A few years back, there was a minor flurry of worry about how scientists at the Brookhaven National Laboratory in New York were doing experiments that might destroy the Earth. The lab has a particle accelerator, a device designed to (duh) accelerate particles. They smash the subatomic critters together, and watch what happens. A lot of insight into nature comes out of such things, and labs such as Brookhaven have greatly increased our knowledge. Well, some folks were concerned that the Mad Scientists at Brookhaven might accidentally create a black hole, which would then fall into the Earth, and eat it up atom by atom. Eventually the entire planet would get munched by the black hole, and we'd all die. At the time, I thought this was silly. No scientist would ever do such a thing! They'd never get another grant.
Closeup of a black hole Well, this has turned ...
