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Randy
SFN Regular
USA
1990 Posts |
 Posted - 09/12/2008 : 13:38:49 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by astropin
Originally posted by filthy
It will not produce a "mini big bang," and in vacuum and at the temperatures it runs at, the only hot air will be from the usual chowder-heads at the Creationist sites.
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Well it is sort of "a mini big bang". My understanding is that it recreates the conditions that were present just after the big bang (just on a vastly smaller scale).....so in that sense.
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Just came across this 'on-site' webcam link at the Austin Astronomy Society site.
Enjoy...
http://www.cyriak.co.uk/lhc/lhc-webcams.html
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"We are all connected; to each other biologically, to the earth chemically, to the rest of the universe atomically."
"So you're made of detritus [from exploded stars]. Get over it. Or better yet, celebrate it. After all, what nobler thought can one cherish than that the universe lives within us all?"
-Neil DeGrasse Tyson |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 09/12/2008 : 14:43:55 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Randy
Originally posted by astropin
Originally posted by filthy
It will not produce a "mini big bang," and in vacuum and at the temperatures it runs at, the only hot air will be from the usual chowder-heads at the Creationist sites.
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Well it is sort of "a mini big bang". My understanding is that it recreates the conditions that were present just after the big bang (just on a vastly smaller scale).....so in that sense.
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Just came across this 'on-site' webcam link at the Austin Astronomy Society site.
Enjoy...
http://www.cyriak.co.uk/lhc/lhc-webcams.html
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Um. I'm not a physicist, but that didn't look so good.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
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Zeked
Skeptic Friend
USA
90 Posts |
Posted - 09/12/2008 : 23:43:41 [Permalink]
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The collisions taking place inside the LHC are taking place in the upper atmosphere constantly. The fact that no back holes have formed and eaten the planet or the universe yet, is a good sign that LHC won't do any better.
A simple photomultiplier setup to detect cosmic rays can be built for a few hundred bucks. Cloud chambers are even cheaper to construct, but they are not very efficient and you really need very high altitude to see the most common energies.
On long international flights, I sometimes use my retinas as a biological spinthariscope to directly watch the highly energetic collisions. Only the most energetic particles can cascade to these altitudes and through the airplane skin or create showers within the cabin. Eye visors and good dark adaptation, and anyone can do the same at high altitudes. Highly energetic interactions should also alter cognitive functions as well, but I find little research on this topic.
Sometimes I have seen pools and blobs of light, not just peculiar flashes. These are probably involved with other visual processing regions other than the retina, and not related to Cerenkov radiation. It is often more enjoyable than the in flight movies, and great for the imagination, thinking of the distant violent supernova, black holes, magnatar and quasar origins of these tiny beasts.
Don't worry about LHC. Collisions at these energies are common in the universe - and the Earth. |
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H. Humbert
SFN Die Hard
USA
4574 Posts |
Posted - 09/12/2008 : 23:54:29 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Zeked
The collisions taking place inside the LHC are taking place in the upper atmosphere constantly. The fact that no back holes have formed and eaten the planet or the universe yet, is a good sign that LHC won't do any better.
A simple photomultiplier setup to detect cosmic rays can be built for a few hundred bucks. Cloud chambers are even cheaper to construct, but they are not very efficient and you really need very high altitude to see the most common energies.
On long international flights, I sometimes use my retinas as a biological spinthariscope to directly watch the highly energetic collisions. Only the most energetic particles can cascade to these altitudes and through the airplane skin or create showers within the cabin. Eye visors and good dark adaptation, and anyone can do the same at high altitudes. Highly energetic interactions should also alter cognitive functions as well, but I find little research on this topic.
Sometimes I have seen pools and blobs of light, not just peculiar flashes. These are probably involved with other visual processing regions other than the retina, and not related to Cerenkov radiation. It is often more enjoyable than the in flight movies, and great for the imagination, thinking of the distant violent supernova, black holes, magnatar and quasar origins of these tiny beasts.
Don't worry about LHC. Collisions at these energies are common in the universe - and the Earth.
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That was a pretty great post. Thanks for all that info.
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"A man is his own easiest dupe, for what he wishes to be true he generally believes to be true." --Demosthenes
"The first principle is that you must not fool yourself - and you are the easiest person to fool." --Richard P. Feynman
"Face facts with dignity." --found inside a fortune cookie |
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filthy
SFN Die Hard
USA
14408 Posts |
Posted - 09/13/2008 : 03:22:17 [Permalink]
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Not wanting to be left out, ICR puts forth a few thoughts on the matter. | The Collider has been called the “Big Bang Machine,” and some even refer to it as a time machine because the collision of protons at these speeds is alleged to mimic that which supposedly occurred during the early natural formation of the universe. Though its adherents are reluctant to concede, the big bang concept has been discredited by observable evidence.2 The array of difficulties that encumber that hypothesis, including the cosmic microwave background radiation-caused “horizon problem,” has led many scientists to seek alternative naturalistic theories to account for the origin of the cosmos.3 |
Now, before everyone goes all apeshit & stuff over footnote #2, I've already googled it with the expected results. From Conservapedia: Dr. John Hartnett is a young earth creationist physicist who has done extensive work on discovering flaws in Big Bang theory, the theory of relativity, and experimental quantum cosmology.[1] He has criticized the lack of accounting for the numerous parameters, the miscounting of cosmic numbers, and the fix-all "explanation" known as dark matter and dark energy.[2] He joked that the fad of dark matter and dark energy in physics has led to some dim theories.
John Hartnett has never been afraid to show his faith in a scientific setting and avers that the atheistic approach to science has led the pursuit of knowledge down many false paths.
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If that doesn't poison the well, show me something that does.  The mere mention of Conservapedia taints any waters flowing through it. Pretty good for a laugh though, now & again.
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"What luck for rulers that men do not think." -- Adolf Hitler (1889 - 1945)
"If only we could impeach on the basis of criminal stupidity, 90% of the Rethuglicans and half of the Democrats would be thrown out of office." ~~ P.Z. Myres
"The default position of human nature is to punch the other guy in the face and take his stuff." ~~ Dude
Brother Boot Knife of Warm Humanitarianism,
and Crypto-Communist! 
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| Edited by - filthy on 09/13/2008 03:30:24 |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 09/13/2008 : 05:45:19 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Zeked
The collisions taking place inside the LHC are taking place in the upper atmosphere constantly. The fact that no back holes have formed and eaten the planet or the universe yet, is a good sign that LHC won't do any better.
A simple photomultiplier setup to detect cosmic rays can be built for a few hundred bucks. Cloud chambers are even cheaper to construct, but they are not very efficient and you really need very high altitude to see the most common energies.
On long international flights, I sometimes use my retinas as a biological spinthariscope to directly watch the highly energetic collisions. Only the most energetic particles can cascade to these altitudes and through the airplane skin or create showers within the cabin. Eye visors and good dark adaptation, and anyone can do the same at high altitudes. Highly energetic interactions should also alter cognitive functions as well, but I find little research on this topic.
Sometimes I have seen pools and blobs of light, not just peculiar flashes. These are probably involved with other visual processing regions other than the retina, and not related to Cerenkov radiation. It is often more enjoyable than the in flight movies, and great for the imagination, thinking of the distant violent supernova, black holes, magnatar and quasar origins of these tiny beasts.
Don't worry about LHC. Collisions at these energies are common in the universe - and the Earth.
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I don't for once think that the collisions in the LHC will result in the End. But I'm skeptical they are occurring in our upper atmosphere all the time. Everything I've read on the thing A. calls the energy level of these collisions unique since they occurred naturally moments after the big bang and B. never casually reassure's the nut jobs that they are common place about 80 miles up. Can you please post some sources? Also, I'm interested in seeing a source about the high-altitude hallucin- ah, collisions you were talking about.  |
-Chaloobi
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Zeked
Skeptic Friend
USA
90 Posts |
Posted - 09/13/2008 : 12:16:09 [Permalink]
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Chaloobi
Really, the interactions in the LHC are as common as dirt from mother nature. LHC is just doing it in a very controlled way.
http://www.lhc.ac.uk/about-the-lhc/faqs.html
The LHC is "recreating energies that are continually being produced naturally (by high energy cosmic rays hitting the earth's atmosphere) but at will and inside sophisticated detectors that track what is happening. No Big Bang – so no possibility of creating a new Universe."
http://www.cosmicrays.org/
Cosmic rays occur ~200 per square meter every second.
Eyeball cosmic ray interactions causing retinal stimulation are known. The energies are known for the cosmic rays and the pion decay chain. Penetration and interactions with different materials are also well known. The energies for stimulating the retina and neural tissues are also a known.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mir_lights_030416.html
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v239/n5369/abs/239209a0.html
The protons and pions are more likely to interact with biological tissues than the muons, but they are all capable of stimulating biological tissues. It will be a mix of high-energy interations; gamma rays, protons, electrons, neutrons, and high-Z charged particles. Some of these are obviously blocked by metals, some can pass through glass, others pass through many feet of lead. It is still a mix.
Long term exposure on ISS, culmative, with ionizing radiation a key component.
http://www.physicamedica.com/VOLXVII_S1/69bis-NARICI%20et%20alii.pdf
Just an abstract on retinal flashes.
http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0038-5670/16/1/R15
Discrete (retinal) flashes are generated by neutrons with energy ranges between 3 and 8 MeV. Fremlin, J. H., New Scientist, 47, 42 (1970). |
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HalfMooner
Dingaling
Philippines
15831 Posts |
Posted - 09/13/2008 : 14:16:24 [Permalink]
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I've noticed those retinal flashes myself, while flying in a commercial jet once. Though I'd never heard of them, I supposed they were caused by cosmic rays. They were brief, point flashes. They were unlike "floaters," phosphines, or other such common visual phenomena. I saw a few of them, randomly spaced out over time, with maybe half a minute average between them. They weren't much of an interference with normal vision. They would have been easy not to notice, or to ignore.
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“Biology is just physics that has begun to smell bad.” —HalfMooner
Here's a link to Moonscape News, and one to its Archive. |
| Edited by - HalfMooner on 09/13/2008 14:17:15 |
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Zeked
Skeptic Friend
USA
90 Posts |
Posted - 09/13/2008 : 23:28:48 [Permalink]
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I found these interesting bits of research. Study of cosmic rays intensity by altitude and the effects on crews of international flights.
http://www2000.irpa.net/irpa10/cdrom/01004.pdf
http://www.srp-uk.org/utrecht/utr18.pdf
Here is some of what I gathered from the above reports and the citations. My words, so no quotatations.
Astronauts are subjected to the full intensity of high-energy cosmic rays and solar particles, and the secondary particles produced in the spacecraft walls. One crew of Apollo astronauts had an event where they all were observing an intense period of retinal flashes that appeared green and swarming like fireflies. In space, concern about the effects of ionizing radiation on cognitive functions is real, the possibility of inducing a motor reflex is real, and as we look to prolong our stays in space, genetic damage, cancer and risk of death by radiation exposure are real.
Most cosmic rays are produced within our galaxy. The highest recorded energies are presumed to be extra-galactic or galactic core in orgin. The first extreme energy cosmic ray recorded was called the "Oh-My-God" particle on October 15, 1991. It was estimated its' energy to be approximately 3 × 10^20 electron volts, far higher than the 10^13 eV that the LHC can produce, and higher than the average cosmic ray produced by supernova at 10^14 eV. At least 27 other extreme high energy cosmic ray events have been recorded since 1991.
The radiation we observe at aircraft altitudes of typically 10-12 km is due to very high-energy particles - mainly protons and helium nuclei, together with a small amount of heavy nuclei - penetrating the atmosphere and colliding with air atoms. These collisions give rise to the production of more particles, such as protons, neutrons and various mesons. A cascade of particles is then produced by successive interactions as they penetrate deeper into the atmosphere. As a result, the flux of particles increases in the upper atmosphere and reaches a maximum at about 20 km above sea level. Below this point, the number of particles begins to decrease due to energy losses and continued particle interactions.
Neutrons are the major source of concern at aircraft altitudes because they occur in significant numbers at altitudes of about 12 km. The European Union has put saftey guidlines in place for air crew and outfitted aircraft with radiation monitors to estimate crew exposure rates to cosmic radiation.
During solar minimum, galactic cosmic rays are much more abudant in the atmosphere because they are not pushed away from Earth by the solar influence. We are now entering solar minimum, it is comparatively dead quite on the sun right now, and this is found to follow an 11 year cycle. Galactic cosmic rays are typicaly much more energetic than the average solar atomic nuclei cosmic rays.
***
Conclusion: Now is a good time to watch for retinal flashes on international flights.
LHC has nothing on momma nature. |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 09/14/2008 : 05:39:06 [Permalink]
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Originally posted by Zeked
Chaloobi
Really, the interactions in the LHC are as common as dirt from mother nature. LHC is just doing it in a very controlled way.
http://www.lhc.ac.uk/about-the-lhc/faqs.html
The LHC is "recreating energies that are continually being produced naturally (by high energy cosmic rays hitting the earth's atmosphere) but at will and inside sophisticated detectors that track what is happening. No Big Bang – so no possibility of creating a new Universe."
http://www.cosmicrays.org/
Cosmic rays occur ~200 per square meter every second.
Eyeball cosmic ray interactions causing retinal stimulation are known. The energies are known for the cosmic rays and the pion decay chain. Penetration and interactions with different materials are also well known. The energies for stimulating the retina and neural tissues are also a known.
http://www.space.com/scienceastronomy/mir_lights_030416.html
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v239/n5369/abs/239209a0.html
The protons and pions are more likely to interact with biological tissues than the muons, but they are all capable of stimulating biological tissues. It will be a mix of high-energy interations; gamma rays, protons, electrons, neutrons, and high-Z charged particles. Some of these are obviously blocked by metals, some can pass through glass, others pass through many feet of lead. It is still a mix.
Long term exposure on ISS, culmative, with ionizing radiation a key component.
http://www.physicamedica.com/VOLXVII_S1/69bis-NARICI%20et%20alii.pdf
Just an abstract on retinal flashes.
http://www.iop.org/EJ/abstract/0038-5670/16/1/R15
Discrete (retinal) flashes are generated by neutrons with energy ranges between 3 and 8 MeV. Fremlin, J. H., New Scientist, 47, 42 (1970).
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Great, thanks for the sources. I'll be looking for those cosmic rays on my way to Las Vegas next month. The kids won't be with me so I won't be pulling my hair out keeping them entertained.  |
-Chaloobi
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Dude
SFN Die Hard
USA
6891 Posts |
Posted - 09/18/2008 : 20:05:37 [Permalink]
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Apparently the LHC had some glitch that shut it down last week...
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/26780393/
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Ignorance is preferable to error; and he is less remote from the truth who believes nothing, than he who believes what is wrong.
-- Thomas Jefferson
"god :: the last refuge of a man with no answers and no argument." - G. Carlin
Hope, n.
The handmaiden of desperation; the opiate of despair; the illegible signpost on the road to perdition. ~~ da filth |
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chaloobi
SFN Regular
1620 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2008 : 12:10:38 [Permalink]
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It's broke. Estimated two months minimum time to fix. Bummer.
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2008/922/1?rss=1
A faulty electrical connection apparently melted and caused last Friday's breakdown of the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the world's new highest-energy particle smasher, officials at the European particle physics laboratory, CERN, near Geneva, Switzerland announced this weekend. Repairs will keep the machine off line for at least 2 months.
Researchers started circulating protons in the 27-kilometer long, $5.5 billion LHC on 10 September and had hoped to start smashing the particles together as early as this week. But the gargantuan machine literally sprung a leak last week when several of its main "dipole" magnets, which guide protons around the collider's two counter circulating rings, suddenly overheated in an event called a "quench" (ScienceNOW, 19 September). The violent temperature spike apparently ruptured the plumbing within the magnets that carries frigid liquid helium to them and keeps the magnets cooled to just 2 degrees above absolute zero. |
In other thoughts:
[rant] This thing only cost 5.5 billion to build, but we couldn't afford to build it in the US. We CAN afford to spend a trillion dollars on running our financial system without sensible regulation and another trillion on invading and occupying a country that was no threat to us, but not .275% of that on a chance at puzzling out the underlying nature of reality.    [/rant] |
-Chaloobi
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| Edited by - chaloobi on 09/23/2008 12:18:52 |
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Zeked
Skeptic Friend
USA
90 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2008 : 13:16:29 [Permalink]
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Wow, more than a simple few simple circuit breakers.
I would love to see if the LHC could resolve the question of the Higgs field and find just what the heck dark matter/energy is. If it is some gravity modification, that would be cool.
chaloobi, I too am so frustrated with this economy. The Republican ideology of deregulation and "free markets" was like letting the inmates run the asylum. The Democratic ideology of believing that every American should own a home was probably the stupidest idea in the history of our country, and just proved that many morons in this country should rent forever.
We do have all that gold just sitting there in Ft Knox that could be used to back the dollar ;)
The superconducting super collider was estimated to run over two times what LHC has actually spent. A lack of fiscal responsibility shut the SSC project down, too many butts doing meetings and PR, and too few butts doing productive work. There was more to it, but I have a bias against non-value added carpet dwellers today.
Anti-gravity to float the dollar. That would be cool! Lets get that LHC up and running pronto! |
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the_ignored
SFN Addict
2562 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2008 : 13:50:55 [Permalink]
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Well, here's two sites that teach a little bit more about the LHC and what it produces. I'll leave you to guess which site is more educational.
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>From: enuffenuff@fastmail.fm
(excerpt follows):
> I'm looking to teach these two bastards a lesson they'll never forget.
> Personal visit by mates of mine. No violence, just a wee little chat.
>
> **** has also committed more crimes than you can count with his
> incitement of hatred against a religion. That law came in about 2007
> much to ****'s ignorance. That is fact and his writing will become well
> know as well as him becoming a publicly known icon of hatred.
>
> Good luck with that fuckwit. And Reynold, fucking run, and don't stop.
> Disappear would be best as it was you who dared to attack me on my
> illness knowing nothing of the cause. You disgust me and you are top of
> the list boy. Again, no violence. Just regular reminders of who's there
> and visits to see you are behaving. Nothing scary in reality. But I'd
> still disappear if I was you.
What brought that on? this. Original posting here.
Another example of this guy's lunacy here. |
| Edited by - the_ignored on 09/23/2008 14:34:50 |
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Simon
SFN Regular
USA
1992 Posts |
Posted - 09/23/2008 : 15:01:37 [Permalink]
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Quarks; which are quarks.
Example: quarks.
Make sense too. |
Look again at that dot. That's here. That's home. That's us. On it everyone you love, everyone you know, everyone you ever heard of, every human being who ever was, lived out their lives. The aggregate of our joy and suffering, thousands of confident religions, ideologies, and economic doctrines, every hunter and forager, every hero and coward, every creator and destroyer of civilization, every king and peasant, every young couple in love, every mother and father, hopeful child, inventor and explorer, every teacher of morals, every corrupt politician, every "superstar," every "supreme leader," every saint and sinner in the history of our species lived there – on a mote of dust suspended in a sunbeam.
Carl Sagan - 1996 |
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The Large Hadron Collider
