Baby Bang experiment could open door to new dimension

[ArrowX]

Monday September 11, 2006

Deep underground on the Franco-Swiss border, someone will throw a switch next year to start one of the most ambitious experiments in history, probing the secrets of the universe and possibly finding new dimensions.

The Large Hadron Collider - a 27km-long circular particle accelerator at the CERN experimental facility near Geneva, will smash protons into one another at unimaginable speeds trying to replicate in miniature the events of the Big Bang.

"These beams will have the kinetic energy of an aircraft carrier slammed into the size of a zero on a 20p piece," Brian Cox of Manchester University told the annual meeting of the British Association for the Advancement of Science.

"We are going to make mini Big Bangs.

"There has never been such a jump in particle physics. It will go into an area that we don't really understand," he added.

The fundamental goal of the massive machine is to answer the basic but crucial question of how matter was created at the birth of the universe.

"We don't know what 95 per cent of the universe is made of - which is a bit embarrassing for a subject that claims to be fundamental," Dr Cox said.

"There is dark matter. It is all over the place but we have no idea what it is."

"There is also something called dark energy, and that is an even bigger question.

"It makes up about 70 per cent of the energy in the universe, but again we have absolutely no idea what it is.

"It is an incredibly exciting machine. It will be turned on next year and run for at least a decade and probably 20 years and the first results - if the machine behaves itself - should start coming out within a year," he added.

If the theories are correct, the machine will create tiny black holes that evaporate and possibly even find particles that offer evidence that the three dimensions known to mankind are just a fraction of those that exist.

"That would be an even bigger headline than the black holes. It could be that there is a whole new universe a millimetre away from our heads but at right-angles to the three dimensions that are here," Dr Cox said.

"That would be a real paradigm shift - our relegation to a little sheet in a multi-dimensional universe.

"That kind of thing is really profound and will capture the imagination that perhaps the origin of mass won't, although it should.

"For the first time in many decades we have built a machine that exceeds our powers of prediction.

"New processes are bound to be discovered. We are truly journeying into unknown territory."

Dr Cox dismissed worries that by adventuring into the unknown and creating tiny black holes, the machine could even destroy the planet.

"The probability is at the level of 10 to the minus 40," he said.

MINI BANGS

* Scientists aim to reproduce miniature versions of the so-called Big Bang, which is thought to have started the universe.

* To do this they will smash protons together at huge speeds along a 27km tube known as a particle accelerator.

* They hope to create tiny black holes or find extra dimensions in the universe.

* They estimate the possibility of accidentally destroying the planet as extremely low.

* The risk is calculated at about 10 to the minus 40 - a 1 in 10,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 ,000 chance.

- REUTERS

link here

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/topic/story.cfm?c_id=325&objectid=10400645

This just SCREAMS great idea.

[Sethomas]

You reading physics-for-idiots articles and posting them in this forum screams "bad idea" as well.

[DuFresne]

I thought this article was going to be about exploding babies.

[kahljorn]

Sethomas what do you think of this because I was under the impression they've been doing experiments like this for a long time. I've never heard them call it "Big bangs" or "Blackholes" before though.

Do you think the world will explode? That would be nice, I'm sure it wouldn't be painful.

[Grislygus]

So, what, it's just a new design for a particle accelerator?

[Marc Summers]

The world wouldn't explode, it would be sucked into the mini black hole that may cause scientists to say "uh oh, why isn't it dissipating?"

A lot of this article is speculation from Dr. Cox that seems underdeveloped. I find that to be...well...scary.

"There has never been such a jump in particle physics. It will go into an area that we don't really understand,"That's comforting.

"There is dark matter. It is all over the place but we have no idea what it is."It's everywhere but we dunno man...

It makes up about 70 per cent of the energy in the universe, but again we have absolutely no idea what it is.How did they get 70% I wanna know >:
But then again, they have no idea.

For the first time in many decades we have built a machine that exceeds our powers of prediction. That's comforting.

Dr Cox dismissed worries that by adventuring into the unknown and creating tiny black holes, the machine could even destroy the planet.

"The probability is at the level of 10 to the minus 40," he said. How did he come up with that??? I thought it "exceeds their powers of prediction" >:

To me, it sounds like the scientists are going to do experiments in an area that they have absolutely no clue about, and they may destroy the world in the process. Instead of addressing concerns about that, they just seem dismissive about it.

Then again, the atom bomb was created and it didn't destroy the whole world in one go, so maybe I'm just overreacting. I hope I am :(

[Sethomas]

Creating a black hole in Geneva, if it were powerful enough to collect an excess of matter despite the tremendous void of space at the quantum level where it develops, would give everyone the quick and painless death they want. You'd just go from ordering McDonald's or wanking to being a femto-nugget instantaneously, more or less. But, if one takes Hawking radiation as a given then the chance of a black hole getting larger than the composite parts that created it is pretty damn slim.

Dark matter and dark energy aren't solid physical concepts right now, they're just buffering to explain why the visible universe exhibits more gravity than its visible mass can account for. Saying that there's "some matter we can't see, and some energy we can't see" is actually much more cogent of an explanation than saying "Fuck, Newton was wrong, Einstein was wrong, and a 500 gram apple on earth would have an altered mass of 50 kg in space because space is weird."

Kahl, they've been talking about making baby black holes for quite some time, but most every time I've heard it, it was talking about optimism for the accelerator at CERN. I don't think anyone in the real world appreciates the possibilities CERN presents. Stephen Hawking predicted that physics would be totally dead by 2003, and CERN shows how wrong he was.

CERN is just another particle accelerator like the ones we've had for decades, but it's just HUUUUUUGE and EXPEEEEEEEENSIVE. Which means it's gonna be awesome.

[Fathom Zero]

We're all going to die.

[Marc Summers]

OK thanks Seth I can sleep now :)

[FartinMowler]

I love watching NOVA when they talk about cool stuff like this, I can't believe you guy's crumpled it up and threw in the waste basket :(

[Courage the Cowardly Dog]

MORE EXPLODING BABIES!

[Chojin]

Dr Cox dismissed worries that by adventuring into the unknown and creating tiny black holes, the machine could even destroy the planet.

"The probability is at the level of 10 to the minus 40," he said.
this is like something you'd read in a comic book :lol

[Yggdrasill]

New dimensions? I wonder if we would be the good universe or the evil one.

Either way I will kick my ass and this universe shall reign supreme.

[Sethomas]

It really frustrates me that so many physicists take the multiverse idea seriously. It's such an odd, off-the-wall explanation for quantum probability that people eat it up just for its weirdness. Whenever string theory or any other purported Theory of Everything sees a place where alternate universes could serve a function, they throw it in like it's a viable idea even though it takes the origin of matter as a negligible variable.

I'm not even convinced either way that multiverses are existent or not, but even with CERN I doubt it'll see a disprovable hypothesis in our lifetime. Hence, talking about it seriously is pretty worthless at this stage. As theapportioner pointed out to me, the attention garnered by string theory itself is causing a lot of practical physicists to lose patience, and talking about invisible universes centuries away from any form of proof or disproof only exacerbates matters.

Mostly, I see the multiverse theory as a grave physicists are digging for themselves. The origin of matter is THE question, right beside the unification of the four forces of nature, that is fucking over everyones minds in the higher eschelons. To completely write off the subject and say that a new universe forms every time there's a 50/50 chance that you fart just to accomodate each possibility, is quite akin to slapping the real world in the face when you don't even have an arm to slap with.

"That would be an even bigger headline than the black holes. It could be that there is a whole new universe a millimetre away from our heads but at right-angles to the three dimensions that are here," Dr Cox said.

This line in particular pisses me off. Given that he seems to be a doctor of physics, I'm quite sure that he knows shit tons more on the subject than me. Still, what it seems to be is that he was given the prompt "talk about hidden dimensions and parallel universes and shit" and he threw in both in the same breath as if they have any similarity whatsoever. Talking about "the fifth dimension" like it's some place where people where pants on their heads is just 1950s pulp sci-fi talk that doesn't make a damn sliver of sense in real physics. Parallel universes are a material concept developed to rationalize the incompatibility of probabalistic physics with determinism. Extraneous dimensions are a mathematical construct to explain the vibrational patterns of energy filaments. Sure, they're both aspects of weird physics that are impossible to grasp or even verify right now, but comparing the two is like putting "Clerks" with "The Seventh Seal" because they're both black and white movies.

[kahljorn]

"The origin of matter is THE question, right beside the unification of the four forces of nature, that is fucking over everyones minds in the higher eschelons."

What are the four forces of nature??
lol nevermind they ended up being exactly what I thought they would be.. an explanation of the two that aren't common knowledge would be nice, though. I've never read much of steven hawking or any other physicists writins (or none on actual physics, anyway) . I even have a copy of brian greene waiting to be read..

[Courage the Cowardly Dog]

First of all this IS the plot to the SUper Mario Bros movie if I recall, so lookout for turtles kidnapping princesses, and plumbers riding raptors next year.

I think the multidimension theory is asanine but I'm curious as to how they plan on replicating the bang. We aren't really sure what caused the matter in the beginning to explode or if it just looks and behave like it exploded that's why we call it a theory cause we have gaps in it so much that we can't prove it.... yet.

Hopefully this will clear up some things.

Is the sum total of mass and energy in the universe REALLY constant? What did matter consist of BEFOR the big band? Can matter be created or just destroyed? Will Rog by Courage a hamburger?

these questions and more will be answered ... RIGHT NOW!

yes, nuetrons, just destroyed, and no.

[Preechr]

Science is just the process of us finding and destroying God.

We can't help it, and I think it's overall a good thing.

[ziggytrix]

"I think the multidimension theory is asanine"

I'm curious just how much you understand about multidimensional theory. Did you read Seth's post?

It doesn't necessarily mean "parallel universes" or anything like that.

Think of it in terms of a flat sheet of paper. Now fold it in half. In the two-dimensional representation of the paper, nothing has changed. To draw a line from one edge to the other, you still have to go the same distance. In fact, you could fold the paper up like a piece of oragami, and every point in the paper still has the same neighboring points in it's two-dimensional representation.

But consider that same folded paper in 3-dimensions and you have all sorts of points that are now adjacent that were not in a 2-dimensional representation.

As I understand it, when these guys talk about the shape of the universe, they're talking about n-dimensional (where n is greater than 3) representations of the universe that may be applicable only to sub-atomic particles.

Talk about material existence in these extra dimensions is all speculation, and to me, the thought of people living in these dimensions is pure fiction.

[executioneer]

christ haven't you people read a wrinkle in time

[Grislygus]

How DARE you even ask. Of course I've read it.

[kahljorn]

"Talk about material existence in these extra dimensions is all speculation, and to me, the thought of people living in these dimensions is pure fiction."

What about god, the bright fuzzy guy with a beard. Clearly surviving in vacuum or whatever for billions of years means people can survive in these "Extra Dimensions" right? I mean maybe we don't even need space suits in outer space. Why doesn't science consider important things like this???

[Courage the Cowardly Dog]

I meant the multi universe theory which is commonly called "another dimension" and i hear this all to often with time theory and i really hate it.

I've read every stephen hawking book forward and backwards and I can't get behind the other dimension in the super mario bros movie sense. If you mean sub atomic particles below even quarks and the origin of matter I am VERY MUCH looking forward to this but I don't see how folding the universe makes it a parrellel dmension. Shape cannot exist in a vaccuum without matter and a container, the only thing that can have shape is the universe that contains matter and energy as far as the bang has spread it.

A vaccuum is what is beyond it, and vaccuums are void and nothingness and shapeless if it has no container. Light and energy can fold even time can slow and speed up although not bend or reverse, but i don't see how existance as a non physical plane can be bent.

Now let me get out my thinking grenades.

http://i11.tinypic.com/2nqbeb8.gif


You can fold matter and energy all you want you aren't getting an episode of Sliders.

[Sethomas]

Anyone who calls parallel universes "extra dimensions" is a moron.

Yes, you can have "shape" without matter. Those issues with mathematics Einstein spoke of having problems with mostly referred to a unification of linear algebra with Riemannian geometry, if I remember correctly, and it all was to be applied to space itself. Not matter within space, just plain space.

Stephan Hawking is one of the sharpest minds in the world, but his opinions have often been wrong and his books for the masses aren't canon. Even as such, I think you demonstrate that you didn't understand a word of what he said, nor what has been said above in this thread.

There is no "vacuum" beyond the universe. There isn't anything, and in physics language to say that something exists beyond the universe is a non-statement. Either there's matter PARALLEL to our universe or there isn't, and that's a totally different subject. But to speak of somewhere "beyond" the universe is just crazy talk. You can't go in a straight line to the edge of the universe and then leave it because it's a self-contained system. Nobody agrees on what would happen, but it's generally agreed that the curvature of spacetime would either send you to the opposite end of the universe or put you in reverse motion.

And before you talk more gibberish of no curvature of spacetime, it was proven precisely as calculated IN FUCKING 1915. The sun's gravity in an eclipse bent the stellar light, and photons aren't electromagnetically charged and contain no mass. (Yes, they are units of electromagnetic force, but they have no positive or negative charge associations). The fact that light beams can be bent is proof of spacetime curvature, as is the uneliptical orbit of Mercury.

[Courage the Cowardly Dog]

what do you think i was saying when I talked of a vaccuum? A vaccuum is the non existance of energy and matter. What do you think is out there where the blast radius of the big band hasn't spread yet? a lack of law and fairy gnomes?

Explain to me how for one second einstiens experiments bent anything mre then matter and energy. How was space and the universe as we know it folded?

[kahljorn]

you guys haven't been l istening to me at all courage the answer to your question is god he grabbed space with his mighty hands and folded it in truth he was trying to make a giant airplane to fly around in but i think he gave up on it after the first fold like god gave up on humanity.

[Sethomas]

A vacuum has to exist within space. There is no space beyond the universe.

I don't need to explain how spacetime can be folded to make a point that it happens. It just DOES happen, and we've seen it happen, and it's extremely reliable and in concord with the theoretical equations behind it.

[Courage the Cowardly Dog]

I don't get it, how do you define "the end of the universe" and what could be there aside from empty space?

[Sethomas]

No, there wouldn't be "empty space" because space is a property of the universe, and thus there would be no space outside of the universe. "The end of the universe" would just be an arbitrary point where spacetime begins to fold over on itself.

[Emu]

Go get yourself some marijuana and read this thread again, it'll all make sense after that.

[ziggytrix]

The end of the universe is kinda like in Asteroids - when you go off one side of the screen you appear on the opposite side.

What good does that knowledge do us? Absolutely none! But it's fun to think that a waveform in 4 dimensional space is equivalent to a straight line in 4 dimensional space. No? Well thanks to Physics we learned the world is round, and now we know the universe is actually flat (http://map.gsfc.nasa.gov/m_uni/uni_101shape.html)!

Like in Asteroids.

Physicists are nuts, I tell ya.


edit: sorry, that should have read "a waveform in 4 dimensional space is equivalent to a straight line in 3 dimensional space"

[executioneer]

i think i'm in love w/ this thread

it's all hot and science-y

[kahljorn]

so the universe is like an insideoutsideboy version of earth or something? I'm going to have to read that link :(

[Sethomas]

What Ziggy described is one theory, but not the only one. I think if you represented the universe as a giant matrix, the Pac-Man/Asteroids system of going off the edge would make the most sense. That doesn't mean it's right, and it's one of those things that'll take a long time to figure out.

[Emu]

First we'll just have to earn enough points to get another man, and then send someone over the edge. If they appear behind us, we know it's true. If they die, they can just start over.