Is CERN safe?

From Journey to the centre of the earth

" ... Bunches of protons will smash into each other - smaller than a human hair, but with the combined force of a freight train. Scientists will never have meted out such violence to objects so small. There will be a huge party. Careers will be made; new textbooks will be written. Conditions will be created that replicate the universe moments after the Big Bang. Miniature black holes will be created (but only tiny ones, millions of times smaller than an atom, and only for millionths of a second. So not to worry.) The Nobel Prize may be won, as it was by Cern physicists Carlo Rubbia and Simon Van der Meer in 1984. Most importantly, there is a significant chance that the most important mystery of the universe - what is mass? - will be solved.

One thing that occurs to me is that smashing things into each other at the speed of light might not be an entirely safe thing to do. Could there not be, as some have already suggested, a very big explosion? Might Switzerland disappear into a black hole? The answer is: almost certainly not. Why? Well, if you think about Einstein's equation, E=mc2 (where E stands for energy, m for mass and c for the speed of light), you can see that it takes a huge amount of energy to create a tiny bit of mass. That's because mass consists of minuscule particles held together by vast forces. So if you take a piece of mass (uranium is good for this) and break it apart in the right way, you release these vast forces. A nuclear explosion turns a small amount of mass into a huge amount of energy.

'We do the opposite thing,' Gillies says. 'We turn a huge amount of energy into a small amount of mass, using Einstein's equation backwards.' ... "

 From Raising the Alarm Over Massive and Dangerous New Experiment; Where Is the Oversight on CERN?

" ... Some of the world’s top scientists, including some Nobel Prize winners, are preparing to create black-hole material in a laboratory in Europe this spring. What will happen when they fire up the Large Hadron Collider (LHC)—the largest machine on earth? Will the black-hole material be stable? Will it be controllable? European Center for Nuclear Research (CERN) scientists say their experiment is safe, but how they are sure? Some opposing nuclear physicists have raised the alarm, including a Nobel laureate.

Scientists at LHC, outside of Geneva, have been planning for years to collide bundles of 10,000,000,000,000 (10 trillion) protons moving at the speed of light head-on into other bundles of 10 trillion protons. The LHC is a new type of accelerator, which will cause collisions to pile up at predetermined junctions into a huge dogpile of collisions that have the potential to build spontaneous black-holes.

The new material created by this collision is unknown to humanity. Its dynamics are unpredictable. The methods and requirements for containment are unknown, and if an accident occurs and an uncontrollable black-hole is created, scientists do not know how they will destabilize it. What if this experiment “succeeds” beyond their wildest dreams and becomes uncontainable? What if this black-hole begins progressively compacting all the matter near it? What will be the result? No one knows. Who has a plan to destabilize any voracious material created? There does not appear to be one.

As the author of The Dominium, a new book outlining a new scientific model on antimatter and gravity relationships, I am raising questions about the presumption that mini-black-holes are harmless. The Dominium model outlines cosmological events from Big Bang to Big Bang. This model is not plagued by anomaly as other theories are. It is coherent. It is seamless. Yet this model presents the awful implication: mini black-holes will not disappear as simply as predicted. They will persist, and they will begin compacting, which in scientific terms means they will be “stable” and uncontrollable. ... "

 

From The Potential for Danger in Particle Collider Experiments

" ... The CERN study [Ref. 1] is a remake of a similar study for the earlier Relativistic Heavy Ion Collider at Brookhaven (RHIC) [Ref. 6] adapted to the LHC.
It is important to notice that: The study for the RHIC had concluded that no black holes will be created. For the LHC the conclusion is very different: "Black holes could be created!" !
The main danger could be now just behind our door with the possible death in blood of 6.500.000.000 (US notation 6,500,000,000) people and complete destruction of our beautiful planet. Such a danger shows the need of a far larger study before any experiment ! The CERN study presents risk as a choice between a 100% risk or a 0% risk. This is not a good evaluation of a risk percentage!
If we add all the risks for the LHC we could estimate an overall risk between 11% and 25%!.
We are far from the Adrian Kent's admonition that global risks that should not exceed 0.000001% a year to have a chance to be acceptable. [Ref. 3] .Even testing the LHC could be dangerous. Even an increase in the luminosity of the RHIC could be dangerous! It would be wise to consider that the more powerful the accelerator will be, the more unpredicted and dangerous the events that may occur! We cannot build accelerators always more powerful with interactions different from natural interactions, without risk. This is not a scientific problem. This is a wisdom problem!
Our desire of knowledge is important but our desire of wisdom is more important and must take precedence. The precautionary principle indicates not to experiment. The politicians must understand this evidence and stop these experiments before it is too late! ... "

 

 

From Risk Evaluation Forum

Recent developments in physics suggest the possibility that an experiment, scheduled to begin at the European research facility at CERN in May 2008, will destroy the Earth. CERN is installing a new high-energy particle collider, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC). It is expected to produce particles scientists have not seen before. Two of these particles could be dangerous.

Black Holes
Several string theorists have published papers predicting that the LHC will produce mini black holes. In the worst case, a mini black hole could swallow Earth.

Strangelets
Strangelets, another potential collider product, might catalyze conversion of normal matter into more strangelets, turning Earth into a small ball of strangelets.

Safety Factors
CERN has published a paper asserting several safety factors. Black holes are supposed to dissipate via Hawking radiation. A collection of strangelets is supposed to be electrically positive on its surface, and therefore not attract other matter. However, new studies have put these safety factors in question. New physics papers question the existence of Hawking radiation. A recently published paper finds that a collection of strangelets can be negative on its surface. Other safety factors also seem subject to question. For more details, see our discussion and reference sections.

Risk Management
Proper risk management requires a formal risk assessment. CERN has done this for radiation in their tunnels, but not for black holes and strangelets. Further, a proper risk assessment requires updates when new information becomes available. We encourage CERN to do a formal risk assessment.

What You Can Do
This issue should be on the public agenda. Readers can help by thinking about, discussing, and publicizing the issue. Contact us to help with our initiatives. We also encourage more physicists to work on the issue, and we encourage funding to help them to do so. (Physicists quickly see model limiters. Consider if candidate model limiters are reliable enough to protect something as valuable as Earth. If you think you have found a sufficiently reliable model limiter, please let us know.)

More Pages:
Discussion of the problem
Help us find a limit to this model
Legal action
Forum
References and links to published articles

 

 

From Yahoo! Answers

 

Will CERN mean the end of the world?

Pretty soon the particle accelerator in Geneva, Switzerland will come online and scientists will use it to probe deeper into the atom than ever before, but are humans meant to probe this deep? Is there any possibility what humans will find will destroy the world, so to speak open a rift in the space time continuum that will swallow up our solar system or perhaps even our galaxy? Some scientists feared that setting off the first atomic bomb would create chain reaction in the atmosphere that would destroy the planet. While that obviously was untrue, unless you take into account the tons of radioactive material that was pumped into the atmosphere, could it possibly be true with CERN? All I am saying is that maybe the scientists at CERN should pole the world to determine if they should actually turn it on.

Answer:

No Chicken Little, the sky is not falling. While there are some dangers at CERN they are local dangers. For example the proton beam might escape the beam pipe and damaging some equipment and hurt some people. There is no danger outside the immediate vicinity. The Large Hadron Collider is no more dangerous than a busy construction site. CERN is much safer than a nuclear power plant.