[oblio]

> CERN’s convention states: “The Organization shall have no concern with work for military requirements and the results of its experimental and theoretical work shall be published or otherwise made generally available.”

CERN was founded after WW2 in Europe, and like all major European institutions founded at the time, it was meant to be a peaceful institution.

[oytis]

Sorry, looks like I misunderstood what "having no concern" means.

[danparsonson]

Yeah it's written as in, "we don't concern ourselves with that", i.e. it's none of their business

[jacquesm]

It's a bit of a fig leaf though, any high energy physics has military implications.

[tempay]

What does the LHC physics program have to do with military applications?

[oskarkk]

Research on interactions between particles can probably be helpful for nuclear weapons R&D.

[miningape]

You'd be surprised how creative the military can be when there's demand

[fainpul]

Doesn't all of physics have some military implications?

But at least they make everything public knowledge, instead of keeping it secret and only selling it to one nation.

[oblio]

> any physics has military implications.

Fixed that for you. That's been the case since we discovered sticks and stones, but it doesn't mean that CERN is lying when they say they want to focus on non-military areas.

Let's not assume the worst of an institution that's been fairly good for the world so far.

[jacquesm]

> Fixed that for you.

You didn't fix anything.

> Let's not assume the worst of an institution that's been fairly good for the world so far.

I'm not assuming the worst. I'm just being realistic, and I think it would be nice if CERN explicitly acknowledged the fact that what they do there could have serious implications for weapons technology.

[oblio]

By that logic a tire manufacturer should do the same.

You're really grasping at straws here. CERN doesn't need to do anything. Nor do universities, for example.

[jacquesm]

CERN is explicit about something they know isn't true. They could just say nothing.

I'm fine with CERN, its scientific mission and whatever they come up with there and have contributed to their cause in a minor way so I can do without the lecturing.

If you do research it is easy to stick your head in the ground and pretend that as an academic you have no responsibility for the outcome. But that's roughly analogous to a gun manufacturer pushing the 'guns don't kill people, people do' angle. CERN has a number of projects on the go whose only possible outcome will be more powerful or more compact weapons.

For instance, anti-matter research. If and when we manage to create anti-matter in larger quantities and to be able to do so more easily it will have potentially massive impact on the kind of threats societies have to deal with. To pretend that this is just abstract research is willfully abdicating responsibility.

Once it can be done it will be done, and once it will be done it is a matter of time before it is used. Knowledge, once gained can not be unlearned. See also: the atomic bomb. Now, CERN isn't the only facility where such research takes place and I'm well aware of the geopolitical impact of being 'late' when it comes to such research. I would just like them to be upfront about it. There is a reason why most particle accelerators and associated goodies are funded by the various departments of defense.

Your typical university research lab is not doing stuff with such impact, though, the biology department of some of these are investigating things that can easily be weaponized, and which should come with similar transparency about possible uses.

[oblio]

Antimatter would also revolutionize energy production...

[SideburnsOfDoom]

sure, though "have no concern with" comes across to me less like ""we avoid building anything that could be conceivably used as a weapon by anyone", and more as "We're not in that business, but it's not our concern if you manage to stab yourself with it. It's not secret".