Large Hadron Collider Concerns

Discussion in 'Astronomy, Exobiology, & Cosmology' started by __your_Zahir_, Aug 10, 2008.

  1. Lamont Cranston Registered Senior Member

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    Don't be fooled by the CERN guys and their contorted arguments. The fact,is The pro's can't prove the safety of the LHC, and there are some good reasons for worrying about it.

    Pandora's Box was safe, wasn't it?
     
    Last edited: Sep 6, 2008
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  3. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    And I assume that since you claim their arguments are contorted that you can prove it? You've made the statement - let's see your proof.
     
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  5. Lamont Cranston Registered Senior Member

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    Like the CERN guys, I can't. But I can have an opinion...as do they

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    RE the energy of the beams in the LHC, I understand it will be sufficient to melt a ton of copper. Could that amount of energy cause temporal effects? (That's not a rhetorical question, I have no idea).

    I've read the many arguments on this subject between Paul, Walter, AN, Billy T. and co. and its seems that the arguments are one opinion pitted against another. When there is obvious disagreement among the specialists, isn't it always wise to follow the safest course of action? Why not ramp up the LHC energies very slowly from a low starting point, and assess hazards after each run? Why the stampede to reach 14 TeV by early next year?

    By the way, QW, thanks for your message. I can't reply properly at the moment as I haven't acquired sufficient posts!
     
    Last edited: Sep 6, 2008
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  7. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    Sure, but do you have the qualifications to state and defend your opinion publicly? They do.


    There's no "stampede" - have you been keeping up with the news? They will be running a very low-level test soon and there are dozens more scheduled for purposes of testing and adjustments before reaching the highest level late next year. By what standards does that constitute a 'stampede?'
     
  8. Lamont Cranston Registered Senior Member

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    137

    I have an opinion on this but I'm not a physicist. I am an interested observer. What worries me is that all the decisions here are made by an intellectual super-elite that the man in the street won't have a cat-in-hells chance of understanding. That worries me greatly, because the public don't have a properly informed knowledge of the issues.

    A heck of a lot of money has been put into this LHC project. The CERN scientists will be under a lot of pressure to find the Higgs Boson quickly...before it's done at another centre.
     
    Last edited: Sep 6, 2008
  9. Captain Kremmen All aboard, me Hearties! Valued Senior Member

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    Your link has a diagram of the LHC with the following comment:

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    The researcher with a hard hat is shown only to give a sense of scale.

    No, really?

    Top Honcho: OK Guys, we need a volunteer to go into the LHC and observe the Black Hole decay.

    Physicist 1: Well I ain't going.

    Physicist 2: And I sure ain't going.

    Top Honcho: And I can't go, because I'm er, supervising. Say didn't we have a researcher here, what was her name, Suzie?

    Top Honcho: Suzie! Where are you girl? We've got a big important job for you.
     
    Last edited: Sep 6, 2008
  10. Walter L. Wagner Cosmic Truth Seeker Valued Senior Member

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    Link was fixed minutes after you posted.
     
  11. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    If I was you, I'd be more worried about being involved in a fatal car accident. The chances of your being killed that way are millions of times higher than of you being killed by the LHC.

    Physicists are scientists, so they don't tend to make categorical statements about the unknown. Rather, they precisely quantify their uncertainty. So, when a physicist says "It is almost certainly safe", he may mean there's a 1 in a million chance something could go wrong, or 1 in 10 billion, or something like that. If you dig through the scientific literature, you'll probably find a precise calculation of the likelihood of any of the doomsday scenarios.

    Well, no harm in that, then. Nothing to worry about.

    If I was a pessimist, I'd think nuclear weapon self-destruction was a more likely explanation of the Fermi paradox. But, being an optimist, I think the most likely explanation of the Fermi paradox is the humungous size of our universe.

    For the particles in the beams, certainly. But they aren't building a time machine or anything. The relativistic effects are well understood, and are no danger (except for the black hole thing, maybe...)

    Will all due respect to the people you name here, I don't think any of them are active, professional particle physicists, let alone experts on the LHC. On the other hand, I personally know physicists who are working directly on the LHC, and they don't seem worried.

    They are ramping up the energies slowly, I think. There's a huge amount of testing that needs to be done with a piece of equipment whose cost runs into the billions of dollars. On the other hand, the thing is designed to run at a certain energy. There's little point in running it at low power under ordinary circumstances. Otherwise, why build it in the first place?
     
  12. Lamont Cranston Registered Senior Member

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    137

    This week, tests on the crash of a plane showed that it was caused by ice crystals in the engine. This baffled scientists, because they had never seen the phenomenon before, and have no hard theory as to how it happened (though they have some ideas).

    Do we know more about Hadron Colliders than aircraft engines?
     
  13. Captain Kremmen All aboard, me Hearties! Valued Senior Member

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    What JR is saying is that scientific, and philosophical absolute certainty is different from everyday use of the words.

    If you asked a philosopher whether he was absolutely certain that America existed, he would pause before giving you an answer, and the answer when it came would have qualifications.
     
  14. James R Just this guy, you know? Staff Member

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    I am confident the aircraft engine mystery will be solved.

    The LHC is a research instrument, so by definition it works on the borderline between known and unknown science. That's the whole point.
     
  15. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    I just tried it again (for the third time) and it just took me to a hodge-podge page of blogs that I have NO interest in sifting through to find that precise document. I was willing to give you a fair shake by reading it - but you blew that chance just as you most likely have ALL of your others when it comes to presenting facts.

    Are we to take that as an indication of your overall ability at precision? Not being able to direct me to the particular document you claimed to be linking me to? Pity. You appear to be even LESS accurate than I was previously giving you credit for.

    No wonder the judge has refused to allow anymore documents to be admitted as evidence!!!!!!!!!!!!!
     
  16. Walter L. Wagner Cosmic Truth Seeker Valued Senior Member

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    It looks like the webmaster hasn't posted either the subsequent Strauss affidavit or my rebuttal affidavit as of yet. The rebuttal affidavit wasn't filed until September 2.

    The judge's comments about filings was aimed at the government attorneys and their flurry of pleadings. Mine were entirely in response to theirs. And, it wasn't strictly evidence, but any pleadings, motions, etc. now require approval of the court first. And, she also discharged the Amicus brief because it wasn't properly authenticated. If you are truly interested, you can also contact the court website and find out how to access documents there, the way that Alan Boyle does, without having to bother other people.

    If you pm me an email address, I will send you the affidavits directly.
     
  17. Read-Only Valued Senior Member

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    I see. And you were so certain it was there that you sent me TWICE to see it before you even checked??? You are loosing credibility due to your complete lack of accuracy with each fleeting moment!!!

    I happen to be fully aware of that. My comment was simply short and to the point - it included YOUR filings as well as theirs.

    Absolutely not. I use that address for business as well as other purposes. If you want it/them read, then post a proper link that goes DIRECTLY to them. There just might be those here who would like to read the information also.
     
  18. Walter L. Wagner Cosmic Truth Seeker Valued Senior Member

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    2,559
    I will alert the webmaster that documents previously forwarded to him still are not posted. I will endeavor to post a comment here once they have been.
     
  19. prometheus viva voce! Registered Senior Member

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    I would like to remind the general audience that the only formal qualification in physics that Walter Wagner has is an undergraduate minor. I'm yet to find out what his PhD (if indeed he has one) is in. The claim by Wagner that he is a nuclear physicist is a lie and if he lies about something like that, how can we trust anything that he says, especially if it is a technical point on something he doesn't understand?
     
  20. Lamont Cranston Registered Senior Member

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    137

    Of course, you're right.

    The point I'm trying to make is that in 60 years and who knows how many thousands of jet powered flights, the technology has bowled us a googlie that was totally unexpected and unpredicted, and could have cost a large number of lives.

    That should serve as a very timely warning about the LHC, which I understand will produce 600 proton collisions per second (or is it 600,000?). Anyway, are we sure that just one single collision of a certain type couldn't bowl a similar crooked ball? After all the LHC is really a device for converting energy into mass and this process could follow physical laws with which we're unfamiliar.
     
  21. orcot Valued Senior Member

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    3,488
    Is it?
    I was under the impression that it mostly yust speeded atoms up until they collide and to study the fragments does it really transform energy into mass?
     
  22. Captain Kremmen All aboard, me Hearties! Valued Senior Member

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    12,738
    Here's a way to make some money, with no risk to your capital.
    Simply borrow some money and use it to bet on Steven Hawking winning the next Nobel prize for physics.

    If his theory of Hawking radiation is proved correct, he will be firm favourite.
    If his theory is not correct, and micro black holes eat the earth, your debt will never have to be paid.

    It's foolproof.
     
  23. Lamont Cranston Registered Senior Member

    Messages:
    137
    Yes, it can be seen that way. If a two-proton collision produces a Higgs boson, it certainly is, because the boson product is vastly more massive than the proton reactants.
     

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