Thursday, July 03, 2008
Stranglet Than Paradise (or Pair o' dice)
And I quote, from The New York Times of June 27, 2008:
"Calling its claims 'overly speculative and not credible' and saying it is too late anyway [emphasis added], lawyers for the federal government argued this week that a so-called doomsday suit intended to prevent the startup of the world's most powerful particle accelerator should be thrown out.
In the lawsuit filed in March in Federal District Court in Honolulu, Walter L. Wagner, a retired radiation safety expert, and Luis Sancho, a Spanish science writer, contended that the Large Hadron Collider could create microscopic black holes that could wind up eating Earth [emphasis mine, but can you blame me?], or other dangerous particles known as strangelets -- a sort of contagious dead matter -- or so-called magnetic momopoles that could catalyze the destruction of ordinary matter."
The collider is being built outside Geneva, Switzerland, by the European Center for Nuclear Research, or CERN, with American collaboration.
Let's all just take a breath here and pause, shall we?
Oh. The story was on page A17. Either it was too hot for page A1 or too unimportant. After all, what's the Big Deal anyway? What's a little apocalyptic angst compared to, say, the importance of Britney Spears's latest custody battle? Or Cindy McCain's hair?
Where was I?
This is either a topic you want to Google like crazy, or else simply log off your computer, say your prayers, and kiss your sorry ass goodbye.
And what would you Google anyway? "Large Hadron Collider"? Or "Instant Acts of Contrition"?
In the face of a doomsday scenario, leave it to me, The Laughorist, a.k.a. Pawlie Kokonuts, to seize on semantics. Don't you just love the term strangelets? I do. (No, it's not what I call my kids.)
There's a movie script here somewhere for, yes, of course, Dr. Strangelet.
Anyway, pleasant dreams. Carry on. Don't mind me; just blogging.
p.s. It's a good thing dyslexia didn't kick in; then we'd have the Large Hardon Collider. Now that would be truly dangerous!
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6 comments:
I enjoyed your excellent blog, I don't find it stranglet at all!
My primary concern has been with micro black holes. But in order for Earth to be in danger from micro black holes, all of the following would need to be true:
- Micro black holes would need to be creatable at collider energies. This is unknown.
- Micro black holes would need to be stable and not decay. This is unknown.
- Micro black holes would need to grow quickly. This is also unknown.
Cosmic ray impacts do not prove safety because results of cosmic rays pass through Earth and into space at nearly the speed of light.
The probability of danger is unknown, though the legal action currently before US Federal Courts estimates high risk.
Wikipedia, Safety of the Large Hadron Collider
LHCFacts.org LHCDefense.org
I like how you seize on semantics.
Pleasant dreams...
I sleep too pleasantly, I might wake with a Hadron.
Cheers
I love you posts and always have even if I sometimes have to keep my dictionary handy to understand! lol
I read this article and it freaked me out! As if I need one more thing to worry about! Geeze, all this and Britany too! What's next?
I think I'll google my acts of contrition but right after I wet myself laughing at your dyslexia... so not PC I know!
All the best always,
M
Ps. Did you read the NYTimes today? There is a very interesting article above the one about Gossip Girl and it's clothing options. The article in regards to soldiers and alcholism becoming a trend due to their severe post traumatic stress disorder... It's shout's, "Duh, You think?", all over the place.
The reason I am PS-ing you is because while reading said article... Paulie you popped into my head. All I could think about was how you could twist that article into something so clever! NYTimes.. just seems to leave a lot to be desired!
Thanks for making me think!
M
JTankers,
Thanks for your enlightenment. En-LIGHT-en-meant.
Patti,
As always, thanks for stopping by.
GOTR,
Thou art welcome.
PK
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