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[Skull Commander]

Originally Posted by pixie

Ahh sorry Skull Commander just noticed your post is a link, didn't see it in Politics & Current Affairs but at least now you all have a countdown!

I didn't realise I'd even done that. I just copied and pasted the link. Must be after that black hole experiment. It's taking a grip of the fairum!!!!

[Flash@TMB]

The whole thing is pointless. Every time they build one of these things to smash little things into each other, all they ever find is even littler things. Somewhere out there God is laughing. The money would be better spent on beer.

[soundian]

Originally Posted by Ithaca

£500 million. Bargain! What's it do again? Oh yeah, science stuff! We'll have a better understanding of the universe. 1.1 billion people don't have clean water, but it's ok 'cause we'll all find out a little more about dark matter!

If it wasn't for this "science stuff" most of the other 4.5 billion of us wouldn't have clean water either. (as well as power, enough food, etc etc)

[Flash@TMB]

Let them eat Higgs boson.

[Ithaca]

Originally Posted by french_disko

By that logic, why are you using a computer or using central heating or driving a car when there's 1.1 billion people without clean water?

Because I've been fortunate enough to be born in a developed country where people take simple things for granted every day (I'm not discounting myself from this!). Are you saying that I can't make a post quoting fact and opinion of this ilk unless I'm thirsty everyday? Forgive me, you're right. I'll crack on with the rest of my easy life, give my weekly £2 to water aid, fuck my girlfriend and go to sleep with a big smile on my face knowing a big fuck off science experiment will explain the universe to me and I've done my little bit. Thankyou for you're insight.

[Chris]

Originally Posted by lepeep

I still don't read on those pages that dave sent

*cough*

[daveofficer]

Originally Posted by Ithaca

£500 million. Bargain! What's it do again? Oh yeah, science stuff! We'll have a better understanding of the universe. 1.1 billion people don't have clean water, but it's ok 'cause we'll all find out a little more about dark matter!

did you know the internet was pretty much invented at cern, the home of the large hadron collider?

£500 million for arguably one of the most empowering inventions of modern times is a bargain. plus we get cool extras like better nanotechnology as we learn more about the miniscule world around us leading to all manner of amazing medical and commercial breakthroughs.

[lepeep]

Originally Posted by Chris

*cough*

I'd read it at 1.30 am....went to bed....got up.....had a 50 / 50 chance....ho ho. I just hope that you two don't bump into each other, you might cause a singularity...sorry chris!

[Chris]

Big Bang day on radio 4
BBC - Radio 4 - Big Bang Day

[lepeep]

Originally Posted by soundian

To put it simply:
The reason there were no protons at that point was because the universe had too much energy for the constituent particles of protons to "stick" together. You can use the analogy of ice and steam if it helps, with ice being protons and steam being the "soup" of elementary particles.
The only way to force protons apart into their elementary particles is to shove them together at such high velocities that there is enough energy created when they "crash" to separate them out.

Black holes are "fuzzy", i.e. they emit energy .
Quantum black holes, like the ones they might create in the LHC, are incredibly tiny, much less mass than a proton iirc and since E=mc² they don't have a lot of energy .
Quantum black holes radiate so much energy compared to their mass that their lifetime is the merest fraction of a second.
To use another analogy, think of two spheres*. The smaller the sphere has the larger proportion of surface area to volume, i.e. it can radiate more of it's total energy than a bigger sphere. As the sphere gets smaller, the proportion of total energy emitted gets larger, so the "evaporation" process speeds up.

So, they're you go, nothing to worry about.
Unless every top brainy person in the last 100 years or so has got things incredibly wrong.

*surface area of sphere=4Πr²
volume of sphere=4/3Πr³

That's a great response, thanks for that...but it still flys in the face of "reason". Even if ripping apart atoms creates the same energies / "possible" particles at the begginging of the big bang - it still strikes me as incorrect to state that it will be the same conditions as the start of the universe. The "difficult" aspect (and what is at the root of all "science Vs Religion" arguments is, we should be creating "something from nothing".


To put it simply, I have a vision that it's like smashing two busses together, saying that the wreckage will explain what happens when two elephants smash together...(does that make sense?) - but - this again is obviously an oversimplification. I'll write a letter to the new scientist. that's what I'll do.