THE END IS COMING...AGAIN!

September 15th 2008 – Hackers have attacked the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) or the biggest and most expensive scientific experiment ever devised. Although causing minimal damage, these attacks come mere days after the collider conducted its first successful tests. You may not know what a Hadron collider is (much less a very large one) therefore I will tell you a story of immeasurable horror and how it may simply be a historical sequel.

Built underground across the Swiss-France border, this monstrosity is a circular particle accelerator. The “large” aspect of it comes from its 27 kilometers in diameter. It will be used for extensive and breakthrough nuclear research by spinning and smashing atoms, molecules and subatomic particles at speeds unseen as of yet by humanity and quite impossible in our immediate sector of the universe. I purposely used the grandest and vaguest terms to describe it so that you may see the elusive and mysterious glow of uncertainty that surrounds the machine and that has terrified extremist groups.

It may recreate the Big Bang and destroy the universe, it may produce a microscopic black hole and destroy the universe, it may create “strange matter” which theoretically transforms all connecting matter into unstable goop, destroying the universe and finally it could simply create a nuclear explosion that will kill us all. Unfortunately for the radical fear-mongers, the scientific parameters of the machine have been developed over the past 13 years (and 15 billion dollars) to produce limited effects and reactions that will be controlled and studied underground. No wonder CNN has covered 3 hurricanes continuously for the past two weeksinstead of this. If the Americans aren’t spinning the possible end of the world, there mustn’t be much credibility to the threat. That being said, there is a small possibility that we may all die very soon.

You see, even the scientists that have spent decades on the project have admitted that there is an infinitesimal chance of these catastrophic phenomena occurring, destroying the universe. We are talking one in a billion or so but that is assuming we currently possess all scientific knowledge that exists. We unfortunately know very little of the universe and its physical laws (scientists have proposed that over 95% of the Universe is unaccounted for, seriously, check it out). That is to say that the European Organization for Nuclear Research may be the next Manhattan Project who’s aims are noble and concern scientific advancement yet could end in human annihilation if it falls into the wrong hands.

In the early 1940s, the United States, England and Canada were arduously battling the Nazi agressor (or waiting for the Japanese to provoke them into doing so) and therefore these nations collaborated in an important scientific endeavour of defense and progress. Directed by J. Robert Oppenheimer and assisted by a plethora of specialists such as Albert Einstein, the project not only aimed to research the nuclear weapons that Nazi Germany were potentially developping but to create them as an incentive for peace. Oppenheimer and Einstein would never have though that their ingenious creation would become the angel of death for tens of thousands of Japanese civilians. Furthermore, they probably never thought that their research would lead to a terrifying 50 year stalemate where all industrialised countries would practise nuclear shelter drills in the utmost terror and where belligerent nations could potentially annihilate each other within a single day and a few buttons pressed.

Don't get me wrong, the LHC will not shatter the fabric of space-time, it will probably not even reveal the very interesting things that we are promised. It will slowly go back to being an unknown project that is just very big and very expensive (or will it...).

Have a nice week (please keep in mind it could be your last so go spend those RRSPs)

(Pictured: Trinity test, the first atomic bomb developped by the Manhattan Project - The LHC, a cross-section of the 27 km tube)

End.