Date published: 2008/09/10
The BBC says:
Scientists have hailed a successful switch-on for an enormous experiment which will recreate the conditions a few moments after the Big Bang.
They have now fired two beams of particles called protons around the 27km-long tunnel which houses the Large Hadron Collider (LHC).
The £5bn machine on the Swiss-French border is designed to smash protons together with cataclysmic force.
Scientists hope it will shed light on fundamental questions in physics.
It's an amazing piece of technology, but that doesn't mean it's worthwhile. And the statement that it "will recreate the conditions a few moments after the Big Bang" is fairly meaningless, since existing particle accelerators also do this, just not quite so far back. But it's evidently a phrase that non-physicists (at least those who write for the media) seem to love, so it gets repeated endlessly as if we are all supposed to be in awe. When the physicists apply for even more money for the next accelerator, you can guarantee they will come out with the same slogans all over again.
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