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Atom Smasher - Black Hole???

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Ara-anna
Post subject: Atom Smasher - Black Hole???
Posted: Tue 09 Sep , 2008 5:31 pm
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It has been called an Alice in Wonderland investigation into the makeup of the universe - or dangerous tampering with nature that could spell doomsday.

Whatever the case, the most powerful atom-smasher ever built comes online Wednesday, eagerly anticipated by scientists worldwide who have awaited this moment for two decades.

The multibillion-dollar Large Hadron Collider will explore the tiniest particles and come ever closer to re-enacting the big bang, the theory that a colossal explosion created the universe.

The machine at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, promises scientists a closer look at the makeup of matter, filling in gaps in knowledge or possibly reshaping theories.

The first beams of protons will be fired around the 17-mile tunnel to test the controlling strength of the world's largest superconducting magnets. It will still be about a month before beams traveling in opposite directions are brought together in collisions that some skeptics fear could create micro "black holes" and endanger the planet.

The project has attracted researchers of 80 nationalities, some 1,200 of them from the United States, which contributed $531 million of the project's price tag of nearly $4 billion.

"This only happens once a generation," said Katie Yurkewicz, spokeswoman for the U.S. contingent at the CERN project. "People are certainly very excited."

The collider at Fermilab outside Chicago could beat CERN to some discoveries, but the Geneva equipment, generating seven times more energy than Fermilab, will give it big advantages.

The CERN collider is designed to push the proton beam close to the speed of light, whizzing 11,000 times a second around the tunnel 150 to 500 feet under the bucolic countryside on the French-Swiss border.

Once the beam is successfully fired counterclockwise, a clockwise test will follow. Then the scientists will aim the beams at each other so that protons collide, shattering into fragments and releasing energy under the gaze of detectors filling cathedral-sized caverns at points along the tunnel.

CERN dismisses the risk of micro black holes, subatomic versions of collapsed stars whose gravity is so strong they can suck in planets and other stars.

But the skeptics have filed suit in U.S. District Court in Hawaii and in the European Court of Human Rights to stop the project. They unsuccessfully mounted a similar action in 1999 to block the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York state.

Link for the rest
http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_worl ... _set_.html


Either way, here comes an adventure Mr. Baggins.

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Axordil
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Posted: Tue 09 Sep , 2008 6:33 pm
Not so deep as a well
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Time to break open that vintage port! :D

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LalaithUrwen
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Posted: Tue 09 Sep , 2008 8:00 pm
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It's really been nice knowing you all. :cheers:

(I've been following this story; it's fascinating.)


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*E*V*E*N*S*T*A*R*
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Posted: Tue 09 Sep , 2008 10:55 pm
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Oh, I had to stop reading about it. Makes my imagination go to a bad place. :P

Hopefully Sarah Connor will get there in time!




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The Watcher
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Posted: Tue 09 Sep , 2008 11:37 pm
Same as it ever was
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Hey, wait a second - the Mayan calender says we have until December, 2012.

:D

I agree, this is fascinating, I hope that they really do learn some things about the amazing world of subatomic physics.


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Dawnnamira
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 4:38 am
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You know, I'd be perfectly happy if the world ended tomorrow.

:scratch:

Anyway, I've been waiting for the LHC to start so we can learn! Particle physics is fun.


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jewelsong
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 4:43 am
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Great little youtube rap about the Hadron:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j50ZssEojtM


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Ara-anna
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 3:51 pm
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Well I'm here. Where are the rest of you?


Now on to the other side of the photon smashing experiment.

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*E*V*E*N*S*T*A*R*
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 3:59 pm
I've cried a thousand oceans, and I would cry a thousand more if that's what it takes to sail you home.
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Dance party. Population: me!

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Dawnnamira wrote:
You know, I'd be perfectly happy if the world ended tomorrow.
Not me, too much left to do.




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Jude
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 4:09 pm
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Maybe we're all in the black hole and don't know it? :D

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Nienor SharkAttack
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 4:18 pm
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Well, I read somewhere that if a black hole actually developed because of this experiment, it would take 15 months for it to grow big enough to swallow the earth. So there's still a chance we're all doomed. :D

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Ara-anna
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 4:23 pm
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I'm gonna party like it's 2009.

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PrinceAlarming
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 5:20 pm
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Didn't Adam and Even get kicked out of Eden for eating from the tree of knowledge?

We know too much already.

Truthfully, I think this is all wicked freakin' cool, and hope that something interesting happens.

Maybe we'll get some type of tear in the space-time continuum and beings from another dimension will come out... Ever play that computer game, Half Life?

Maybe highly intelligent extraterrestrials are waiting to introduce themselves using this discovery as some type of litmus test for our intellectual readiness...

I can't wait for the results...

Imagine the parties that would ensue if a slow growing irreversible black hole is produced. We may just have world peace for 15 months!


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Cenedril_Gildinaur
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 5:24 pm
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We know too much?

Yes, Adam and Eve, and also Pandora, are all religious cautions against knowledge. The one thing Jesus wasn't tempted by when he was in the desert for 40 days was knowledge.

I've great sympathy for Pandora.

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jewelsong
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 5:24 pm
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I hope you've all seen this:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j50ZssEojtM

Heh...great little rap and educational, too!

(One of my students pointed out that the voice in the beginning is Stephen Hawking's voice synthesizer! How cool is that?)

PS: C_G, did you even read the rest of PrinceA's post? He was obviously being facetious. Geeze, lighten up, man....


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*E*V*E*N*S*T*A*R*
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 5:27 pm
I've cried a thousand oceans, and I would cry a thousand more if that's what it takes to sail you home.
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PrinceAlarming wrote:
Maybe we'll get some type of tear in the space-time continuum and beings from another dimension will come out... Ever play that computer game, Half Life?
No, but I've seen a film called The Mist.

...

Hm.

*grabs can of Thomas Jane repellent*



EDIT:
Cenedril_Gildinaur wrote:
The one thing Jesus wasn't tempted by when he was in the desert for 40 days was knowledge.
I thought that was Moses? EDIT: wait, he was out there for forty years. I am new to the bibble, sorry. :P




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Jude
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 5:32 pm
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No, Moses spent 40 years. :D

Edit: you're too fast for me! :P

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*E*V*E*N*S*T*A*R*
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Posted: Wed 10 Sep , 2008 5:45 pm
I've cried a thousand oceans, and I would cry a thousand more if that's what it takes to sail you home.
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What a feat, considering how slow I really am. ;)

Time to read some wikipedia, it seems...




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*E*V*E*N*S*T*A*R*
Post subject: Re: Atom Smasher - Black Hole???
Posted: Sun 14 Sep , 2008 3:58 pm
I've cried a thousand oceans, and I would cry a thousand more if that's what it takes to sail you home.
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[NOTE: roughly a page and a half went missing in the move to our new board77.org site, so I'm pasting the text from those posts.]




TheEllipticalDisillusion Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 1:17 pm
I think this is going to hasten the zombie apocalypse that is bound to be the end of us all. But a zombie apocalypse should bring world peace or at least a military dictatorship inside safe zones. Then one person is going to get curious and fuck it up for the rest of us.

Pandora's box and Adam & Eve are just stories to scare kids like the FISA Act and PATRIOT Act. We must drink of the fruitful particle nectar that lies beyond this dimension.

I read that any black hole that develops would be too tiny and would pass through Earth unnoticed, and any serious black hole would take centuries (or decades, I forget) to develop. Margin for error?

LalaithUrwen Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 1:42 pm
BTW, the zombies are headquartered in Disney World, if you're wondering.

So, yovi, it's been nice knowing you! :kiss:

Axordil Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 1:44 pm
Actually, yovargas will be the hero of the next big FPS: ZOMBIE THEME PARK MASSACRE!

Ara-anna Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 1:45 pm
my atoms feel uokie

LalaithUrwen Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 1:47 pm
:LMAO:

Lidless Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 2:58 pm
I thought they preferred to be called African-American holes these days.

*E*V*E*N*S*T*A*R* Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:01 pm
So did I.

PrinceAlarming Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:02 pm
Yes, I think I might enjoy some quantum ambrosia...

I thought zombies were MTV faithfuls... Man, Disney World must have changed since I last went.

TED, I think I am that curious person you speak of.

Hey, even if we are swallowed by a black hole in hours, because someone forgot to carry the 1 or convert to the metric system, that is one hell of a way to go.

Way better than some atomic apocalypse.

Ara-anna Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:02 pm
:Q

PrinceAlarming Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 3:18 pm
What? Would you prefer nuclear winter?

Ara-anna Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 4:24 pm
Channels Bob Pinciotti
Ah Geeze

TheEllipticalDisillusion Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 5:13 pm
Prince, is there anything that I can do to stop you now? The last 8 years taught me something very important: if there is a perceived threat, or even imagined threat regardless of imminence of said threat, it must be stopped waaaay ahead of time. You know, maybe the war in Iraq was actually to stop the same events that happened in the game Doom, but we don't know it yet!

Cenedril_Gildinaur Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 5:35 pm
pretty cool webcam they set up so we can keep an eye on progress

http://www.cyriak.co.uk/lhc/lhc-webcams.html

Nin Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 6:19 pm
Folks, this is happening in my city, in Geneva.

Bow before me I am the Godess who will stop the world.

(Newpapers were full here... the boys even took them to school and my students asked me for a party.)

elfshadow Posted: Thu Sep 11, 2008 6:25 pm
Don't worry, guys, we have until 2012. It's science.

ToshoftheWuffingas Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 5:55 am
What I am unclear about is if this astonishing apparatus is not much more than a one-experiment project? I mean can they keep on doing the collisions indefinitely and come up with new facts?

Axordil Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 11:40 am
They can vary the experiments by varying the energy of the collisions, the target, et al. There are a range of different detectors they can put in place as well. I would say they are limited to one family of experiments, which is kind of where the physical sciences are at this point in terms of experimentation structure. We may well have reached a point of diminishing returns: if things like the Higgs don't show at this energy level, the protons are back in the theoretical physicist court.

Ara-anna Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 11:48 am
Axordil wrote:
They can vary the experiments by varying the energy of the collisions, the target, et al. There are a range of different detectors they can put in place as well. I would say they are limited to one family of experiments, which is kind of where the physical sciences are at this point in terms of experimentation structure. We may well have reached a point of diminishing returns: if things like the Higgs don't show at this energy level, the protons are back in the theoretical physicist court.
So are you saying we humans have peter principled out on the science front, if this doesn't work?

Axordil Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 12:07 pm
It's a money vs. energy question: the cost per additional electron volt goes up very steeply at these energy levels.

ToshoftheWuffingas Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 12:27 pm
Quote:
Folks, this is happening in my city, in Geneva.

Bow before me I am the Godess who will stop the world.

(Newpapers were full here... the boys even took them to school and my students asked me for a party.)
I knew it. Nin is Galadriel and has claimed the Ring. We're stuffed girls and boys!

Jude Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 12:34 pm
But she's beautiful, not dark!

*loves her and despairs*

ToshoftheWuffingas Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 12:41 pm
Now will she give me three golden hairs?

Alatar Posted: Fri Sep 12, 2008 12:43 pm
*loved her and despaired before Jude did*

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Riverthalos
Post subject: Re: Atom Smasher - Black Hole???
Posted: Sun 14 Sep , 2008 4:21 pm
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And here I thought the Ring of Power would be, like wearable. :damnfunny:

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