21. GLIESE 710
Apparently GLIESE 710 is a small red dwarf star
that is heading our way. It will arrive in about 1.3 billion years and
if it passes through our solar system then it is very possibly goodbye
planet Earth. Just so you know - it may be small but it is still 50
times the size of our planet. It will also disrupt just about every
rock and asteroid in the region. So even if GLIESE 710 is a close
miss we’re still space debris thanks to all those disturbed asteroids.
Will it hit our solar system? At the moment it’s a 1 in 50 chance but
that’s still not good when that one chance means total annihilation.
22. ANTIMATTER
This option may well deserve to be ranked higher,
particularly as science seems determined to prod this concept until
something nasty happens. First off - is there really something called
antimatter – in essence the opposite of matter? According CERN, yes
there is and during 1995 they announced that they had successfully
created nine antihydrogen atoms by implementing the SLAC/Fermilab
concept during the PS210 experiment. The experiment was performed using
the Low Energy Antiproton Ring (LEAR), and was led by Walter Oelert
and Mario Macri. Fermilab soon confirmed the CERN findings by
producing approximately 100 antihydrogen atoms at their facilities. The
problem was that these antimatter 1995 particles were “hot” (a
disturbing term) and not that suitable to study. (Nearly 15 years later
CERN now have the Large Hadron Collider. It makes the LEAH look like a
kid’s toy.) We won’t trouble you with the science – there is a very
good page on Wikipedia and the online Encyclopedia Britannica. But ...
we will explain the issue. Put simply, when antimatter and matter
neutralize each other vast amounts of energy could potentially be
released. In the 2000 novel, “Angels and Demons” by Dan Brown (Author
of The Da Vinci Code) a very tiny amount of antimatter stolen from CERN
is used to create a massive explosion over the Vatican (Rome). It
appears that CERN are improving their ability to produce this “stuff”
and it may be very dangerous “stuff” indeed. We did some calculations
that became incredibly complex so we are very willing to admit that we
may have got it wrong but according to our estimates just one (1)
kilogram of pure antimatter allowed to interact with matter would
completely disintegrate the Planet Earth and the Moon. Actually the
calculations suggested that it could take out every planet from Mercury
to Jupiter but surely that’s a mistake? The very good news is that it
is incredibly expensive and difficult to produce this stuff. Hang on a
moment … that’s today. It might well be quite easy to produce it in a
thousand years time. We’d better hope that they have really good
Health and Safety standards by then. The more we think about it the
more we worry that this should be our number one concern … maybe!
23. ARMAGEDDON
According to various religious beliefs,
particularly the Christian Church, God will eventually end the world
and the “good’ will go to Heaven and the “evil” will go to Hell.
Believers call this the Rapture. It was supposed to happen just over a
decade ago and again as recently as the 21st of May, 2011. (It was
incorrectly predicted by a popular evangelist . The BBC ran the story
under the headline - '
Followers Baffled as Life Goes On - click here to read more.)
In the Book of Revelation, God, ushering in the
Great Tribulation judgments, commands seven angels to pour "seven vials
of the wrath of God" upon the Earth. Armageddon (the end of the world)
then follows the pouring of the sixth vial. If you are a deeply
religious believer then this is what will happen – end of debate. If
you are an observational scientist or of a different religion then this
is just a load of rubbish. Both the Armageddonists and the Scientists
firmly believe that the world will end. The disagreement is about
when, how and why!
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