The Large Hadron Collider Is Still a Fantastic Waste of Money

Here’s a follow-up on last month’s post on the Large Hadron Collider:

“The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) must close at the end of 2011 for up to a year to address design issues, according to an LHC director.

Dr Steve Myers told BBC News the faults will delay the machine reaching its full potential for two years.”

Basically, the LHC is still probably an egregiously bad investment.  Dr. Myers does caution that the LHC is “its own prototype,” and while its shutdowns get huge press coverage, “you don’t hear about the thousands or hundreds of thousands of other areas that have gone incredibly well.”  Fair enough.  But these shutdowns are still hugely expensive, and they push any benefits the LHC may yield to humankind back into an increasingly distant future.  The scientists at CERN have yet to convince me that the LHC is a good idea.

—Aaron Bekemeyer