Muons and Indridi

• Re David Hambling’s reportage on the Large Hadron Collider [ FT406:16], I am very grateful to know what the Compact Muon Solenoid detector looks like. I remember when people believed that turning the LHC on would create a mini black hole and spell doom for us all. And the awesome urban legends out there about CERN staff mysteriously disappearing through cracks in the fabric of reality, and sacrifices taking place in front of a large statue of Shiva dancing in the wheel of time that just so happens to be there on the forecourt. A favourite reality bomb I like to drop is that MRI scanners would never have been invented had we not been on the hunt for the God Particle.

• Ryan Shirlow [ FT406:76] might appreciate knowing that Indrid Cold’s main contactee was Woodrow Derenberger, according to that man’s 1971 collaboration with Harold W Hubbard: Visitors from Lanulos. The isomorphism with Icelandic mystic Indridi Indriason’s name is very probably coincidental. Indeed, that mystic seems to have been obliviously giving himself an honorific right up there on the imagination scale with “Boaty McBoatface.” I’d like to see someone trying to conjure oceanic awe in the 21st century with just a silly name! Hardly going to happen, is it?

Ryan Shirlow may be comforted to know that there are still extant screengrab snapshots of the Wuhan Fact Sheet, evolving over the period from 20 January 2021 to 26 May 2021, here: Wayback Machine (archive.org)

• Martin Jenkins is absolutely correct about the Sagan Standard [‘Who says?’ FT406:71]. Extra-ordinariosity is subjective, so if people are going to go and get evidential about it, they should get on a level playing field first. James Wright Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex