September 13, 2010 weblog
LHC lawsuit case dismissed by US court
Walter Wagner, a retired nuclear safety officer, along with Spanish journalist Luis Sancho, filed the lawsuit in March 2008 before the LHC was turned on. The LHC, located on the border between France and Switzerland, was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN). As a collaboration among thousands of scientists from more than 100 countries, the LHC is the largest and most powerful particle accelerator in the world. After an electrical fault initially shut down the collider when it was first turned on in September 2008, it has been operating successfully since November 2009.
The LHC was designed to investigate many exotic areas of science, such as supersymmetry, extra dimensions, and dark matter. Wagner filed the lawsuit due to his concern that the LHC would produce black holes or a strange form of matter that could destroy the Earth. While he attempted to stop the LHC before it began operating, the US court originally dismissed the suit in 2008 on the grounds that the court had no jurisdiction over the LHC operations.
But Wagner appealed the case, and now, for the second time, the court has dismissed the lawsuit for similar reasons. The judge noted that the LHC is owned, managed, and controlled by CERN, not the US. "The US government enjoys only observer status on the CERN council, and has no control over CERN or its operations," the judge wrote in the final decision. "Accordingly, the alleged injury, destruction of the Earth, is in no way attributable to the US government's failure to draft an environmental impact statement."
Even if the US court could have an impact on LHC operations, the judge also concluded that Wagner did not demonstrate sufficient standing in the court for the case to proceed. "At most, Wagner has alleged that experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (the 'Collider') have 'potential adverse consequences.' Speculative fear of future harm does not constitute an injury in fact sufficient to confer standing."
Wagner told Cosmic Log, a science blog at MSNBC, that he plans to seek a review of the court's ruling, since the law allows review requests to be filed up to 45 days after the August 24 ruling.
CERN plans to continue operating the LHC through 2011 at half-power, or 3.5 trillion electron volts. Then, after one year of scheduled maintenance, the power will be increased to the maximum 7 trillion electron volts in December 2012.
The full (five-paragraph) court ruling is available here.
Meanwhile, a monitoring system that provides real-time updates on the LHC's potential for destruction is available at www.hasthelargehadroncolliderdestroyedtheworldyet.com.
Explore further
-- A Lawyer's View of the Risk of Black Hole Catastrophe at the LHC, PhysOrg.com, January 22, 2010.
© 2010 PhysOrg.com
User comments
Probably won't help much...
CERN's LHC safety report, touted in a prior comment, is a self-serving whitewash that has been shown to be badly flawed. See the critique by physicist Rainer Plaga, Ph.D., at http://arxiv.org/...8.1415v3 . A rebuttal of CERN's arguments by the co-plaintiff is at: http://www.cerntruth.com/?p=6 and an extensive report, "Critical Revision of LHC Risks," is available at http://lhc-concer...ge_id=91 .
Boy is my face red!...
up a normal nucleus, which is of the order of one to a few million electron
volts. Similar energies would be reached in a heat bath with a temperature of
ten to several tens of billions of degrees Celsius. However, heavy-ion
collisions are known to produce heat baths that are far hotter, reaching
temperatures exceeding 1 trillion degrees Celsius [3]. Basic thermodynamics
would require most strangelets to melt in such a heat bath, i.e., dissociate into
the known strange particles that decay within a nanosecond. For this reason,
the likelihood of strangelet production in relativistic heavy-ion collisions can
be compared to the likelihood of producing an icecube in a furnace."
--- LHC Safety Assessment Group
When my calendar ends on Dec 31st 2010, I'll buy a new calendar, have a few drinks, maybe host a party....
I won't be anticipating the end of the world.
Then why did they bother building the thing if they are capable of having all the answers a head of time.
[This question is posed as the devil's advocate's retarded nephew, and is in jest]
Most of the LHC ring is colder than outer space. The high heat in energetic lead collisions is expected to deconfine quarks, which then may reassemble into exotic particles. CERN's own statement about ALICE acknowledges this: "The ALICE colaboration plans to study the quark-gluon plasma [resulting from high heat] as it expands and cools, observing how it progressively gives rise to particles..."
Technically true, but also (seemingly intentionally) misleading. RHIC is producing strange quarks, but you say they cant produce enough of them to make strangelets however, LHC with its increased power will make more and destroy the earth. Unfortunately, quantity of strange quarks is not the limiting factor in stable strangelet production; time and temperature are the limiting factors. The strange quarks have less then 1 nano second to form a strangelet, but cannot due so until their temperature has fallen to an acceptable range. The higher energies of LHC will therefore make it less likely that LHC produce strangelets then RHIC.
I feel threatened by punctuation
Strangeness distillation has been proposed specifically as a mechanism for strangelet production. This mechanism assumes that a baryon-rich quark-gluon plasma is produced in a heavy-ion collision, which cools by evaporation from its surface. Due to the large baryon chemical potential in this plasma, an ¯s quark would be more likely to pair with an u or d quark, than an s quark with an ¯u or ¯ d. As a consequence, the cooling of the plasma would lead to an excess of s quarks in a baryon-rich lump, which may finally become a strangelet. We note that this production process would be more likely for large baryon chemical potential, and thus would be less likely for heavy-ion collisions at the LHC than at lower center-of-mass energies."
--- LHC Safety Assessment Group; Strangelet Addendum
--- LHC Safety Assessment Group; Strangelet Addendum
Plainly said: if the LHC is going to destroy the planet, stangelets will not be the destructive mechanism. I would be more worried about more conventional threats like governments appropriating stored anti-mater for weapon programs. (although the LHC would have to run for centuries to produce enough anti-mater to blow up anything substantial)
Hilarious stuff. 'they have been testing with protons, but now they are going to start using HADRONS! OH NOES!' protons ARE hadrons. really guys if you want a laugh go check out his website. It is so chalk full of logical fallacies that it will make your head spin.
All your unproven confidence that nothing will go wrong, when no one really knows what will result, has already been shown to be too optimistic when it comes to the ordinary material design of the collider, let alone its potential effects. The darn thing fell apart when cranked up for the first time.
Clearly there are many acts of cover up going on at CERN to shield the magnificent operation from public gaze and the doubts of its critics, to to mention ad hominem attacks on the critics (always a very bad sign) rather than what they theorize.
The confident assertions of supporters of CERN that there is nothing to worry about are thus plain silly, given all these retractions, not to mention the ongoing retractions of safety arguments over more than a decade and their replacement with others, presumably likely to be retracted as well, once we know more.
Let's face it the only good theory about the LHC is Eric Johnson's conclusion after writing his long history of the affair, which everybody here should read before arguing further.
It is the theory that experts especially of the small boy type that make up CERN should undergo outside review before being allowed to open their box of matches and set the curtain alight to see what happens.
If I may be allowed to say so, perhaps the reason people don't subscribe to it here is that they have no children.
I wonder how many posting here are bona fide parents?
There are also a number of strange particles commonly referred to as 'strangelets' but are incapable of the ICE-9 conversion. These have energies higher than their non-strange counterparts and as such are entirely benign.
Do you realize you're asking this question of a person who willingly named themself "BozoChavez"?
That's another debatable issue, involving several factors, such as charge and stability. The 2008 LSAG report retreated from the 2003 safety report by conceding that negative strangelets such as could accrete matter were possible, citing a 2007 study from China. The latest study from the same Chinese physicists concludes, "With the present knowledge, strange quark matter and strangelets are metastable or absolutely stable for some parameters in the reasonable range..." (X.J. Wen et al., J. Phys. G. 2009; 36: 025011),
The last line of the article is a schoolboy jape of a level of facetiousness that betrays the utter lack of seriousness of this and all other journalists on this issue.
What is needed is for any reporters and editors dealing with this topic to read at least Eric Johnson's essay and stop transcribing CERN's pr as if they were stenographers.
Would you at least agree with that?
First off it's out of context. The true context of that passage refers to their stability in a mathematical model, not in what LHC will be capable of producing. We all know that stable strangelets are bad. No one here is suicidal. The question being debated is whether LHC has the ability to destroy the world, NOT whether strangelets are theoretically possible.
I would argue that if you truly hold this opinion, you may already be beyond help. They are human beings. They have families. Many of them (despite the media's projections) have a strong religious faith. They're pay is ridiculously tiny compared to doctors in other fields. They are just like you and I, except their life's training has been in physics and mathematics.
Serious challenges have been brought regarding the safety of the LHC, and the physicists have dealt with those challenges scientifically. They are NOT blind to the concerns raised by Wagner and Sancho. Are the then, intentionally misleading us? Maybe they have an escape plan so they can watch the destruction from space? No seriously, explain to me their motivation for deceiving us.
You have really showed us your ignorance on this topic now. I haven't APPARENTLY conceded it, I EXPLICITLY conceded it. All those things, which i mentioned have already been produced in other colliders. All of them. The only thing not produced was a strangelet with the properties to destroy normal matter. And as i just mentioned above, LHC will produce an environment more hostile to their production then any of the other colliders. If you want to dispute this claim, please do.
Particle physicists of CERN are human and thus prone to bias and belief in whatever serves their personal interests. The LSAG report was written by CERN employees and chaired by a longtime LHC advocate (Ellis). Independent multidisciplinary review is needed.
The quoted Chinese conclusion about strangelet stability was relevant to the LHC. It was preceded by: "These parameters may be further constrained from future heavy-ion collision experiments and/or astronomical observations."
Again, the Chinese conclusion is one based in a theoretical model. All it states is that given the right conditions strangelets can form and be stable. NOT that LHC will produce them, or their necessary conditions.
CERN is acting off the leash and you haven't yet justified this public irresponsibility which arrogates the risktaking involved, which is clearly some risk of sending us all down the plughole in one way or another. However small the risk (and there is no way of estimating a risk if the expected result is unknown) the consequence of failure are so dire that we must take it into account, don't you see? This is risk evaluation 101, Brestel.
Do you have anything to add to why LHC will be conducive to strangelet production in a way that RHIC is not? I grind on it, because no one seems to be able to form an actual argument against it, and its a damn strong argument.
"off the leash"? "public irresponsibility"? those are the claims that have no backing. You tell me how LHC is taking a greater risk then what RHIC is doing today, and then we can talk about irresponsibility.
Not a good recommendation for a realistic physicist, by the way.
Why? is it easier to demonize them if you think they are all atheists? You're the one making the infinite harm risk reduction analysis, so i assume you have a very strong faith yourself. Without it your soul has a small chance of being eternally punished.
You dont seem to understand the simplest principle - that physicists are human, and thus typically subject to group psychology. We all are, if we don't take special measures to correct our course.
The important point is simple. CERN is evading public review of a risk it is taking on all our behalf. All 6 billion of us.
Saying RHIC is also risky is hardly an answer to the problem. We need proper review by outsiders in public. Why argue against this? Are you fearful of the result? Fair enough, but it still should be done.
You are absolutely right - it is a huge problem. So? Why do you project a separate view on someone who professes one view?
Keep to the issue.
However much we as physicists (or physicists manque) love exploring the physical unknown we have to review the process of escalating collider power at some point, and early is better.
How? How have they evaded public review?
I have never said that the public does not deserve straight forward answers. 1 i think CERN has done that. 2 You have failed to refute any of the major claims of safety that CERN has put forward. All you have done is claim them to flimsy. HOW ARE THEY FLIMSY? all you do is assert danger at every step and refuse to actually make any stand. I am done with this. You have one last chance to make a serious attempt to actually refute something before i simply label you a troll and go do something else.
How is LHC any more dangerous then RHIC? It IS an important question because RHIC hasnt destroyed the earth. I have made solid arguments to the fact that LHC is actually LESS dangerous then RHIC, and all you have done is... is.... NOTHING! Bring something to the table or go home.
Wow your ignorance is staggering. Put down the Dawkins book and come back to reality.
Ah, ok so you were referring to the blind Acadian. Good obscure reference, however, why do you think the conspiracy theory of 2012 is worth any of your time?
From Wikipedia: Mad Scientist:
...Mad scientists also, whilst definitely being intelligent, if not necessarily brilliant, usually fail to think things through to their conclusion...
Some excerpts from the LSAG (CERN safety committee) summary report:...So just what do they think stable neutral black holes, which remain on Earth, might do next?
You're right, it's not worth the energy. These morons don't have the courage of their convictions. But you should know that your efforts are not unappreciated by others, especially those who have engaged these idiots on this topic in the past.
European physicists, one of whom is the director of the CASTOR detector at the LHC, have published several papers on the possible production of strangelets in the heavy ion experiments at LHC. They point out that strangelets might form as decay products from Centauro-type fireballs at the LHC - a mechanism not mentioned in the LSAG safety report. See their paper, "Model of Centauro and strangelet production in heavy ion collisions" at: http://arxiv.org/.../0301003
All heavy ion collisions at the LHC and RHIC should be forbidden as a potential peril to the planet, especially in light of the new Chinese reports.
Perhaps you think we should stop prosecuting rapists because of all the drug dealers?
No, because we actually do prosecute drug dealers.
My question is how much damage to the beam line from debris is the machine able to safely accomodate?
Time constraints.
And, nuclear weapons aren't an active threat, but rather are a static threat (lower priority).
Nuclear weapons are one of the largest most pressing threats we face today, primarily because they're entirely preventable.
The issue is immediate and involves infinitely dire consequences so even the smallest risk should be reviewed by competent and wiser outside reviewers. Apparently you are not part of science yourself or you would be aware that all science is reviewed before publication in good journals, with the exception of the few journals which exist to counter the influence of peer reviewers who defend the status quo for spurious personal reasons.
What if this scenario:-
The beam line corrodes beyond the estimate
A beam dump puts the energy at point distance
A water source lake or aquifer target goes plasma
Fusion occurs and the load nuclear fuel is vast
Geneva and the LHC go bang
(naturally every tinpot will want one then)
Geneva and the LHC burn like a star
(new physics and uncertainty)
Carbon nitrogen triple bonded compounds pollute the world (glucose can offset the long term effects which include paralysis)
The world is shaken and the oceans wash the shores
EM pulse blinds the nuclear powers.
The end of science. Hmm is that good?
Well then, you worry about them.
As for me, they are a lower priority. Although dangerous, they generally don't represent a threat of extinction... for the entire world.
A strangelet disaster or black hole disaster at the LHC, however, has the potential of killing all 6.8 billion people (1000 times the Holocaust) and destroying the Earth itself. Therefore, the LHC is a far greater menace than nuclear weapons.
Besides, countries need nuclear weapons to defend themselves against other countries that have nuclear weapons.
Everyone can identify a mushroom cloud and fears seeing one. Very few people understand that a mushroom cloud anywhere in the world affects everyone on the planet.
Hiroshima/Nagasaki demonstrated to all the non-nuclear powers just what those who possessed these weapons were capable of. This, it can be argued, was viable deterrence.
Your comment about nukes being 'entirely preventable' is a little puzzling. Uranium is readily available and the dissemination of tech and knowledge on how to build a bomb is inevitable. The only way to prevent proliferation is war. Iran can support itself while remaining totally isolated, and still build many bombs.
Just for the record, many munitions such as barometric bombs will produce mushroom clouds, as well as industrial accidents of sufficient magnitude.
A simple question I have put to "Ask the Physicist" is where is the proton. To me it seems logical that the start and finish point for a proton fired at a target is to start and be retained by the accelerator. Seems illogical but quantum strangeness allows for certain conditions such as transfer of information. A simple count of target impacts and percentage count of contained particles would give an answer.
Certainly anyone could give what they think is the logical answer but the question is has the test count actually been done.
I am sorry that the focus is just on the large accelerator when it is possible that our knowledge may not be complete enough to go that far. How much is too fast, too much and too far in advance of what we should still be looking for.
The problem is not enough answers.
CERN has been completely unresponsive to criticism on the level of scientific argument for a year and a half, with scientists peddling outdated safety rationales in public and evasion being the strategy of pr. The public safety report at http://public.web...-en.html is blatantly out of date, still quoting the drivel about cosmic rays which Martin Rees exploded in 2003, error acknowledged by CERN in its safety report to scientists in 2008.
The big problem is that the outcome is unknown, which makes it difficult to work out safety measures anyway other than ratchet up slowly, which the LHC has been doing. What is needed is some means of detecting mBHs. Maybe one has drifted down to the center of the Earth and is slowly supping on our only home in the universe as we speak. We will know in a few years.
It is important to know how to guard against Mother Nature swallowing us whole.
"Strangelet production at the LHC is therefore less likely than at RHIC, and experience there has already validated the arguments that strangelets cannot be produced."
Presumably they gave the job to some attractively ectomorphic intern. Enough said: scienceguardian.com should do another of its expert updates before ALICE ups the ante.
Classic. History tells us that fear of the unknown was allways prominent in human minds. Abused countless of times by introduction of the "unknowable", with the aim to gain almost absolute control and power over the unknowing. People are affraid of various creatures or entities, while the only "proof" they have about their existence are tell-tales.
Why am I mentioning this? Because the principle behind the fear of LHC is the same. Mass hysteria triggered mostly by made-up tales about evil strangeletz and super-evil BH's eating up the Earth if we dare to eat the "apples from the Tree of Knowledge!" (©Jigga) :)
No scientific facts, just fantasy..
They issue retractions. They correct their errors. When your point of view is sufficiently discredited, do you do the same?
(Hint: your posts in this thread prove the answer to be "No.")
So, scientists at CERN are too error-prone and imperfect to run or build a proper particle accelerator safely. Yet, this accelerator has the power to destroy all life in the universe. Perfectly sensible. I guess we should stop building skyscrapers and bridges... we just aren't good enough to do it right, and the risk is so great!
Want to go back to the Dark Ages? After you, please.
All stem from various speculations, unproven theories, and a bajillion of "what if this / what if that" conditions. Well, that's certainly not convincing enough for me, and all I can say is:
What if God was real? Then we better no eat fruits from the Tree of Knowledge, or we shall all burn in hell!
- If that's how your logic works - fine. But then there is hardly anything more to discuss (in a scientific context) on this topic. Really.
On the other hand, if you have any factual scientific evidence supporting your doomsday claims, then by all means, go and present it to the public, please!
I say it again, if you have any solid evidence/theory/(facts?) that backs up your claims about a doomsday caused by the LHC, then I strongly encourage you to write a paper and submit it for peer review.
If what you provide is sound and based on facts rather than pure speculation, it should generate positive feedback and you might even achieve what you so strive for..
And if not, then I suggest to try a career as a Sci-Fi writer. One can tell the basics and a talent are well present :)
Cheers.
-In order to join the galactic country club, earthers need to create their own planet-sized black hole. For transportation. And as the Terran biosphere is about trashed and the sun is warming anyway, a black hole maker is built and Plans are made to move to mars where it's cooler. A brand new city on the hill.
When Lawrence of Arabia was asked why he liked the desert he replied "Because it's clean." Mars looks very clean.
A group of scientific critics of the LHC have issued an extensive paper rebutting CERN's safety report at: http://lhc-concer...-int.pdf
My recent comments referenced published papers by European physicists, including some at CERN, that the LHC could produced strangelets, and recent studies by Chinese physicists who concluded that some strangelets could be negatively charged and "absolutely stable." There's a combination that could really ruin one's day.
Precisely. Read the links to papers provided, and you will then be qualified to comment. Hopefully with a little more appreciation of the fact that all that is being asked is an outside review of the theoretical basis for proceeding with confidence, and an assessment of what safety measures should be taken.
Completely uninformed rejection of this wise caution because you are confident of CERN expertise is uncalled for, because of their poor performance to date.
And, he specifically used the word "annihilation" which implies a broader tragedy than one death:
annihilation: 1. total destruction.
source: http://www.thefre...hilation
And, at the very least he is suicidal, which still demonstrates unreasonableness.
Really? Which ones, specifically, and how so? (I'm bettin' you won't have a concise response)
See Our Final Hour p 122 and following. He says that cosmic rays routinely crash into other atomic nuclei in space, proving there is no problem until accelerators "100x" more powerful than planned in 1983 came along. Then he notes that symmetrical collisions in the colliders would leave no net motion, so strangelets might grab ambient material, and consume the entire Earth if other assumptions are wrong. The symmetrical angle is what vitiates the arguement that the earth survives cosmic rays all the time without turning into a black hole. But you are right, he didn't specifically reject Cosmic Ray 1 himself then in his book. Just by implication. His remarks were addressed to strangelets.
However, he has kept quiet since, as a good president of the Royal Society should. But he is being replaced now, so let's see if he gets back to being a troublemaker.
Either way, he has more authority than software designers on Web threads.
It wasn't "peer review" that forced them to concede the cosmic ray argument. Sometimes, you gotta' work from the outside...
But, I'll concede that the basic physics in question are essentially there, and the complete set could've been worked out from there.
Excellent work.
Let's see... how to begin? Ah yes, here we go:
Once upon a future...
If you bunch were even remotely right with your claims, the scientific community would listen..
Ventilating your feelings on a science-news webpage won't get you anywhere. So if you really are that smart/genial as you all present yourselves, and not just a bunch of crackpots and/or religious lunatics, go and write that damn paper allready!
Until you do that, just keep barking..
..and if your papers get rejected - go figure!
Howgh :)
Oohw, you make it sound like you were alone in the middle of the ocean, sitting in a leaky rowboat, with just one paddle..
If there is a tide, then it is not as steep as you would ever imagine, it seems..
Yes but the problem is that the observations are also there. Strange quarks and strangelets should still be around, and we should be entirely composed of them unless there is an effect that prevents this from happening, or our calculations for strange matter, which are based on the errant standard model, are entirely incorrect. Beyond that, how would the weak force, responsible for flavor change in quarks, be suspended within the LHC? If anything the range of said force would be unleashed, allowing for faster decay and quicker degradation into standard and more stable quark flavors and spins.
Interesting. First you backtrack away from your previous proclamation, then you reiterate it. So essentially and again, this just serves to to show that LHC proponents really DON'T care about life!
Since you like the rest of the world including CERN have no idea what will result in ALICE and the highest energy levels of operation of the LHC, how do you work out the likelihood of what you don't foresee?
Like most of this thread written by game players and other couch potatoes you express only your subjective and therefore unpersuasive fantasies. Kindly pay attention to the points made against you and take them into account when replying, otherwise you are just playing games in the wrong arena.
As Rees noted problem with former is that such products might be stationary. With latter it's that both (check) star types are reckoned at least partly strange matter. Oops!
Heck, if I wanted to generalize and put you + all your doomsayer friends into one bag, then I possibly couldn't have written it better.. :)
------
And of course all we write is based on our subjective opinion. You not?
I speak for myself and I think for many others too when I say:
We are not like the doomsday/alarmist herd which allways needs a speaker, because the wast majority of them doesn't know enough about the subject to actually pull any meaningful argument. Most of us think for ourselves and have our opinions based on our very own knowledge, rather than on what the shepherd(s) says.
Thats the major role of the whole project - to see how the results fit with what is expected! And that nicely goes in line with what I want to say next..
Basing on theories, which were allready (at least to an acceptable extent) verified and on wast other empirical/observational evidence, we know that your doomsday claims are all bollo.. ehm, highly improbable.
Whereas almost all of the doomsday scenarios are based on theories, or "flavors" of theories, which - as of yet - have actually NO (zip/zero/nada!) observational/empirical evidence at all (ST, SST, SUSY, M-T, etc.) And multiple dimensions past the accepted standard are also unproven, so don't pull that on me..
Indeed, but so far nothing even remotely profound.. Sadly.
Without any controversy, there would be no advance at all. We would be stuck in the stone age, without fire or actually anything else than our naked selfs. So you have to take controversy as an inseparable and essential part of science. As a scientist, it is very important to believe in yourself and in what you do - but stay reasonably self-critical at the same time. Truth will allways win in the long run..
And as for the question, if you mean something strictly controversial, then the answer is clearly: No. (At least not yet ;o)
In 2008 CERN safety theorists admitted in a published technical report that the cosmic ray argument was invalid for "Earth... and ordinary stars" (p 16). The difference is admitted in CERN's public safety report (Par. 7). The argument was then shifted to dense neutron stars and white dwarfs, but these are protected by powerful magnetic fields and believed to contain strange matter, the feared fate for Earth of a strangelet disaster at the LHC.
I find the Bible quite inspirational (my opinion) and the bit about the days becoming shorter would be a guide to a problem. A singularity generates drag of space and it seems logical that 'spin' from a massive point object would translate to planetary rotation if present.
So opinion aside what is known is that science has enabled incredible accuracy of time measurement. Perhaps time is both our guide and early warning.
But those are my risks to take. Running the LHC exposes everyone to risk, generally without their consent.
Well, my problem with 2 is that the known dense matter objects (white dwarfs and neutron stars) are statistically insignificant in number as compared with bright objects in our galaxy.
I mean here we are in the third generation of stars in the oldest observable galaxy in the universe, and we find mere handfuls of these objects. They should number in the millions (locally), and therefore be relatively easy to find (even against the bright background). Where are they?
If their argument could be supported with a statistical survey of the local star clusters that reveals the expected number of dense objects after two generations of star death, then they might have an argument.
Additionally, if they could explain the apparent lack of bright objects in dark matter halos and dark matter galaxies (without surmising the dark matter somehow destroys bright objects), then they might have an argument.
Perhaps the relative few we know of, are environmentally protected.
So, supposing your claim of original thought is true, what have you brought to the argument that other proponents hadn't already discussed?
By the EPA, you mean? Agree entirely, ubavontuba. In fact let's allow fantasy to reign at last in the manner we are accused of from the stalls, or rather, by the Monty Python mob on the parapets chucking down dead cows and turnips on the brave knights assaulting the Castle of Unreason from below?
It might well be that all the missing stars are planets which built their own LHCs with dire consequences, and the eight that are left are the few where reason prevailed. In other words, they had effective EPAs, as you surmise.
http://cerncourie...rn/29199
Extra dimensions are expected/hoped for, but there's even an argument in GR that allows for black hole formation at this scale. In this case, the point of energy convergence essentially becomes a third (virtual) mass which draws the two colliding objects in the rest of the way.
And, since no theory is known to accurately predict what will happen at this scale, stating it's safe without knowing what can happen is rather presumptuous.
Would it be too much to ask of the dead cow hurling mob here to read these and other key links offered to them, rather than repeat their mantras of confidence in CERN as All Knowing Leader?
That way they would a) have some fun beyond repeating themselves ad nauseum without references and b) contribute to the discussion of holes in the doubters case, of which they have shown so far precisely none.
Come on folks, you can pause in your gaming long enough to read something, can't you?
That is precisely why caution and full assessment is required, not gay abandon and laughing jollity and jeering at the cautious as the largest physics bandwagon in history goes over the cliff without wings.
Everyone with an ounce of curiosity about the nature of the universe is fully behind this enterprise. It is just that some spare a thought for the possibility of adverse consequences, and wish to have as careful a review as possible.
We were lucky with Trinity and there may be no way to escape depending on luck again, but that dependence should be reduced as much as possible.
Judging the future by the risk free past is not a sensible option.
Above, I should have written, "It's entirely controllable." where I wrote; "It's entirely preventable."
The NY Times spoke with Dr. Pier Oddone, director of Fermilab: "The only thing physicists agree on is that they don't know what will happen...when the collisions reach the energies just after the Big Bang. 'That there are many theories means we don't have a clue,' said Oddone" (NYT, 9/10/2008).
Dr. Rolf Heuer, director of CERN, said at a press conference on 11/23/2009: "It depends how kind nature is to us. If we would know, then it would be nice but I need a crystal ball in order to predict it... but I don’t know what nature has for us." See http://www.scienc...gods.htm
Such confessions are not the confident reassurance one would wish when the planet is put at risk.
Perhaps they are acolytes of Brian Greene, who in a recent New York University seminar admitted freely he had no idea what will happen. Physics may well be quite different in the future from our current theories, he said.
It was the only one he offered while telling Times readers this was the most wonderful enterprise in science since the moon shot or whatever (paraphrasing here).
The sad truth is that Greene et al are no more than supperannuated schoolboys who feel they should be left alone to carry out the cosmic equivalent of pulling off the legs of cockroaches to see what will happen.
Sorry to say such a disrespectful thing but that is the clear impression given by Greene and the heroic rock star Brian Cox in the UK who is his counterpart.
Especially after a salmon sized misunderstanding/red herring:
{q}You are trying to exploit the inevitable inaccuracies of communication via spoken language. {/q}
CERN director Heuer's statement of bafflement to the press on 11/23/2009 was in the context of what could be expected among the early results at the LHC. He said, "I do not know what Nature has for us." The assumption that the unknown is unrelated to planetary risk is based on a fallacy: that whatever is unknown is necessarily benign.
Plausible theories, as yet unrefuted, indicate that some LHC results at some point could be highly destructive. Because such an outcome cannot presently be ruled out, the LHC is a thoroughly immoral project.
I find the aspect of 'as yet unrefuted' most interesting. The notion of a discussion on alternatives to the mainstream idea of physics is a complete nonsense. Ideas don't get a chance to be considered before being refuted.
The problem will become obvious long before scientists ever get a grasp of physics. Most obvious is what a waste of time discussions are.
@fraio Humble apologies for the false brackets in the quote tags, tho an excellent example of the mini red herring/non sequitur/distraction/irrelevancy turnips the castle defenders here like to chuck over the parapets at the Knights of Truth below. Is that all you have left, fraio? Surely not.
Because it is irresponsible regarding the interests of the rest of the planet. Do you not have a spouse, parents, siblings, sons or daughters, fraio? What it is - youth? - that makes their welfare so irrelevant to your world view as presented here? When the manure and salmonella bacteria spill out of chicken sheds in Iowa you don't wonder if Austin DeCoster has a family and neighbors? When the plastic executives defeat efforts to stop ocean pollution you don't wonder if they have daughters who ask them to stop?
We hear you, SentientMarine. But as Margaret Mead said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has."
What is needed here perhaps is a review of theory in the past to see how often predictions were borne out. How much was after-the-fact analysis of collider results? How often was the particle sought found?
At least we would know what the batting average was. At the moment the score for CERN in safety arguments is zero, with even the neutron star part of Cosmic Ray 2 admitted to be a no go.
Not to mention engineering calculations which resulted in the LHC blowing apart twice before they got it right.
We hear you, SentientMarine. But as Margaret Mead said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has."
What is needed here perhaps is a review of theory in the past to see how often predictions were borne out. How much was after-the-fact analysis of collider results? How often was the particle sought found?
At least we would know what the batting average was. At the moment the score for CERN in safety arguments is zero, with even the neutron star part of Cosmic Ray 2 admitted to be a no go.
Not to mention engineering calculations which resulted in the LHC blowing apart twice before they got it right.
Tired light, atomic size variance measured by electron vs muon, more muons forming outside the beam line, the 40% difference of neutinos and their anti particle. The list is extensive, very extensive. It is rather like watching a committee attempting to assemble a watch. It certainly gives one a far greater appreciation for the committee that assembled a camel when trying to emmulate a horse.
As for small groups I believe the small group of lawyers that took to the oil giants over the Gulf of Mexico will want to clear a space in the diary in the next few years. Prediction it will go bang or it will burn. I dread the consequences if it burns.
Interesting point. But I merely relayed what Dr. Heuer said: "I do not know what Nature has for us." Many scientists and officials at the LHC and elsewhere made similar statements regarding the LHC experiments. A form of self-deception renders them apparently oblivious to the obvious contradiction between their admitted ignorance of what to expect and their proclaimed certitude that all will be harmless.
Hear you, SM. But Margaret Mead said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has." One should try, at least.
What might be helpful is a review of theory to see how often predictions have been borne out in colliders. How often was a new particle sought and then found? How much theory is just after-the-fact analysis of collider results?
At least we would know what the batting average was.
At the moment the score for CERN in safety arguments is zero, with every one abandoned as wrong after a while. Even the neutron star part of Cosmic Ray 2 was lately admitted to be a no go.
Not to mention the engineering calculations which resulted in the LHC blowing apart twice.
True, SM. But Margaret Mead said, "Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world; indeed, it’s the only thing that ever has." One can try, at least.
What might be helpful is a review of theory to see how often predictions have been borne out in colliders. How often was a new particle sought and then found? How much theory is just after-the-fact analysis of collider results?
At least we would know what the batting average of establishment was.
At the moment the score for CERN in safety arguments is zero, with every one abandoned as wrong after a while. Even the neutron star part of Cosmic Ray 2 was lately admitted to be a no go.
Not to mention the engineering calculations which resulted in the LHC blowing apart twice.
I believe my basic point is worth discussing - that we should study the history of colliders to gauge how often theorists have been successful in predicting outcomes as power got ratcheted up. As I say the safety arguments have always been exploded within a few years except now for the handful of dwarf stars supposedly being our safety guarantee, already suspect since they are partially strange matter.
Otherwise as noted above we don't have a clue what to expect and safety measures are few and probably meaningless eg go slow, etc. Waiting till we can detect mini black holes might be a good idea, though
I believe what you mean, BC, is that the project should wait until there's the capability to detect mini black holes. Presently, they could only detect the signature of a small proportion of evaporating mBHs and have no means of detecting metastable or stable ones. It is possible that the LHC or other colliders have already produced one or more stable neutral micro black holes that are growing at the center of the Earth.
The question at the website to which Lisa Zyga directed us with her superbly worded last line should not be "Has the LHC destroyed the world yet?" - but rather, has it doomed the world? The answer would be: Maybe.
See it live, here:
http://op-webtool...usr=LHC1
Of course, I only base this on a random sampling (as I can't watch it 24/7). But this gives me hope they listened to our arguments in time (but are probably too embarrassed to admit it).
Does anyone have any information about this?
A very good point. One of the reasons for my six month break from the forums is that is the length of time the physicists asked for to analyse the collider results. Back then I severely doubted the existence of the proposed Higgs Boson.
The failue to find this fundamental particle on which the whole of QED gravitation and also the Higgs field invalidates the whole of modern high powered nuclear science. Sure some known quantities are expected to occur such as night follows day but now the very foundation of atomic science is flawed.
I do not need to look to the stars when the lack of results scream failure and as such invalidate all previous safety arguments.
The neutron star argument was judged unconfirmed in the Report on LSAG Documents by the CERN Scientific Policy Committee (SPC, 2008). Though a whitewash of the safety issues, it accepts for a dense star rationale only the white dwarfs, stating that "at the LHC energy, any danger for the Earth...can be ruled out on the basis of...white dwarf stars..." (p 3). Its only mention of the neutron star argument is a diplomatic rejection for the present:
"A powerful argument applicable also to higher energies is formulated making reference to observed neutron stars, but this argument relies on properties of cosmic rays and neutrinos that, while highly plausible, do require confirmation, as can be expected in the coming years." (p 3).
What gives you the idea it's for fusion research?
Thats assuming that the budget doesn't evaporate as the money is rechanneled to the poor and vulnerable of the world, as some advise.
That would be a sad thing given the amount each would receive which would not make a great deal of difference to them.
This experiment is far more fun, even if it does risk the disappearance of the entire planet and all its inhabitants, even the innocent butterfly.
But we are assured by CERN that the risk is minimal, and by all science writers who edit their press releases and call that reporting.
Let's see. Frajo believes that it is worth the non zero chances of annihilating everything from butterflies to him/erself, including the planet, to obtain a non zero chance of obtaining fusion to allow himself and 6.499999999999 billion people to enjoy cheaper energy.
Somehow this seems an unbalanced tradeoff.
However, we are of course ignoring the fun element mentioned above, which may restore the balance.
Already, as Houston has pointed out, it has resulted in an exceptionally telling story in Onion.
Is there not any means by which Frajo et al may be allowed to risk themselves and their future without risking the rest of us?
Or are we all stuck on the same planet at the same time?
Frajo?
Approx value a cup of coffee for all world citizens. I have given it some thought and for a species that offers so many avenues of advancement a scientific approach that puts at risk all art, medicine and other innovation offers less than the cuppa
To what "prior question" do you refer?
Precisely, and explained before on this thread. How astonishing that anyone still thinks that this is a safety argument for the LHC. Well, perhaps not so astonishing, considering that CERN has continued to carry this rationalization on its Web site for the admiration of the untutored when its pet theoretical defense squad duo G and M have already ruled it inadmissible. And Brian Greene's last NYTimes OpEd statement still uses it as the only defense. To be brutally frank, this is institutional and personal dissembling/prevarication/lying to the 6.5 billion humans at risk.
With respect, am I the only reader who is baffled as to the meaning intended by this and other posts of the estimable Sentient Marine?
Perhaps not. I have explored a different atomic nature (one that has not met understanding at any outing)... t is not zero.
May I offer the words quoted to Szilard.
"We turned the switch and saw the flashes. We watched them for a little while and then we switched everything off and went home." He understood the implications and consequences of this discovery, though. "That night, there was very little doubt in my mind that the world was headed for grief."
A read of 'Inertial Confinement Fusion' via laser shows the impact of wave confinement and frequency. When bundles of ions achieve the set harmonics in release a standard large nuclear reaction may be the initial trigger to a longer term result.
Do we really
S.M. divided the LHC's $10 billion cost by the world population to find it's worth a cup of coffee per capita (about $1.47). He commented that the actual value would be less due to the risk posed by the LHC to all human achievement.
The first remark was by Mr. Chavez. In the context, the reply by Sentient Marine was clear to me, and apparently to others who commented on it except Chavez. The word "less" used by S.M. could include infinite loss but was left discreetly undefined. Not all scenarios of LHC risks involve total loss (e.g., Dr. Plaga's radiation scenario). By the way, S.M. has acknowledged he is not a physicist, so the generalization by Chavez to all physicists is unwarranted.
There's a new story on physorg which is about darkmatter converting neutron stars to strange stars...
http://www.physor...nge.html
...which certainly supports your strange matter contentions.
Sadly, this does not seem to provide any time for post facto safety measures.
Let's note white dwarfs have reckoned to be partially strange since 2002.
I will attempt to make a simpler case.
The facility is being used to look for exotic particles based on Einstein's E=mc^2. However the same facility is unable to produce the most common particle the proton and as such invalidates E=mc^2.
I contend high energy particle physics has failed to prove the case for science.
I do not know why I bother because the answer is so obvious. I hope someone with a certificate can figure it out before it is too late.
Perhaps just going to the conclusion because it appears that in this disputed multiverse the SM is unable to communicate for some reason. I don't believe in the multiverse by the way. If the machine goes bang and the surviving people and nations organise fast enough then Mars offers a new world to colonise. Anything from the earth will eventually return when it is destroyed in the future because the molecular stuff is different. Information can be passed on tools to make tools used then discarded, seeds to grow food and water to be found on Mars.
If it does not blow up then kindly disregard. It is simpler this way and allows you a bit of a laugh for now. Take it or leave it if you will but it saves me wasting my time and yours.
Meanwhile, the ALICE lead experiments, which may be capable of generating planet-destroying strangelets, are set to begin Nov. 9th. These will resume with increased intensity for one month out of every year of operation - in case they don't wreck us the first time. See: http://www.cerntr...m/?p=125 .
There are lots of people far brighter than I am and it takes just the smallest amount of faith so I know it will be worked out if needed, only if needed.
Which is precisely the same thing, surely.
Sentient Marine, one gathers that you think there is a certain danger that all will go pfft in some way as ALICE cranks up, or the process has already started, perhaps.
Suggesting migration to Mars is impractical even if there were resources to do it. Humanity faced with being swallowed by a black hole, or decimated by hundreds of nuclear explosions and the nuclear winter that would follow, or transformed into strange matter in a few seconds, would not be in any psychological condition to plan and execute a departure to the next planet.
Your lack of realism in this regard calls into question the credibility of your (actually credible) belief that all could go pfft.
Please sign in to add a comment. Registration is free, and takes less than a minute. Read more