Science: Stop it before it kills someone!
So, scientists are looking to flip the switch on the big ass doohickie that will kill us all. Or not. Depends who you talk to, someone educated or someone thumping a holy book. Supposedly, this will simulate the universe at the approximate time of the Horrendous Space Kablooey. And don’t even get me started on The Universe.
In equally scary but also equally kinda cool news, scientists are on the verge of creating life. And I, for one, welcome our new protocells built from fatty molecules overlords.
See you tomorrow. . . maybe.
September 9th, 2008 at 2:06 pm
Life, Death, Creation, Destruction – all are one and the same. At least to the disinterested observer. Are there any of those around whom we could use to report on the results from the Hadron Collider – or is that a Schroe-dinger cat of a question?
September 9th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
I, for one, welcome our new Interdimensional Overlords.
Heh. It’s not as dangerous as the unshielded ion propulsion drive model I built for a high school science project. The worst that will happen is that the sucker will probably draw so much current that the espresso machines in Geneva will brown out and not make enough steam for a good crema.
Even Texas A&M has a Cyclotron. If you can trust Aggies with old toys like that…
If I were more of a team player, I’d see if my neighborhood would be interested in writing up grant papers for a Toshiba nuclear block powerplant. A little nukie never hurt anyone.
Regards,
Rabbit.
September 9th, 2008 at 2:24 pm
The same thing happens when cosmic rays strike the atmosphere. We will be here tomorrow and Hawking is right, they won’t find the Higgs Boson.
In the end they will blame conservatives for the failure.
But some wicked cool science will come from this. I have a friend going there for four years. Just because they don’t bag the Higgs Boson doesn’t mean it wasn’t worth it.
I can’t wait for string theory to be shown the door.
September 9th, 2008 at 2:45 pm
“Life, Death, Creation, Destruction – all are one and the same. At least to the disinterested observer.”
I am definitely not disinterested. I am very interested in my own life, a little less interested in most other peoples’. But the nice thing about the scientific doohickey is that if it kills us all I probably won’t notice.
September 9th, 2008 at 3:09 pm
It’s OK. They haz a button.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2008/09/lhc-is-safe-cms-stop-button.html
September 9th, 2008 at 4:03 pm
When the scientists set off to test the very first a-bomb, about half of the scientists believed it would work as planned, the other half believed it would start a chain reaction that would consume earth’s atmosphere.
I just pray they are as lucky with this endevor.
September 9th, 2008 at 5:45 pm
Stupid people getting worked up over something that can’t happen tomorrow. Why? Because they aren’t doing collisions tomorrow! Just running the protons in a big circle to see if they can make it. That’s it.
So we’ll still be here tomorrow. So they’ll change the date for the end of the world, micro black hole invasion, etc as nothing happens.
Sigh. Like the Dutch, the stupid are everywhere.
September 9th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
In equally scary but also equally kinda cool news, scientists are on the verge of creating life.
*tosses Gasoline*
So would that make it Intelligent(ly) Designed? ‘Cause I thought ID was completely UnScientific? And if it ever evolved into an intelligent species would it be allowed to contemplate ID in it’s Science Classes?
*running away* 🙂
September 9th, 2008 at 6:32 pm
It is not intelligent design, as the “lifeforms” created aren’t part of a grand masterplan which encompasses the entire creation.
As for the LHC scare … what of it? Wake me up when they start stockpiling antimatter, then I’ll break a sweat.
September 9th, 2008 at 7:11 pm
Michael, you better start sweating then
While not antimatter, per se, my wife has amassed a large quantity of anti-cash which seems to annihilate my money instantly. However, unlike a matter / antimatter reaction the cash / anti-cash reaction results in shoes and scrapbooking materials.
September 9th, 2008 at 10:55 pm
How much damage can two subatomic particles do?? heh…
September 9th, 2008 at 11:43 pm
Flip the switch, Man. I guess the fact that they call this theoretical particle a “God Particle” is the reason some people are getting their panties in a bind over it. I mean, who gave a crap about the quark or the muon?
The Frankenstein model has infinite manifestations, but basically they all say that our creative impetus is going to kill us, kill us all I tell you, which is to say that that which makes us human (our inquisitive, creative minds) is the very thing we should hate and fear, i.e. people suck and would be better off forced to live like monkeys.
We were warned before the Trinity test that the bomb might, just might, cause a chain reaction in the Earth’s atmosphere and destroy life as we know it. I don’t think any real physicists were worried about it– it’s tough enough to get uranium in a chain reaction, and it’s way more fragile than, say, nitrogen atoms. Besides, we’ve been on the verge of the End of The World for practically as long as humans have been able to communicate abstract concepts, scaring the shit out of one another for amusement and attention.
Scientists have been “on the verge of creating life” for at least 50 years. Maybe always will be.
According to the famous astrophysicist, Douglas Adams, before the Big Bang, there was (is?) a restaurant called “The Big Bang Burger Chef” in which you may have a nice meal whilst observing the Big Bang. You of course need a decent time ship to get there, and they’re not easy to come by. At the far far other end of time, you may visit the Restaurant At The End Of the Universe, where you may enjoy a fabulous meal while observing the end of everything.
Robb; Interesting observation. I have generated a fair amount of anticash as well. Cash does annihilate it however. Further, anticash seems to increase in mass over time in the absence of cash, which is the opposite of what we observe in other unstable elements. The closest thing to it that we might observe in the universe would be a black hole, which sucks everything into it, and from which virtually nothing comes.
September 10th, 2008 at 7:43 am
*looks around*
What’s that giant sucking sound?
September 10th, 2008 at 7:53 am
Well, it is tomorrow.
Hi!
:waves:
September 10th, 2008 at 8:24 am
Is it safe now?
September 10th, 2008 at 9:02 am
You have more to worry about with Obama.
September 10th, 2008 at 9:04 am
That is, at best, an exaggeration. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and assume you read that urban myth someplace and are just parroting what you read, so I won’t actually call “Bullshit!” on you.
September 10th, 2008 at 2:38 pm
It is not intelligent design, as the “lifeforms” created aren’t part of a grand masterplan which encompasses the entire creation – Michael
1) ID doesn’t actually posit such a thing. Those who believe that ID is simply a repackaged creationism have mistakenly attributed it to them. ID doesn’t attempt to explain the creation of the Earth, for instance, much less the universe. For all the ID’ers care, we could just be the result of some alien species Science experiment that they’ve since lost funding for.
2) Who said the scientist won’t eventually have a grand masterplan for the construction and evolution of said lifeform?
September 10th, 2008 at 8:19 pm
Tam:
“When the scientists set off to test the very first a-bomb, about half of the scientists believed it would work as planned, the other half believed it would start a chain reaction that would consume earth’s atmosphere.”
Yeah, untrue. I’ve been hearing that one since I was a kid. In the early ’60s. It was media hype for the most part, but some “scientist” did speculate about it. That speculation of course became a main story for some. R. Feynman wrote about it in his autobiography, IIRC. He worked on the Manhattan Project. It just wasn’t a big deal to those who were actually involved.
September 11th, 2008 at 4:00 am
1)Those who believe that ID is simply a repackaged creationism have mistakenly attributed it to them.
Key word: mistakenly
2) Who said the scientist won’t eventually have a grand masterplan for the construction and evolution of said lifeform?
The complexity of such a masterplan exceeds the capabilities of mere humans. Furthermore, the humans are themselves part of the creation and gods plan, and if you start saying that god acts out his will through us humans, then you might as well start saying that he intended for evolution to take place.
And what folly would that be! Claiming that a being of unintelligible wisdom and foresight would be able to predict how the world would evolve if he simply provided for the very beginning. Ha! Absurd I tell you.
Okay, enough with the sarcasm. For those who are interested, I’m a highly religious agnostic who puts no faith in any bible. I’m also a scientists who considers evolution to be the most likely way for the world to have becomes as it was, following spontaneous generation as seen in the Urey-Miller experiment.
I don’t believe in intelligent design or the actions of a supernatural being, though I do entertain the idea that both could be real and true.