Can a judge save the universe?

[GlobalExplorer]

Originally Posted by Steel_Tomb

Guys the black holes metioned are MINI black holes, they only exist for a few seconds before simply "dissapearing". Its all nonsense.

I also remember this idea come up at several places, but this has usual been about civilizations using up their resources (environment, genes). That it could happen through a physical effect that can only be caused be extremely advanced technology is new I think.

Originally Posted by Steel_Tomb

Guys the black holes metioned are MINI black holes, they only exist for a few seconds before simply "dissapearing". Its all nonsense.

You're probably right. But no one should claim "it is nonsense" before the experiments were done. Especially in a field like this that is ripe with surprise.

Originally Posted by baggygreen

So, if it goes ahead, what advances are we hjoping to make from it???

Well, the one thing they're really after is that "Higgs Boson" (hope I spelled that correctly). It's supposed to be the particle that gives matter "Mass".

[Raptor1]

Originally Posted by Zayphod

Well, the one thing they're really after is that "Higgs Boson" (hope I spelled that correctly). It's supposed to be the particle that gives matter "Mass".

But that's just to prove it's existence, we can't do anything with it...yet...

Originally Posted by Raptor1

But that's just to prove it's existence, we can't do anything with it...yet...

Not at the moment, but when it comes time to create the Higgs Bomb, we'll need to know this stuff.

[Stealth Hunter]

Originally Posted by CCIP

"Hey Gordon, you left this at Black Mesa"

No worries, the crowbar dude will save us :p

Black Holes cannot be stopped by Gordon Freeman... not even Chuck Norris can stop them!

If we do open a mini black hole, and if it begins to devour matter and grow, we've got a very serious problem... and I should imagine that we're all doomed to certain death. It is possible that the black hole would simply break us down into huge amounts of tiny atoms and then would plunge us into another area of space (as one theory states). However, it's equally possible that the same theory is complete bollocks, in which case we'll all be destroyed, and our matter will be recycled and pushed out again from a white hole... though we won't be back to tell the story. In either case, we won't be back as humans... our atoms might be part of a new star or even a new galaxy, but we're gone for good as we know ourselves to be.

[Skybird]

Wouldn't a black hole, no matter the size, consume the matter of planet earth as soon as it was created, talking of 1-2 seconds at best? We do not talk about a little nasty entity that takes its time to devour its prey - but a BLACK HOLE that even defeats light, a nail's head of it being potentially dense enough to include all matter of the solar system, or a mass in that range.

If such a mini blackhole turns out to be a threat, the inhabitants of planet earth probably will not even have enough time to just take note of that, but will be gone as soon as the phenomenon jumps into existence, or not!? Destroying the universe it will not - there are some really big monsters out there, and we are still there. but destroying the earth and solar system, and then growing - well, that is what black holes do, or not? I remember to have read they also seem to be involved in the birth of new stars.

Sounds like a chance for rebooting the system.

[Stealth Hunter]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Wouldn't a black hole, no matter the size, consume the matter of planet earth as soon as it was created, talking of 1-2 seconds at best? We do not talk about a little nasty entity that takes its time to devour its prey - but a BLACK HOLE that even defeats light, a nail's head of it being potentially dense enough to include all matter of the solar system, or a mass in that range.

If such a mini blackhole turns out to be a threat, the inhabitants of planet earth probably will not even have enough time to just take note of that, but will be gone as soon as the phenomenon jumps into existence, or not!?

I should imagine that it would take some time for it to completely destroy Earth... if it needs to grow. However, if it does start to grow, then we can all be assured that we, our planet, and even our solar system are doomed to be broken down atom by atom, piece by piece.

It's a risky thing. We can't be sure of what is going to happen, but we can't be sure that this won't unlock secrets regarding the universe's coding and help us greatly in the scientific field. Perhaps instead of doing this on Earth, we should try to do it on another planet in the future... say after we colonize Mars?

[Skybird]

Originally Posted by Stealth Hunter

I should imagine that it would take some time for it to completely destroy Earth... if it needs to grow. However, if it does start to grow, then we can all be assured that we, our planet, and even our solar system are doomed to be broken down atom by atom, piece by piece.

It's a risky thing. We can't be sure of what is going to happen, but we can't be sure that this won't unlock secrets regarding the universe's coding and help us greatly in the scientific field. Perhaps instead of doing this on Earth, we should try to do it on another planet in the future... say after we colonize Mars?

Since black holes even "suck up" light, I cannot imagine it to be a long-taking process to suck up something of a diameter that light travels within two or three seconds (I haven't done the math right now, but the diameter of earth, how long does it take light to travel that distance? 12.000 kilometers, 300.000 km per second - wooh, not even a second, it seems). And if it is strong enough to destroy earth, it will consume the rest of the solar system as well, so it makes no point to have colonies on other planets - or even in the close stellar neighbourhood. If a black hole survives it's immediate birth-phase, you're done. The power of it maybe can be expressed in mathemaqtical terms, but it is beyond human imagination, and thus: totally abstract to us. Maybe that is why CERN is raising fears in some people, who see ghosts from nightmares were maybe there is nothing at all, while others ignore any risk completely and make mockery of it, convinced that something that is too abstract to be imagined cannot become a reality.

Somehow I have this image on my mind, a man lying in a bathing tub, then pulling the rubber plug - and getting flushed away along with the water.

[Stealth Hunter]

Well, for you to be sucked up, you'd have to pass within the Schwarzschild radius of the black hole (not even light can escape when it touches the radius). If you were just a foot outside of it, you'd feel sucking sensations, but you wouldn't be pulled in. You'd hear noise from the sucking, but eventually there wouldn't be anything since the atmosphere would be completely destroyed and we'd all be dead then.

Please take note that the Schwarzschild radius has an escape speed equivalent to the speed of light.

We can calculate the Schwarzschild radius by using the equation for escape speed.

vesc = (2GM/R)1/2

If you've got photons, or objects with no mass, then you can substitute c (the speed of light) for Vesc and find the Schwarzschild radius, R. This comes out to be:

R = 2GM/c2

If the Sun was replaced with a black hole that had the same mass as the Sun, the Schwarzschild radius would be 3 km (compared to the Sun's radius of nearly 700,000 km). This means that Earth would have to get very close to get sucked into a black hole in this scenario.

[Skybird]

Ah, that is real stuff you are talking, note that I indicated that I did not know solid scientific facts.

In your sun scenario, three questions: wouldn't the black hole neverthelss grow in mass and thus: gravity, by sucking up light and radiation, particals, and stellar debris, so that it expands and sooner or later would consume the solar system as well? Can a black hole continue to exist if it is not fed with additonal matter it sucks in? Would a black hole consumming additional matter not increase it's gravity and thus project increasing "sucking" power onto objects with mass in the solar system, first affecting the travelling paths of planets, and later attracting them until they touch the (expanding) Schwarzshield?

And wouldn't even a mini black hole nevertheless consume the devices of the laboratory being in touch with it's mini Schwarshield, that would expand at the rate it touches new matter while growing, and wouldn't that process, from planet earth's and it's inhabitant'S perspective, sooner or later go beyond control, necessarily? A mass strong enough to even catch up the light, hardly can be kept under control by trying to lock it inside a magnet field or an energyfield, since these energies also would just be sucked up!?

[Stealth Hunter]

Originally Posted by Skybird

Ah, that is real stuff you are talking, note that I indicated that I did not know solid scientific facts.

In your sun scenario, three questions: wouldn't the black hole neverthelss grow in mass and thus: gravity, by sucking up light and radiation, particals, and stellar debris, so that it expands and sooner or later would consume the solar system as well? Can a black hole continue to exist if it is not fed with additonal matter it sucks in? Would a black hole consumming additional matter not increase it's gravity and thus project increasing "sucking" power onto objects with mass in the solar system, first affecting the travelling paths of planets, and later attracting them until they touch the (expanding) Schwarzshield?

First answer: the black hole would continue to grow. As long as it had something to feed off of, it would get bigger and bigger. They can grow with masses that are billions the times of the mass of our sun, and they can have lifetimes that can exist for fractions of the universe's lifespan.

Second answer: black holes, in theory, will die if they are not fed matter. It's a form of "evaporation", shall we say. We've never actually observed this, mind you, so it is still just an idea, though we've got evidence to support it.

Third answer: it could increase its gravity if it grew in size. In the scenario I mentioned above (a black hole in place of the sun), the planets would orbit the hole as they always had before with the sun. "Sucking" in space really doesn't exist. Remember, space is a vacuum. Since there are no particles to produce a sucking effect, it's purely up to gravity. Eventually, the planets would be consumed by the black hole, and they'd be spaghettified, along with everything on them. However, they'd still be in their regular orbit pattern.

On a more interesting note, black holes are said to exist at the center of every galaxy (supermassive black holes, that is).

[Skybird]

"Sucking" is no precise term, yes, but a BH would nevertheless "suck" the circling planets by distorting the gravity in the solar system, and attracting them by attracting gravity, or not? Or better said: the BH being a strong and growing source of "sucking" gravity itself? for a while, planets would continue to be carried by their own "swing", but even a small gravity influence sooner or later would have distorted their travel paths so massively that they start to more and more change their movement around the sun/BH...!?

[GlobalExplorer]

Originally Posted by Stealth Hunter

Well, for you to be sucked up, you'd have to pass within the Schwarzschild radius of the black hole (not even light can escape when it touches the radius). If you were just a foot outside of it, you'd feel sucking sensations, but you wouldn't be pulled in. You'd hear noise from the sucking, but eventually there wouldn't be anything since the atmosphere would be completely destroyed and we'd all be dead then.

Please take note that the Schwarzschild radius has an escape speed equivalent to the speed of light.

We can calculate the Schwarzschild radius by using the equation for escape speed.

vesc = (2GM/R)1/2

If you've got photons, or objects with no mass, then you can substitute c (the speed of light) for Vesc and find the Schwarzschild radius, R. This comes out to be:

R = 2GM/c2

If the Sun was replaced with a black hole that had the same mass as the Sun, the Schwarzschild radius would be 3 km (compared to the Sun's radius of nearly 700,000 km). This means that Earth would have to get very close to get sucked into a black hole in this scenario.

with G being the gravitational constant, M the mass, and c of course light speed

I have no time to check with the suns mass, but for an object the suns size a radius of 3km sounds way off (intuitively). If it is true, first the mass of the sun would have to contract to a sphere smaller than 3km radius.

[Iceman]

Originally Posted by goldorak

Frankly as a European I say who the hell cares what the Americans think about CERN ?
They don't participate, have no legal jurisdiction so they can sue to their hearts content for all I care. The only practical result is thet they will be ridiculed even more for their "war on science". Man what a country that negates evolution and now wants to sue CERN for "the impossibily remote possibity of destroying earth". :rotfl:

Well if you bag on my American Bush then we can let the air out of your Fizzy experiment lol....you guys remind me of when cavemen were given fire by the monolith.

[Letum]

Originally Posted by GlobalExplorer

with G being the gravitational constant, M the mass, and c of course light speed

I have no time to check with the suns mass, but for an object the suns size a radius of 3km sounds way off (intuitively). If it is true, first the mass of the sun would have to contract to a sphere smaller than 3km radius.

Well, if the sun became a blackhole it would contract in to a sphere smaller that 1mm. 3km soulds like a reasonable Schwarzschild radius to me.

However, Stealth is wrong about some other bits....
A black hole sucks in things from an infinite radius in the same way the the gravity
caused by the mass of my hand attracts things to my hand from an infinite radius.
Even the most distant stars are effected by each move of my hand, but the effect
in inversely proportional to distance and proportional to mass.

The Schwarzschild radius is not the radius at which the black hole 'sucks things in'.
It is the radius at which it becomes impossible for light to avoid heading in the
direction of the singularity. i.e. it is the radius of the black bit of the black hole
when it is looked at through a radio telescope. Outside of the Schwarzschild radius
light will just be bent by the pull of the hole. Or to be more accurate, space is bent
and the light follows it.

If our sun collapsed into a singularity, the earth would continue to orbit as the mass
and gravity of the black hole would be the same as the mass and gravity of the
former sun. However, if the earth was stationary at the time, it would certainly get
sucked in from far outside the Schwarzschild radius.

If you where a foot outside of the Schwarzschild radius, but not moving closer to
the hole, you would be experiencing a force of gravity several million times that of
the Earth. That is not good for your health or completion.