Possible Apocalypse

Off Topic Politics & World Issues
21

[quote]Headhunter wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
lixy wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
The annual budget for CERN is around 2 billion US dollars. You are right that no businessman would fund this, as there is no expectation of making any revenue from the experiment.

You folks do realize the first successful communication between an HTTP client and server via the Internet took place there.

I won’t bore you with W and Z bosons though, but CERN is where it was discovered.

What exactly is your point?

I was not denying that incredible breakthroughs have been made at CERN.

I was simply agreeing with Headhunter that no private investor would be willing to put up the money to fund the LHC experiments.

His point is…uhh…maybe…

Lixy, what was the point?

[/quote]

Iraq

22

[quote]Regular Gonzalez wrote:
What exactly is your point?

I was not denying that incredible breakthroughs have been made at CERN.

I was simply agreeing with Headhunter that no private investor would be willing to put up the money to fund the LHC experiments.[/quote]

HH’s wrote that those scientists “sold their souls”. I most certainly do not agree with that part, and I hope you don’t either.

Although CERN isn’t out there to make money, they do hold numerous patents in plenty of domains. If nothing else, to protect their brand name and finance such things as the LHC.

23

[quote]Regular Gonzalez wrote:
lixy wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
The annual budget for CERN is around 2 billion US dollars. You are right that no businessman would fund this, as there is no expectation of making any revenue from the experiment.

You folks do realize the first successful communication between an HTTP client and server via the Internet took place there.

I won’t bore you with W and Z bosons though, but CERN is where it was discovered.

What exactly is your point?

I was not denying that incredible breakthroughs have been made at CERN.

I was simply agreeing with Headhunter that no private investor would be willing to put up the money to fund the LHC experiments.

[/quote]

One of my professors designed a desktop plasma accelerator:

I wouldn’t worry about CERN. The guy complaining about a possible apocalypse sounds like a kook. They’re ramming only very small particles together. But if I’m wrong, I owe you a Coke.

24

[quote]Headhunter wrote:
…
[/quote]

Ho-ho-ho!

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2008/528/3

25

[quote]lixy wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
What exactly is your point?

I was not denying that incredible breakthroughs have been made at CERN.

I was simply agreeing with Headhunter that no private investor would be willing to put up the money to fund the LHC experiments.

HH’s wrote that those scientists “sold their souls”. I most certainly do not agree with that part, and I hope you don’t either.

Although CERN isn’t out there to make money, they do hold numerous patents in plenty of domains. If nothing else, to protect their brand name and finance such things as the LHC.[/quote]

I don’t agree with that part either.

Also, the two billion dollar figure that I mentioned is the amount of funding provided by the governments of the member nations. Any extra revenue from patents is on top of that.

26

[quote]lixy wrote:
Headhunter wrote:
…

Ho-ho-ho!

http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2008/528/3[/quote]

There is a big difference between a donation and an investment.

27

[quote]Regular Gonzalez wrote:
lixy wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
What exactly is your point?

I was not denying that incredible breakthroughs have been made at CERN.

I was simply agreeing with Headhunter that no private investor would be willing to put up the money to fund the LHC experiments.

HH’s wrote that those scientists “sold their souls”. I most certainly do not agree with that part, and I hope you don’t either.

Although CERN isn’t out there to make money, they do hold numerous patents in plenty of domains. If nothing else, to protect their brand name and finance such things as the LHC.

I don’t agree with that part either.

Also, the two billion dollar figure that I mentioned is the amount of funding provided by the governments of the member nations. Any extra revenue from patents is on top of that. [/quote]

Well, I don’t see anything wrong in governments injecting money for fundamental research. I might be biased because half of the money in my department is from the state, but I truly believe that innovation and technology is the way to go. I mean, industries are bound to feel the heat from China/India and all France/Switzerland/Sweden will have is the know-how edge.

“Two billion dollar” spent to better our understanding of the world around us is money well-spent in my eyes. That much money is spent in a few days killing brown people by the US, and I feel HH’s position is highly hypocritical.

I am very often in Switzerland and have never EVER met a single person who criticized the money spent in CERN. They all see it as an investment, prestige and a myriad of positive attributes. The place is as close to direct democracy as a country can get. As for France, it is admittedly more divided on the matter. But I can say in all confidence that most French people are diametrically opposed to HH’s views

28

[quote]lixy wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
lixy wrote:
Regular Gonzalez wrote:
What exactly is your point?

I was not denying that incredible breakthroughs have been made at CERN.

I was simply agreeing with Headhunter that no private investor would be willing to put up the money to fund the LHC experiments.

HH’s wrote that those scientists “sold their souls”. I most certainly do not agree with that part, and I hope you don’t either.

Although CERN isn’t out there to make money, they do hold numerous patents in plenty of domains. If nothing else, to protect their brand name and finance such things as the LHC.

I don’t agree with that part either.

Also, the two billion dollar figure that I mentioned is the amount of funding provided by the governments of the member nations. Any extra revenue from patents is on top of that.

Well, I don’t see anything wrong in governments injecting money for fundamental research. I might be biased because half of the money in my department is from the state, but I truly believe that innovation and technology is the way to go. I mean, industries are bound to feel the heat from China/India and all France/Switzerland/Sweden will have is the know-how edge.

“Two billion dollar” spent to better our understanding of the world around us is money well-spent in my eyes. That much money is spent in a few days killing brown people by the US, and I feel HH’s position is highly hypocritical.

I am very often in Switzerland and have never EVER met a single person who criticized the money spent in CERN. They all see it as an investment, prestige and a myriad of positive attributes. The place is as close to direct democracy as a country can get. As for France, it is admittedly more divided on the matter. But I can say in all confidence that most French people are diametrically opposed to HH’s views[/quote]

You appeared to be implying that the LHC experiments are being funded by revenue derived from patents. The point that I was making with my last post is that a large amount of government money is also necessary in order to fund these experiments.

Just to clarify, the part that I was saying I don’t agree with refers to the statement that those scientists “sold their souls”.

While I’m not sure that “killing brown people” is official US policy I understand the point you are making. I also agree with you that there are many examples of much worse uses of taxpayer’s money than CERN (eg waging a war on a noun).

I am only 21 and still undecided on what I believe the role of government should be in general, so I am not sure yet if I would support my own government being involved in a similar initiative.

BTW Switzerland are contributing only a tiny portion of the budget for CERN. The UK, France and Germany are bearing most of the financial burden.

29

Uh huh. If governments didn’t fund research like this then the only research that would be done are things that have a direct line to a profitable product or idea.

So many great advancements have come from areas of inquiry that at face value had to prospects to be useful.

As far as CERN’s safety goes:

I do not beleive the excellent scientists at CERN and those that have collaborated with them would have ignored any serious risk. What is being brought up in these articles is the fact that as scientists they cannot absolutely rule out these possibilities.

In any other profession you would call that essentially no risk.

30

How cool are they?

31

[quote]lixy wrote:

How cool are they?[/quote]

That song is awesome

32

They think they have already produced these things in atom smashers, although they weren’t able to verify it.

They were worried that exploding a nuke might ignite the atmosphere on fire, and destroy the Earth.

Some theorize that there are already mico black holes on the Earth, so small that we do not notice them.