Science Prepares To "Fire Up" the Large Hadron Collider: Investigating the "Big Bang"

It doesn't really matter. Particle physics is old hat, now. Today's real research is biological and has been ever since Apollo landed on the moon. Trying to know more about less and less is just intellectual masturbation.

All of sentient life is intellectual masturbation.
 
It doesn't really matter. Particle physics is old hat, now. Today's real research is biological and has been ever since Apollo landed on the moon. Trying to know more about less and less is just intellectual masturbation.

~~~!!!!!!!!!!

Something we can actually agree upon...please don't run crying into a corner in misery!:)

The LHC is a collosal boondoggle that cost billions just to dig the hole to put it in; estimates from 2.4 Billion USD to over 10Billion convince me that the total cost is perhaps three or four times that, plus yearly operating costs I will double damn bet the the scientists and hundreds more paid high wages are not even counted.

Move over Al Gore, the are attributing the invention of the Internet to the CERN program that preceeded the LHC. The hoped for goals of 'pure science' are a better understanding of the creation and evolution of the Universe, yeah, I can put that in my pocket and with a buck,I might get a cuppa...

"Spin off' technology, they claim, will make the whole project 'more than worth the investment....', yeah, they always say that, so much for Space Shuttles, a Moon and a Mars base, not much real science there, huh?

Government investments in Spain for 'alternative energy sources' has all but bankrupted that and several other countries whose governments are heavily invested.

About the only good thing about it is the identification of the 'God Particle' that played a part in a Tom Hanks movie...sheesh...I'll have a burger & fries to go, please....

:rose:

So happy we agree!

ami

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It doesn't really matter. Particle physics is old hat, now. Today's real research is biological and has been ever since Apollo landed on the moon. Trying to know more about less and less is just intellectual masturbation.

Possibly. But physics has been such a potent force for the last five hundred years that it's dangerous to write it off.
 
http://public.web.cern.ch/public/

In a paper published in the journal Nature today, the CLOUD experiment at CERN has reported its first results. The CLOUD experiment has been designed to study the effect of cosmic rays on the formation of atmospheric aerosols - tiny liquid or solid particles suspended in the atmosphere - under controlled laboratory conditions. Atmospheric aerosols are thought to be responsible for a large fraction of the seeds that form cloud droplets. Understanding the process of aerosol formation is therefore important for understanding the climate.

The CLOUD results show that trace vapours assumed until now to account for aerosol formation in the lower atmosphere can explain only a tiny fraction of the observed atmospheric aerosol production. The results also show that ionisation from cosmic rays significantly enhances aerosol formation. Precise measurements such as these are important in achieving a quantitative understanding of cloud formation, and will contribute to a better assessment of the effects of clouds in climate models.
 
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