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Recreating the early universe

networkworld.com — The Large Hadron Collider, the largest scientific instrument ever built, examines the universe ’s tiniest pieces of matter to discover the origins and makeup of our Universe. This illustrated slideshow describes how the collider works and details each of the six major experiments created to leverage the collider's enormous and unique power.

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  • TentOfSkin, on 04/23/2008, -10/+3Good gravy!
  • Indyanna, on 04/23/2008, -55/+8Quite impressive. The Designers of this entire project are obviously quite Intelligent.

    Oh, wait. What am I saying? Just because it took thousands of scientists from all over the world, and truckloads of money and the latest technology to try and recreate one small part of the Big Bang - that doesn't mean the universe was created and designed, right? No, of course not. It was a total, complete accident. Pure chance.
    • jynweythek, on 09/17/2008, -4/+29it will be fun to check back here tomorrow and see your comment buried to hell.
    • kanuk20, on 04/23/2008, -4/+5I'll assume that your being sarcastic in support of ID. Weak argument my friend. (no references to South Park please)
    • BoneheadFarker, on 04/23/2008, -5/+11Possibly pure chance...we don't know yet. That's why we are designing these tests. But I can guarentee that whatever the cause, it can be explained and understood in scientific terms...
    • Brutusfly, on 04/23/2008, -5/+20Yah! And the Bible says God makes rainbows! They can't possibly be light reflecting back from inside raindrops! One or the other, people! Pick your side!
      • alkajazz, on 04/23/2008, -3/+6Don't forget the rain and sickness and lighting and thunder and the Sun rising and setting.
      • mwmccullough, on 04/23/2008, -3/+5Ramen.
    • MCurley, on 04/23/2008, -3/+4Yeah, a total and complete accident. Instead of changing over time, when the Big Bang happened I spawned in my bedroom ready to go to work.
      Yup, there was no time involved. Just BANG, then time to go to work.
    • UnWeave, on 04/23/2008, -3/+13And here we have a wonderful example of the ignorance of ID supporters. See, the LHC isn't actually creating a little universe, it it merely simulating SOME of the conditions that we believe were present. Were you not a complete ***** idiot, you would see that these are very different things and so realize that your argument is... n't one.
    • abuelos84, on 04/23/2008, -2/+5Heh, i don't know if you are kidding or being serious, but still gave me the chuckles...
    • WayneCA, on 04/23/2008, -2/+8Nice circular logic. So.. if the universe was indeed created and designed.. how in the hell did that designer come to be?? Maybe the designer was designed?

      Chicken meet egg.
      • crump199, on 04/23/2008, -7/+1Well if the universe wasn't created and designed, how the hell did IT come to be?
        And don't tell me the big bang, because that's how the planets and other junk that inhabit the big empty space that is our solar system came to be.
        The universe and everything in it has to have always existed, no beginning, no end.
        What i'm trying to say, is there's somethings people will probably never be able to comprehend, like the infinite, which is pretty much what the universe is.
        There may be a designer, there may not be, it's just what you choose to believe.

        What came first, chicken or the egg? Who gives a crap.
        • WayneCA, on 04/23/2008, -2/+5I agree we probably won't be able to comprehend the entirety of the universe, however, you can't believe that something intelligent designed the universe without explaining how the designer came to be. That's just passing the buck.

          By the way, the big bang is how the universe (not the solar system) came to be the way it is today. The solar system (i.e. the sun and surrounding planets etc) came to be through a giant rotating cloud of gas and dust probably spit out of a supernova elsewhere in the galaxy. The big bang happened 13 billion years ago, our solar system is only 4.6 billion years ago.
      • neonoodle, on 04/23/2008, -2/+2you're an idiot and completely missed the point the original poster was trying to make. Obviously, our universe was made inside a giant large hadron collider in the meta universe. That collider was made by thousands of scientists much like this one. The meta universe, however, was created by chance. < /sarcasm >
        • kanuk20, on 04/23/2008, -4/+2your "< /sarcasm>" has no opening bracket, therefore making everything preceding it to being sarcasm until the system finds an opening bracket. So you just made the comment you are responding to into sarcasm. Nice.
    • Ramble, on 04/23/2008, -3/+8No wonder your a friend of Jimmy.
      Good luck with the whole idiot thing.
  • jbrodkin, on 04/23/2008, -10/+4Slashdot has picked up this story (which links to the slideshow in the Digg entry): http://science.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=08/04/2 ...
  • cmsjustin, on 04/23/2008, -11/+2I hope this isn't all hype, and that least some cool YouTube videos come out of it
    • B1663r, on 04/23/2008, -0/+12Ouch... These colliders don't make very good visuals. They make lots of data which needs to be analyzed statistically, and even then greater that 99% of the data is fairly standard stuff which they already know.

      With this collider they are attempting to nail down The Higgs Boson and probe the properties of the Higgs field, which ~might~ lead to technologies that allow for the reduction/altering of things like mass and intertia.

      So even better than youtube videos, this might let us have our personal jetpacks and flying cars.
      • cmsjustin, on 04/23/2008, -0/+3So we won't actually "see" 2 somethings traveling near the speed of light smash into each other?
        • B1663r, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2I think they will eventually produce a pictograph that shows the collision event with an arrow pointing to one of the sparks that is labeled "That the Higgs Boson!"
        • alecks, on 04/23/2008, -0/+4Just shine a flashlight at the sun and you'll see billions of photons smashing into eachother
    • Zique, on 04/23/2008, -0/+7Considering the proton stream they use in the collider is thinner than human hair, I doubt it'll be very flashy.
      • B1663r, on 04/23/2008, -0/+4My understanding is, even in the old colliders that enough cosmic rays escaped from confinement, that if you put your head right next to the beam pipe and closed your eyes, you could see sparkles and pops as the cosmic rays collided with your retna. Although the brain tumors caused by this exposure was no fun at all.
      • ApokalypseNow, on 04/23/2008, -0/+5I still want to see what happens when you point the stream at a pigeon.
        http://xkcd.com/401/
  • bbqsalad, on 04/23/2008, -3/+15I am really excited about this project. I cant wait until they start it up for the first time...
    • Beanbones, on 04/23/2008, -7/+3Yes, it's all very exciting... but can the Large Hadron Collider run Crysis?
      • bbqsalad, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2Only on high with no AA... And thats with liquid cooling.
    • alkajazz, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2No.
    • crump199, on 04/23/2008, -4/+2I'm ready for the end of the world too.
  • mrlivingston, on 04/23/2008, -7/+29All this talk about large hardons and black holes makes me very uncomfortable.
    • jynweythek, on 09/17/2008, -3/+4i lol'd
    • bakagaigin, on 04/23/2008, -1/+4He's just saying what you all are thinking!
    • zKman, on 04/23/2008, -2/+2I'd supercollider black hole with a large hadron, if you know what I mean...
    • firecow, on 04/23/2008, -1/+7So I says, "Super collider? I just met her!" And then they built the super collider. Thank you, you've been a great audience.
  • mokodo, on 04/23/2008, -20/+8Where it is
    ===========

    Located at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research, the world's largest and most powerful particle accelerator is in the final stages of construction within a 17-mile circular tunnel between 50 and 175 meters underneath France and Switzerland. The tunnel was constructed between 1983 and 1988 and formerly housed an electron-positron collider.

    Large Hadron Collider details
    =============================

    Circumference: 26,659 meters (16.5651 miles)

    Particles accelerated: Protons and heavy ions of lead

    Maximum beam energy: 7 tera-electronvolts (TeV), or 7x10 12 electronvolts, per proton. All protons combined will have an energy equivalent to a person in a 1500 kg vehicle driving at about 25,000 km per hour.

    Total number of magnets: Approximately 9,300; number of large dipole magnets, which steer the beam around the ring: 1,232. Each dipole magnet is 14.3 meters (46.9160 feet) long and weighs around 35 tons.

    Magnetic field: 8.33 Tesla, or about 200,000 times the strength of the Earth's magnetic field, at beam energy of 7 TeV.

    Super cold: The LHC will operate at 1.9 Kelvin (about 300 degrees Celsius below room temperature), colder than outer space. The beampipe's ultrahigh vacuum of 10-10 Torr (about 3 million molecules per cm3 ) is approximately equivalent to the vacuum pressure at an altitude above Earth of 1000 km. For comparison, the International Space Station's orbital altitude is 380 km.

    Super conducting: The total length of the superconducting wire for the LHC, the world's largest superconducting installation, is 250,000 km, enough to go 6.8 times around the equator. It consists of 6300 strands of niobium-titanium filaments, embedded in copper. Each filament is about one tenth of the thickness of a human hair. When ultracold, the wire conducts electricity without resistance.

    Super fast: At their top energy of 7 TeV, the particles in the LHC will travel at 0.999999991 the speed of light. Each proton will travel around the 27-kilometer ring 11,000 times per second. Collisions will occur so often (up to one billion times a second) that particles from one collision will still be traveling through a detector when the next collision happens at the detector's center.

    Super computing: The LHC experiments together will generate more than 10 million gigabytes of data every year (a stack of CDs 20 km high). LHC scientists have created a grid computing system in which more than 100 small and large computing centers share the responsibility for storing, processing, and analyzing the data. PC farms such as this one at CERN will provide the computing power.

    Control room: The CERN Control Centre combines the control functions for the accelerators, the cryogenic system, and the technical infrastructure. It has 39 work places.


    How it will collide protons
    ===========================

    "Two proton beams travel in separate beam pipes passing through oppositely directed magnetic fields. At certain locations around the ring, called 'collision points,' there are no magnetic fields, and the protons are moving in straight lines," CERN explains. "At those places, the two beams can be brought together into a single vacuum enclosure and allowed to collide head-on."

    When the fun starts
    ===================

    Around mid-June, the first proton beams will be injected into the LHC, and particles will start smashing into each other about two months later. Collisions will occur 40 million times a second, creating all sorts of stuff not seen since long before the birth of our solar system. Pictured is the underground tunnel where proton beams will be steered in a circle by magnets.


    ALICE
    =====

    Location: St. Genis-Pouilly, France

    Detector size: 26 meters long, 16 meters high, 16 meters wide

    Detector weight: 10,000 metric tons

    The LHC has six experiments, each with its own detector. One of the largest is ALICE, which stands for "A Large Ion Collider Experiment." ALICE will smash lead ions to recreate the physical makeup of the universe just after the Big Bang. Physicists are looking for a state of matter known as quark-gluon plasma, which should be produced from the melting of protons and neutrons in temperatures 100,000 times hotter than the heart of the Sun. More than 1,000 scientists from 28 countries will examine how the quark-gluon plasma present just after the Big Bang progressively gave rise to the particles in our universe today.


    ATLAS
    =====

    Location: Meyrin, Switzerland

    Size: 46 meters long, 25 meters high, 25 meters wide

    Weight: 7,000 metric tons

    ATLAS (A Toroidal LHC ApparatuS) is one of two LHC experiments using general-purpose detectors designed to uncover the Higgs boson, the search for which may be the most commonly cited goal of the LHC. The Higgs is an elementary particle predicted by theory which is thought to endow all objects with mass. The Higgs has never been observed, but ATLAS -- with its eight 25-meter-long superconducting magnet coils arranged in a doughnut shape around a beam pipe -- is designed to suss out the elusive particle. ATLAS, designed not just to find the Higgs boson but to investigate the largest range of physics possible, will also search for particles that make up dark matter.

    CMS
    ===

    Location: Cessy, France

    Size: 21 meters long, 15 meters wide, 15 meters high

    Weight: 12,500 metric tons

    The CMS (Compact Muon Solenoid) uses the second general-purpose detector searching for the Higgs boson. ATLAS and CMS have the same scientific goals but use detector magnet systems that are designed differently. "Having two independently designed detectors is vital for cross-confirmation of any new discoveries," CERN explains. The huge CMS magnet is a cylindrical coil of superconducting cable that generates a magnetic field 100,000 times more powerful than the one which protects Earth from deadly radiation. Most of the detector's 12,500 metric tons are consumed by a steel yoke that confines the magnetic field.

    LHCb
    ====

    Location: Ferney-Voltaire, France

    Size: 21 meters long, 10 meters high, 13 meters wide

    Weight: 5,600 metric tons

    Why is there something instead of nothing? Or, more specifically, why do we live in a universe that is composed almost solely of matter, rather than anti-matter? If the amounts of matter and anti-matter were equal, all particles would be destroyed, leaving behind a great void of nothingness. The LHCb, or Large Hadron Collider beauty, was designed to investigate the small differences between matter and antimatter by studying a particle called the "beauty quark." To capture beauty quarks created by the LHC, the LHCb will use sophisticated movable tracking detectors close to the path of the beams circling inside the Large Hadron Collider. 650 scientists from 13 countries will study the resulting data.

    TOTEM
    =====

    Location: Cessy, France

    Size: 440 meters long, five meters high, five meters wide

    Weight: 20 metric tons

    The TOTEM (TOTal Elastic and diffractive cross section Measurement) detector will examine physics that is not accessible to the general-purpose detectors (like CMS) by looking for particles produced very close to the LHC beams. "TOTEM will include detectors housed in specially designed vacuum chambers called 'Roman pots,' which are connected to the beam pipes in the LHC," CERN explains. "Roman pots will be placed in pairs at four locations near the collision point of the CMS experiments."

    LHCf
    ====

    Location: Meyrin, Switzerland

    Size: Two detectors, each 30 centimeters long, 80 cm high, 10 cm wide

    Weight: 40 kilograms each

    Cosmic rays are at the heart of the smallest Large Hadron Collider experiment, LHCf (Large Hadron Collider forward). The detector will simulate cosmic rays in laboratory conditions by using forward particles created inside the LHC. "Cosmic rays are naturally occurring charged particles from outer space that constantly bombard the Earth's atmosphere," according to CERN. "Studying how collisions inside the LHC cause similar cascades of particles will help scientists to interpret and calibrate large-scale cosmic-ray experiments that can cover thousands of kilometers."
    • kanuk20, on 04/23/2008, -6/+8It would have been a lot smarter to have linked to your source then to annoy us with an overly large comment.
      • teh_techie, on 04/23/2008, -1/+3If you'd have read the article, you'd realize it's the article content.
        FAIL
        • kanuk20, on 04/24/2008, -1/+1Since you realize this is article content, you have proven my point that this is pointless. Why be forced to read it twice.
          FAIL
      • cmsjustin, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1He's copying the text besides the images, which in my opinion, were a pain in the ass to read quickly.
        • kanuk20, on 04/24/2008, -0/+1Read quickly? Didn't know there was a time limit.
    • pradaaddict, on 04/23/2008, -6/+1tl;dnr
  • badqat, on 04/23/2008, -14/+3Wait a second...so now the Hadron Collider is about recreating the earliest forms of the universe instead of creating a black hole to destroy the universe?

    When are they going to make up their minds?
    • bdog9, on 04/23/2008, -0/+3The black hole they create would at worst destroy our solar system. The universe is safe!
    • alkajazz, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2I didn't know that was the goal.
    • SickTear, on 04/23/2008, -2/+2Douche
  • FishHammer, on 04/23/2008, -8/+3as long as it's just the large hadrons colliding and not the large tetsicles, it's not gay
  • laserblazer, on 04/23/2008, -14/+5The universe never began. It's quite beyond the human mind's scope to understand such a paradox.
    • orangefly, on 04/23/2008, -2/+4this has all happened before and will happen again....
    • kanuk20, on 04/23/2008, -2/+6Considering most people still deny the earth is round or that we evolved, I would agree that we are still to stupid to understand anything. Besides that, I'll assume you are also being sarcastic, because you contradict yourself with that statement, unless your not human.
    • Beanbones, on 04/23/2008, -1/+5Speak for yourself.
    • staffa, on 04/23/2008, -1/+2Unless you are the most intelligent, brilliant and gifted mind with respect to the subject matter to exist past present and future, you have no idea what a human mind could understand.
    • kbro, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2ya? I dare you to prove either one of your assertions.



      • DelayedEraser, on 04/24/2008, -0/+1it's important to remember that scientists are studying the universe *in its current form*
        I read about some theories emerging on what might have existed before the universe as we know it (i.e. before the big bang), but there's very little to go on there, so most scientists stick to what we can actually observe and test. The LHC lets us observe and test some new and very important stuff. It doesn't even attempt to go all the way back to the beginning of this universe – it recreates the conditions *shortly after* the big bang.

        as far as understanding existence as a whole, beyond even our entire concept of the physical universe, I would tend to agree that there is going to be a radical restructuring of our consciousness first, not just new scientific data. (though I don't agree that it would be impossible)
  • DaviDTC, on 04/23/2008, -6/+3Pic #13 is the big black hole it created and is going to eat up that sphere which resembles the earth.
    • WayneCA, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2Because black holes think earths are tasty!
  • leerayIG88, on 04/23/2008, -7/+1042
    • Briankh3, on 04/23/2008, -1/+2That's it? At least a brought a towel.
  • garryw, on 04/23/2008, -7/+2All this to prove string theory wrong? or right.
    • UnWeave, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1To try to find some evidence for it, amongst a load of other things.
    • staffa, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1I don't think you can prove string theory wrong, at least not the general concept. That's kinda the problem. String theory can be reformulated to agree with any reality that happens to exist. That is why it is losing some credability as a useful way of looking at things. It is probably an unneccesary complication.

      However. very specific formulations of string theory can be proved or disproved.
  • JimmySpaza, on 04/23/2008, -31/+1Wouldn't the scientists running this grand experiment have to know pretty much how the alleged Big Bang occurred in order to determine if this machine is providing anything accurate?

    Buried for inaccurate headline and borderline junk science.
    • ApokalypseNow, on 04/23/2008, -2/+22They are testing hypotheses - you know, doing science?
      And actually, we do have a pretty good idea how things happened during the Big Bang, some of which we've been able to test experimentally using the previously-existing, smaller particle accelerators.
    • riskybeats, on 04/23/2008, -2/+19I don't understand it, therefore its wrong.
    • kanuk20, on 04/23/2008, -2/+10Shows someone knows nothing about science. Hypothesis != Theory ( ' != ' is not equal for non-programmers)
    • harmonik, on 04/23/2008, -2/+14I'm just trying to get into your head for a second..
      Gosh, you must be really stressed out. I don't think I could spend my ENTIRE ***** TIME on Digg wandering around trolling and spouting *****.

      WE GET YOUR POINT MAN.

      We realize that you are a small-minded, right-winged, and god-fearing nutcase.
      We realize that your pet-peeve is any display of INTELLIGENCE or scientific test of knowledge. It seems like I can't find a single topic involving science in which you don't attempt to belittle whatever is stated.
      Do you think there's just a coalition of Diggers who get together and bury your dumb comments for the fun of it? No.
      Anyone who reads your babble realizes how much of an idiot you are, and then presses that lovely red button.
      If you haven't gotten it by now, study up..
      Nobody cares about what you have to say. You might as well start filling in every comment you make from now on with "ASFJKAWERGHIAERHIAJERHKJAER," because that is exactly the point you get across.
      You aren't going to change anyone's mind.
      You're certainly proving nothing more with your comments than how feeble your reasoning ability is. I don't think you know how much of an embarrassment you are to yourself or how you've killed any credibility you (ONCE..maybe?) had.
      Give up, already.
    • harmonik, on 04/24/2008, -0/+2Oh, and I feel that this is on topic..
      http://www.pibburns.com/augustin.htm
  • robotto, on 04/23/2008, -10/+1Yeah let's hope we don't get sucked into a mini black hole.
  • scabbers, on 04/23/2008, -3/+18They're waiting for you, Gordon.... in the tesst chamberrrrr
    • Aaronraw, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2Me and my crowbar stand ready.
    • Beanbones, on 04/23/2008, -0/+3I never thought I'd see a resonance cascade. Let alone create one.
    • alkajazz, on 04/23/2008, -0/+3Prepare for unforeseen consequences.
  • heartcoldfusion, on 04/23/2008, -6/+11As a concerned ignoramus, I feel it is my duty to awkwardly inform all Diggers that the LHC is going to like create black holes and stuff that is going to kill the world.
    • Aaronraw, on 04/23/2008, -0/+5You are defiantly an ignoramus. Good Luck with that. http://www.ehow.com/how_2049858_make-tinfoil-hat.h ...
    • Alreadyinuse99, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2The term "black hole" is really not the right one to use here. The best they could do would be to create a singularity which is the environment inside a black hole but not a black hole itself. A black hole's gravity is relative to the amount of matter that it contains. If you were to take a few million protons and compress them into a black hole, that black hole would not have any more gravity than the protons had to begin with. That's not much gravity. A black hole that small would radiate out of existence in a few nano seconds.
      • Aaronraw, on 04/23/2008, -1/+1And THAT is cool. I hope it happens. It would be a breakthrough of epic proportions.
    • friedcalamari, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2The first beams are due for injection mid June 2008. So long and thankx for all the fish.
  • evilregis, on 04/23/2008, -9/+2.
  • McShr3dd3r, on 04/23/2008, -6/+3I for one, welcome our new Black Hole planet devouring Overlords
  • Nhmarine, on 04/23/2008, -1/+6Watch out for the Black Holes! Everyone be paranoid of things you don't understand! Run for your lives! The Black Hole is coming!
  • Nexiec, on 04/23/2008, -0/+5As long as they don't destroy the universe I'm ok with it.
  • COINTELPRO, on 04/23/2008, -9/+1The Universe is two dimensions of energy and one dimension of matter... not space-time

    How do the buffer that much power. I can't see it creating a black hole, it will release energy and increase the mass of something, if they are colliding a few electrons or protons I can't see any problem. Technically your car is creating a black hole or burning fire logs...

    lllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllllll
  • tonerbaloner, on 04/23/2008, -15/+1Wow and I thought our Federal Government was good at wasting money.
  • bdog9, on 04/23/2008, -2/+2I'm a layman as well, but just to clarify to people who are worried about black holes:

    Yes, the LHC will create lots of black holes. They will be micro-sized ones. A black hole is not defined by its mass, i.e. a collapsed sun is a very massive black hole. It is defined by its volume--A single atom can be a black hole if it is somehow crushed into infinitely small space. It would be a micro-blackhole, but have almost no gravity of its own. It is possible for it to grow, however, by smacking into other atoms.

    The reason scientists are not worried about this is that Steven Hawking theorized that black holes tend to evaporate on their own. (a small one should evaporate very quickly)
    • Ramble, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2That's not the aim, they're not even sure if they will create mini black holes, if we're lucky we will do and we'll observe it.
  • godseyeview, on 04/23/2008, -5/+3This is where time travel starts. http://www.johntitor.com/ Each microsingularity is a gateway into another universe. The multiverse is ultimately deterministic with parallel dimensions of variance and the observer individual has a quantum effect of deciding which path through the parallel existences he observes. Get the calculation of the deviance of parallel universes and have the black hole swallow a small object say a car and u can jump universes.
    • Beanbones, on 04/23/2008, -1/+1Your comment in and of itself is a black hole of reason, with the link being its event horizon. Thoughts go in, nothing comes out.
    • daecrist, on 04/23/2008, -1/+2Burying your comment as inaccurate. Everyone knows that time travel was invented in 1985 and requires a DeLorean equipped with a flux capacitor.
  • DuffyDirect, on 04/23/2008, -3/+2How do sci-fi writers get the notion that these black holes can teleport ships across the universe?
  • ryleyleckie, on 04/23/2008, -1/+3although i fully support the science behind it, this thing still scares the ***** out of me.
  • tuzziel, on 04/23/2008, -15/+2What for?

    Why are we paying millions for this futile research especially at this turbolent time?

    Nobel prize hunters, tax leeches, narcistic egoists that are running useless but very "scientific" research at our expense,
    whole CERN is one tax predating boffin kindergarten. Sorry, but there is nothing positive or usefull stemming from this ****, aside, of course, a sci-fame for those selected few..!?
    • CrackyJSquirrel, on 04/23/2008, -0/+8I agree finding out about the origins of life is neither positive nor useful.. I would type more, but my knuckles drag on the ground and are hurting today..
    • Ramble, on 04/23/2008, -0/+6You think particle physics is useless?
      Lets hope you never use any medical scanning equipment, nor any product that has benefitted from particle physics abnd imaging (good luck finding those that do not).

      Maybe you should stop wasting $5000 a second on the Iraq war, or maybe you're right because the dollar is becoming more worthless than monopoly money thanks to your 'more useful' activities.
    • YoThisBAlec, on 04/23/2008, -0/+8That thing you're typing on? If people like you had their way it would never exist.
    • Beanbones, on 04/23/2008, -0/+1YoThisVAlec is spot on - without CERN, we'd have neither HTTP nor FTP. But in all fairness, I find myself agreeing in principle - if a person doesn't WANT to support this kind of research, they shouldn't have to. We can't force people to be open-minded and interested in progress, no matter how much good that'd do.
      • eir574, on 04/24/2008, -0/+2Unfortunately, society doesn't work very well that way. What if I want to opt out of paying for roads (not to mention other infrastructure) with my taxes because I'm willing to walk everywhere I go? We all agree that once society decides to do spend money on something, we're all in it together. We get to have input (ideally) at the point where the decision is made to spend the money and at times when that decision is reviewed, not afterwards and in between.
    • vengefuldrx, on 04/24/2008, -0/+2I was going to try to make a coherent argument. Instead I think I shall just tell you to go to hell.
  • euvirtual, on 04/23/2008, -0/+3Digg reads global warming article: How can people be so arrogant as to think that we, as a species, can be directly responsible for the shifts in weather patterns on this planet?
    Digg reads LHC article: OH MY GOD. Those guys are crazy, and are going to create black holes that will destroy the earth, and possibly the entire universe.

    Yes, I know. too much generalization.
  • tratten, on 04/23/2008, -0/+2TOTEM (TOTal Elastic and diffractive cross section Measurement) [slide #11]
    Wow! They really wanted that acronym...
  • NecroSexy, on 04/24/2008, -0/+1They should have Iron Man inaugurate the LHC in style: Proton Cannon!
  •  

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