Today a team of scientists in the CERN laboratory, Switzerland began the biggest experiment of our time. After 14 years of preparation and over $10billion in investment the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), the “Big Bang machine” as it is now known, was finally put to the test as the largest civillian experiment of all time.
The idea is to recreate the Big Bang, the time when the Universe began. The LHC is meant to accelerate two streams of protons to within 99.9999991 per cent of the speed of light. At points, these beams will collide and the sub-atomic debris that results will theoretically hold clues to the nature of the Universe.
This is just the start of the experiment and the LHC will take nearly a year just to run at full power. Then the beams will be able to circulate properly and scientists will be able to look for the so-called “God particle” – the much referred-to but yet to be detected Higgs boson.
The 'Chicken Littles' who have been claiming that this experiment could lead to the end of the world (through the creation of a black hole) have been widely derided by the scientific community. The CERN team, housed 300 feet underground on the French-Swiss border claim it is 'safe' but that didnt stop another group of scientists going to the European Court of Human Rights to attempt to stop them.
Then if you look at it from the religious angle God created the Universe. Should we be meddling with it at all? Will we reap the consequences by being sucked into infinity when this experiment goes wrong? Just like stem cell research and genetic engineering do we know what we are creating?
I have always taken the middle ground between science and religion. I think both can be equally good and equally destructive. They are strange bedfellows with a lot in common. Whatever happens it is an 'experiment' - just that. Even though the scientists say there is a 40million to 1 chance of it going wrong and the World ending, there is still a chance. Interestingly the year when all their experiments are planned to come to fruition is 2012 the year the ancient Mayan Empire predicted Armageddon.
Do I think they are right? I really don't know but the words of Jesus on the Cross come to mind: "Father forgive them, they know not what they do". Because they don't know - do they?
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