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Higgs Boson Discovered?!

MattusMaximus

Intellectual Gladiator
MattusMaximus
Joined
Jan 26, 2006
Messages
15,948
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'
Scientists believe the "God particle" that might explain the underpinnings of the universe is real, and they are about to present their evidence to the world.

Physicists at the world's biggest atom smasher plan to announce Wednesday that they have nearly confirmed the primary plank of a theory that could shape the scientific understanding of all matter.

The idea is much like gravity and Isaac Newton's discovery: It was there all the time before Newton explained it. But now scientists know what it is and can put that knowledge to further use.

The focus of the excitement is the Higgs boson, a subatomic particle that, if confirmed, could help explain why matter has mass, which combines with gravity to give an object weight.

Researchers at the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, say that they have compiled vast amounts of data that show the footprint and shadow of the particle - all but proving it exists, even though it has never actually been glimpsed. ...
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Anyone here got an inside scoop on this? :popcorn1
 
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MattusMaximus said:
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'


Anyone here got an inside scoop on this? :popcorn1
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Currently they're in a superposition where they both have and have not found evidence. Publication collapses the wave function, you see...
 
PixyMisa said:
Currently they're in a superposition where they both have and have not found evidence. Publication collapses the wave function, you see...
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First physics joke of the thread goes to PixyMisa!

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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Checkmite said:
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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Yeah, that's why I'm hoping that some Forumite who works in particle physics may or may not have some kind of inside info on this. I've known for a long time that physicists have been narrowing the potential energy range for the Higgs, so what I'm really wondering is whether or not this "big announcement" is positive evidence of the Higgs or stating that "if it exists, it has to be within this super tiny energy range".
 
Checkmite said:
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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Data has been gradually accumulating, but the bar for an official "discovery" is set very high in particle physics. So while the existing evidence points quite strongly towards a Higgs with mass of 125GeV, as of the previous announcement it wasn't strong enough to be considered a discovery.

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.
 
Checkmite said:
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?
Click to expand...

Well, that's basically what you expect to happen if the Higgs is really there. When you've run your accelerator for a year and have 2 Higgs events, you say "we've seen a hint"; run for another year, see 4 events, and call it a "strong hint", and upgrade and run again and see a "discovery".

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.
 
MattusMaximus said:
I've known for a long time that physicists have been narrowing the potential energy range for the Higgs, so what I'm really wondering is whether or not this "big announcement" is positive evidence of the Higgs or stating that "if it exists, it has to be within this super tiny energy range".
Click to expand...

The latter has already been done, and there is already some positive evidence (something like 3 sigma for each of the two experiments). So it's either a discovery or the Higgs isn't visible at all and the minimal standard model is wrong.
 
sol invictus said:
The latter has already been done, and there is already some positive evidence (something like 3 sigma for each of the two experiments). So it's either a discovery or the Higgs isn't visible at all and the minimal standard model is wrong.
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Thanks Sol. I didn't know whether or not the energy range had been narrowed any further (or even if it could be narrowed further). I recall the 3 sigma signals awhile back, but if I'm remembering correctly the standard for a "discovery" is more like 5 sigma, right?

Wednesday should be interesting :)
 
ben m said:
Well, that's basically what you expect to happen if the Higgs is really there. When you've run your accelerator for a year and have 2 Higgs events, you say "we've seen a hint"; run for another year, see 4 events, and call it a "strong hint", and upgrade and run again and see a "discovery".

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.
Click to expand...

Thanks Ben :)
 
MattusMaximus said:
I recall the 3 sigma signals awhile back, but if I'm remembering correctly the standard for a "discovery" is more like 5 sigma, right?
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Correct.

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."
 
Bikewer said:
CNN is reporting that they are inviting Peter Higgs to the announcement...
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That is interesting.... doesn't mean they have conclusive evidence but it does sound like they have something reasonably important to announce.

I am really interested to see what shakes out.
 
Checkmite said:
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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Hah! :D Exactly my thoughts. Could well be that the media is blowing very early results way out of proportion though.

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. ;)
 
MattusMaximus said:
Anyone here got an inside scoop on this? :popcorn1
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If they did do you think there is the faintest possibility that they would say anything? Media management generaly isn't a strong point in science but the LHC mob have shown a degree of competence in that area and are well aware that any rumours anywhere online will find their way to the the media fairly quickly.
 
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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