Posted on 04/07/2008 8:05:12 PM PDT by rpage3
GENEVA (Reuters) - British physicist Peter Higgs said on Monday it should soon be possible to prove the existence of a force which gives mass to the universe and makes life possible -- as he first argued 40 years ago.
Higgs said he believes a particle named the "Higgs boson," which originates from the force, will be found when a vast particle collider at the CERN research centre on the Franco-Swiss border begins operating fully early next year.
"The likelihood is that the particle will show up pretty quickly ... I'm more than 90 percent certain that it will," Higgs told journalists.
The 78-year-old's original efforts in the early 1960s to explain why the force, dubbed the Higgs field, must exist were dismissed at CERN, the European Organization for Nuclear Research.
Today, the existence of the invisible field is widely accepted by scientists, who believe it came into being milliseconds after the Big Bang created the universe some 15 billion years ago.
Finding the Higgs boson would prove this theory right.
CERN's new Large Hadron Collider (LHC) aims to simulate conditions at the time of that primeval inferno by smashing particles together at near light-speed and so unlock many secrets of the universe.
Higgs was in Geneva to visit CERN for the first time in 13 years in advance of the launch.
Scientists at the centre hope the process will produce clear signs of the boson, dubbed the "God particle" by some, to the displeasure of Higgs, an atheist.
He came up with his theory to explain why mass disappears as matter is broken down to its smallest constituent parts -- molecules, atoms and quarks.
BIG BANG
The normally media-shy physicist, who has spent most of his career at Scotland's Edinburgh University, postulated that matter was weightless at the exact moment of the Big Bang and then much of it promptly gained mass.
This, he argued, must be due to a field which stuck to particles as they passed through it and made them heavy. If this had not happened, matter would have floated free in space and stars and planets would never have formed.
Higgs said he hoped the elusive boson -- which an earlier but less powerful collider at CERN and another at the U.S. Fermilab had failed to detect -- would be identified before his 80th birthday in 2009.
"If it doesn't," he said, "I shall be very, very puzzled."
But there may be no immediate visible proof -- despite some fanciful portrayals of what it might look like -- of the boson's appearance on the ultra-sophisticated computers used by CERN scientists to track the billions of collisions in the LHC.
"It all happens so fast that the appearance of the boson may be hidden in the data collected, and it could take a long time for the analysis to find it," said Higgs.
"I may have to keep the champagne on ice for a while yet."
I don’t know about the Higgs Boson,
But I know where you can find some Huge Bison.
Alternate headline: “Old guy about to die is sure validity of life’s work will soon be confirmed”
Fair enough. I could quibble that God being nonmaterial doesn't give the universe mass, but no matter.
The question is, how, within physical terms, does God do it?
Nevermind...
That would be contrary to the command of God.
Gen 1:28 And God blessed them, saying: Increase and multiply, and
fill the earth, and subdue it, and rule over the fishes of
the sea, and the fowls of the air, and all living creatures that move upon the earth.
May the Higgs boson be with you. Seriously, it would be impressive to find the gravity particle. A long time coming.
Hebrews 1: 2Hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son, whom he hath appointed heir of all things, by whom also he made the worlds;
3Who being the brightness of his glory, and the express image of his person, and upholding all things by the word of his power...
The part about "upholding all things" is very mysterious (like the 'God particle' being asserted here). It also contains the force we've been seeking -- the force that keeps the particles apart, giving space and mass to the objects in the universe, keeping all from collapsing in on itself. Quite remarkable, actually. The Apostle seems to have been given some rather sophisticated insight into it.
<}B^)
I worked on some of the data network requirements for this thingy. the first 20 minutes of operations should pump out enough data for a single man to read non-stop for the next 200 years.
On the other hand a Married man wouldn’t be allowed to read non-stop. He’d have to take 174500 years of 20 minutes on the john reading, getting hollered at just 10 minutes into it.
A couple more interesting articles written for laymen about the Large Hadron Collider:
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2008/03/080331122534.htm
And these guys have an interesting theory on its potential.
Two men have theorized the Collider could destroy all life on earth (but not to worry it’s just a “small chance of annihilation of the planet”).
“Fight to save Earth from tiny black hole”
http://www.smh.com.au/news/science/fight-to-save-earth-from-tiny-black-hole/2008/04/01/1206850910851.html
” The Higgs Boson exists not” - Hoseya
So should we shut down all science and stare aimlessly out the window regarding every unanswered question?
You want the answers to questions? Look to the Word, it will answer all your questions.
Saying a Heavenly Creator created everything is avoiding the question.
It’s simply a matter of Faith. And about questions, truth will be unfolding to the believer throughout eternity.
The question is, how, within physical terms, does God do it?
Simple, He is God!
One would expect this effort to advance computational sciences almost as much as particle physics. FWIW I know plenty of grad students who would do it for a modicum of pizza and nice European beer...
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