Did A Particle Collider Change Our Timeline? A Hair-Raising Discussion! S:2E:41

A 17-mile machine buried under Switzerland and France sounds like a movie prop, but CERN’s (European Organization for Nuclear Research) Large Hadron Collider is real and it has been on our bucket list for years. From the Rabbit Hole studio (and through Midwest heat that should be illegal), we break down what a particle accelerator actually does, why the LHC smashes protons and heavy ions near the speed of light, and how those collisions help scientists test the Standard Model of particle physics while chasing bigger mysteries like dark matter and antimatter.

We don't really have any answers, but we love to talk about the moments that made CERN a household name: the first major collisions after the 2008 startup, the energy records measured in TeV, and the Higgs boson discovery in 2012, aka the “God particle.” Then we get into what’s happening now, including why the collider is currently offline and what CERN hopes to achieve with the High-Luminosity LHC upgrade targeted for around 2030. If you’ve ever wondered why “more collisions” matters, we translate the science into normal-person logic without stripping away what makes it fascinating.

Of course, CERN comes with a shadow side of internet lore, so we tackle the big ones: black hole fears, timeline shifting, and why conspiracy theories connect the Mandela Effect to 2012. To round it out, we compare CERN to America’s own unrealized giant, the Superconducting Super Collider near Waxahachie, Texas, a project that started in the early 1990s, burned through billions, and was abandoned before it could deliver its promised 40 TeV power.

If you like science, big questions, and a little chaos, subscribe, share this with a curious friend, and leave a review so more people can find us.

email: boomerandgenxer@gmail.com

Transcript

Heat Check And Quick Banter

SPEAKER_00 0:05

Welcome, welcome, welcome everyone to today's show. Boom and Jennings are walking into a bar, coming to you from the Rabbit Hole studio, where you as a listening as well experiment some wet and wisdom, some smart ashry, and a mother and a daughter questioning, are we even related? My name is Jane. My co-host is my daughter Bobby, and for the next several minutes, we're here to entertain you. Hey Bobby, what's going on? Not a whole lot. Uh it's very hot out. It is very hot out. I got sweating so bad and I thought I was gonna pass out. And right now I can't see out of my left ear. So I'm not really sure. I'm not really sure how hot it is out there, but it is. Well, I mean, we've said it before 100 and F degrees out there.

SPEAKER_01 0:47

Cause you know, we we're in it, we're in Iowa, so we get the corn sweats, and that corn shot up over the last couple weeks. Oh man, it's crazy. It used to be, you know, the saying knee high by the 4th of July.

SPEAKER_00 1:00

Well, it's up over my hybrids and GMOs, you know.

SPEAKER_01 1:03

So see, I'm almost six foot tall and it's up over my head in some areas already.

SPEAKER_00 1:07

It's crazy. It's crazy how fast it just came up when you're right, when the heat hit and the humidity starts, and it's like, man, that stuff is crazy. Yeah, it's hot. Send help. That's all I can say. Send help. We need help. Anyway, uh,

Dr Domain Is Too Busy

SPEAKER_00 1:25

so let's see. Um, we talked to Dr. Domain, but he's just not available to us anymore because he's too busy right now. And we mentioned that. That's why we're only dropping every two weeks now, as he's kind of uh left us on our own, and which is really not a good thing to do for that. I mean, sometimes. Sometimes, sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 1:45

But it also gives us some time to actually do some research. Do you want to bond to some other dogs? Oh my god. Do you want to do that?

SPEAKER_00 1:52

Like, do you want me to come over there and hug you or something?

SPEAKER_01 1:54

My life 360 is so that I can find your body, not for nothing else. Okay, quit stalking me. That's cold. That's really cold.

SPEAKER_00 2:02

That kind of hurt my feeling.

SPEAKER_01 2:03

I mean, I'd show up if you're having dinner. You could buy me some Mexican food. You do show up for food.

SPEAKER_00 2:08

That's for sure. That's for sure. So, um, what's our topic today, Bobby? I know we had a couple of things on the books, and uh, you picked today, and we did research on several things, so I'm kind of anxious to see what the topic is.

SPEAKER_01 2:23

Yeah, so today I know that we've talked

Why CERN Is Our Dream Trip

SPEAKER_01 2:25

about it before, but you know, one of our bucket list items. Well, you pointed at Dr. Domain, he's not my bucket list item. That's no, I know that. So one of our bucket list items is the CERN super collider in Europe, also known as the Hadron Collider. So the CERN super collider is you located in Europe, correct? You know exactly what countries, mom, because you correct me.

SPEAKER_00 2:50

It's near Geneva, Switzerland.

SPEAKER_01 2:53

And it's uh also near a different country, too. Is it France?

SPEAKER_00 2:57

It is France, yes, it is.

SPEAKER_01 2:59

Yeah, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 3:00

So how many miles is it? Uh, and it's an underground ring accelerator. How many miles is it, do you know? Uh I just had it uh 17 miles. Okay, I was gonna say 22, but 17 mile underground ring. And what is this thing, Bobby? Because we had said, this is when this came up in our podcast. We said if we won the lottery, first thing we would do, some of the one of the first things we would do is you and I would take off and we would go see the Hadron Collider. Right. So what does this thing do, Bob?

SPEAKER_01 3:36

Well, it's to put it very simply, it's a particle accelerator. Okay. And so how is that interesting? Well, because it's I'm just asking. So um, what it does is it has like uh, you know, the Higgs Bos Boson um particle properties, things like that, where it's like the god can I help you simplify this? Okay, yeah, simplify it because otherwise I'm gonna go into like LHC forward

How The Collider Actually Works

SPEAKER_01 4:05

and the exotics detector.

SPEAKER_00 4:07

Because you'll lose me and I'll go to sleep and then my ear will start to bleed. Uh, this underground ring accelerates protons and heavy ions uh too near the speed of light to smash them together, right? Yep. And it is um it smashes it together to simulate the Big Bang Theory. Right. Okay, so that was pretty simple. Yeah, right? I guess, yeah. Okay.

SPEAKER_01 4:32

So um I mean, I just said it was a particle accelerator, we could have just stuck with that. Okay.

SPEAKER_00 4:38

Well, I just wanted all of our listeners to kind of know what that is.

SPEAKER_01 4:42

Yeah. Okay. So it's it's here's the thing, you know, a lot of people we talk about it being on our bucket list and everything, but a lot of people don't understand that you can't just go out and see this. This isn't like some kind of like um amusement ride at Adventureland that you can go out and look at.

SPEAKER_00 5:01

I'm gonna go on this ride. You have to be tall. It's not even above ground. No, it's underground. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 5:07

So uh people wouldn't even know it's there, you know, flying over it or whatever, unless they were real nerds like me.

SPEAKER_00 5:14

Well, yeah, even then, I don't know that they would know that it's underground because I don't know from space. Is it visual? Is it visible that you can see that where it's buried?

SPEAKER_01 5:25

No, I wouldn't think so.

SPEAKER_00 5:27

I don't think you can. I don't think you can.

SPEAKER_01 5:29

Because I mean you're looking at what basically what it is is it's it's two pipes that are in a loop, and on each pipe, like the they travel the beams could travel in opposite directions. So it's basically like one gigantic loop uh underground. So how would I guess I don't I don't think you'd be able to see that at all unless you know you were looking for like the entrances or exits to it.

SPEAKER_00 5:53

To me, it would be like being in a generation plant. You know, you know this thing is running and you see the you see the equipment itself or you see the massive metal because this stuff is super, super thick. And so you see this and you know that it's accelerating, you know, these particles to crash into each other, and it has to withstand, it has to have a yield strength to to contain all of that,

Why You Cannot Just Tour It

SPEAKER_00 6:25

and so you know it's super thick, you know it's super strong, you know the yield strength is is is or the hoop strength, I guess it would be, on those is uh excessively strong. Now, one thing I don't know if you know this, it's out of commission right now. I did know that it is shut down right now. Why?

SPEAKER_01 6:41

Do you know why?

SPEAKER_00 6:42

Well, um I know some conspiracies about it, but well, it's uh and I can tell you what they're telling us right now, right? That it's supposed to restart in 2030. Yes. Uh as uh a high as the high luminosity LHC, and it'll produce up to 10 times more collisions to help those scientists explore the dark matter, the antimatter, and the physics beyond the standard model. So what they're doing basically is doing an upgrade to this thing, right?

SPEAKER_01 7:16

Right. It's like a like a software upgrade, but in bigger, bigger terms.

SPEAKER_00 7:22

Yeah, it's it's kind of bigger and badder than that whole thing.

SPEAKER_01 7:25

So do you know when when the first collisions were achieved? Now we know when it was first turned on. When was that in 2008? Okay, so it was built between 1998 and 2008. It took 10 years to build. Okay, but the first collisions, do you know when those were achieved? It was built in 1998 to 2008.

SPEAKER_00 7:46

Yep, so it was turned on in 2008. I would say probably it took them a little while to get it online, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. A couple years later.

Shutdown Now And 2030 Restart

SPEAKER_01 7:55

Couple years, so 2010. Oh, so is when we had the first collision achieved. And how'd that go? Uh well, I mean, it it was about four times the previous world record in uh tera electron volts, which is what they measure per beam. Uh, so in it also kind of forwarded the discovery of the Higgs boson because that's where it was discovered in 2012.

SPEAKER_00 8:19

Okay, so when you say it, the Higgs boson, um, the Higgs boson is also sometimes called the Higgs particle, correct?

SPEAKER_01 8:28

Right, or the God particle.

SPEAKER_00 8:30

Okay, and it's an elementary particle in the standard model of physics, uh particle physics, and it produces the quantum excite uh excitation, right? Right.

SPEAKER_01 8:42

And so it's kind of, I mean, unless you get into the whole thing, it's hard to kind of explain, but it is, but I mean, a lot of people have heard of the God particle and things like that, and that's exactly what they're talking about.

SPEAKER_00 8:54

Okay. And so the Hadron Collider, why are they really trying to replicate this Big Bang Theory? Why? What's the purpose behind it?

SPEAKER_01 9:06

Well, I think a lot of it is just unresolved questions in particle physics, you know, we're we're constantly searching for answers, which I love. Um, but we are looking for certain answers, and in particle physics, it's so hard to prove those answers because you know, you look at it like the Big Bang Theory, that was such a an enormous thing that happened. How could we ever recreate that in order to study it?

SPEAKER_00 9:38

Well, that's a good point. And I I don't know that the accelerations that they've had and the testing that they've had thus far has actually gotten to the point of recreating it because why would they need it to be 10 times more powerful now?

SPEAKER_01 9:54

Well,

Big Bang Questions And Black Holes

SPEAKER_01 9:55

I black holes. What? Yeah, I mean, you know, the it can it's said to the you know, if it if it goes a certain way that this thing uh actually can can create black holes.

SPEAKER_00 10:08

Okay, and then it falls into a black hole once it's done that.

SPEAKER_01 10:12

Well, we all fall into a black hole, but we we made it.

SPEAKER_00 10:15

I mean, we don't know what's on the other side.

SPEAKER_01 10:17

That's our success. We don't we can be perfectly fine on the other side of the side.

SPEAKER_00 10:20

So we'd be in a black hole somewhere and we'd be saying to each other, oh, I guess that we did drum collider thing works worked out. I guess that worked out the way that we wanted it to be.

SPEAKER_01 10:30

I mean, that that's been a huge thing, you know, with the CERN collider is the conspiracy theories about, you know, did we create a black hole? Did we uh shift timelines, things like that? And I'll get into that a little bit um

Mandela Effect Timeline Theory

SPEAKER_01 10:45

when you allow me to.

SPEAKER_00 10:46

Oh well, you just go right ahead. I'm just gonna shut up for a while because this is way out of my element.

SPEAKER_01 10:51

Oh, okay. So you everybody's heard of the Mandela effect. Yes. Okay, so back in 2012, they did have that record voltage level. Um, and what conspiracy theorists believe is that it put us on another timeline. So it it basically shifted our timeline. So when we talk about Mandela effects, you know, the fruit of the loom thing, the Monopoly Man thing, things like that, we remember them because they were there, but it was a different timeline. We need to do a show on the Mandela effect. Oh, that would be that would be cool. Cool. But yeah, okay, anyway. But that's that's a big thing that they were talking about, you know, back in 2012, it was such a high voltage collision that they believe that we got kicked onto another timeline. And that's why this Mandela effect has affected us so much, especially Gen X and older, because we remember a lot before 2012. That's quite the theory. Yeah. I mean, it kind of makes sense if you think about it, because I mean, look how screwed up we've gotten since 2012. What else could it be but a different timeline?

SPEAKER_00 12:01

Well, that's a good point.

SPEAKER_01 12:03

But you know, you talked about the black hole thing, yeah. So it's it's really not something that would be able to suck us up, it wouldn't be able to turn us inside out.

SPEAKER_00 12:13

So only if it stays contained, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:17

Well, no, and in reality, with the CERN, um, any black holes produced would be incredibly small, and they would only be able to exist for probably a fraction of a second. So even if we were able to produce that black hole, it would disappear almost immediately.

SPEAKER_00 12:35

So it's not something you could catch in a mason jar and give it to your loved one?

SPEAKER_01 12:40

Uh maybe.

SPEAKER_00 12:41

Eventually. I mean, maybe that's why they're doing uh the upgrades. So I had asked you a question earlier on how deep this this uh collider is. Do you know the depth? Uh I know it's over 500 feet. 500 uh it's in places uh because of the mountainous range, right? 164 to 574 feet underground. Yeah, that makes sense. And that was deliberate. It was really to reduce the amount of you know tunnels that lie under the Jura Mountains. Jura? Jura. I think Jura Mountains are in Switzerland.

How Deep CERN Sits Underground

SPEAKER_00 13:15

Like with a is it Jura? No, it's J. Is it Jura? Jura? Jura Mountains? Jura Mountains.

SPEAKER_01 13:22

Somebody'll have to come and comment and tell us because we are lost.

SPEAKER_00 13:26

We are lost on that one. But anyway, that's that's kind of the deal there. So we are very infatuated by this. We really only know like a minute of what this whole thing can do and what it's about, right? Right. And and at this point, I think if we won the lottery, we would be going to check this out. We would ask we'd be over there with cameras knocking on the little door outside. Can we come in? We have dollars, we have dollars. Yohoo! Need some of a blowout. Anyway, uh, we would encourage our listeners to look this up, but I want to get on to this other part that I wanted to talk about because the USA attempted something uh in respect to this, isn't that correct? That

Texas Tried Building A Bigger Collider

SPEAKER_00 14:20

is correct. And so tell us about that.

SPEAKER_01 14:23

So uh construction down in Texas. I'm trying to find the exact uh town, but I Waxahachi. Waxahachi, Texas. So it's the Texas desert. I mean, it's out in the middle of nowhere. Uh, but the U.S. was building its own CERN collider back in.

SPEAKER_00 14:43

Actually, I'm gonna correct you there. It was called a superconducting super collider.

SPEAKER_01 14:46

Okay, superconducting. Well, it's a can't, yeah, because it it would have been more powerful than the the CERN, apparently. Right. Uh, but they did begin construction in 1991.

SPEAKER_00 14:58

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 14:59

So what happened? I think it was a budget issue. So I think that they thought that the space race, the the um whole space thing was more important to put money into than this thing because it it was already at like two billion dollars uh by the time they shut it down, and it was gonna cost like another four billion to complete.

SPEAKER_00 15:21

And that was a lot of money back then. I mean, that was horrible. People kind of just sniff at that, but that was a lot of money back then, yeah. And um some of the you know, it was supposed to be, it was designed to be 54 miles long. That's crazy in circumference, okay, and really kind of shatter those energy limits of any other uh machine on earth, right?

SPEAKER_01 15:45

Because and we talked about the TEV, which is what they measure the the power of the collider in now the SSC is down in Texas, it would have accelerated protons with a capacity of 40 TeV. And CERN's current world record is 14 TEV.

SPEAKER_00 16:05

So that kind of tells you that's scary. Massive. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 16:09

Because you know, the US has to be bigger and better. Yeah, like if if we're not, we just have to destroy everything, apparently.

SPEAKER_00 16:15

And apparently that's kind of what happened because it was Ronald Reagan's administration that approved um the SST SSC, excuse me, back in 1987, and it was really kind of be it to be the crown jewel of American physics, right? Um, which makes sense, you know, and it really kind of solidified the US's dominance over the Soviet Union and you know, ensuring that the discovery of the Higgs boson uh on American soil was was made. Right. And you were right, uh, one of the reasons why it was shut down had to do with the cost. Initial estimates were a little over four billion.

SPEAKER_01 16:54

Yeah, that's that's crazy. But another thing that that they had an issue with, you know, only 20% of those costs were actually to to digging the tunnels.

Why The U.S. Project Died

SPEAKER_01 17:05

The rest was funneled into the development of magnets for the systems, and those were actually still in development when it was canceled, so they hadn't even fully developed the magnets that they needed in order to run this by the time that they even shut it down.

SPEAKER_00 17:24

So where are those now? I mean, those magnets. I mean, maybe that's why my hair stands up sometimes.

SPEAKER_01 17:32

I don't well, honestly, I honestly I think that if they would have or did develop the magnets needed for that that high of TEV, I think that CERN would have gotten them already. But I don't think they ever finished developing them.

SPEAKER_00 17:50

That's interesting.

SPEAKER_01 17:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:52

So we know that the reason that the US is kind of stopped was because of, as you mentioned, exploding budgets. Um, the estimated costs just ballooned way out of proportion. Yeah. But also the loss of the Cold War race, you know, because the Soviet Union collapsed and um there was geopolitical pressure to prove American scientific dominance, that kind of faded.

SPEAKER_01 18:18

Right. Um and also they had the they were building the International Space Station. Right. So NASA. NASA. NASA. I say Nassau. You say NASA? It's NASA. I say NASA and ASA. There's no AL after it.

SPEAKER_00 18:32

Wash or Walsh? Warsh. Warsh? Crick. You wash your clothes. I say crick. And the crick. Okay, anyway, meaning all back in front.

SPEAKER_01 18:40

But yeah, the International Space Station, um, they considered a much more noble endeavor because you know, international and space. I mean, what could be more cool other than the Space Force?

SPEAKER_00 18:51

Yeah, and just so you know, back in the 60s, we did not land to walk on the moon. We already went over that. Okay, okay. Just just so what happened to the site? Where what's going on with it today? Hey, guess what? It's still out there abandoned. Really? It is. So I wonder if anybody can like take tours in it, like what's already been there.

The Abandoned Site Today

SPEAKER_01 19:10

Yeah, so all honestly, all it is is a building above ground, okay, and then the the tunnels, the massive tunnels.

SPEAKER_00 19:18

So they didn't lay any type of any type of materials or anything. If they did, they took it.

SPEAKER_01 19:25

So it's it's empty tunnels, it's a massive building above ground. And it is, it's a very it's a huge, like office-looking type building above ground.

SPEAKER_00 19:34

So didn't they fill those tunnels though? Because they didn't want to have any of the back gases. They filled it with water. Oh, did they? I think they did. In Texas desert, they filled it with water. You have to because otherwise it's like the mining industry. That's why they collapsed the mines behind them, is because of the um toxic gases that can build up and cause explosions. Man, so I think they filled them with water. That's crazy. I don't know. Anyway, that would be something to look at. Um, so it's been abandoned. Yeah, that's quite interesting.

SPEAKER_01 20:09

Yeah, I mean, you uh the cost alone back then, two billion dollars, and then you're just gonna walk away from this, is just God, talk about government waste.

SPEAKER_00 20:19

It is, it's crazy. So uh that's uh do we have to go see this site too? I mean, there's really nothing.

SPEAKER_01 20:27

Well, if there's if we can't get into the tunnels and and risk our lives, I'm really not too interested in it at that point.

SPEAKER_00 20:33

We could take a little metal detector and see if we can see it.

SPEAKER_01 20:35

I mean, like we can maybe like like somehow gain access to the abandoned office building that's above it. Is there one there? There is one. What? Yeah, there's a huge abandoned building above the site. So they built the building, and it's and you should see a picture of this. I mean, it is a gorgeous building.

SPEAKER_00 20:55

Like, I wonder why they don't give it to like the homeless or something.

SPEAKER_01 20:59

Or well, it's in the middle of the desert, mom. I guess the homeless are downtown by the subways.

SPEAKER_00 21:06

I don't know. You know, I'm just saying. I mean, what a waste. We're just gonna be able to do that.

SPEAKER_01 21:10

But yeah, but I mean it's it's in the middle of the desert. And honestly, what else are you gonna use it for? I don't know. I you know what I mean. I just think it's very wasteful. You have the tunnels underneath that, even though they're filled with water, they could collapse at any time, sucking that whole building in. I suppose. You know, I maybe it wasn't water, I don't really know, but it seems to me like it was like they filled I don't know. Well, even if they didn't fill it, it's just open tunnels underneath this giant building that that and they're not reinforced because there's nothing in them. I mean, that's just the whole building could just get sucked down one day. It'd be like, yeah, an opening of a well and just so where were we going with this?

SPEAKER_00 21:48

Where were we going with this topic today?

SPEAKER_01 21:50

We just want to inform people that we're totally intrigued by this. Well, and we also wanted to, you know, give people the heads up that you know the Hadron Collider is offline right now and it's being built more powerful, right? And it's supposed to reopen

Easy Ways To Learn CERN

SPEAKER_01 22:05

in 2030, I think. 2030 is the estimate.

SPEAKER_00 22:09

So if you were planning a trip to see this and you were gonna knock on the door and say, Let me in, let me know.

SPEAKER_01 22:16

Maybe they would let you in if it's not running. No, you don't think so? Because people be touching stuff like keep your crappy fingers off of trends, please.

SPEAKER_00 22:24

You know, somebody would do some graffiti, and then you wouldn't instructions.

SPEAKER_01 22:28

I'm gonna take this wire as a memento, and it's the wire that and then now it explodes.

SPEAKER_00 22:34

Discarts the whole thing. I'm gonna take this on switch. Anyway, not really sure where we were going with this, but listen, if you want something to cool to look really look up, look up. Want something to cool. What's that? Cool, something very cool to look up. And we get we are very intrigued by this stuff just because I don't know, she's a geek and she drags me into it. I do, she's a science geek and she just drags me into chemistry, I love all of it, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 23:04

And and so, and I do too, but anyway, but if you know, and if you're not so science savvy to look up, you know, it takes a lot to understand this on like a Wikipedia page and things like that, because you have to have some kind of knowledge of particle physics at that point. Watch the Big Bang Theory. They talk about CERN a lot, they talk about the God particle a lot and particle physics, and they break it down into things that you know people can actually understand, and it's funny, but you know, it it's a good show to to really educate the masses.

SPEAKER_00 23:37

I think somebody should create a comic book of the whole thing, of the CERN, yeah, CERN comic book, yeah, to kind of explain the whole thing and how it works and all that business. I think kids would pick it up and read it.

SPEAKER_01 23:50

You think so? I don't know, would you? Uh, if there was a superhero involved.

SPEAKER_00 23:54

Well, you know CERN man. Black holes out my butt. Atomic man, or you know, I don't know, or proton

Final Thoughts And How To Reach Us

SPEAKER_00 24:05

woman.

SPEAKER_01 24:06

I don't know. Anyways, hey, I think that that is all the scientific insanity that we have for you today. But we do appreciate you joining us here at the rabbit hole studio. So be sure to follow us because we look forward to spending time with you each and every week. No, every other week now. Every other week. So please like us. And if you have positive feedback for us, or if there's a topic that you want us to talk about, a question, anything, uh drop us a short email at boomerandgenxer at gmail.com. And if you have hate mail, we'll we'll launch that into the CERN and see what happens.

SPEAKER_00 24:43

Nobody will ever drop it into the tunnel. Drop it in the tunnel.

SPEAKER_01 24:46

So until next to next two weeks, I'm Bobby Joy and I'm Jane Burke. And you're stuck with us out later.