Random Thought of the Day

Quote: Nareed

Thanks! run with it.

Some priest is in Geneva to witness a new start up of Cern super collider, and if all goes well to bless the melding of science and religion. Secretly the priest is there to sabotage the experiment, [under orders of the Vatican bank] by placing a crucifix, made of ferrous metal inside while no one is watching. As the protons approach light speed and collide a Higgs Boson breaks loose and magic happens. The priest is back in the time of the Inquisitions, what does he do with the knowledge of how this is going to play out? The story almost writes itself : )

I am fairly honest, but I have to say I'm not sure I could keep my hands off of a billion dollars, and the power that much knowledge would give someone? In my youth, there is a chance [maybe] I could leave the money lay, if it belonged to someone else, especially if they worked for it. But being able to command all the lovelies,,,, I never had that much restraint, nor saw any reason to.

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Oh, no. I'd have to learn the state and practices of two religions, plus a bit of another two. I'd dislocate my eyes from rolling them so much! :)

You have skills, I'm just an idea guy.

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Looks like that's one for you to make up and write down.

Send me back and the Navajo would still be running the joint, and the Christians would be living on reservations. : ) Wouldn't that be a choice ending, with the world having to listen to the Navajo creation story and the Christians running the casinos?

Quote: petroglyph

Some priest is in Geneva to witness a new start up of Cern super collider, and if all goes well to bless the melding of science and religion. Secretly the priest is there to sabotage the experiment, [under orders of the Vatican bank] by placing a crucifix, made of ferrous metal inside while no one is watching. As the protons approach light speed and collide a Higgs Boson breaks loose and magic happens. The priest is back in the time of the Inquisitions, what does he do with the knowledge of how this is going to play out? The story almost writes itself : )

Not bad, but getting a crucifix, or a speck of dust, inside the tunnels at CERN's LHC would be between inhumanely difficult and just completely impossible. Further, as the tunnels run the most powerful electromagnets you've ever seen, and the cross isn't at all like the trillions of protons they're designed for, would likely just damage the machine.

How about he tries to get into one of the four detectors (ATLAS, seeing how the reference to a pagan deity offends him) to sabotage it, and then magic happens?

Oh, getting into the detector is also impossible, but there are accesses for maintenance. He might think he can get in, sabotage, and get out, not realizing the effing machine is on! He doesn't even have to go in, he just has to try.

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I am fairly honest, but I have to say I'm not sure I could keep my hands off of a billion dollars, and the power that much knowledge would give someone?

Money for what? Think about Dr. Diana Brickell's work on moral amplifiers (though she's never published a paper on it as far as I know). Basically some human attributes are neither good nor evil, but they can greatly amplify good or evil actions. Take persistency, for example. A persistent Nazi will be worse than others of his kind. But a persistent surgeon will save more people than a regular one.

So, what is the money for? If it is to establish "God's kingdom on Earth," or whatever the hell the priest wants, then it is the moral amplifier for his goal.

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You have skills, I'm just an idea guy.

Perhaps. but learning the particulars of Christianity today, and Christianity, Judaism and Islam in the Dark Ages, might cause me to become allergic to research, and then what will I do? ;)

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Wouldn't that be a choice ending, with the world having to listen to the Navajo creation story and the Christians running the casinos?

But don't we want honestly run casinos? :)

Quote: Nareed

Not bad, but getting a crucifix, or a speck of dust, inside the tunnels at CERN's LHC would be between inhumanely difficult and just completely impossible. Further, as the tunnels run the most powerful electromagnets you've ever seen, and the cross isn't at all like the trillions of protons they're designed for, would likely just damage the machine.

This thing is probably about as reliable as a Chrysler Jeep, so they have got the hood up working on it all the time.

Could also be, Cern actually is building a time machine and to test it, the scientists shove a priest in it an push the big red button ? : )

Quote: petroglyph

Could also be, Cern actually is building a time machine and to test it, the scientists shove a priest in it an push the big red button ? : )

Not bad.

But make it a drunken bet between the priest and one of the scientists.

It's been used, though. Heinlein has his hero more or less do this, on purpose, in "The Door To Summer." (great read, BTW)

Quote: Nareed

But make it a drunken bet between the priest and one of the scientists.

Make the bet between two drunken electricians working on all the electrical gizmos in the tube, and it is completely believable. Realistic even. : )

Quote: petroglyph

Make the bet between two drunken electricians working on all the electrical gizmos in the tube, and it is completely believable. Realistic even. : )

Now you're forgetting the priest.

this means either 1) you're loosing focus or 2) morphing your story into something far more interesting.

It's hard to tell the two apart.

Quote: Nareed

Now you're forgetting the priest.

this means either 1) you're loosing focus or 2) morphing your story into something far more interesting.

It's hard to tell the two apart.

Ok, ok. Can you visualize some crazed priest, being let inside the LRC by one of the drunken electricians that plans to "exorcise" the devil "Higgs", out of the cauldron?

You got to remember we are dealing with drunks and lunatics here. Not claiming, that I am immune from either.

I still say that when you first brought it up, I got an immediate visual which makes me believe the idea has potential ? It's not like the story [any story] has to bound along for a chapter or two to get the reader interested. It was like, "yeah" I can see this. Index finger twisting in cheek dimple inquiring, "what would he do with all that power", fix the world, or go all Beelzebub ?

Quote: petroglyph

Ok, ok. Can you visualize some crazed priest, being let inside the LRC by one of the drunken electricians that plans to "exorcise" the devil "Higgs", out of the cauldron?

that's a good opening for a comedy.

There's nothing wrong with that. Asimov's "The Red Queen's Race," has the world hanging in the balance after a time travel incident, and I think it's rather funny (what else but a comedy would use words like "foolscap" or "apoplexy.")

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You got to remember we are dealing with drunks and lunatics here. Not claiming, that I am immune from either.

I like it. they might think removing the evil boson would allow the LHC to prove super symmetry, or string theory, or even, if you're in a retro mood, return the universe to a steady state.

That's good comedy, too. As you build up expectations in cosmology and fundamental physics, and wind up telling a story about something else.

Quote: Nareed

Heinlein has his hero more or less do this, on purpose, in "The Door To Summer." (great read, BTW)

I read a lot of scifi in the 60's and 70's.
They were always so optimistic about
the near future. Heinlein wrote Summer
in 1957, and by 1970 we had robots. By
2000 robots were running everything.

As I recall 1970, we had 8 track players
and cassettes were on the horizon. Not
a robot in site.

Paraphrased from The Big Bang Theory:

If a man is bitten by a radioactive man, what super powers would he get? And would his super hero name be Manman?