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Jul. 23rd, 2011 02:00 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
stormdogI got to go on a tour of Fermilab this past week with Danae and a co-worker of hers who was visiting from overseas. It was so fantastic!
Now, I've been tickled just to be on the grounds in the last few months, attending the Monday night board game event. And a few weeks back, Danae took me around the grounds and I saw some of the interesting architecture that's off the main route, as well as the pioneer cemetery on the grounds that dates from the 1850s.
But earlier this week, I got to go on a tour of Wilson Hall as well as the LinAc (linear accelerator) building with a tour guide who talked about what was going on at the site, and it was a fantastic experience for a lot of reasons.
I idolized science and scientists when I was growing up. I wanted to be a scientist in the hard fields. While it seems that that won't happen (though maybe I'll get to be a social scientist, which would be really neat), I still have such respect for the people who work at places like Fermilab and for the work that's done there. So on Monday when I got to walk around and photograph Wilson Hall, it was a really neat thing for me.
And then on Monday, when I got to go on a tour of the building and see a mock-up of the Tevatron accelerator tunnel and then walk through the building where the control stations for the accelerators are and even see the actual LinAc, it was just thrilling. It made me so very happy to to be in this special place where people are working together to make the world a better one to live in. I can't imagine seeing this place firsthand and still voting to end funding for the Tevatron and high energy particle experimentation. The thought of the Tevatron being permanently shut down, even if the LHC does kind of make it obsolete (though not, as I understand it, in the area of proton-antiproton collision), makes me sad. It feel a little bit like the ending of the shuttle program in the sense of it being the ending of something that, for me, has sort of alwasy been around, and has always been a symbol to me of some kind of idealism.
Now, I've been tickled just to be on the grounds in the last few months, attending the Monday night board game event. And a few weeks back, Danae took me around the grounds and I saw some of the interesting architecture that's off the main route, as well as the pioneer cemetery on the grounds that dates from the 1850s.
But earlier this week, I got to go on a tour of Wilson Hall as well as the LinAc (linear accelerator) building with a tour guide who talked about what was going on at the site, and it was a fantastic experience for a lot of reasons.
I idolized science and scientists when I was growing up. I wanted to be a scientist in the hard fields. While it seems that that won't happen (though maybe I'll get to be a social scientist, which would be really neat), I still have such respect for the people who work at places like Fermilab and for the work that's done there. So on Monday when I got to walk around and photograph Wilson Hall, it was a really neat thing for me.
And then on Monday, when I got to go on a tour of the building and see a mock-up of the Tevatron accelerator tunnel and then walk through the building where the control stations for the accelerators are and even see the actual LinAc, it was just thrilling. It made me so very happy to to be in this special place where people are working together to make the world a better one to live in. I can't imagine seeing this place firsthand and still voting to end funding for the Tevatron and high energy particle experimentation. The thought of the Tevatron being permanently shut down, even if the LHC does kind of make it obsolete (though not, as I understand it, in the area of proton-antiproton collision), makes me sad. It feel a little bit like the ending of the shuttle program in the sense of it being the ending of something that, for me, has sort of alwasy been around, and has always been a symbol to me of some kind of idealism.
