CERN LHC = danger?

This is a quote from lifeboat.com. I left these quotes about the risks of the LHC in full here as they explain very well the risks. This material can be found in it's original at: http://lifeboat.com/ex/particle.accelerator.shield

This is a possible risk scenario explained in a movie way.

'Alright, so accidents happen. But the accident that happened today is a rather awful one. Scientists triggered the end of the Universe. By mistake, that is.

It was all supposed to be under control. Sure, in the 1990s, there were some oddball scientists who gave off warnings that things might one day go terribly wrong at the lab. But no-one really cared.

Unfortunately, the oddballs were right. Today, during an experiment in high-energy physics, the inconceivable happened. The experiment triggered what scientists call a quantum vacuum collapse. And one second later, the dreaded phenomenon has wiped out all matter on the planet. The world with everything and everyone on it has simply ceased to exist.

But that's not all. Traveling at the speed of light, a huge wave of destruction sets out from where the Earth used to be. Like the shockwave of a bomb exploding, it flings off into all directions. And everywhere it passes, it brings about mayhem and destruction. Voom! -- there goes the Moon. Slam! -- that was the Sun. Spat! -- Mars, Jupiter, Pluto; all gone. The shockwave never stops. It will expand and expand. And expand, until every molecule in the Universe is dead.

(admin: i always must think of PacMan - as in the game - eating it all)

So, what exactly is going on? The answer takes you to the heart of quantum physics: the chunk of science that deals with the tiny particles that make up everything in the Universe. Quantum theory predicts that the Universe is filled with so-called vacuum energy -- which is the average energy of all those zillions of particles that pop into and out of existence everywhere around us each moment. As the Universe expanded, the vacuum energy dropped down to the lowest possible level. Well, in theory, that is.

So what would spark off the collapse? Well: particle accelerators, for example. In a particle accelerator, science smashes all kinds of tiny particles into each other to learn more about matter and the Universe. Now that's neat -- but according to critics, there's a real possibility such collisions may yield enough energy to push the Universe off balance. `The Universe can be blown to smithereens', as one of them (Paul Dixon) cosily put it in 1998.

If you find all this hard to understand, don't worry. Even specialized physicists don't fully understand how the quantum vacuum works.

Phew, that indeed seems reassuring. On the other hand: as some physicists have pointed out, there is also a possibility nature simply hasn't found the right fuse yet. And here on Earth, we're experimenting with all kinds of new fuses -- for example, we're doing and planning particle accelerator experiments with rare elements such as gold and with elements that are so unstable they don't exist in `real' nature.

What's more, accidents happen. And the bigger the science, the bigger the accidents. So please, dear physicists. If you read this, please be a little careful.'

This is a quote from lifeboat.com. I left these quotes about the risks of the LHC in full here as they explain very well the risks. This material can be found in it's original at: http://lifeboat.com/ex/particle.accelerator.shield

This is a possible risk scenario explained in a movie way.

'OOPS! - Honey, I Think I Blew Up The Universe...

There's a fuel supply that is costless, unlimited and that gives off no pollution at all when you use it. There's just one minor problem. When you try to use it, you may accidentally blow up part of the Universe.

It will be over before anyone can say `sorry'. In a laboratory somewhere, someone tries to get hold of a weird and completely new, exotic type of energy. But boy, the experiment goes out of hand. Suddenly, there's a BIG explosion. And then there's nothing -- our planet, the sun, all planets in our solar system and even some stars surrounding our solar system have been blown to smithereens.

And explaining what went wrong isn't even simple. We're talking quantum physics here: the physics of the vanishingly small building blocks that make up all matter in the Universe.

In quantum physics, everything is totally different from daily life. Quantum particles can be in two places at the same time, and can behave both like waves and particles. In fact, when you hear a quantum physicist say `particles', don't think of little, round balls. Quantum `particles' are better compared with tones of music: they're definitely there, but you can't see them or catch them.

One of the most mind-boggling properties of quantum particles is that they come into existence out of nowhere. Suck every molecule of air out of a bottle, making it completely vacuum -- and quantum particles will still be there. They pop up in pairs out of nowhere. And within a tiny fraction of a second, they merge together and -- zzzip! -- they're gone.

It is precisely this odd `quantum vacuum' that may one day open the door to a very new source of energy. Suppose you're able to snatch some of those out-of-nowhere particles away. Admittedly, you'll have to be REALLY fast. But if you do succeed, you'll have harvested particles out of nowhere. And since matter and energy are basically the same stuff (according to Einstein's E=mc2), you'll have energy out of nowhere!

The advantages would be unimaginable. Here's an energy source that never runs out, is everywhere around, is extremely cheap, and causes no pollution whatsoever.

But then again, there is a small, but alarming risk. There may be simply energy too much. Mining the quantum vacuum might bring about an unstoppable chain reaction, releasing an ever increasing amount of energy. In fact, no-one knows how much energy will be released: calculations done by physicists give answers anywhere between zero and infinity.

Obviously, too much energy would mean trouble. The explosion could be huge enough to blow apart our entire solar system and everything around it. And of course, infinite energy would bring about infinite destruction, bombing not just a handful of stars, but everything in the entire Universe.

Gladly, no present-day scientist is capable of mining the quantum vacuum. On the other hand: one day, there will be. And that day may arrive sooner than you think: some estimate around 2020 science will be ready. Let's hope physicists finally have their calculations straightened out by then.

So it's `wait and see'. And talking about `seeing': as the famous science-fiction writer Arthur C. Clarke once pointed out, whenever you see an unexplained burst of energy coming from the cosmos (and there are a lot of them), it may be some alien civilization, blowing itself to kingdom come while experimenting with the quantum vacuum...'

This is a quote from lifeboat.com. I left these quotes about the risks of the LHC in full here as they explain very well the risks. This material can be found in it's original at: http://lifeboat.com/ex/particle.accelerator.shield

This is a possible risk scenario explained in a movie way.

Strange Apocalypse

Isn't that appalling? This morning, all matter on our planet suddenly changed into a very different kind of stuff. The changes are quite radical. For one thing, our bodies have just ceased to exist.

This time, the trouble didn't come from some colossal piece of rock slamming into our planet, or from some divinity deciding to end our world. No, the danger was so small we didn't even see it coming. We're talking quarks here: the tiny building blocks that make up protons and neutrons.

Quarks come in different `flavors'. There's `up' quarks, and `down' quarks, and `strange' quarks. The nuclei of atoms are made of just the right mix of just the right quarks. Matter ultimately is made of `up' and `down' quarks.

But other mixtures are possible too. In the first moments after the Big Bang, there also was stuff made of `up', `down' and `strange' quarks. It was a completely different kind of stuff than what we're used to. Appropriately, scientists call it strange matter.

But as the universe expanded, strange matter vanished -- although some chunks of strange matter (called `S-curves') may still be out there somewhere. One thing's for sure, though: no human has ever actually spotted a single speck of strange matter.

Oh, but that can change. In recent years, quantum physicists have tried hard to imitate the earliest moments of the Universe. That sounds more difficult than it is: the only thing you have to do, basically, is to slam two particles at tremendous speed head-on into each other. And that's exactly what they do at huge particle accelerators such as those at CERN in Geneva or the `Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider' (RHIC) at Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York.

You already feel what showed up this morning. Strange matter, my friend. LOTS of it.

In a particle accelerator experiment, a tiny bit of strange matter suddenly popped into existence. Against all expectation, it had a negative charge. The next moment, it engaged into a chain reaction theoretical physicists call `Ice-9 Type Transition'.

Sure, the lump of strange matter that showed up was incredibly small. But that changed within moments, as the `strangelet' began gobbling up all positively charged atomic nuclei it encountered, forming more strange matter. The blob grew and grew, eating the accelerator, the building around it, and the town around the building. It turned everything it encountered into more atom-eating strange matter. It was ice-9 at its best. Within seconds, our entire planet including everything on it became a strange matter planet.

Does that, er... matter? Oh man, you just don't wanna know. All conventional atoms ceased to exist this morning. And in case you forgot, everything we know of, including us, is made of atoms. What's worse, strange matter particles are equally charged, making them want to go away from each other as far as possible, like the equally charged sides of a magnet. Simply put, all matter on the planet has fallen apart this morning. The world went boom, or whatever the sound was.

Well alright, I'll admit it. Of course, nothing really happened today. I wouldn't be writing this if it had. But could it happen tomorrow? Or next week, next year?

Here's some reassurance: strange matter is so unstable, it simply wouldn't have time to consume nearby atoms. What's more, strange matter probably has a positive charge. And positively charged strangelets aren't very dangerous. They would have an appetite for electrons, sure, but this wouldn't bring about a chain reaction. The strangelet would simply snatch away a few electrons from surrounding atoms, and that would be it.

Would, probably, perhaps. Actually, no one knows for sure. As I already mentioned, no human being has ever studied a chunk of strangeness. And if scientific history has made one thing clear, it should be that reality often defies theory. As the Russian theorist Lev Landau once put it: `Cosmologists are often wrong, but never in doubt.'

Strange, don't you think?

This is a quote from lifeboat.com. I left these quotes about the risks of the LHC in full here as they explain very well the risks. This material can be found in it's original at: http://lifeboat.com/ex/particle.accelerator.shield

This is a possible risk scenario explained in a movie way.

'No, really -- you just don't want to know this. There’s a remote, but extremely terrifying possibility our planet is about to be swallowed from within by a man-made black hole. In fact, our planet could be booby trapped with baby black holes already.

It is one weird way to go. One moment, you’re here. And the next -- you’re not. It will be sudden, and dramatic. Within seconds, the planet, with everything and everyone on it, is reduced to nothingness. Or actually: it is squeezed together into a tiny black hole, no more than 9 millimeters wide.

Perhaps some astronauts will realize what has happened. They might recall how back in the early 21st century, physicists tried to create baby black holes in the lab. And now, many years later... Well, the black holes obviously did show up, after all.

And then continues:

'So, it’s 2007, and science switches on its LHC. According to some calculations, this super particle accelerator could summon up one black hole every second! There they are: black hole, black hole, black hole; Pop! Pop! Pop! Now suppose that against all expectations, these baby black holes aren’t the fleeting, unstable mini monsters we expect them to be. Suppose they’re stable.

At first, no one would notice. They wouldn’t eat up the lab or something. Instead, they would escape. One by one, the baby black holes would leak away from the lab, going through concrete walls as if they didn’t exist. If you’re that small, traveling through solid objects is no problem: you just rarely bump into a molecule.

And then? Slowly, our refugee black holes would begin to sink towards the center of the Earth, attracted by gravity. And there, they would sit and wait.'

And then asks:

' So, should we leave?

Well, that’s hard to say. As far as we know, everything should be okay. Our world is constantly being bombarded by tiny, high energy particles from outer space. This should also create mini black holes, high up in the atmosphere: up to one hundred each year. And as far as we know, these black holes are indeed unstable. For the last 4,5 billion of years, our planet didn’t die.

Now, you don't want to be such a surprise to be a black hole that has our planet for breakfast!

And then there’s this. In march 2005, scientists working on the Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider in Upton, New York created a fireball that indeed looked awfully much much like a black hole.

It was unstable. In fact, it wasn't even a real black hole. Or so the scientists involved say. Perhaps the first man-made black hole is on its way to the center of the planet already!'

This is a quote from an article at Risk Evaluation Forum, published in March 2005:

The text continues with:

'...This study explores processes that could cause accretion to be significant.

Other dangers of the LHC accelerator are also discussed.

I. Arguments for danger in LHC particle accelerator experiments

"In the 27-kilometer-long circular tunnel that held its predecessor, the LHC will be the most powerful particle accelerator in the world. It will smash fundamental particles into one another at energies like those of the first trillionth of a second after the Big Bang, when the temperature of the Universe was about ten thousand trillion degrees Centigrade." [Ref. 5]

1. There is a high probability that micro black holes (MBHs) will be produced in the LHC. A reasonable estimation of the probability that theories with (4+d) dimensions are valid could be more than 60%. The CERN study indicates in this case a copious production of MBHs at the LHC. [Ref. 1] One MBH could be produced every second. [Ref. 4 & Ref. 5]

2. The CERN study indicates that MBHs present no danger because they will evaporate with Hawking evaporation. [Ref. 1] However, Hawking evaporation has never been tested. In several surveys, physicists have estimated a non trivial probability that Hawking evaporation will not work. [Ref. 9] My estimate of its risk of Hawking evaporation failure is 20%, or perhaps as much as 30%.

The following points assume MBH production, and they assume that Hawking evaporation will fail.

3. The cosmic ray model is not valid for the LHC. It has been said that cosmic rays, which have more energy than the LHC, show that there is no danger. This may be true for accelerators that shoot high energy particles at a zero speed target. This is similar to cosmic ray shock on the moon's surface. In these cases the center of mass of interaction retains a high speed.

4. Lower speed MBHs created in colliders could be captured by earth. Using Greg Landsberg's calculation [Ref. 3] of one black hole with velocity less than escape velocity from earth produced every 10^5 seconds at the LHC, we have 3.160 (US notation 3,160) MBHs captured by earth in ten years.

5. The speed of a MBH captured by earth will decrease and at the end MBHs will come to rest in the center of earth. The speed will decrease because of accretion and interaction with matter.'

In concludes with:
'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: Risk evaluation forum
Link: http://www.risk-evaluation-forum.org/anon1.htm