Large Hadron Collider
- Thread starter Lysander
- Start date
OK, so far I've learned:
a] It collides hadrons
b] because they're looking for pig's bosun. But they don't know whether it will actually work.
I'm not getting very far with this.
Talk about scaremongering and not knowing the actual facts.
http://www.misunderstooduniverse.com/France_Builds_Doomsday_Machine.htm
Check out the comment (98) for an even bigger laugh.
Yes. Kick there arses.
You seem to have forgotten that this experiment has already given us the internet, scanners for airport security and MRI scanners to greatly improve health care. Seems like we've already got our moneys worth, and it can only get better
How? I'm not being argumentative, I'm genuinely interested to know.
Know what? Sorry if I've misunderstood, but did you mean to quote me?
Also, I was at CERN last November, and was standing next to the ATLAS detector, and I can tell you that it certainly is an impressive piece of kit
No no, I meant to quote you. I was wondering how the LHC has given us MRI scanners, etc etc. Was the research into building it relevant to those kinds of machines as well?
Do you have a link, that's wonderful.
Well indeed. What a salient point.
I'm sure there are multiple things this project will accomplish. Possibly the Higgs Bosun, nanobots that can repair axons, rayguns for starships or one of those fairground grabby machines that actually picks up the bunny. I say leave them to it.
I think it's not that black and white. There are people - not just in the UK - who don't have a Danny LaRue about this kind of thing and its implications. They will have not heard of the LHC, particle colliders, string theory or anything; they'll believe the media stories and then be overcome with fear at something they don't understand and have no hope of ever doing so.
In a more underdeveloped place such as India where the class pyramid is top heavy with the working class, there is a greater possibility that people will get scared out of their minds and kill themselves because at least then they have control. It's the age-old problem of the governments having massive power to control a Doomesday Device that will kill us all. And a lot of people will believe it because they have no other frame of reference.
It doesn't make them stupid, just uninformed. Sure, they could go on the internet and 'educate themselves' but they're far more likely to believe a newspaper which says "the end is nigh" than scores of websites which say, "this is a very promising particle collider which can help develop future technology and possibly find the Higg's Bosun". What the hell is that going to mean to them? It's just meaningless wasted words grinding literary metal. The fault lies with the media, not the people who take it in.
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Yes, but a lot of people don't think that way. They don't sit down and consider all the reasonable possibilities, they're governed by instant knee-jerk reactions. When you're scared, you don't always have the nouse to be able to sit down and figure out the alternatives.
It's a matter of perspective. We have the privileged position of being able to know more about it and not be concerned. Those people who don't research things on the internet, who read the news, who don't have even a basic knowledge of physics or the benefits such research can reap are more likely to be frightened. We can't say "if I were in their position I wouldn't be frightened" since we'd be in a completely different culture with a different mindset.