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Tiny Black Holes Could Trigger Collapse of Universe—Except That They Don't
sciencehabit writes: If you like classic two-for-one monster movies such as King Kong vs. Godzilla, then a new paper combining two bêtes noires of pseudoscientific scaremongers—mini black holes and the collapse of the vacuum—may appeal to you. Physicists working with the world's biggest atom-smasher—Europe's Large Hadron Collider (LHC)—have had to reassure the public that, even if they can make them, mini black holes, infinitesimal version of the ones that form when jumbo stars implode, won't consume the planet. They've also had to dispel fears that blasting out a particle called the Higgs boson will cause the vacuum of empty space to collapse. Now, however, three theorists calculate that in a chain reaction, a mini black hole could trigger such collapse after all.
Great, now I'm hungry!
Tiny black holes don't stick around for long due to the quantum uncertainty around the event horizon
See Hawking Radiation
But whatever, I'd rather the world end doing science.
Such as... scare mongering Youtube video's and of course the current LHC status, showing nothing is wrong.
I welcome our new microscopic black hole overlords!
Maybe the universe gets destroyed all the time, and nobody notices because the many worlds hypothesis is correct, and you can't experience a universe in which you don't exist.
There's nothing that the LHC (or any other conceivable accelerator that we could build at current technology levels) can do that the sun isn't already doing in the upper atmosphere (or in the centre of the sun)
What the LHC brings is doing the collisions in a small, controllable space where it's (relatively) easy to measure what is happening.
God said, "div D = rho, div B = 0, curl E = -@B/@t, curl H = J + @D/@t," and there was light.
You have to divide by zero when working with black holes.
The simple truth is that interstellar distances will not fit into the human imagination
- Douglas Adams
They evaporate first before eating the entire universe.
Quite polite of them, I must say.
- Zav - Imagine a Beowulf cluster of insensitive clods...
Stan describes Earth as a "type 13 planet". Type 13 planets are characterized by a headlong rush for scientific knowledge that, without fail, culminates in the catastrophic unraveling of the very fabric of the planet and reducing it to the size of a peanut.
"Within a fraction of second, the bubble would then expand to consume the entire visible universe."
So, we can now communicate faster the light by modulating Higgs field, instead of torturing kings.
http://www.goodreads.com/quote...
My fear is that they will make a mini black hole, and the Earth WON'T be sucked into it. The Universe really would be a better place if that happened IMO.
Are we all ready for the undeclared war with Syria that was just declared?
That barrier is so big that it would likely take many, many times the age of the universe for the transition to occur.
No, it will take exactly one "age of the Universe" to tunnel and cause the collapse.
Tiller's Rule: Never use a word in written form that you've only heard and never read. You will end up looking foolish.
... destroy it due to local laws of physics would be destroyed at the moment of their formation when the energies tend to infinity. This may well have happened in the past (if you believe in the eternal inflation-collapse universe theory) or be happening (if you believe the multiverse theory) but since our universe is still here after 14 billion years I think its a safe bet that the laws of physics here don't allow it.
And cosmic rays are far more powerful than anythibng humans can create yet. Back tio the Whiteboard, folks.
What empty vacuum of space? Space is a quantity in itself. Obviously what used to be perceived as empty is swarming with all kinds of things we don't understand. We may have things like dark matter and dark energy and all kinds of super dark stuff that makes space some sort of dark solid with plenty of dark activity within. If we treat space as a quantity we need no magical suppositions about some under lying fabric of space. Said plainly just because we can not see it, sense it, or measure it in any way does not imply that it is not present.
"I was playing with my Li'l Physicist home experiment kit, and I accidentally destroyed the universe."
"I promise I'll never do it again!"
To prevent that the vacuum collapse spreads beyond LHC, just put it into a vacuum-vacuum flask!
Summoning virtual Higgs bosons into existence using the HLC may create mini black holes. (Meh, what could possibly go wrong?) A bubble of nothingness that expands to consume the entire Universe! In less than a second! Sounds like an enthusiastic ten-year old after watching a bad Sci-Fi flick.
There's no sense in being precise when you don't even know what you're talking about. -- John von Neumann
Seen it. It was called "The Quiet Earth".
http://www.imdb.com/video/screenplay/vi4143055129
they are whoring for attention, ok how much do they want this time? so a few governments in the EU and the americas will write them a check so they will shut up and quit scaring the public and driving the christian's wild with end of the world scenarios
If the theories are calculating that it could happen, but it hasn't happened, the theories are obviously incomplete, wrong, or the calculations are wrong. Because the evidence in the form: the universe is still here; strongly indicates to the opposite.
In addition to the comments concerning the fact that there is nothing new at the LHC that wouldn't already be produced by cosmic rays in our atmosphere - there is an assumption in the paper: The production of small black holes at the LHC rests upon the assumption of "large" extra dimensions. There is no experimental evidence for this assumption. Therefore, there are many conclusions one could draw, a few that are consistent with the results of this paper are: There are no large extra dimensions. The parameter space they investigated is insufficient to characterize the real universe.
Are they saying black holes don't matter?
Just another day in Paradise
Three theorists eh? OK, so in theory, mini black holes could devour the universe, but in practice they don't.
I'm not sure who first said it, though I've seen it attributed to both physicist Albert Einstein and baseball catcher Yogi Berra:
"In theory, theory and practice are the same; in practice, they're different."
It's a little funny (in a cynical sense) to consider that if some other life form had advanced to this point and destroyed their planet, there would be no evidence left of them (minus whatever they had established in space and maybe whatever radio waves they had broadcast).
In a universe of nearly infinite size (from our perspective at least), there's bound to be other more advanced species somewhere. Many of them too. If it was possible to collapse the universe with tiny black holes, one of them would have already done it and we would not be here to talk about it.
all black holes lose suction. It's because their filters clog.
And since particles can quantum tunnel that must mean that there is a small chance of all of the particles I'm made up of tunneling at the same time, thus enabling me to teleport wherever I want. Somehow I doubt I'll achieve this any time soon.
What the LHC does is allow us to observe the higgs particle, which will then allow the higgs field to recycle the universe, which is what it does. The LHC scientists realize this, so, instead of making an observation of the higgs particle, they present a statistical model showing virtual certainty that the higgs particle exists, proving its existence without triggering its consequences.
The thing to remember is that the energy levels we are creating with the LHC aren't new to the universe. If these energy levels could destroy the universe, it would have happened by now. They're only new in the context that we've never had them under intensive observation before.
You are insisting that he's Angry About God (tm). This is absolutely not proven. After all, he could be pissed off with the moron. You DO know that on the internet, *people disagree with the content of others' posts all the time*, right?
Now lets look at what atheism means: no belief in god.
What, exactly would an angry not believer in god be angry about god for? They wouldn't. because the god doesn't exist any more than Marduk does. Or Gandalf.
But he's getting angry at someone,who definitely DOES exist,and the thing that angered them was the attack on rationality. Which is an action that really was taken.
No god needed to be angry at.
Just angry at the bullshit posting of a moron on the internet.
Just like this "angry atheist" calling your bullshit out isn't angry at god but at the incredible arrogance and inanity of your post.
What is the one thing a black hole must have? Mass. What is the one thing a black hole created in a Collider will never have? Mass. Only a black hole created inside a Uranium or Plutonium particle MIGHT have enough mass to exist.
But but I thought women in STEM were banned by order of the patriarchy?
The theory requires the specific condition that we're not in the ground state and that if we are not in the ground state, the quantum levels below us are not full.
That many other civilisations in our universe have used higher energies, yet our universe is still here.
"Except That They Don't?". Pray tell, how do you know? You're confusing belief with fact, Soulskill.-Ignacio Agulló
that would be much harder with other larger and/or denser bodies like Jupiter, the Sun, and white dwarfs.
Actually the argument also used pulsars. These have densities at, or above, that of a nucleus. A blackhole produced at the surface of one would swallow the entire star due to the phenomenally large cross-section. Pulsars are easy to detect and since we have never yet observed a pulsar winking out of existence we can exclude dangerous black hole production.
If you want particles collided right, go European !
Trust the scientists, they are always as correct as their data. Let us forget Luminiferous aether, Young Earth theory, Static universe, Immovable continents, Stress theory of ulcers, ...
“Common sense is not so common.” — Voltaire
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No, because compared to the age of the universe, our civilization has only existed for a fraction of a blink of an eye. Also, the end of our civilization is fairly insignificant and, in the long run, inevitable.
The micro-black-hole-problem, on the other hand, affects the universe as a whole.
That's a rather well put argument, and after reading it carefully I think you are spot on. Wish you didn't post it anon, as I'd like to read more of your thoughts.
Iff black holes can briefly upset the Higgs energy balance and put it in a new state, there is at least a possibility that that same process can be used to harvest very large energies from the vacuum state. Of course, I don't know whether the new temporary Higgs state will be at higher or lower energies that the nromal state, but I assume they will be higher.
After all, if this were to occur, property values would be devastated. Then we wouldn't have to listen any more to how rich Donald Trump is.
But if we or another race out in the Universe did collapse the vacuum and destroy the Universe, wouldn't it only be one of the Many Worlds? We would continue to exist in the alternate Universe where the bubble did not form. It would turn out to be like the quantum experiments where they see probabilities of things, but in this case it would always be a probability of 100% not collapsing the vacuum since any World that did collapse would cease to exist and there would be no observers to measure that probability.
-- ssoorrrryy,, dduupplleexx sswwiittcchh oonn.. -Quote found on actual fortune cookie.
There are over 7 billion people on the planet and growing - each of whom will die and will likely not have a pleasant death. A black hole would be a pretty clean way to go.