Dooms Day Approaches! Yes, the Hadron Collider Will Soon Be Up and Running. Can This Be the End?

John Lake
Here's good news for dooms day fans! The Swiss Particle Accelerator, aka the "Large Hadron Collider" will soon be back up and running.
We recall that the collider is a 17 mile long circular tunnel in Geneva, Switzerland, built by the worlds scientists to magnetically propel small gold particles to a speed approaching the speed of light, this in a vacuum environment at cold space temperatures near absolute zero.
The small particles will be moving at those light speeds, in opposite directions, with the intent of a collision, which will be photographed and studied, to provide information related to the "big bang",- black holes, and various other theoretical applications.
During September of 2008, the collider ran into a problem when a faulty electrical connection between two of its magnets caused a malfunction in the cooling system that subsequently led to a helium leak. By the latest reckoning, the system will be turned on again in late September 2009.

But here I must express concern. The scientists all tell us we have nothing to fear from banging particles together at light plus speeds. Maybe they have a false sense of security. I recall that when we first split the atom, there was some concerne that we may burn a hole through the planet. Now that we are colliding particles head-on, instead of splitting, some have registered similar fears.

We may accept that two particles cannot exceed the speed of light relative to one another.
Does that mean that if a particle- some traveling neutron in our Milky Way, for example - moveing at light speed , and another such particle in say, Andromeda, also moving at light speed and more or less toward one another,then does a difficult to understand theory come in to play, and somehow change the equation?

Einstein says that the energy produced by splitting atoms equals the mass of the atoms, multiplied by the speed of light squared..

The Swiss supporters say that the mass of the particles involved in the proposed collision is so small that the energy produced would be a mere sneeze. But Dr. Einstein says that a particle moving at 186,000 miles/second has "infinite mass". Now if the particles being smashed head-on in the collider (to be photographed by cameras capable of taking 2000 pictures/second) have infinite mass and the impact produces energy at infinite mass times the speed of light squared, then, one must wonder, is there any justification for the speculation that the entire universe will there and then end? No more space - no more time? "Like two universes coming together, and everything flying apart!". Who knows.Perhaps before the fabled "big bang", there was a group of scientists trying to smash a few particles together..

And incidentally,our scientists trying to record particles colliding at the speed of light with the aforementioned cameras is not unlike a Renaissance painter in oils trying to record the takeoff of a single hummingbird on a single specific occasions.

Maybe I worry too much!

Published by John Lake

Born on the North Side of Chicago. Educated at the University of Illinois, Years in Wonder Lake, and Lake Geneva, then back to Chi-town!  View profile

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  • Cassandra Antares3/5/2010

    thanks for your comment on my page. Also, it seems to me that creating a little wormhole is a bit much, with the atmosphere as it is already with the supposed "global warming" maybe they should put it off until the earthquakes are over with, what if one hit there while it was in use? they are to start it up this month again.

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