Large Hardon Collider

[Mizango]

Also, has anyone ever read this?

http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/...SH20_OU01_.jpg

Seems really interesting, but like I mentioned before, I tend to not be able to read through his books. I have this entire book on a PDF file and I'm wondering if it's worth reading.

Yes I have that book here at home, it is a good one actually. But you and I have talked about Lee Smolin and his writing style. Its much easier to wrap your head around than Three roads to quantum gravity ever was.

But yeah its still Smolin.

Isn't the universe only about 14 billion years old? A "few" billion isn't nothing compared to that. Even just 3-4 billion years would be a quarter of the universe's current age, that's a lot.

That "few" was supposed to be "four", I love the iPhones auto word complete feature.

Nah, even after the giant comet destroys the outer planets, and the sun's subsequent supernova destroys the inner planets, we'll still be around. It only deals a few hundred damage, IIRC.

lol

[Neosutra]

The universe is more like 30-40 billion years old (probably).

[Abandon]

The universe is more like 30-40 billion years old (probably).

And Brett Farve will be swapping teams for another 5 billion years.

[Khamsin]

So, I read there'll be a super large hadron collider after this regular large one?

What will that one do that this one can't? Says it'll be up and running universe-breaking tests as early as 2012.

[Eliseos]

The bigger colliders can reach higher energies than the smaller ones, completely depends on it's radius. Higher energies mean you can (hopefully) see smaller and smaller particles break off than you could at the lower ones. I think to prove string theory correct or incorrect, a collider the size of the milky way would have to be constructed (with our current technology anyways).

EDIT: after reading the wiki article on it, it looks to be just increasing the resolution on their detectors, not an actual new collider.

[Neosutra]

Yes, to prove string theory correct, we would need more energy than like.. the entire universe has at the moment.

We can however attempt to find a higgs particle with the LHC.

[Mizango]

STRAIGHT BOSON

[Woozie]

What will that one do that this one can't? Says it'll be up and running universe-breaking tests as early as 2012.

It's going to destroy the world, obviously.

Spoiler: show

DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL! DESTROY US ALL!

[Khamsin]

If cosmic rays hitting earth are more energetic than the LHC, why not study their points of impact? Or would it not be possible to have sensor equipment measure a natural particle collision as well as within a controlled environment?

Also, in regards to string theory, I've heard it described using short little strings. Do those strings extend into other universes/branes/dimensions/whatever, or are they self-contained short little wigglyworm strings confined to this brane?

If they pass through other branes, can they be tugged from ours to influence others?

[Woozie]

If cosmic rays hitting earth are more energetic than the LHC, why not study their points of impact? Or would it not be possible to have sensor equipment measure a natural particle collision as well as within a controlled environment?

The Earth's magnetic field diverts most cosmic radiation so it never reaches the surface of the Earth. I guess we'd have to bring the equipment up there to the upper atmosphere/space. That would make things complicated and costly. Also, in a collider, we have a particle traveling nearly at C, and another at the same speed but in the opposite direction. But in space, we have cosmic radiation at nearly C hitting objects sitting still. So the center of mass of the system moves away from us at C when measuring experiments in cosmic ray collisions, whereas the center of mass of the collisions we create on Earth is pretty much stationary with respect to the laboratory.

[Eliseos]

I think the only observable evidence we have for cosmic rays has been the fly's eye detector, and it's follow up Telescope Array Project - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia They basically follow the particles that split off from the cosmic ray, and hit the earth's surface. I may be wrong on this, but I think cosmic rays hit the atmosphere too randomly to be able to study them directly.

[Max™]

The universe is more like 30-40 billion years old (probably).

How ya figure?


Also: my favorite astronomical phenomenon is Gold.

Gold is only produced in extremely energetic supernova's, it's so energetic that the electrons in the outer shells (the visible ones) are being dragged around at relativistic velocities, which is what produces the colors that entrance us so.

Gold is a little piece of an object that is almost certainly a black hole now.

[Woozie]

Or you could just make it from Lead like I do. lern2alchemy, gimp.

Edit: By the way, Max, since you're a bigger fan of Smolin, what do you think about the book I posted above? Have you read it? If so, how good was it and is it worth me trying to read?

[Mizango]

Don't get me wrong Smolin is the man, its just you know....boring. The trouble with Physics is a very good book, I did a review on it on Amazon like a year or so ago after I got done reading it.

It's there somewhere, may be still on the first page.

[Mizango]

Or you could just make it from Lead like I do. lern2alchemy, gimp.

Amen brother, Edward Elric checking in and ready for duty!

[Woozie]

Okay, I'm going to go ahead and try to read it. And yeah, I agree, Smolin is awesome, but it's just something about the way he writes, coupled with my learning disabilities, which makes it nearly impossible for me to finish his books or articles.

[Max™]

I'm biased, as I love how Smolin writes.

Ask someone else.

Smolin, like myself, is highly skeptical of String Theory.

String Theory is jerking off to a mathematics textbook and noticing that your jizz on the wall looks like a theory of everything.

Nothing will come of it, other than the proven useful aDS/CFT correspondence, WHICH EMERGES FROM OTHER FORMS OF PHYSICS, and just happened to be noticed first through stringy methods.

String Theory is why I would never try to get a job as a PhD in Physics, and would never recommend it.

The landscape currently is like 98%: STRING THEORY MUST BE THE KEY TO FINDING M-THEORY WHICH WILL ANSWER EVERYTHING, AND YOU'RE STUPID FOR QUESTIONING THAT, RAWR! FUCK OUR SIMILARITY TO THOSE WHO QUESTIONED NEWTON!

1.9%: Uh, Loop Gravity looks kind of promising, I think you String Theorists need to look around and see what you can incorporate into your models to bring them back to reality.

0.01~ or less: Uh, you guys are morons, quantum effects are merely an artifact of the small scale structure of the Universe, the Universe is NOT made of tiny little "bits", it only behaves that way. The Universe is an extended object, and must be represented as such in any theory which attempts to properly explain it. Also, you have to respect the impact time has on an actual physical theory.

I'm in that tiny little bit there, we're usually called "fringe" at best, "kooks" or "quacks" at worst, but unlike the vastly larger number of quacks, I can actually show I know what I'm saying, and make testable predictions.

[Mizango]

Anyone down with João Magueijo is down with me and if you down with me, then you down wit O.P.P.

[Woozie]

The main reason I want to read his book is because of his arguments against string theory. I'm skeptical of it. I usually wont just come out and say I'm sure that it's wrong, but if I had to place a bet, I'd definitely bet against the theory.

And there's nothing wrong with people liking a theory that I disagree with. I mean, in theoretical physics, there will be disagreements. I just hate how such a large portion of physics buffs follow String Theory as if it's the second coming of Newton or something. There's really no good reasons to think it's better than any of the other theories out there. The only thing spectacular about it is how it stimulates the imagination, but that doesn't make it any more right than any other theories.

If we ever get any sort of empirical data pointing towards, then maybe I'll give it more respect. But for a theory we can't even test, way too many people are way too sure that it's correct for very wrong reasons.

[Max™]

Quite, I'm a big fan of Smolin, though I don't think LQG is exactly the right path, the Spin foam idea is great.

As for Susskind btw, as I'm also somewhat of an outspoken detractor of Hawking and his views of black holes, I can't judge the guy.

If I'm anywhere near right, Hawking can not be, if black holes decay, then the Universe is not what I thought.

That, to me, would be like having a hole in a blanket weave itself back together.