Jon Henley
London Guardian
Wednesday, Sept 10, 2008
Be a bit of a pain if it did, wouldn’t it? And the most frustrating thing is that 
we won’t know for sure either way until the European laboratory for particle physics (Cern) in Geneva switches on its Large Hadron Collider the day after tomorrow.
If you think it’s unlikely that we will all be sucked into a giant black hole that will swallow the world, as German chemistry professor Otto Rössler of the University of Tübingen posits, and so carry on with your life as normal, only to find out that it’s true, you’ll be a bit miffed, won’t you?
If, on the other hand, you disagree with theoretical physicist Prof Sir Chris Llewellyn Smith of the UK Atomic Energy Agency, who argues that fears of possible global self-ingestion have been exaggerated, and decide to live the next two days as if they were your last, and then nothing whatsoever happens, you’d feel a bit of a fool too.
Rössler apparently thinks it “quite plausible” that the “mini black holes” the Cern atom-smasher creates “will survive and grow exponentially and eat the planet from the inside”. So convinced is he that he has lodged an EU court lawsuit alleging that the project violates the right to life guaranteed under the European Convention of Human Rights.
Prof Llewellyn Smith, however, has assured Radio 4’s Today programme that the LHC - designed to help solve fundamental questions about the structure of matter and, hopefully, arrive at a “theory of everything” - is completely safe and will not be doing anything that has not happened “100,000 times over” in nature since the earth has existed. “The chances of us producing a black hole are minuscule,” he said, “and even if we do, it can’t swallow up the earth.” So, folks, who do you believe?
Large Hadron Collider Visible in Google Earth
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is a particle accelerator and collider located at CERN, near Geneva, Switzerland, and is scheduled to be open in May of 2008. Large particle accelerators are built in circles to get particles up to very high speeds (near the speed of light). The LHC is nearly 27 km in circumference and is located 50 to 175 meters underground on the border between France and Switzerland. CERN is the European Organization for Nuclear Research. This massive underground structure is difficult to visualize since it is all underground.
Google Earth 3D modeling guru Joey Wade has posted a 3D diagram and models showing the LHC and floated it directly above its actual location so you can see how it looks in Google Earth. Download the LHC model 
. He has roughly modeled the 3D buildings on the surface so you can get a feel for the underlying structures and how deep they are underground. Zoom in to see the buildings and tilt your view. Joey has included a folder with YouTube videos in placemarks which provide some excellent information about the project. The large deep structure is the new ATLAS particle detector system. Nice work!
2 comments:
Well by the lack of posts i guess im the only one thats exited about the results that are going to come forth the next few years. I have a deep interest in cosmology and astronomy and although im not an expert, i know enough about particle physics to know that the super collider will not end the earth. And if it does for some god awful reason, what a sweet way to go.
Myan and I-Ching calenders end the year 2012 amazing how they both end that same year and they used the stars with no telescopes to do so many things like planting and harvesting time. makes me wonder
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