A vast cavern is the stage for tests to find the 'God particle'

The Times ^

[TomB]

I've just started rereading Goedel, Escher, Bach: An Eternal Golden Braid.

I must admit I've started the book numerous times before only to toss it aside in frustration. My innate weakness in mathematics makes it very hard to plow through.

Anybody read it?

[Physicist]

the Higgs boson, a mysterious fundamental particle held to give matter its mass,

A common misconception. The Higgs mechanism gives the fundamental particles (such as quarks and electrons) their masses, but most of the mass we see comprises protons and neutrons, whose mass arises primarily from quantum chromodynamics. (Dark matter, which dominates over the "baryonic" matter I mentioned, may or may not get its mass from the Higgs mechanism.)

[aruanan]

Anybody read it?

I did. It was a creative and nicely illustrated grinding of a philosophical ax.

[js1138]

Anybody read it?

Yes, but can't claim to have followed all of it.

[Phaedrus]

"God" particle, indeed. What nonsense.

[Physicist]

BUT - how do they know this thing will mimic the high-energy conditions that existed fractions of a second after the b-b? I don't know that they can make that comparison because there are no records of what the conditions of the b-b were.

Good question.

They can because the direct observations we make of the early universe place very tight constraints on what the conditions of the very early universe could possibly have been. The conditions are so incredibly tight, in fact, that for many years they were considered to pose a philosophical problem for physics: how was it possible that conditions in the Big Bang were so "finely tuned" that the universe ended up the way it did? If you make a change in even the 50th decimal place, up or down, in any of a number of variables, you get either runaway expansion or nearly immediate collapse.

Nowadays we don't worry about that problem, because the theory of Inflationary Cosmology accounts for that exquisite balance. This model also makes a number of extremely detailed predictions about the Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation, and these preditions have been verified in stunning detail by recent observations with the WMAP probe.

So we're confident that Inflation is reasonably close to the truth. From there, inferring the conditions close to the Big Bang is a matter of straightforward calculation. If those conditions had been ever so slightly different, the universe would look very different from the way it does now.

[ShadowAce]

OK--help out a non-physicist, please. First I read that:

According to the theory, the Universe is permeated by a field of Higgs bosons,...

Then I read that:

As the boson is unstable, it will quickly decay...

How can the Universe be permeated by a field of unstable, rapidly decaying particles?

[ShadowAce]

Please see my post #27

[HoustonCurmudgeon]

Meanwhile, near Waxahatchie, TX, developers try to find a use for a big underground hole that woulda been the SSC (Superconducting Supercollider).

How about we shove about 50 Texas Democratic State Reps in it and then backfill?

[HoustonCurmudgeon]

Trying to figure out what would offend someone about this?

PLEASE! Someone can be found who is offended by anything that is posted. ;-)

[Saturnalia]

Dibs on the secret underground lair!

[KDD]

The proof of Gödel's Incompleteness Theorem is so simple, and so sneaky, that it is almost embarassing to relate. His basic procedure is as follows:

Someone introduces Gödel to a UTM, a machine that is supposed to be a Universal Truth Machine, capable of correctly answering any question at all.

Gödel asks for the program and the circuit design of the UTM. The program may be complicated, but it can only be finitely long. Call the program P(UTM) for Program of the Universal Truth Machine.

Smiling a little, Gödel writes out the following sentence: "The machine constructed on the basis of the program P(UTM) will never say that this sentence is true." Call this sentence G for Gödel. Note that G is equivalent to: "UTM will never say G is true."

Now Gödel laughs his high laugh and asks UTM whether G is true or not.

If UTM says G is true, then "UTM will never say G is true" is false. If "UTM will never say G is true" is false, then G is false (since G = "UTM will never say G is true"). So if UTM says G is true, then G is in fact false, and UTM has made a false statement. So UTM will never say that G is true, since UTM makes only true statements.

We have established that UTM will never say G is true. So "UTM will never say G is true" is in fact a true statement. So G is true (since G = "UTM will never say G is true").

"I know a truth that UTM can never utter," Gödel says. "I know that G is true. UTM is not truly universal."

Think about it - it grows on you ...

[Doctor Stochastic]

It's harder to plow through if one knows some mathematics.

[RightWhale]

We are not spending enough money on government science!

An interesting assertion, although unrelated to the precedent ironic observations.

[AndrewC]

Right Wing Prof is opus'ed and gone?

What are you wailing about? RWP is still in good standing. If he chooses not to participate, that is his choice (this has happened before).

[AndrewC]

An interesting assertion, although unrelated to the precedent ironic observations.

I think that was needed to make his point(IOW it was related). It is akin to the assertion that we need to spend more money on "Art" and "education". The education system is the epitome of the "spend the people's money" approach. If you spend money and the spending achieves your goal, spend more money for even more benefits. If you spend money and the results are not achieved, spend even more money to fix the "problem".

[RightWhale]

How can the Universe be permeated by a field of unstable, rapidly decaying particles?

They decay rapidly in the free state. When bound they live forever, nearly.

[Porterville]

If it is being done in Europe, by Eurocentric scientist, it will ultimately fall short. In fact, they may blow up Franco-Swiss land for good.

[Porterville]

Another legacy of Bill the Destroyer of America.

[RightWhale]

"spend the people's money"

We argue about how to do this, what to spend it on. For example, gov't is encouraging consumers to buy homes, encouraging it as much as they can. It might seem like we are each choosing how to spend our personal funds if we don't understand the purpose of money.