Does the Large Hadron Collider worry you ?

[quexos]

OK guys as some of you may know, the Biggest particle accelerator at the French/Swiss border at the CERN facilities, will be activated if all goes well, this month of August.
The machine, the biggest of all constructions in human history has been assembled 100 meters underground. the Ring shaped device has a circumference of no less than 27 KM (about 17 miles) meaning a city could be built inside (that says how huge the machine is).

Anyways, here is the issue: when the machine will be at its full power, it will be using the highest levels of energy ever needed by anything made by humans and though most scientists think it is safe, a few have mentioned that there is a small and theoretical chance that the accelerator could produce a small BLACK HOLE yes, you read right: a black hole !!!

For those who don't measure the implications of such an event, let me just say that the most powerful nuclear bomb would be a small meaningless baby toy compared to the destructive power of a black hole, it would be the absolute end of earth and mankind if such a thing happened. Now I'm not a scientist so I'll choose to trust those in charge of the LHC. But what do you guys think ? does the Large Hadron Collider worry you ?

Oh and to not stray too far from this site's topic, let me just say that a Black Hole would destroy all of our Bluray players and Discs

[fighthefutureofhd]

i read that as hardon collier and was begin to wonder what this thread was about. i was also beginning to get worried too. *whew*

[AliceT]

ah, ive seen multiple interviews with scientists, like Michio Kaku who is a well known theoretical physicist, and they all say that the hype and dangers are WAY overblown. The longest that any of these energy fields will even be in existance is measured in pico-seconds.

[quirkmanly]

Without being to philosophical, whatever will be will be.

Ultimately, I'm going with Stephen Hawking on this one though.

[jsteinhauer]

It baffles me.

Why people would worry about this, but stick their thingy in any strange hoo-hoo that comes along and not worry at all.

[Seablazer]

I live about 3 minutes from the RHIC (Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider) here on Long Island....

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Relativ...y_Ion_Collider


Fear? Nope.....

Science requires the pushing of bounds so I'm all for it...

But here's something to think about... The RHIC was also "poo poo'ed" because it could possibly create black holes, strange matter, etc... People got over it because "it is good for science..." BUT some years previous, the idiots in the my town (Shoreham), along with many other Island NIMBY idiots decided to fight tooth and nail against the Shoreham Nuclear Power Plant...

Possible black holes are fine, nuclear power plants bad... LI residents are still paying off the power plant (made it to 5% power before the protesters won out and the thing was shuttered)...

[SeahawxBlu]

Originally Posted by AliceT

ah, ive seen multiple interviews with scientists, like Michio Kaku who is a well known theoretical physicist, and they all say that the hype and dangers are WAY overblown. The longest that any of these energy fields will even be in existance is measured in pico-seconds.

Yeah, he's in The Universe and one of the shows was actually about that very thing. I wouldn't worry in the least.

[dialog_gvf]

Originally Posted by quexos

Anyways, here is the issue: when the machine will be at its full power, it will be using the highest levels of energy ever needed by anything made by humans and though most scientists think it is safe, a few have mentioned that there is a small and theoretical chance that the accelerator could produce a small BLACK HOLE yes, you read right: a black hole !!!

For those who don't measure the implications of such an event, let me just say that the most powerful nuclear bomb would be a small meaningless baby toy compared to the destructive power of a black hole, it would be the absolute end of earth and mankind if such a thing happened. Now I'm not a scientist so I'll choose to trust those in charge of the LHC. But what do you guys think ? does the Large Hadron Collider worry you ?

Oh and to not stray too far from this site's topic, let me just say that a Black Hole would destroy all of our Bluray players and Discs

First off, a black hole can't be an exception to the law of conservation of energy. The energy out can't be any more than the energy in.

As for people worrying that one would gobble up the Earth, then they need to look into Hawking radiation. A theoretical black hole created in the LHC would evaporate in microseconds, or less.

Gary

[quexos]

Originally Posted by dialog_gvf

As for people worrying that one would gobble up the Earth, then they need to look into Hawking radiation. A theoretical black hole created in the LHC would evaporate in microseconds, or less.
Gary

Indeed that's what the scientific community says and I personally abide by that. However the levels of energy that will be used by the LHC are beyond any other particle accelerator and as much as theoretical science is trustable, the issue is that we will be swimming in uncharted waters. to make a comparison, we could talk about the global warming issue. Scientists can more or less predict what could happen, but in the end since there is no precedent recorded in human history, the ultimate truth is that nobody knows for sure. In other words we don't have any experience at all with black holes, the knowledge we have of those is mostly if not entirely theoretical. so to sum up the mind of the scientific community:

There are very VERY small chances of creating a BH that could gobble up the earth, and if one is created it would (theoretically) evaporate in a fraction of a second, but in the very end, having no practical experience of such destructive phenomena, we simply don't know for sure ...

[AliceT]

If any of you are interested in stuff like this, all of Michio Kaku's books are excellent. I just finished his new one, and its really cool. He takes things from movies, such as star wars, star trek, back to the future, and explains in scientific terms if such things could ever be possible and how they work.

[bhampton]

Hey,

I think when you get far enough along into theoretical physics... nobody knows just what's going to happen. Experiments will be done without good understanding of the effects they will have which is the point.

However,.. Should a black hole form and the entire planet be destroyed I would imagine it doesn't sound like the worst possible ending to life on Earth. There's a kind of neatness to it. Sounds clean.

I would guess that if some type of black hole thingie formed and grew... most of us would go without having any idea what hit us.

That may not be so bad... I think we are sort of overdue for some refreshing end of the earth type of stuff. Y2K was a major letdown,.. let's get something cooking.

-Brian

[quexos]

Originally Posted by AliceT

If any of you are interested in stuff like this, all of Michio Kaku's books are excellent. I just finished his new one, and its really cool. He takes things from movies, such as star wars, star trek, back to the future, and explains in scientific terms if such things could ever be possible and how they work.

It does sound interesting
However it does not apply here because the situation here is not fiction compared to scientific reality. The LHC is very real, its city-like size very real, and it's dangers, though low in chances of happening are nonetheless very real too.

[Clark Kent]

At the energy levels being used here microscopic black holes are really the only possibility. They can still be quite destructive but no one should worry about the planet disappearing in one blink. Fortunately the chances are very remote. The only real concern would be if we encounter exotic particles that the theoretical models don't predict.

[swifty7]

I'm sorry to say but these super expensive colliders are a waste of time and money IMO.

[quexos]

Originally Posted by swifty7

I'm sorry to say but these super expensive colliders are a waste of time and money IMO.

I have to totally disagree with you friend.
this (and other future ones) super collider should make the knowledge we have of physics and astrophysics, advance by a tremendous lot. We should better understand the nature of matter and energy and we can potentially better understand the origin of our universe.

This is everything BUT a waste of money and time

[AliceT]

Originally Posted by quexos

It does sound interesting
However it does not apply here because the situation here is not fiction compared to scientific reality. The LHC is very real, its city-like size very real, and it's dangers, though low in chances of happening are nonetheless very real too.

It does apply, because it takes actual scientific data and breakthoughs and applies them to things. In fact, it even discusses the LHC in the book. But either way, his other books are based upon theoretical physics and are great.

[U4K61]

The Black hole post

For Stars that have burnt-out: In order of smaller diamater/increasing density.
White dwarf: A degenerate dwarf < 1.4 solar masses. Chandraseker_limit
Neutron Star: 1.35 to 2.1 solar masses, radius of about 12km. Tolman-Oppenhimer-Volhoff limit.
Quark Star: 1.5 - 1.8 Solar masses.
Black Hole: Zero Volume

A black hole is nature's ultimate death trap and antithesis to our expanding universe. A zero and an infinity. The collapsed star becomes a singularity when its mass is compressed to a point of zero volume and infinite gravity. The region where acceleration is greater then the escape velocity of light, C, as in E=MC^2 is called the event horizon. Like a perfect Black body, no particles are emitted. Zero volume/infinite density violates the Pauli Exclusion Principle, where no two things can be in the same place at the same time. A star's gravity will overpower the Exclusion Principle when the mass of a burnt-out star is > 1.4x the mass of the sun, the Chandraseker Limit.

Black Holes
Black Body
Exclusion Principle
Chandraseker Limit

One way out of the trap is Hawking Radiation: A flow of negative energy into a black hole that reduces it's mass and increases it's tempereture - beginning a cycle of temperature increase/emissions/and further loss of mass. The lower the mass, the higher the rate of emission. Following the laws of entrophy, the little low mass black hole created in a instant by the the LHC, will evaporate just as fast - not to worry.

Other Posts:

• A History
• Black Holes
• Black Holes
• Black Holes

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[quexos]

hmm it seems the prospect of the LHC being activated does not scare the average Bluray fan nearly enough so let me make things more clear for you guys:

IF a blackhole was created by the LHC, it would damage all your beloved Bluray movies and the hardcoating on the discs would most likely not resist the black monster and your collection would be all scratched (possibly worse)

[AliceT]

Originally Posted by quexos

hmm it seems the prospect of the LHC being activated does not scare the average Bluray fan nearly enough so let me make things more clear for you guys:

IF a blackhole was created by the LHC, it would damage all your beloved Bluray movies and the hardcoating on the discs would most likely not resist the black monster and your collection would be all scratched (possibly worse)

You really believe the LHC is going to cause a problem, yet the top minds of the world arent worried. Hmm, who to believe?

[Mikeblu]

god its Angels and Demons