By JOHN HEILPRIN and SETH BORENSTEIN
Associated Press
GENEVA (AP) — 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.
…
But two independent teams of physicists are cautious after decades of work and billions of dollars spent. They don’t plan to use the word “discovery.” They say they will come as close as possible to a “eureka” announcement without uttering a pronouncement as if from the scientific mountaintop.
full AP story here
Lobos Motl has more here and writes:
According to an incognito ATLAS member who spoke to Nature, they have a discovery without any doubts. Pure elation that will culminate on Wednesday morning.
A live webcast will be provided, though I expect it it will be so overloaded as to be useless:
Watch at webcast.cern.ch
I coulda lived without seeing Seth Borenstein’s name today.
nargun said:
July 2, 2012 at 6:06 pm
and what happens when we split the higgs-boson?
—————————————————————
We will find its twin particle: the boson’s mate.
Dear beng and everyone with a weak enough computer or browser, please use this version of my blog:
http://motls.blogspot.com/?m=1
It now contains DISQUS comments – the relevant ones – as well as all the correct mathematics whenever it’s used. No widgets. Black-on-white. You may like it. 😉
I do recommend WUWT readers to bet on “Higgs found by the end of 2012” here:
http://www.intrade.com/v4/markets/contract/?contractId=700242
You may buy (at this moment) 180 stocks per $7 which will become $10 by the year end. Sorry, no strict guarantees, but you may publicly criticize me if you lose the money. 😉
Wow. Lotsa harsh language for physicists. Has climate science made us so cynical that we see corruption in all sciences at all times?
Might we be reminded that the profession most likely to be openly skeptical of CAGW are the physicists? That the key arguments beyond the temperature record itself that refute the CAGW meme are based firmly on physics? Sheesh! Give these guys a break. Let’s see what they announce, how they support it in terms of data and methodoloogy release, how reproducible their work is, and then decide to condemn it or laud it.
Amino Acids in Meteorites says:
July 2, 2012 at 9:38 pm
I coulda lived without seeing Seth Borenstein’s name today.
What do you have against Seth Borenstein?
Oh come on guys its not that difficult to understand why its called the God Particle. God is claimed to have created matter from nothing. For matter to exist at all it must have mass and most subatomic particles have no matter ( and behave in ways that don’t fit with the General Theory of Relativity). So when you put all of these particles together to make protons, neutron and electrons (the building blocks of atoms) they still lack mass. Hence, the theory goes, there must be a particle that confers mass ie the Higgs Boson. Now if it confers mass to something that has no mass, then it does the miraculous task of changing non-matter into matter. Hence it’s called the God Particle. I see it as a kind of an honorific.
Anyway the article is only semi right in stating that mass combined with gravity produces weight. In truth it is mass that generates a gravity in the first place and the gravity generated is proportional to the mass. So the gravity of the moon is approximately one sixth of that of the Earth because the moons mass is approximately one sixth of that of the Earth. Hence, on the moon, I would weigh only one sixth of the weight I am here on the Earth even though I would be the same mass.
I remember listening to the radio in the 1970′s, and reading in the newspapers, about a carburator design that would give 100 miles per gallon…but that the Saudi’s bought the rights to it and denied it to the world.
You remember nonsense.
In order for the Saudis to buy a patent, that patent would first have to be published.
Where’s the patent? Identify it!
And since patents have a term lasting for 20 years at most, why hasn’t the world jumped on the expired patent and made super-carburetors?
And in other news, Michael Mann is expected to announce that the discovery of the Higgs boson also serves an independent confirmation of his Hockey Stick.
nearly confirmed
Doesn’t cut it in my book.
Seriously? So when Einstein predicted general and special relativity, no doubt you would have been one of the naysayers then? It was decades before that was proved to this level of accuracy. (And there were fools who kept working with classical theory on that basis throughout the 20’s.)
There’s a great deal of difference between knowing something exists and proving it to the degree of proof physicists require. We know that the Higgs Boson exists, just not its energy levels.
All in anticipation of a nearly confirmed extended grant to continue their research?
To my mind the physics involved got to a point where even if they by some miracle would ‘find’ it it would only confirm that their particular brand of math sums up.
Making a sum that complex come out as you thought it would is virtually meaningless. The whole thing exists only in a formula and some resultant of how they calculated an exploding particle should behave.
All in all it’s a pretty vague ‘milestone’. It only ‘proves’ that the particle exists in their mathematical reality. If it exists in reality (whatever that may be) is doubtful
davidmhoffer says:
July 2, 2012 at 9:50 pm
Wow. Lotsa harsh language for physicists. Has climate science made us so cynical that we see corruption in all sciences at all times?
Might we be reminded that the profession most likely to be openly skeptical of CAGW are the physicists? That the key arguments beyond the temperature record itself that refute the CAGW meme are based firmly on physics? Sheesh! Give these guys a break. Let’s see what they announce, how they support it in terms of data and methodoloogy release, how reproducible their work is, and then decide to condemn it or laud it.
I’m a fan of physics and “normal” (as opposed to post-normal) science. I’m interested in what the CERN guys are doing and I value their work. WRT AGW – I suspect that the Geologists have more to say.
the allah particle
the muhammed particle
What about an Atheist particle that doesn’t believe in the God Particle? We’d better call up Particle Man and Triangle Man. They Might Be Giants!!! Boy!!!
The crucial clue that led CERN to this breathrough came two years ago from, of all places, a TV show:
When contacted for comment, the God Particle would only say, “Look, I just got tired of everybody worshipping that damned CO2 molecule, so I decided to reveal myself. So tremble before me and sacrifice unto me pepperoni pizzas, no anchovies.”
Obviously there’s no Higgs boson. It’s a hoax. It’s existence is derived from “models” and the experimental “evidence” is not directly linked to the Higgs. Instead, they use theoretical “simulations” to infer the particle’s existence from the data. If we start believing in this sort of science, then we’re on a slippery slope to believing that other models and simulations (such as those in AGW) could infer scientific “facts” from data. We can’t have that now, can we?
They’ll probably also want to build a bigger “laser” and ask tax payers for a million … sorry, strike that … a billion dollars!!
I’m a particle physicist working on one of the LHC experiments.
The reason for the announcement now is that this is our deadline for producing new results ahead of the major summer conferences. There likely won’t be an update for some time. If a signal is,eg 4.99 sigma and not 5 sigma then this is indeed “nearly” a discovery. Its pure convention btw that 5 sigma is the discovery limit and not 4 sigma; both represent extremely strong signals. However, in science you decide your methodology and criteria in advance of looking at the data and stick to it regardless. It may also interest you to know that most of the analyses are “blinded” i.e. even the people doing the analyses didn’t know what the results would look like until the very end point. Furthermore, if both experiments come up with 4.99 sigma then a combination would definitely exceed 5 sigma. However, the decision (again, taken in advance) is that both experiments must wholly independently of each other exceed 5 sigma. It would be little unfortunate if there is an “almost there” statement tomorrow but there are no short cuts in science. Nature is often very uncooperative in revealing her secrets.
I’ve noticed a few posts along the lines of “I’m sceptical due to climate scientists” etc. etc. Being sceptical is always good but being dogmatic isn’t. My field tries to avoid false claims. For example, the fast neutrino study was not a claim of new physics but an example of the scientific method in action i.e. here is a result we don’t understand, please feel free to speculate about systematic uncertainties we may have missed.
We are far from perfect but we merit well reasoned criticism and not unthinking negativity.
Miss Grundy says:
July 2, 2012 at 10:19 pm
@ur momisugly Jack (July 2, 2012 at 2:17 pm): “I remember listening to the radio in the 1970′s, and reading in the newspapers, about a carburator design that would give 100 miles per gallon…but that the Saudi’s bought the rights to it and denied it to the world.”
You remember nonsense.
It was nonsense, but it *was* the prevailing Urban Legend. In 1954, PopMech even had a speculative article on what the miraculous carburetor probably looked like, and ads for a do-it-yourself kit still appear in trade mags from time to time — usually on the same page as the “run your car on water!” ones.
ZOMG! It must be true — it’s on the Internet!
http://www.rexresearch.com/fishcarb/fish.htm
I love physics. I used to understand a little of it. I certainly will not mock this latest announcement. But I seriously ask one question. Can anyone here tell us what further research is now justified based on this discovery/confirmation/announcement?
There is mention of “the focus of the excitement” and “now scientists know what it is and can put that knowledge to further use”. It seems to me that excitement would be justified if physicists are now justified in pursuing new concepts that previous uncertainty about Higgs Boson stopped them from pursuing.
I would dearly love to hear a simple description of this “further use”.
And I say this with no hint of sarcasm.
Many years ago I visited CERN several times. Our company had sold them a set of pulsed power supplies, for which I was the electronics design engineer. I visited the underground accelerator ring, which was the predecessor of the LHC.
One of my main memories was of the superb restaurants and the seemingly endless lunch breaks!
As I’m sure the physicists are doing honest science I wish them good luck in their incredible voyage of discovery. But I hope they are aware of the pitfalls of confirmation bias….
Chris
timetochooseagain says:
July 2, 2012 at 5:36 pm
Claims of having found some effect or particle in high energy physics requires several orders of magnitude more evidence than climate scientist will ever have in their wildest dreams.
=======
Climate scientists may compute for each station in the GHCN data base a correlation between its time series and a regional series in a small latitude band. They should use this statistic in a comparison between all stations dropped during the great dying of the thermometers and those who did not. They will get an effect of more sigma’s than ever hoped for by physicists in their wildest dreams.
Don’t take it to heart Roger…. some climate scientists would have claimed the discovery at 1 sigma… It must be exciting being involved in such important science…. I await any announcement eagerly… what interests me more is what practical use can be made of this\any new knowledge arising from LHC experiments….
Garrett says:
July 3, 2012 at 1:13 am
“Obviously there’s no Higgs boson. It’s a hoax. It’s existence is derived from “models” and the experimental “evidence” is not directly linked to the Higgs. ”
Garrett, imagine you know the point, direction, velocity and time a particle was ejected. Imagine you have a formula for its trajectory, given it has a certain mass.
Now, imagine you do not know the mass, and your formula has been confirmed by plotting trajectories, and comparing the plots with measured trajectories of other particles.
The fomula is your model. What is wrong using your formula, plotting, and comparing to measured trajectories ? We, engineers, do it all the time. Everywhere. That is how a control-system works. Now, if you keep the measured data, and your formula a secret, and predict the end of the world by plotting a hockey-stick, that is another story.
Reg Nelson says:
July 2, 2012 at 3:54 pm
I won’t believe it until someone does a survey that shows that 97% (of some) of these guys believe in the Higgs Boson. And why aren’t these guys busy dodging FOIA requests? This sounds like very shoddy science.
———————————————————————————
🙂 beat me to the punchline. Not being even an amateur theoretical physicist, I can’t comment intelligently on the science. I suspect the methodology involved in the search for the Higgs boson is a trifle more rigorous.
@Crispin in Waterloo
That is precisely the point of ‘science’ to investigate phenomenon we do not understand which then leads to further discoveries, understanding and then the process repeats. Sorry if you have been suckered into thinking that science is a ‘cureall’, or that you can possible be in a position where everything there is to know is known.