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I understand the common logical sence of physics thats why I get it, but when it comes to math its just so much to take in at once I kinda lose track of everything.

Black holes we don't have to worry about, because if particle colliders do end up making them that would mean that they are also coming into existence and then vanishing all the time about 100 kilometers over our heads, as cosmic rays hit atoms in the atmosphere.

Strange matter I haven't heard anything about yet, unless it's something like the 'Chaos Cloud'. But again it seems unlikely that a particle collider would somehow make it.

To my knowledge, monopoles are not possible, and even if they were I don't see why they would make protons decay that much faster, and even if they did I don't see why that's such a problem to us unless we have thousands of tons of the stuff rather than just a few billionths of a gram which is what we'd probably end up with in the particle collider.

Have you been reading Callahan's Key? Anyway, this probably won't happen because if it did, it ought to have already happened elsewhere in the Universe (during gamma ray bursts or inside black holes, stuff like that).

I never knew that the particle collider could have such devastating effects, and (OMG Meklar i used to play Moo 2 !!!!1) if you're right and there is no possible way that hazel's fear mongering apocalypse scenarios could come true, does that mean he's wrong about his other claims as well???

We won't have to worry about the apocalypse until December 21, 2012.

To say to the last few people posting. Strange matter is probably not a problem, considering we've already thought it might be created.

The nice thing is, it can't.

Hmm... You know, it's strange, it seems like lots of people have played it, but no one except a few hardcore fans ever talks about it. o.O

I'm not sure exactly which other claims you're talking about, and I'd rather not go back through everything searching for them. If I never replied to them in the first place, you can point them out and I'll have a look.

lol

Yeah there was actually a study about the possibilities of the collider causing an apocalypse, and they put the chances and basically nonexistent, because as was pointed out above, high-energy cosmic rays are doing similar things all the time, often very nearby.

The black hole scenario, while the easiest to visualize, is the easiest to explain away. All black holes decay, if i remember it's an exponential decay of hawking radiation. The ones that are too large though decay so slowly that they will outlast the universe, however the smaller they get the faster they decay, thus the decay of this black hole would be practically instantaneous.

The strange matter hypothesis stems from the fact that in theory, matter tends to prefer to hang around in clouds of quarks, rather than bound up in protons in nuclei with electrons swinging about. However, nucleated matter is "metastable" which is to say it is stable enough to no spontaneously decompose into quarks. That said, contact with strange matter could be a catalyst for all the matter on earth to spontaneously decay into quarks. The reason it is feared that the ion collider could cause this is because despite the creation of strange matter in the universe, and its collision with earth, it is positively charged, and nuclei of atoms are also positively charged, thus they repel eachother. Supposedly the ion collider could possibly cause strange matter to merge with nuclei of normal matter, causing a chain reaction in which the nuclei explodes, releasing more strange matter, which merges with more nuclei.

This, i'm afraid, is also a slim possibility, because strange matter isn't even proven to exist in this way, and the nucleated matter that decays into strange matter would still be positively charged and repelled by other nuclei.

Magnetic monopoles are magnetic particles with only one pole (duh), that could possibly exist according to superstring theory. However, this theory runs into trouble early because a "pole" is actually just a name for a phenomenon, not a name for an actual physical object. That said, magnetic monopoles do seem to exist in new physical theories.

Proton decay is another unproven. It is predicted that protons should decay into smaller particles, yet it has never been observed. One experiment set the rate of proton half-life at 100000000000000000000000000000000000000 years (35 zeroes) (if they actually decay), so it's possible that we will simply never see it happen.

Both magnetic monopoles and proton decay should exist in most unified theories, and the even less likely theory is that monopoles on earth would reduce the half-life of proton decay, possibly causing something akin to the strange matter apocalypse. Also not happening.

The triggering of a transition to a different quantum mechanical vacuum is another function of the metastability, but not the permanent stability of the matter and the current system. If the current vacuum state of the universe is not the true stable vacuum state, then we are living in what is called a "false vacuum." The implications of a transition to a true vacuum from a false one are worse than catastrophic, as they involve a change of the constants of nature, the cessation of all life, a radical destruction of all laws of chemistry, and preclude the possibility of a new stable state.

Cross your fingers.

Do-0dan, is the Large Hadron Collider the machine that will be looking for the graviton or the with super-particles to prove Super-string theory ( or M-theory? what are we calling it today?) correct?

Also, didn't string theory start with an accidental discovery of someone trying to describe the Strong Force?

If I recall correctly, his idea was not accepted and, when he looked at it, he realized that the string would have to be a lot smaller than he thought. Then came 23 dimensions, uncertainty, quarks, super-particles, and a whole load of junk that may never be proven, because M-theory provides no testable predictions.

I did a 1000 word essay on 'string theory' involving the other theories related to it, 'M-theory' etc. the fact is, string theory CANNOT be tested, and it CANNOT be proven correct, but it has already been proven wrong, simply by the fact that it cannot explain how to create our own universe, let alone any others

But, nothing can exactly say what created our universe, but String-theory does give a good reason for the big band (I would have never thought of membranes!).

Part of the theory could be correct, but it would not clarify anything. Ney, it would make our universe a lor more complicated than it already is. But, with no testable predictions, its just a bunch of smoke and mirrors.

The creaters of string theory are basically old school philosphers, and not modern day scientists. There is no way any part of string theory is correct in my opinion. The only thing that could be corrrect is the statements on the space vacuums...

Could you explain why?

Please note that intrauniversal laws of physics do not apply to starting universes. This is a fact frequently overlooked by proponents of intelligent design, although I have not heard it used in an attempt to disprove string theory before.

Because it provides no predictions that we, with our level of technology can look into. The only things that we could find that MAY prove String theory correct is to find gravitons and super-symmetry ( or somthing like that. )

There is a huge difference between 'impossible to prove' and 'only possible to prove with higher technology than we currently have'. Thank you for clarifying that you did in fact mean the latter, because I find the former pretty ridiculous.

Yes, I am glad that is clear because if something is ENTIRELY impossible to prove, then no one should believe it (as a scientist STATES in a movie on String-theory).