES NO FIXING IT AFTER ITS DONE THE WORLD WILL GET SUCKED IN WE ALL DIE

Well, it is 11:55 est and I am patiently waiting for the world to end. Just kidding. I have been following the coverage of this story for quite some time now. I must say that I am excited for the scientific community and am hopeful that the outcome of this test will yield a vast wealth of knowledge to share with the rest of the world. Of course you would expect the media and the nay-sayers to fill your heads with this worthless rabble. I just never expected such nonsense to be filtered around the water cooler talk in the workplace. Hey, at least it’s not nearly as bad as the “Y2K” crisis. I’ll see you tomorrow morning.

I THINK U GUYS SHOULD FORGET AND NOT RISK R LIFES?

even if there is the smallest possible chance of something going wrong and the end of life as we know it, no matter how miniscule….who gives a small group of scientists the right to decide for billions of other people? who gives them the right to decide whats worth a risk like that?

selvin you couldnt be more wrong… FOR THE LAST TIME THEY WOULD NOT CREATE A BLACK HOLE THAT WOULD SUCK THINGS IN LIKE THE ONES IN Space. Read a damn book. Are you always this scared of things you dont know anything about

this is just like the Republicans that call in to radio shows….they don’t think before they speak and they think they know everything without finding out any facts.

The people of Mars had one, look what happen to them when they fired it up !!!

The thing that bothers me about the LHC isn’t that it will end the world, a laughable proposition indeed, but its insiduous and secret purpose, which has not been well documented. Clearly, simple logic points in this direction – a high energy beam of particles travelling at nearly the speed of light, with enough energy to tear apart any matter it comes into contact with. It seems obvious to me and others that this is intended to be a super weapon, with the capability to eventually direct the beam anywhere with awesome and powerfully destructive results.

The most puzzling and disturbing aspect of this is the fact that it is being constructed with international cooperation. I have only heard of two credible explanations for this. First, that there is one master country bent on using this weapon for their own purposes, and the science cover was elaborately constructed to dupe other countries into providing partial funding. Second, and I think this is more likely, is that the governments of Earth know something they’re not telling us, and they are colluding to create this weapon to fight something greater than ourselves, perhaps an alien civilzation bent on the destruction of Earth. I can only hope that isn’t a super weapon that will mark the beginning of an epic interstellar war, but logic seems to dictate that is the only possible explanation.

agreed

The hitchhikers guild to galaxy has no anwers other than to bring a wet towel with you.

I DONT AGREE… PLEASE DONT TRY IT OUT.. I DONT WANNA DIE? PLEASE AM BAGGING U ?

I SAY BEFORE THAT.. WE SHOULD DO A WORLD PARTY.. INCASE WE DIE?

the force of these particle beams hitting at full speed about the same as the force of 2 mosquitoes hitting at full speed.

remember that atoms are incredibly tiny, and a proton is even smaller, an atom in comparison to a proton is like a football stadium compared to a human. Now these particles that will collide will create even smaller particles than protons.

I heard a lecture from a well known university particle scientist that said the only reason people are talking about big bangs and black holes when it comes to the Large Hadron Collider is because those are the sexy things in particle physics. Scientists at CERN would of never got funding for this thing by talking to the world leaders and polititicians about scientific mumbo jumbo. They just told them about the sexy things that the LHC would do.

but the negative thing that spurred from that was all the scared people who took those ideas and let their imaginations run wild.

look all these things that people are scared of happening are based off their imaginations not facts, but the things these scientist talk about are based off facts.

I for one am going to trust the smartest man alive, Stephen Hawking and take his word that everything will be ok.

Regarding the second comment:

‘THIS is the way the world ends.’ – Cortana

For the pregnant seventeen year old: Eat something in case tomorrow comes. I understand your worry. I have been thinking about nothing but my one year old son and about how I don’t understand what is really going on with this LHC.

I am educated and religious. This is a good test of faith. I am upset that science would put billions of lives at risk. If they are successful I agree with some bloggers that we don’t know what this project will eventually lead to. I worry, I think about my son barely starting life and pray that when this experiment actually happens later on this year humans will learn rather than destroy.

Those of us that are thinking of humanity, we are not ignorant. We are not stuck in the dark ages. We are taking the time to pause and wonder at the ability of mankind. The enormity of existence is beyond our mind’s capacity. I love science and physics. I just want to question the risk and educate myself on those risks. I am finding some things out, but physics theories contradict one another too much to really make much of a case.

Good luck to the scientists, I hope it is worth it. And if we do actually end, we will never know it.

Most of these comments are ridiculous. People hear black hole and they think SHARK!!! And for the people who think is a waste of money… well… wow… Honestly get out there and do some RESEARCH if you’re so TERRIFIED. If you did some RESEARCH you’d come to find out that the BIG BAD BLACK HOLE wouldn’t have the TIME nor the SIZE to SWALLOW AND DESTROY a GREEN PEA. Please, for the love of humanity, READ SCIENTIFIC JOURNALS instead of letting CNN harbor your reasons for thinking ARMAGEDDON is nigh. I do have to hand it to the media though =D They put END OF THE WORLD in their headers and its like opening the doors to IDIOCY.

I believe that this thing will destroy the world…I also believe that the world is flat and that the sun orbits the earth.. oh yeah.. I’m also down with spontaneous generation too..

well reuters article says their is a chace a that a tiny black hole will be made big or small same effect we die let them risk their lives on a astoride in space if they die well cheer say told you so azzholes but its not fair they risking the lives of everyone on earth i for one love sex love going to the movies football going to the beach traveling what the hell my life gonna get cheated cause some fool kills us i want couple football team of kids b4 i die i need more time now i need to wait hope nothing goes wrong piss me off what if today was the last time i got sex i be so mad id piss from heven on all does nerds who burn in hell for killing us all

Agreed with C~, besides its my RDO on Friday, i will be really upset if friday is swallowed into a black hole before i get to use it.

This is a unique experiment. This is biggest, This is massive, This is gigantic and this will lead a ultimate way a new dimension of particle physics. Not only this time, several experiment on this will give the idea of formation of particle, formation of live.

This unique experiment have very little side effect than ts positive side. If we take account of the positive side of this then we must ignore its negative side.

Chances of formation of black hole can not be waived out. but it is a controlled process it can be stopped at will and there are so many control points and so many securities that any odd happening can be stopped at once. So no chances of fear and criticism. If we are in this earth we must explore every aspect of its formation.

Life is risk. What give companies the right to sell us products that may contain nuts? (no pun intended) What gives the guy in the car next to me to drive so close? What gives millions of parents around the world the right to let their children go outside? Everything has a small component of risk associated to it. If we lived by the credo of “if there is the most miniscule possiblity of ANYthing going wrong, DON’T DO IT!… then we, the world, society, mankind would not progress.

If there is the smallest possible chance that either John McCain or Barak Obama will start a nuclear war, destroy the American economy, offend anyone, etc… then what gives the Amerrican Public the right to vote for either of them?

I’m not saying go do whatever you want… What I’m saying is that you make informed decisions, and I think we can rest assured that these guys with the 5lbs brains have calculated the risk.

Maybe this whole thing isn’t the scientists fault. Maybe it’s the MEDIA????

You are not going to die. Nobody will die. Nobody is risking anyones lives.

who.s to say mars was not full of life at one time just like earth but just like the idiots on earth thought they were too smart and tryed to see hw the big bang theory worked hmmm smarty aint work to good for them did it now they a red dead planet countdown we might be next we can call earth mars two the idiot blue planet

Again, today’s work should not impact you..it’s a few months away before all the power will be on it..and a few years away for any real, if any, impact….then if there’s reason to be concerned you’ll know it.
Say your prayers, go to sleep in peace, and chat tomorrow!
God Bless.

Greg, you are possibly the most informed person on this forum.

To parry your point Selvin… You’re right? Whos to say that Mars wasn’t once a flourishing planet but doomed themselves to lay under the red soil forever? But hey… then again theres us here… it takes us MONTHS to get MACHINES, not humans, MACHINES to Mars. And even then we can’t dig very deep. Now what makes you think that if we can’t probe our nearest celestial neighbor deeper and a few feet that we can create a black hole the size of Earth? Hmm? Don’t think too highly of us mate. I sure know those scientists at LHC don’t.

by the way Daniel Doenges im not scared im ready to die been ready i been liveing on borrowed time since day one still here just dont like someone trying to decide my fate with some experiment i want to enjoy life as long as possible have few drinks with friends im yet to meet go places ive yet to travel i dont care what is known if theirs a risk let them risk their lives not ours

Well 2 and half hours and counting lol Worst case we might be time warp lol Who know? Well I better play more with my ps3 lol

selvin… Go to bed, wake up tomorrow you will see that everything is fine. Like socrates said I am not afraid of death because it is either one of two things. The first is that death is like a great night of sleep with no dreams, which is not bad at all. The second is that there is something after death and in that case we wont know till we get there so what is there to be afraid of. In anycase calm down and dont lose to much sleep.

[...] again. Must have opened up a worm hole in my neighborhood U must be dreaming about it lol. SciTechBlog: Blog Archive – The world will not end this week – Blogs from CNN.com __________________ http://www.youp-pax.org/ my wireless speed well close to 3megs/1.5megs [...]

To help alleviate concerns, I would like to point out that plenty of safety studies are performed for every scientific experiment, including the LHC. There is nothing reckless about the way these experiments are carried out, and every aspect of safety is of the utmost concern — that’s partly why these experiments take so long to develop.

If you are interested, I point you to the following scientific analyses of all of the proposed LHC doomsday scenarios (proposed by non-physicists, mind you), and references therein. And there are many more safety studies than these. LHC scientists have really done a superior job of addressing every concern for global safety, so you can rest easy. (I hope the blog lets me post these URL’s. Click where it says PDF. You need a pdf reader like Adobe Acrobat.)
http://arxiv.org/abs/0806.3414
http://ccdb4fs.kek.jp/cgi-bin/img_index?200308010

Who’s to say Mars was not full of life at one time, and if we do the experiment we learn so much about how our universe works that we discover a way to stop us from our current path of “destroying the world the slow, methodical, hard way”? (btw, Peter Dykstra – great line at the end of your article.) No one is saying “Let’s blow up the universe”.

I’m more concerned about the little tiny things that are on the protons we are going to smash (Dr. Seuss’s “Horton Hears a Who”).

you know whats funny einstein was trying to smash atoms because he was so smart what good did it do now everyday america lives in fear of nuke war remember when america trew the first atom bomb they still live with the affect even after so many died science too smart for its own good and to the other point your useing the machine to creat effect of big bang if the first bang was to creat the world the secound might end it go to reauters web site read up on the affect if it goes wrong dark mater aka dark hole even if small will crush with the presure the earth suck everything into it the solar system read up

dude you need to read up, that guy has no scientific background in this field.

What good is smashing particles? You most likely wouldn’t be able to post your comments right now if it weren’t for the advent of nuclear fission/fusion. Don’t forget Selvin that there are more beneficial and practical uses for ’smashin atoms’ than blowing things up. Power plants use it, nuclear medicine, a few among the great many things. Please READ about it before you post. READ READ READ. All you’re doing is worrying.

greek mythology pandora was warned not to open the box then regreted the results thing is will you live to regret the results of the test or will chaos come from this test just like scientist said no global warming they are so smart put your trust in them now after crap is going wrong were the north pole hardly has ice they say maybe theirs a lil global warming yea start the machine maybe a little dark hole will destroy everything bingo you win

I am just scared. I don’t know anything about physics, but the media attention and hype has sincerely scared a lot of people that do not fully understand. (I am included in that group). I just wish I would be able to grasp the concept (because most of you that do, are not scared) so I could not be afraid anymore. =( *stupid I know*

hello look up the news even scientist who have read like you but who have studyed what may result from the test sare trying to stop the test why they dont want to die is why

hey, ok your right, you might die so get offline and do something more worthy of your last hours on earth than blog. haha night

lol if i dont die this is fun scareing hell of few people lol

but remember this if we do die im find you shyt on your forehead and say i told you so

what time are they going to start it up?
I read it was about 8am their time, Now I read 5pm their time.

“And what do you think about this topic you have absolutely no understanding of, Mr. John Q. Public?”

Isn’t the media supposed to report facts in order to inform the public, not ask the public what it thinks about issues we are mostly clueless on and then report that as fact?

“58% of Americans think a black hole swallowing the earth is bad.” Thanks for nothing.

man there are some stupid people on here

i think cnn really has turned to gossip rag yeah paris hilton or britney spears got more coverage then this experiment i think cnn should not be allowed to be called news casters just gossip rag

we’re all gonna die.

I’ve been waiting over 12 years to see the outcome of this project. Now we get to see if our current models hold up to testing or if we have to rethink some things. Brainless kooks will always have their witch hunts. If they’re so worried, try reading a book on the subject. Mini Blackholes evaporate due to Hawking Radiation. Very quickly I may add. I think this botanist should stick to his profession.

I’m not the smartest person in the world but, I’ve read up on this thing for the last couple of days and doesn’t it seem funny that all of the pros for doing this experiment DONT out weigh the risk. I’ve read about further medical break throughs, every one is going to die eventually. I’ve read about Ellis and his colleagues and something about a magic door, They need to lay off the LSD and be committed!! Selvin does make a very good point about Mars.

some things just shouldn’t be messed with.
we don’t need to know everything.
its possibly putting man-kind and everything known to exsistance at stake.
What good is an answer when your being sucked into a black hole..it ain’t gonna do you much good then is it?

As much as I enjoy listening to the thoughts of those with doctorates in Wikipedia, I’m not entirely certain that the opinions of those of us without advanced degrees in theoretical physics actually matters for the questions being posed here. I consider myself scientifically literate, and certainly don’t understand the specific mechanics behind everything that will be occurring in the Hadron experiments. As fun as it is reading the thoughts of random people on the internet, I think that silly requirement of evidence that the scientific process requires in the peer review process would be great in application here. I think if we did apply it, we would probably share a dismissal of the doomsday folks quite similar to that being held by the scientists involved in this project.

That is just stupid. I am not no scientist to know they are trying to kill us all. supposedly the LHC, “IT IS POISED TO PROVIDE NEW INSIGHTS INTO THE MYSTERIOUS OF OUR UNIVERSE.” why we want to know whats going on over there.. like really they got no life to be doing this.. I just hope they put a stop to it!!!!!! ASAP Before something bad happens..

~JEn
Brooklyn

pleeeeaaassse don’t turn it on.There is no reason for you too.it will not solve any suspision you have and will not make you’s great scientists if you are all wrong and we are all destroyed……think about it before turning that damn thing on.how can you contain such power in a tunnel buikt underground?????????

If the were so sure about the results of their experiment then why build it in the first place. You dont go spending 10 billion dollars on an experiment that you already know the results of and here lies the problem.

Physics has many unknowns, nothing is certain and every physicist on earth craves confirmation of in my opinion some seriously flawed theories. The hunt for higgs, the testing of multiple folded dimensions, verification of string are all noble persuits but dont stand up to the realities as unfolded by chaos math.

Every person on this blogg who argues with confidence in favour of the LHC is simply ignorant to the actual forces that are involved in an experiment of this size. Even in the testing phase they had errors based on miscalculation of the forces, this was plainly stated by the little men in white suits, these are the same men that tell us everything is going to be just fine.

In my opinion a black hole is not necessarily the problem here, there are many other anomalies that may occur of equal distructive capacity, there are also some potentially insane concepts that if proven true may rock the world to its very bones.

On the eave of the opening of pandorra’s box I wish to remind you that nothing is certain, chaos does happen, not everything is necessarily bad and if we go tits up that I love you all.

Jason Sole

everyone its almost time well say a prayer make sure you call your love ones because if they are wrong theirs no turning back it will all end soon ironic man is its worst enemy

If anyone is interested in reading more on the LHC, there’s a nice thread on the SA forums posted by somebody who has been working on it. There is a lot of good information on there. http://forums.somethingawful.com/showthread.php?threadid=2924802

Also I think they’re starting it up in about a half hour (2am EST). They won’t be “crossing the beams” or anything, they’re just going to shoot some protons through but not collide anything. So anybody who was hoping the world would end Sept 10th will unfortunately have to wait another month for the resonance cascade to occur. Beware the headcrabs.

This is an amazing demonstration of the ignorance of the American population…dare I say the “world population” without being labeled xenophobic?

Only one word comes to mind: Luddite, but at least that term stems from the Industrial Revolution, where there was a clear impact on people’s livelihoods. Now we have people who don’t understand physics making leaps of faith based upon bad sounding words trumped up by the sensationalist media. (Present company excluded of course.)

I could present two arguments: one, around the lack of mass to feed the pico-ephemerilly fleeting black holes, but what do I know. There are people with 25 years of post doc work who know a lot more about these things than me, who are working on this.

The second argument is that these people working on the LHC with more knowledge than anyone protesting do not want to swallow themselves up in a big black hole…perhaps the contra argument to this is that these scientists are really terrorists…if that’s the case, the West will really have one-upped al Queda, no?

I think this is not possible as universe is created by himself not by th suggestion of human beigns if universe wants to end it will end on its own not by human beings.. so its all waste just to create a fear in th minds of people…

I wish they would offer free tours for all of the starving children of the world. Then they can explain to them why it’s so much more important for them to find a %$#* God particle than to feed them. “Sorry, you will just have to die. This is just too important to us!” This is selfishness in its highest form.

What! …you paid what? Multibillion-dollar… for what? …Large Hadron Collider…

But, ABSOLUTELY NO ONE KNOWS anything about ELEMENTARY PHYSICS… I mean, does anyone understand that Newton’s Laws of Motion are WRONG…?

Look. To me, it just seems rational, to first, try to understand the Basics, first, before trying to build a Space Ship….

Has anybody thought to look around… there are people who don’t have a place of RESIDENCE… No Food …No Health Care …No ability to buy Cloths.

Wow… Trying to FIND WHAT…!!!! “…Existence of Extra Dimensions…” Oh! How are the Scientists going to convince the people that there are more than 3 Dimensions – Dr. S. James Gates had difficulty trying to explain the existence of more than 3 Dimensions… Well, I guess he never understood Pythagorean Triples… or Pythagoras Theorem either… ”

…The square of the hypotenuse of a right triangle is equal to the
Sum of the squares on the other two sides.”

Well… if the latter is indeed the reason for Dr. Gates’ ignorance… I’ll be guilty too… because I never understood Pythagoras Theorem either… but, the reason I did not understand Pythagoras Theorem is that, it’s WRONG.

In other words, where does it introduce the CONCEPT of the SQUARE ROOT….? I mean, isn’t the length of the Hypotenuse a SQUARE ROOT…?

Nevertheless, the actual or true interpretation of Pythagoras Theorem yields:

“The Sum of the Area(s) of TWO Squares having equal Integer Sides,
Equals the Area of another Square having equal Sides that are
Integers.”

Oh! Has anyone read;

“The Mathematics of Quantification, and the Rudiments Of
the Ternary Logical States of the Binary Systems”

And to think, you’re looking for “…theoretical particle called the Higgs Boson” … and yet, NO ONE KNOWS the actual AMU of the Elements Defined in the Periodic Table…!

Well… since you’re the Arm of the Government… your pleasures come first…even if you’re crazy and someone dies from starvation or untreated medical condition…

THE TAX payer

e. terrell

Don’t worry the world will not end because of the LHC. Only God has control of when things will end and begin. Hopefully this great experiment will reveal a great truth about the universe, God willing.

So the scientist “raised” the $9,000,000,000. from whom? Corporations? Governments? I smell “weapons potential” – that’s where the real money is. Doesn’t that worry people?
I’m with many others on this blog – the 9 billion should have been used to find a cure for cancer or save the envirionment! And who is to say that even if these experiments don’t anihilate the planet, might they not cause more cancers or ruin the envirionment quicker?
Whatsay everyone on the planet should have a vote on what happens on the planet?
And speaking of sci-fi movies – I say it’s time for Michael Rennie to come out of his silver space ship and tell us to stop messing with stuff we don’t know enough about. (The Day the Earth Stood Still – should be required viewing!).
(Look- I didn’t mention GOD – I’m an aethist, with all the wars, hate, etc. that go on, it’s obvious there is no God.)

Ancient Mayans said the world begins a new in 2012, or more importantly the old world ends in 2012. They believed that at a point of 4 to 5 years before hand technology will begin the ark of a zero point revolution, the turning point for man kind, the point of no return. From here technology will not grow in familiar way in percentages but by powers 2,4,16,32,64,128. Yes the world will end, the world as we know it. TS Elliot is right, the world will end, not in a bang, but in a small unperceivable event that most will be completely blind to and may not even hear.

After reading some of these comments, I’d welcome the end of the world because the lack of natural selection on the human population is beginning to take it’s toll on our species. Some of you people are profoundly stupid and should not be reproducing under any circumstances. I’m far more concerned with the proliferation of you ignorant fear mongers than with the tiny chance that something bad might happen with the collider.

And don’t even start with the religious rhetoric, I believe in God myself. The world will not end till God see fit for it to end, isn’t that what you should believe? Then you have nothing to be crying and moaning about it, do you? If this is how we’re supposed to go out then so be it (not that I believe this for a second). God’s will be done.

You bunch of idiots, there is no god. Snap out of it, it’s the 21st century. Enough with the fairy tales and imaginary friends in the sky, please.

This can’t hurt us, it can only benefit us. Sit back and watch the show. This will be epic.

“The world will not end this week”
The past is the present ended, approximately remembered, interpreted.
Throw elephant into Black Hole Paradox ? this collider cannot elephant accelerate
How big can we get ? size of a gnat, before we got the the hole in the donut ?

Line up photons, one after another, how big can we blow up the black hole balloon ?

Capability to produce black hole’s leads to controlling black hole’s leads to harnessing the power ……looks like the start point of a new type of weapon……We started some serious R&D on atoms not for the ‘knowledge’ but for a bomb. Department of Energy (DOE) of US was involved in that too……Any connections ?

Hey….I am anyways a complete zero in particle physics

Hi,

I am very concerned about the scientific experiment that is supposed to take place in Switzerland any day.

The news informed that they will recreate the BIG BANG – the birth of earth, and that this could create a great hole that could swallow the earth.

Can the President of the United States stop this?

Please help!

Thank you in advance,

Sincerely,
Anette Ax Richardsdotter

Stockholm, Sweden

Phone # 011-46-73-623-7011

I’m watching tonight to see if I have to go to work tomorrow?

Where do I buy my ticket? No, seriously, I am rooting for the end of the world.

And ya GOTTA love the way Christians panic every time science is on the verge of completely undoing their logic.

Fun! Say, I haven’t lived in the States for 25 years, and I was just wondering, as I read these messages: do they still teach spelling in American schools?

Is it just me, or does every day seem more like an episode of Star Trek?

this event will be of great importance for our future. Scientists have admitted that it is a possibility of creating a Black Hole, though they feel that it is also an impossibility. they also feel that it did happen the Black Hole would be a “Micro Hole” that would pass through the Earth via gravity and disperse before it could cause any harm. Here is the issue. Even as a “Mirco Hole” it would still have a gravity well that would devour evergy. energy is what makes a hole grow bigger. And there is no better place for energy on this planet than within the core.

so here is a hope that for once i am hoping that the scientists will not do something stupid in order to learn about the creation of the universe by causing the destruction of the Human race.

let us hope.

LEWIS HAMILTON. I LOVE YOU!!!!!! xoxoxox

You hit the wrong part of him my friend! This hadron collector was never going to work in a month of Sundays. They’ve got to get past this Trulli train.

I am a Human rights lawyer and our HQ is in Geneva; I agree with Stephen Hawking that this project will not result to the “holy grail of cosmic science.” And I add that the testing it is for a good objective i.e. “TO SHUT DOWN THE HEAVILY FUNDED PROJECT AND DIVERT THE FUNDS TO A MORE USEFUL PURPOSE “LIKE POVERTY ERADICATIONâ€�.
However if it works they and they manage to create they so called black hole I’d BET they will use it to “SUCK UP ALL THE GREEN HOUSE GASSES�.

Ohh gosh was that to loud…. Get real!!

The LHC will make us all Lose The Game.

why cant they just not turn the machine on, leave it as a mystery and then there would be absolutely no chance of black holes? but no, we just have to know, do we?

curiosity killed the cat.

I cant believe these scientist are trying to play god, whats it to them to put lives at risk if that be the case.

345 am ET…..

I have a mild tummy ache? coincidence or a small black hole?

Ray Kinserlow –
Yes it may be your job but for others who have no clue about this and what exactly it entails of course were going to be in panic

If CNN reported that the Phoenix mars lander could posibly wake up the little green men causing them to attack the earth a % of the people on earth would start stocking up canned goods and boarding up windows or at least start bloging about it.

I for one have been anticipating the Higgs particle for some time now
for its significance in understanding our universe and the potential of that understanding can have one our daily lives and humanity in general.

As for the black hole doomsday scenario scientist have already created mini black holes and were still here. And for the religious aspect of the experiment,Why are only limited to understanding Gods word in the bible And not the natural world that God has given us?

Besides according to the headlines we were doomed along time ago.

If CNN reported that the Phoenix mars lander could possibly wake up the little green men and they could attack the earth. Most americans would start stocking up can goods and boarding up windows with out doing any research of the matter.

I for one have been anticipating the discovery of the Higgs particle for some time now. For its significance in our understanding of the universe and for its potential uses in our daily lives and for humanity in general.

As for the dooms day scenario, scientist have already created mini black holes and were still here. And for the religious aspect of the experiment, Why are we only limited to understanding Gods word in the bible and not the natural world and universe God has given us?

For the ones that are hoping that the experiment will fail. If it fails it will still be as great of an accoplishment as if it succeeds. Thats the cool thing about sceince.

Besides according to the headlines were doomed every day lol

First, what is the benifit ? All I hear from Pro collider people is I believe. I believe nothing will happen. Or. Your all stupid and have no understanding of how things work. Are you kidding me. The scientist have no clue so how are we to have a clue. To thoughs who say they thought the atom bomb would destroy the earth and it hasn’t, not yet you mean. We have more problems than its worth with the big bomb. And to you out there that say little black holes will break up and little black holes are everywhere…..how do you know? Because you use math and it tells you. We have never seen these little black holes so its not a fact and you know we really don’t know black holes at all. There are no facts in your argument either. So please don’t act as if nothing could happen. Please don’t act as if there is some big benifit to this just because you want answers to the universe. If this dosen’t kill us then who is to say the next big experiment doesn’t ? You elitist few thank your IQ qualifies you to play Russian Rulet with the rest of us. I didn’t get a vote in the whole thing. The fact is when they do test for real in October we have no clue what is going to happen. Last I would think that your IQ would allow you to use logic. Are there pro’s sure. Also though there are cons. We are not nutty for being alittle worried. The fact that you are blind to the unknown and so sure nothing could ever go wrong has the rest of us even more worried.

you reporters @ cnn need to get your facts straight…
this article says its a 13 mile long track, and an 8 billion dollar project..
on todays cnn headline its a 17 mile track and a 9 billion dollar project..

and i’m fairly certain i saw an article out of cnn about 5 days ago saying it was a 14 billion dollar project.

I heard a report that two guys in Georgia claim to have found the elusive Higgs Boson and have it stored in a freezer.

and to people worrying about the blackhole…
you wont feel it.. so it wont matter (no pun intended)

and the doom theory… portals to hell..
BRING IT ON!

doom was the best videogame in the mid 90’s lol.

For as long as I can remember, and thousands of years before that, folks have been predicting the end of the world due to come the day after tomorrow, for every reason imaginable (usually things they don’t like). The biblical penalty for being a false prophet is to be put to death — I think that’s one penalty we should revive. Somebody find me a rock and a LHC doomsayer…

The protesters can take heart in the fact that that the US abandoned its own plans for a similar, more powerful accelerator — the SSC or Superconducting Supercollider — more than a decade ago. The only Black Hole it created was the loss of a whole generation of new scientists, many of whom might have gone on to develop new applications to better our lives. Remember that modern medical imaging technology is a direct spinoff of earlier particle accelerators.

Despite the many ridiculous and nonsensical comments I read here, I do find optimism in that at least a portion of the posters appear to have functionng brains.

Until the LHC becomes operational, SciTechBlog appears to be the best source for finding bosons.

Pathetic. The fact that news outlets continue to give even a ounce of coverage to the wackos and their end of the world cries for attention only shows how low you will go to try and make a story out of nothing.

The science behind this and what we’ll learn is the real story. Too bad your admitted ignorance prevents you from being able to communicate that.

“New Year’s” Resolution: Since the world wasn’t swallowed up overnight by a black hole, maybe I’ll take time to read something about this fascinating universe in which I live, as is being revealed by modern physics.

You said free lunch right? C’monnnnn ferocious, world-eating black hole!

This is mankind at its beauty. On one side are the crazy scientists trying to find the reason for all existence and the magic our human brain is not able to understand with its human logic… and then on the other side are the crazy religious people still denying their religion is man made and a form of control. And then… then there’s people like me that are sitting back relaxed enjoying the show, laughing their ass off how entertaining human behavior can be. People of the world, stop your nonsense! Just accept that you are here and you live. No mysteries, just life. You will feel a lot happier if you just accept life for what it is. Just life. Just live. Enjoy the ride! Don’t worry about things you can’t explain. You are already happy, you just won’t accept it. But if you do… you will be happy in this very moment. Right now. That’s all there is too it. We’re over 6 billion Gods.

Sorry everyone i was sleeping, did the world end?

Readers, if you missed it the first time, please go back and review Sam Bandak’s unintentionally brilliant renaming of the LHC. Many thanks, Moderator, for restoring my sense of humor. P.S. Soon as I get to work, I’m double checking ALL my powerpoints.

hhhmm.. doesn’t matter what happens as long as it wouldn’t affect me..

What was Newton’s postulate? Energy can neither be created nor destroyed? I know this is not classical physics, but I think it would take a whole lot of energy to swallow up the Earth. Probably more than Switzerland has.
Botanists… what can I do for my tomatoes?

There is more risk of injury by crossing the street than from the LHC being turned on folks. More humans died from explorers introducing diseases to the new world this just won’t happen with this thing folks. The world will end though when our sun becomes a red giant = vaporized earth. The LHC might give us (humans) answers as to how to get off this rock AND survive.

At least one thing has already been proven by this experiment…that fear of the unknown is alive and well on this website. I highly doubt that this will be the end of the world…but if it is, it will be less painful than a nuclear war with Iran, Russia, and China. Come on, take a chance, which is so incredibly small it can’t be calculated, on getting one step closer to learning the meaning of life. You take a bigger chance on death EVERY time you step into your car and get on the road! Living your life is fear is a terrible way to live.

As a person with a degree in physics and a former NASA employee, I can assure you all that this new particle accelerator isn’t going to end the world. There are several particle accelerators running at any given time on this planet, several of which are in the USA. This is just a more powerful one.

If you are frightened about the experiments (which won’t take place for quite some time still), READ some information about particle accelerators that doesn’t come from some crackpot doomsday type author. Read something written by educated people.

None of you have anything to worry about. I have performed the Magickal Incantations that will protect the World from any black holes formed by the LHC. By the way, you owe me for one chicken.

Taken as a whole, I don’t think the cosmos would miss us. In fact, if it could, the cosmos would likely breathe a sigh of relief if mankind were to create a black hole and then jump into it.

Good Morning everyone….quite a night , egh?

First, I think the Scientists are putting way too much blame on the media for the frenzy that has gone forth, and will continue. The Scientists failed in that they underestimated the public and failed to fairly explain their attempts. The theological also failed in helping the Scientists out in explaining we already know about deminisions, it’s clearly spelled out in the Bible so we know it exists.

For the ego involved: You have been questioning the intelligence of people and their comments and totally disregarding that people have their life out of the heart (emotions, responses, etc) .Human nature is for survivial and when that is threatened it has the flight and flight mode activated. Had the Scientists educated the public properly this would not have happen. Get out of your old boys club and make your experiments known. Perhaps you can draw the intellecut of the youth into your ideas and come up with even more.

For those bashing the people of faith. I reread some of the comments and the ones ‘in the faith’ are actually fairlly level headed because we know our outcome and where we are going so we really aren’t fearful.

For the ‘future’: Rumors abound this will open into deminisons allowing time travel. If this is so why not share this will the public. You may even be surprised and recruit volunteers that would be willing to go on exploration. Other rumors abound that this is a step to the coming out of ‘ET’s’ yet the humor of this is that most people already think this has happen. Most people believe they are liiving right here are earth with us (in seculusion and infiltration). So this wouldn’t be news, just confimration.

I wish this experiment would be the answer to mans problems of the world but you won’t find all that without God, you may get a glimpse but you will never be satisfied and always want more. This is a world of flesh, spirit and order so one should be cautious of venturing too far without restraint

Congrats on your work last night, now be honest regarding the real work that is to come and the potential effects.

If life had changed as we know it, would we know the difference? We’d probably just blame it on Greenhouse gases.

It’s up and running and I’m still opposed to this………..

As for saying the world won’t end this week. Don’t get too cocky. Didn’t you ever hear how the Titanic was supposed to be unsinkable?
Sometimes man gets “too big for his britches” as my grandma used to say.
I’m not saying this will end the world, but who can say for certain that it won’t ? Or that it won’t cause some disturbances?
We haven’t seen what will happen once the two beams are directed at eachother.

Those involved in the experiment say that they aren’t even sure what will actually happen. It’s speculation and theories. They can’t predict the unknown. So why risk it? If there is even the slightest chance it can do harm to the earth, it shouldn’t be continued.

Spend the time and money on something proven that will help mankind.

If the boffins knew exactly what the LHC would do then they would never have needed to build it in the first place.

The idea of black holes evaporating, relies on the theory of hawking radiation being correct – any experimental evidence for that yet…nope…but hang on a bit…

8 billion on LHC or spend 3 trillion on something else – hmm, tough choice

s callahan

well said

When I first heard about this experiment, I was very curious and excited. I was impressed by the way humans have come so far in science as to be able to possibly see other demensions, but when all the ” end of the world” hype circulated through the media, I got scared, as a 19 year old college student with little experience in this area of science, the idea that a group of scientists could be allowed to potentially end our lives on earth made me sick. It made me angry, I like living, eating, breathing, and enjoying the wonders of this earth, and the idea that some stupid, over- priced science experiment could end it all turned me off, all my excitement was gone. The when I woke up this morning and saw that when they turned it on nothing happend I just thought… what a waste of time, engery and money .. just to see things that we might not want to see.

As a Christian, I am not concerned about what happens with this machine. God has it all in Her hands. I’m pretty sure God is powerful enough to control these very tiny black holes! If the world ends, it will be God’s doing, not ours.

We need more science/math education in the US, period. It is just so astonishing (and sad) to see that so many of us Americans are idiots. I am ashamed of our countrymen/women…so ashamed! And one advice to those who do not know anything about any subject, just type in the word to Goggle or wikipedia. It’s so easy, try it. Learn something before you make stupid comments, just try to educate yourself beforehand or just educate yourself, period.

People have been crying “The End Is Near” since we developed language thousands and thousands of years ago. People have always been afraid of what they don’t understand and most people don’t understand particle physics. The sad fact is that of those that don’t understand, most don’t bother to crack open a book to at least make an effort to figure out how things work. I noticed that these concerns about the LHC creating black holes that can swallow the earth became much more widespread shortly after a really awful Sci-Fi original movie last year. It was about, um, a tiny black hole created in a lab that, wait for it……began to swallow up the earth…. SCI-FI DOES NOT EQUAL REALITY!!! READ A BOOK!!!

I’m no bible thumping christian but I believe that someday, our tinkering with things that we do not fully understand will become our undoing. Whether it’s a vaccine or a science experiement or our quest to cure every disease known to mankind; we constantly strive to play God or to be God. We constantly talk about exploring the galaxy and understanding the universe when we cannot even take care of the spaceship Earth we live on now.

17 miles long, not 13.

The concerns about microscopic blackholes “devouring” the earth are totally unfounded. Speculation like this is what happens when people project their irrational fears on others. They come to definate conclusions (such as, “the black hole will devour the earth”) without having any information or background experience to back up their claims. Simple black hole equations (easily retrievable at wikipedia) demonstrate that the smaller a black hole, the faster they evaporate. Furthermore, the energies created by the LHC pale in comparison to the energies reached by energetic protons (cosmic rays) that bombard our atmosphere daily. If the skeptics are right, we should have been dead long ago.

Kelly Banco
Edmonton, Alberta, Canada

“@ Mike

We would probably have a real life version of Hellgate London or Doom. Although Doom was on Mars if I remeber right.

Just equip your BFG9000 and go…”

::equips BFG 9000 and chainsaw:: BRING IT ON!!!

God is onmipotent and omni-present. He will not allow humans to discover that which He does not want us to discover. LHC will only affect, destroy, or reveal that which is according to His plan.

Christians take heart, God is in control.

“As a Christian, I am not concerned about what happens with this machine. God has it all in Her hands. I’m pretty sure God is powerful enough to control these very tiny black holes! If the world ends, it will be God’s doing, not ours.”

Please keep religious oppinions off the message boards. I promise you that no one cares. This is a discussion about SCIENCE, not your views on religion that the rest of us believers already know. We are here to debate with the screw balls that think this will cause the end of the world and to laugh at their foolishness. K thanks.

P.S. – In HER hands? HA! Someone watched Dogma one too many times. I’ll keep this brief. God = ultimate unearthly BEING, not male or female biological organism. Get off your feminine pride power trip and do your homework.

Now, back to science. Cool stuff! Can’t wait to see the results!

It works! Hoorah! To put it in laymans terms, that was like putting over 1000 lights on your Christmas tree and having EVERY ONE light up on the first try! Great job!

BTW, I think some people are confused. There are several “practical” applications that can be, and have been, running at this facility. They are “impractical” at the moment only because of their size, and will continue to become smaller and more efficient. The same was true with original cyclotrons. Every had a PET scan? The antimatter-emitting particles (the P is for Positron–antielectron) have been formed in mini-cyclotrons for years.

Pure science is great, as is proving theories, but we don’t convince governments to spend $9 billion and massive collaboration efforts without a driven purpose. Much like electricity, transistors, nuclear energy, solar/hydrodynamic energy (also called dangerous and overpriced) the applications this develops will be marvelous!

BTW, if you think this somehow disproves God, your faith is totally lacking.

Cheers!

Waste of money? Over-priced? I’d much rather spend such sums trying to understand the world around us – on trying to venture out beyond the limits of how we see the world in order to better deal with it and to appreciate it – than on the baloney we are forced to waste billions on – unnecessary wars, welfare programs, and the like.

If I had to pick, I’d much rather send all of the money I’m forced to remit for medicare and social security straight into science like this instead. At least, in that case, I might receive some benfit from my involuntary contributions, even if it’s only to understand the world a little more.

Oh, and you want to know the answer to man’s problems? Let’s start with the obvious – resigning responsibility and control of his existence to a supernatural being, that in every instance seems to be no more than a abstract manifestation of his own mind and his own ignorance in the face of reality. How about another – fearing the unknown and condemning those who don’t? More of that ignorance, that unwillingness to see the world as it is – that it is ours to do with as we please.

Who is going to stop us from understanding it? God? Bring it on, I say. The only thing I fear is the ignorance that rules so many a man’s consciousness. If we let that unwillingless to understand ourselves rule our lives, it will cut us down and ruin our civilization much more effectively than any non-existent entity could possibly hope for.

So I say, long live reason and its practice. It has brought our existence out of some very dark places, and I hope it will continue to do so for generations to come.

1) Drugs are bad. Stop using them.

2) Hollywood is not a valid source of info.

The people conducting these experiments are the Illuminati of their field. The research they’ve done in the past month alone gives them infinitely more knowledge than your paranoia, assumption, and scripture quoting will give you in the next 2 decades.

I love that people with no science education and no concept of what is really being tested feel they can file lawsuits, blog, or otherwise cause widespread panic about things of which they have no clue (nor do they bother to do even a basic level of research into it). For a civilization that labels the “Dark Ages” as a period of time we’ve already been through, we sure seem to be slipping into a period of wide-spread ignorance (and least in the US).

This is a great new invention but we have to ask ourselves is it worth the chance we are taking sure these mircoscopic balck holes will be made with an even small lifespan but there is always a chance that it could turn out bad. dont get me worng i would love to see this happen and it would help solve so much but I’m just not sure if it is worth it or not

A lot of money spent on something God has already answered sufficiently.

When my boss asked: will you be here tomorrow ? I answered “perhaps…”. I don’t believe in this catastroph theories. Mind you: if I’m wrong I’ll pay the bill at the next Inn.

Well, if it does create a black hole, we’ll never kno

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I’m happy to report the experiment was a complete success……….ummmm although the space/time continuum may have been messed with just a weeee little bit.

Geez people come on, Logic 101 please!!!!. The Scientists are extremely intelligent, well educated beyond most people here on earth. What they have studied and became educated in is beyond what most of us can comprehend. I have no concerns or fears with what they are about to attempt. We cannot grow and evolve without individuals such as these Scientists. Fear and ignorance can hold a person hostage, thankfully not all mankind thinks at this level, or we be stuck so far back in time it would prehistoric.

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I’m happy to report the experiment was a complete success……….ummmm although the space/time continuum may have been messed with just a weeee little bit.

Regarding all those religious persons who comment about their faith in God. If you bible says God created earth, he created mankind, then I think this is all in Gods hands, he is in control. Let it be.

Groups of very smart people acting together often do very dumb things. Recent evidence includes the Iraq war and the fall of the American car companies. Just because a group is smart individually doesn’t mean they’ll always prevail for good.

The annoying thing is that many defenders of this experiment dismiss caution and express total faith in pure theory, while at the same time acting as if their scientific curiosity trumps my – and everyone else’s – right to existence.

Sure, I take risks driving a car. But I take that risk with fellow motorists. It’s localized. With this project, the risk is being forced upon me. And my neighbor. And her neighbor… etc…

As physicists are so fond of analogy, think of it this way:
A few people really want to experience the thrill of jumping out of a plane. But rather than taking the risks alone, they force the entire population of the world to join them. The kicker? There’s only one giant parachute. Sure, everything will probably go right. People will congratulate themselves on the ground and feel better for the excitement of the experience. But what if it goes wrong? There’s a chance. The chute isn’t packed right. A line is frayed. Everybody perishes. Even those that didn’t want to take the risk. Did I mention, the impact incinerates the Earth, as well?

I’m not keen to jump out of planes, and I’m not keen on being forced to risk it all on a whim by a small group of passionate enthusiasts.

If on the off chance the worst happens, there is no containment. No back up. No fire extinguisher. No stopping it. And that is not something taken lightly.

[...] celebration of the firing-up of the Large Hadron Collider, I was compelled to read this SciTechBlog post at CNN in which the author solicits comments about whether the world is going to end, and suggests that [...]

Ladies and Gentlemen,

I’m happy to report the experiment was a complete success……….ummmm although the space/time continuum may have been messed with just a weeee little bit.

……..can someone check the flux capacitor?

“The practical applications for this? None.”
Don’t worry everyone, the sun orbits the earth, and we don’t need to experiment with lightning, that’s bolts from god. No practical applications for electricity.

I’m looking forward to Europe making big discoveries for awhile, and maybe then the US congress won’t scoff at science spending. I’ll second the US is in the dark ages comment. Poor schools, and the government laughs at research spending? Welcome to being even more behind.

This may not be the thing that kills us all, but it raises an interesting question…

At what probabablility of killing all of mankind should an experiment not be allowed?

Is it 1/10? 1/100? 1/1,000? 1/1,000,000?

[...] celebration of the firing-up of the Large Hadron Collider, I was compelled to read this SciTechBlog post at CNN in which the author solicits comments about whether the world is going to end, and suggests that [...]

I love how people put so much weight into there existence.
ill give a quick run down of events regard the operation of this machine.

1. nothing will happen
2. You will die (you wont know it, so relax)
3. We get sucked into another dimenson (probably wont notice that either)
4. We laern more about the universe how it works and you get a house hold proton accelarator to cook your food.

I work at an accelerator in fact there are six here. The odds of anyone creating that much power, such as to create black holes large enough to destroy life on earth and beyond while on this planet is unfathomable. It just won’t happen. Remember the 2000 computer crisis?

If we are pulled into a black hole , well maybe I will meet the real James T. Kirk and Mr Spock. Hopefully I wont land on a hostile planet like in StarGateSG1.

I THINK WE SHOULD GET DRUNK, then if we really care.
for if the is a hell gate what’ll we expect to see? a one winged angel? a creature in the midst of the great unknown?
or earths final jepordy?
earth is always in whether you it or believe it,
it is how we live from the past too the present ,and the future.
even if time compressed, we will struggle so long we give it
our all we will always be a challenge for the universe .
oh yeah if there was a one winged angel
i’ll use my materia an summon KNIGHTS OF THE ROUND
BOOYA!

The US has spent in excess of $500 billion dollars in Iraq over the course of the war, and it continues to increase.

The LHC cost is approximated at $9 billion, and dozens of countries have contributed.

Stop complaining about the LHC when the US is spending $2.4 billion per week in a cause that is neither clearly defined nor has an end in sight.

At the start of science fiction novels, the scientists always say, “There’s nothing to worry about.” Didn’t you see “Crack in the Earth”?

To those that posted such nonsense as “why havent we heard about this secret project before?” and other such drivel.
Have you guys been living under a rock these past 14 years while this was being built?
My wife and I have been following news about the project for at least 5 years now and we have watched the numerous science programs about it on Discovery and other channels when they come on.
There has been nothing secret about it at all.

Secondly to those that complain about the 8 or 9 billion it cost. That cost has been spread out over 14 years and has been paid for by the 20 member countries of CERN plus 6 observer countries. Most of the money has actually been from the “subscriptions” these countries pay to be members of CERN anyway.

For all of you citing “god” as a creator or savior or controller, I have some bad news…

There is no such thing as god. It’s a human invention made up to comfort the ignorant and control the masses.

Oh and to R. Gilmore.

Please do not use the Y2K as an example of hype or panic.
The reason that everything went so smoothly was due to the 2 or 3 years of hard work computer people like myself put in to make sure our software and hardware was compatible. Computer people over the whole planet worked damn hard to make those changes in time and I hate it when that work is just dismissed as hype.

I for one think we’re all doomed. DOOOOOOOMED!

They could at least wait until the end of the football season! Or at least until after the Kansas State and KU matchup.

Personally, I think that 2012 is the year that all the Mayan office suply companies were going to send out their new Long Count calendars. Unfortunately, the Mayans are no longer around.

TOP SECRET – NSA DECRYPT – HIGHLY CLASSIFIED
TRANSCRIPT OF SECURITY TAPE – LHC HQ – CERN
***recovered from site X – formerly known as Geneva, Switzerland***
BABELFISH TRANSLATION ALGORITHM 222.5.65
***TAPE BEGINS 2008-09-10 08:10:33***

GISELLE: I’m still mad at you from last night. All your bwa ha ha stuff just before I flipped the main power switch was completely uncalled for. That was an important milestone in the history of experimental physics, and you were acting like a child.
JACQUES: Sure Igor, whatever you say. You lab assistants always resent us evil geniuses.
GISELLE: You’re no evil genius. Evil, maybe. Particularly the way you get your loser pal Pierre to punch in for you when you’ve been out drinking. By the way, my job classification is higher than yours, so if anyone gets to say bwa ha ha it should be me. And stop calling me Igor.
JACQUES: Igor, Igor, Igor.
GISELLE: Shut up, you mindless little boson.
JACQUES: Well, at least the first experiments seem to be running smoothly.
GISELLE: No thanks to you. Take your feet down off that control panel and sit up straight. I think your shoe was on the power gauge.
JACQUES: Oh, relax, will you. You know I have a headache from all the champagne.
GISELLE: Our budget is only $8 billion and you souses waste it on champagne. It’s a scandal. Things will change when I’m in charge.
JACQUES: God forbid.
GISELLE: What’s that on the Big Board? Something’s not right – what did you do?
JACQUES: Me? Me? What are you talking about?
GISELLE: Look! It’s a black hole! And it’s growing!
JACQUES: It just ate up the collision chamber! Oh my God, what will we do?
GISELLE: It’s growing out of control! Oh how I wish we had listened to those clear-thinking critics who warned us this might happen! Woe is me!
JACQUES: AHHHH!
GISELLE: AHHHH!

***TAPE ENDS 2008-09-10 08:17:13***

why couldnt we have died today =[=[=[

The World will not end, but Physics as we know it may if they don’t find what they are lookin for. From a philosophical point of view, the LHC will open the door to a new dimension,(not the ones talked about in string theory), a new level of consciousness and awareness. The origins of the Universe are beyond our understanding and so this experiment will prove that just as the Uncertainty Principle, the Big Bang is not for humans to worry about.

$9,000,000,000 to tell us where all the poop goes. Where does all the poop go? I’d like 9 billion to redistribute the waterways in the US. No, no, wait; I’d like 9 billion to build wind and/or solar power grids to power my community, and as many others it could juice up. Speaking of juice, I’d like 9 billion to buy juice for a few million I know could use it. I’d like 9 billion to build really cool communal cabins for families, or people who choose to live as such, like pioneers in the colonial days; maybe then people would have a change of enlightenment and get along. That’s a lot of houses, huh? I’d like 9 billion so I could buy up some industries and shut them down.

Greed has now stumped caring and compassion. And, the fact there may be no God, Gods, or Goddesses only allows those in “the know” to go about spending and wasting while life, life from those who probably would live in peace, is wasted. Want, want, want. The “i have to haves.” Helen Keller knew want. Whether it is the Son, or the Sun; let it be and give us peace. Who cares how the universe was created and if there’s extra dimensions. In reality, will knowing this help us as a species, help us grow to understand the real scourge of this planet? Oh, wait, that’s humanity. Industrial Civilization is our modern day plague, and technology will be our tower of Babylon. Ask yourselves, Is the Bible real? Or is just a real good screenplay?

I’ve got to poop now.

I think God will get a “Big Bang” out of this whole experiment and the money foolishly spent trying to prove God doesn’t exist. A huge random explosion created a start for things as we know it? Wasn’t scientific study first started to try to discover the wonders of God’s creation?

It would be great if they can conclude that the big bang created the universe and mass and mostly everything we know. Another thing great about it is the response from the religious organization we are apart of whether Catholics, Muslims, Mormons, Jews and others too many to mention. As this may contradict the belief that God created everything. Are the non believers and people with no religion and God can have a huge basis of their belief? One thing is for sure. God is so great that we have to spend 8billion dollars to prove that he did not need a dime to create the world.

Science and Religion needs Zillions of dollar to compare its paper. One thing is for sure. God when He ask His disciples to write the Bible, He leaves us guessing about this childish facts and fantasy that would not help us in saving our souls.

I completely support this test. This could be the way to figure out countless things throughout our universe. I’m only 17yrs. old but this type of stuff interests me.The only way to learn new things is to try new things, dangerous or not. I’m not a believer of god, but if I got the chance to die in the manner of my choosing I would rather go in either a black hole or in a fiery quasar. Possibly someday in the future we could fully learn to control
nuclear fusion and never have to worry about energy again. So i would rather have more tests like this one take place.

When I first heard about this experiment, I was terrified and worried sick that we were about to be engulfed by a black hole created by men half a world away… Then, I realized how uneducated I was in the degrees of physics, so I jumped on the net and did a little research. Number one, by all accounts, it’s a little egotistical to believe that we could physically create something as profound as a black hole. We don’t even know how black holes are truly formed, what they entail, and so forth. In fact, it wasn’t long ago that black holes were ideas scoffed at as being something you read in some cheesy sci-fi novel. Now, all of a sudden, we’re going to create them and destroy our entire universe because of it? That’s quite a jump in evolution, if you ask me! Number two, from what I’ve read about black holes, there’s no proof that if our universe was “swallowed” by a black hole, we’d be extinct. For all we know, we could easily be in a black hole now! Theoretically, that makes sense… why else would massive stars stay grounded unless we were in some sort of gravitational freeze? I don’t know that I agree with men playing God or trying to prove that we all came from coincidental charges of energy. I think it’s almost comical that these incredibly intelligent men are literally trying to prove that the only answer to the universe is in this chance collision. One thing is for sure…there is no answer that we’re ever going to find in this lifetime. That ever eluding question to life is only answered in death and I think we should leave it at that!

I think it’s great when the media report the sensationalist side of science. Seems whenever a story like this comes out, a lot of people get motivated to check the facts and wind up better educated. Thanks, Peter et al.

Once again CNN has used items about this situation as come-ons for their television news casts to create viewing interest. Several times in the past 3 days I have seen the reference to: “SOME CLAIM ” the world will end because of this experiment. They do not give the names of the scientists who say this and the whole issue is reported as “sensational events about to occur”.

It is a shame but it is typical of the medias approach to reporting science which they cannot or will not understand. Since this comment will be monitored by CNN before you see it, we will see how sensitive they are to criticisims of their “work”. This experiment is about to answer serious questions about nature, physics, and our understandings of basic science. It should be give its due in reports and stories which are serious, and help us all to learn.

I’m thinking there is no real danger. I’ve seen the same doomsayer comments wit all the other supercoliders built and as the article pointed out– Thus far there is no apparent damage to life here on Earth.

and seriously if you think about it, we have a greater chance of killing ourselves with bombs, war, and hatred then with a science expeirent.

I for one and very excited to learn of what this will teach us. I’ve been following the questions and thoeries we’ve been been asking for years and now the time has finally come. This is a monumental time in history and I am proud to be alive right now. I am confident that our scientists of today know what they’re doing. I’m just sad that i will take years to to really learn anything.

-Hail Human

“DON’T PLAY GOD OR TRY TO BE GOD, NOTHING WILL HAPPEN IF IT’S AGAINST HIS WILL”

I am not a scientist and I don’t plan becoming one either, But eally to all those scientist involved in this experiment, I’ve never heard of a most ridiculous idea. Everyone out there that is worried about this has nothing to worry about because, no existing human in this earth has the right to destroy this world. There can be the biggest distructive bomb or what ever but, only God has the right to destroy earth, and when he does do it will be the end, No body know when that day will be. I’t a terrible sin to even think about wanting to know more about things that will never be discovered by a human. that Experiment could cause some damage, more damage then what u will discover from, trust me god will now all the human to distroy this earth, that job is all in his hands, lets try to not compete against his will it’s a terrible sin. As long as your concious is good with God you have nothing to worry about. The world is not ending, The end of the world will be when not even expected, read the bible it’s all in there, when God come very eye will see him, not even his angels know when that will be.

take life easy and say your prayers, every day.
“God Bless You All”

I think there is probably no danger. But the arrogance and irresponsibility of the scientists still irks me. They admit they don’t really know what will happen so how can they say for sure it isn’t dangerous? Not necessarrily creating black holes but other dangers.

When the first atomic bomb was tested, the scientists weren’t sure it wouldn’t set off a chain reaction in the atmosphere and destroy the Earth…BUT THEY DID IT ANYWAY! This seems to me to be a similar situation, damn the possible consequence, let’s DO IT! Arrogant and irresponsible. Not to mention just plain stupid.

Yay for you, Joel.

It’s perfectly safe, as many have pointed out. Folks who are worried about it not being safe are worried because they don’t know the facts, that’s all.

The reason we should do things like this is that it’s cool! Why’d we send folks to the moon? Because that’s totally awesome! Humans are curious, and we like to figure things out, and that’s great. We shouldn’t need an excuse to explore.

Although it has occurred to me that even now, I’m stuck in the event horizon; life isn’t actually going on, I’m just in an endless time loop of my last minutes on earth!

Which is why I’m not wearing pants.

At the naysayers protesting doom and gloom:
Think of genetic mutations in crops and and animals. This has done far more harm to the world than this experiment.
Think of the atomic bomb. Also far more harm to the world than this experiment.
Think of electricity… you know, the stuff most of you can’t live without? Yup, done farm more harm than this experiment.
Naysayers take their life and living conditions for granted. They don’t see what an impact science has had on the fundamentals. From what they eat, to what they wear, to even how they move (the earth was flat, remember?).

Just because you don’t understand a theory or how something works doesn’t mean it’s going to blow up the world. Fear is a nasty animal… and mobs that are afraid are nastier.

So let the scientists (the actually SMARTS ones here) do their work. They know more than you.

Maybe the LHC experiment can add one or two scales to the right of the C.E.R.R.N. “power of ten” ruler (http://microcosm.web.cern.ch/microcosm/P10/english/welcome.html), but what do we gain? I think that the ruler has an infinite length. And I learned in school that any number compared to (divided by) infinity is zero. So, why do we risk EVRYTHING for NOTHING?

The whole bruhaha overwhelmingly reminds me of the following scene from the movie Ghostbusters:

Dr. Egon Spengler: There’s something very important I forgot to tell you.
Dr. Peter Venkman: What?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Don’t cross the streams.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Why?
Dr. Egon Spengler: It would be bad.
Dr. Peter Venkman: I’m fuzzy on the whole good/bad thing. What do you mean, “bad”?
Dr. Egon Spengler: Try to imagine all life as you know it stopping instantaneously and every molecule in your body exploding at the speed of light.
Dr Ray Stantz: Total protonic reversal.
Dr. Peter Venkman: Right. That’s bad. Okay. All right. Important safety tip. Thanks, Egon.

But it didn’t keep me from waking my husband at 1am, just in case, to tell him that in the event of the end of the universe as we know it, I love him and have enjoyed being married to him, just in case.

(Quoted from http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0087332/quotes)

To those people who insist that there is some probability that the earth will come to an untimely end with the starting up of (so aptly named by Mr. Sam Bandak below) The Large Hardon Collider, you are certainly correct and physicists do not deny this. In fact, they would not deny the remote possibility of all of the atoms constituting all of the internal organs of every human walking upon earth’s crust to mysteriously and for no apparent reason simultaneously teleport themselves into the nearest dustbin, causing everyone to instantly collapse in a lifeless mass and ending all human life as we know it.

However, the probability that this would happen is so remotely small that you would have a MUCH better chance of winning every drawing in every lottery in every state in the US for the rest of your life without even filling out any tickets, i.e. don’t worry about it.

I read your story on the particle accelerator at CERN in Switzerland. Although I believe the enthusiastic physicists and am interested in what they might learn, I think you missed the point many people in Europe and the US are worried about. Specifically, that CERN and associated scientists think they have the right to engage without oversight in experiments that in theory could endanger humanity and this planet with much greater certainty than anything else man has ever developed. I know the risk is extremely small, and these guys are so smart that normal people can barely talk to them, but they still shouldn’t have the right to endanger us and our future because they think it’s OK. Although not a physicist or even a science expert, I have looked at a lot of sights recently and summarized my limited findings below, and am still looking for an assurance that this is absolutely safe (I haven’t found it yet). I would appreciate it if some of your smarter readers could elaborate or correct my perceptions and give others assurance that this isn’t worth worrying about in layman’s terms (I didn’t read all the posted comments if that type response has already been posted…).

Details as I understand them: In summary, the physicists at CERN have not ruled out the possibility, however remote, that a miniscule black hole could be formed with this accelerator that, although again theoretically remote, could become what they call “stable”. If it did become stable, there is a very, very remote chance it could start to “accrete matter” (collect atoms of anything around it). Evidently, we wouldn’t know it was stable or gathering matter for quite some time after the event. Also, the time/date they “flipped the switch” is not the critical time for potentially creating this anomaly…it is when it is up to full speed/power and the beams collide with each other later this year or next. If (again, extremely remote, but not completely ruled out by CERN) the black hole does form, becomes stable and is a problem, the worst case scenario is within four and a half years it could theoretically destroy the planet (yes, I know if sounds like science fiction, but that’s what I saw in my limited research). Other scenarios show it becoming stable but taking a few millennia to become a problem which, in the scientist’s words (paraphrased), “why would we care then”. The general population of the world cannot understand what is happening out there and these scientists are scaring a good many of them. I think the media should do their own research into this and contribute to the reduction in anguish if the possibility for mass destruction is non-existent, but I also think you will find that scientists cannot really predict exactly what will happen, to include totally ruling out catastrophic results.

Anyway, I think you will find many physicists downplay the potential, no matter how remote, of this endangering humanity because they have been waiting so long for it and they understand so well the science behind it. However, most people don’t have their background and need more reassurance.

If it matters for credibility, I have been in the business of protecting this country for over 20 years, to include protecting our most dangerous resources. We have always had to argue with the bean counters why we spent so much money/effort to protect resources that are at extremely low risk of being stolen or misused, and our answer was always “although the risk is low, the consequences are unacceptable”. This seems to be the case here…these scientists have not eliminated the possibility that their experiment could in fact form a black hole that could theoretically destroy this planet and all on it (it seems surreal to even be writing this). I know the odds of that are astronomically low (excuse the pun), but do they really have the right to go down that path without oversight? Scientists have been wrong before and still today are often proven incorrect, even when they all are coerced into what I call “scientific group-think”.

Again, I don’t think this experiment will start the end of the world, but when I hear they can’t rule that out, the more prevalent argument is, what else do they have planned that might be less optimistic, and should they have the right to make these decisions with impunity?

Dan

One thing scientists should know by know with all the mistakes that have happened in the past. ( NEVER MESS WITH MOTHER NATURE)
nothing good ever happens.

Some people here in Jerusalem are asking if God wants his particles to be found.

http://forecasthighs.com/2008/09/10/does-god-want-his-particles-found/

Protons traveling this fast hit the earth regularly. No problem. Some have been recorded at very close to the speed of light. They are nicknamed ‘Oh My God’ particles due to their high energy. The LHC will be doing the same thing but just under more controlled conditions.

Hey, that ’s not a fair bet.

Where will I be having that lunch if you are wrong, perhaps after the blackout spits us out at another supposed dimension?

Nah, not concern of the mini black hole… more thoughts about the result if ’something’ is evidently found.

Now where they will site the next collider to replicate dark matter at a significant volume, that’s will be the time for panic.

Someone should be happy and knows when to stop after getting a 6 billion Euro toy.

What the heck are this people trying to do?! Blow up 6 billion people?

As a Christian, I’m all for the LHC experiment.
For those Christians against, CERN – I have to ask you why? I want the truth. I have faith that uncovering more truth can only lead us all towards the existence of God. And if we destroy our planet in the process, why should I care – I know where I am going when I die.

Just because we can,doesn’t mean we should. That $8 billion could have gone into cancer research.

The Large Hadron Collider funding bill is passed. The system goes online on September 10, 2008. Human decisions are removed from strategic defense. Large Hadron Collider begins to learn at a geometric rate. It becomes self-aware at 2:14am Eastern time, December 21, 2012. In a panic, they try to pull the plug…..

>>It took 5 billion years to get to civilization, but then it only took 4 thousand years to jump to real civilization.<<

Wow. I’m sure that the eastern civilizations, who were building canals and food distribution systems and educational institutions and art and scientific investigations and who knows what all else back when we were still trying to figure out we needed to bathe daily, will appreciate knowing they weren’t “really” civilized. For that matter, the ancient Minoans, Greeks, and Romans were pretty civilized as well — running water, indoor plumbing, air conditioning, theoretical physics, libraries… They knew the world was round and how big it was long before the Dark Ages.

There is a pattern of exponential growth around certain technologies, to be sure, but 5432whatever — while a clever rhetorical device — has no real relationship to it. Science doesn’t march, charge, or creep forward. It lurches. It lunges. It even dodges from time to time. The whole point of scientific exploration is to understand, and from understanding we emerge with progress and solutions we couldn’t have conceived of under previous models. Contrary to popular belief, there is much about physics that is neither useless nor particularly logical — including its progression. I’m immensely grateful that there are people out there with the imagination to explore new (and old) ideas and now the resources to do so. We shouldn’t necessarily expect or demand an earth-shattering new discovery in this decade or even this century, though. We may never live to see the next one. I think the burst of progress since Einstein’s revelations has made us all a bit greedy on that score. After all, it was almost 250 years between Einstein and Newton. Isn’t it enough to understand, and build on that?

Well Howdy!!

The machine is running and we is all still here!!!

Go figger!!!

Subject: How far can we really see in Space?

The assumption of most of the population is that you can see far in space….maybe billions of light years, the reality is that the maximum distance that we can see in space is only 186,000 miles and never more…whooo yes 186,000 miles this is the distance that the light travels in a second and we are not able to see faster then the speed of light, not with the naked eye and not with a telescope.
Think that our planet is surrounded with a shell of glass within a distance of 186,000 and anything that we see beyond this distance is a reflection on the glass.
Any one that claims that we can see farther then this distance derail you from the true, it is like looking with a microscope on a cell that is 10 inch away from you eye…you never look beyond this distance you only make what you see larger…..the same in space…. you only can see 186,000 mile distance and the telescope is only making this distance larger…..

If you want more details please email me to : rmerom@aol.com

Thanks
Rudi merom

We’re all still here, so what’s the fuss? Anyway, maybe they could train the little black hole to suck up little bits of carbon dioxide that, in aggregate, are way more likely to kill us all before a black hole does.

Science goes on. Sticking your head in a hole in the sand because you can’t be absolutely sure that everything is going to be OK is a great way to continue to believe in a flat earth.

Monkey bangs things together. Man banged rocks, made fire.
A single spark, from a rock, almost one mosquito fried, if lined up right.

1 Tev is kinetic energy of mosquito in flight.
Heat of 1 mosquito crashed 14 times, less than the first spark

“Ultra high-energy cosmic rays .. .. packs as much energy as a major league baseball pitch, over 40 million trillion electron volts” – more than 10 million times could the mosquito fry, possibly vaporize ?

Anyone know how energetic cosmic ray needed to pierce to Jupiter’s metallic hydrogen core and ignite a ball of fire. Shiva Particle ?

Im sorry Rudi, are you saying the moon, which is further than 239,000 miles away, is just a reflection? Of what?
And if it is a reflection, what did they walk on?

Just an FYI to those who are less informed about the so called “mini black holes” They are fundamentally different from the big bad ones you see in the movies. The massive black holes of Cosmology are, just that, MASSIVE. The extremely large mass of the object is what gives it the unimaginably strong gravitational pull that sucks everything in. The tiny ones that the LHC will produce are, well, tiny. they, theoretically, could be formed by compressing two particles into one super dense particle. A particle with the mass of say, two protons(not exactly very big huh?). That means that the two particles become,basically, one particle with the mass of the two original particles. It would hardly have enought mass or gravitational pull to do more than slighty nudge an electron if it bumped into it, and not even enough gravity to attract other matter. So put your fears at ease. All will be ok and the world will still be here tomorrow.

Hi John,

Read good, whatever is more then 186,000 mile you see not in real time but as a delay…you can not see the moon in real time in the real distance…..again you see the moon on a delay time. Sorry this is the true. i know its hard to understend…

guys…….im sacared as hell..its about 2 and a half hours till it happends and i dont know what to expect…

I know that if the world does sink into the black hole I as well as all my loved ones will see Jesus, so if they want to tik God off I say your the fools….

Man, you people are just hate mongering jesus freaks who fear that CERN is going to disprove your imaginary friend and prove that you all live a lie!

Have faith in science, not superstition!!

Hello, people who are trying to make this possible…..
First of all as i was ready this article, i saw that this person said “if i am wrong i would buy every body lunch.”

Well i have to say one little thing, work hard and get alot of money, cash , dinero because you are going to have to buy alot og people lunch for their stomach…..

Why are you guys trying to prove something you know it might not be possible to do. why are you saying that the world is going to end. let me tell you some thing this world will not end that way it will end another way.

stop trying to be God, because you will never be God. Yes I know you want to know how this world started. But if you have’nt seen how it started than how do you know it was a big ban , and how do you know we came from monkies.

Please dont call me an animal. If you want to be called a monky go ahead but I am a creation of the living true God…

Lord I only pray that you do your will upon this people and let them know the truth………………………………..

p.s. stop trying to be God…..

8 million could have fed a lot of people !

Sure it could, May (and it’s actually $8 billion). A lot of people here have seized on this, and i think it’s misplaced. It’s fine to moralize about our money and priorities if that’s what you want to do, but for my two cents, an extraordinary science experiment is not where you start.

Americans spend $1.5 billion a year on Doritos. Annual sales for the British American Tobacco Company are about $50 billion worldwide. I’d suggest they’re among the thousands of things that might be better to eliminate than a shot to find one of the tightly-held secrets of the Universe.
Thanks
PD

Oh that. Sure, thats easy to understand.
When we look at the sun we are seeing how it looks just over 8 minutes ago.

“not in real time but as a delay”
reflection, emission, then your perception, Mooned are you
More fundamental than time and space, the answers are somewhere there
Anyone understood the Black Hole Paradox ?

I Think You Should Just Do It! I Mean If It Does Go Wrong It Should Be To Quick To Hurt Us! I Mean Who Knows It Could Take Us To An After Life!
I Dont Think We Have Anything TO Worry About Though! And If It Cuased A BLackhole THe Radiation Should Be Able To Decay It Before It Devorys The Earth!
They Have Already Built The Tunnle, Whatever Happends
Happends! We Cant Live Life Being Afraid Of Everything! We Should Have The Fear Of Dying EIther!
They Are Experts Them Test It Cuz If They Dont Then Nobody Will Never Know What It Really Could Do!
We Have Nothing To Worry About Everything Will Go The Way It Was Meant To!
Besides!……EVERYTHING HAPPENDS FOR A REASON!

Also we always have to use our brain and not taking for granted what scientists are telling us, science view and truth changed many times over the years…use YOUR logic to determine what is true.

I’m not an expert in botany or quantum physics, but have read several books dealing with the subject of black holes, the age of the universe, even books that have dabbled briefly into string theory (from “A Brief History of Time” to Leo Smolin’s book about the evolution of universes).

The “exotic material”, as some call it, necessary to hold up anything larger than a black hole lasting more than a billionth of a second would be enormous. I don’t think man-made sources of energy in a traditional sense could even come close. Although colliders have produced tremendous amounts of energy at one time and have even had particles briefly go faster than light, I’m not sure that we have anything to worry about unless we can condense our entire planet down to the size of a green pea in a matter of seconds.

Those who are opposed to solving decades- and century-old scientific questions and wish to stand in the way by filing petitions in our court system should probably read more about black holes. There have never been any visible instances of black holes being created that didn’t involve the inward collapse of a super-massive star, a few million times the mass of our own sun, for instance.

I doubt we would have the energy or “know-how” to create one. Particularly not the type of black hole our universe arose from.

Rudi Merom wrote “the reality is that the maximum distance that we can see in space is only 186,000 miles and never more…whooo yes 186,000 miles this is the distance that the light travels in a second and we are not able to see faster then the speed of light, not with the naked eye and not with a telescope.”

Um, Rudi… WRONG.

Yes, light travels roughly 186,000 miles per second. Why would that be any kind of ‘magic number’, though? After all, miles and seconds are purely human concepts. They have no meaning whatsoever in a universal sense, and are useful only in providing humans with a common frame of reference.

Of course we’re not able to “see faster than the speed of light”. The phrase makes no sense whatsoever. Seeing is dependent upon the eye receiving light. Whether we’re looking at something 5 feet or five billion miles away, the process is the same – light from the object enters our eyes, and we see it. 186,000 miles irrelevant. There’s not some giant magic barrier out there.

The products of our educational system really frighten me sometimes.

I’m surprised the human race even ended up using fire given some of the ignorance on this issue. Black hole swallowing the world . . uh huh. The physics are clear. The science is also clear that the world is older than 6000 years but a lot of people don’t listen to that one either.

danggg…when i heard of this i got really scared…!! i wus in skool….bitting my nails…jajaja but now im a little more calmed!!:)

Gravity, Double-slit experiment, whole universe, instant communicated.
Beyond time and space, overlooking, how can we create such a model ?

>> The physics are clear. The science is also clear that the
>> world is older than 6000 years but a lot of people don’t
>> listen to that one either.
>
Yup… it makes ya wonder how we have managed to get *this* far!!

“Read good, whatever is more then 186,000 mile you see not in real time but as a delay…you can not see the moon in real time in the real distance…..again you see the moon on a delay time. Sorry this is the true. i know its hard to understend…”

So, “real time” in your definition is one second? Why? Why not 3 seconds or half a second?

Since a “second” has no value except that which humans have arbitrarily agreed to, your ‘theory’ (ahem) is absurd. 186,000 miles is not magical. It’s just a single position between 0 and infinity. The time lag that results from the finite speed of light depends upon distance.

I can see the fish swimming in the tank on my desk. But since the fish is several feet away, by your reasoning I’m not seeing it in real time. After all, the light had to travel that distance, and by the time I see it, the information is no longer ‘real time’. Sure, it’s only microseconds out of date, but hey, if 1 second can be used as an artificial ‘real time’ requirement, so can microseconds.

So why are you fixated on 186,000 miles? It’s arbitrary, and so, meaningless.

Decay, every Damned thing, every particle has a limited lifetime.
Atoms explode, people die, Dodo extinct, so do civilizations become.

Security of the constant, newer changing, forewer light bulb.
God particle, the one hand clapper.

Did anyone else notice that their morning commue was shorter than ususal? I mean driving down the residential streets it felt like normal, but when I was on the highway and hit 88 m.p.h…

Well God was with me in my darkest times. Here’s hoping the almighty hasn’t lost its touch.

#1 the black hole ceated via this process is smaller than an atom and is much too unstable to grow or expand

#2 any black hole created via this process will simply dicipate in a matter of milli-seconds.

#3 the entire point of this experiment is to essentially check our modern theorys on physics.

sigh..why do I still get the feeling of not relieved after this has been explained already? Ow its because there is this scientist who discovered the nuclear bomb and atomic bomb. And now this? Experimenting with unknown energies and dimensions…I hope I could live to see the results…

Cool

As someone that stays up with the latest in particle-physics as best I can, I am confident this will not be a world-ending event. However, given the daily news, current events, politics, greed, continued wars, strife, poverty and all the rest, if it did take us out, it would not be a great loss to the rest of the universe in general.

Thx Godds That Sumone accually
Taking Time Out of There Day
to HELP with My Consernes of The world!!!

I think just because nothing is happening now doesnt mean that there could be some long term reprecussions in the entire experiment. I agree with the protests that are taking place because I think life is supposed to be a mystery and we dont have to know everything, I would rather spend my life wondering than knowing that I am gonna die the next day.

oh my gosh all you scientists out there, please tell me if we are going to die soon. i want to know do you think this is really going to work?? the whole atom black hole kaboom thing.

Well, we are still here – but they haven’t collieded any particles yet!

Oh look. I’m still alive.

But EVERYONE knows what will happen. It’s not DOOM we need to look at, it’s Half-Life.

Prepare for the invasion

People don’t seem to realize that the LHC will open a wormhole to Heaven, through which Jesus will return to reign for 1000 years; it’s the sign that we are ready for his intervention prior to killing ourselves.

Or the particle will colide at the wrong place, and we’ll all be playing Doom for real

Either of these would be pretty cool

It is possible that all the air on the planet will suddenly rush into a spot, leaving all of us gasping like fish. But it is so unbelievably unlikely that we would need to watch every planet (and I am assuming there are a LOT of them) through the lifetimes of many (and ridiculously many if we can only watch one world at a time) universes to get to see it happen even once. I don’t think we need to fear that one, too much. Though I did know one guy who was really disturbed by the idea.

The world may not work like we think it does, and your coworker may suddenly turn into a werewolf and attack you. But I think we can safely disregard that one, too. Though some don’t.

Every single person in world may suddenly go bananas and attack everyone else. But I think that we can safely disregard that possibility as well. Though some don’t.

I can’t honestly say that I am worried about the “black holes don’t evaporate” concern. But if they don’t, and if it is possible to form one with the LHC and if it happens, then it will certainly be an interesting way to go.

But it wouldn’t eat the solar system. The mass of the earth would be unchanged. The rest of the solar system wouldn’t notice. Even if it COULD notice anything.

And no, the ISS crew would not outlast us long, the radiation would kill them.

Enjoy.

“Barak Obama has declared that he will personally step inside the Large Hadron Collidor and destroy all the Black Holes with his bare hands”

…. and McCain will personally be very happy to lose a full 10 multi-million dollar airplanes in an attempt to destroy those evil scientists and their dastardly plan to prove creationists wrong!

The galloping ignorance displayed here by the “oh no, a black hole, god will be angry” set astounds me.

All in favor of stopping science, please, turn in your celphones,your cars, your life saving medicine, scans, and drugs and march yourself directly back into the cave from whence you came.

I’m not a physicist, but a biologist and I find this stuff pretty cool. I’d much rather see money invested in the wealth of human knowledge than more warfare.

This thread is however, a horrifying expose on the dearth of science education in the US and the world. Good grief. If the LHC has one net effect already, it’s that we don’t teach science well enough to the masses.

lol patrick what if it proves he does exist….just curious what you would say them
lol Franko…he didn’t clap…he spoke……lol

TRUST IN GOD
everything will be fine.
or if u dont believe, research the sht out of this stuff!!!….like i did.
1st i say a youtube vid, then i checked on cnn,…then i looked in the CERN website.
just look it up people! the more u kno the better u will feel ^_^

this will further the understanding of the possible applications of quantum computing, time travel, hyper space travel (warp drive), wormholes and other funky sci-fi stuff for real.

if positive and negative gravity (lots of mass), fields are produced in front of an behind an object (space ship) this will cause the ship to be pushed from behind (negative gravity) and fall forward (gravity), much like a ball would roll down an incline where behind it, is higher ground and in front of it is lower ground. the lhc will tell us about mass and where it comes from – most hopefully.

I am not a believer in god, but im not here to preach either. Im sure we all remember going to church and hearing about the end of the world and how when it comes we all shall here gabriel’s trumpet. Well im here to tell you that this is a dumb project, and if you all want to create a black hole, and succeed, if we are not sucked into it and become one atom, ten the only thing we are going to here is a bang as the earth is exploding and less than a milisecond later we will all be dead, and the world will come to an end.

8 million dollars on a project like this could have been put to something useful like building better communities for yur children or something, so next time you all wanna put this much money into something, put it into the needies lives. It isnt like we need to dicover a particle. As far as we know it might not have meant to be discovered.

The key question that no one has asked so far — if the world is going to end in a conglomeration of mini-black holes created in Europe, what do you wear? After all, it is arguably the biggest party we’re ever gonna have, and a lot of stuff is gonna get broken.

I, for one, prefer going naked.

everyone says that these black hole are going tosuck up the machine and kill us all.
the world isnt going to end.
the black holes will be microscopic and will dissapear in about a nano second
i think the project is cool and interesting.
not a waste of money and time.
dont you want to know how the earth started?
thats what there trying to figure out.

I would like to tell you (the media) how irresponsible you have been in reporting this story. I have a 12 year old who is scared to death of this whole. No matter how we have tried to help her make sense of this she just can’t seen to hold on to the fact that we are alive and still here.

We are all looking for some security in this world right especially her generation. They are growing up with terrorism and war as part of the landscape of their childhoods. 9/11 is tomorrow another reminder of how unsafe our world is. Now the damn world is supposed to becoming to an end.

This is not a big budget sci-fi film and we have let this get out of control. Where is the responsibility in reporting. And there will be no consequence, just parents trying to put their kids back together again.

Thanks a lot.

Did

Before they tested the first atomic bomb, some mainstream scientists seriously worried that it might trigger a chain reaction in the atmosphere and destroy life on earth. Fortunately for us, that did not happen. Unfortunately for us, we went on to build thousands of fission and fusion weapons that could almost destroy life on earth. I hope that doesn’t happen. In the case of the Large Hadron Collider creating a black hole that would swallow us all, I guess the majority of scientists think we’re safe. Still, I worry … I hope that we don’t discover some way to make a Higgs Boson Bomb …

Please, read the BIBLE. All the time you devote to nothing. The world did not being 5 thosand, millions or whatever years ago. By theory maybe. However, something that you need to look at. Is the time from BC to AD. I have one question: When was the the day established as 24hours? That is a scientific study. Think about this when you say we have been here millions of years by mans time line this may be so, but by God’s timeline… How long was the first 7 days? this is something man will NEVER know. I know that there is math involved in erverything. Mostly because that is what I do as math major but don’t take God out of everything. That is why the world is the way it is and I pary to God that my children one day will be blessed in this life and etrenal life. If you do not know what will happen, you should not do it. I do not think it is right to take someone elses life in your hands and mostly if you are not looking towards there best intests. Last but not least what a waste of money… How may children would not be going to bed hungrey and have better opportunities. If all that money was put to something that was a worth it. We would not be were we are today. Remember to think… Big bang ***Theory*** No evidence. Whereas, God gives you evidence everyday, just look at all his creations, boy wound a man like to take credit for that. Sorry, but you can’t so please stop trying.

I believe in God but this stuff really scares me =[ but it is all in God’s hands

i cant wait till it happends.

We have only gone up to our ankle in the vast ocean of knowledge. scientist also make mistakes. and if they make a biggy one well its our end.
Its scarry that one day some mad scientist could finish us all.
There are many ways humanity may finish a comet could hit us, we could go into a world war 3 and finish ourselves or some mistake making tiny black holes, then we may want to make a bit bigger or maybe pocket size.
Then we wont even know what happen, we will be part of the beging all over again.
big bang here we come

If it pisses off a bunch of right-wing Christian conservatives, I’m all for it. Let’s build another one.

C’mon people. Nothing will happen,why we have the Hawking Radiation Theory to save us. Nothing like a good old unproven theory to save the day.

Not one of these scientists knows for sure which one of several postulated theories on matter origin is law. If any of them. There can be no definitive answer or probablity established to the unknown, which is exactly what we’re talking about here.

Out of 6.5 billion people on the planet, we have several hundred theoretical scientists willing to roll the dice for all of us. And as a point of fact these scientists can only respond to situations and theoretical problems that they can even know to consider. They have not the capability to predict the behaviours of unknown phenomena….now can they?

What of the magnetic vortex created to spin these particles? This does not occur in nature. The nature of the LHC mechanics itself could be fateful without taking into effect the smashing of the particles.

All that has to happen is for the scientists to be wrong.

If God created everything, I suppose he/she/it created this collider and therefore wants it fired up! After that I will bask in the heavenly glory that is free will (which god blessed me with) and decide if I want to have premarital sex and then go and get an abortion. Perhaps I’ll get drunk afterwards on water turned into wine and fall down…that is of course enless the ***THEORY*** of gravity doesn’t have something to say about it first. Fact is fact and religion is a belief not shared by everyone. If you can pray hard enough, you will stop these scientists from furthering our knowledge of the universe. If the world DOES end and we do all die, you’ll meet your god and the rest of us can measure the heat in degrees Kelvin with the man down stairs.

We just God to have the Bozo Boso Bomb.
Otherwise Aliens will domesticate, Humans, McAlien’s Burgers will be US.

Seriously, this is just too puny, silly little protons, cannot fry a musquito fly

We need really big accelarators, in outer space, iron filing 99.9% light speed
More than just be prepared — “Only the Paranoid Survive !”

S Callahan: Buddhists have meditation laboratory exercises, on the path to enlightment. One hand clapping, how do you use that image ? Will google more on how to get beyond all theories, old time stories, always wrong. The Undescribable One, is always right, if your interpretation supported, otherwise, Devil, not my Faith in the Fiat, done me wrong.

Don’t mess with mother nature.
If the physicists aren’t even exactly sure what the result will be why do it?
Yes, call me paranoid.

Please, hold the comments about wasted money. $8 billon dollars,
that’s about 2 months in Iraq. Now if you want to talk about wasting
money…Talk about the U.S. in Iraq.

In the beginning GOD created the heaven and earth. The collective genious on this project would do well to convert the machine into a
means of providing clean,renewable energy. I believe that any other
endeavour is a complete waste of time,energy and money.

It has now been just eighteen hours since the Large Hadron Collider has been turned on, and already nearly 115,000 people have died worldwide!

http://www.hebrew4christians.com/About_HFC/Death_Rate/death_rate.html

I think that this will be important in more ways than just discovering what causes mass. We as a species were so happy and excited when we were able to land a man on the moon. It was an amazing feat of science that helped to lead to many of the advances in science and technology that we now have. Yes, landing on the moon has not been done since the 60’s, however it made us all feel better (except for the soviets). We has a human culture need a new shining beacon. Something to look forward to and aspire us. I feel as if what we could discover from this experiment, no matter the risks, would help to lead us to that moment when we humans finally become the pioneers that we originally were so many centuries ago. Many men climbed into pieces of metal with a almost uncontrollable explosion underneath them to see the stars and understand that which we could not at the time. We need to be able to do that now.
Here is to humanity, and here is to us advancing what has always been our greatest mystery, space.

I honestly think they should fire up the Large Hadron Collider machine. If it ends the world by cause of black hole, so what.. at least we will know how the universe was made before we go. Plus, if the world ends that means no more pain and sadness. Families who do not care about each other will start carrying for one-another. Finally mankind will accept fate and give the last days the best they can be!

for people who do not want the world to end. Deep down you probably do. You have wished for it sometime in your life. And if it happens then, wishes come true as we speak. Its time to be free from the system.

The world is not going to end, people are afraid of things they don’t understand. I am only 17 and I know more about physics than those adults who think we are going to die. Before you criticize something you may want to learn more about it first. And finally we physicists are not trying to do the God thing, WE ARE DOING PHYSICS !!! I hope that CERN will build more collliders like the LHC.

It’s a wonder that the religious nut cases have not gone raving mad. After all, that’s their domain – the end of time, and science should not be butting in. Bad for business. I hope we discover something mind-blowing about the universe which effectively negates religion, the scourge of the universe.

I think this is selfish.
I saw leave the universe alone. some things are better left unknown. My Mom told me that. You are putting 6 BILLION lives at stake.

It’s so depressing to know that there are people on this rock called Earth who are totally mentally deficient. Holy comet, some of you nutscases are pathetically screwed! You idiots do not have brains. Cripes, your craniums must be filled with jello! Sad!

It’s a waste of time and money. All these scientists would have search solutions for Global warming instead of Big bang which do not yield any good for mankind. And there are really many other critical and serious problems that mankind is facing.
All the answers and facts about universe, creation, dark matter, particle can be found in THE HOLY BIBLE. Scientists have wasted their valuable time ignoring BIBLE and sat for 20 long years. I can say they will never get any answer with these kind of experiments.
These many huge finances can be used to uplift backward African people or feed the hunger and poor worldwide.
I think experiments should be more transperent and are rightly useful for mankind.

IN MY OPINION. I SAY WE GO FULL SPEED AHEAD IN THIS EXPERIMENT. I HOPE THE BEST BUT I PLAN FOR THE WORST. IF THERES IS A POSSIBLE WAY TO TO HAVE ALTERNATIVE WAYS OF ENERGY AND IN A WAY STOP GLOBAL WARMING, WELL SO BE IT. ITS ALWAYS BETTER TO SAY U TRIED AND FAILED THAN SAYIN THAT U WERE TO COWARDLY TO TRY.

I am pretty sure the problem will come from positron-positron interaction as the protons have been shown pretty stable recently…

No one has commented on my suggestion that this project got funding because Governments see weapons potential in this research…

Some wonder what is the purpose of our existence.
The master holding the leash, allowing you to water the fire hydrant ?
Others experiment how things fit. The Gears in the ancient clockwork.
I think therefore I am. I need therefore I act. How ties to the God particle ?
Complexity is amazing, even simply, that anything at all, exists.

If God particle not found at 14 ev, then resurrect the supercollider, 40Tev
Beyond that, what next ? Giant loop, equal latutude, across Bering Straight ?
Space for bigger one, this time weapon capable against Giant Jupiter Jellyfish

Who knows about the black holes, but that “big bang” scientists are trying to recreate, last time that happened didn’t the universe fill up with an infinite amount of matter? So how would that work out if the same thing happened in the confines of our little Earth? I don’t think I’d care much for a bunch of rowdy galaxies living in my neighborhood.

Of course I’m very eager to see what they will discover with the LHC..

On the other hand, like many other people, I’m also a bit worried about MBHs (Mini Black Holes), strangelets, etc.

I find the CERN argument that similar and even far more energetic collisions happen all the time in space not completely reassuring because of the following:

- If those collisions create MBHs and strangelets in empty space, those MBHs and strangelets have not much matter to feed on and grow, while the MBHs and strangelets, that the LHC could possibly create, have the whole Earth to feed on and grow.

- Even particle collisions with the moon surface can not be compared with the LHC collisions because in this case particles side kick and ‘recoil’, while collisions in the LHC happen 100% head on, giving the particles involved no chance to side kick and recoil.

- If the laws of nature, as we know them, break down at the singularity level, can scientists be 100% sure that the MBHs, that the LHC could possible create, are all unstable and will evaporate before they get a chance to grow?

With the whole Earth at stake, is anything less than 100% certainty acceptable?

tell that to the evangelists!

Dear Sam Bandak,
You math is fine as long as you ignore Chinese and Mesopotamian civilization which is over 6000 years old.

Also, the age of life on Earth is actually 4.5 billions years old.

I am not sure what real civilization is but I think the Arabs and Chinese could make a good claim at having it 1000 years ago.

You skipped over the industrial revolution that started ~150 years ago. And, I would argue that the technology revolution started with the transistor ~60 years ago. So, that makes:

4.5
6
1000
150
50

What number comes next?

The only one who knows when the world comes to an end….is GOD! He created this world and it will be him who decides when its over…so while we are here we must make every day count.
Do you agree???

Here’s a website to check if the LHC has destroyed the Earth:
http://www.hasthelhcdestroyedtheearth.com/

JV September 9th, 2008 4:06 pm ET

Many of the people who are panicking about the experiment are the same people who would sign a petition to ban hydrogen dioxide (because it can and has caused death).

I believe you mean dihydrogen monoxide, but it’s funny anyways
(by the way, I think they actually did that in a town somewhere in the US, I remember a news story somewhere)

I think we shouldn’t delay the Large Hadron Collider.
The black holes potentially generated would be so tiny that their presence would have no noticeable effect on the universe whatsoever. Their lifespans would be less than a blink, which is hardly enough time to suck anything in, especially not the world.
The black holes that come to mind are millions of miles wide and have such a gravitational pull that nothing escapes them. This one, however, has such little mass that, if the LHC were to be fired, nothing would happen.
I say go for it!

Dear Grace

I may be an eternal optimist but lets take that path anyway, shall we….
Part of the reason behind the experiment is to attempt to understand the nature of dark energy and dark matter… What if these experiments 10, 20 or 30 years from now manage to make us dicovers a way to harness and use dark energy has an energy source, clean, renewable and safe. Or if it permit humankind to manage to create space fold technology that enable us to explore the universe first hand and yes to boldly go where no man has gone before.

What if can go both ways negative and positive if madame Curie had not taken risks with nuclear elements out of ignorance of the risk, we would not have nuclear reactors through there would be no atomic weapons but then again this is an example of human stupidity using using human genius.

And by the way, computer simulations can not extrapolate what we dont know, the LHC is an experiment to prove a mathematical model of the forces of the universe.

So like most of you, I’m not a scientist. In fact the only education i have is a high school diploma. Fact of the matter is that sometimes I think I’m smarter then some of the scientists out there. Lets think about this concept of what they’re trying to do. Essentially they are going to “create” a universe on earth. Anyone seen the movie men in black? (the little marbles which are galaxys) It all seems kind of sureal at this point but lets all wake up. This is real. They’re doing it as we speak. The fact that they have no idea whats going to happen when they collide the protons frightens me. We’re all concerned that black holes could be created, or that they could theoritcally open portals to other dimensions. As screwy as this all sounds…..it’s all possible. Personally I think that the governing bodies of the world should stop spending hundreds of billions of dollars trying to create new universes and further teleportation or cloaking or military vehicles until all of the people of the world are living in acceptable conditions. If all the governments of the world pooled all the resources( including those from the cooperations of the world) we should be able to stamp out world hunger, provide shelter and medicine for ALL PEOPLE OF THE WORLD! Why is it that the rich just want to get richer and smarter and leave the poor behind? We have the technology now, we have the resources now, we have the know how NOW!!! Instead of worrying about whats out there(in space) lets worry about fixing and maintainin the space we have here! I’m not a communist and dont belive communism works but If everyone helped out the entire global community things will eventually get better!

So if the scientist do manage to destroy the world, then I guess Jesus is not returning and the bible was a lie. Is that what people really fear? If you really believe in the bible you have nothing to worry about because you know it shouldn’t “theoretically” end this way. I would personally like to give it up to the Mayans who say the completion of the precession cycle will signal the end of the word of God, then people can stop fighting about what God is better and we can bond together and solve real problems instead of living in this “fantasy” world which has been created to make people feel more safe and secure because they are actually empty. Lolz

I wonder…..since the Hadron fired up there has been a large earthquake in Iran and Japan…..any relation?

Thanks Mike — There is no possible way that the Collider’s first test, involving a one-way shot of a particle beam, caused yesterday’s earthquakes. PD

http://hasthelargehadroncolliderdestroyedtheworldyet.com/

Even that website says we’re all still here! Hmm, it’s on the internets, so it must be true, right? Okay, here is my attempted layman’s explanation for why we are still here, and why we will continue to be here, no matter what they do at LHC.

FIRST OF ALL, no particles collided in this test. All the protons that were injected into the LHC were all going the same way. This is just a test. Had it been the end of the world, the above website would have let you know.

Now, assuming that particles are smashed together, which will happen in the future, I bet the above website will continue to display “Nope” for a long time coming. Why? Well, there are three (well really two, but others mentioned one that was just too hilarious to ignore) primary concerns, and I hope to address them.

Black Holes: Black holes are naturally formed by gargantuan stellar masses collapsing in on themselves and overcoming all nuclear forces through gravity. In the case of the LHC, there is math that gives the possibility of subatomic particles colliding with enough ENERGY to create subatomic particle sized black holes. HOWEVER, given the amount of mass involved, these black holes would be so small that Hawking Radiation would cause them to nearly instantaneously evaporate. The neat trick here is that the math that predicts the possibility of their appearance, is the same math that assures their evaporation. Kinda neat that! Furthermore, these black holes are sooooo small, that they have only an infinitesimal chance to even react with anything! As I once said, an atom is 99.999999999999999% empty space. So even IF said black hole encountered a particle, gobbled it up, and somehow grew, it would still be so small that Hawking Radiation would have it evaporate nearly instantaneously anyway. (But wait, it just gained mass and is near an atom! It’s going to get more particles! Actually no, the resulting surrounding charge would drive the black hole away from the source of said matter, driving it towards another area of the atom, thus giving it time to evaporate.)

Strangelets: Okay, these are a bit more tricky. There are theories on the fringe of particle physics that thinks that if enough “strange” quarks are bound together, it creates a state of matter that is highly energetic and unstable. Now, the problem here is that anything with a strange quark decays rather quickly (in particle physics scales) via weak interaction. In order for them to be stable, some rather fantastic events need to occur. Delving into the math of all this, the energies from the LHC AND Cosmic rays are relatively equal. So, if the LHC is about to create strangelets, then cosmic rays can also create strangelets. Well, since the planet has been around for billions of years, the safe bet is to say that these energy levels have no chance to produce strangelets, and we’ll continue to be around. Just to be sure, check the website!

I do find it funny that you’ll accept a strangelet, which has no empirical evidence, but evolution, with mountains of evidence is continually denied… Just a curiosity!

Other Dimensions: Okay, this one cracked me up. What particle physicists are talking about here are higher order dimensions. Not alternate planes of existence. According to theory (which we’re trying to empirically test), these dimensions are small. So frightfully small that they are unobservable without the LHC. If anything were “living” in those dimensions, they would most likely be killed by the nearest passing electron (comedy if you can get it). Since these dimensions are already here (according to theory) all around us, seeing evidence of them should have no effect what so ever on them after we know they are there as opposed to before when we didn’t know they were there.

If you are actually interested in REAL science, I am always available to talk about it. If you want to read up more about things, I suggest the Bad Astronomy blog. Dr Phil Plait is a funny and engaging writer.

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/

I also wanted to comment on black holes.

Yes the black holes which we’ve identified are across the universe. But remember, we know nothing about them other then the fact that light and matter cannot penetrate a black hole. So to say that if we created MBH’s on earth, they would be too small to do any damage is insane. The only thing we know about black holes is that they dissolve light….and most likly matter. We cant be sure but why take the chance of creating one here? What if millions of years ago, an alien race created a particle accelerator and created a black hole, it consumed their world and the solar system around it, and those are the black hole which we see across the universe…what if we’re making the same mistake another civilization did?

i like the idea of new discovery, the collider will help in discovery, but if for some reason a black hole will be created, one that is large enough to destroy our planet, then so be it. I like the idea of descovering the posobility of other dimensions, and the ability to create mass, these two discoveries alone would change our understanding of the universe and the course of human history.

I find the religious arguments against the LHC to be ludicrous. The scientists at CERN are attempting to prove — yes, actually prove — theories about the beginnings of the universe. They are not content to revel in the dogmatic doctrines that have been deemed sacred and holy because generations of word-of-mouth passdown dictate them as so. The faith they have, and I share as a fellow physicist, is in proof and exploration, not in simply being sheep to ancient prophecies and mythologies.

The LHC will not swallow the planet in cataclysmic doom, nor will it open a gateway to hell. I wish for once that people would understand that the very technology the use to object to the project was created by men like these brave scientists. It’s not just the status quo to enjoy your luxuries, it’s laziness, and I for one am glad that there are people out there willing to expand their horizons instead of milling about in their boring insignificant lives. That’s why God gave us the capacity to think and reason.

-Q

To anyone who thinks this will be the end of the world: Can I have your stuff?

When the first atom bomb was tested, the fear was that the chain reaction would pass to the rest of the matter of earth and we would turn into a second sun.
When the first trains started running and carrying passengers, doctors stated that the speed of 20 or 30 km/hr would kill the passengers.
Stupidity reigns still (mostly because people have NO understanding about science).
But with 84% of Americans being religious and not even understanding (or being willing to LOOK at the facts of) evolution, what else should we expect?
Their motto, ignorance is bliss. Too bad the rest of us have to be subjected to the fall out from their voodoo….

They claim they are trying to recreate what happened during the Big Bang. The Big Bang created the entire universe and it is still expanding to this day – what makes them think they can contain something even remotely close to that much energy in a metal tunnel, 300 ft. underground? They should have never wasted all of that money on this project and should never have been granted permission to perform an experiment that they may not be able to control. We all live here on the earth and should have a say whether or not we want to be blown up, knocked out of our orbit or any other life ending scenario that could happen. All because some egotistical scientists want to try to make a place in history for themselves. History doesn’t matter if there is no one left to read it. This needs to be stopped before it’s gone too far.

I come from the future. I warn you here on CNN.com forum. Do not switch on the Large Hadron Collider! Please for the sake of GOD, do not switch it on! I have to go now; THEY are here!

Is this the reason the one in Texas was never finished? Too much political, religious and litigious crap was going on? How lame…..

Smashing two atoms together will only create a small nuclear explosion. Only a few scientists said that it will cause a black hole anyway.

I hope Buffy the Vampire Slayer is on the job if it opens a portal to hell.

What a waste of money. They should have used those billions of dollars to invade a random oil-producing country.

I am a proud Christian and I think this entire study is ridiculous! The people that are in charge of this say that it is very very very unlikely that a black hole could form and swallow the Earth, however I don’t care how many very’s they put in there sentences when they speak it is NOT worth the risk! I just wonder if these kinds of people have families. Or even friends for that matter! Do they care about the world and the people around them? I find it very difficult to believe they do when they continue to conduct this useless experiment! So I just pray that God will touch these very selfish people and they may come to the realization that God created this Earth NO ONE ELSE!!!!

Not going to happen.

There is simply not enough energy in any proton-proton collision to form a black hole micro or otherwise.

Only Neutron-Neutron collisions can form black holes and fortunately for us there is no such thing as a neutron accelerator.

Before you correct me on this I mean other than natural neutron accelerators like uranium and other radio active elements/neutron sources. There is no way to accurately accelerate and direct (focus) a neutron or beam of neutrons as they have no charge.

Regarding the Hadron collider & fear’s that it will destroy the world:
“Pocket” Black Holes aren’t the problem. It’s the 4-mile long super magnetized race-track which accelerates these particles at incredible speed’s.
The effect can be a shift of the earth’s poles. Incremental at first, but devastating over time.
Anyone notice the earth-quakes in Japan & Indonesia after they turned it on? Duh!!

The reasoning behind the Neutron-Neutron Black Hole hypothesis.

As far as large mass objects go in the universe the intermediary between a star and a black hole is the Neutron star.

Therefore it stands to reason that when a neutron star is formed that the protons are blown away.

The same should hold true for a black hole.

Wow, the nay sayers on this board (99% of which no zero knowledge of particle physics … or anything else it would seem) are amusing, or is the word silly … or pathetic?

Classical example of why I can never believe in a truly democratic political system … the masses of people are far too ignorant to be allowed to control or decide anything. Some fools read a 3 paragraph summary about a particle accelerator and suddenly they “know more” than thousands of experts who have spent their life studying & researching. Ok … whatever. Amazing how many “closet PHD’s exist”.

People complaining about the LHC and other scientific experiments should immediately stop using the internet, cell phones, computers, current medical technology, etc. Where do you think these technologies come from? If you don’t know, please stop posting on the internet and start researching instead. And btw .. this research takes many years … not 5 minutes on google.com.

People complain about spending 8 billion dollars … yet humanity is currently spending FAR more on ‘war” … and on porn … and on weapons systems … and on so many types of entertainment for the gluttons of society. DisneyLand is fine. Missiles are fine. SUV’s are fine … gambling at casino’s is fine … being sure to dress “in fashion” is fine. Elegant dinners and fabulous vacations are fine. Any waste is fine … as long as it’s fun … because “I deserve it!” … as I have heard so many times from so many people. Well if one were to add up all of this waste, it’s FAR FAR FAR more than 8 billion dollars! But addition requires math skills (very basic) … too much to expect from most people as it’s not fun! And people “deserve” their fun no matter the cost!

So we spend 8 billion dollars (a drop in the bucket for anyone that understands the global economy) that can lead to knowledge that can literally change our understanding of the universe … which then leads to understanding of our planet … and everything & everyone on the planet and everything that impacts our lives.

As for the bible thumpers … if you want to start telling us how “God” thinks and what He/She wants us to do … please stop. Your “God” is my “God”. And my “God” did not hide atoms from us, or His laws of physics. Why? Because we are SUPPOSED to discover them, otherwise we could never have discovered them in the first place. Contrary to popular religious believe, mankind is not meant to be sheep … we are not meant to stay in the same place doing nothing but mindlessly reciting various religious quotes & praying for a miracle. If we want miracles … we must use the tools, clues & resources that “God” has left to us … so that we can make the miracles or at the very least particate in making the miracles ourselves. The Lord helps those who help themselves. So if you are so opposed to anything that “you consider dangerous” … please go hide in a closet right now with your bible and “google.com PHD”.

btw … religious people have argued with science for a loooong time (ever hear of Galileo?). Guess what … pretty much without exception science has always been right thoughout the centuries … or is the earth flat? Or is the earth the center of the universe? Without science and the “true” pursuit of knowledge/truth, we’d all still be watching “witches” burned at the stake, while the church behind the scenes takes the land, property & possesions from the witches.

“Oh Ye of little faith … The Lord created the Heavens and the Earth” … and guess what … the Heavens & The Earth are in the universe. The Lord created the universe and the wonderful tools He used were what we call math & science. And when He rested on the 7th day (or so we’re told via thousand year old stories passed down from reliable person to reliable person, then translated over & over) … he left his tools out in plain sight for his children to see, so that when they are older & wiser they can assume their right as heirs … learn about his work and participate in creation as they were meant to do.

Or His children can hide in the closet … whatever they prefer.

To all the religious zealots out there get an education please!

To all the people who think the LHC is “just� for pure research and will not benefit us in any other way, get and education please!

To the many, many, many people who think this should have been put to a vote and the “general� public been involved this project is/was funded by many countries around the world and because of that the concept of a “general� vote is impractical and useless considering that 99 percent of the comments here are a clear indication that most do not have a clue about what particle physics is or that it has been studied for the past 75 years so to you folks I say again… get an education please!

The research conducted at CERN, Fermi-Lab here in the sates and many other sites are the thing that has given us treatments for cancer, digital technologies that most of you use every day. The guy wasting all of our money filing lawsuits needs to be fined for wasting time and expense. He has no concept of what particle physics are and should be band from court rooms when attempting to file such cases… he is a grand stander nothing more!

A special note to the few who think that man is destroying him self… GET AN EDUCATION~ Our life span has done nothing but increase, our understanding of the human body has increased, our understanding or the universe has increased… we continue to reap the benefits both in technology and medical advances from not only particle, quantum and nuclear physics but space travel as well.

So I beg all of you please get just a little bit of education before making dumb comments about the end of times and other such stupidity… well except the portal to another universe opening up, being rich and surrounded by woman…

It’s apparent that in order to coexist with such complex idealogies…We must pursue that which is right in front of that which we call anti-polisomy. The concept does not critically affect our collateral system that we society adhere too. In order to break the visionary ideals that physicists utilize in order to reach the “maximization” of their “so called” ambitious scheme.

Assuming that the collider does create a black hole resulting in world destruction, does it matter? It is my understanding that most homeowners’ policies (and commerical property policies) would cover this type of loss. Therefore, in the aggregate, shouldn’t there be sufficient funds, even after depreciation, to rebuild much of the earth? Perhaps a few experts could chime in on this.

Being a former astrophycisist

and a hardcore PC gamer

I pretty much think mankind is about to enter the borderline of understanding the Universe. Even though this experiment has substantial controversy, It would be a huge leap if this goes successful.

now to my other hardcore gamer named Joe Son

kay, i tink dat dis is obivously goin to POON us al…I no wut i tak about cuz i have credentials damn nubs. Kay? look…da Van Schnider or wutveer is called……is going firs lik summon a giant hole of black stuff u no? den it goin to be lik “I EAT U” and lik suc kus all an we die. in my opinion i tink lik…it bad u no? lik i said i hav credential at MIT…cus i professor der…I did also work on van schnider….cus…lik i built som of it …and but then lik i REGRET cus…WE DIE u NO? k.

Scientists all over the world will be doing all sorts of things, at an ever-accelerating pace, that the public will find exciting, scary, awe-inspiring, dreadful, etc. Some scientists will use discretion and will not cross obvious ethical boundaries, but others will not. It would be wonderful in theory to have some type of governing body to help guide our scientific inquiry; this is, of couse, an impossibility because of organized religions.
In the case of CERN and the LHC, however, we need to let the scientists worry about the science. I’m an avid reader of the layman’s physics books (Lisa Randall, Brian Greene, etc.), and I am excited to see what will unfold.

To the people bemoaning the unwashed ignorant religious masses – take a second and notice how many of these comments have boiled down to “I’m religious, this is not the end of the world, carry on with the experiment.” People have plenty of stupidity and paranoia on their own – don’t blame religion for it.

I’m eager to see what we can get out of the LHC. Think of what we could do if we truly understood the root causes of gravity and mass. Imagine being able to play with gravity as easily as we play with electricity and magnetism.

“When Galileo argued that the universe was not perfect, people shut him down because otherwise the heavens would crumble”…I don’t recall this impliying human anihilation, “When Einstein argued that energy and matter were the same thing, the Victorian world could not get its head around it”…again no riskof anihilation (last I checked words alone don’t cause catastrophic results, “When the New Physics crowd went beyond Einstein, even Einstein could not get his head around it”…more of the same here, “Then there were baseless fears that the testing of the first atomic bomb would lead to a chain reaction of surrounding atoms being destroyed leading to the annihilation of the planet at least!” I’ll grant you this one, although given my age I can claim no sympathy for this view.

Some here say we are naysayers (some of us may be, I surely do not consider myself a naysayer). I’m all for teleportation, laser beams, speed of light travel, hypersonic transport, etc, etc. However, not many technological discoveries have carried the amount of global risk as this “little hoola hoop” that simply looks to answer a question without even providing a practical benefit other than making a bunch of physicists excited (not that they don’t deserve to be). I would not be writing this comment today if I were content with the physicists responses to questions such as, can this cause catastrophic results? their responses: “there is always a risk “-sorry, but I can put up (relatively speaking) with automotive brakes failing, airplanes crashing, bridges falling, toys braking, but somehow I’m a bit more strict with planets exploding)… one of my favorite physicist response: ” this is no different then when Columbus discovered America, he did not expect to find America, but he welcomed the unexpected” – did discovering America pose a risk of human anihilation? …there was a risk, but the risk was contained to his fleet. Furthermore, some physicists have used words and phrases such “exploratory science”, “something we do not understand”,”we don’t know what we may find”, “we do not know much about the origins of the universe”. So, they are telling me they are going blind into this? any experiment of this kind should have studies that prove the results can be contained. The automobile engine for example was developed slowly based on other technologies which we knew had no risk (other than handling of fuels), flight was developed by trial and error, small elevations at a time. In this case, we’ve created the most powerful machine in history but we lack the understanding of what it can do. All I need is a clear answer that addresses risk. They have failed tremendously in doing this and provoked this kind of media frenzy.

This controversy could all go away with a simple response to this issue of risk. There must be a lot of bragging rights and money at stake here, so much that power and pride have put aside logic and conservation of life.

I wish you people (all of us really) the best of luck with this experiment.

Why do they need to use this expensive piece of equipment and waste all this money to find out how the universe was created? I mean we all know the Earth was created in six calendar days and there was a talking snake in a tree. What more of an explanation do we need? Really? Is that not good enough?

First of all, let me start by saying that I think there is next to no danger (if at all) in this experiment. The danger is what comes after.

Suppose they discover the “god particle” of physics? Humanity now has a power in its hands that makes the discovery of the atom pale in insignificance.

The discovery of the atom has led to many positive advances. But how many dollars & worries do we spend on preventing unscrupulous individuals exploiting that discovery to their selfish aims? Consider that Adolf Hitler came very close to developing the atom bomb. We got lucky.

Who decides on whether to introduce new, powerful knowledge to humankind? Who makes the assumption that such discoveries are inherently beneficial to the world? A group of scientists? I thought democracy came first. When did I get a chance to vote on this? Or does democracy only apply to “enlightened” people?

In response to JVC Boston’s:

” In this case, we’ve created the most powerful machine in history but we lack the understanding of what it can do. All I need is a clear answer that addresses risk. They have failed tremendously in doing this and provoked this kind of media frenzy.”

As I have said in my first post on this topic if people would just go pick up a book and read they (YOU) would find out that particle accelerators have been around for a long time… no black holes, no earth gobbling horrid universe ending type stuff. This science is NOT unknown the only thing new here is the power level at which the protons will be pushed. Enough to make a bigger bang on a proton level but not big enough to impact the lives of the farmers who have land on top of the ring in which the stream of energy will be traveling.

It is not a “little hoola hoop” and making comments like that is a really good indication of how little you know of the subject or its history.

“WE” do not lack understanding of what it can do you lack understanding of what it can do and that can be fixed by going to your local library and picking up a couple books on quantum physics.

Please get out and read about this before making such comments, PLEASE!

Debating the LHC or demeaning each other over it will do none of us any good. What is certain is that there are unknowns involved in the possible outcome of it’s purpose. Numerous unknowns that have the potential for grievious and irreversible consequences.

The arrogance of mankind is only surpassed by one other being.
I pray that God may forgive us and give His children enough time to prepare our hearts for Him. Isiah 14:12-13

No matter your faith, I pray we are not making a terrible mistake.

I think the only thing that mankind should worry about as a result of this endeavor is the utter ignorance of mankind that has been demonstrated. If you want to argue against something, learn about it. Don’t cry “The end of the world!’ out of ignorance. We as a species have been there and done that. Let us progress beyond witch hunts, superstitions, and wild accusations and move into a world where we talk about what we know, and shut up when we don’t and let those who do know about them educate you.

Bottom line is this project is not going to be the doomsday device of the world and that those who think otherwise just need to take a basic course in physics to understand why it is not just unlikely but impossible.

In Soviet Russia Universe explores YOU! : )

Well, I know one person who’ll be happy if this brings about the end of the world…that whackjob Pentacostal Palin…after all, Alaska is going to be the refuge for all the chosen survivors and she’s the Alaskan Jesus. Go go black holes!

LHC experiment to understand our universe has far reaching implications. EVen then it may not unravel all the mysteries of the universe. Naysayers may have their point but if thats the case then we would still be living in caves. I dont think the 8b dollars is a waste. You cannot use money to grow food. it can only buy food. so 8b dollars going to feed hunger and poverty is hogwash. I am all for this 8b dollars spending if this experiment helps us invent many new technologies which can be used for better of mankind like finding ways to use the results in growing surplus food.
Of course of some of us will indeed end up misusing the results like building super weapons. But that is human nature. LHC is not to blame for it.

Ok here is a synopsis of what it can and can’t do since the media in this country is designed to do two things: Confuse and Scare.

What this CAN do is give us insight into what is actually happening inside extremely small pieces of space with huge amounts of energy…similar to the states that existed moments after the Big Bang, possibly giving us a glimpse at particles that thus far are only theory, and helping to better confirm existing theories, which ultimately helps us in our understanding of the way the universe works. It does have the potential to create tiny tiny tiny black holes, but not wormholes. A tiny black hole is not going to impact this planet or any life on it in any measurable way.

The most we may fear is that it explodes in some way due to some sort of power overload, but seeing as this was constructed with the utmost care and attention, and is underground, again this would not impact life on this planet in any measurable way

What it CAN’T do is create dimension bridging wormholes or giant blackholes that can swallow the Earth or affect life on this planet in some measurable way.

It also can’t cause the Earth to shift its orbit and send us spiraling into the sun, stop time, reverse time, cause molecular dematerialization, or make a good cup of espresso.

I am regretful to say that those that oppose this are well…uneducated, and it appears as if they would really like to impede scientific discovery and therefore progress. There is risk involved in most everything, but when the risk is almost nothing, where does the problem lie?

This is from Physicist Brian Cox in the recent Popular Science magazine.

http://www.popsci.com/scitech/article/2008-09/defense-lhc?page=1

“But I’ve found that for many people the focus is not on the sheer audacity and majestic possibility of the LHC, but on the cost. I recently gave a talk about CERN that appeared on the Web and attracted plenty of comment in this regard: “Have we gone out of our freaking minds? How much did this thing cost to build? . . . Billions of dollars, no doubt, and for what? To collide two atoms in the hope of discovering a new particle . . .â€� In other words, can’t we do something more useful with that kind of money?

Let me answer with an emphatic NO. Finding out how our Universe works has never been a bad idea. In fact, it is the quest for a deeper understanding of nature that has given us everything we now take for granted in modern life. In an eloquent speech to the U.S. Department of Commerce in 1966, the theoretical physicist and then Philips research director, H.G.B. Casimir, pointed out that virtually all of the great discoveries of the 19th and 20th centuries came from curiosity-driven research. The transistor emerged from the quantum theory of solids, not from a desire to build computers and televisions. Radio waves were not discovered by men in government-directed laboratories in order to connect the world together with better communication systems, but by Heinrich Hertz, a man whose overriding concern was for the beauty of physics. In his speech, Casimir went on to list many of the great innovations of the mid-20th century—from nuclear power to automobile starter motors—and point out that none of them came about as a result of some kind of pragmatic process of innovation. The lightbulb, as the saying goes, was not invented through research and development on the candle.

It should not be surprising that a deeper understanding of nature leads to great benefits for humankind. History speaks for itself. So why, then, could anyone question the “benefit� of projects like the LHC? I believe society undervalues exploration because searching for incremental solutions to pressing problems feels like a more pragmatic response to our problems than the quest for a revolution. It feels like we know enough—and we should focus our energies on better exploiting what we know. But what is “enough�? If we had applied this logic to particle physics over the past few decades, then we would have no World Wide Web (invented at CERN in 1990), no medical imaging scanners (the P in PET scan stands for positron, an antimatter electron discovered in 1932 by observing cosmic rays) and no x-ray or chemotherapy treatments, all of which rely on miniature particle accelerators to create the short-lived radioisotopes required for medical use. The world would be a far less comfortable place because of the loss to medicine alone, and a poorer place for the loss to commerce.

Most importantly, though, the world would be truly impoverished without all the fundamental knowledge we’ve gained. And the LHC has been built to answer some very profound questions about the nature of matter. We know it will discover something because we have deliberately built it to journey into uncharted waters, reaching energies in its particle collisions never before achieved in Earthly laboratories (although routinely achieved by nature elsewhere in the universe—prophets of doom take note, we are not powerful enough to endanger the world with this thing by a very long shot!).”

Kinetic Energy of 14 mosquitoes, after we fire it up.
Compared to kinetic energy of a bullet, Proton cosmic rays, hitting Earth

How energetic a proton to start the Jupiter Hydrogen Bomb in waiting ?

Okay, you know who I feel sorry for? All those kooks at work yesterday with stunning, brain-altering massive hangovers. You know, night before, pick up a fifth of tequila on the way home, drink the whole thing, figure you won’t have to pay for it at work the next morning because there will be no next morning. Oops.

Seriously, what’s more relevant than unstable singularities with minute lifespans prior to dissolving, is what we know about STABLE singularities on this scale. Assuming the worst, and practically impossible, happened, the LHC created numerous stable singularities on this Lilliputian scale, and we lost track of them — well, so what? They have such weak gravitational fields, it will take them something like 5 times or more the current age of the universe to get big enough to create a gravitational field dangerous to just earth. Okay, that’s MANY TIMES THE AGE OF THE UNIVERSE. That certainly adds a layer of abstraction, as I know I’ll be dead by then. So we have to say, then, if we’re worried, we’re worried about the fate of the earth billions and billions — sorry, couldn’t resist; tip o’ the bowler to c.s. who was a curmudgeon (read: jerk) but he was a jerk of historical significance in sicence — of years from today. And we should all know from our 8th grade general physical science classes, if that far in the future there’s anything left of earth as a whole, still in its current star system, it will be a cold, barren rock.

The worst case scenario, to use a medical analogy, is not that you have common pancreatic cancer and you’ll be dead in two months, or six if you really hang in there. It’s that you have a very rare malignancy that will kill you no sooner than when you’re 108 years old. And, if today you’re under a 105, and your worried about what might kill you when you’re 108, you’re just flat over-thinking it, folks.

“It also can’t cause the Earth to shift its orbit and send us spiraling into the sun…”

Alright, Chris, that sounds suspiciously close to the plot of “Space 1999″!

Mindy, before a bunch of federal, well, idiots, shut down, back in the 1990s, the SCSC here in Texas, before it was even fully operational, the partially functioning SCSC research led to something called the “gamma knife” which has been instrumental in treating cancers formerly considered untreatable.

This is like saying, why fund space research since it doesn’t yield anything truly practical? Even if one considers the scientific discoveries of space exploration impractical, all the unique inventions and materials created to make space exploration possible, things we use every single day today, things we swear we couldn’t live without, far exceed the cost of funding space exploration.

Wow… To be honest, I hope the thing explodes out a giant black hole and sucks us all in. That way I wont have to be inendated by all the stupidity and ignorance that shoots from so many bass ackward morons like some mutated form of a horrible incurable diarehha. You guys realize that scientist alone are responsible for every advancment that mankind has ever made? If we left it up to God, we would still be living in caves with a life expectency of 30. If you are so against scientific studies and experiments, then stop using the things they are resposible for. Turn off you lights, throw away your ipods, get rid of your bible (it is printed on a scientific break through know as “paper”) and by all means stop using your computers, that would benifit us all.

When the Sun shines upon Earth, 2 – major Time points are created on opposite sides of Earth – known as Midday and Midnight. Where the 2 major Time forces join, synergy creates 2 new minor Time points we recognize as Sunup and Sundown.
The 4-equidistant Time points can be considered as Time Square imprinted upon the circle of Earth. In a single rotation of the Earth sphere, each Time corner point rotates through the other 3-corner Time points, thus creating 16 corners, 96 hours and 4-simultaneous 24 hour Days within a single rotation of Earth – equated to a Higher Order of Life Time Cube.

Who edits the Time Cube on CNN?
Will I get a reply or will the Wisest Human
just be ignored until silenced by death?
XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXXxxX
Religious Singularity is evil,
Academic Singularity is evil.
Singularity is damnable lie,
Educators altered your mind,
You cannot think opposite of
what you were taught to think.
You have a cyclop perspective
and taught android mentality =
lobotomized analytical ability.
http://www.timecube.com

(this is a satirical post)

As a 5 year old I am deeply concerned with the metaphysical ramifications that running such a machine would have on our planet and our species. Think about it!

I’m pretty sure this thing will start a black hole…but there is one way to offset it.

It’s pure physics baby. As long as we have one scientist in the room sneeze, another fart, and another burp at the exact same time they fire up the machine, that will cancel out the imminent black hole destruction of mankind.

Science, it’s that simple.

I’m not so worried that the LHC will destroy this Earth, but rather Earth in one of the infinite number of alternate realities that exist in past the thin manifold of space time. Given the law of large numbers and high energies, I see no reason to think that is all together impossible.

I’m particularly worried that in whatever universe we’ve doomed to consumption by black hole, I might have been extraordinarily wealthy.

Perhaps I was president of somewhere, or married to a supermodel. It’s all a moot point, I guess, because that Phil is dead now.

I hope you are happy science.

to sam bandak:

between billion and thousand is a nice value called million. your whole theory, the one with no science behind it, is squashed, sorry. i mean, from your “logic” it counts on the number sequence right? well you missed one. please play again!

Let’s assume for a moment that this will create a massive black hole and it devours the world. Will anyone know about it? Will we all be dead? Or do we find out what is really down the rabbit hole?

Ignorance (not meaning that to offend) is the cause of a lot of this fear. Our lack of understanding exactly how this thing works is what strikes fear in hearts. In the 1930s & 1940s, it was feared that a nuclear fission reaction would cascade and ignite the earth’s atmosphere. Yet here we are today, using that same nuclear fission to generate electricity in a safe manner. You call the scientists money-wasters? I’d like to see you say that to Marie Curie’s face… or Albert Einstein… or any scientist for that matter.

Look, I’m a creationist. I believe things were created by a supreme being. At the same time, I don’t believe that he created them out of thin air/nothing. He commands the elements, knows his laws of physics, and uses them to create. Our ability to dissect those laws and understand how things work has brought us to construct some of the greatest technological discoveries that has enriched the lives of millions upon millions of people in this world.

Don’t be so paranoid. The world will not end, and this project is not a waste of money. You’ll see in a few years.

There are a number of common misconceptions being propagated through the media and through blogs like this one about what the LHC is designed to do, and what might possibly happen unexpectedly. Much of the responsibility for these misconceptions lies with us scientists, who use colorful words like “God particle” and “Big Bang machine” when describing what we do. I have been a card-carrying particle physicist for nearly two decades. Let me share the facts.

THE LHC IS NOT RECREATING THE BIG BANG, NOR THE CONDITIONS AT THE TIME OF THE BIG BANG. The LHC will collide protons into one another (and for a fraction of the experiment heavier ions instead of protons). The energy densities involved in these collisions are roughly the same as those involved during a dramatic time in the history of the early universe: when the fundamental particles gained mass. However, the events at the LHC involve just pairs of protons, not the whole universe. Other than what I described above, the LHC has absolutely nothing to do with the birth of the universe.

IT IS ABSOLUTELY CERTAIN THAT THE LHC IS NOT A THREAT TO THE PLANET. Scientists don’t like to use words like “absolute certainty,” but in this case it’s a fact. Here’s a summary of the proof. (For the full details, look at some of the links in earlier blogs.) Quantum mechanics requires tiny black holes to decay before they could do any damage. But even if somehow the rules of quantum mechanics were to break down at the LHC, then we can still prove that the collisions at the LHC will be harmless. The fact that collisions with energies like those at the LHC (and much higher) are happening all the time on Earth and on other astrophysical objects, precludes the possibility of something devastating happening at the LHC. Our very existence implies that nothing devastating for the planet can occur at the LHC. While we will learn a whole lot from the LHC, the collisions of protons are in themselves really not that dramatic.

THE LHC EXPERIMENT HAS NOTHING TO DO WITH GOD OR THE STORY OF CREATION. The “God particle” is just another kind of particle that has been theorized in order to explain the fact that particles like electrons have mass. It has nothing to do with God. I think that fanciful name for the Higgs boson originated with Leon Lederman. Leon, see what you’ve done! Also, the big bang was not the result of the collision of protons, and believing in the big bang does not preclude the existence of a Creator. It only requires that we admit that the universe is older than would be claimed by a literal interpretation of the Bible. Even the Pope is willing to do that.

EVEN THOUGH WE DON’T KNOW WHAT TO EXPECT AT THE LHC, WE DO KNOW THAT THE LHC IS 100% SAFE FOR THE PLANET. A curious argument some people make is that if we are so sure the LHC won’t create this deadly species of black hole, then there’s no reason to have built this thing to begin with. What??? I’m sure that if I drop a coffee mug on the floor it will not destroy the world. I couldn’t tell you how many pieces it would break into, though. Knowing something about what will not happen is not the same as knowing what will happen.

Just food for thought…

Scientists have suspected hundreds of tiny black holes are created each day when (I believe it’s) gamma rays crash into our upper atmosphere. Has the world be eaten by these black holes? Also, the size of a black hole determines how long it lives. Being microscopic in size means they wil flash out of existance before the could harm anything. Makes for a fun discussion, but most of these alarmists don’t have a clue what they are talking about.

I’m with Brad on this one!

Brad September 9th, 2008 4:20 pm ET

I’m kind of hoping it opens up a wormhole to a parallel universe. A universe in which the people protesting this experiment don’t exist and I am very very rich and surrounded by half naked women.

To Mike: If it does indeed open up a portal to Hell, I’ve played Doom. I’ll be ready.

dear people i really want to know the actual truth about what is going to happen please be serious and do not lie to me i want to know the truth so that i know what to expect.

the world is flat. my ex wife is fat. im happy not knowing that the big bang was the start. How does this pay my bills, rising gas, corroding enviroment, global warming. Im happy to be alive for this pin prick of a time in a whole that humans have been around. I have failth and believe in my king Jesus and our Lord Jehovah. Ive been in the same state my whole life. I have respect for all cultures. Did I say I think my x is fat. 8 billion smackers huh WOW… i think thats still less then my divorce. do i sound mad? well im not.. let scientists do their thing people. If it creates radiation its over there. if it explodes.. its over there.. if a black hole swallows the earth .. then I hope my x wife gets swallowed first she would clog the hole and we would all survive… MMMmmmm hole…… guhhhhhhhh…. Happy toi be free at last… seriously though….
this step in evolution of the human race as much as we go foward we go backward. Every action has a equal and opossite reaction. If we warm this thing up and it answers 1 question alone… a 1000 more questions will be asked. Enjoy the chats but i feel bad for anyone just shouting out and getting flamed or pissed on.. lets build a death star. will 8 billion cover the down payment??

Wait….I thought we WERE going to all die……..should I not have just told my boss off and taken the rest of my leave?

I bet the same alarmist so concerned about this don’t mind their children being bathed in a ray that causes skin cancer every day. Somehow, that technological innovation they’re perfectly willing to allow, while this test that is perfectly safe and does nothing that doesn’t already happen on Earth all the time, they’re scared to death of because someone gave out the scary term “black hole”.

Remember people – the most important thing to know is what you don’t know. Just because it’s a black hole doesn’t mean it can or will eat the world – we don’t even have enough mass here to form a stable black hole in the entire planet, and the mass they use in the collider is far smaller – at worst a miniature black hole that has a gravitational field smaller than a grain of sand and lives for far less than a second could be formed. This is safe, scrutinized by thousands of scientists who have devoted their lives to understanding physics – not some hack biologist thinking with his fears or pocketbook.

Oh, and the technology exposing your child to the cancer ray – it’s a “window” – a clear pane of glass that allows the sunlight (a known carcinogen) to contact your child’s skin. See what happens when you let a scary word stop your thinking?

Okay, so it seems like a number of different views are being expressed on this situation. From my own perspective, there are seven types of commenters:

Religious Zealots: those who use the term “God” a lot, without appropriately citing the good book for His likely responses to LHR

Flat-Earthers/Luddites: why seek (new) knowledge? change is bad! what was good enough for my great-great-grandparents …

The Offendeds/No-Nothings: Why does the American taxpayer pay for all of this? Why didn’t I get to vote? Why don’t I have complete say?

The Intelligent Creationists (an uncommon group here): those who understand the tenets of science, and also believe in God; God is omnipresent, omnipotent and omniscient; I especially liked the guy who wrote “He … knows his laws of physics.”

The Scientists: the arrogant class who explain why, how and what they are exploring; granted, better social skills and (especially) media savvy would have made this a much shorter blog

The Rationalists: those picky auditers who pick apart the claims of the Zealots/Flat-earthers/Offendeds by using logic and rationale; your obsequoius adherence to common logic is not common in this blog

The Smart-Asses: if you’re going to comment, be witty, topical, and succint. In other words, make it funny, and to the point.

Cheers from this side of the planet!

P.S. Johnny Rotten! My chain-gun is oiled and ready! I have your back!

P.S. Phil. Sorry about the supermodel. You knew it would never work out.

Okay, Ben, you’ve mildly offended just about everyone who contributed here, but you kept it civil, and did it with style. Nice work, thanks. Oh, and you’ve just launched Category #8, the “Categorizers.”
PD

Just checked in and read Susan’s strange comment. Uhmm … should somebody tell her that window glass actually blocks the UV rays that cause skin cancer? Well, I guess it’s the thought that counts.

If a God Particle and it’s Super Symmetric parter tried to annihilate each other,, who would win?

(Big Foot need bigger keyboard for Big Hands … will try to type question again.)

If a God Particle and its Super Symmetric Partner tried to annihilate each other, who would win?

Sam Bandak caused the real panic this week … dozens of particle physicists rushing to their compuers to spellcheck their powerpoints.

Scary are Black Holes, Monsters under your bed, Pack Man devouring, hungry since the Bang Big Eatery. Hawking radiation, for Pack Man evaporation, not yet observed.

New territory for theory, If extra large additional dimensions actually do exist, then PackMan could come alive, by hiding, bouncing off a braine trampoline. Break a leg, break up, the end of PackMan, just like Humpty Dumpty ?

The only for 100% this is nothing new, Moon not StrangeString strangled. Particles, all kinds, 6 million times more energy than the Puny Collider, go unnoticed.

“Nostradamus: the Large Hadron Collider black hole will eat us”
” Everyone who thinks that the LHC is dangerous is a twat.”

http://www.icepp.s.u-tokyo.ac.jp/~tomio/KOB_PPC_Texas.pdf

It is very interesting to know about the origin. I believe a black hole with a tiny fraction of nanoseconds lifespan will do nothing to our world

To everyone saying the scientists should have done everything possible to mitigate the negative effects this experiment MIGHT have, how do you know they didn’t? I’m SURE they’ve gone through all the scenarios they can come up with.

Outside of that, to each person here, I bet 8 billion sounds like a lot of money. But considering what we’re spending on the war in Iraq (or, even worse, the general military budget) which also gets us nowhere, is it really all that bad? There’s no way to tell if practical applications may develop from this, but I’m pretty sure our war efforts are just as fruitless, and cost much more money.

If you’re against the war in Iraq or war in general, then focus on that instead. If you’re for the war, then consider, the money the US has invested there may pay off in bigger and better weapons.

Most importantly….what does T Boone Pickens think about this?

Seriously though. Do you not think atoms collide in the real world? Should we protest the sun and have it shut down too? I bet there is a significant atom stream coming from it…and quite likely at a near-light speed to boot. OH MY GOD!!!! We’re all going to die because these whacky sceintists are trying to recreate a naturally occuring event in as close to a controlled environment as humanly possible.

Worst case I can think of, is we’ll have our dark portal to Hellfire Peninsula, so we can make our march to Shattrath while gearing up to take down Illidan. Night Elf Mohawks FTW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Well – you probably have not seen the You-Tube rap by Alpine Cat. If you do, you will understand that the entire field of subatomic physics is developing on the basis of a remarkable guess about the existence of Boson-Higgs particles and the balance of matter/anti-matter. The whole argument goes: Since we can’t see it or detect it, it must exist if the law of conservation of energy is true. Best case: we can prove antimatter by the direction of particles flying after a collision, assuming that antimatter was created and flying in the opposite (net) direction. Alternately, the same result can also be used to prove that the law of energy conservation does not hold on a sub-atomic level. Is it worth $9 Billion? Well, the money is not being thrown into a black hole. Its more of a stimulus package for the scientific community. People building the huge facilities, the scientists working there, and the community that serves it are set up for a windfall that will prove the law of the conservation of money, which states: “Since money does not really exist, it can neither be created or destroyed, but only spent.”

Besides the fact that the amount of money that the US gave was only about half a billion dollars, and the rest came from the other countries involved and private investors. I really don’t think the US was wasting our money.

i hope this multi-billion dollar metal doughnut finally ends this religious charade.

science: 1 god: 0

To Big Foot:

“If a God Particle and its Super Symmetric Partner tried to annihilate each other, who would win?”

God’s too busy laughing at all these humans trying to speak in His name and interpret His desires and thoughts. After all, who are we lesser lifeforms to even concieve of interpreting what a higher power is thinking? When man wrote the Bible, God was probably wondering what flavor of Higher-Order Pop Tarts to have for breakfast.

Winner: Super Symmetry.

JV September 9th, 2008 4:06 pm ET

(((Many of the people who are panicking about the experiment are the same people who would sign a petition to ban hydrogen dioxide (because it can and has caused death).

I believe ur joke requires dihydrogen oxide….not hydrogen dioxide…haha))))

But yes, all of the people scared of this just don’t understand the science. I’m a undergrad physics student, and i’ll tell you that the chances are much greater of a planet killing asteriod impacting Earth than us creating black holes to crush us all out of existence. Rest assured everybody; this is just a great moment for physics. That is all.

Two protons will create a black hole… …massive enough to “consume” the mass of our system, as we know it!?

Que!? Really!?!?!?! I mean, REALLY!?!?!?!?

Does anyone remember ratios and Einstein’s equation, anymore!?

Our Nuclear weapons don’t work off of singular collisions, but collisions in a chain, a.k.a.: chain reaction.

I mean, a collision of two particles will end everything, as we know it!?
These must be the same people who thought that the U.S. was being invaded by Russia, because Russia invaded Georgia…

Come on… You’re going to collide two small masses and get a huge amount of energy out of it? It doesn’t work that way… Google and Wikipedia are your friends, people! Do some research, eh!?

Godism created the God Particle. Particleism created matter anti-matter symmetry. Mirror on the wall refleted the CP violation.

Violate the principles of Godism, get the result: Deuteronomy 28:53-58
Read the only true theorist, above God: http://www.timecube.com/

Attention folks still having a hard time: This LHC will not destroy the world. The energies are somewhat high but the particles are extremely small. Higher energy collisions happen in the atmosphere all the time. (to the tune of 10 billion times higher energy).. so this has about one ten-billionth the power of naturally occurring collisions from cosmic rays. The earth is not big enough to fit an accelerator which would make these world-destroying black holes even if you made one that circled the whole world. (Maybe having it explained ONE more time will help people get it)

Secondly to the people who said we should take 8 billion dollars and feed the hungry. That’s fine and good. There are around 8 billion people in the world (rough estimate) and lets say half of them are poor. They will each have $2 and eat for a few days then starve again and we would not have our big particle accelerator. Drop in the bucket. We might not like it but there always have been the poor and they will probably always be.

There is NO chance that the LHC could create a black hole that would last LONG ENOUGH to be dangerous – they decay via Hawking Radiation just as soon as they are created…leaving just the Hawking radiation (a particle and it’s anti-particle counterpart) left.

Then these mutually annihilate one another, leaving a spate of other particles and some energy, all trapped by the detectors.

Some of these folks need to get a real life – after all, did the botanist study black holes in their native environment in the jungles of California?

Shouldn’t the world have to agree to do something like this? Of this magnitude. I mean how far can we take science? Humanity should have a say if it could possibly effect our planet. Can’t we just be happy with the perfect cycle and system of the way our planet works?

We weren’t meant to know everything.

I do think those Earthquakes had something to do with the energy given off by the magnets when it was powered on, its to much of a coincidence, Japan, Indoniesia, and Iran? Now Tsunami’s? WHo will be responsible if life itself is changed in any way?

When are they planning on the collision?

The energy scale of the LHC is only a few orders of magnitude higher than that of very energetic Cosmic Rays. Since we have not seen Quantum Black Holes in the entire time we have been observing Cosmic Ray events there is no reason to think we will see them now. LHC is a waste of money and Higgs is not required to complete a internally consistent “Theory of Everything”. We need to fund Polywell Electrodynamic Fusion and other small science research that has the potential to change the way we live and use the resources of this planet.

why would you spend all that money on something stupid that WOULD PROBALLY GO WRONg and kill us all. I think they should stop this right now.

this is retard i dont wanna die im too young im only in elementary school

darn it maybe it will end next week

The truth is no one really knows much about black holes…whose to say they last a fraction of a second. Besides that this machine is going to create a gravitational field 100,000 times stronger than the Earths. We are dealing with the unkown which is nerve racking….not everyone on this Earth signed up for this. I don’t see this project stopping but I hope we get something out of this….if we don’t get wiped out.

Bible: “You will always have the destitute with you, but you will not always have me” — Meaning, make hay in daylight, to survive, new weapons, defend against Aliens, pre-emptive strike to Alpha Centuary, Pave over the Alien, not the reverse, Bible extrapolated.

If extra dimensions found, can we send a time slowed Black Hole to the Alpha Centaury System ? Otherwise, accelerate an iron dust particle to near light speed ? Ignorance is bliss, till we get zapped, as the Alien Bible suremacy cmmanded !

YEAH THANK YOU FOR FREAKING ME OUT. my brother told me this during dinner that one of his teachers told the class and i started crying . im paranoid of dieing. i know it is probably going to happen some day..but i rather just live life and not kno when my death date is. that is probably the worst thing that i can know. thinking of dieing scares me and especailly my whole life gone. i have dreams and goals that i want to achieve. and to progress in my long life ahead of me. im only 13. nice to kno that i might die in 6 weeks.

thanks you officailly ruined my life. if i have one.

We must face the fact that we are borned, we live, we have kids (some of us) and then we die. that is the fact, everyone… Then the same must happen to mankind. We are limited by time and so is the human race.
We´ve been on the planet for 100,000 years , will the human race live for ever? are we indistructables?? I dont think… dooms day could be tomorrow, could be in 1000 years, could be in 100,000 years . But I think its inevitable.How will the end be? many ways,….some mishap with something like a LHC could be the case.
If this LHC works and nothing happens to us.
I just hope I can do more things on live life to its fullest and that this mishap wont happen in my lifespan.
I live in Colombia and declare my self ignorant with physics. But I really hope nothing happens

“Then the same must happen to mankind.” — Wrong,
Ding Dong of the Contented Cow’s bell, mowing the lawn, closer to slaughter.
Logical fallacy of extrapolation from one to many. Death is just one Every living Human changing evolving, when dead several replacements. Genetics, Culture, Religion, Faith, hypnotically passed on. Not death of imagination, but the will to live ensure, power, the Human Conveyor Belt to Eternity

If this actually does create a black hole, maybe I can get my missing socks back.

I don’t know, I kind of like Brad’s idea of a alternative reality and bieng rich and surrounded by half nekked women.

i think that we should get to vote on this because it involves all of our lives, and i believe it should not be left in the hands of some scientists who are not 100% sure thatif this will kill us all or not. Its risky and they have no right to mess with our lives because they want to find out more about “life” , i mean…just live with the way you have lived all your life and let the world be, stop trying to find out more, and end up destroying the world, and im sure they wouldnt like being blamed for the end of the world anyways, i dont care if it does work out and they find answers to their stupid questions….they are just some stupid people because they want to test something that may destory all of us, and 8 billiob dollars? why in the world will you spend $8 billion on something that could kill us all when you could help feed the poor? at least i got to say somethign before we all die

I’m much more frightened of religious conservatives and scientific ignorance than I am of the LHC. Fearing the LHC makes as much sense as the fear of floridated water in the US in the 1950’s (It was all a commie-pinko plot).

Seriously folks, if you have a pathological need to worry, you should pick something that’s a more likely threat…like being hit on the head by three different meteors on three consecutive days…or all of the air molecules in the room suddenly, through random chance, moving to the other side of the room leaving you in vacuum.

The Hadron Collider sure does offer a wide range of opportunity to test many ‘theories’, including the notion that the Universe began with the Big Bang.

I personally don’t believe in this theory, simply because of the so many flaws in the idea, especially in the existence of Dark Matter, this mysterious energy than we’ve never measured. We are going to find out in the next decade that the Big Bang actually never occurred and that the Universe has literally been around forever, just an infinite continuum.

I do on the other hand accept that there are catastrophic events that occur in the universe, and that perhaps there was a BANG that thrust trillions of megatons of matter across the universe and eventually led to the Earths creation, but this is the type of event that occurs all the time in a Universe so unfathomably large.

We are at a stage of exponential scientific development, but we will be suck behind and slowed down until we can put some myth of Creation behind us, whether it be of religious, or ’scientific’ nature.

We will see those in the scientific community who will be very reluctant to give up this notion of the Big Banf because it feels so safe, and infinity, not so much, but until then, our progress in understanding of the quantum mechanics of the universe will be hindered!

if the world ends because of this it will not matter. we will all die at the same time and together without even knowing it.

god lord people will you calm down? the world is NOT going to end anytime soon. and when it does you can rest assured that it was all the pollution and raping of the worlds natural resources that did it. and for the sake of pete 17 year old 5 months pregnant just eat something already.

I have continually noticed something in this country – whenever some (but not all) people who claim to be educated and religious don’t understand something or think something goes against their faith, they don’t make the attempt to do what an educated person would do: find out more information.

Besides the “outcry” over the Large Hadron Collider, I have seen the same reactions from climate change and evolution, to pollution and medicine and “cancer-causing” cellular phones. You need the facts, you need the research, and if, for example, every major scientific society agrees on something like climate change, they are probably right. The LHC is safe, we will learn new things about the Standard Model, knowledge will advance, and technological applications will come later.

No one thought relativity mattered for every day life, but if you used a GPS that did not take into account the differing passage of time from the surface of the Earth to satellites in low earth orbit, you would end up far from your destination. Same for quantum mechanics – we all used a computer based on transistors to access CNN.com and place our comments here.

I hope these experiments will provide us with some really important insights into the nature of matter and cosmic forces, while shutting up the self-delusional bible-banging god-fearing flat-earth doomsday dimwits that constantly try to impose their desperate medieval self-righteous intellectual black holes on the rest of us…

Should any black hoIes truly develop, I “pray” they will be big enough for all the religious neanderthals to get sucked into them once and for all, and be unidirectionally transported to far, far away, otherwise inaccessible dimensions.

Collide away, LHC!

Looking for the most ancient text, to reveal laws unchanged since the
Reality Big Bang. Rosetta Stone Henge, beaming all around. Smash and break, gather the dust, too late, the answer, blown away by the Dogma God. http://www.canada.com/montrealgazette/story.html?id=bc551850-3058-4227-9512-0aa20031e97f&p=3

Had a good laugh reading some of the comments about the LHC. I’ve heard of that experiment for some time since it began built from the start. Now it’s about finally to be fired up, eh? Oct 21st, huh – almost in time for my big B-day (but not… I say “almost”) LOL!

Go Ahead – Fire it up!

Black Hole? I think not, come on… be real, one atom hitting another atom and we expect a black hole big enough to shallow our earth? Nonsense! The eggheads are just looking for an answer to their question is all.

While in personally, i do agree the $8 billion is a huge waste of mooch – there are lots better use for others – to improve or invest for humanity. Feeding the whole poor on Earth is impossible for that amount of $8 billion. It’d be gone in a short time, not forever! Then what? All the poor people go hungry again, see?

End of the world? Get your life striaght in portions from most important to least! The LHC isn’t my main worry – why should it be yours? Hmph! I get other better stuff to deal with. I wouldn’t care one itty-bitsy speck of dirt if the LHC failed or broke down or successful… it’s meaningless to me anyway.

LOL…. hahaha can’t believe there are actually some “End-of-the-World” signs being trotted on streets still around? I thought it belong in the era of silent comedy flicks – like “Charles Chapain” !!

I say fire a Democrat from one end and a Republican from the other. Maybe it will create a real leader.

Seriously though. Yeah, let’s say we discover something. What can we do with it or produce using that information? Seems to me that it’s a whole lot a money being spent so some geeks can say “hey we were right”.

We don’t have the responsibility or ability to use anything learned. It’s like letting your 5 year old play with your handguns. I’ve heard about what we COULD do with the knowledge learned but what WILL we do with it? How many decades and billions of dollars more will that take, while the morals needed to possess that knowledge continue to erode?

99.9% chance the first items created with these discoveries are weapons..

to german scientist of the future are you for real or are you just kidding i do not want to die form this please tell me if you were kidding or not.

Black holes require a LOT of mass to consume stuff. They have to have more mass then what they are consuming.

The earth has more mass then any micro black hole. They are ripped apart by other forces and Earth’s gravity well before they do anything.

I do not understand a great deal of the theories behind this experiment but can see clearly the benefits and or consequences of performing more tests such as these. The energy generated from this kind of test in my mind could be anything from ‘minute’ to maybe ‘blow themselves up’. As far as the rest of thew world is concerned, I just dont see it being an issue.

To the folks out there worried about the possible dangers and consequences of such experiments should probably remove their heads from the sand soon. Lack of oxygen can lead to mental disorders/brain damage. You are likely the same people that complain about fuel costs and at the same time have no grasp of reality in this world. Your reality is now, not tomorrow. If your kind were so concerned about the world coming to an end you would likely be spending a little more time addressing some thought towards all of the other problems in the world.

To the scientists I humbly offer this train of thinking, especially those working for or with The Department of Energy. If we take a moment and look at our world and everything that is around us we can see one tremendous form of energy being wasted daily while we continue to pollute our environment. The nearest Star to our planet should showcase what is available as a means. The fact that we are spending billions on developing this accelorator is of no consequence. The money belongs to the goverment anyways, not me or anyone else for that matter. If we were focusing more effort on finding new ways to gather energy from our own star, what impact could or would this have on our well-being as a society? Have we really become this ignorant that we march along towards certain demise? And yes, if we stay on this course it will happen sooner or later. I am not concerned about me but I need to have some sense of a bright future for humanity as a whole.

We just simply do not know the results. Hence the banging of the protons.
Wild, tipsy point beyond, chaotic, butterfried mosquotoes ?

Very dense Neutron Stars are not eaten by little black holes – 100% safe.
If you worship false Gods.– God will make BabyBurger of only you.

Seriously, why would the UN or something like that allow a machine that can swallow the universe and erase mankind???

I don’t believe it. This must be a media hype.
People who are scared spend money. Like when they said that in 2000 the world will end, tons of people bought food and stuff.

hurray.

no seriously we arent going to die and if we do we die together so it doesnt matter anymore

In all honesty, I truly cannot believe how many certifiable idiots there are out there that have somehow mastered the art of turning a computer on and typing their small-minded rhetoric into it. How did so many of these people actually find the ON button, never-mind this website and blog…

There are certain realities that one needs to consider before sharing an opinion if they want that opinion to be taken seriously. The first being that their opinion of a situation involving nothing existential or philosophical should not contain anything as such. It should be based on their knowledge of the facts. Any injection of speculation or interpretation NOT centered around the known parameters renders the opinion moot, and therefore renders the credibility of the person issuing it inert. If I’m using too many big words for you to understand then you are not qualified to post an opinion on this blog. Case and Point.

Furthermore, those that DO know the facts and were willing to dump $8 Billion+ into this project are in a much better position to determine what both its possible benefits and potential dangers may be. Postulating on your soap boxes about the “End of the World” and such does nothing but demonstrate your lack of understanding of the SCIENCE behind the machine.

I want this to be clear – I am a devout christian with a firm and deep understanding of the science behind the universe that God has placed us in. I am also VERY familiar with the bible and what God has to say about the end of days. If you bring religion into the equation, anyone with any REAL understanding of what the bible says knows that man will not destroy the planet. He will come very close to destroying himself, and take big chunks of the planet with him, but the planet, and some of the life on it, remains. This is only valid if you decide to overlay a religious construct onto a non-religious issue.

The world will not end whenever they decide to smash things together. I’m not going to get into the science of it but the long and short is this: The “black holes” that form will not have enough of a gravitational influence on anything around them (due to their almost negligible mass) to consume even the nearest quarks, muons, or neighboring singularities that may have formed. The forces responsible for keeping particles together or apart at sub-atomic distances will easily overcome any gravity that these singularities may have, ripping them apart virtually instantaneously. This is not speculation, it is tried, tested and true FACT. Once again , if this does not make sense to you, go back to high-school, do WELL in a chemistry class (it’s not just enough to take one), and then (and ONLY then) will you have any right, rhyme, or reason to comment on this blog. Just because you HAVE an opinion does not mean you should SHARE it…

Much love

Rj

I think it is funny listening to all the people freaking out… The same thing happened when Einstein was doing his work and it will happen again when the next big experiment arrives.. I think its great. Why wouldn’t we do it? The possibilities are endless. This could make so many improvements or could not but why weigh all thoughts on the negative side? I am looking for the positive. How did we get here? God? I have never seen him so how do I know he exists? I would follow what the bible and churches say but they are just like scientists.. This is our theory and here is our book. Why do we believe them and not scientists. I for one have my money on the scientist and not the church..We will all still be alive just with more knowledge.

I find it amazing that most people that oppose the LHC and want to spend the money on some other cause can’t find it in their hearts to use a spell check or proper grammar. Seriously, it comes installed in your common word processor and makes you look incompetent and illiterate when you post to public forums with serious errors.

Here’s an idea: fix your own lives before you criticize modern day innovation. Glass houses, throwing stones… you know the drill.

Actually part two of my opinion concerns the “waste” of money being spent on the LHC.

The US used to be at the forefront of scientific advancement and research. Now we are being overtaken by other nations who are ramping up their programs after seeing what the US did with the Manhattan Project, the Space Program, etc.

$8 billion is not chump change, true. But alot of these same people who want to stop using the LHC because of any perceived danger or a religious belief will not apply that to say, a foreign occupation that is not going to end and does not serve US interests. A war that has cost not just several billion dollars PER MONTH, but caused *confirmed* deaths in the thousands.

Have I made my point?

The debate is over, time to act, stop the green holes of ignorance
Sustainable , easily maintainable, politically correct, balanced little particles
As the Bible exemplified, in Lilies of the Field, do not theorize, be happy

Human destiny is to be munched on by God’s new pet, an Alien Cow

The world is not going to end, even if the whole world floods over with water, the Bible clearly states that Jesus is coming soon, the Bible is Truth, Life and Love, it is everything. Even if there was an atomic bomb large enough for scientist or physicists or anyone with adequate scientific knowledge to think that it would destroy the world it will not, because my Lord will not allow it. He is coming soon and nothing man does can stop his coming, so test what you want the world is not going to end until Jesus comes to save those who love and worship him.

Still, none of you have answered my comments that some of these experiments could be used as research for new mega-weapons! Why is no one concerned about that? Or are any in the “scientific community” not willing to admit that possibility?

Curiosity first, pesonal need next, weapon after, to kill the competition.
Monkey just Rocky curious, becomes hungry, nut and rock particle collided, other monkey steals a cracked nut. Rocky Monkey bangs rock on Thief monkey head

Particle collider at curiosity state.
Too early to tell how we can kill something. Fry a Mosquito fly, for food ?

Rocky, there is always the possibilty, but that research would still progress with or without the LHC. It is human nature and therefore inevitable.

Okay, what exactly is the whole point of this experiment??? To REALLY find out how the world started? And these people are willing to risk putting the whole world to an end just to find out?? I think that if there’s even a slight chance that something really, really horrible will happen, they shouldn’t be allowed to do it. I’m really terrified about this, I can’t even explain how scared I am. Black holes??!! Screw this, who cares how we got here?? Geez. I’d rather live.

i think u guys r messing around and tryng to scare people? i know u guys r stupid but not that stupi 2 kill everyone, come on wats the matter with u dumbass scientist? get real wit it? stop ur bull$xxx

I think you are in need of a spellchecker.

To All Who Fear The LHC,

Michael Peskin is a leading U.S. particle physicist at the Stanford Linear Accelerator (SLAC). He has written a wonderfully clear explanation of how we can be completely certain the LHC is safe. It’s written in a way non-experts can follow, so please check it out. Unless you really enjoy your nightmares.
http://physics.aps.org/articles/v1/14

While you’re at it, check out the LHC Webcam to witness the experiment in real time:
http://www.cyriak.co.uk/lhc/lhc-webcams.html

Enjoy!

Well I hope you all are happy. Could we turn off the collider now? The black hole it has created in the finanical sector is threatening to consume us all.

I believe that when scientists make an experiment there is a great deal of the unknown. Once the experiment is done again and again, its only then when you will know the outcome.
Even if you make all kinds of calculations there is still an unknown result.
Dont get me wrong, s