Difference between revisions of "Talk:547: Simple"

Explain xkcd: It's 'cause you're dumb.
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...TL;DR; - I'm pretty much sure the joke is more of an "[[Up_Goer_Five|Up-goer 5]]" nature... I also don't see any reference to Black Holes/conspiracy theories...  It's just doing an "If this part is broken, you will not <strike>go to space</strike> collide any particles today" thing, surely? [[Special:Contributions/31.111.87.233|31.111.87.233]] 22:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
 
...TL;DR; - I'm pretty much sure the joke is more of an "[[Up_Goer_Five|Up-goer 5]]" nature... I also don't see any reference to Black Holes/conspiracy theories...  It's just doing an "If this part is broken, you will not <strike>go to space</strike> collide any particles today" thing, surely? [[Special:Contributions/31.111.87.233|31.111.87.233]] 22:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)
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::Sorry, but I have no time to read this comment. Keep short! --[[User:Dgbrt|Dgbrt]] ([[User talk:Dgbrt|talk]]) 22:18, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Revision as of 22:18, 27 May 2013

This is possibly even another take by xkcd at conspiracy theories such as the one in http://xkcd.com/966/

In this comic too he presents conspiracy theories against each other, the black hole with the guidance system.

The fact that the reference of something bad happening is to the Black hole theories comes from the fact that the comic was drawn the same time the theories were most predominant.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Safety_of_high_energy_particle_collision_experiments#Micro_black_holes Mr Andersom (talk) 13:40, 13 April 2013 (UTC)

I don't think there's a joke here regarding "particle accelerators not having a guidance system" (paraphrasing the first paragraph of explanation, currently). Maybe there's a confusion about the phrase "the particle accelerator's tertiary F.E.L. Guidance System"? The FEL (Free Electron Laser, IIRC) itself is a tunable lasing 'cavity' for electrons that is magnetic, not optical, in nature, but (again, IIRC) is supplied with electrons at relativistic speeds by way of a particle accelerator (depending on which FEL, sometimes dedicated to the FEL and sometimes "from a main multipurpose ring", such as the LHC might be). Particle acceleration requires that the particles being accelerated be constrained within the ring (when being brung up to speed or collided within the ring's in-line experiment zones) or redirected out of the ring (or allowed to depart it, but still in a controlled manner) if being used for an out-of-ring experiment. It's true that particles being smashed are thrown together rather haphazardly (when compared, say, with collisions at the scale of vehicle crash tests), but there's actually quite a lot of sophisticated detection equipment used to work out the path of the particles so that guidance can be applied by magnetic fields (separately from the 'corner turning' ones and/or including those). I think I would consider such systems (including the ones that 'extract' particles for use in off-ring experiments) worthy of the title "guidance systems", albeit external to the particle as opposed to on-board like on a smart missile... And so if (and I haven't checked, so colour me wrong if I turn out to be so) the complex has at least three FELs attached, it's reasonable to assume that the third of these (hierarchically speaking) has, like its brethren, a particle guidance system involved at some point to ensure the electron supply is suitably contained and piped into it... Or it refers to the third of (at least three) beam-guiding systems for the lone FEL. Maybe even this means something active within the magnetic "wiggler" assembly of the FEL itself, or even (if this is what they do) on the output to the FEL leading into the LHC itself... But whichever it is, it the relevent FEL Guidance System surely exists in some form or other.

...TL;DR; - I'm pretty much sure the joke is more of an "Up-goer 5" nature... I also don't see any reference to Black Holes/conspiracy theories... It's just doing an "If this part is broken, you will not go to space collide any particles today" thing, surely? 31.111.87.233 22:05, 27 May 2013 (UTC)

Sorry, but I have no time to read this comment. Keep short! --Dgbrt (talk) 22:18, 27 May 2013 (UTC)