Scientists may destroy the Earth in 2008 - Reprive, you now have until next year

[flamey_mcflame]

I love how the title of the thread. Of course, a more appropriate title should have been, "Scientists attempt to recreate the origins of the Universe".But knowing your disposition towards an ultraconservative ideology, I knew you'd find a way to label scientists as the "bad guys".

And by the way, this is not new news. If you were such an avid reader of scientific magazines, you'd have known that both the particle collider dissension and the lawsuit have been in the news many months ago.

And using your logic that even the remotest possibility of things going catastrophically wrong should prevent others from doing things that might affect the general public, we should all stop doing things. I can guarantee that the odds of myself killing someone with my car are infinitely greater than the black holes that could be created by this project that would destroy the earth. Should I no longer drive my car because of every possible outcome that may result?? Essentially, its your argument, except on a micro stage. That person is no longer part of the earth due to no fault of their own.

I particularly like how you used the global term, "scientists". Not particle physicists, but scientists. I wonder what you're reasoning behind that was.

Run for the hills Ma Barker, the scientists are up to no good again.

[Nehkara]

Here we go folks... Just 2 days until LHC starts up. Should be fun to read all of the doomsday talk.

[Bagor]

Originally Posted by Nehkara

Here we go folks... Just 2 days until LHC starts up. Should be fun to read all of the doomsday talk.

Surely, somewhere there must be a far right Christian group denouncing all this as the devils' work.

[Ford Prefect]

Originally Posted by flamey_mcflame

And by the way, this is not new news. If you were such an avid reader of scientific magazines, you'd have known that both the particle collider dissension and the lawsuit have been in the news many months ago.

Just for clarification, this is a bumped thread from last October.

[Dion]

Originally Posted by Nehkara

Here we go folks... Just 2 days until LHC starts up. Should be fun to read all of the doomsday talk.

I wonder if there will people parading around the site with signs saying the world is going to end.

[flamey_mcflame]

Originally Posted by Ford Prefect

Just for clarification, this is a bumped thread from last October.

Oops, I do apologize for that Jolinar. I was careless in not checking the date of the original post. Please disregard any comments relating to my ignorance in that matter. Thanks for the heads up Mr. Prefect.

[HOOT]

I thought the world was suppose to end 12 20 2012?

I had big plans before that date....now I have to fit it all into 2 days!

[REDVAN]

I hope it doesn't f us up hard, because that's the exact type of misbehavior that can get you killed.

That being said, it's kinda neat. But I honestly hope the thing doesn't even work.

[Joborule]

So with the likelyhood that this things work (better, my 18th birthday is on Friday!), what will be the rewards from it? A hell lot of power, or just a hell lot of new knowledge?

[Blaster86]

Originally Posted by Joborule

So with the likelyhood that this things work (better, my 18th birthday is on Friday!), what will be the rewards from it? A hell lot of power, or just a hell lot of new knowledge?

Both possibly.

[CaptainCrunch]

Or a gateway to hell that lets evil demon's and monsters out to roam the earth, eating out brains, using our bones as tooth picks and violating our women.

[BCReefer]

Originally Posted by flamey_mcflame

Oops, I do apologize for that Jolinar. I was careless in not checking the date of the original post. Please disregard any comments relating to my ignorance in that matter. Thanks for the heads up Mr. Prefect.

Don't feel bad, I also thought it was a new thread

Very interesting and yes like everyone else this is really above our heads and we have no idea of what it means but being human is all about taking calculatated risks.

If mankind did not take risks we would still be living back in Roman times.

On the otehr hand, what ever new technologies that are discovered are usually exploited to benfit a selective few unless you have oodles of money.

About violating our women, I don't think you have anything to worry about in cow-town (just kidding)

[JBR]

Can't they wait until my vacation is over before they let Gozer run wild?

[mykalberta]

If it does happen, someone PM me. I have some hookers and blow money saved up for just the occasion. Well actually its for a new car next year but I wont be needing that if this occurs

[HotHotHeat]

Moved back to October 21st.


http://www.russia-ic.com/news/show/6852/

I was hoping to watch at least a few more flames games before getting sucked into a gapping hole of nothingness.

[Itse]

You know, philosophically speaking, we don't know anything for sure. I'm not sure how to put it in a short and simple way (especially in a foreign language), but basicly it goes like this:

Take anything you think you know. Anything at all. For example, that when you drop something in your house it falls down. Or that you're not a frog next time you wake up. How do you know this? Because you've seen propably seen thousands of objects fall in your lifetime, and they've all come down. And because you've never been a frog as far as you know.

But actually, that's not knowing. That's an assumption. We drop something a million times, we see that every time it falls, and we assume that's the way things go. We make theories as to why that is, we notice that there's gravity, we build theories on why gravity exists and observe that yeah, good theory, things still go down and it all goes together with these other theories and we can observe those things happening too. But really, hypothetically, it could all be an extremely unlikely coincidence. Gravity could actually be suspect to extremely rare but wild fluctuations. All laws of nature could just turn inside out one day, and the reason could be so simple any physicist could tell why things happened given more time than the millisecond it took for him to vaporize.

Maybe next time you drop something it goes up. Maybe some day we'll all learn that there's a power in the universe that can seemingly randomly turn people into frogs, we just haven't noticed it before because it's never been recorded. Maybe next time it hits you. Maybe some day God shows up and goes "Wazaa dudes! See what I did with there, that frog thing? Funny ain't it? You know Saturns ring is so cool, I could watch it for millenniums. So what have you guys been doing the last two thousand years? Is Halo 3 out yet? I planned it to be the the pinnacle of human civilization you know, so it's all downhill from there." There really is no way of knowing.

What we do know, there's no point in sweating over this stuff, as it really isn't very likely.

[octothorp]

Originally Posted by Itse

You know, philosophically speaking, we don't know anything for sure. I'm not sure how to put it in a short and simple way (especially in a foreign language), but basicly it goes like this:

Take anything you think you know. Anything at all. For example, that when you drop something in your house it falls down. Or that you're not a frog next time you wake up. How do you know this? Because you've seen propably seen thousands of objects fall in your lifetime, and they've all come down. And because you've never been a frog as far as you know.

But actually, that's not knowing. That's an assumption. We drop something a million times, we see that every time it falls, and we assume that's the way things go. We make theories as to why that is, we notice that there's gravity, we build theories on why gravity exists and observe that yeah, good theory, things still go down and it all goes together with these other theories and we can observe those things happening too. But really, hypothetically, it could all be an extremely unlikely coincidence. Gravity could actually be suspect to extremely rare but wild fluctuations. All laws of nature could just turn inside out one day, and the reason could be so simple any physicist could tell why things happened given more time than the millisecond it took for him to vaporize.

Maybe next time you drop something it goes up. Maybe some day we'll all learn that there's a power in the universe that can seemingly randomly turn people into frogs, we just haven't noticed it before because it's never been recorded. Maybe next time it hits you. Maybe some day God shows up and goes "Wazaa dudes! See what I did with there, that frog thing? Funny ain't it? You know Saturns ring is so cool, I could watch it for millenniums. So what have you guys been doing the last two thousand years? Is Halo 3 out yet? I planned it to be the the pinnacle of human civilization you know, so it's all downhill from there." There really is no way of knowing.

What we do know, there's no point in sweating over this stuff, as it really isn't very likely.

Right, Cartesian Doubt. But are you saying that this doubt should prevent us from bothering with scientific research such as the LHC, or are you suggesting that is should prevent us from caring about the remote possibility that the LHC might turn the planet into a smoldering little mass of strange matter?

[Joborule]

Originally Posted by HotHotHeat

Moved back to October 21st.


http://www.russia-ic.com/news/show/6852/

I was hoping to watch at least a few more flames games before getting sucked into a gapping hole of nothingness.

Oh good I get to live till my 18th now.

[fredr123]

http://fqxi.org/community/forum/topic/230

As the LHC supposedly gears up, Harvard physicist Kevin Black, based at CERN, investigates rumors that the particle accelerator may, in fact, soon be shut down—by ripples from the future.

[Itse]

Originally Posted by octothorp

Right, Cartesian Doubt. But are you saying that this doubt should prevent us from bothering with scientific research such as the LHC, or are you suggesting that is should prevent us from caring about the remote possibility that the LHC might turn the planet into a smoldering little mass of strange matter?

I guess what ever floats your boat. Personally I go with the latter option. Science is fascinating and surprisingly useful from time to time. I always like to keep some around the house.

EDIT: Btw I meant to go more the way of "problem of induction", although it's pretty much the same thing when described like this (=badly). Descartés somehow never really made that much of an impression on me, but I really liked Hume at certain point. Funny guy. That was also about the point where I realized that I don't really want to be a philosopher after all. It's been about fourteen years since I last read that stuff.

(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_of_induction, for those who care)