It's the end of the world as we know it, and I feel fine...
So, my sister is not alone in her concerns about the LHC in Switzerland/France. There are indeed quite a few people worried that it might just end our universe.
(Maybe that's how our universe sprang into being, some other civilization made a LHC and destroyed theirs.)
I've been doing some research into it, and while there have been some concerns about black holes and such, the LHC is just a bigger version of the RHIC, or Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider. Google that yourself for more info. But essentially it has been running for seven or eight years without destroying the universe. The LHC will be doing the same thing on a larger scale. It can even do some things the LHC can't.
The thousand plus scientists who have been working on the LHC for the past twenty years are pretty confident that they aren't going to blow us up. Good enough for me. Here's a report on the black hole issues. Very technical, but essentially saying "no worries".
http://lsag.web.cern.ch/lsag/CERN-PH-TH_2008-025.pdf
And if they do blow us up, well, it will all be over before we are even really aware of it. So why worry? I'm going to be more concerned about wet soil as I start to dig out my wall this week.
More Later
Addendum: 9/16/08
This post is not meant to be patronizing to anyone, as I had some concerns about the LHC myself when I first heard about it. My apologies if anyone's feelings were hurt by what I wrote. If anyone is still offended by this post, please let me know what it is that is offending and I will consider removing it. Thanks
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