the Hadron

Some time ago I read a neat book on Membrane Theory. Among other things, it spoke of the Hadron collider, the world's largest high-energy particle accelerator which would (might?) validate certain "warped extra-dimensional theories". After involvement of some 10,000 scientists from 100 countries, the Hadron was fired up on Sept. 10, 2008. Many (non-scientific) people were afraid. Would anti-matter be created? Would it create a black hole that would devour the Earth? The scientists that awaited the start up (on Sept 10) hoped that the theoretical existence of the mysterious Higgs boson might be revealed. Higgs what? Higgs who?. --------------------------------------------- On Sept 19, 2008, something went wrong: Hadron failed. It's taken time to fix it ... but: Next month Hadron will be restarted. Okay, so in order to be prepared for the destruction of planet Earth (or even the manipulation of time), I bought a couple of books: Einstein's Bridge (recommended by my son-in-law) and the Accidental Time Machine. I expect to read them both before the Hadron is fired up. I'll then be ready ... for anything.