I heard a rumor about some scientist creating a black hole tonight. Is this true?

[ck]

Some kids at school where telling me that some scientist in Europe was making a black hole and we all could die if it gets too big or something. I totally don't believe this but I want to be sure its just a rumor and not real.

[suitti]

Too late.

They fired up the Large Hadron Collider - the LHC today, but the real high powered stuff won't happen for another couple months. Some say it could create a black hole which would destroy the Earth. However, if such a black hole could be created, it won't last long enough to swallow material in the lab, much less outside the lab.

The LHC gets a particle moving at high energy and smashes it into another. That's all it does.

This kind of experiment has been going on here on Earth since the Earth formed. High energy cosmic rays, which are typically atoms stripped of their electrons, have energies much, much higher than the LHC can produce. While you've been reading this, several have passed through your body. And sometimes these things do a head on collision with the stuff of the Earth. If the LHC can create a small black hole, then so can cosmic rays. The Earth is still here, so it's safe.

If i'm wrong, feel free to tell me "I told you so".

One of the very cool things they'll be looking for is the Higgs Boson. This particle, if it exists, is currently thought to be responsible for gravity. Either they'll find it or they won't. Either answer is extraordinary. Either it exists and they'll learn how it works, or it doesn't exist, and currently theory will be thrown out the window and new ideas will have to be developed from scratch.

[hmmmeee]

Seriously, you need to keep up. They built a particle accelerator with which they are trying to make particles move fast enough and get hot enough to re-enact the big bang with little miniature ones. The consequences of a malfunction (which are ASTRONOMICALLY small chances) could be a black hole or a world explosion, but I doubt this will happen. The machine was fired up at 8:30 this morning (that is, I live in England). Don't you worry your little high school head about it, things will be fine, Stephen Hawking says, "It's perfectly safe" Bye bye!! xxxxx