the world's largest and most expensive science experiment starting soon

[Lumpy]

Exiting times indeed! I always love it when scientists flip a switch and run for their lives. 

[SirLoin]

Richard dawkins last dying wish is to witness the "event horizon"..Maybe he will.

[Phaser11]

Ok,
 This means gas will be cheaper right?

[Strip]

No it means we wont need gas....

Strip

[moot]

No it means we wont need gas....

Strip

?

[john9001]

layman: "what will this thing do when it's finished?"

scientist: " it will reveal the secrets of the universe."

layman: "how will that effect me?"

scientist: " you don't know anything, do you? just keep sending me money."

[AWMac]

I wonder if HT will have a "King of the Hill" event on 12/21/2012?

Ya know, kinda like the Last Man standing event?

 

Mac

[moot]

layman: "what will this thing do when it's finished?"

scientist: " it will reveal the secrets of the universe."

layman: "how will that effect me?"

scientist: " you don't know anything, do you? just keep sending me money."

John, everything from silex tools to today's screwdrivers and fly swatters and airborne artillery aiming systems and pregnancy and alcohol breath tests were thanks to scientific "secrets of the universe"..

[Thruster]

Moot

You're starting to sound a bit confrontational, I know the symptoms. We call it the tiny mind syndrome. I'm glad you have a slavish loyalty to holders of advanced degrees. The problem is I have my opinion and as much as you want to belittle my ability to form it, hiding behind some geeks lab coat won't alter the fact. I just wish you sat on an endowment committee.

This all reminds me of an old joke.......

"Newspapers around the world proclaim the obsolescence of God"
The world's leading scientists have announced that they have at last discovered the secret to life and have successfully created a man out of a handful of dirt, a formal demonstration is scheduled for next Sunday"

On Sunday the scientists gather on the stage and announce their discovery to the gathered press...

Out of the sky a booming voice says " So you've learned how to create life? Does that mean I'm now obsolete?"

The scientist nod in agreement and explain what they have accomplished.

The booming voice says, "Well, we're all watching. How 'bout you show us?"

The head scientist bends down to gather a handful of soil with which to begin the demonstration when there's a big flash of lightening striking the ground at the scientist's feet.

The booming voice says "Get your own dirt."

Or something like that.

[moot]

Alright, I skipped the rest of your post after "sounding confrontational".
You don't know squat about me.  I'm not confrontational.  I answered your self-confident post tit for tat in the first place, cause you're as old as you are (I can smell the old spice from here I think) and yet can't even arse yourself with 30seconds to google CERN LHC WTF (or something) before ragging on it being a colossal waste of money.. Money that as far as I've seen so far, doesn't come from the US; so what's there to complain about?  Free science breakthroughs for the world to benefit from, at no taxpayer cost.  That'd be the only remotely valid excuse for complaining (misinformedly) about it.

If you have any more nastygrams, PM em to me, if the first line reads like something else than BS I'll consider reading past it.

[bozon]

Wasting money and mental energy on a multi billion dollar intellectual jerk off is just a scam. Privately funded science is one thing. Publicly funded white elephants are another. When the amount of energy and funds invested in academic mental masturbation starts to equal the GDP of a small industrialized nation I start to hope they have at least a cogent hypothesis to prove.

This mental masturbation is what brought you almost every piece of technology you use. The publicly funded white elephants, unlike "private science", produce advancements that are not protected by stupid "patent" laws that hold back progress even long after the patent itself is worthless.

If you'd like to stare into the face of private science, look into medicine. I sure hope you have a good medical insurance and good health or you'll get a good idea of what paying for science means.

[moot]

The nearest thing to a colossal publicly-funded money pit that I know of (from everything I've heard first hand in labs and read on the net from specialists) is ITER.

[Thruster]

I get the impression that I have a completely misguided idea of what this project is about. Although no body seems able to elaborate on the error of my ways.

I've got one rocket scientist trying to provoke me with accusations of advanced age (which I never thought was a bad thing), another telling me the public sector is the wellspring of all the neat stuff I have (internet excluded, but I still think Gates and co. deserve the lion's share of that credit, it seems the work done at CERN was going to happen wherever Berners-Lee was working ) even though as I look around me I see very little that government research has spawned for my benefit. I'm still waiting to eat a Big Mac on the moon.

For those of you who are not "in the know", there's a collider here in Illinois, called Fermilab. They've been engaged in this type of research for decades now and as far as I know we're still waiting for a practical application to emerge from there.

By the way, Einstein, "Free science breakthroughs for the world to benefit from, at no taxpayer cost."

Guess again. 20+ nations fund CERN. I believe Fermilab gets it's money mostly from the academic community but I won't swear to that. It's not a private enterprise.

[MrRiplEy[H]]

This mental masturbation is what brought you almost every piece of technology you use. The publicly funded white elephants, unlike "private science", produce advancements that are not protected by stupid "patent" laws that hold back progress even long after the patent itself is worthless.

If you'd like to stare into the face of private science, look into medicine. I sure hope you have a good medical insurance and good health or you'll get a good idea of what paying for science means.

Actually medical insurance is just a form of socialism where healthy people finance the caretaking of the sick and unfortunate. A true conservative never gets insurance!

[Gh0stFT]

Guess again. 20+ nations fund CERN. I believe Fermilab gets it's money mostly from the academic community but I won't swear to that. It's not a private enterprise.

For a privat sector most important is to make $
this experiment is much more then just a question of $ its way beyound it.