We survived the end of the world again

[Big Al]

... so long as I have time to kiss my ar$e goodby I'll be ok with a black hole...

This is way to far above my head..... I mean Shrodingers cat done my head in for a long while never mind 7 dimensions et al.

[gdb]

personally i find science about as daft as religion.

both are as dangerous as they are helpful.

both lots think they know more than we poor mortals can ever know.

both have followers who shout down anyone who dares to raise any objections.

i wish they'd put the extremists of both - science and religion - into that colloider thing and fire them at one another!

[Rod in Japan]

so we should deny knowledge just because some people won't be able to accept that the world isn't flat or that there isn't a god? Sounds a pretty poor reason to me. If we all had that attitude we'd still be back in the medieval times.

Nice example of reductio ad absurdum. I didn't suggest anything of the sort.

If Hawking is concerned about what the 'epithet' human involves, perhaps he should try some of the Taoist practices to test the limits of human capabilities without even picking up a screwdriver.

The supposed spin-offs the space program rest on fallacious thinking. There's no reason to suppose that Velcro might not have been invented at the same time for some other reason, we managed without Velcro before that, and if the cost of the whole space program was the cost of inventing Velcro, it wasn't worth it. The motives behind the space program have been suspect from day 1, and they still are. Sure, we can monitor global warming from space now. But how much has the space program contributed to that very same global warming? Call me a medievalist if you will, or deny my humanity with 'Dr' Hawking, but I'd quite happily forego the 'knowledge' and 'spin-offs' of these giant 'science' projects.

[MikeM]

Well, would you care to tell me what you did actually suggest? your post was as clear as mud. This what you said:

"Most people have fixed and probably incorrect ideas about their place in the universe and if all the goodies promised of the LHC come about, the consequences are ... unforeseeable"

You seem to be saying that we should deny the pursuit of knowledge because there are people out there who won't be able to accept the fruits of that pursuit. As I said before, to appease the bookburners and flat earthers is no reason.

"There's no reason to suppose that Velcro might not have been invented at the same time for some other reason, we managed without Velcro before that"

but the fact is, velcro was a spin off of the space program. There is every reason to suppose that it wasn't developed as a result of something else.
We have done without a lot of technological progressions as well as velcro, would you care to tell us which ones we can have and which ones we can't?
As a species we are driven by our curiosity of the world around us, to deny that is to deny our very essence. Just because you would "happily forego the 'knowledge' and 'spin-offs' of these giant 'science' projects" does not give you the right to deny those to others.

[MikeM]

here ya go, a short bit on why science is so important and some of its benefits:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shGI-kpnMgY

[jim]

I find the whole thing fascinating.

As to the utility of the project we have no idea, at present, where it will lead. As an example consider Boulean Logic which had been around since Victorian times with no practical application until Alan Turing, Tommy Flowers and un-named Polish mathematicians invented the computer at Bletchley Park in WW2. Without which none of us would be communicating as we now are.

Yes, Governments will invest in projects which will give them tactical advantages in warfare. (See above) And will continue to do so until we grow up enough to decide we don't need them any more. I have no trust in them whatever.

As to an outside agency creating the Universe, I'll believe it when scanners scouring the outside edge of space wipe out the background noise sufficiently for us to hear the echo of God saying "Oh shit! I didn't think THAT would happen!"

However, the search for understanding is an end in itself and if knowledge is dangerous ignorance is far worse!

Love and Peace
Jim

[Ellendra]

Its the same basic curiosity that keeps me experimenting with recipes, or disassembling broken gadgets. We want to open things up and peek inside. We want to know "What would happen if I . . . ?"

Love it or hate it, its a human trait.

[Thomzo]

I went to Cern when I was a teenager trying (and failing) to study A level physics. I don't remember much about the place itself but I do remember lots about the field trip Including getting very drunk at a fondu party in Geneva (shhh don't tell my mother).

If these guys want to play then why not let them? It keeps them quiet and, you never know, they may just find out something useful.

You might say that the money should be spent on something more useful, like feeding the starving or saving the planet but that money isn't "lost". It gets paid out for salaries and materials and gives people jobs. So, if nothing else, these scientists are providing employment.

Zoe

[Rod in Japan]

here ya go, a short bit on why science is so important and some of its benefits:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shGI-kpnMgY

Interesting. The chief science adviser to the UK government questions the cost-benefit ratio of this particular spending and laments its abstraction and lack of utility, and pretty much all the proponent has to offer in reply is vague promises and ad hominem condemnation. All in a stupidly short, sound-bite length package. "I'm sorry folks, that's all we've got time for." What was that, about 3 and half minutes of 'discussion'?

[MikeM]

here ya go, a short bit on why science is so important and some of its benefits:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shGI-kpnMgY

Interesting. The chief science adviser to the UK government questions the cost-benefit ratio of this particular spending and laments its abstraction and lack of utility, and pretty much all the proponent has to offer in reply is vague promises and ad hominem condemnation. All in a stupidly short, sound-bite length package. "I'm sorry folks, that's all we've got time for." What was that, about 3 and half minutes of 'discussion'?

some of the greatest technological progresses the human race has made have come from abstract research. The sort of thinking the FORMER chief science advisor was proposing was worthy only of an accountant. Somethng are too important to be subject to the law of the bottom line. Still, it's your right to think like that.

[The Riff-Raff Element]

here ya go, a short bit on why science is so important and some of its benefits:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=shGI-kpnMgY

Interesting. The chief science adviser to the UK government questions the cost-benefit ratio of this particular spending and laments its abstraction and lack of utility, and pretty much all the proponent has to offer in reply is vague promises and ad hominem condemnation. All in a stupidly short, sound-bite length package. "I'm sorry folks, that's all we've got time for." What was that, about 3 and half minutes of 'discussion'?

some of the greatest technological progresses the human race has made have come from abstract research. The sort of thinking the FORMER chief science advisor was proposing was worthy only of an accountant. Somethng are too important to be subject to the law of the bottom line. Still, it's your right to think like that.

It is true that a lot of the best science came out of funding that was never expected to produce anything, certainly not a return on investment.

Then came the 1980s and research was expected to justify itself by explaining what it was going to deliver BEFORE the work was started;

The upshot of this (and it is not restricted to Britain, though I'd suggest that the damage here was more extensive than elsewhere) was that the practice and education of science declined hugely: engineering and science departments in universities were closed by the score as not being "cost effective" and the net result is that the UK, US and (to a lesser extent) Western Europe have now put themselves at a competitive disadvantage: we have cut away our technical base while our competitors have spent lavishly on theirs.

And now, with the seemingly imminant collapse of the Western Capitalist economic paradigm (http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/7615931.stm - I have a feeling that things just got really serious) there will be even less cash to "waste" on research.