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The Large Hadron Collider Has Not Destroyed The World (Yet)

Posted 9/10/2008 8:02 pm by Ron Hogan

cern-lhc-gallery-20.jpg

Everyone’s been talking about the Large Hadron Collider. It’s the hot new topic amongst the science set, and even those vaguely interested in science, not because of what it does, but because of what it could do. Here’s a great explanation, but I’ll try to mash out a quick one for those not inclined to read it all. Or, just watch the following rap video, complete with cute girl MC and geeky scientist dancing.

The device is basically the world’s largest atom smasher at over 17 miles in length. It’s a giant circle that crosses the France/Switzerland border, and it smashes protons together with such power that it creates the same amount of energy as 380 pounds of dynamite going off. The large magnets that keep the proton beams traveling contain the energy of 2.4 TONS of dynamite! Get to know your enemy with this amazingly cool image gallery.

Any mistake could blow up half of Switzerland, and that’s not even the doomsday scenario!

The world ending scenario that the LHC has conjured up is that of an earth-devouring miniature black hole. Fortunately, the launch of the Large Hadron Collider, like many other failed dates of the Apocalypse, has not brought about the end of our humble blue planet. Yet. Here’s our current LHC world-destroying status.

I don’t know about you guys, but I’m going to celebrate by buying a teeshirt to go with my post-apocalypse survival gear.

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