Death threats over Large Hadron Collider
It’s not quite pitchfork-bearing mobs, but still.
Scientists working on the world’s biggest machine are being besieged by phone calls and emails from people who fear the world will end next Wednesday, when the gigantic atom smasher starts up….
Such is the angst that the American Nobel prize winning physicist Frank Wilczek of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology has even had death threats, said Prof Brian Cox of Manchester University, adding: “Anyone who thinks the LHC will destroy the world is a t—.”
Fermilab plans a pajama party to celebrate the start of the experiment.
[Photo: Fuzzy Gerdes]
September 6th, 2008 at 7:13 am
Dr. Cox didn’t actually say that, y’know… read http://www.giagia.co.uk/2008/09/06/cern-scientists-receive-death-threats/
September 6th, 2008 at 9:46 am
Thanks for the link, Brian T. Definitely worth reading.
Being sucked into a giant black hole: scary; America’s decline in science leadership, maybe not so much:
http://www.newsweek.com/id/157514
September 7th, 2008 at 4:15 am
Let me get this straight; people are assuming that if they turn the thing on and it destroys the planet and all Mankind, that this would be a BAD thing???
September 7th, 2008 at 7:34 am
I think, were it to be put to the vote, then yes - that’s exactly what most people would think. Sure, we’ve made mistakes and we’ll make more; but progress and growth has to be a better alternative to species-wide extinction, surely? If love of nature prompts your response, aren’t humans just as much a product of nature as the planet itself?
September 8th, 2008 at 1:20 pm
Looks like sufficiently advanced aliens could revive Stephen Colbert from digitized DNA left in orbit by a game designer. So our survival is assured.
And now I’m supposed to go write science fiction?
September 9th, 2008 at 3:32 am
Everything is Mundane now, Tom…