Higgs Boson Discovered?!
Despite the fact that I hate the headline ("God particle" :rolleyes: ) I am very, very interested to see what this is all about. Looks like a big announcement coming on Wednesday...
Scientists find evidence of 'God particle' Quote:
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Smart ass ;) |
Don't take this the wrong way, but how many times has CERN reported that they're close to discovering the Higgs already? Are they trying to prove the Higgs boson or Zeno's paradox?
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As of now, much more data has been collected. So if the evidence so far was a statistical fluke, that should be apparent. If on the other hand it was real, there should be enough evidence to constitute a discovery even by the very conservative standards of particle physics. We'll find out which it is on Wednesday. |
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If you're a lower-cost, lower-impact experiment---say, you're looking for some rare meson decay---you'll see the same thing in your internal data, but you wouldn't bother publishing/announcing until the final "discovery" business. The LHC experiments are important enough that they want to keep people up to date (and people want to know) on year-to-year progress, even if that progress is only the step from "hint" to "stronger hint". ANYWAY: if you want to find out, tune into the webcast: Wednesday, 4 July at 9:00 CEST http://cern.ch/webcast Yes, that's 9:00 Central European Summer Time, UTC+2:00. |
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Wednesday should be interesting :) |
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I'd bet on a discovery, particularly if you combine the two experiments (which you should). It was pretty close to that already with the last announcement. But it will be interesting to see if the properties are as expected - there was weak preliminary evidence that the amplitude to decay to photons was much higher than expected, which would mean it can't the standard model. We'll see! |
CERN Spokesperson : "We have looked upon the god particle."
Journalist : "What did you see?" CERN Spokeperson : "You won't like it." Journalist : "Why not?" CERN Spokesperson : "Well, She's Black, to start with." |
CNN is reporting that they are inviting Peter Higgs to the announcement...
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I am really interested to see what shakes out. |
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And another exactly-my-thoughts to Mattus. That idiot physicist who named it "The God Particle" has made me very reluctant to follow this at all. I may (suppose) I know his point behind that description, but the description itself is asinine. Why would any competent scientist compare a fundamental force of physics to a religious entity? Does he realize how loaded that analogy is? Again--the media just vomits "God Particle" "God Particle" "God Particle", inviting millions of religious zealots to either a) dispute that science can ever find anything "godly", or b) believe that science is trying to search for an effect-without-cause explanation, thus science is proving God! But they're trying at the same time to dispute God! Fire up the torches! Who was that idiot physicist who coined the term? If he ever won a Nobel he should now be stripped of it. |
I'm delighted that the announcement, if it's made, will be made in my fair city. I wish I could say that everyone here was in an excited state (sorry), but it would be a lie.
Oh, whoever organized a conference in Melbourne in July has never had a look at our Weather Bureau website. ;) |
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leon_Lederman And yes, he won a Nobel. |
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I think it's important to keep a sense of persepective about this, and understand the distinction between the media hype, which CERN don't correct, and the physics. Take a look at A Zeptospace Odyssey: A Journey into the Physics of the LHC on Amazon. It’s by Gian Francesco Giudice, a physicist at CERN with a hundred-plus papers to his name. There's a search-inside on Amazon. If you search on Higgs sector you can read pages 173 through 175. He starts by saying: “The most inappropriate name ever given to the Higgs boson is 'The God particle'. The name gives the impression that the Higgs boson is the central particle of the Standard Model, governing its structure. But this is very far from the truth.” He also says the Higgs mechanism is “the toilet” of the standard model, and is “frightfully ad-hoc”. On page 174 he says: “It is sometimes said that the discovery of the Higgs boson will explain the mystery of the origin of mass. This statement requires a good deal of qualification.” To cut to the chase he says “In summary, the Higgs mechanism accounts for about 1 per cent of the mass of ordinary matter, and for only 0.2 per cent of the mass of the universe. This is not nearly enough to justify the claim of explaining the origin of mass.” The thing to appreciate is that the 'mystery of mass' publicity doesn’t square with E=mc². In his 1905 paper Einstein described how a radiating body loses mass. Every physicist under the sun knows that this works both ways. You can trap a massless photon in a mirrored box, whereupon it adds mass to that system. When you open the box, it’s a radiating body that loses mass. There’s absolutely no Higgs mechanism involved in that at all. So my advice is to maintain a degree of scepticism about what you read in the papers.
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And this really irks me. Waaaaaay to much fractionousness just from the term itself. Scientists should not, for example, call Evolution "The Jesus Genetics" or somesuch. Quote:
Still though, don't see why if Goddamn Particle was impolite it should've been renamed God Particle. Kind of a 180-degree change, rather than slight. Or maybe you're joshing me (?) eta: Or joshing someone, sorry, I mistakenly thought you'd replied to me instead of Mattus |
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It is hardly surprising that the scientists haven't found the Higgs boson, isn't it meant to be something to do with gravity? Yet they try to detect it in a vacuum!
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So when they discover the Higgs boson and it has a mass of 125GeV or thereabouts, do they have to start looking for the boson that gives the Higgs boson a mass?
It's Higgs bosons all the way down! |
I suppose there will be a Satan particle as well?
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You called ?
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"GOD" particle. At least, that's how the media will continue to portray it, in order to garner views/clicks. Heh, "they". I guess you're referring to scientists? They've already found the God Particle. What else is there? [sorry, I'm using your post to be very sarcastic; and bitter] |
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As for the Higgs mechanism being "the toilet" of the SM, I totally disagree. I think it's quite elegant and beautiful, actually. But those are of course just qualitative feelings. The facts are that the Higgs particle is an essential part of the SM, without which it is logically and mathematically inconsistent. |
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Other than distaste for dumbing down abstruse concepts for a general audience, and the usual atheist squeamishness about any reference to "god" anywhere even as a figure of speech or colloqualism, what's the objection to calling it the "god particle"?
As sol points out (and with respect), "the Higgs particle is an essential part of the SM, without which it is logically and mathematically inconsistent." |
So,
The 'dog particle'? |
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May as well let Allah in on sharing the discovery as well. I can just imagine theists all a twitter thinking "god" has been proven.;) |
Hence, dog.
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