Higgs Data Offers Joy and Pain For Particle Physicists 186
scibri writes "So now that we've pretty much found the Higgs Boson, what's next? Well: 'There's going to be a huge massacre of theoretical ideas in the next couple of years,' predicts Joe Lykken, a theoretical physicist at Fermilab. The data has shored up the standard model, but technicolor is dead and supersymmetry is starting to look pretty ropey now. Theorists are now poking at the mathematical chinks in the standard theory in the hopes of being the first to find a deeper truth about how the Universe works."
Stopped reading at "Mathematical chinks" (Score:2, Funny)
C'mon slashdot, you're better than that.
Yes I'm being funny (or trying to).
Re:Stopped reading at "Mathematical chinks" (Score:4, Informative)
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3 petabytes per experiment per year. Also, experiment != collision.
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See, there's your problem right there. That's two men holding each other's penises, not the developer version of Mac OS X Mountain Lion.
(If it were Mountain Lion, there would be an Apple logo in there somewhere.)
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Did we really find it? (Score:3)
From what I understand it was only one single experiment that showed us something that we think is where/what the Higgs Boson would look like.
Has it been reproduced or confirmed?
Scientists using the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva have announced the discovery of a new subatomic particle to very high confidence that is consistent with what we expect the Higgs particle to look like.
That's not very definitive. Can anybody else around well versed in particle physics tell us if the Higgs has really been found or not?
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From what I understand it was only one single experiment that showed us something that we think is where/what the Higgs Boson would look like.
Has it been reproduced or confirmed?
Not yet, but soon!
I'm building my very own Large Hadron Collider in my backyard in order to try to reproduce the results.
Of course I don't have superconducting magnets, but I'm hoping that by using ALL the the letters of the alphabet I can get close enough to the required field strength.
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:5, Informative)
It is not confirmed, but it is not expected to not be confirmed, so nothing lost by starting on the theoretical work ahead of the confirmations. In the unlikely case it turns out to be something else, we can just start over.
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In the unlikely case it turns out to be something else, we can just start over.
So we can spend millions of dollars, and perhaps billions if a huge linear accelerator is built, going down the wrong track instead of waiting a few months or years to confirm the single experiment. IResearch funding should be spent on confirmation rather than advancement based on a single experiment.
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This is either a troll or you really do not understand the costs of theoretical research. If it is the former then you got me. If it is the latter then here are a few more costs to consider;
1. Wages of the PHDs.
2. Wages of the grad students helping the PHDs.
3. Administration costs for above payroll.
4. Costs of lab space.
5. Costs of computer time for simulations.
A two year research project with a team of 2 professors and 4 grad students could easily run over a couple of million dollars. If many universities
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:5, Funny)
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Now that is either a troll or a very stupid poster. I prefer to give the benefit of the doubt and go with the former.
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You are talking about costs that are at least an order of magnitude smaller.
An order of magnitude less than horrendously expensive it still very expensive.
And what would you have those PhDs and grad students do in the meantime?
How about working on the data from the current experiment to prove it rather than assuming it proves the theory. Isn't there other things to work on in theoretical physics rather that work based on the unproven existence of Higgs bosun?
I think I see where we diverge in our ideas. I see a huge difference between a theoretical physicist and theoreticians. To me theoretical physicists takes proven fact and theorizes one or two level
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You seem to have missed the word "theoretical" in my post.
Lets not jump the gun (Score:2)
Theoretical research still takes people and computers; both of which cost money. A research team consisting of two PHDs and four grad students can easily cost $1Mill. a year. Multiply that by the number of interested research groups and the possible waste can be huge. Are you really willing to risk wasting millions of dollars in very scarce funding for theoretical research just because one can not wait to be sure that the single experiment was not an anomaly?
Here is a quote from CERN Director General Rolf H
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You are exaggerating to an incredible degree here.
You think those people wouldn't be paid if they weren't working on the Higgs results?
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You are exaggerating to an incredible degree here.
What exactly do you consider to be exaggerations?
You think those people wouldn't be paid if they weren't working on the Higgs results?
How about we pay them to work on something based on a more proven theory rather than, what is at this point, yet another layer of conjecture. How many layers of conjecture does it take to change from theory to flight of fancy? If this is true and this is true and this is true and this is true and this is true then this could be true.
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I have no idea what you are even talking about any longer.
This is a first experimental verification of a theoretical result. It fits what was expected. It is not enough for a solid confirmation yet, but for it to be false would be quite unexpected and surprising. We are not expecting further experiments to disprove this.
Why are you so upset over a tiny little chance that maybe this will turn out to be a different particle, and that a few professors would have wasted a couple months of work on that?
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Why are you so upset over a tiny little chance that maybe this will turn out to be a different particle, and that a few professors would have wasted a couple months of work on that?
That assumes a couple of things;
1. That it will take only a couple of months to replicate and prove. It may take years especially if funding get diverted to post-Higgs bosun study.
2. That their estimates of probability are actually correct. From the article they stated that if one sensor detected decay as predicted for a Higgs bison it was 90% probability that it was one. Later they state that since two detected the decay simultaneously the probability goes up to 99.999%. From elementary probability if one
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That it will take only a couple of months to replicate and prove. It may take years especially if funding get diverted to post-Higgs bosun study.
What funds are going to be diverted? Are we suddenly going to start paying professors more money?
Also, if you can't even spell "boson", are you really sure you are qualified to talk about the value or likelihoods of these results?
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If professors who are currently working on proving that the Higgs boson exists accept the current theory that it does as fact they may move to new research based on that assumption. So instead of continuing to work to prove the existence of the Higgs boson they are spending their research dollars on something else. That is how finding gets diverted.
The experiment has not even been replicated. There could have been some flaw that created false results like the faster than light experiment done by the same or
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Re:Did we really find it? (Score:5, Informative)
Discrediting a theory isn't a permanent thing. Any theory can be brought back if evidence warrants it. Even Einstein's "biggest blunder," the cosmological constant, is now the most popular theory to explain the universe's accelerating expansion.
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:4, Insightful)
the cosmological constant, is now the most popular theory to explain the universe's accelerating expansion
describe, not explain
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:5, Informative)
It's unknown but really likely. There is definitely a particle at around 125 GeV but there certainly is a (very small) chance it could be something else.
The standard model predicts a number of different ways the Higgs Boson can decay and what probability it has for each type of decay.
The most common easy to measure decay modes are:
Higgs -> Two Photons (high energy gamma rays)
Higgs -> Two W Bosons -> 4 leptons (electrons or muons)
So what they are actually seeing is the decay products and they measure the energy of each component of the decay and add that up to find the original energy of the Higgs.
The measurement of the two photons is called the "gamma-gamma" channel or "diphoton" channel. They call the 4 lepton channel the "golden channel" because it's a pretty clean signal with a low "background" (noise). That is, they get a good signal to noise ratio from the 4 lepton channel.
The theory says that the two photons should happen a certain % of the time and the 4 leptons should happen a different % and the other decay modes should happen with other probabilities.
One of the reasons to believe they have found the Higgs boson and not some other particle is that the decay relative rates for each type of decay are pretty close to what the theory suggests.
The best way to study the Higgs would be to produce lots of them accurately without producing other particles. The best-known way to do that is with a linear collider that smashes leptons (usually electrons) together. They can tune the energy of the collisions to the exact value to produce Higgs. This is how the W boson was studied so accurately at SLAC. A new international linear collider (ILC) would need to be built to reach the energy levels needed to make the Higgs. Luckily, it's a pretty low and easy to reach energy compared to what it could have been which makes an ILC somewhat reasonable to build.
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A new international linear collider (ILC) would need to be built to reach the energy levels needed to make the Higgs.
. . . so we built a billion dollar ring, that told us, that we need a straight line . . .
Brilliant!
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:5, Informative)
The LHC was built to find any new physics, not just the Higgs. The fact that we've been able to rule out SUSY for large mass ranges is part of that. To measure the specific properties of one particle though does need something a bit more purpose-built. They'll be able to measure a lot about the Higgs boson but not anywhere near as much as a linear collider could measure.
Also, for part of the year they stop injecting protons and instead inject lead nucului. This is meant to measure extremely messy but very high energy collisions that should generate quark-gluon plasmas.
Decay channels not rates (Score:5, Informative)
One of the reasons to believe they have found the Higgs boson and not some other particle is that the decay relative rates for each type of decay are pretty close to what the theory suggests.
Actually that is not really true because we do not have enough statistics to measure these rates with any accuracy. In fact the "most likely" value for diphoton rates for both ATLAS and CMS are quite a bit higher than the Standard Model predicts but the accuracy is sufficiently low that they are not yet inconsistent with the SM values. So really the rate measurements are currently far too inaccurate to have any idea whether this is a Higgs boson or not but things are improving rapidly as we gain statistics.
What is far more important at the moment are the decay channel observations. Since it decays into photons, W and Z bosons we know it must be either a spin-0 or spin-2 particle and it cannot be a fermion (spin-0.5). The Higgs should be spin-0 so this is consistent but not conclusive. Essentially it decays into the particles it should do and it _potentially_ has the correct spin. We can get a more accurate determination of the spin i.e. whether it is spin-0 or spin-2 by looking at the angle between the two leptons (electron or muon) produced in the WW decay channel - expect results from ATLAS and CMS on this soon.
However by the end of the year the rate measurements should be a lot more accurate and things will possibly start to get interesting if the current diphoton rates stay where they are but we end up with less uncertainty on the measurement.
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A few corrections:
Higgs -> Two W Bosons -> 4 leptons (electrons or muons)
This is actually H -> ZZ -> 4 leptons [wikipedia.org]
This is how the W boson was studied so accurately at SLAC.
I believe this is also incorrect. The W boson was discovered at Gargamelle and studied at LEP, CERN.
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Yeah you're right, it is H -> ZZ -> llll
The WW decay is H -> WW -> lvlv
Sorry about that.
You're also right about it being LEP and not SLAC that studied the W boson with so much accuracy.
Thanks for the corrections.
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:4, Informative)
The "v" in the context of W decay to "lv" is a neutrino ("v" is a close approximation to the lowercase N or Nu in greek ν)
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:5, Informative)
From what I understand it was only one single experiment that showed us something that we think is where/what the Higgs Boson would look like.
Has it been reproduced or confirmed?
That's not very definitive. Can anybody else around well versed in particle physics tell us if the Higgs has really been found or not?
I think that the announcement is based on a couple of years of data collected by two different teams using different methods, so calling it a single experiment seems a bit of an over simplification. See Higgs Discovery: The Data [profmattstrassler.com] blog entry by Matt Strassler.
Pink elephants (Score:5, Informative)
http://vimeo.com/41038445 [vimeo.com]
Enjoy!
It has been reproduced (Score:2)
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No it was really two separate, independent experiments, CMS and ATLAS. Both reported discovery independently at the 5 sigma level (10^-5 probability of error or whatever it is). Both discovered a particle at the same mass, within experimental error. There was no shared knowledge or data between the analysis teams. They were working on the same accelerator (LHC), but at different points in the ring, so no cross talk or anything is possible between the two experiments (several km of rock in the way). The on
Re:Did we really find it? (Score:4, Informative)
only one single experiment
Actually, it was two different experiments: CMS [wikipedia.org] and ATLAS [wikipedia.org]. The LHC is the big ring-like structure that accelerates particles around it; CMS and ATLAS are two detectors at different points on that ring that watch as the particles collide with each other. Both CMS and ATLAS have detected a new particle, with the same mass (~125 GeV), with about the same significance (~5-sigma, or about a 1-in-50-million chance of getting that result by chance).
The mass is about what the standard model of particle physics predicts for the Higgs boson, so it looks very much like this new particle is it. But the physicists are being careful not to state outright that they've found it, because there are certain properties that the Higgs is expected to have - charge, spin and parity, I think - which they haven't been able to measure yet. When they've got enough data to measure those, and if they match what the Higgs is supposed to have, then they'll state that they've definitely detected it.
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I was always dissatisfied by string theory to be honest. Not from the science per se but from the philosophical implication that after you wade through all the scales there actually exists one distinct smallest and one distinct largest scale.
I mean, come on! The Universe can do better than that! And what about recursion? Huh that is a bit poetic at least!
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Oh no, that isn't true. The Higgs Boson is a small but consistent data blip in a multitude of a huge number of experiments. Its only been found in this one collider though so the blip in the data could be due to an issue in the equipment.
http://theskepticalteenager.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/higgsbosongraph1.png [wordpress.com]
As the Input Energy of the collisions changed the expected output of the collisions changed following a predicted exact graph. The Higgs Boson is predicted to alter that straight curve at an exact s
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"From what I understand it was only one single experiment that showed us something that we think is where/what the Higgs Boson would look like.
Has it been reproduced or confirmed?"
CMS and ATLAS are TWO like 2 independant experiments. So, yes, if data in both experiments converge to the same conclusion, it would have been confirmed and reproduced. Physicists aren't idiots and this is the reason they are running two different experiments with the same goal and working in isolation to each other.
Now, the poi
Re:learning by smashing (Score:5, Insightful)
This is an idiotic analogy. This isn't about breaking things, it's about reproducing the kinds of conditions necessary to observe phenomena. Do you feel the same way about dissecting animals to learn about internal structure or heating various substances to get spectral signatures.
If you're going to confirm or throw out a model of subatomic physics you're going to have to use accelerators to produce the conditions where particles can be observed.
When the string-theory gets ropey... (Score:2)
Really? (Score:5, Funny)
Theorists are now poking at the mathematical chinks
I realize Asians are known for excelling at math, but do we really have to bring race into this?
I'm very, very sorry. I couldn't resist. I understand I'm a terrible person, you don't need to reply and tell me that.
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oblig (?) http://images.t-nation.com/forum_images/6/e/6ea45_ORIG-1025_You_found_the_chink_in_my_armor.jpg [t-nation.com]
The real takeaway (Score:5, Insightful)
I predict, over the next two years, what's going to come out of this is the following:
Physicists will have poked holes in most all the prevailing Standard Model-compatible theories, and will start talking about the inadequacies of the LHC and how we need a much bigger collider to prove or disprove the existence of those elusive super-partner particles required by supersymmetry.
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Re:The real takeaway (Score:5, Informative)
More like, we will find that quantum physics and standard model don't actually differ, but only in observation.
They differ by virtue of belonging to different categories of things.
Quantum physics is a general framework that encapsulates a number of particular physical theories, including quantum electrodynamics (interaction between charged particles and photons), quantum electroweakdynamics or whatever it's called (throw in the W and Z bosons and neutrinos on top of quantum electrodynamics), quantum chromodynamics (interaction between quarks, bearing a charge called "color", and gluons, the force quanta for the field generated by that charge), and the standard model (quantum electroweakandchromodynamics). So the standard model is a quantum theory, and thus falls under the general heading of "quantum physics" (as do atomic physics, nuclear physics, most if not all of what's called "condensed matter physics", and so on).
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While you can SM = Quantum Theory, the Standard Model is badly *incomplete*. ... needed to explain the deficiencies of the Standard Model, such as the origin of mass, the strong CP problem, neutrino oscillations, matterâ"antimatter asymmetry, and the nature of dark matter and dark energy. Another problem lies within the mathematical framework of the Standard Model itself â" the Standard Model is inconsistent with that of general relativity to t
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beyond_the_Standard_Model [wikipedia.org]
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If the next step in discovering what makes the world around us tick involves a slightly larger tunnel, I'm all for it.
You can't kill SUSY (Score:5, Interesting)
Every new discovery of the past few decades has supposedly "killed" SUSY, but every time it makes a comeback with a modification to avert whatever problem the observation caused. Other theories do the same, to a slightly lesser extent.
I don't see why Technicolor is dead. The Nature article makes the claim that it's because Technicolor is Higgsless, but that's something of a falsehood. Technicolor lacks an elementary Higgs, because the role played by the elementary Higgs in the Standard Model is instead played by a composite particle. As far as I can tell it's perfectly possible that the bosonic state at 125GeV is a composite rather than elementary Higgs.
(FD: I'm a PhD student with a thesis area based around technicolor)
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Every new discovery of the past few decades has supposedly "killed" SUSY, but every time it makes a comeback with a modification to avert whatever problem the observation caused.
Which just goes to show that supersymmetry theorists are very adept at predicting the past.
Where's the pain? (Score:2)
I understand that it would be frustrating to see years of labor on a theory go down the tubes, but at its root the finding means that we now have a slightly better understanding of reality. I would think that for many if not most people in the field, if the implications are as stated in the summary, this is exciting because we have a better idea of what direction to theorize in. Falsification is just as if not more important than making hypotheses.
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Ever since relativity and quantum theory came along, a lot of physicists have been looking for nifty or non-intuitive explanations for things. They keep looking for unexpected stuff in contrast to the "standard model". You know "new physics" is a common term and probably helps to get funding. The more exotic hypothesis (I won't give them the satisfaction of calling them theories) have been people hoping for
Summary of the Higgs Boson "Finding" (Score:2)
consistent with The Higgs Boson
The short version of what scientists are *actually* saying boils down to:
We theorised where IT would be and when we finally looked THERE we found SOMETHING which isn't Absolutely Not IT.
Reports I've read (forgot URLs, sue me) indicated the result found was NOT exactly as expected, but also not so massively different that they'd be sure it was NOT The Higgs.
More like:
Scientist1: Yup, that's the Higgs!
Scientist2: But I thought you said it'd have black spots not very very dark brown.
Scientist1: Well if we'd solved everything then what are we going to do after that?
Holy crap (Score:5, Funny)
"Joy and pain"? Jesus, what are they doing, tying the boson in a knot and putting it up their bums? (I guess it would have to be a "boson's knot").
Instead of the God Particle, they could call the "Oh God! Particle".
[note: I only make this kind of off-color joke because it's past 9pm and the children have all gone to bed. I call this the "safe harbor" hours, when normal FCC rules moderating online behavior are relaxed, like a sphincter with a Higgs Boson in it. Thanks to these safe harbor rules, constitutionally-protected free speech rights of adults are balanced with the need to protect children from harmful content, like the word "fuck" and references to tying massive particles in knots and putting them up one's bum and then pulling it out slowly as climax is achieved (thus the expression "string theory"). Two physicist doing this while standing face to face are called a "Hardon Collider", named for the famous Scottish physicist Sir Ivan Hardon (1847-1903) who first posited that there's nothing else to do while waiting for the experiment to finish and there were so few female physicists back then that, hey, what happens in the lab stays in the lab. Tragically one of his experiments exploded while Hardon and a lab assistant were engaged in this act of outrage and since they had their pants down both of them got kilt.]
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Instead of the God Particle
Don't call it that, you fool [youtube.com]!
Tragically one of his experiments exploded while Hardon and a lab assistant were engaged in this act of outrage and since they had their pants down both of them got kilt.]
Thank Science for the random Scotsman when you're in need! (I'm not sure whether that was on purpose, but if it was: very nice!)
This article differs (Score:2)
from every other article I've read on the topic, which say that the measured mass of the Higgs boson is exactly where it should be if the Minimally Supersymmetric Standard Model is correct; and too low for any non-supersymmetric theory.
http://motls.blogspot.com/2012/07/why-125-gev-higgs-boson-isnt-quite.html?m=1 [blogspot.com]
Break out the check book (Score:2)
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The LHC is that bigger and costlier accelerator. It's being run at way less than nominal power right now.
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>> poking at the mathematical chinks
Not all Maths graduate students are Chinese, you know.
That's true. It's only the good ones.
(They're especially good in wector calculus.)
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>> poking at the mathematical chinks
Not all Maths graduate students are Chinese, you know.
That's true. It's only the good ones. (They're especially good in wector calculus.)
No, that's actually a Russian specialty.
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They've also had some success in building nuclear wessels.
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I'm just wondering how "The Big Bang Theory" is going to respond to all of this when next season starts. Will Sheldon be devastated, will he defend String Theory against "this silly, inept Higgs experimental data," or will he somehow hop on the Higgs Bandwagon?
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I'm just wondering how "The Big Bang Theory" is going to respond to all of this when next season starts. Will Sheldon be devastated, will he defend String Theory against "this silly, inept Higgs experimental data," or will he somehow hop on the Higgs Bandwagon?
I think he will rail against it at first, but his gf will convince him to change. After a few mild electric shocks.
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Hey, I thought string theory wasn't falsifiable. Did you guys figure out something last time I looked at it?
Re:I for one welcome the death of String Theory (Score:4, Interesting)
String theory has many, many variations. Falsifying them means first narrowing down which variations just might have some correspondance to physical reality, then finding ways to test those further. All the ones that we could call interesting (because they might fit 'objective reality for this universe'). involve very high energies, so we can't build an accelerator nearly powerful to test them by that particular method. That's not the same as being untestable - for example, a particular string model might make predictions about something else, like Proton decay, that we can test. Some versions imply things about cosmolgy that we can test by astronomical observation.
The point is, that we probably won't test all the variants much or at all. Sometimes, a physicist may decide to toss out a bunch of variants because the equations look needlessly complex or full of fudge factors - scientists often look for certain types of style or form in fundamental equations, as when Einstein decided to not add the complexity of a Cosmological constant to General Relativity. It's not the same as doing a scientific test for falsifiability to just decide not to look at the more complex equations at all and hope you will either find something going through the more beautiful and elegant versions, or shoot them all down, and then some grad student can try some of the more complicated variants.
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That crossed my mind when I first heard about them finding Higgs, but what I though was Leslie telling Sheldon "See? Told you so, dumbass!"
Whatever happens, hilarity will certainly ensue. I think my two favorites were when Stephen Hawking found an arithemetic error in Sheldon's paper, and when George Smoot said "With all due respects, Dr. Cooper, but are you on crack?"
Re:I for one welcome the death of String Theory (Score:4, Funny)
Did you miss the part about "looking ropey"? That's String Theory on Steroids.
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The experiments indicating the existence of the Higgs Boson at now at 5 sigma, which validates the "pretty much" qualification for particle physics.
The existence of God fits into a entirely different ontological category. There are no experiments you can perform to confirm or invalidate the existence of God.
Re:brilliant, clap, clap (Score:5, Interesting)
> There are no experiments you can perform to confirm or invalidate the existence of God.
Actually there is. Unfortunately it requires death as that results of that experience and the aftermath will provide all the proofs and more then one person could ever dream that indeed your consciousness simply changes state after death, and that there is a super-consciousness to the sub-consciousness of everyone. *Unfortunately* getting the results of said experiment back to the living is the catch. The other "kink" is that: Besides if you already knew the answer, it would (mostly) invalidate the purpose of being human in the first place.
The other way would be to learn meditation and learn how to interact with your True Self. Again, unfortunately one could spend an entire lifetime before ones "get confirmation" that there is indeed far, far more to "who you truely are."
The point though, either way the answer is largely irrelevant in the grand scheme of things. There are indeed many good people of all kinds of beliefs, faiths, and lack of said beliefs and faiths. If one has to rely on an external force / rules to be positive internally methinks one is the missing the *whole* point of religion which is little more then spiritual kindergarten. At some point one doesn't need others telling you to internalize how to treat others with respect, kindness, etc.
The ignorance and arrogance of man is to simply assume that some questions are unknowable. They may not be easy to get, but they are indeed there if one dedicates their life to seeking them. Again, the proof of this, sadly, is also going thru the death experience.
It is simpler to "just get on with life" - learning and loving. That's what its all about at the end of the day -- creating positive relationships with everyone else.
The instant someone is trying to "sell you" a philosophy is the instant it would be good to be skeptical of their agenda.
Re:brilliant, clap, clap (Score:4, Interesting)
It is essential to science that experimental results are public and repeatable. What you are talking about doesn't fit into those categories. Perhaps you could call it knowledge, but it isn't knowledge in the ordinary sense.
If I had a dream where I met Satan and he told me his favorite shampoo, you could call that knowledge, but it isn't knowledge in the scientific sense, or even common sense.
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> Perhaps you could call it knowledge, but it isn't knowledge in the ordinary sense.
That is indeed correct, for there are two types of knowledge.
i.e. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_priori_and_a_posteriori [wikipedia.org]
A priori knowledge or justification is independent of experience, and
A posteriori knowledge or justification is dependent on experience or empirical evidence
I prefer the word Gnosis = knowledge that can ONLY be understood from experience. e.g. Men have NO knowledge of what it is like to give birth. The
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N.B.Yoga here is used in the true sense of the word w
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> There are no experiments you can perform to confirm or invalidate the existence of God.
Actually there is. Unfortunately it requires death as that results of that experience and the aftermath will provide all the proofs and more then one person could ever dream that indeed your consciousness simply changes state after death, and that there is a super-consciousness to the sub-consciousness of everyone. *Unfortunately* getting the results of said experiment back to the living is the catch.
But what if experiments were to conclusively prove that all aspects of personality can be explained by neurological processes? Then, consciousness would be tied to an observable, physical mechanism and then you would need to render the idea of a mirroring consciousness existing outside the observed - which is kind of a stretch, but those are not exactly news to theology.
The basic point that should be made is that just because something cannot be disproven does not mean that it is more likely than any other
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> But what if experiments were to conclusively prove that all aspects of personality can be explained by neurological processes? Then, consciousness would be tied to an observable, physical mechanism
You fallacy is assuming brain = mind.
Prove to me that :
a) numbers are physical
b) time is physical
Our mind deals with meta-physical objects all the time. Our brain _represents_ these concepts and ideas mechanically, but you are confusing the representation with the actuality.
See Peter Russell
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> But what if experiments were to conclusively prove that all aspects of personality can be explained by neurological processes? Then, consciousness would be tied to an observable, physical mechanism
You fallacy is assuming brain = mind.
How on earth can you say my fallacy is that assumption when you're replying to a sentence which explicitly supposes it as a hypothetical?
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Our brain _represents_ these concepts and ideas mechanically, but you are confusing the representation with the actuality.
You haven't presented any evidence beyond the material, other than to meditate, which provides no evidence at all, as people have fooled themselves into thinking all kinds of bullshit based on such practices.
If, in fact, you could directly experience this meta-conscience, you should be able to reliably and unequivocally demonstrate some knowledge gained in this manner that couldn't have been gained through normal means.
On the other hand, there's a vast amount of evidence that points to materialism being the
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What you missed in your science fanboi rant is that the reason there is such a widely held belief in a God is because so many people have 'experienced' God. Religions are just attempts at explaining these widely spread experiences. Of course, your posture will determine how much God expe
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What you BPD sufferers confuse all the time is the mechanism with the reason. I was going to say 'what came first the chicken or the egg' but you guys have such low intelligence you still haven't solved that one and it's painfully obvious.
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How will you know you are really dead?
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You see, we have this little fact of life in which everyone dies; everyone will be given this opportunity to do their own science!
In the meantime, enjoy life! It is too short.
Besides, it is only a gamble, when you don't know the outcome or the odds. In this I already know both so to answer your question: mu.
i.e. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mu_(negative) [wikipedia.org]
Actually... (Score:5, Insightful)
While disproving the existence of God is effectively impossible - proving it does exist would actually quite simple, provided you had His/Her/Its/Their cooperation. The fact that their is no credible evidence the existence of God suggests that either:
1) It doesn't exist
2) It doesn't desire to prove Its existence, or
3) It's incapable of proving Its existence
Considering we're talking about a being who most claim created the universe and intervenes in peoples life in ways both subtle and miraculous, number (3) seems unlikely - even just having one of his chosen messengers take part in a double-blind psionics test while God read out the cards to them would be enough to give the question serious scientific merit.
Now (2) could very easily be the case, and is in fact perfectly consistent with some faiths. But in that case I would suggest that either It doesn't actually care about our worship, codes of conduct, or the other stuff religions tend to obsess over, or It's a complete jerk: "Yeah, I know it's been a hundred generations or so since I bothered to offer any evidence that I even exist, much less which of the hundreds of continuously-mutating religions I endorse, but you didn't follow the right one so you're getting eternally condemned anyway".
Which leaves (1) as the default assumption. Either God doesn't exist, or It wishes us to be free to conduct our lives as though it does not - in which case spreading the "Good Word", especially through coercion, would seem to run counter to God's will.
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Yes, but *which* Bible? One of the Abrahamic ones (Old Testamanet, New Testament, Koran, or one of the dozens of variations thereof? The Norse Eddas? Perhaps the Hindus have it right with their expansive pantheon? Their are literally hundreds of different religions out there, and most of them claim to be The One True Faith. How is a person not raised to one of them supposed to choose the right one? None of them offer the slightest shed of evidence that they are truer than the others.
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There's only 1 Bible that's the most widely available book which contains explains fully the past, present, future.
The Bible was written by a group of men who collected a bunch of stories and decided which ones were canon and which ones weren't. It doesn't explain shit, unless you believe in ridiculous Hebrew mythology like Adam & Eve, Noah's Ark, or that the Earth doesn't move and hence doesn't revolve around the Sun.
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Jesus believed in Adam and Eve and Noah's Ark.
So? Does believing in Hebrew mythology make him more or less credible?
It also doesn't say that the Earth does not move.
http://www.aboutbibleprophecy.com/q7.htm [aboutbibleprophecy.com]
You can find relevant passages quoted there, along with an excuse which amounts to just re-interpreting the Bible, as is often the case whenever it is shown to be wrong. One of the reasons the Earth revolving around the Sun was initially rejected and consider heretical was because it contradicted the Bible.
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But why have humans evolved to believe that there is the "all-powerful being somewhere and everywhere in the universe, but you can't see him"?
Because we're more intelligent than our nearest living ancestors, and are smart enough to articulate and ponder our origins. Is this really some amazing concept? You might as well ask why we evolved to do better math than some birds that have some rudimentary counting skills.
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Re:brilliant, clap, clap (Score:5, Interesting)
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Great, now I'm probably going to have to listen to the juvenile debates b
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No, it just wants you to think *THAT*.
Re:Is mass loss in nuclear fusion just Higgs drag? (Score:5, Interesting)
The three valence quarks inside a proton for instance have a rest mass of only 11 MeV/c^2, which they get by means of the Higgs mechanism. The rest of the 938 MeV/c^2 that is the full rest mass of the proton is its quantum chromodynamic binding energy, that is the energies of the gluons that are keeping the three quarks together, so the Higgs mechanism accounts for only 1% of the mass of a composite particle like a proton. Not all mass is drag in the Higgs field. It is by no means the final word on the origin of all mass. If the Higgs mechanism was the only way particles could acquire their masses, then the neutrino should have zero mass, and well, it doesn't [wikipedia.org].
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Since mass is apparently simply drag in the Higgs field...
Ah, I don't know anything about this to speak of, but obviously mass is not drag. Drag always slows things down while mass has momentum which tends to keep things going. I'm afraid the drag thing (journalists hanging onto thus slowing down celebrities) was just a crude analogy sombody cooked up in a press conference to try to explain the abstract mathematical nature of what is really going on to journalists and other mere knuckle draggers like myself. Frankly, I think they need to get back to the drawing bo
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Ask again in 50-100 years. It typically takes a while for technology to catch up with science. Especially fundamental science. Electricity was basically useless when discovered, and look how that turned out.
My own pie-in-the-sky speculation? Since the Higgs field is responsible for inertial mass, if we can learn to manipulate it then inertial dampening may become possible,which could make interplanetary travel convenient, and interstellar travel feasible. Not to mention potentially revolutionizing on-pla
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I think Entropic Gravity is looking very promising.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Entropic_gravity [wikipedia.org]
Verlinde claims that it is starting to make some sense of the Dark Matter and Dark Energy problem.
http://www.scilogs.eu/en/blog/the-dark-matter-crisis/2012-06-28/discussing-gravity-with-eric-verlinde [scilogs.eu]
This theory could change a whole lot of things in physics. And might provide a way to finally bring Quantum Theory and Relativity together.
General Relativity actually adopted equations that would be consistent with Ne