Quick ? - Can the LHC end the world

barnicles

Explained in the title

IrishKnight

Short answer, no

twasantis

IrishKnight wrote: »

Short answer, no

proof please :P

moggins7

twasantis wrote: »

proof please :P

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080627175348.htm

don't be so stupid.. sorry if i cause any offence but honestly do you have no faith in physicists, i mean this is the place that brought you the internet afterall:rolleyes::rolleyes:

Podge_irl

moggins7 wrote: »

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080627175348.htm

don't be so stupid.. sorry if i cause any offence but honestly do you have no faith in physicists, i mean this is the place that brought you the internet afterall:rolleyes::rolleyes:

I think its safe to say the poster wasn't being serious.

moggins7

Podge_irl wrote: »

I think its safe to say the poster wasn't being serious.

true but still, i hate the fact that if you try to talk to people about this exp. all they know about is that there could be a massive black hole that could destroy the earth...
this is going to be the biggest exp. to date. the possibility of freeing gluons and/or quarks, finding the higgs boson... seeing extra dimensions
are the desired results of this exp not far more exciting than the result the media is swaying towards??

sink

moggins7 wrote: »

true but still, i hate the fact that if you try to talk to people about this exp. all they know about is that there could be a massive black hole that could destroy the earth...
this is going to be the biggest exp. to date. the possibility of freeing gluons and/or quarks, finding the higgs boson... seeing extra dimensions
are the desired results of this exp not far more exciting than the result the media is swaying towards??

Well to people who have no interest in science and could care less about extra dimensions and the higgs boson the destruction of the earth and possible ending of the universe might hold their attention longer.

moggins7

sink wrote: »

Well to people who have no interest in science and could care less about extra dimensions and the higgs boson the destruction of the earth and possible ending of the universe might hold their attention longer.

fair enough but then those people are just being ignorant towards science.
ok i know this has being discussed in other threads before so i don't want to argue wit anyone but i cant understand how people take science for granted so much.
i mean things that are took for granted today, phones, computers, gps, satellites, planes, microwave ovens, solar cells, pharmaceuticals etc etc etc were all created by scientists/ creators...
now when we're so close to the biggest breakthrough to date for theoretical physicists(the fact that they got there before experimenter) people decide to forget about how scientists have made their life so much cushier and ridicule them instead about a necessary experiment.

and please nobody make an atomic bomb argument about how scientists can get it wrong or you're just proving me right...

and i'm sorry for the rant but i just had to vent the fustration in some direction...

on the other side of things, ooh the excitment it creamilicious...:rolleyes::rolleyes:

Kevster

The LHC stands no chance of creating a large black hole that 'destroys' the world. If theory is correct, it may open up many small black holes. However, 'small' is misleading because these black holes would be so small that they evaporate in less than a second (Yes, black holes 'evaporate').

I think the main goal of the LHC is to find that elusive Higg's Boson. if that is found, Inflation Theory takes another step to being the theory that describes our Universe's evolution best.

Kevin

ZorbaTehZ

What about the alignment of Venus and Jupiter? Surely you can't disregard how significant that is in determining the outcome of the experiment.

Kevster

Are you talking to me, ZorbaTehZ? I had never heard of this Venus-Jupiter experiment previously. What does it aim to prove/disprove?

Professor_Fink

twasantis wrote: »

proof please :P

Cosmic rays constantly bombard the earth and every other body in the universe. These have energy scales much higher than what the LHC will be capable of. The universe has is constantly performing LHC type experiments (the figure I have seen quoted is 10^31 LHC lifetime runs) without any noticable effect. The fact that we are still here is proof enough that the LHC poses no quantifiable risk.

twasantis

moggins7 wrote: »

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/06/080627175348.htm

don't be so stupid.. sorry if i cause any offence but honestly do you have no faith in physicists, i mean this is the place that brought you the internet afterall:rolleyes::rolleyes:

dunno why i am even replying to this.... but i was not serious....i was kinda havin a dig at the op itself...

twasantis

Professor_Fink wrote: »

Cosmic rays constantly bombard the earth and every other body in the universe. These have energy scales much higher than what the LHC will be capable of. The universe has is constantly performing LHC type experiments (the figure I have seen quoted is 10^31 LHC lifetime runs) without any noticable effect. The fact that we are still here is proof enough that the LHC poses no quantifiable risk.

as above...surely the :P:P:P:P's give it away..no???
and is it not the obvious sarcastic answer???

i like most people feel it is a ridiculous question,but people will keep asking until they a see it proven otherwise...

i am sceptical of using universal enery scales as an example here
but i am curious about the 10^31 figure u quote..any chance of a link??

Professor_Fink

twasantis wrote: »

as above...surely the :P:P:P:P's give it away..no???
and is it not the obvious sarcastic answer???

Ok, you used the smiley, but generally it is impossible to tell whether someone is being sarcastic in a comment, as they don't use any of the normal indicators (body language, tone of voice, etc.) that distinguish sarcasm from other comments.

twasantis wrote: »

i am sceptical of using universal enery scales as an example here
but i am curious about the 10^31 figure u quote..any chance of a link??

The LHC safety assessment group's report (http://lsag.web.cern.ch/lsag/LSAG-Report.pdf), bottom of page 6.

breadmonkey

ZorbaTehZ wrote: »

What about the alignment of Venus and Jupiter? Surely you can't disregard how significant that is in determining the outcome of the experiment.

Post of the year imo:rolleyes:

koolkakool

barnicles wrote: »

Quick ? - Can the LHC end the world

you might find this interesting

Professor_Fink

koolkakool wrote: »

you might find this interesting

NOOOOoooooooo......

Not those crackpots. I'm not quite sure what's with this notion that crazy people know how to do theoretical physics better that the entire theoretical physics community.

Podge_irl

Professor_Fink wrote: »

NOOOOoooooooo......

Not those crackpots. I'm not quite sure what's with this notion that crazy people know how to do theoretical physics better that the entire theoretical physics community.

Because clearly we go through years and years and study just for fun. Once we actually get into proper research we abandon all the maths we've spent years learning and that has been refined over centuries and we all just sit around and think of what sounds kinda cool and go with that. Its basically all one big giant conspiracy and I've decided now is the time to reveal the truth.

nesf

Professor_Fink wrote: »

Not those crackpots. I'm not quite sure what's with this notion that crazy people know how to do theoretical physics better that the entire theoretical physics community.

Well, the pinnacle of theoretical science was reached with the Timecube. Since then it's been all downhill.

Professor_Fink

nesf wrote: »

Well, the pinnacle of theoretical science was reached with the Timecube. Since then it's been all downhill.

Sure, but Steorn do a better job of playing the media.

twasantis

Professor_Fink wrote: »

NOOOOoooooooo......

Not those crackpots. I'm not quite sure what's with this notion that crazy people know how to do theoretical physics better that the entire theoretical physics community.

firstly i want to say i have the utmost respect for your opinions and have no wish to enter into a debate on this with you (cuz i wud LOOSE)

but surely alot of this THEORY is been sold as fact in the case of the LHC..

so i am curios to know:

is there any part of u at all believes this experiment could be a complete disaster??

if yes...what??

i dont intend to come across as some conspiracy theorist or to sound like i have a negative attitude towards this experiment....i am not and dont.

i remember Al GORE one time quoting a statement from a guy one time which said :
"its not what we dont know that gets us in trouble,but,what we know for fact that just aint true that does"

that quote comes to mind to me on this subject..

godspenis

heres what a celebrity has to say bout all this.

http://michaelianblack.typepad.com/blog/2008/06/disappointing-n.html

Professor_Fink

twasantis wrote: »

firstly i want to say i have the utmost respect for your opinions and have no wish to enter into a debate on this with you (cuz i wud LOOSE)

Cheers! Don't worry, I don't mind chatting about these things. I do get a little upset when people imply physicists (or me in particular) are idiots, but I don't think that is what you are trying to do.

twasantis wrote: »

but surely alot of this THEORY is been sold as fact in the case of the LHC..

Ah, well this might be down to a misunderstanding by what scientists mean by the word theory. We use the word hypothesis to mean what other people may call a "theory" (i.e. an idea or conjecture). Scientists, and physicists in particular, use the word theory as the highest level of acceptance any piece of work can have. In this sense 'theory' basically means fact. No science can prove something absolutely, since at a fundamental level it assumes that the universe follows a fixed set of laws. If this assumption in false, then all of science collapses. On the other hand it is pretty clear that there are fixed laws, whether we know them or not, and so we use 'theory' to mean as close as science can get to a fact.

twasantis wrote: »

so i am curios to know:

is there any part of u at all believes this experiment could be a complete disaster??

if yes...what??

Well, I guess the equipment could break in some unrepairable way before any useful results are obtained, but I suspect this is not what you mean.

I do not believe that there is any real possibility of the LHC posing a risk to us.

twasantis wrote: »

i dont intend to come across as some conspiracy theorist or to sound like i have a negative attitude towards this experiment....i am not and dont.

Don't worry. The problem is that there are a lot of cranks passing off what they say as fact, and it can be hard to distinguish fact from fiction if you are not already familiar with the physics.

The only thing I would say is to check out things you do hear before passing them on as fact (everyone is guilty of this from time to time).

twasantis wrote: »

i remember Al GORE one time quoting a statement from a guy one time which said :
"its not what we dont know that gets us in trouble,but,what we know for fact that just aint true that does"

that quote comes to mind to me on this subject..

Fortunately physics is a little more black and white than most human issues, and we test our assumptions all the time.

koolkakool

ok.im not saying im against the lhc or anything.but isnt the idea to find out what will happen by starting the lhc and observing.so by doing it, they dont really know what will happen, so isnt it unpredictable.they cant really know if anything will go wrong because nothing this powerful has ever been done before, can they? just curious and as i said im all for the lhc...

Spear

koolkakool wrote: »

ok.im not saying im against the lhc or anything.but isnt the idea to find out what will happen by starting the lhc and observing.so by doing it, they dont really know what will happen, so isnt it unpredictable.they cant really know if anything will go wrong because nothing this powerful has ever been done before, can they? just curious and as i said im all for the lhc...

There is such a thing as theoretical physics, rather than experimental physics.

Professor_Fink

They don't know what particles they will see formed by the collisions, or the branching fractions for decays, but the do know some of the things they won't see. As I've mentioned before, Earth, the sun and eveny other body in the universe is being constantly bombarded by cosmic rays which essentially mirror what the LHC is doing. We usually can't detect the particles that are created by these cosmic ray interactions but its pretty clear that they aren't creating black holes which swallow up planets. Basically, nothing noticable happens on a macroscopic scale, and the same will be true of the LHC.

Crazy Ivan

Indeed a lot of cosmic rays have higher energies than the LHC can provide, and they constantly shower onto the Earth at incredible rates. No ill-effects worth mentioning there.

The reason the LHC is important is that we can control the experiment, knowing the initial energy very precisely as well as having all the timing information etc etc. We just don't have this level of control with cosmic rays.

Mr Benevolent

Won't theoretical physicists cease to exist the moment the LHC is turned on?

Crazy Ivan

<mumbles>... carry the 2...<\mumbles>

If my calculations are correct, they'll evaporate! :eek:

Professor_Fink

Confab wrote: »

Won't theoretical physicists cease to exist the moment the LHC is turned on?

No. First of all theoretical physics is a vast area with theoretical particle physics only taking up a small area. Secondly, the LHC will help us confirm or overturn the standard model within a certain energy range. It won't give us any information about what lies beyond. The results from the LHC will give theoretical particle physicists a lot to work on as the data isn't easily interpretted and may violate our current models. It is highly unlikely that we will learn anything about quantum gravity via the LHC. It's a really neat experiment which should help us learn a lot about particle physics, but is most certainly not the end of theoretical physics.

r3nu4l

Podge_irl wrote: »

Because clearly we go through years and years and study just for fun. Once we actually get into proper research we abandon all the maths we've spent years learning and that has been refined over centuries and we all just sit around and think of what sounds kinda cool and go with that. Its basically all one big giant conspiracy and I've decided now is the time to reveal the truth.

Great post

I wouldn't worry too much about the possibility of ending our universe. They used to think that if another universe were to come into existence, ours would be engulfed and destroyed. Now some physicists think that there are new universes being created all the time and that many of these grow, expand massively, go through aging and death...all in the space of our time that it takes us to blink an eye. A whole Universe could be born, age and die in your living room and you might never know (in theory).

Maybe our own universe is actually just something that was created for a nanosecond in some LHC in another universe...now I feel all small and insignificant

:pac:

lisbon_lions

This brief explanatory submission should put your mind at rest:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j50ZssEojtM

ZorbaTehZ

A Boston Globe piece on the LHC with 27 large photos of the accelerator et al. Amazing stuff.