On a serious note... is there something about the size of this that actually makes it more dangerous than other particle accelerators/colliders already in existence?
Isn't there one of these in Louisiana or somewhere that is currently operating and producing anti-matter?
This is just going on some faint photographic memory, but the LHC's collisions are probably at least an order of magnitude more powerful than any other on the planet. I think I saw most accelerators at some single digit GeV, while the LHC is supposed to start at 7 TeV and get to twice that (that's off the top of my head, though). IIRC only a few accelerators are in the 10s or 100s of GeV range.
As for the dangers.. Yeah, probably more dangerous, but if that means a 100 fold increase of a .0000000000000000000x probability...
I'm betting it creates more questions than answers, at least I hope so. Would hate to see all the money and effort gone into this project without getting a little wonderment in return.
Yep. I forgot the details, but iirc the consensus is that finding that higgs boson would validate present theories and not leave much to go on, past that.