Comment

Comment by Mama's Dirty Li'l Secret on June 4, 2010 at 12:55pm

Top 10 Fantasy Spaceships Headed for Reality
http://www.space.com/missionlaunches/top10-fantasy-spaceships.html

Comment by Mama's Dirty Li'l Secret on June 3, 2010 at 9:49pm

Hey Compound Egret,
Oh, the LHC is the shit!

http://public.web.cern.ch/public/en/lhc/lhc-en.html

Rock Hard! Rock Sexy!
-The Deacon

Comment by Mama's Dirty Li'l Secret on June 3, 2010 at 9:30pm

Hey AP Science Geeks (me included)!

The death metal rooster explained! I love it.

Rock Hard! Rock Sexy!
-The Deacon

Comment by Obsidian on April 12, 2010 at 6:30am

Thanks. I have a passion for science that stemmed from reading way too much science fiction as a kid. I think it is a field that is under appreciated and dominated by people who lack imagination; also, I feel it is a field scoffed at by ... people who lack imagination. As for all the folk who do have imagination, they think it is only applicable to the Arts. : P*

Comment by Lunakiss on April 11, 2010 at 9:46pm

I am glad Obsidian you created this group. I love science.

Comment by Compound Egret on March 16, 2010 at 11:18pm

Thank you for the info and explanations.

Comment by Obsidian on March 15, 2010 at 6:05pm

There are weak and strong nuclear forces. The strong forces are those that keep the nucleus of atoms together. Weak is responsible for radioactivity and atomic decay. The energy involved is so strong that nuclear bombs are driven off of strong nuclear forces. This is why huge particle accelerators are needed to create new particles. Miles and miles of tunnels give the particles the necessary velocity and acceleration to generate energy so that when they smash together, a chemical reaction occurs and new particles are formed. These particles may have existed once in the early universe, but their half lives are so small that after a few micro seconds they decay to their component particles. I do not understand all of it so I may have gotten some of my facts wrong.

People fear what they do not understand. When you deal with life on a quantum scale, physic principles of the macro world do not apply and thus physics at the quantum level is not as well understood. Throw in the fact that most people only learn about macro physics such as gravity, light, momentum, electromagnetism and waves and you have an atmosphere for for ignorance. Particle accelerators have existed for a long time. CERN is just much more powerful than any other that has existed thus leading to the creation of particles that require higher energy levels than past accelerators could produce. As with all things with an air of mystery, that mystery is filled with devils, doom and gloom. In the case of CERN - mini black holes and the end of the universe and other such and such. These beliefs were probably accelerated by the internet - the story teller of this age.

Comment by ET on March 14, 2010 at 10:04pm

So I cannot remember all the nuances of particle theory, but from what I remember...
Even though the particles are small the energy they would create scares some. Thus leading to fears and theories concerning death and Black Holes.

But from Wikipedia, CERN is just trying to understand basic physics principles on a fundamental level..its run a couple times already.

As for layman books...don't know any but try starting here: http://plus.maths.org/latestnews/sep-dec08/lhc/index.html

Comment by Compound Egret on March 14, 2010 at 9:53pm

I really want to learn more about science, especially astronomy and astrophysics. Do you guys understand the CERN supercollider? Why were people concerned that they could cause a black hole if the particles colliding are so small? Any books that explain this stuff to the layman that you would recommend?

Comment by ET on February 24, 2010 at 12:48am

im more into engineering specifically renewable stuff.

• ‹ Previous
• 1
• 2
• Next ›
• Page