While it is true that the Large Hadron Collider will launch on April 8, it is important to note that the facility conducts regular experiments and the timing has nothing to do with the astronomical phenomenon taking place in North America. But conspiracy theorists believe otherwise and have taken action.
They took to social media to share their thoughts on the supposed connection between CERN activity and the total solar eclipse, although they struggled to come up with a coherent explanation. One of them is IFLScience According to his article, he claimed that Aleister Crowley – the notorious English occultist and author – contacted a demonic entity called Aiwas on April 8, 1904 (exactly 120 years ago on this day) and that CERN is now trying to contact Satan again.
Of course, this is not the first time that conspiracy theorists have put forward similar assumptions, as the Hulk is often associated with parallel universes or other dimensions, perhaps because the nature of his work is very abstract and difficult for ordinary people to understand.
Before making similar assumptions, we must not forget that the Large Hadron Collider is located 100 meters below the Swiss-French countryside, where the total eclipse will not be visible. The machine consists of a 27-kilometre-long underground tunnel system lined with superconducting magnets capable of accelerating subatomic particles to near the speed of light. Once they accumulate enough energy, these subatomic particles are forced to collide, giving us insight into the basic building blocks of the universe. A total solar eclipse more than six thousand kilometers away on another continent would have very little effect on this work.
CERN is at the forefront of some of the world's greatest physics discoveries, including the discovery of the Higgs boson, an elementary particle often referred to as the “God particle” to the chagrin of physicists. Naturally, this also often excites the human imagination, just as the two-metre-high statue standing in front of the CERN facility, which depicts Shiva, the Hindu god, is often referred to. Some point to the statue as evidence that the Large Hadron Collider is being used for “dark universe shenanigans,” but as always, there is a much simpler (and, to the average person, more boring) answer.
Incidentally, the Shiva statue was a gift from India to celebrate its association with the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN), which began in the 1960s and is still strong today. The Indian government chose this deity because a metaphor was drawn between Nataraja's dance and the modern study of the “cosmic dance” of subatomic particles.
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