By Adrian Cho
For the first time in more than a year, protons should soon be whizzing around the world’s biggest atom smasher, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), officials at the European particle physics laboratory, CERN, have announced. Within the next several hours, physicists at the lab near Geneva, Switzerland, aim to have beams of particle making complete laps through the 27-kilometer-long ring-shaped accelerator. That would get them back to where they were on 19 September 2008, when the LHC suffered a catastrophic failure just 9 days after researchers first fed particles all the way around it. “Keep your fingers crossed for us,” says Steve Myers, CERN’s director of accelerators and technology.
After researchers achieve stable circulating beams, they will likely try to accelerate them to an unprecedented energy of 1.2 tera-electron volts—only 1/6 of the LHC’s design energy of 7 TeV per beam. “The dream scenario is that people come to work Monday morning and find that we’ve broken the world record for energy,” says CERN spokesperson James Gillies.
Of course, the real goal is to smash those countercirculating protons together and then to raise the energy of those collisions. Lab officials can’t predict precisely when that will happen, but Myers says the goal is to obtain some collisions, even at low energy, before the end of the year.
Meanwhile, a group called conCERNed international announced today that it had filed a complaint with the United Nations in Geneva seeking to halt operation of the collider, which the group says may create mini-black holes that could destroy the world. “What we’re saying is that they should stop the machine until [physicists] do a better risk evaluation,” says James Blodgett, a conCERNed member from Albany, New York. Blodgett agrees that the risk appears low but says that the potential for triggering an apocalypse requires far greater margins of safety. Physicists argue, among other things, that astrophysical observations already show that even higher energy particle collisions involving cosmic rays do not create killer black holes. Some of the same critics filed unsuccessful lawsuits last year to try to keep the LHC from running, notes CERN’s Gillies. “Their arguments are as baseless as they were year ago,” he says.
Dear Adrian:
You were the only high-ranking science reporter (and Science the only journal) who tried to get a response from me before last year's start. Again, you are the first to report seriously on the day of the re-start took place yesterday.
Do you allow me to enquire publicly about the status of my (perhaps highly) relevant paper on the topic that I submitted in April to Science, currently available as a revised draft on: www.wissensnavigator.com/documents/GreatRisk.pdf ?
Take care,
Otto
(Otto E. Roessler, University of Tubingen, Germany)
holy. thread manifesto!!!!!!!!!!!! lol what? why? and... why? and who?
Contrary to the statement by CERN's publicist Mr. Gillies, two of the arguments by collider critics in recent years were conceded as essentially valid - not "baseless" - by CERN's June 2008 safety report. First of all, it deviated from their previous safety report in 2003 by acknowledging that new theories made the production of microscopic black holes by the LHC a plausible possibility.
Secondly, CERN has conceded that there is a crucial difference of velocity between possible black holes created by cosmic rays versus those at the LHC. As stated in CERN's own public report on "The Safety of the LHC" (linked at the end of Mr. Cho's article), under "Microscopic black holes" (3rd paragraph): "Those produced by cosmic rays would pass harmlessly through the Earth into space, whereas those produced by the LHC could remain on Earth."
Consequently, CERN's theorists had to relocate the cosmic ray argument to dense neutron stars and white dwarf stars, but critics have pointed out various holes in such examples. Several are specified in the 73-page complaint just filed, which presents a powerful and well-documented indictment of CERN's safety review.
The 90 page text-dump on this thread by the rude poster called "Global Alliance" is way off topic and never even mentions the LHC or CERN. It is an egregious abuse of the posting privilege at Science. Readers are advised to scroll to the end to read the trenchant and probing comments by philosopher of science Luis Sancho and a foremost risk assessment expert, Prof. Mark Leggett.
Hey can't they just speed up the LHC
create a blackhole and kicks these conCERN people into it.
SPARTA style
CERN misinforms mankind. The Large Hadron Collider is a quark factory that will deconfine millions of quarks, the strongest, most attractive particles of the Universe. They carry the Atom’s mass, caged inside their nuclei. 99% of LHC’s production will consist on superfluid Quark condensates, a new state of matter, defined by Einstein, in which Quarks fusion together, creating hyper-dense, attractive tornado-like vortices with properties similar to black holes. Astro-physicists fear that if enough quarks are pegged together in one of those condensates, they can trigger a mass-reaction that would attract all the other quarks of the Earth, transforming our planet into a dense pulsar or black hole. CERN, affirms they won’t pose any danger, because according to a theory proposed by Mr. Hawking, small Black holes will evaporate in a burst of energy, before they can attract the mass of this planet. Yet Mr. Hawking’s theory has never been proved and it contradicts Einstein’s Relativity. So to prove Mr. Hawking’s right, 2 experiments were devised last year: a satellite called Fermi was launched to detect radiating black holes in the cosmos, but it failed to find any. A second test was done, manufacturing superfluid condensates, similar to those CERN will make with quarks; but formed with lighter, inoffensive ‘electro-weak’ Atoms. Those ‘atomic holes’ rotate 1 million times slower, absorbing sound ‘phonons’ instead of light ‘photons’ - reason why they are called dumb holes, instead of black holes. So, this June in an experiment at Haifa, Atomic Condensates rotating at supersonic speed became Dumb holes and absorbed sounds. Problem is they didn’t evaporate, proving that Quark Condensates, made at CERN, will absorb light & matter without evaporation. Because in Nature all what is possible happens (Totalitarian principle), Quark Holes should happen at LHC, making prohibitive for Public Policy the risks for Earth of a quark factory in this planet. CERN affirms LHC carries no risk, but critics contest neither Haifa or Fermi showed evaporation and the Company’s safety report doesn’t study Quark Condensates, which were little known when the factory was designed.
We are talking of a serious issue of national security, industrial corruption and the first potential genocide of the human race, for the sake of an obsolete industry relic of the cold war. As science stands today, there is a big chance this can happen, making it the biggest potential genocide of history. That this is allowed by mankind is a 'monstrosity' that can only be explained in the present age in which human values are irrelevant to what Eric Fromm called technological values:
‘Technological civilization is programmed by the principle that something ought to be done because it is technologically possible. If it is possible to build nuclear weapons, they must be built, even If they might destroy us all. Once this principle is accepted, humanist Values (something has to be done because it is needed by man) are Dethroned and technological development becomes the foundation of ethics'.
Eric Fromm, father of political psychology
The LHC is an industrial con-cern with little use for the advancement of science. Today those of us who are at the edge of research in science consider this machine obsolete. We are studying, after Hubble proved the fractal structure of the Universe and Nottale explained it unifying quantum and relativity (in what concerns the fractal structure of spacetime) the fractal paradigm in a Universe of infinite hierarchical scales in which big-bangs don’t happen. Which means the background radiation can only be created in real time by micro-black holes as those CERN will create, which according to Einstein will produce by gravitational lensing this exact 2.7k radiation, when their mass is that of a moon. This means the Universe is full of dark matter black holes, which have eaten the commonest planetoid on the galaxy, a moon. And so the collisions at CERN will have a big chance to do so with the Earth. Cern affirms this is impossible, but it does so because it sticks to the probabilistic/quantum paradigm previous to the topological/Non-Euclidean/Fractal Einsteinian paradigm, in which black holes are fractals of quarks, the substance CERN will deconfine. Thus, black holes will be frozen stars as Einstein called them. In those models the Universe is a deterministic topology and reality is created with energy and mass, which is physical information, ‘form’ - hence there is not quantum entropy and information paradoxes, black holes do NOT evaporate but as Einstein explains, transform energy into quarks, mass/information that balances the Universe. In those models the probability of extinction is huge... CERN should be halted for a decade till the theoretical issues prove it is safe or prove the fractal paradigm and put the risk close to 100%
What cern has done is to follow the usual systems of industrial corruption that allow all industrial crimes to happen a priori, and then we realize that ‘experts’ are often corrupted, that ‘latin jargons’ are the High priests’ secret talk to hide that corruption, that ‘AAA-derivatives’ turn out to be toxic financial scams and black holes turn out to eat planets and stars, but in this issue there won’t be turn back. The easiest job is to ‘believe’ on the Company and voice out its 'ad hominem' campaigns against those of us who denounced the crime, voice out its false statements (cern portrays the quark factory as a cosmic ray factory, when we never found quarks in cosmic rays), its marketing campaigns (the god' s particle, the big-bang hype), and print its paid-by articles. It is easy for clueless politicians to take the money of high-tech corporations and the Nuclear Industry behind this con-cern. So now that all is set mankind will live with a Damocles sword for years to come. If you want to see a real documentary on the facts of this concern, visit www.lhcdefence.org. Many lives are at risk, real lives of real people, as never before. Today mankind has no defense because the judiciary, politicians and the press who should check and denounce the excesses of companies and governments are not doing their job of warning the population and so private individuals have to step forward, obviously with far less efficiency as our suits against this company which judges have refused to accept, have shown. And so as the romans say, ‘Alea Jacta Est’.
Adrian you wrote:
“Some of the same critics filed unsuccessful lawsuits last year to try to keep the LHC from running, notes CERN’s Gillies. “Their arguments are as baseless as they were year ago,” he says.
I suggest the following shows that the court action MR Gillies refers to was in fact in an important sense successful, and that a key plank of the argument – on flaws in the method used by CERN to assess the risk from running the LHC – is far from baseless.
In 2007 and 2008, a court case was held in the US seeking an injunction against the LHC continuing. This case was dismissed, on the grounds that the US court did not have jurisdiction. [62] However, in her decision, concerning decision-making on the risk from the LHC, Judge Helen Gillmor wrote these history-making words: “It is clear that Plaintiffs’ action reflects disagreement among scientists about the possible ramifications of the operation of the Large Hadron Collider. This extremely complex debate is of concern to more than just the physicists.”
The European Commission guidelines "Improving the knowledge base for better policies (2002)", "commission on the collection and use of expertise" Principles and Guidelines state that one of the three determinants of quality of advice is pluralism:
“Wherever possible, a diversity of viewpoints should be assembled. This diversity may result from differences in scientific approach, different types of expertise, different institutional affiliations, or contrasting opinions over the fundamental assumptions underlying the issue. Is it appropriate to mobilise experts beyond the scientific community? These may include, for example, lawyers, ethicists...”
How then do the latest official reports assessing the risk from the LHC compare with the EC guidelines on plurality of expertise?
The LSAG report itself was conducted by five particle physicists. The associated report “Astronomical Implications of Hypothetical Stable TeV-Scale Black Holes" was conducted by two particle physicists, one of whom was also in the LSAG report team. It was reviewed by the 20-member CERN Council Scientific Policy Committee, also composed only of particle physicists. All of the contributors to the CERN 2008 safety review (including the SPC report) are presently listed in the CERN directory.
So all these 26 were particle physicists. Despite this large number, none were “experts beyond the scientific community… for example, lawyers, ethicists..”, despite that being recommended by the European Commission.
This particle physicists-only advice was then put to CERN Council for consideration and advice to the relevant governments controlling CERN. CERN Council represents the 20 governments funding the LHC and consists of 14 particle physicists and 14 civil servants.
Half of the Council is therefore the interest group concerned – particle physicists. And the other half is also not immune from possible vested interest. This is because the Council as a whole has approved the prior funding of and building of the LHC. As such, CERN Council is far from arms-length from the project, and may feel a bias to justify its prior decisions of support.
Given this possibility of bias in the decision-making within and about the LSAG report, the complainants are uneasy because of reference to a basic sense of fairness. This is embodied in one of the rules of natural justice or procedural fairness: the rule against bias (nemo debet esse judex in propria sua cause – "no one to be a judge in their own cause").
It should also be pointed out that the EC guidelines on the use of expertise arose precisely out of an event (the mad cow disease crisis) in which people died partly because of narrowly-based scientific advice. CERN, also assessing the possibility of events in which people may die, has used none of the EC guidelines, indeed gives no inkling that it is aware they exist, and has produced exquisitely narrowly-based advice.
With this background, a case can be made - and is in the Complaint to the UN - that in regulating the risk from the LHC CERN Council has a conflict of interest, and is under-constituted to assess such a novel, potentially catastrophic and therefore sensitive risk. On this basis, a new review panel based on best practice for such panels should be set up to advise national, EU, and governments worldwide on the adequacy or otherwise of the LSAG report, and the LHC not produce collisions until that panel has reported.