Deep in the farthest regions of space, a star is undergoing a change.

The star, having spent its life balancing on a tight rope between the expanding hydrogen gases that make up its atmosphere and the crushing weight of gravity pushing against it, is beginning to lose its battle.

As the last of its gases are burnt up, gravity begins to push.

Sooner or later, gravity wins, collapsing the star and then – BOOM! – the star goes supernova.

Somewhere along the line, as the explosion contracts in on itself again, a black hole is formed. A black hole (while still unproven) is a point of infinite density, a place where all matter surrounding it is sucked in and compressed.

And now several hundred scientists and engineers are using the Large Hadron Collider to try and understand such phenomena.

The problem is they very well may kill us all.

That’s right, science is at it again, trying to kill everyone. As though films warning us of robotic armies and post-nuclear-winter zombies haven’t been enough, scientists are trudging along, doing everything they can to kill everything.

Don’t get me wrong, I’m no theologian, nor even all that religious; I merely fear anything that could make me explode in a millisecond.

The LHC is the largest particle accelerator ever built. In fact, it’s the largest machine on Earth. Its basic function is to slam ions and particles together at speeds reaching something near the speed of light.

Skeptics have voiced concerns that it may, however, create a black hole that could consume the Earth, thus posing quite a threat to the human race’s whole “existing” thing.

But the LHC has been used off and on for the past two years and no such thing has happened yet.

Ultimately, though, the LHC’s main function is to help scientists better understand our universe and its creation.

For example, scientists working on the LHC have said a byproduct of their research could lead to better understanding of “dark matter.”

Scientists believe that what we conceive as matter actually only makes up about 4 percent of everything in the universe. So, your high school math teacher and your mom were right, even if you think you matter, your basic physical make-up proves that you, in fact, do not.

Scientists believe that even with “dark matter” included with what we call matter, the two still only make up about 25 percent of everything in the universe.

They have said the rest is made up of “dark energy.” I can’t even begin to explain “dark energy” or my head will explode.

But the fact is that scientists want to go fiddling around with this stuff. Hasn’t all of history taught us that most things with the word “dark” in front of it rarely turn out to be good? The Dark Ages, dark magic, dark arts, THE dark.

And scientists want to go finding stuff out about “dark matter and energy.”

Well, scientists, you can be the ones to go back into the DARK house looking for the killer while the rest of us run away like logic tells us to.

Thanks a bunch, science. It looks like you are finally going to kill us all.

David Thill is a senior journalism major and can be reached at [email protected] or 581-7942.