Comments on: 10 Things About the Large Hadron Collider You Wanted to Know But Were Afraid to Ask

By: 1 of the unlucky 6 billion

1 of the unlucky 6 billion — Mon, 31 Aug 2009 08:14:34 +0000

Large Hadron Collider ang A Reached Lord Rolling
Cost yeh right good one.You keep beliving them statistics what they tell u
400 yrs ago they said The world was flat
{Well for once chaps you might be right}
Iam i the only one that can see whats going on?
Like the girl said,about back to the Dark Ages
1/2 the population suvived that though
i dont think we will be as lucky this time
Not TO WORRY THOUGH
HONEST HATS OFF TO THE ONE WHO THOUGHT OF THE LOCATION NOW THAT IS VERY VERY CLEVER
geuine emails rams8785@rock.com

By: I LIKE GIRLS

I LIKE GIRLS — Sat, 23 May 2009 21:49:10 +0000

Why why why!!!? After all that u're telling me that the world's NOT gonna end!! Take it back or i'm telling... Hey Bin Laden, they say they can't do it so u better get back to work again. U too Bush...don't worry about Obama, he's trying to get the young generation educated so it's just a matter of time before the Indians & Chinese kills him...hey Obama's threating their job security.

By: lklardcric

lklardcric — Sat, 09 May 2009 06:21:53 +0000

I just thought that the entire sum of the comments was lacking in a true way of realizing that conservation is the missing element.

By: lklardcric

lklardcric — Sat, 09 May 2009 06:18:22 +0000

Too much information for you?

By: jobias

jobias — Thu, 05 Mar 2009 11:04:53 +0000

top ..excellent

By: phone

phone — Wed, 22 Oct 2008 14:41:37 +0000

So yur wit ur honey, n ur makin out wen the phone rigns. U anser it n the voice is "wut u doing wit my daughter?" U hang up n tell ur girl. She say "my dad is ded."

THEN WHO WAS PHONE?

By: tom o'leary

tom o'leary — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 12:12:55 +0000

The famous physicist Max Bohr could cause an experiment to fail simply by being present - was it his ghost that caused the failure of the LHC so soon after it turned on? - not to be r-started until spring?

By: MartinodF

MartinodF — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 15:12:21 +0000

@My Pet Tiger: The phase of the moon does affect the magnitude of the distortion simply because the sun itself provokes a tidal effect. So, when both effects "pull" in the same direction, the distortion is bigger, when they "pull" in opposite directions, the moon's distortion is diminished by the sun's!

By: Old Wolf

Old Wolf — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 03:48:19 +0000

Very informative website, thank you. However, if you're going to make jokes, good spelling is de rigeur: "Midichlorians"

By: My Pet Tiger

My Pet Tiger — Mon, 06 Oct 2008 02:32:38 +0000

Why would it matter if the moon was full or not? The mass (and therefore gravitational pull) of the moon is constant. The phase of the moon depends on the angle it is hit by the sun, not by changes in mass. I'd buy that the land rises slightly when it is closer to the moon, but the phase of the moon shouldn't affect the magnitude of the distortion.

By: Andre David

Andre David — Mon, 15 Sep 2008 15:07:35 +0000

v.dog:
"I have just one question, which no-one seems to answer; How is the CMS at 21 m long, 15 m in diameter and weighing 12 500 tonnes, considered ‘compact’?"

CMS is compact when compared to ATLAS, which is light but takes a lot more volume: 46 metres long, 25 metres high and 25 metres wide; ATLAS weighs 7000 tonnes.

As you can find easily, the CMS volume is roughly 3700 m^3, while the ATLAS volume is roughly 22600 m^3.

That is a factor 6 less in volume, more than the difference from a break to a compact car.

By: George

George — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 16:30:14 +0000

Oops, I meant 'protons'!

By: Bernice

Bernice — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 15:54:35 +0000

It's ridiculous what a fuss the press made about the end of the world!

I love this 'I survived' but my boyfriend preferred the one at http://www.madscistuff.com so we got one of each *grin*

By: George

George — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 15:45:44 +0000

Andrew, your answer didn't entirely make sense to me (probably because of my limited understanding of the matter)...

Do I understand you to say that: although individual gamma rays may have more energy than "individual" photons in the LHC, that the LHC has a SUM energy of all of the photons circulating in it greater than any gamma ray to have struck earth?

Further, are you saying that: although the SUM energy in the LHC might be very great, that when there is a collision, it involves only 2 photons and is therefore not as powerful as, say, all of the photons in the LHC simultaneously colliding, or even one gamma ray striking somewhere in the earth?

By: Akshay Mishra

Akshay Mishra — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 13:30:40 +0000

Really good and informative....
Hats off to people taking this initiative...

By: Demq

Demq — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 09:57:52 +0000

carye1: It is almost impossible to predict the long-term benefits of doing fundamental science research like on done LHC, as we explore the unknown, but time and again it proved to bring unforeseen technological benefits that were created during these explorations and pushed the humanity forward. Think of almost all electronics, Internet, etc, without science the world would still be stuck in the dark ages. Your argument of diverting the money to humanitarian causes is valid, but I would suggest on concentrating on diverting the money from the non-humanitarian causes first! Just put them side by side, the cost of the war in Iraq is nearing 600 billion, where this experiment is only 6. It is interesting that the government does not promote the science and its importance for the future prosperity of the humanity, creating negative public opinion about science and discouraging scientists...

By: sigh

sigh — Sat, 13 Sep 2008 01:54:50 +0000

Obviously it won't be able to be a time machine. It uses less than 1.21 GigaWatts. LOL.

By: Andrew Gallagher

Andrew Gallagher — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 22:43:12 +0000

sparge: you're correct - tides pulled by the moon happen twice a day, and are stronger during full (and new) moons than at other times. This is exactly the same process that causes tides in the sea, but the effects on solids are obviously smaller than those on liquids.

george: individual cosmic rays can have energies higher than those of individual protons in the LHC. Strictly, the energy _density_ in the LHC is higher, but this isn't related to the nature of the collisions, only how often they happen.

By: v.dog

v.dog — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 20:21:50 +0000

I have just one question, which no-one seems to answer; How is the CMS at 21 m long, 15 m in diameter and weighing 12 500 tonnes, considered 'compact'?

By: carye1

carye1 — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 16:31:24 +0000

While I really am in awe of all this and am very interested in what the collider will find, I have a very difficult time getting past the costs. Those billions of dollars funded from governments around the world could feed, clothe, & shelter millions of people in need in all continents.

By: George

George — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:49:31 +0000

My only question is this: The articles I read on-line repeatedly state that "Cosmic rays more powerful strike the earth all of the time (at least 100,000 times in its history)." And yet, I also constantly read articles that claim, "energies not seen since the big bang." Further, I ask myself, "well, the cosmic rays may be traveling at near the speed of light, but the particles they strike in the earth are not anywhere near the speed of light." This accelerator takes beams moving near the speed of light in both directions to double the energy upon collision. So, where does the truth lie? Will the LHC create energies not seen since the Big Bang, or will it create energies that have been created 100,000s of times on the earth? I hate to say it, but in this layman's mind, that's an important question... It seems to me one contradicts the other and we're going into powerful unknown territory if one of those statements is true.

By: sparge

sparge — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:45:53 +0000

OK, I can buy that the land tide exists, but why would it have anything to do with the full moon? Shouldn't the tides fluctuate twice daily, like the ocean tides? Unless you are saying that the maximum high tide would be at full moon.

By: keith

keith — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 15:08:02 +0000

Dude, please cite your source. Why should anyone believe any of this?

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 14:34:14 +0000

@Monique :: I was quite surprised at that statement too. Scientific American has validated it though.

By: Matt

Matt — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 14:29:41 +0000

@Anaslex :: A particle accelerator usually sufferers from diminishing returns, the most discoveries will be straight after switch-on and the number of new discoveries will decrease with time from that point onwards. There are a number of limiting factors like the luminosity and energy of the colliding beams. As the energy of the beams in the LCH is much greater than anything anybody has done before CERN is expecting a lot of great data in the next few months. In approximately ten years time there are plans to upgrade the LCH to the Super LCH to improve these factors and collect more useful data.
They should still build an amusement park on top and make use of some of those amazing superconducting magnets.

By: Anaslex

Anaslex — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 14:14:53 +0000

How long are they gonna keep colliding particles? Would a year's worth of hadron collisions be enough? Are we expecting a different result in every collision?

I always wonder what the plans are after they finish colliding the particles. There's some $8 billion of highly specific equipments there, are they gonna convert the site to an amusement park?

By: streetattack

streetattack — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 13:44:02 +0000

I feel I learned more with this article than my high school pysics class...although our teacher did fall asleep in class often. Very interesting, talks of the LHC have been popping up all over the web.

By: Monique

Monique — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 12:51:48 +0000

What is the source of your information? I've never heard of the earth's crust rising or falling with the pull of the moon and haven't been able to find any corroborating info online.

By: surya narayan singh

surya narayan singh — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 11:38:57 +0000

My tnoughts on lhc
http://snsays.com/429/lhc/

By: Christophe

Christophe — Fri, 12 Sep 2008 11:06:38 +0000

Quite interesting post.

Instead of volunteering your computer to LHC@Home (or the useless SETI@Home for that matter), if I may, I recommend the World Community Grid, more oriented to medical or environmental research. Check it out at:
http://www.worldcommunitygrid.org/