Bye, Bye, Fermilab

[technoextreme]

You don't think CERN gives out observer status for nothing do you?

I have no idea what you are getting at. You said the United States should buy into CERN. I pointed out that they all ready have.

 

[Kestrel]

If one were to read the website one would discover purchase would not be the right word. At least it doesn't fit my definition.

Most folks don't know that high energy physics research labs have traditionally been open to scientists from all nations. When I worked at Fermilab back in the '70s, researchers from China and the USSR had offices next to mine.

 

[geni]

I have no idea what you are getting at. You said the United States should buy into CERN. I pointed out that they all ready have.

No. The US has purchased observer status but not full involvement.

 

[technoextreme]

Most folks don't know that high energy physics research labs have traditionally been open to scientists from all nations. When I worked at Fermilab back in the '70s, researchers from China and the USSR had offices next to mine.

All ready knew that. My grandpa worked as a security guard at BNL. He used to get gifts from people he met from Japan. They were chocolate covered grasshopers.

 

[UnrepentantSinner]

Remember Alaska's infamous "bridge to nowhere" that got killed after public protest? Well, now they're trying to build a ferry to nowhere, for $20 million.

Kill that ferry and Fermi lab can get pretty much the same funding as last year.

On TAA2 we saw Ketchican where the bridge to nowhere was going to be built. It was definately a boondoogle.

The ferry I'm a bit torn over. I think government should be able to provide some infrastruture, but this is also a situation where some enterprising ferry captain could set up shop and make a mint.

As far as Fermilab goes, if the U.S. keeps failing to fund big science, it'll just be a matter of time until all those Nobels in physics are being given to Chinese and Indian scientists. I remember when the SSC was defunded and still shake my head.

 

[egslim]

The question is, 'what good is it?

I don't know, nobody really knows, and that's the whole point of trying to make discoveries - scientific or otherwise. We don't know beforehand what we'll find, or what good it will do us. But history shows that initially pointless discoveries often provide major benefits further down the line. And societies that invest in discoveries often end up coming out on top.

 

[Rob Lister]

I agree, egslim. But I don't agree without limit, and I also think that the investment should have at least some possibility of return. High-energy physics, as practiced today (though not so in the past) really doesn't express that possibility. I think it is too large an investment for the science we get from it. I think the money could be better spent on more, less expensive experiments.

I'm more than willing to be convinced others because, as I said, I like high-energy physics. The results are interesting, just not useful.

 

[Lensman]

Whatever.

The question is, 'what good is it?'

Answer....? Not much. What can we expect from funding Fermi? At least a little. We get really, really smart guys with a sense of a purpose (for small values of purpose). They may eventually be useful, though for what we do not know.

What good was the discovery of radioactivity & was it apparent at the time?

What use was the discovery of fission & was it apparent at the time?
(I think the researchers had a vague idea that it COULD mean almost limitless energy generation in the far distant future, but that would be on the order of many decades, maybe centuries away).

What use was the discovery of thermionic emission of electrons in a vacuum & was it apparent at the time?

What use were any of the major scientific discoveries & how apparent wre they at the time?

ETA: oops!! Wrong post quoted

 

[egslim]

High-energy physics, as practiced today (though not so in the past) really doesn't express that possibility.

You don't know that. Historically it often took several decades or even longer for fundamental research to become beneficial, and in ways few people at the time could have imagined, let alone predicted. Not to mention the huge number of seemingly unrelated spin-offs. Why would modern particle physics be different? I see no reason to believe that, and I generally distrust assumptions that current phenomena are somehow exceptionally different from previous ones.