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European scientists have invited actor Tom Hanks be present when they switch on the machine that could (possibly) destroy the world:

Cern's head of communications, James Gillies, confirmed that the facility would be delighted to have Hanks there to restart the collider, which organisers hope will take place in June.

The machine is designed to simulate the "Big Bang", which started the universe 15 billion years ago, by smashing subatomic particles together at energies never before achieved.

Scientists hope this will help them find the answers to big questions, such as what causes mass and whether hidden dimensions exist in space.

There is also a possibility of tiny black holes being created in the Collider. Experts insist that if this happens, they will pose no threat.

You may recall that the Large Hadron Collider suffered, as The Telegraph says, “a catastrophic malfunction soon after being switched on amid a fanfare of publicity last September.” Hmm, did the “experts” predict that would happen?

To me a “catastrophic malfunction” with my PC, a machine that can run SimCity, is cause for concern; a “catastrophic malfunction” in the CERN, a machine that can run SimUniverse, should make us think twice about turning it on again.

I’m not a scientist (though I have watched a lot of disaster movies) so I don’t know what the effect of creating a black hole in Switzerland will have on the existence of our planet. But I suspect that Tom Hanks presence at the next Big Bang has to exponentially increase the probability of global annihilation.