Big science's big day

Tim Ann Arbor, MI — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 18:16:57 GMT

It's a very envious position to be in when your experiments have merit, even if there are no results. :) Best wishes to the LHC. How exciting!

Big science's big day

Phil Young, Simi Valley, CA — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 18:56:55 GMT

I hope this super collider doesn't start an unpredictable chain reaction that turns the earth into the Sun since they are looking into the unknown.

Big science's big day

James Bordonaro — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:16:48 GMT

Git 'R Done! It is interesting that there are still many people willing to pay for "basic" science such as this when there are many other practical demands such as feeding the hungry. Yet, who knows what these experiments might reveal. Still, at $8 Billion, the LHC does sounds a bit like the Particle Physicists Full Employment Act.

Big science's big day

Tony French, Sydney NSW Oz — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:20:44 GMT

Amazing, that after all this time we are finally told in simple words the purpose is to understand the mechanisms of existence, matter and anti-matter and possible other dimensions. Till now we have only heard about "particles"

Big science's big day

John, IL — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:24:17 GMT

USA losing it's technical edge? Spend more on the WAR and invest less in the US....

Big science's big day

Chris McDaniel — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:48:53 GMT

I am very excited for all the scientists and for the experiments sbout to take place. I look forward to reading about the results of these experiments for many years to come!!! Please feel free to name a micro black hole after me - Best of Luck!

Big science's big day

Joe C — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:51:06 GMT

Oh man I can't wait! I bet you all $10 that the Higgs Boson is nowhere to be found, but that extra dimensions show as plain as day.

Big science's big day

Tony B, Baltimore, MD — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 19:57:27 GMT

Okay. Can someone PLEASE explain the significance of this event in laymen's terms please?? We are living in a world where hunger, poverty, disease, war, and general ignorance constantly threatens our long-term existence. How is this 5 Billion dollar device going to improve the living conditions of the inhabitants of this planet????????

Big science's big day

J Quinlan — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 20:13:59 GMT

The dawn of a new beginning; This will be the engine for scientific results that LHC will continue to deliver for decades to come ! I'm thrilled for the scientists involved with this project.

Big science's big day

Wayne McCoy — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 20:17:42 GMT

The most interesting statement in the article is this: "[if the LHC doesn't find what we expect,] it means that every basic idea we have about the fundamental structure of matter, in some way, is wrong. And there's nothing more exciting than that."

How better to describe the difference between science and religion?

Big science's big day

Jonathan, Pittsburgh, PA — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 21:38:52 GMT

I am not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but I am not the dullest either. I read the article twice and still have no idea of what I just read. You make it sound very exciting, but something that cost 10 Billion should be able to make dinner too, maybe it does. Please word an article that would allow real people to understand. Sorry...

Big science's big day

Tony, Chicago, IL — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 21:50:00 GMT

Much focus on the cost of the project, but sometimes knowledge doesn't come cheaply. It's money very well spent in comparison to many government projects whose purpose is to destroy, not construct/learn.

Big science's big day

Denny, Enterprise, OR — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:02:01 GMT

Two films spring to mind - Crack in the World and The Day the Earth Caught Fire. Perhaps Congress will attend the grand opening gala?

Big science's big day

Geno, Chicago IL — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:06:03 GMT

I am so excited for this to get started, even though it will be a while until we find out about the Higgs. This has the potential to reinforce our trust in theory, or severely undermine it.

Big science's big day

Brian Peterson — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:20:44 GMT

Kudos to the LHC- it WILL be interesting!

This could have been built in the US at Waxahatchie, Texas, except Congress voted down the first $600 meg in funding, years ago- they didn't see the use for it. Wouldn't give them any bribe money, probably.

"Suppose I was talking about an idiot, or a member of Congress....excuse me, I repeat myself." WILL ROGERS

Big science's big day

Don — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 22:38:58 GMT

It's a pity that the US never finished the super-conducting super collider.
Ironically, that money was transfered into the Human Genome project, but before any of the academic researchers got close, Craig Venter's private company sequenced the human genome.

Big science's big day

a p garcia — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 23:19:28 GMT

Why couldn't it be built in the US? I am a USA phile. The western states have a lot of open space.

Big science's big day

Walter A., San Diego, CA — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 23:21:40 GMT

Too bad the politicians here in the US weren't more in tune with the scientific community. They allowed our own SSC to flounder in the 1980s due to many delays in the approval process (red tape) and using portions of the project to further their own political grandstanding. This ended up increasing the costs to 3x to 4x what they would have been had they been fully funded and approved at all stages from the beginning.

Big science's big day

Larry Flynn, San Diego, CA — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 23:46:28 GMT

With the collective steps of many we find ourselves on the threshold of another giant leap for mankind. While I don't fully understand the physics, I do appreciate the profound insights we'll glean from this endeavor. I anxiously await the results!

Big science's big day

Gabriel Feliciano — Sat, 16 Feb 2008 23:53:41 GMT

I can hardly wait to be surprised. I got a feeling, this is just the beginning.

Big science's big day

Bruce Cain — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:09:51 GMT

A wave and a particle, walking side by side
One said to the other, "Which one of us am I?"

Big science's big day

Bruce Cain — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:12:47 GMT

A Neutron walks into a bar ...
and asks the bartender " How much for a beer" and the bartender says, "For you? No charge"

Big science's big day

Brian M. — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:24:26 GMT

In response to Tony B.:I can't answer your question, and whithout a functional crystal ball, I don't think anyone else can either. I would ask however, How does the purchase of a computer and time spent reading and responding to an article such as this, improve the livin conditions of the inhabitants of this planet?

Big science's big day

Ron K — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:26:02 GMT

We do have a neutron collider at Oak Ridge. We're not totally absent in the world of physics... although the funds were already committed before "W" showed up. http://neutrons.ornl.gov/aboutsns/aboutsns.shtml

Big science's big day

Brad, San Diego CA — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:29:14 GMT

Have to agree with the person who questioned the use of spending $8B on this machine when we still can't feed and house the hungry and homeless or cure cancer and AIDS. It seems like the kind of money would be better spent on the present and the future, rather than trying to figure out scientific mysteries of the past. Now, if this device will help us solve the energy crisis or some other result benefiting mankind for the future, I'm all for it and wish them good luck.

Big science's big day

Detroit, Mi. — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 00:55:45 GMT

Something that has NEVER been done, is the size of...well, its BIG, cost billions and needs to be buried deep into the earth....Now thats just scary folks!

Big science's big day

Dave Stone, M.D. Springfield, Mo. — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 01:20:06 GMT

Johnathan in Pittsburg and several others asked that the purpose of the LHC be further clarified. I'm not a physicist but rather a medical doctor with a strong interest in physics. I'm thus speaking not as an expert but as a scientist who practices medicine, something that needs translating into "simple" all the time. I think I have an analogy that may help some readers. Imagine you've never seen a car before but do live in a world of trains and buggies. You find a car one day and, without having any really specific tools, want to know what's beneath the windows and paintjob. You maybe can open the doors and peer inside but if you have no key and are still left wondering what it's made of, you might take the primitive route and bash the hood with rocks until it pops open. There you'd see an engine, likely shrouded under a large valve cover, and see nothing further you understand. So you put the car on the tracks of your local train and let a locomotive smash into it. The car will splinter, showering out thousands of parts, but mostly the bigger, most-obvious ones like the wheels, maybe transmission, engine block, etc. You would be clueless about the inner workings of the engine, what valve lifters are, what spark plugs do (your locomotive is diesel so it has none so you have NO idea they convey electrical energy), etc. You are now so curious about the remaining rubble (in this thought experiment maybe you found yourself another car somewhere and could start fresh each time) so you petition the management of the train company to sacrifice two locomotives to smash together, head-on, with the car in the middle. Depending on how big, heavy and fast the locomotives are accelerated to, the resulting blur of bits and parts that flies out of the collision may be spread over a large area and be of smaller and smaller sizes. How would you ever know there are maybe five or seven bolts holding the main engine block together if you didn't smash it hard enough? What might it take for the valve springs or lifters to be liberated, as opposed to lost in the debris? You'd also have to analyze all this stuff quickly or you'd soon have a scene too complex to figure out, or the pieces might rust away, etc. The LHC is like a titanically-large pair of locomotives, so large that maybe the car would be vaporized, but you *do* have scientists and tools that can measure or sense vapors and gases, even if you had never seen a car, and you might figure out that there are explosive hydrocarbons in the center of the car, surrounded by machinery made of steel, aluminum, plastic, etc. Some bright person might theorize the hydrocarbons are a motive force for the car, that the steel contains and shapes these forces, etc. That's about where things are with the Large Hadron Collider, which will smash subatomic particles with much greater electrical energy than ever before possible. It's still not an *elegant* way of figuring out what stuff is made of; we can dissect bodies with sharp, small instruments and figure out SOME of what's going on, but who yet has the instruments to tweeze apart subatomic particles? The best they can do in this era is smash them apart, see what flies out, analyze the debris according to how the bits fly out, their course, how they possibly decay, etc. Over decades they might figure out the car in the thought experiment was a vehicle for 1 to 6 people operated by a driver inside the vehicle. If a shred of an integrated circuit is found, though, you'd better have some very bright people around to figure out what it does if you've never seen one before. I hope this helps, as basic as it (and my level in physics) is. Read lots more on wikipedia.org or Scientific American's website, etc. The LHC won't feed the starving anytime soon, but if it reveals unseen dimensions that someday we can transport food through 200 years from now, who knows? Basic science is ALWAYS important and the poor, sick and starving will ALWAYS be with us, no matter how much resource we divert to their cause.

Big science's big day

Rascal Minihan, Telluride, CO — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 01:21:19 GMT

Is there a website that explains what this thing does in laymens terms? Or have all these PHDs spend 20 years in school and they still don't know how to write a letter in plain english that the average adult or even college grad can understand.
The US spent $700 billion in Iraq and chose not to spend 10 billion on the super collider. When will we learn to put our money towards positive productive things like education and science rather than wars that only lead to retaliation at some future date?

Big science's big day

stoo bethel, me — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 01:44:58 GMT

is the lhc shaped like calabi-yao

Big science's big day

Q, Continuum City, ExOrbis — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 02:05:01 GMT

To Tony B in Baltimore and to James Bordonaro: Tony and Jim, all the aggregated money in the world will not alone resolve the problems you list. To be certain, the world's gross domestic product might make a small dent in the serious issues enumerated, but as long as there the world experiences overbreeding, overpopulation, catastrophic climatic changes, arrogance, greed, totalitarianism, political despotism, spontaneously mutating bacterial and viral infections, maldistribution of goods and services, and countless other factors beyond mere mortal control, people are going to suffer and die. Humans, as biological entities, are subject to these idiosyncracies, and it is only by good providence that you have not yet joined the ranks of the downtrodden. So why not invest a few billion of pocket change in the Large Hadron Collider. Facetiously, it might also make one helluva oven in preparing mega tons of food for the world's masses. Brian Peterson (above) is quite correct that the pseudo-illuminati known as the U.S. Congress were not very "dis-CERN-ing" when rejecting the project near Waxahatchie, TX several years ago. Pathetic earthlings!

Big science's big day

Phil Young, Simi Valley, CA — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 02:09:54 GMT

I hope this super collider doesn't start an unpredictable chain reaction that turns the earth into the Sun since they are looking into the unknown. The dawn of a new beginning; Git 'R Done! Why couldn't it be built in the US? but something that cost 10 Billion has the potential to destroy a lot of open space.

Big science's big day

James, Las Vegas — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 02:10:10 GMT

'Why are we wasting money on the mysteries of the universe instead of ending war, hunger, poverty, or disease,' you ask? Because five, ten, or even twenty billion dollars won't solve those problems as fast or as permanently as a some hard thought and hard work could.
Super science? Easy.
World peace? Not so much.

Big science's big day

Michael Hill, Staten Island, NY — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 02:28:09 GMT

To those that don't understand the why of spending billions on science and experiments; it cost the equivalent of the 10 billion and much longer to find out how to make fire, and then there is the wheel of course. Those people asked the same question.... You never know where a little extra knowledge might lead.

Big science's big day

Mark oldenburg, Grande Prairie, Alberta, Canada — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:03:01 GMT

CERN, men to Mars, Deep Space Exploration, all wonderfully interesting and exciting things. All terribly expensive as well. Yet we cant afford to address the pressing issues here on earth ? STOP all of this and redirect the talent and money to combating pollution, warming, health and the other serious issues that affect us all here on good old Earth !!!!!!!!!!!

Big science's big day

Bob, Milwaukee, WI — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:11:50 GMT

This has been an ongoing project for years and it's nice to see it coming to fruition. I'm glad it was an international effort and not just a "US" thing. As far as spending the money wisely...give Man a fish, he eats for a day, teach Man the secrets of the universe and the possibilities are limitless...I hope.

Big science's big day

doc3osh, NY — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:21:56 GMT

Jonathan in PA--
As best I understand it, they are going to shoot protons around this ring in opposite directions at nearly the speed of light. When they hit each other, the scientists think it will simulate the Big Bang and provide info about the origins of the universe, as well as give insight into weird physics concepts like Dark Matter and some miniscule theoretical particle called the Higgs boson. They also hope to learn whether there are more than 4 dimensions (3 spatial dimensions plus time). Some of Einstein's theories are sort of incompatible with each other-- his theories on gravity have separate rules from his theories on quantum mechanics. He wasn't able to make rules that applied to everything. His successors have tried to find a unifying "theory of everything", but as I understand it, so far their answers only work if there are 10 or 11 dimensions instead of four. So one thing they are hoping is that the particle collider will smash protons hard enough to create subatomic particles that have momentum in these extra dimensions that they can measure. They also expect to create black holes (really tiny ones, very briefly), which may lead to other insights.
Ultimately they don't really know what they will learn, since this has never been possible before.

Big science's big day

Walter , miami FL — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:41:28 GMT

TO thos of you that say that the money could be used to feed the poor. First of all, poor countries are not poor because they have no money, but because politicians in these countries stop the money from reaching to the poor. Even if those 10 nillion were to be sent to africa, they would end up in the hands of militia men, who would buy guns and kill each other.
Sadly, we are humans, and we just care about knowledge and destruction......
I personally think that knowledge is way more valuable than human life, after all....Knowledge stays, but humans die....

and it is a very nice toy.

Big science's big day

Jeff Phoenix, Arizona — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:47:50 GMT

The problem with this sort of experimentation is that you keep having to increase the energy by another order of magnitude to learn anything. They better find what they're looking for, because no one will be able afford the next collider. This is really the endgame of a way of pursuit theoretical physics that has been in vogue through most of the 20th century. What is needed from here on out is less money, and more intelligence on the part of theoretical physicists. As the "fundamental" partical count explodes, I think we're in something like the situation of Ptolemaic cosmologists who kept adding more and more epicycles. A more fundamental and philosophically sound conception is required than to say that everything is made of particles (or waves for that matter).

Big science's big day

Michael-Scott Heberling — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 03:51:39 GMT

Understanding the fundamental laws of the Universe allows us to more fully manipulate our world. For example, without Maxwell's equations (discovered in the 1850s) which describe electricity and magnetism, modern electronic devices could not exist. Though modern technology would be inconceivable to people of Maxwell’s era, retrospectively it would be impossible to deny the social and economic importance of the understanding of this physics. Modern business, medicine, agriculture and general quality of life would be greatly diminished without this understanding. The billions of dollars invested in great scientific projects such as the LHC have immense importance to humanity as a whole, even if it takes time for benefits to come to fruition. By the way, I hope they don't find the Higgs Boson; What an ugly mess of a theory!

Big science's big day

Alan Boyle — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 04:52:02 GMT

I've been meaning to get back to Tony's comment, but as usual, some smart people have already weighed in. I particularly like Dr. Dave's analogy to smashing cars. What these physicists do is smash tiny bits of matter together and try to figure out what they're made of by sorting through the pieces that come off and tracing them back to their sources.

Here's another good analogy from a New York Times article on the LHC:

"Physicists, you see, learn about the subatomic world by smashing things together and then looking at the debris. Imagine a midair collision between two watermelons; it would make quite a mess, but nothing very interesting would result. Suppose, though, you get two protons to collide head-on. If they are moving fast enough, the energy of their collision, converted into mass à la Einstein’s E=mc2, will produce a shower of new particles. (It would be as if colliding watermelons splattered into a shower of pineapples, blueberries, mangoes and more exotic fruits.) Some of these particles will already be familiar to physicists. Others, though never before observed, might well have been hypothesized by one of the speculative theories that physicists busy themselves devising, hence giving us reason to think that a theory in question is true. Still others might come as a complete surprise, eliciting an amazed cry of "Who ordered that?'"

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/01/14/
magazine/14supercollider.t.html?
ex=1326430800&en=715cc5e0c520abf3
&ei=5090&partner=rssuserland&emc=rss

"Who ordered that," by the way, is what physicist Isidor Rabi is said to have exclaimed when he found out about the existence of the muon, a particle that is like a heavier version of the electron.

But it's not just about particles ... as commenters have said above. Although the physicists themselves are focusing on the particles right now, usually there are wonderful things that come out of new discoveries in physics, particularly the surprising ones. The typical examples are nuclear power, which arose from Einstein's special relativity; GPS systems, which couldn't function without recognizing the effects of special as well as general relativity; microwave ovens and the like, which followed up on Einstein's insights into the quantum nature of light, etc. A couple of medical innovations that depend directly on particle physics are PET scans, which actually depend on antimatter interaction; and anticancer therapies that rely on proton beams somewhat like the ones at LHC (but not 7 trillion electron volts).

It is very plausible that the discoveries made at the LHC (or other colliders) could lead to the development of new power sources - perhaps fusion or perhaps something more exotic. Or they could lead to new types of probes, just as scientists now use muon detectors to create X-ray-type imagery of ancient structures. Who ordered that?

http://cosmiclog.msnbc.msn.com/archive/2007/10/22/423358.aspx

But Jeff's comments about the old Ptolemaic system are also highly relevant. In the old days, people calculated the movements of the planets by putting Earth at the center and trying to figure out all sorts of complex epicycles for the planets. It was a very clunky system, but it worked. It just so happened that the Copernican system was much more elegant, and did a better job of explaining how things work. That opened the way for Newton, Kepler, orbital mechanics, moonshots and ... well, you know the rest.

Now we have a theory called the Standard Model that explains the structure of things at the smallest scale. It's clunky, but it works. Sort of. There are gaps and missing pieces, and there could well be a more elegant, more powerful explanation waiting to be found. That could open the way to heaven knows what. New methods of interstellar travel?

http://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/bpp/

The discovery of new realms just next to our own that we never knew existed?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/13070896/page/2/

Time travel?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17544598/

OK, maybe not. But that's what kind of brings out the kid (or the caveman) in us, and stimulates our imagination ... just as the imagination of past generations was stimulated by the stars.

One of the things that the scientists at today's press conference said was that we seem to be just on the edge of what society will tolerate in terms of spending on big science projects. About $5 billion to $10 billion every 10 to 20 years. To some extent, projects like the international space station and the LHC are the Great Pyramids or great cathedrals of our era. I suppose there were some Egyptians who grumbled about the pyramids as well (definitely the slave laborers!). We can only hope the investments that free societies put into their grand projects will result in payoffs at least as great: in practical applications as well as the pure, marvelous understanding of what we are made of, where we came from and where we stand in the cosmos.

Big science's big day

us — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 05:31:59 GMT

My basic guess at why so much money is spent to understand how the basic universal elements work is to learn how to control them. The pure scientists involved are probably just curious but the investors definitely would like a return on their investment, eventually. Imagine the ability to create another inhabitable world orbiting the sun? Or the ability to utterly annihilate an enemy while leaving all the structures intact? Or simply create gold or even people out of dust? It's sounds a little like playing God or eating some forbidden fruit of knowledge. You never know completely the consequences of fooling with such powerful forces. Hopefully the results will lead to a discovery as beneficial as penicillin or simply a better understanding of how the universe was created. At worst as one poster said it could create an uncontrollable event or a "slate cleaner." Unfortunately mankind at the current rate is overwhelming our environment and desperately needs a new clean source of energy and eventually the ability to colonate. History tells us that civilizations climax to a zenith then extinguish themselves due to lack of control, so modern science has no real choice but to take chances for the future of humanity or risk being thrown back to a new "dark ages." Where of course the population will be dramatically reduced and over several generations people will have to learn about technology again. Considering that by then the gene pool hasn't been exhausted, then we're talking about a long time past our grandkids, grandkids.

Big science's big day

Sapphia — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 07:20:45 GMT

Money spent on research is not just thrown into a hole and buried. It pays salaries, supports families, and stimulates the economy. The economic ripple effect benefits a lot of people. Supplies and materials going into a project like this keep a lot of people working.

In addition, the comments about looking for a cure for cancer instead? Stop ingesting artificial foods and chemicals into your body. Stop using chemicals in your yards. The toxins in our environment cause cancer; it's no great mystery

Big science's big day

Martin, Orlando, Fl — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 08:55:17 GMT

To those that say that its a waste of money: Well, there are a lot of ways to tackle this, but let me say this. When Einstein developed General Relativity, there was no application for it. Great time, effort and money was spent on verifying it. But now, almost a hundred years latter, our GPS system would not work without it. While I don't have the numbers in front of me, I'm sure this system has already made tens billions of dollars in revenue and hundreds of new technologies. I'm quite confident it has repaid the money spent on it many many times over. That's why we need these projects. They will not benefit you or me directly. We do them to help our grandchildren.

Big science's big day

Chris H, Washington, DC — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 13:37:12 GMT

An excellent popular novel on the subject is "Blasphemy" by Douglas Preston. It's a very easy read, entertaining while it makes you think.

Big science's big day

Kevin, Alexandria, VA — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 14:40:49 GMT

This has been a interesting thread to read. Not so much about the super collider but how people really differ on varying topics without understanding the broader scope, just the surface level and in this case money. People need to understand that everything in life that we know of is about human discovery. Without our sense of discovery, what would we be? What if it were possible that a result of the experiments find new elements that could be repeated. In 10,20,30....50 years what if this could become a infinite source of enery which would eliminate dependence on electricity and fossil fuels? Can you imagine in the year 2008 we rely on fossils to fuel our world????? The one thing I don't understand with some people's comments is that we are talking about a tiny drop in the bucket of what has been spent on AIDS, hunger, and war in the past 100 years. Taking 10 billion dollars and dropping it into the hands of warlords around the world in a futile attempt to stop world hunger is not the answer. Taking 10 billion to fight global warming will not resolve it, dent it, crease it, stop it. You would probably have just enough money to do worldwide advertisements on tv daily for say three months. Take this money to heal the world oceans is not the answer since you would have to pay companies to stop poluting it which collectively they would rather make more than hundreds X 10 billion than clean it up. We spend collectively so much money in our lives, it we just stopped using paper towels for a year, we would have 10 billion. So what should we do? Take the 10 billion and invest it in our future for the HOPE that we can make the greatest discoveries of our existence in our life time or that of future generations. What if we discovered a new power source that could end carbon emissions? Would that be worth 10 billion some day?

Big science's big day

concerned — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 15:28:08 GMT

everyone keeps talking about feeding the poor and helping those in need... all of that is great and we spend an enormous amount of monies to do this... but the bigger picture here is... with all the scientists working on this project and the fact that you just can't stop dead standstill if something goes wrong. something really really really bad could go wrong with this... like taking out half of Europe if an explosion occurs even though this thing is buried deep underground. you are still talking about multi megaton explosive possibilities and the real possibility of taking out over half or europe and the people living there if a bad chain reaction happens. that is millions of lives and a large part of land and water sources that would then be ever eternity unusable for all.

Big science's big day

Emery Rudolph — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 17:03:42 GMT

I am constantly amused by people who always bring up the poor and hungry when they see big money going to something they don't understand. Believe me - there are many more billions of dollars in the world to help those individual if the will is there.

Please understand that everything you do and everything you touch or use is the result of a scientific experiment sometime in the past. I'm sure that the people of Ben Frankin's time thought "What an idiot, wasting his time with that thing called electricity". These scientist are pushing the boundaries of our understanding of physics and particles. What comes out of that will without a doubt be immensely important to future advancements. The taming of that electron beam many years ago is why you can sit in front of that big plasma/lcd screen today and enjoy the Super Bowl and World Series.

The fact that you don't understand the purpose is more a statement that you need to educate yourself rather than the project being worthless.

Big science's big day

Dave Stone, M.D. Springfield, Mo. — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:08:14 GMT

Despite my one lengthy post above, I feel it necessary to respond to "Concerned" (post of Sunday, Feb. 17, 10:28 a.m.) about his (or her) risk of "taking out half of Europe" if something goes wrong with the LHC. I read just the other day that the 7 TEV (trillion electron volts) equivalent is roughly that of a large truck traveling about 100 mph. (It might have been a train, but that's the general vicinity.) So the worst that could happen is a large, messy, hugely-expensive CONVENTIONAL explosion wrecking a chunk of the collider. This would be a huge shame but remember it took many passenger plane crashes in the early years (especially the deHavilland Comet, the first passenger jet) before flying became as safe and routine (though miserable these days) as it is now. Many early engineering feats failed and we learned from most of those mistakes (the brittle metal of the Titanic comes to mind). There was talk before the first atomic test in 1945 that igniting the atmosphere might even happen (fusion weapons that came later do actually ionize the atmosphere into hydrogen and oxygen ions, but this obviously isn't a sustainable reaction or I wouldn't be here to type this) and there IS the possibility with the LHC of producing "mini black holes", but these, if they are formed, are likely to be a gold mine of data as black holes don't voraciously swallow everything around them as Disney would have you believe. So the main risk here is of damage to an extremely-expensive miles-wide machine. The risk of NOT EXPLORING AND FUNDING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH is what would truly be the death of humanity. For the price of the Iraq war we could have a colony on the moon or Mars by now.

Big science's big day

Kurt, Indiana — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 18:25:38 GMT

No, no, no. These are protons, neutrons, and electrons we're talking about. No "taking out half of Europe." Won't happen. No "turn the Earth into the sun." Won't happen. Look. Do the math. Take the mass of two protons, multiply them by the speed of light, and you get an energy amount in Joules (a small energy value). There won't be enough energy produced to do either thing. As far as "spending money on the poor," we desperately need to understand that advancement is our only hope. Redistribute the world's wealth and everyone becomes poor and resource-starved (especially with the undeveloped world's prodigious breeding). We need space and science programs to solve that problem . . . but that doesn't stop the naysayers, because they either can't or won't do the math. Again: do the math. If you can't, just listen, okay? We don't need any more wild internet rumors based on supposition.

Big science's big day

L.C., Detroit, Mi. — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 20:37:47 GMT

Thank you Allen, the fruit example was FINALLY a description and explanation, I could understand!
However, as I "Detroit" and "Concerened" (among others)referenced to above, PLEASE, address the flip side of this issue. Can they (the Scientist/Physicist's) ASSURE US...THE WORLD...That NOTHING can go wrong? As I happen to Love Europe!!
I will admit to my own Scientific ignorance with only a humble Bachelors of Science.
For the Scientist in me, this is MOST EXCITING!
BUT.. folks, I STILL think its SCARY!
To Wayne McCoy..... So Eloquently Put! Your post ROCKED!

Big science's big day

confused — Sun, 17 Feb 2008 22:55:43 GMT

So why do they have this thing?
Anti-matter can be examined at the edges of our own atmosphere. Plus no matter how big you make this thing, it's not going to let you examine the dimension theories. How about we spend our money protecting our planet from gamma ray bursts, or expand our species to the stars instead of crashing particles together.

Big science's big day

GKam — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 01:54:15 GMT

Eight billion dollars for the whole project? Bush spends that much every month to kill Afghanis and Iraqis, abusing our troops in the process.

Goethe predicted the future when he said "Nothing is more terrible than ignorance in action." But even he could not have predicted the cost.

Big science's big day

Frank, Dallas, TX — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 02:00:44 GMT

Even if it costs the full $10 billion, and even if the US were footing the bill (we're not, its mostly paid for by other countries) that is a tiny, tiny expenditure in terms of national budgets. The IRS collects $2.2 trillion every year. Would we even notice if we're spending 1/2200th less by cancelling a $10 billion expenditure? Of course not.

Big science's big day

Martin, Orlando, FL — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 02:08:10 GMT

concerned: I can't think of a way this could lead to the type of explosion you describe. The energy just isn't contained in a way that could lead to an explosion. Anyway, the best way to prevent accidents is to understand what we are doing. And we understand things by research through theory and controlled expirements.

Big science's big day

Thomas Ashby, Calgary — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 02:10:27 GMT

This is almost as interesting and well anticipated as a space flight or some robotic mission. You don't have to be a physics person to appreciate what is being done here. I sure would like to see a pic of what results from the first collison at energies that far surpass other experiments. I have seen one before but that was some time ago and they are quite spectacular. Maybe they don't release this information readily.

Big science's big day

Benjamin Corey Feinblum — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 02:14:49 GMT

For everyone who has concerns about the cost of basic research and why we spend money on things like this rather than food, I will help shed light on the situation. What we learn on the journey leads to spin-off technologies that fuel all of the economies of the world. In other words, we do this - we learn - we make new things - we sell new things - we create new jobs - we create new prosperity. People have the same questions about NASA. NASA had this problem, they needed to calculate a lot of numbers really quickly and computers used to be the size of a room. NASA while flying the space shuttle worked to solve this issue. Astronauts kept asking for more and more computer power, yet the amount of space on the space shuttle remained the same. So, NASA drove the development of smaller and smaller computers - from handheld calculators, to desktop computers, then to laptops. Every article of clothing you wear has fibres that were influenced by the space program. What we learn along the way turns into things that become the engine of future prosperity. On the food question, in Star Trek, they used replicator machines to generate food from thin air. Well, if we understand the basic materials that make-up food and understand matter as this machine aims to, we can make machines that create matter - such as food. Don't be afraid. Long-term investment is the secret of wealthy people and wealthy nations. If you are poor, consider how many long-term investments you have made - study and become more financially educated - and whatever income level you are at, you can become more wealthy.

Big science's big day

Neil A Victoria , BC — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 04:00:38 GMT

Its easy. Thr purpose of the LHC is to create an artificial black hole that they think (officially they are 'almost positive') will evaporate, producing a shower of particles unseen untill now. Studying the behavior in turn , enables many scientists to confirm , deny and create new hypothesis about the universe.

The actual purpose of the LHC is unrelized in that the black hole will instead devour the earth. Thus, the end of hunger , poverty and all world strife!

Haha just kidding. We think ;) . Good joke , eh?

Isnt the progress of science wonderful?

Big science's big day

Des Emery, St. Thomas, ON, Canada — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 05:56:15 GMT

The money some people here think should be used to end poverty, feed the hungry or cure the sick would never be diverted by government into those projects from the things government believes are more important, like defense, or border security, or pork-barreling rewards.

Scientific inquiry like the LHC, or NASA, or similar effort occasionally manages to squeeze a pittance out the hands which control funding. But those funds, if they were re-directed, would not go to the hungry, the poor or the sick. Either they would be kept by the government to be used as bribes for votes, or spent on other government subsidies for the energy companies, manufacturing bailouts and similar vote producing efforts.

It may seem to be a lot of investment in scientific investigation, and $10Billion would buy a lot of KFC, to be sure, but Man does not live by bread alone, and the acquisition of knowledge will lead us all out of the wilderness eventually.

Finally, remember it is you who put politicians into places of power, and you who can evict them, too. If you want a government to tackle social problems like poverty, hunger, homelessness and illness, you have the power to make it happen.

Big science's big day

Eric — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 08:33:44 GMT

You know a lot of people ask why so much money was spent on this thing to begin with. Why don't we feed the hungry, cure cancer/other diseases, et cetera.

On that same line of thought - how do you think nuclear medicine began? If scientists didn't unlock the mysteries of the atom and begin nuclear science we would never have developed x-ray machines, MRIs would never have existed, nuclear energy would be a thing of science fiction, even smoke detectors have small amounts of irradiated material to make them work. But... We did investigate the atom and we did learn how to manipulate it. We did make new discoveries in particle physics.

What was found over time is that we only touched the tip of the iceberg in terms of what atoms are made of and how they work - there are many subparticles that make up protons, neutrons, and electrons of atoms. They are inferred but have not been observed fully or contained. Immagine for a moment what lies ahead as we actually begin to understand how the subparticles work. If for example a new source of energy is discovered (like last time think nuclear power plants) those issues of poverty and starvation etc might be alleviated once and for all.

Give it a chance people.

Big science's big day

Uncle Rocco — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 12:17:15 GMT

Now hold on a second. Let's be scientists here and seek the truth. Solving hunger throughout the world won't be accomplished by throwing money at it. We live in a world where you take some money to the store and you buy food. It doesn't work that way in the third world. It doesn't work that way in parts of THIS country, amigos.

The particle accelerator is worth its weight in gold and may hold the key to free, unlimited power for all. Imagine that. The ability to make as much power as we need, forever, without consuming vital resources or creating any form of pollution. That's just one thing that may be discovered using the accelerator.

R

Big science's big day

JC, Ky — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 12:53:44 GMT

Could this thing create a black hole and kill us all? A scary quote from a website...

"III. CONCLUSION

The CERN study [Ref. 1] is a remake of a similar study for the earlier Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven (RHIC) [Ref. 6] adapted to the LHC.

It is important to notice that: The study for the RHIC had concluded that no black holes will be created. For the LHC the conclusion is very different: "Black holes could be created!" !

The main danger could be now just behind our door with the possible death in blood of 6.500.000.000 (US notation 6,500,000,000) people and complete destruction of our beautiful planet. Such a danger shows the need of a far larger study before any experiment ! The CERN study presents risk as a choice between a 100% risk or a 0% risk. This is not a good evaluation of a risk percentage!

If we add all the risks for the LHC we could estimate an overall risk between 11% and 25%!.

We are far from the Adrian Kent's admonition that global risks that should not exceed 0.000001% a year to have a chance to be acceptable. [Ref. 3] .Even testing the LHC could be dangerous. Even an increase in the luminosity of the RHIC could be dangerous! It would be wise to consider that the more powerful the accelerator will be, the more unpredicted and dangerous the events that may occur! We cannot build accelerators always more powerful with interactions different from natural interactions, without risk. This is not a scientific problem. This is a wisdom problem!

Our desire of knowledge is important but our desire of wisdom is more important and must take precedence. The precautionary principle indicates not to experiment. The politicians must understand this evidence and stop these experiments before it is too late! "

source: http://www.nowpublic.com/technology/potential-danger-particle-collider-experiments

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Lee — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 15:28:49 GMT

If you don't understand what this research is for.. just watch some Star Trek...

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S.Clark, Wichita, Kansas — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 18:09:39 GMT

Hey, why not just use the energizer bunny to power it up?

Big science's big day

I love smart people, Los Angeles, CA — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 18:38:36 GMT

I would like to note how refreshing it is to have intelligent posts and rebuttals. I only hope those naysayers who have yet to educate themselves on the bigger picture at least have the sense to read the intelligent explanations and rebuttals to their comments, and not simply post something and walk away from intelligent posts. that would be the definition of ignorance.

Big science's big day

Susan Polkinghorn, Atlanta, Georgia — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 20:03:47 GMT

I understand very well the legitimate concerns of those who criticize big-budget scientific experiment. But without scientific experiment in quantum physics, used to prove scientific theory in quantum physics, we wouldn't have TV, music reproduction, computers, telephone, cell phones, radar, sonar, processes which kill bacteria in our food supply, X-rays, GPS, CAT and PET scans, radiation therapy for cancer patients, lithotripsy for those who suffer kidney stones, nuclear power and weaponry (OK so we goofed there, big time), hybrid cars, the promise of nuclear fusion and countless other inventions which enhance the lives of almost every human on the planet. Our study of quantum physics and our space travel are a beautiful tribute to our maker and an expression of our gratitude, wonder, and hope. There IS enough money to go around for all pursuits improving the lives of God's children. This research is as important as any.

Big science's big day

Dale, Salt Lake City — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 20:07:06 GMT

10,20 30 billion for science/space is a drop in the bucket compared to the billions spent by the countries involved to "help" the poor and yet there is still poor. Every "tech age" has its protesters for the poor I suppose if they were successfull in the 50's & 60's they wouldn't be sitting in front of their computers and the internet complaining.

Big science's big day

Art, Tampa, FL — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 20:29:39 GMT

To those who are complaining about the cost: since it was the Europeans that built this, why are you all complaning? None of your precious tax dollars was "wasted" on this project. Make your once a year donation to United Way and delude yourself into thinking that all is well.

Big science's big day

Barry U. Headinsand — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 20:42:04 GMT

I hate to inject (another) note of political tension into these very interesting comments, but I can't help myself:
How many of the people complaining about the $5 billion cost of the LHC see nothing wrong with spending over 100 times that much on the war in Iraq, the multibillion dollar casinos that Las Vegas is building these days, or tax cuts for the wealthy which have robbed the poor of many basic services?

I love the LHC & CAN'T WAIT for it to start taking data. I'll gladly chip in a hundred bucks to offeset the construction cost if it'll help. Maybe I could take some cash out of what I'm forced to pay my government to fight a war I don't support.

Big science's big day

A, Einstein — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 21:42:52 GMT

THIS IS A VERY BAD IDEA! LOOKING INTO THESE AREAS OF SCIENCE ON OUR ONLY HOME, ONLY PLANET IS A MISTAKE. THEY ARE PLAYING WITH FIRE AND ARE ABOUT TO LET AN BEAST OUT IN WHICH THEY CANNOT CONTROL!

Big science's big day

H.S. Fort Collins, CO — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 22:08:47 GMT

I wonder how many carbon credits they have to buy to run this thing. Not that I buy global warming, which I don't, but how many houses could be run with the energy this thing will use? Counting construction and application I would be a few pounds of carbon will be emitted. I guess that is OK, huh??

Big science's big day

Michael C., Denver, Colo. — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 22:57:46 GMT

For the cost of 18 - 37 days for the US military to be in Iraq (@ ~$270 million per day for the US), I think this thing is pretty cheap (esp. considering it's not just the US footing the bill).

Of course, good science never gets the funding it needs unless it helps us fight better wars (e.g. the A-Bomb). If there were really a possibility of weaponizing this thing, the US would have paid double for it and made it top secret as well.

I think it's worth the relatively small outlay of cash (and huge economic impact to the Swiss) to find out more about the nature of the universe. Some things can't be done without some sacrifice in terms of time and money.

As far as the black hole thing goes, I don't believe we have enough energy on all of the earth, let alone just in Switzerland, to create a black hole that will suck the earth and all of her inhabitants into it. If we had this amount of energy on earth, there wouldn't be an energy crisis!

Besides, I thought black holes like this were formed after stars went supernova or something. If there is one created in the LHC, it will likely be infinitessimally small and evaporate almost immediately after it's formed.

Big science's big day

Gary Maxwell, Lynnwood, Washington — Mon, 18 Feb 2008 23:57:56 GMT

I am surprised at the number of people that think an investment of less than $10 billion for this project is a waste of money. The US spends that much on our military in just a few days.

This project is supports very basic research into what makes everything in the universe work. If we don't invest in the search for such understanding, our progress in science and technology will slowly grind to a halt. Imagine if the scientists who studied electricity decades ago had not bothered because nobody could imagine a use for it?

The bottom line is with basic research we really don't know what we will find. But our future will be based on the new understand of our world.

Big science's big day

Frank Glover Rochester, NY — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 00:11:56 GMT

"CERN, men to Mars, Deep Space Exploration, all wonderfully interesting and exciting things. All terribly expensive as well. Yet we cant afford to address the pressing issues here on earth ? STOP all of this and redirect the talent and money to combating pollution, warming, health and the other serious issues that affect us all here on good old Earth !!!!!!!!!!!"

First...you propose taking physicists ant turning them into something else. Take away LHC, and they'll pursue their passion somewhere else, in some other way.

Second, you write as if billions of dollars *aren't already* being spent on all those things you deem more inportant. Have you really stopped to find out? I submit that you'd be very suprised. LHC is chump change compared to many other programs and projects...

And there's always the chance that what we learn with LHC might (or might not...basic science is like that, you can't really know what will be useful, and knowledge *is* worth pursuing for its own sake) have some bearing on one of those issues (cleaner energy through a currently unknown physical process, perhaps?) you list.

Or not. If you don't look, you won't know.

Big science's big day

Steve, Dalhart, TX — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 00:47:03 GMT

If the collider results in an extended economic boost for the locals, then it has at least some value. If it results in useful technology for the average man then, that is even better. Do the collider engineers and scientists see such results forthcoming? I am all for expanding the frontiers of pure academic knowledge, but price tags for experiments need to be weighed carefully against real need and practicality. If these experiments can eventually result in more food on the table for our upcoming population of 7 billion, then more power to them.

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John Nicholson — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 01:38:00 GMT

Sounds like the Gillette company is going to again enable me to get an even closer shave. Sad to spend that kind of money when shaving isn't even popular!

Big science's big day

James b Dickinson — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 01:38:06 GMT

It is going to reveal secrets that will so alarm the persons that can understand the information, "That their hearts will fail them for fear for the things that are COMING on the earth" If you think our weather is getting crazy, wait, these people will figure out that IT IS ABOUT OVER! The only ones that are going to be happy with what they find, is the Born again, the ones that are just waiting for Christ to come for them.

Big science's big day

Jim Miller, Dallas, Texas — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 02:25:32 GMT

I found it interesting that Bill Clinton and Al Gore helped shut down the SSC, but then turned around and built the SNS in Al's backyard. Talk about Pork Barrel politics. Al's right up there with Senator Byrd.

Big science's big day

Ken A, austin, tx — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 02:49:07 GMT

For those who are concerned about some sort of catastrophe, it might be comforting to know that this "machine" is not the first of its kind. It is just the latest and largest particle accelerator. Here's a list of about 50 particle accelerators which have been built over the last 77 years: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accelerators_in_particle_physics
You'll notice that the CERN Large Hadron Collider is one of a handful of such hadron colliders. The main difference is beam energy. The new collidor has roughly seven times more beam energy than the next "competitor," which is Fermilab's Tevatron near Chicago.

Big science's big day

Martin, Orlando, FL — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 03:06:53 GMT

First off, any black holes created by the collider would be too small to present any danger to anyone. Much less the whole planet. They would be too small to absorb anything, and too short lived to grow. If that weren't the case, our planet would have been destroyed billions of years ago by naturally occuring energetic reactions. Secondly, to Steve: we can't say for sure what technological benefits these expirements will provide, since it typical takes many decades for practical applications to develop. But, speaking from our past experiences, we should be able to make the money back many times over.

Big science's big day

Martin, Orlando, FL — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 03:32:02 GMT

Ok. The energies achievable by the LHC fall comfortably with the "intermediate energy" region for cosmic ray particles. Tremendous numbers of particles of this energy strike the earth everyday from outter space. The most energetic cosmic rays that have been detected on Earth are billions of times more energetic than anything the LHC is capable for producing. If such energetic impacts were going to destroy us, via the creation of black holes or otherwise, it would have happened on its own long before life on Earth existed.

Big science's big day

Des Emery, St. Thomas, ON, Canada — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 06:18:39 GMT

Human beings are a trepidatious species indeed, always afraid to get our feet wet without testing the water with our big toe first.

When steam engines first pulled passengers from place to place, only the brave and foolhardy took advantage of that rapid transit of the day. Why? Because we believed that the terrible speeds of 15 miles per hour or more would do irreparable damage to the human constitution. We learned over the years since then that we can move faster than sound itself, faster than a speeding bullet (ask the spacemen upstairs in the ISS) and now we are going to sling 'particles' magnetically even faster than that in the LHC.

We aren't going on the trip ourselves, but observing the 'how' and the 'why' and the 'what' will be like opening windows on the world of the incredibly big and the impossibly small things in the universe.

Best of all, the exercise will expand our minds far beyond the fear and trepidation that holds us captive, no longer afraid to get our feet wet in new knowledge.

Big science's big day

William, Los Angeles, California — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 06:47:22 GMT

Remember these?

***
"We are living in a world where hunger, poverty, disease"... "STOP all of this and redirect the talent and money to combating pollution, warming"... "and it is a very nice toy."
***

Folks, you just *used the Internet* in order to share your opinions with the rest of us.

The very same Internet which originated from several million dollars allocated to make the "ARPANET," the first "version" of the Internet, in 1968. (1)

I can imagine trying to persuade a flower child in 1968 that this money was better spent on researching computer networking, than feeding people in Biafra (2)

Now: if you don't agree with this idea, does this mean that in solidarity with Suffering Millions, you'll forsake using the Web?

Your answer will be most illuminating. Particularly if you choose to air your opinion on this website.

Sources:

1. http://www.dei.isep.ipp.pt/~acc/docs/arpa--1.html
2. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biafra

Big science's big day

Diego de la Verga — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 12:36:26 GMT

big deal... how many sick people and starving children can be saved with all that money ?

think about it.

Big science's big day

Barry U. Headinsand — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 15:14:55 GMT

For the last time...
The LHC is NOT going to BLOW UP the world, or create a gigantic black hole, or a rip in the space-time continuum. Please go and do half an hour's reading on Wikipedia about the LHC, or cosmic rays, or Hawking radiation, & you'll understand that the type of collisions they'll be creating occur naturally in our upper atmosphere every day and pose no threat to anyone. The reason they're burying the LHC in the ground ISN'T because it's some dangerous thing that's likely to explode. It's because the equipment is huge, heavy, & needs to be aligned with microscopic precision & it's easiest to do that if it's all sitting on bedrock & not subject to a lot of vibration from trucks driving by, etc.
People, PLEASE get over your poorly-informed paranoia. The LCH isn't dangerous. It isn't scary. It's not run by mad scientists or evil geniuses. The ONLY thing the LHC will destroy is the limits of our knowlege.

Big science's big day

john...kansas — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:04:35 GMT

GREAT!!! this sure sounds a lot like the sci-fi book written by John Ringo (The Vorpal Blade) same kind of experiment done in a university in florida, it goes wrong blows up like a 2 megaton nuclear warhead, opens up dimensional doors and aliens come thru and attack earth...Wohoooo!!!!

Big science's big day

Bob Murdock Alto, Texas — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:09:04 GMT

Some people here try to make sound like Republicans shot down the Superconducting Supercollidor, but if I remember right it was the Democrats.

Big science's big day

George Y. — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:16:51 GMT

I believe it was Michael Faraday who was asked by the Prime Minister of Britain why he was wasting his time researching this electricity stuff, back in about 1815. Maybe some of the above commenters would have preferred that he feed the hungry, clothe the poor, or tend the sick. His answer? He didn't know what good could come of electricity, but he was sure that someday other politicians would find a way to tax the stuff. Now we know: electricity does get taxed, but does it do a whole lot more than his own resources could possibly have done toward feeding, clothing, and healing? You bet. The LHC is in Faraday's shoes today. Let's get on with it for the future of the poor, sick, and hungry. It may be a distant future, but it will come.

Big science's big day

Rapid R — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 16:27:23 GMT

What if they find particles that may be the culprit to cancer? there have been many exploding stars that would have probably produced the same result except we do not see anything but some gases expanding trillions of miles away from the exploding star.If we can find out other possible particles I think we will be on our way of curing cancer or maybe preventing it.If something is so small that it cannot be recognized, I believe it has the answers to the why Doctors and scientists cannot find cures.I think there is so much space matter flying through our bodies that it can and has caused most of our worst deseases. I'm not a scientist just a curious regular person who thinks small and large. any feed back for my small gray noodle

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Daniel, Milwaukee — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 17:17:12 GMT

Interesting idea and project, but I'm glad its across the ocean. Can't help but imagine this will lead to some huge discovery... like how to blow a 17 mile crater into the earth. Burying all this energy underground is eventually going to affect something we shouldn't be messing with. Maybe.

Big science's big day

Stan, Pittsburgh, PA — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 17:33:04 GMT

Some who are questioning the value of scientific experimentation at great cost, would be better off living in the dark ages. Who knows what benefits to the human condition might come from this. Humans inhabit this universe it would serve us well to know more about how it was created and how it works. Many have mentioned that human misery has always existed and probably always will. We must move forward in some areas perhaps others will follow.

Big science's big day

James, TN — Tue, 19 Feb 2008 17:57:58 GMT

The experiment will effectively break a proton into its constituent components allowing scientists to peak into the components that make up matter. Since the cooling of the universe, this information has been inaccessible to man. Colliders have been built before, but were not large enough to produce the impact speed to break the constituent components of a proton into all of their individual pieces. The LHC theoretically has enough power to show us the next layer underneath the matter we all take for granted.

Likely, it will create more questions for physicists to ponder ad infinitum. The LHC is also by no means the end-game or the largest possible lab for particle physics. We won't know until the experiments are run and the data is analyzed.

Lamenting that big science comes at the cost of human welfare is nothing more than short-sighted naval-gazing. Humanity in general has no desire to equalize and it will never happen even in the most idealistic world. There will always be haves and have nots as there has always been. Big science pays-off by raising the quality of life for everyone that has access to the applications, hydro-engineering, electrical engineering, computational engineering, biotech engineering, etc, etc. Physics may appear on its surface to be a superficial endeavor, but it is by far the most fundamental as ALL tools are the product of physics exploration and implementations. Imagine a world with no measures, no levers, no lenses, no springs, no axels, etc, etc.

The LHC will give us significant insight, the only question remains whether we are wise enough to use the insight for the benefit of our species.

Big science's big day

Martin, Orlando, FL — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 03:08:46 GMT

john: sadly, we don't have anything that could be called an expiremental particle physics program.

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Reinhard Langos, Toronto, Ontario, Canada — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 03:31:02 GMT

I am, right down to my core, very excited watching the progress of CERN, .... vicariously taking a journey with the entire CERN team towards scratching the heretofor-unexplored micro-scale of the building blocks of matter ... the building blocks of existence. Thanks to front-liners, supervisors, and managers at CERN for "boldly going where no person has gone before ...", and thanks to senior directors of the project for sharing information and progress on the project so openly / transparently online.

As well as marvel in the anticipation of the physical-world discoveries which CERN may produce, I am fascinated by the cornucopia of humanity which is brought about in this series of online-messages regarding CERN ... from the logic of the scientist, to interest shown by those wanting to know more but in lay-terms, to fellow onlookers keen to support others in grasping the gist of the project, to assessments of the projects economics, to objections to the project in favour of saving mankind from age-old perils, to the occasional religious slant / rant.

Good show all around. I've got my popcorn. Roll 'em.

Big science's big day

Jaycubed — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 18:02:10 GMT

" For example, without Maxwell's equations (discovered in the 1850s) which describe electricity and magnetism, modern electronic devices could not exist.
Michael-Scott Heberling"

While Maxwell's work certainly was a foundation leading towards modern electronics, the physics behind them is far weirder.

In fact, "modern electronic devices" are based on quantum mechanics rather than on classical physics such as Maxwell's equations.

A semiconductor based transistor or I.C. is a practical device based on obscure & counter-intuitive physics (ie. quantum tunneling) & would not have been conceived or invented without the kind of expensive, elaborate & collaborative projects that have led up to the LHC. The same is true of the laser & of the earliest quantum device, the photovoltaic cell (for the understanding of which Einstein was awarded his Nobel Prize).

Those who think such a physics project is "SCAREY" have little understanding of the universe they live in. More energetic events than the LHC will create occur in our atmosphere constantly due to cosmic ray impacts. The danger of catastrophe is essentially zero as these events have occurred an uncountable number of times in the billions of years the Earth has existed. The Earth, as well as life, is still here.

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Jeremy, Brisbane — Wed, 20 Feb 2008 19:49:30 GMT

I'm not sure which horrify me more: the requests to dumb down an already glib story, or the people who think they understand and don't see the point of spending money on basic research.

You do remember that Bush Junior is spending $20 billion just on that leaky border fence? And how much for the "Iraq Experiment" so far?

Big science's big day

George Y. — Thu, 21 Feb 2008 20:05:09 GMT

Just so we don't dumb it down too much, let's look at the points already made about cosmic rays. The issue is, should we worry that the proton-proton collisions at the LHC might cause half of Europe, half of the world, or half of Geneva, Switzerland to disappear? The new results from the Auger cosmic-rays observatory in South America show that, over their limited area and observing time, they saw 27 cosmic rays with energies over 57 x 10 to the 18th power electron-volts, which we write 57 x 10^18 eV. One eV is the kinetic energy picked up by an electron that falls through 1 Volt of electrical potential. We have to reference this energy to a center-of-mass reference frame to see how much energy is available to do physics. Otherwise, because the total momentum before an interaction must be same as after, much of the incident energy is just used as the kinetic energy needed to carry away all the incident momentum on final-state particles; that part can't blow anyone away with black holes. In the c.m. the momentum balances and all the energy is useful for physics. The c.m. energy at 50 x 10^18 eV incident kinetic energy is about sqrt(2*E*m), where m is the mass of the target, E the beam kinetic energy. A purist would say that the target is one constituent of the struck atmospheric nucleon, known as a quark or a gluon. However, a quark or gluon has a certain probability of carrying most of the energy of the nucleon itself, so we get the safest estimate if we just take m to be the mass of a proton or neutron, a little over 900 x 10^6 eV. Carrying that out, we get about 300 x 10^12 eV in the c.m., or greater, for these 27 events. For comparison, the LHC has colliding beams whose momenta cancel, so the c.m. energy is just the sum of the two beam energies, 14 x 10^12 eV. Therefore, cosmic rays are striking the earth all the time with usable energy more than 20 times the LHC energy and Europe hasn't disappeared even once. Do we need to fear what cosmic explosion will happen at LHC turn-on? Nope. The data proves it.

Those of us who were preparing to work at the SSC were perfectly content to be right above beams with three times the LHC energy.

Big science's big day

Dennis McClain-Furmanski PhD, Dalworthington Gardens, TX — Mon, 25 Feb 2008 18:47:00 GMT

Alan and others have explained very well what the potential benefits are, justifying the spending for the LHC. If spending US$8B (spread among many people in many countries via taxes) bothers people, perhaps things that they spend even more on should be examined even harder. Pornography, cosmetics, pizza, bubble gum, gas guzzling cars, and many other things use up much more than US$8B per year (not spread over many years like LHC). Just cutting back on these things by 10% each, and giving that wasted money to worthy projects would result in many sigificant inventions for the benefit of all.

If NASA were allowed to keep its patents and license them (as a government agency they're not allowed to), the money they made from just four of them developed between 1960 and 1970 for the Mercury through Apollo programs (systems analysis software, medical telemetry, micro-electronics and cryogenics) would have given them a $4.5 to $1 return on investment. (That figure was from 25 years ago; it's undoubtably higher now). That doesn't include all the lives saved through use of those technologies, which is invaluable, or the millions of tons of earth moved and subsequent pollution from mining copper for wires that communications satellites replaced. THIS is what basic research is about. Without it, there is no applied research. You want it justified in terms of what will come out of LHC? We don't know yet. But I'll project that (1) the processes used to develop large numbers of enormous superconducting magnets will mean a lot to the future of efficient energy production of all kinds, affordable maglev trains and rail guns capable of placing things like weather satellites (unquestionably useful and life saving) in orbit without pollution from exhaust gasses and potential crashes, and (2) the enormous computer power in terms of both calculation and storage abilities developed for the two Higgs experiments will be used for many other more socially relevant problems.

If a there's a project that should be looked at for costs and benefits of a questionable nature, it's ITER. The design and location chosen under pressure from the US was due to production of and access to a neutron source. There are some beneficial uses for this, but the major use for high neutron flux is in the production of fissionable materials. Sure, they can say it's for fuel. As the US frequently says about Iran (but never themselves) any source of neutrons capable of making fuel is also capable of making weapons grade material. Other, low-or-no neutron designs were possible. The US forced its hand by threatening to withdraw its funding if they were chosen, and if it weren't placed in France who would allow more access to the device than the Japanese who are much more wary of things that produce fissionables. Figure: if the US wanted nuclear power without the neutron production, they'd have pursued one of the low neutron producing Thorium reactor designs decades ago, or one of the laser based fusion facilities such as the National Ignition Facility at Livermore. They haven't. You want to examine costs and benefits? Look at this on, and keep in mind that we've been 20 years from developing fusion power for 50 years now. We are, however, very close to developing bursts of high energy neutrons which can be easily slowed to thermal neutrons, and smashed into U(238) to make Plutonium. There is very little basic research with potential benefits involved here -- the technology is already developed. They're just trying to tune it up to get it to work.

Stop and think about whether you your collective selves could find US$8B in your pockets and feed the hungry, house the homeless and solve energy problems. You could very easily, a few dollars each, a little at a time. If you're not going to, then don't criticize those spending the same, who are likely to produce things to save you that kind of money anyway.

Big science's big day

William B. Rose — Wed, 27 Feb 2008 03:37:42 GMT

$8 Billion pales nexts to the $468 Billion total spent on the Iraq war!

I hope the LHC confirms the third arm of the triangle of reality!

Big science's big day

Alex Burke, Sunnyvale, CA — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 05:14:40 GMT

The LHC is a very impressive machine and I'm excited to see what it reveals, nobel-prize discoveries like the Higgs boson, supersymmetry, etc. Theoretical particle physics is dazzling in its mathematical abstractness and profoundness. But it's the hardware side that really interests me, the giant particle accelerators pouring energy into beams of charged particles - protons in the LHC case - until the beam carries as much energy as a speeding locomotive (but with only a small fraction of the momentum) and can penetrate almost anything. In fact, there's a concept for fusion energy that uses particle beams instead of laser beams, and some people believe it's the most practical approach, even more practical than ITER. There's a mind-blowing letter about this that was published in Science by Burton Richter, a particle physicist and Nobel prize winner. Just go to www.sciencemag.org and search for "Heavy Ion Drivers". If half the stuff he claims in the letter is true, then the public has every right to be upset at big science, for not developing a promising "spin-off" of particle physics that has the potential to solve the world's energy crisis - and the climate crisis as well.

Big science's big day

Lewellyn Dowd — Thu, 28 Feb 2008 15:43:41 GMT

Frankly I am disappointed in the conspiracy nut cases for not latching on to this. Clearly they are too simple to recognise this as an opportunity to exercise their psychopathic tendencies. I would like to give them a nudge in the right direction by posing a few questions. Why does it cost ten billion dollars to create the energy released when smashing a mosquito? Why do all the articles seem desperate to point to this low level of generated energy? How many thousand times a second is this energy going to be released? Is there absolutely no margin of risk? (I have personally watched roulette wheels spin out 18 consecutive black numbers during actual play. This will be tens of thousands of times probability against chance and I have seen it twice). Did the USA not want the thing built in the states? Are we certain that know we what micro black holes will do? What new matter could it potentially create? Why the sudden urgency? Is someone hoping to use it as an escape portal because the planet is about to be destroyed due to...fill in the blank…? Is someone hoping to use it as an entrance portal for future scientists because the planet is about to be destroyed due to...fill in the blank…? Is someone hoping to use it as an entrance portal for aliens because the planet is about to be destroyed due to...fill in the blank…? Is someone hoping to use it as a propulsion device for the entire planet because the planet is about to be destroyed due to...fill in the blank…?

Hopefully these questions will spark the interest of the lunatic fringe and stir them to activity.

Come on you nutters get off your backsides and start freaking out!!

Big science's big day

Ivor Biggon, Bulge Hill, Tillet, Harts., — Fri, 29 Feb 2008 12:44:50 GMT

Surely if all these financial resources were invested in developing nations these countries would advance technologically to the point that they could build their own super-conducting super colliders. Imagine the swelling of humanitarian sentiment at the site of a Kalahari Bushman, proudly pointing to the super collider that he’s just built, standing next to his mud hut with a boomerang tucked in his loin cloth. By my calculations they could bring the project in well under budget considering that their laborers will work for $1 a day. Personally I wouldn’t get out of bed for less than $4 a day. I’d probably just stay home and watch the television.

Big science's big day

John Doe, Seattle, Wash — Sat, 01 Mar 2008 04:21:34 GMT

i tell u wut we got to git 1 of them ther partical mashers wut need is to dig us a big hole in the ground like they dun in teksas wen i was ther we cood git 2 fellers down in that whole in the ground and have them shoot 2wards theyselvs and wen them bullets smash into 2 eech uther them boys wood gitter dun and it wont cost no millyun dollars it will be reel cheep

Big science's big day

Lars Swoles — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 08:29:53 GMT

The LHC will do more than just smashing things into smaller bits. The analogies of smashing to smashing cars together or smashing fruit together to make smaller pieces are not completely representative. It will also attempt to knock some of the smaller pieces out of existence literally by knocking them into other dimensions. This is specifically what the thing is designed to do.

Big science's big day

Looey Munn Roundup. MT — Sun, 02 Mar 2008 10:17:19 GMT

The whole Universe is unstable energetically, and would prefer to be 100% pure Silver. We think and act as though it was permanent, never fearing that some "strange" particle emitted in a massive supernova might catalyze that conversion and suddenly everything is a ball of silver vapor.

It could happen. Why are not you worry-warts going out to extinguish all the supernovas so it doesn't?

A huge amount of good has some from experiments in the basics. How much real permanent good will come if we put $10 Billion into food for a few days for everybody, and then let them starve again?

Stop and think...really, how much good are the Billions in Carbon Credits doing for the poor and starving in, say, Africa, or the millions dying in African Hospitals because they are not allowed to burn their own fuel for electricity to run modern hospitals?

All on a pseudo-scientific theory that THIS global warming is totally different from any other in the history of the world, and so we must spend billions to prevent it, rather than put that money into food for the poor.

We ferment their food for fuel, in fact! And do not find out anything new except that it is very inefficient and expensive fuel! But keep right on doing it.

Folks need to do a little more thinking on how it fits together, and who benefits in money and power, and who does not.

Ask any patient in a hospital in the African Bush dying because their power is held back to save Polar Bears if he feels a Polar Bear's life is worth more than his! And then be consistent!!

Instead of giving a fish to feed for a day, let's find out how to make lots of rods so they can be fed for a lifetime!

Big science's big day

Evan, Eugene Oregon — Wed, 05 Mar 2008 23:50:54 GMT

Somebody above asked if this LHC could cook your dinner. I'm assuming because of the tremendous energies involved some part of the apparatus becomes hot enough to carbonize meat. So can your car engine. But seeing as this is an expensive scientific instrument, i would not advise frying eggs on it.

Big science's big day

bitfader, VA — Wed, 19 Mar 2008 11:25:53 GMT

If some dreams were not pursued then all of thought would be discouraged. Without inspiration the world would most likely plunge into another dark age, creating more poverty, more hunger, and despair. Unlocking one door feeds the soul forever. Yes some will starve, but money will not solve their problems as the governments which care for those unfortunate people are likely as corrupt.

Big science's big day

CK, Texas — Mon, 31 Mar 2008 13:05:58 GMT

This is wonderful news. My only regret is that we - the US - failed to lead the effort by allowing the Superconducting Super Collider to collapse.

The US is becoming a scientific "also-ran" and that is a shame. The priorities of this nation are sorely out of whack.

Big science's big day

JTankers, Middleton, WI — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 16:18:50 GMT

Professor Dr. Otto E. Roessler estimates 50 months Earth accretion time from a single micro black hole captured by Earth's gravity (www.golem.de/0802/57477-4.html, translation at www.lhcconcerns.com/LHCConcerns/Forums/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=10&t=52) --Jtankers (talk) 06:40, 6 April 2008 (UTC)

JTankers
LHCConcerns.com

Big science's big day

Tyler, 16, Maryland — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 04:15:09 GMT

This thing is probably going to give off some wicked radiation!
Stand back a couple continents, folks.

Big science's big day

David,edgwater,md — Fri, 06 Jun 2008 05:01:33 GMT

Ok yay this is a lot of money teward this project. But if you read rite it said that user countreys are help funding in the project. witch means that all that 10 bill and moor we probaly dont know about is moving threw contreys and to the poorer peopple. hew are working to make all the difrent metals and things in the project. and if you didnt know this there is a very very small chance that this hole thing will destroy are hole universe. :(

Big science's big day

Hemanta Borah and Saurav Saini, Guwahati, Assam,INDIA — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 07:36:15 GMT

BEST OF LUCK to All of the Team members. Best wishes for your success in your 28 years of team efforts.
From

Hemant & Saurav

Big science's big day

Charles Tomison Hawkins, Texas — Wed, 10 Sep 2008 21:07:03 GMT

It saddens me to remember our US government scrapping the Super Conducting Super Collider project here in Texas. Too many short sighted folks sqawking loudly about tax dollars spent on research. I had hoped the heavy hitters here in Texas like the Hunt's, the Perot's and others would have bought the project at salvage value and pushed it ahead. If that had suceeded, the scientific world would have beaten a path to our door with dollars to spend here.