I’ve blogged about this exact issue before and you can hit this link for all my LHC blogging.
LHC switch-on fears are completely unfounded
A new report published on Friday, 5 September, provides the most comprehensive evidence available to confirm that the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)’s switch-on, due on Wednesday next week, poses no threat to mankind. Nature’s own cosmic rays regularly produce more powerful particle collisions than those planned within the LHC, which will enable nature’s laws to be studied in controlled experiments.
The LHC Safety Assessment Group have reviewed and updated a study first completed in 2003, which dispels fears of universe-gobbling black holes and of other possibly dangerous new forms of matter, and confirms that the switch-on will be completely safe.
The report, ‘Review of the Safety of LHC Collisions’, published in IOP Publishing’s Journal of Physics G: Nuclear and Particle Physics, proves that if particle collisions at the LHC had the power to destroy the Earth, we would never have been given the chance to exist, because regular interactions with more energetic cosmic rays would already have destroyed the Earth or other astronomical bodies.
The Safety Assessment Group writes, “Nature has already conducted the equivalent of about a hundred thousand LHC experimental programmes on Earth – and the planet still exists.”
The Safety Assessment Group compares the rates of cosmic rays that bombard Earth, other planets in our solar system, the Sun and all the other stars in our universe itself to show that hypothetical black holes or strangelets, that have raised fears in some, will in fact pose no threat.
The report also concludes that, since cosmic-ray collisions are more energetic than those in the LHC, but are incapable of producing vacuum bubbles or dangerous magnetic monopoles, we should not fear their creation by the LHC.
LHC collisions will differ from cosmic-ray collisions in that any exotic particles created will have lower velocities, but the Safety Assessment Group shows that even fast-moving black holes produced by cosmic rays would have stopped inside the Earth or other astronomical bodies. Their existence proves that any such black holes could not gobble matter at a risky rate.
As the Safety Assessment Group writes, “Each collision of a pair of protons in the LHC will release an amount of energy comparable to that of two colliding mosquitoes, so any black hole produced would be much smaller than those known to astrophysicists.” They conclude that such microscopic black holes could not grow dangerously.
As for the equally hypothetical strangelets, the review uses recent experimental measurements at the Brookhaven National Laboratory’s Relativistic Heavy-Ion Collider, New York, to prove that they will not be produced during collisions in the LHC.
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Similar fears were also expressed before the space shuttle Challenger launched in freezing weather. (The shuttle Challenger exploded.)
CERN argues that the LHC will not do anything that nature does not already do. That is not a true statement. Nature does not create slow moving micro black holes, head-on colliders might, and according to the CERN Courier possibly at a rate of 1 per second[1].
CERN was not aware that Hawking Radiation had been debunked by multiple papers that find micro black holes do not evaporate, particles do not travel back in time and Dr. Einstein was not “doubly wrong”.[2][3][5]
Safety review by senior German Physics PHD Dr. Rainer Plaga finds that safety is not certain, creation of micro black holes might as likely be catastrophic. He proposes feasible risk mitigation procedures including PROCEED SLOWLY![4]
Safety review by Visiting professor of Physics Dr. Rossler also refutes CERNs safety arguments, Hawking Radiation is not possible, cosmic rays are not stopped by Earth or even Neutron stars (protected by super fluidity) and micro black holes if created would grow exponentially and prove catastrophic in years, decades or centuries.[5][6]
Former cosmic ray researcher, California math champion and Nuclear Safety Officer Walter L. Wagner discovered flaws with CERN’s safety arguments. He calculates stable strange matter creation (particularly from Lead Lead collisions) and dangerous micro black hole creation has not been excluded and might as likely prove catastrophic.[7][8]
CERN’s response? Deny possibility of danger, grossly exaggerate certainty of safety, denigrate the opposition personally and promise to prove safety by launching as quickly as possible, possibly 10 TeV before Winter shut down if possible![9]
Am I concerned? Yes
[1] cerncourier.com/cws/article/cern/29199 The case for mini black holes, CERN Courier (2004)
[2] xxx.lanl.gov/abs/gr-qc/0304042 Do black holes radiate?. Dr. Adam Helfer (2003)
[3] arxiv.org/abs/gr-qc/0607137, On the existence of black hole evaporationyet again, Prof. VA Belinski (2006)
[4] arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0808/0808.1415v1.pdf On the potential catastrophic risk from metastable quantum-black holes produced at particle colliders – Rainer Plaga Rebuttal (2008)
[5] http://www.wissensnavigator.com/documents/OTTOROESSLERMINIBLACKHOLE.pdf Abraham-Solution to Schwarzschild Metric Implies That CERN Miniblack Holes Pose a Planetary Risk, Prof. Dr. Otto Rossler (2008)
[6] http://www.wissensnavigator.com/documents/spiritualottoeroessler.pdf A Rational and Moral and Spiritual Dilemma – Otto E. Rössler Safety Counter Arguments (2008)
[7] http://www.lhcdefense.org/lhc_expertssay.php What the Experts Say (2008)
[8] http://www.lhcdefense.org/lhc_legal.php US Federal Lawsuit Filings – Walter L. Wagner (2008)
[9] http://www.lhcfacts.org/?p=72 CERN?s Dr. Ellis tells only half of the story – LHCFacts.org (2008)
Comment by jtankers — September 7, 2008 @ 8:21 pm
The Space Shuttle analogy is as bogus as you can get. If anyone is still worried after reading CERN’s report, I can recommend my post, which shows how truly weak the supposed scientific opposition is. It’s Large Hadron Collider: What’s the Risk?”
Comment by onscrn — September 8, 2008 @ 10:22 pm