Higgs boson has been found. Scientists 99.999% sure

By Tom
in Science News & Discussion

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Grand Master

+Mirumir Subscriber¹

Posted
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in science there is no such thing as 100% certainty

Of course, there's! It's called quantitatively analyzed empirical evidence!

Put an apple into a basket, add another one, and you'll be 100% certain the sum is two.

Veteran

Wakers

Posted
Posted

Of course, there's! It's called quantitatively analyzed empirical evidence!

Put an apple into a basket, add another one, and you'll be 100% certain the sum is two.

What if there is another apple growing within one of them?

Or if you cover the basket? There is no scientific way of knowing whether you have two apples or not.

Grand Master

threetonesun

Posted
Posted

Of course, there's! It's called quantitatively analyzed empirical evidence!

Put an apple into a basket, add another one, and you'll be 100% certain the sum is two.

Unless multiverse.

I'm surprised how much press the Higgs-Boson is getting. We all know mass exists, and while explaining how it exists is a valuable scientific pursuit, and the large hadron collider is pretty-nifty... none of this has much relevance to the average person.

Experienced

Shannon

Posted
Posted

I'm surprised how much press the Higgs-Boson is getting. We all know mass exists, and while explaining how it exists is a valuable scientific pursuit, and the large hadron collider is pretty-nifty... none of this has much relevance to the average person.

The Higgs field gives matter mass. In the future, we could invent technology to alter the Higgs field around an object, therefore decreasing it's mass. The immediate usefulness of this to the average person is staggering. You could have gloves that reduce the mass of the object you're picking up, therefore allowing you to lift heavy items. We could reduce the mass of cars, therefore allowing them to accelerate using very little fuel. We could reduce the mass of spacecraft, meaning we could easily accelerate to light speed and fly to distant planets in a matter of hours.

Did you know WiFi came about from research into black holes? And that the GPS used to navigate your car couldn't exist without Einstein's theory of general relativity, which describes gravity. Who knows what understanding the Higgs boson could do for the average person in the next decade.

Grand Master

threetonesun

Posted
Posted

The Higgs field gives matter mass. In the future, we could invent technology to alter the Higgs field around an object, therefore decreasing it's mass. The immediate usefulness of this to the average person is staggering. You could have gloves that reduce the mass of the object you're picking up, therefore allowing you to lift heavy items. We could reduce the mass of cars, therefore allowing them to accelerate using very little fuel. We could reduce the mass of spacecraft, meaning we could easily accelerate to light speed and fly to distant planets in a matter of hours.

Did you know WiFi came about from research into black holes? And that the GPS used to navigate your car couldn't exist without Einstein's theory of general relativity, which describes gravity. Who knows what understanding the Higgs boson could do for the average person in the next decade.

That's a bit of a stretch, there. WiFi comes from an understanding of radio waves, albeit it's application was derived while looking for black holes. GPS I'll give you, but our current understanding of black holes and Einstein's theory of relativity came from observation, not manipulation. Even if we find the Higgs boson, manipulating it's properties is exponentially more difficult.

I'm not denouncing science, and I'm not saying we shouldn't study these things, I'm just surprised how much press this is getting compared to any of the hundreds of experiments being run right now that will have real world impact in our lifetimes. Honestly, I think it has something to do with people still believing that the LHC will create a black hole, or a perverse desire to see things smash together at nearly the speed of light.

Experienced

Shannon

Posted
Posted

That's a bit of a stretch, there. WiFi comes from an understanding of radio waves, albeit it's application was derived while looking for black holes. GPS I'll give you, but our current understanding of black holes and Einstein's theory of relativity came from observation, not manipulation. Even if we find the Higgs boson, manipulating it's properties is exponentially more difficult.

I'm not denouncing science, and I'm not saying we shouldn't study these things, I'm just surprised how much press this is getting compared to any of the hundreds of experiments being run right now that will have real world impact in our lifetimes. Honestly, I think it has something to do with people still believing that the LHC will create a black hole, or a perverse desire to see things smash together at nearly the speed of light.

Ah, I thought you were being another one of those naive "why are we spending so much time and money on this when it has zero relevance to my every day life" type of people, my mistake. I think it has gained a lot of hype, mostly thanks to the media. The black hole concerns over the LHC were definitely good doomsday-grabbing headlines back in the day, and naming it the "God"-particle I have no doubt was a marketing tactic by the media to lure the religious crowd in to reading the articles. So yeah, it's probably gained a lot more attention in the widespread community than any other scientific discovery would have, but I think that's a good thing. Too many people take stuff like this, and the technology that eventually arises from it, for granted.

And regarding WiFi, well my point was more to do with the fact that if someone hadn't been poking around in the sky studying black holes, who knows how long it would've taken for WiFi to emerge. And I'm sure people back in the day proclaimed that studying black holes would have no immediate advantage to everyday life.

Grand Master

Glassed Silver

Posted
Posted
So does McDonalds.

Gold comment right there.

Best funny post I've seen on Neowin in a long long while. :laugh:

Glassed Silver:mac

Grand Master

Elliot B.

Posted
Posted

Higgs Boson walks into a church.

The priest comes up to him and says, "I'm afraid your kind is not welcome here".

Higgs Boson replies, "But, without me, you can't have mass..."

The Higgs Boson jokes bandwagon... who hasn't Lepton?

Grand Master

Glassed Silver

Posted
Posted

Higgs Boson walks into a church.

The priest comes up to him and says, "I'm afraid your kind is not welcome here".

Higgs Boson replies, "But, without me, you can't have mass..."

I don't know... usually that joke would be lame, but I adore it! :D

Glassed Silver:mac

Grand Master

Astra.Xtreme

Posted
Posted

Higgs Boson walks into a church.

The priest comes up to him and says, "I'm afraid your kind is not welcome here".

Higgs Boson replies, "But, without me, you can't have mass..."

Okay, that's pretty damn epic. :rofl:

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