World to end in August when Large Hadron Collider (LHC) switched on

[Raidou]

Source/ full story:
World to end in August (maybe) +video
5:00AM Wednesday July 02, 2008

The most powerful atom-smasher ever built could make some bizarre discoveries, such as invisible matter or extra dimensions in space, after it is switched on next month.

But some critics fear the Large Hadron Collider could exceed physicists' wildest conjectures.

Will it, they wonder, spawn a black hole that could swallow Earth? Or spit out particles that could turn the planet into a hot, dead lump?

David Francis, a physicist on the collider's huge Atlas particle detector, smiled when asked whether he worried about black holes and hypothetical killer particles known as strangelets.

The collider is a ring of supercooled magnets 27km in circumference attached to huge barrel-shaped detectors. The ring, which straddles the French and Swiss border, is buried 100m underground.

But once it is working, it is expected to produce some startling findings.

Scientists plan to hunt for signs of the invisible "dark matter" and "dark energy" that make up more than 96 per cent of the universe, and hope to glimpse the elusive Higgs boson, a so-far undiscovered particle thought to give matter its mass.

The collider could find evidence of extra dimensions, a boon for superstring theory, which holds that quarks, the particles that make up atoms, are infinitesimal vibrating strings.

The theory could resolve many of physics' unanswered questions, but requires about 10 dimensions - far more than the three spatial dimensions our senses experience.

Critics of the collider filed a lawsuit in a Hawaiian court in March seeking to block its startup, alleging that there was "a significant risk that ... operation of the collider may have unintended consequences which could ultimately result in the destruction of our planet".

Sceptics claim switching on the supercooled magnets could create a doomsday event that would destroy the Earth. Discovery of Dark Matter? Alternate dimension? Possible/ impossible? What do you think? Dialogue.

[Priest4hire]

Ever heard of cosmic rays? They are high energy particles that originate far away in space (from any number of phenomena) and impact the Earth's atmosphere. Before the advent of particle accelerators observing such collisions was the only tool physicists had for investigating high energy interactions. While many are lower energy they can occasionally get really energetic. By energetic I mean many times more powerful than even this accelerator can manage. So if I were to fret about a particle collision causing the end of the world via strangelets or black holes I'd be looking up.

[Atlas]

I'm a bit of an astronomy buff, so I've read a lot about these awesome machines; and really, they are amazing, but rarely does anything spectacular occur.

Nothing to worry about.

EDIT: Funny that there's one called "Atlas", though.

[Raidou]

Priest, this scientist are trying to observe for the very first time the Higgs boson particles inside Earth, not outside Earth's atmosphere. How would they know that it will be stable to be experimenting something like this which may possibly open up mess which they do not want to see such as reversing time and etc? There are certain degree of risks there you know.

For more readings/ visuals on LHC, go to:-

Wikipedia entry for LHC

Large_Hadron_Collider in youtube.com (11 minutes):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_fJ6PMfnz2E

[Atlas]

The power it would take to generate these types of disasters doesn't even exist in our conditions on Earth; we are far from creating it.

[Dick Fitzwell]

Please tell me I'm not the only one who read "large hardon collider"

[Luisfe]

Originally Posted by P?fyllning

Please tell me I'm not the only one who read "large hardon collider"

You are not, and it always amuses me.

[Polygon]

Honestly, remember in the 70s they believed the China syndrome? The idea is just absurd to us. It think this is along those lines.

[Devil King]

This is all Atlas' doing. He's going to cause the world to end.

I don't really think this will be that devastating, though.

[Brokensouls91]

The machine they're describing sounds like a pint sized Halo...

[Devil King]

It kind of does, huh?

[Atlas]

That's basically what it is. It has a circular shape so the particles can gain speed before they collide. They can travel at around 99.9% the speed of light.

[Indigo]

I know this can bring endless advantages but is it really worth the risk?

[Luisfe]

Originally Posted by Fallen Emanuel

I know this can bring endless advantages but is it really worth the risk?

You answered yourself.

[Cyrus the virus]

Cool. I want to see it