LHC Safety and the Law

[Billy T]

WOW, that's pretty cool stuff The so-called God Particle is going to be found then?

Not for sure as it may be heavier than expected or not "formable" this collision way.

 

[CptBork]

Sorry to cut in rpenner, are you yourself involved in fighting this case in any way? You seem to have a pretty sound knowledge of all the details.

I recall Mr.(?) Wagner was saying somewhere else here that extra dimensions are a silly concept and not likely to be of any use in LHC experiments, yet that's the whole basis for this black hole apocalypse idea. Alphanumeric probably remembers more details about it.

 

[rpenner]

No, I don't fight the lawsuit; I just act as a conduit of information, and I have been telling Wagner and all anti-LHC scaremongers, that the lawsuit was baseless and poorly thought out since at least September 2007, before he filed it in March of 2008.

http://sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=2233895&postcount=129

http://www.physforum.com/index.php?showtopic=4830&view=findpost&p=256385
http://www.physforum.com/index.php?showtopic=5684&view=findpost&p=256388

So I do fight the related media campaign with math and science and facts and logic. In the course of it, I have received a smattering of legal learning by paying attention here and at http://groklaw.net/ .

I find it laughable that Wagner called my previous summaries of his filings "snake oil" and so here I made sure to list his petition for rehearing in toto. The solution to abuse of free speech is more free speech to put a spotlight on those claims and specious reasoning.

Lots of the the 2008 District Court filings are now here courtesy of the RECAP project which seeks greater accessibility to US Court documents: http://www.archive.org/details/gov.uscourts.hid.78717

--- BTW -- I'm always interested to hear what qualified physicists and lawyers think. Wagner invited me to create this thread when my criticisms of his positions distracted too much from his media campaign. : http://sciforums.com/showpost.php?p=2005032&postcount=236

 

[rpenner]

On November 5, the request for a rehearing of the appeal was denied. This denial resets the time (90 days) Wagner has to bring this case to the attention of the US Supreme Court.

Why would Wagner do this? Because he doesn't know better or does and can't stop himself. The only "justice" that Wagner seeks is illusory, and the only legal principle that he advocates is that made-up fears should be credited the same as science that works. Luis Sancho literally wrote on his blog that a certain entry will be his very last on the basis of the completely made-up stories these guys tell themselves.

Would Wagner really do this? Aha. Today, I reveal that he has done this before.

http://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=/docketfiles/07-1589.htm

The above link details a portion of the dispute between Wagner and the "World Botanical Gardens" where Wagner, representing himself, brought the case to the Supreme Court of the State of Nevada and then to the US Supreme Court.

So even though Wagner doesn't seem to have spoken to the press on this matter, the default assumption is that not one of the legal or factual claims made by people not on the anti-LHC crusade have taken root and that a Petition for Writ of Certiorari is in the works.

 

[fedr808]

On November 5, the request for a rehearing of the appeal was denied. This denial resets the time (90 days) Wagner has to bring this case to the attention of the US Supreme Court.

Why would Wagner do this? Because he doesn't know better or does and can't stop himself. The only "justice" that Wagner seeks is illusory, and the only legal principle that he advocates is that made-up fears should be credited the same as science that works. Luis Sancho literally wrote on his blog that a certain entry will be his very last on the basis of the completely made-up stories these guys tell themselves.

Would Wagner really do this? Aha. Today, I reveal that he has done this before.

http://www.supremecourt.gov/Search.aspx?FileName=/docketfiles/07-1589.htm

The above link details a portion of the dispute between Wagner and the "World Botanical Gardens" where Wagner, representing himself, brought the case to the Supreme Court of the State of Nevada and then to the US Supreme Court.

So even though Wagner doesn't seem to have spoken to the press on this matter, the default assumption is that not one of the legal or factual claims made by people not on the anti-LHC crusade have taken root and that a Petition for Writ of Certiorari is in the works.

Logic of the anti LHC physicists who don't know physics:

 

[rpenner]

There has been movement on the case. First a trip down memory lane.

13:29: J2: You went to school, where?
13:31: WW: I went to a lot of places. I teach school and I went to school at UC Berkeley as a physics major, initially, degree in Biology.
13:41: J2: And where did you go to law school?
13:42: WW: I went to law school in Sacramento, several schools. McGeorge School of Law, Lincoln University, Lorenzo Patino School of Law.
13:53: J2: Because you sounded like a Berkeley guy.
13:57: WW: I don't know if that's a compliment, Your Honor. I take that as a compliment.
14:01: J2: I'm a Berkeley graduate.
14:03: WW: Yes. No, and I did graduate research at Berkeley and then I went to another .. I was probably on the Federal payroll before you were.
14:10: J2: Oh, yeah? When did you ..
14:14: WW: 1979.
14:16: J2: I've been on the payroll since 1941.
14:20: WW: I apologize. I take it back. Okay. But it's been a while.
14:26: J2: What?
14:27: WW: It's been a while.
14:28: J1: Thank you ..
14:29: J2: You know, it's .. when did you start?
14:33: WW: When did I start what?
14:34: J2: 1970-what?
14:35: WW: Law school?
14:36: J2: No, on the payroll.
14:37: WW: '79, yeah. It's been a while.
14:39: J1: Thank you
14:41: J2: And you're paying your taxes?
14:43: WW: Yes, I got off the payroll after 5 years.
14:45: J2: Okay. Alright

(emphasis added to transcript to better reflect actual tone)

The Letter I wrote to the court countering the Arbab letter was only about 1/3rd the length of the rpenner "Review" of my Letter. It would be better for rpenner to simply publish that letter (it is, after all, public record) rather than make all of his fanciful proclamations, and simply let this readership judge for themselves.

My post might be long, but it is the length required to address the issues raised in your letter. You, who have the computer original, are in a far better place to render an ASCII or web equivalent post for this thread or to post it on your website and I would link to it. The PDF of the clerk-scanned letter to the court looks rather shoddy.

Still waiting for news from the Appellate court. Just a reminder that the best possible outcome for Wagner and Sancho is that they will have to demonstrate that the LHC threatens the world in a non-speculative manner at the District level. The continuing refusals to talk about the science behind their end-of-the-world claims seems to indicate they don't have a basis for any such claims.

Short and sweet -- here it is. Yesterday's decision in appellate court. http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/memoranda/2010/08/24/08-17389.pdf

Appeal from the United States District Court for the District of Hawaii
Helen Gillmor, Senior District Judge, Presiding

Argued and Submitted June 17, 2010
Honolulu, Hawaii

Before: B. FLETCHER, PREGERSON and CLIFTON, Circuit Judges.

Walter L. Wagner (“Wagner”) appeals the district court’s dismissal of his claim against the United States Department of Energy, the National Science Foundation (collectively, “the U.S. government”), and others. The parties are familiar with the facts of this case, which we repeat here only to the extent necessary to explain our decision. We have jurisdiction under 28 U.S.C. § 1291, and we affirm.

This court can affirm on any ground supported by the record. Cook v. AVI Casino Enters., Inc., 548 F.3d 718, 722 (9th Cir. 2008). We review questions of standing de novo, Mayfield v. United States, 599 F.3d 964, 970 (9th Cir. 2010), and factual findings for clear error. Robinson v. United States, 586 F.3d 683, 685 (9th Cir. 2009). To establish standing, Wagner must demonstrate (1) an “injury in fact,” (2) “a causal connection between the injury and the conduct complained of” that is not attributable to “the independent action of some third party not before the court,” and (3) a likelihood that a favorable decision will redress the injury. Lujan v. Defenders of Wildlife, 504 U.S. 555, 560-61 (1992).

Wagner cannot demonstrate that he has standing. A plaintiff alleging a procedural injury, such as Wagner, must still establish injury in fact. See Laub v. U.S. Dep’t. of Interior, 342 F.3d 1080, 1086 (9th Cir. 2003). Injury in fact requires some “credible threat of harm.” Cent. Delta Water Agency v. United States, 306 F.3d 938, 950 (9th Cir. 2002). At most, Wagner has alleged that experiments at the Large Hadron Collider (the “Collider”) have “potential adverse consequences.” Speculative fear of future harm does not constitute an injury in fact sufficient to confer standing. Mayfield, 599 F.3d at 970.

Even if Wagner has demonstrated injury in fact, he nevertheless fails to satisfy the causality or redressability prongs set out in Lujan. The European Center for Nuclear Research (“CERN”) proposed and constructed the Collider, albeit with some U.S. government support. The U.S. government enjoys only observer status on the CERN council, and has no control over CERN or its operations. Accordingly, the alleged injury, destruction of the earth, is in no way attributable to the U.S. government’s failure to draft an environmental impact statement.

CERN maintains total ownership, management, and operational control of the Collider. CERN has never been properly served, and is not a party to this case. Even if this court were to render a decision in Wagner’s favor, such a decision would have no impact on CERN or Collider operations, and would not afford Wagner the relief he seeks. [[Because our determination of standing is not dependent on the identity of the Appellant, we need not address whether Luis Sancho is a party to this appeal.]]

AFFIRMED.

The safety argument for LHC is complex, because all of the disaster scenarios are based on completely unevidenced objects and events, and to argue against them you have to cast such objects and disasters into rigorous forms on which to do physics with and then use the negative evidence of hundreds of years of observation to demonstrate that such objects (1) cannot exist in this universe, (2) cannot be formed at the LHC or (3) cannot be dangerous in the manner suggested. That's a complex argument and while it can be followed by a talented high schooler, you actually need rather deep results from both theoretical physics and experimental physics to argue for either side. In this WLW and Luis Sancho have failed to present a case. They have simply named objects and named disasters, but never argued that evidence and reason leads one to the conclusions that such objects can be formed at the LHC and will cause disaster.

...

I can't speak for any other "guys" but as to what I would like to prove:
1) Neither WLW nor Luis Sancho is a physicist or lawyer, and no physical truth motivates what they say,
2) WLW really did collect funds in excess of $2000, under guise of setting up a 501(c) non-profit to persecute the LHC, and
3) WLW did not accomplish 501(c) status, and left no paper trail that he tried.

If I am wrong about any one of these ideas, it would be trivial for WLW to convince me. WLW could present a single disaster scenario in detail -- he's been working on the strangelets angle since 1999. He could write up an argument which was at least aware of Article III standing to sue and the Hague convention to at least show that he was legitimately surprised by the August 2010 ruling on service to CERN and his inability to show standing. A 501(c) is required to keep detailed records and it's in the public interest to make some of them public. WLW runs a website, which went neglected for years.

Being critical of WLW is by no means the same as "persecuting" him.

At what stage does Wagner get labelled a vexatious litigant?

I'm not 100% sure, but I think at each stage it has been tossed out at the first hearing.
Filed March 2008, Dismissed September 2008. Dismissal affirmed August 2010.
Because this case does not involve one of the categories of cases to be expedited, the appeal got the lowest priority and the court took almost a year between the filing of the last brief in June 18, 2009 and the scheduled hearing in Hawaii on June 17, 2010.

The time to do that was probably back in 2008, but no cross-claim was filed by the US DOE, etc under 28 U.S.C. § 1651(a) (which provides "all courts established by Act of Congress may issue all writs necessary or appropriate in aid of their respective jurisdictions and agreeable to the usages and principles of law") to restrict Wagner's ability to impose burdens on other parties without demonstrating merits.

...

Finally, while Wagner's and Sancho's 2008 filings verge upon the crazypants variety (One exhibit was Wagner's red-penned copy of a filing by Nobel laureates) most of the applicable sanctions are geared at lawyers, not the litigants.

// New: RECAP and the Internet Archive have a site for free copies of the 2008 case documents to accumulate in. The HTML is the partial Docket Sheet.

...

Kirk to Khan, revised: "You've managed to [assert you are better at physics and law than] just about everyone else, but like a bad marksman you keep missing the target!"

While not precisely "sanctions" -- the costs (but not lawyers fees) can be recovered from the losing party.

Where is Luis Sancho, Part III
September 16, 2010. The appellate court once again takes note of Luis Sancho moving without leaving a forwarding address. Perhaps Wagner is now stuck with the whole US xerography bill.

If so then that proves the LHC was dangerous (to Wagner)

So it would appear. Last Thursday, the court did award those costs to the US Government saying that Sancho and Wagner should have to pay the Xerography bill:

UNITED STATES COURT OF APPEALS FOR THE NINTH CIRCUIT

FILED, NOV 18 2010, MOLLY C. DWYER, CLERK, U.S. COURT OF APPEALS

LUIS SANCHO and WALTER L.WAGNER, Plaintiffs - Appellants,
v.
U.S. DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY; et al., Defendants - Appellees.

No. 08-17389
D.C. No. 1:08-cv-00136-HG-KSC
U.S. District Court for Hawaii, Honolulu

MANDATE

The judgment of this Court, entered August 24, 2010, takes effect this date.
This constitutes the formal mandate of this Court issued pursuant to Rule 41(a) of the Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure.
Costs are awarded to the appellee in the amount of $220.55.

This is in addition to self-imposed costs of filing the 2008 case, pursuing the appeal, paying the Swiss process server, their own printing and photocopying, any research fees, any witness fees, etc.

 

[rpenner]

Update from 11/29/2010 10:01:04

Luis Sancho, who wrote the "Goodbye cruel world" post circa November 5, where he claimed that would be the last post, has still not updated his mail address with the Appellate Court. The court clerk complained about this for a second time in the case file.

Sancho has, however continued to find cause to update that blog post, so while it is still technically his last post, the meaning (where you can find any) seems to be evolving.

 

[rpenner]

We are in the last weeks of waiting to see if there will be an appeal to the Supreme Court. If my calculations are correct, that deadline is February 3. Luis Sancho and Walter Wagner have largely fallen silent on the issue, with Sancho's last post update on December 1.

November 21, 2010:
Wagner speaks!
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/theint...omlink-radio-w-joe-joseph-john-king-ac-griffi
That's almost 2 hours of Walter Wagner talking. I guess it's my duty to try an summarize.... sigh.

Someone is reading Luis Sancho still:
December 10, 2010: http://constelaciones-estrella.blogspot.com/2010/12/noticias-del-cern.html (spanish)
This seems to be scare story about CERN repeating the 2008 allegations, adding in Luis Sancho's 2010 inability to parse a report on detector design and a paragraph about super-fast network backbones required to keep up with the collider data. Includes hints I needed to find the above 11/21/2010 interview with Wagner.

January 7, 2011 -- A false alarm, cut-and-pasted from Wikipedia.
http://yosephbuitrago.blogspot.com/2011/01/gran-colisionador-de-hadrones.html but that lead me to recent updates to the Spanish wikipedia page:
http://es.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gran_colisionador_de_hadrones
Apparently there is a Spanish television series "El Barco" (The Boat) which newly features a LHC-fearmongering-inspired storyline. " A global cataclysm, caused by a fatal accident in Geneva (Switzerland) during the implementation of the particle accelerator will lead to the crew and students of the school-ship Polar Star to live the greatest adventure of their lives. Isolated and aware that they only have each other, the ship will become their only home." Gilligan's Island? Lost? The Tempest? Robinson Crusoe? Swiss Family Robinson?

That's right! This very minute Spanish actors are profiting on Sancho and Wagner's back. Good job, guys.

 

[rpenner]

November 21, 2010:
Wagner speaks!
http://www.blogtalkradio.com/theint...omlink-radio-w-joe-joseph-john-king-ac-griffi
That's almost 2 hours of Walter Wagner talking. I guess it's my duty to try an summarize.... sigh.

I lasted 17 minutes.

http://www.blogtalkradio.com/theint...omlink-radio-w-joe-joseph-john-king-ac-griffi

0:00:00 Bad audio engineering quality -- manage to keep going.
0:02:00 Wagner's Welcome -- Still getting called "Doctor"
0:02:50 Request for background
0:03:00 "Known about CERN for decades", Comes from California, "did graduate work in Cosmic ray physics [at Berkeley]." Admits degree is in law, still claims have done "medical physics" and "work in education" without further qualifications.
0:04:00 "Well aware of efforts to make new types of particles"
0:04:15 Asked if creating particles poses "direct threat" to human lives and planet.
0:04:23 Yes. (no empty rhetoric like I'm just asking questions, or I just want to see better studies.)
0:04:30 Fear-mongering: "We don't know" what will happen. Not now, not in the future when they "up the energies"
0:04:45 Wagner characterizes Pb-Pb collisions as "very low intensity" and "testing the waters"
0:05:26 Questioning is handed over to program's "scientific expert" John King
0:05:53 King begins question with "Doctor" (ick). Asks for odds on CERN creating a black hole or "ripping a hole in space-time." (ick.)
0:06:17 Even Wagner thinks "ripping a hole in space-time" is meaningless apart from pop-physics claims about black holes. The prospect of "ultra-miniature black holes," Wagner claims, has been extensively discussed in the literature where "they" say such objects will traverse the Earth without accretion (low cross section) or evaporate (Hawking radiation). Wagner says his side questions that "extensively" because Hawking radiation has never been observed, and therefore "specious."
0:07:06 Wagner thinks the claim that they would be created in Nature is invalid because they would be created "only at very high speed."
0:07:26 Neutron star argument discussed, and that argument has been "countered" in an unspecified manner.
0:07:40 Repeats alarmism of looming "higher energy regime"
0:08:10 Whines "we" (meaning Wagner's unspecified team of physics wannabes) aren't aware of what is happing with the then-current Pb-Pb collisions. (Indeed, it was less than 3 weeks before a preliminary analysis was announced: http://public.web.cern.ch/press/pressreleases/Releases2010/PR23.10E.html And the ALICE collaboration knew what they were looking for and promulgated details days before Wagner went on the program: http://arxiv.org/abs/1011.3916 -> http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v105/i25/e252301 http://arxiv.org/abs/1011.3914 -> http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v105/i25/e252302 so it is not necessarily CERN's fault that Wagner's team feels under-informed.)
0:08:22 Wagner engages in conspiracy theories as to why the CERN press office would announce the trapping of cold neutral anti-matter when he wants only LHC updates. (It's very much like CERN has research activities that don't directly involve the LHC, right?)
0:08:49 Mesmerized by the lack of scientific content or fact-based reasoning displayed, King gathers his thoughts and demonstrates that he was aware of the process in antimatter manipulation.
0:09:04 Wagner pooh-poohs the achievement, since "antimatter has been created for decades." Then goes on to explain what was done, and nakedly assets that the properties of anti-Hydrogen are known.
0:10:47 Back to the conspiracy theory about the timing of the releases. (The anti-matter press release corresponded with the (web) publication in the high-prestige journal Nature which has an embargo policy. http://public.web.cern.ch/press/pressreleases/Releases2010/PR22.10E.html versus http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v468/n7324/full/nature09610.html )
0:11:04 King asks about the danger associated with Pb-Pb collisions.
0:11:15 Wagner says these collisions don't happen anywhere in Nature. Wagner outright claims cosmic rays don't have Lead nuclei but do have protons and nitrogen nuclei. Wagner claims the phenomenon are qualitatively different from Pb-Pb collisions. Claims goal is to create something new rather than to observe something very rare and unscheduled in Nature.
0:12:02 Introduces search for as-yet-unseen strangelets in Nature, claims one of the efforts at the LHC is to create strangelets. Wagner claims that we don't know stranglets are benign, so he doesn't support the Pb-Pb collisions.
0:12:18 Wagner elevates Wilczek's one-time fanciful speculation in the letter column of Scientific American to the status of "some theories" predicting an ice-9 reaction.
0:12:25 CERN of course denies the capability of creating cold strange matter when LHC collisions are so hot. Wagner waves around the CASTOR detector, even though the ability to detect a hypothetical particle is not a demonstration that the theoretical particle exists. (Even CASTOR's advocates no longer subscribe to the interpretation of cosmic rays data the motivated the ST in the acronym. And if you run counter to that, then you accept strangelet exist in Nature and by the naturalistic fallacy, to which Wagner appeals over and over, strangelets must be benign.)
0:13:03 King introduces the story of calculation of a runaway atmospheric event triggered by the atomic weapons, and asks Wagner if this is the same sort of thing.
0:13:50 Wagner is quick to agree that it is. He tells the story in more detail with the upshot that the scientists, left to their own devices, got the answer right on multiple occasions and we are still here.
0:15:17 Wagner asserts that a physically impossible situation is a risk until you demonstrate that it is physically impossible. Wagner asserts (without citation or source) that real doubt about the fate of the atmosphere was rationally held and that the atomic test when on in spite of the real rational doubt.
0:15:40 Wagner feels competent to grade the nitrogen fusion studies. Despite giving the passing grade, those papers are still not good enough for Wagner. (Wagner seems to condemn himself to irrelevancy.)
0:16:12 Wagner again laments "we don't know" over stranglet production and evolution.
0:16:39 King says that is "pretty serious" and Wagner agrees.
0:16:50 Wagner describes a supernova as an example of a "fusion reaction that consumes entire bodies." He seems to want to tie stranglets to supernova.
0:17:24 Wagner again laments "we don't know" and expects scientific literature to be an oracle and not the result of human labor pushing back the frontiers of ignorance.
0:17:33 Wagner blames forces who try to make the LHC critics look like ignorant pontificators.
0:17:38 Wagner blames forces who use fact-based reasoning to make arguments about what is or isn't possible, relying on evidence gathered at other colliders, no less.
0:17:50 Wagner waves the CASTOR flag again, using an acronym of the past to try to explain what people think today. (The CERN name itself is an example of an acronym which has outlived it's original definition, since OERN would look too ugly.)
0:18:02 A listener from the internet asks: Is the LHC a tool of the Sekret Powerz and Elite to open a portal to the Dark Side. (Way to pick the venue, Wagner! LOL)
0:18:32 "There's no evidence whatsoever for [the existence of other dimensions like ‘the Dark Side.’]" "It's not being discussed, so far as I know, by anyone in the physics community. It might be discussed in the science fiction community, and I don't want to rule it out."

 

[rpenner]

On November 5, the request for a rehearing of the appeal was denied. This denial resets the time (90 days) Wagner has to bring this case to the attention of the US Supreme Court.

It's been 90 days + 1 week, and so I think one may come to the conclusion that Wagner and Sancho have dropped prosecution of the appeal of the dismissal of the suit. I see no activity on the Appellate Court since November (including the expected notice that Wagner has paid the US Government's photocopying costs -- Yikes).

Alternately, it may have been simply too hard for them to format their request to the Supreme Court's detailed specifications, and the clerk rejected it before it made it to the docket.

 

[Walter L. Wagner]

There is no right to appeal to the US Supreme Court. It is elective with the Court whether to accept a case or not. The Court clerk informs that, on average, for every 140 cases submitted to the Court (in proper form), only 1 is accepted for hearing; the others are rejected. The other 139 do not present ideas sufficiently novel for the Court to accept, even if there is great injustice.

 

[Guest254]

Walter, I think I asked this in another thread, but I don't remember getting a response (apologies if you provided one and I missed it). Let's assume the LHC continues doing experiments increasing the energies up to its design threshold, and let's assume we all live to tell the tale and it turns out you've been wrong.

Will you be issuing apologies?

 

[rpenner]

There is no right to appeal to the US Supreme Court. It is elective with the Court whether to accept a case or not. The Court clerk informs that, on average, for every 140 cases submitted to the Court (in proper form), only 1 is accepted for hearing; the others are rejected. The other 139 do not present ideas sufficiently novel for the Court to accept, even if there is great injustice.

Are you saying that you did file a certiorari petition and it just hasn't appeared in the online docket yet?

 

[rpenner]

I can't find any journalist who covered this in English, but apparently around January 27, 2011, Otto Rössler appeared reasonable enough that a Cologne judge (Az.: 13 K 5693/08) urged a "safety conference" with Drs. Voss and Ringwald on the matter of LHC Bugaboos. But digging into this story reveals that the lawsuit was dismissed and the judge's position perhaps mischaracterized.

Plaintiff information page: http://www.esowatch.com/ge/index.php?title=Gabriele_Schröter

Court page for BVerfG, 2 BvR 2502/08 vom 18.2.2010, (an appeal of a 2008 decision in Cologne) http://www.bundesverfassungsgericht.de/entscheidungen/rk20100218_2bvr250208.html
or http://www.bverfg.de/entscheidungen/rk20100218_2bvr250208.html
"The application for legal aid and participation of legal counsel is rejected because the intended prosecution is no prospect of success."

Notice taken of January 27, 2011 9:30 am hearing in Cologne. http://www.conspirare.net/w2/cern-lhc-die-bundesregierung-vor-gericht/
Updated with: "The suit was dismissed. The written verdict is still outstanding. It's not certain whether an appeal is being prepared."

Jan 29, 2011 http://brightsblog.wordpress.com/tag/az-13-k-569308/ The lawsuit (Az.: 13 K 5693/08) is dismissed.

Jan 30, 2011: Otto shows himself incapable of fair examination of the question http://lifeboat.com/blog/2011/01/su...sults-on-the-lhc-induced-danger-to-the-planet
Feb 10, 2011: Otto begins the press campaign http://lifeboat.com/blog/2011/02/ne...eins-happiest-thought-is-last-hope-for-planet

Feb 17, 2011 This is the earliest popular report that the judge "called" for a safety conference, but the source is an anti-LHC site. http://www.readers-edition.de/2011/...e-einberufung-einer-sicherheitskonferenz-aus/
The purported quote is „Das Gericht gibt seiner Meinung Ausdruck, dass es möglich sein sollte, die unterschiedlichen Sicherheitsaspekte, die auch Gegenstand der beiden Sicherheitsberichte aus den Jahren 2003 und waren, im Rahmen einer Sicherheitskonferenz diskutieren zu lassen“ which doesn't have the feel of a Bench Order to me.

Feb 18, 2011 The story was picked up and put here: http://www.suite101.de/content/2011...zer-lhc-erwirken-sicherheitskonferenz-a102276

Feb 27, 2011 Press Release: http://www.opednews.com/articles/German-Court-Calls-for-Col-by-LHC-Safety-Review-110227-335.html
(As seen above, this press release perhaps mischaracterizes the pleading of the judge for the sides to hash out their scientific versus pseudoscientific conflict somewhere other than in the courts. It seems unlikely that anything like the court is requiring a conference when the lawsuit is dismissed.)

//Edit: Aha -- the best legal synopsis dates back to January 27-31, 2011.
http://www.vg-koeln.nrw.de/presse/pressemitteilungen/03_110127/index.php ( Press-release by the court )
http://beck-aktuell.beck.de/news/vg...n-muessen-protonenbeschleuniger-nicht-stoppen (news article)

They have one-month to appeal the decision (which should have expired by about now) to the Higher Administrative Court in Münster

 

[rpenner]

Vowing to appeal the January 27th dismissal of the lawsuit, Gabriele Schröter's lawyer, Olaf Möhring, has penned an open letter to Dr. Annette Schavan, German Federal Minister of Education and Research http://www.bmbf.de/en/555.php , attempting to pressure her into doing something unscientific with respect to CERN and the demands for a "safety conference."

The letter claims some people see an urgent need for further study, and that the presiding judge of the dismissed lawsuit said in open court that there could be a safety conference. But it neglects to mention that the lawsuit was dismissed. Isn't the lawyer reading too much into a comment by a Judge, which does not appear (to my limited grasp of German grammar) to be an order?

The lawyer demands the following list of academics attend said conference:

• Prof. Otto Rössler, Tübingen;
• Dr. Rainer Plaga, Bonn;
• Eric Penrose, London;
• Dr. Toby Ord, Universität Oxford/GB
• Rafaela Hillerbrand, Universität Oxford/GB
• Anders Sandberg, Universität Oxford/GB
• Dr. Mark Leggett, Universität Brisbane/Australien
• Walter Wagner, Hawaii/USA
• Francesco Calogero
• Robert Laughlin, USA
• Prof. Nick Bostrom, Yale Universität/USA
• Adrian Kent, Universität Cambridge/GB
• Dr. Tony Rothman, Princeton Universität/USA
• Grigory Vilkovisky, Russland
• Dr. Richard Webb, Mittelneufnach/Bayern
• Prof. Joachim Wernicke, Berlin
• Prof. Edmund Lengfelder, Otto Hug Institut München
• Prof. Dr. Thomas Sonar, TU Braunschweig
• Fernando Loup, ICTP Triest/Italien
• Benoit Famaey, Sternwarte Straßburg
• E. Farhi
• R.L. Jaffe
• P. Katsas
• A.D. Panagiotou
• E. Gladiusz-Dziadus
• Michael Prouza, Prag, für Pierre-Auger-Observatorium/Argentinien.

No effort was made to get the correct titles for this laundry list, since some of the names are just researchers who helped design the CASTOR detector, and Walter Wagner left the State of Hawaii. Is it the lawyers intent to have a scientific conference or just a list of people he hopes to depose for future lawsuits? Evidence that the intent is pseudo-scientific is the apparent insistence on reliance on some version of the "Precautionary Principle" which is not a doctrine of science but of law and philosophy not rooted in empiricism or mathematics. At least some of these persons have no scientific doctorate in a relevant field, and there is a great paucity in peer-reviewed publications on the subject.

Nothing prevents interested parties from forming their own "conference" but it will not be a useful and scientific conference if created to the specifications of Olaf Möhring and inclusion of a list of incompetents and irrelevant non-experts is a sure way to render it unattractive to actual competent experts.

// Source: http://oekonews.at/index.php?mdoc_id=1056746 (deleted)
http://webcache.googleusercontent.c...84_z7EJ:oekonews.at/index.php?mdoc_id=1056746 (Google Cache of above)
http://www.globale-evolution.de/Forum/viewtopic.php?p=21434#p21434 (Copy of above)
http://www.achtphasen.net/index.php/2011/02/16/offener_brief_an_bundesforschungsministe (Anti-LHC copy [or source] of above)

 

[rpenner]

The top part of the list and their most famous published joint and solo papers.
Colored entries are actually well-cited enough to deserve to be called famous.

• Otto E. Rössler. "An equation for continuous chaos" Physics Letters A 57: 5, 397-398 (1976)
• René Thomas, Vasileios Basios, Markus Eiswirth, Thomas Kruel, and Otto E. Rössler "Hyperchaos of arbitrary order generated by a single feedback circuit, and the emergence of chaotic walks" Chaos 14:3, 669-675 (2004);
• Sigrid Gürgens, Carsten Rudolph, Dirk Scheuermann, Marion Atts and Rainer Plaga "Security Evaluation of Scenarios Based on the TCG’s TPM Specification" Lecture Notes in Computer Science, 4734/2007, 438-453 (2007)
• Rainer Plaga "Biometric keys: suitable use cases and achievable information content" International Journal of Information Security 8:6, 447-454 (2009)
• Eric Penrose
• Toby Ord "The many forms of hypercomputation" Applied Mathematics and Computation 178:1, 143-153 (2006)
• N. Bostrom, T. Ord "The reversal test: eliminating status quo bias in applied ethics" Ethics 116:4, 656-79 (2006)
• Jérémie Bec, Massimo Cencini, and Rafaela Hillerbrand "Heavy particles in incompressible flows: The large Stokes number asymptotics" Physica D 226:1, 11-22 (2007)
• Bertil Abrahamsson, Magne Alpsten, Ulf E. Jonsson, P.J. Lundberg, Anders Sandberg, Mats Sundgren, Agneta Svenheden and Jukka Tölli "Gastro-intestinal transit of a multiple-unit formulation (metoprolol CR/ZOK) and a non-disintegrating tablet with the emphasis on colon" International Journal of Pharmaceutics 140: 2, 229-235 (1996)
• Mark Leggett "An indicative costed plan for the mitigation of global risks" Futures 38: 7, 778-809 (2006)
• Jamie Satcher, Mark Leggett "Homonegativity Among Professional School Counselors: An Exploratory Study" Professional School Counseling 11: 1, (2007)
• Walter L. Wagner
• Francesco Calogero "The neatest many-body problem amenable to exact treatments (a “goldfish”?)" 152-153, 78-84 (2001)
• M. Bruschi, F. Calogero "Solvable and/or Integrable and/or Linearizable N-Body Problems in Ordinary (Three-Dimensional) Space. I" Journal of Non-linear Mathematical Physics, 7: 3, 303-386 (2000)
• R. B. Laughlin "Anomalous quantum Hall effect: an incompressible quantum fluid with fractionally charged excitations" Phys. Rev. Lett. 50: 18, 1395–1398 (1983)
• Jing Kong, Erhan Yenilmez, Thomas W. Tombler, Woong Kim, Hongjie Dai, Robert B. Laughlin, Lei Liu, C. S. Jayanthi, and S. Y. Wu "Quantum Interference and Ballistic Transmission in Nanotube Electron Waveguides" Phys. Rev. Lett. 87: 10, 106801 (2001)
• Nick Bostrom "Are you living in a computer simulation?" Philosophical Quarterly 53:211, 243-255. (2003) {one of multiple versions with the same name}
• Milan M. Ćirković and Nick Bostrom "Cosmological Constant and the Final Anthropic Hypothesis" Astrophysics and Space Science 274: 4, 675-687 (2000)
• P. Goddard, A. Kent and D. Olive "Unitary representations of the Virasoro and super-Virasoro algebras" Communications in Mathematical Physics 103: 1, 105-119 (1986)
• A. Kent "Against Many-Worlds Interpretations" International Journal of Modern Physics A 5: 9, 1745-1762 (1990)
• G. F. R. Ellis and T. Rothman "Lost horizons" American Journal of Physics 61: 10, 883 (1993)
• Tony Rothman "Genius and Biographers: The fictionalization of Evarist Galois" The American Mathematical Monthly 89: 2, 84-106 (1982)
• I. A. Batalin, G. A. Vilkovisky "Quantization of gauge theories with linearly dependent generators" Phys. Rev. D 28: 10, 2567–2582 (1983)
• G. A. Vilkovisky "The unique effective action in quantum field theory" Nuclear Sean Washburn, Richard A. WebbPhysics B 234: 1, 125-137 (1984)
• Sean Washburn, Richard A. Webb "Aharonov-Bohm effect in normal metal quantum coherence and transport" Advances in Physics 35: 4. 375-422 (1986)
• R. A. Webb "Quantum Interference Effects in Condensed Matter Physics" Nanostructure physics and fabrication (1989)
• Joachim Wernicke (unless the US medical researcher J. F. Wernicke is meant)
• Hartmut M. Rabes, Evgenij P. Demidchik, Juri D. Sidorow, Edmund Lengfelder, Claudia Beimfohr, Dieter Hoelzel and Sabine Klugbauer "Pattern of Radiation-induced RET and NTRK1 Rearrangements in 191 Post-Chernobyl Papillary Thyroid Carcinomas: Biological, Phenotypic, and Clinical Implications" Clin. Cancer Res. 6 1093 (2000)
• Edmund Lengfelder "A coaxial electron beam attenuator for a febetron 705" Radiation Physics and Chemistry 16: 5, 405-409 (1977)
• Armin Iske and Thomas Sonar "On the structure of function spaces in optimal recovery of point functionals for ENO-schemes by radial basis functions" Numerische Mathematik 74: 2 177-201 (1996)
• Thomas Sonar "On the construction of essentially non-oscillatory finite volume approximations to hyperbolic conservation laws on general triangulations: polynomial recovery, accuracy and stencil selection" Computer Methods in Applied Mechanics and Engineering 140: 1-2, 157-181 (1997)
• Fernando Loup, Paulo Alexandre Santos and Dorabella Martins da Silva Santos "Letter: Can Geodesics in Extra Dimensions Solve the Cosmic Light Speed Limit?" General Relativity and Gravitation 35: 10 1849-1855 (2003)
• Fernando Loup "On the 5D Extra-Force according to Basini–Capozziello–Ponce De Leon Formalism and five important features: Kar–Sinha Gravitational Bending of Light, Chung–Freese Superluminal Behaviour, Maartens–Clarkson Black Strings, experimental measures of Extra Dimensions on board International Space Station (ISS) and the existence of the Particle Z due to a higher dimensional spacetime" General Relativity and Gravitation 38: 10 1423-1506 (2006)
• B. Famaey, A. Jorissen, X. Luri, M. Mayor, S. Udry, H. Dejonghe and C. Turon "Local kinematics of K and M giants from CORAVEL/Hipparcos/Tycho-2 data" Astronomy and Astrophysics 430: 1, 165-186 (2005)
• Edward Farhi and R. L. Jaffe "Strange matter" Phys. Rev. D 30: 11, 2379-2390 (1984)
• Edward Farhi "The wave function of the universe and the square root of minus one" Physics Letters B 219: 4, 403-407 (1989)
• A. Chodos, R. L. Jaffe, K. Johnson, C. B. Thorn, and V. F. Weisskopf "New extended model of hadrons" Phys. Rev. D 9: 12, 3471-3495 (1974)
• Robert L. Jaffe "Multi-Quark Hadrons. 1. The Phenomenology of (2 Quark 2 anti-Quark) Mesons" Phys. Rev. D 15, 267 (1977)
• Chatrchyan, S et al. (Panagiotis Katsas and A. Panagiotou and E. Gładysz-Dziaduś) "The CMS experiment at the CERN LHC." Journal Of Instrumentation, 3 (2008)
• NA49 Collaboration (A.D. Panagiotou and E. Gładysz) "Quark Matter 2005" Nuclear Physics A 774, p. 943-944 (2006) {While in a journal, is this even a paper?}
• Apostolos D. Panagiotou "Λ^0 nonpolarization: Possible signature of quark matter" Phys. Rev. C 33: 6, 1999–2002 (1986)
• E. Gladiusz-Dziadus (typo? -- Yes. E. Gładysz-Dziaduś is meant who presumably also published as E. Gładysz)
• NA49 Collaboration ( E. Gładysz-Dziaduś, A. D. Panagiotou ) "Observation of an Exotic S = -2, Q = -2 Baryon Resonance in Proton-Proton Collisions at the CERN SPS" Phys. Rev. Lett. 92 042003 (2004)
• Ewa Gładysz-Dziaduś "Intermittency in Super-High Energy Cosmic Ray Events" Modern Physics Letters A 4: 26, 2553-2560 (1989)
• M. Prouza and R. Smída "The Galactic magnetic field and propagation of ultra-high energy cosmic rays" Astronomy and Astrophysics 410: 1, 1-10 (2003)

Really?

Corrections appreciated.

 

[prometheus]

Colored entries are actually well-cited enough to deserve to be called famous.

How many citations are needed for a paper to be called famous?

 

[rpenner]

I think I'm using 500 as a threshold, But I think you get almost the same results using 100.
Otto's paper has about 1100 and Nobel Laureate Laughlin has over 2500.

By my criteria, S. Hawking has 12 "famous" papers or about double the entire highlighted list.

The more I look at this list, the more it looks looks like a list made by someone who was completely ignorant of the scientific method. How ridiculously difficult would it be for these people to have a simple conversation about their research in a way that the others of the group could meaningfully parse.

 

[rpenner]

Another nail in the coffin of the anti-scientific LHC "critic."

Anti-matter He-4 production confirmed as predicted by the same thermodynamic arguments that doom the collider-produced strangelet disaster scenario as unphysical as finding a snowball in Hell.

http://arxiv.org/abs/1103.3312

 

[rpenner]

I guess the US Court Case is dead and truly dead, with hunts for the hinted-at Supreme Court petition still failing to find results. Maybe Prof. Johnson would like to write a paper on these.

Wagner v. US Dept of Energy, et. al. (filed 1999-05-17)
http://www.archive.org/details/gov.uscourts.cand.125241

Wagner v. Brookhaven Science (filed 2000-03-03)
http://www.archive.org/details/gov.uscourts.nysd.4472

Wagner v. Brookhaven Associate (transfered/filed 2000-03-23)
http://www.archive.org/details/gov.uscourts.nyed.32311

Sancho v. U.S. Department of Energy et. al. (filed 2008-03-21)
http://www.archive.org/details/gov.uscourts.hid.78717

Appeal (docketed 2008-10-31, Mandate issued 2010-11-18)
United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit 08-17389 (no free docket)
http://www.ca9.uscourts.gov/datastore/memoranda/2010/08/24/08-17389.pdf

A scientist is supposed to be an advocate for the truth, while a lawyer is supposed to be an advocate for his party's position. This is why "you are arguing like a lawyer" is an insult in the scientific community. Time for me to move on the the German appeal of Az.: 13 K 5693/08. Reading German legalease -- it's just like riding a bicycle...