Monday, May 12, 2008

PHYSICS FOR CARTOONISTS: THE HIGGS BOSON



If you're not interested in physics you should stay and read this anyway, because something major is about to happen and when it does you don't want to regret that you missed a chance to have it explained simply. I don't pretend to understand it myself, and the odds are that I'll goof up the explanation, but it's better than nothing...so read on!


CERN, the European particle accelerator lab, is going to turn on it's new 6 billion dollar LHC collider later this year. It's first task is to look for the Higgs Boson, the so-called "God particle" that's thought to be the reason other particles have mass.


According to Higgs, the natural state of all particles is be massless and to travel at the speed of light. The reason that only photons and gluons really do travel that fast is that other particles are slowed down by the medium they're forced to travel through, something called the Higgs Field.






The Higgs Field (if it really exists) is a field, just like a magnetic field. It's everywhere in the universe, that's why even the most remote part of space isn't really a vacuum. It may be clear of particles, but it's not clear of fields.



Astronomers were amazed to find that the universe is not only expanding, but that the expansion is accelerating. Nothing in our experience can account for that, so it was necessary to posit a repellent energy that existed even in the vacuum of space. Lots of theories were put up to speculate where that energy might come from, including the idea that it might be leaked into our universe from parallel universes. That remains a possibility but the theory that excites physicists the most is that it has something to do with an as yet undetected field, the Higgs Field.


The Higgs Field is so important to the current standard model of physics that if it's not discovered we'll have to throw out a lot of current ideas about quantum physics and cosmology.


One problem with the CERN experiment is that in order to discover the Higgs Boson (the particle version of the Higgs Field) they'll have to recreate the simpler condition of the universe as it was less than a billionth of a second after the Big Bang. That condition might be what we would call today a black hole. One group is attempting to get a restraining order against CERN, arguing that a micro black hole, once started, might be impossible to stop. Such a black hole might consume the Earth, maybe our whole solar system.


CERN says not to worry, that Hawking Radiation would sap energy from the black hole and prevent it from growing, but CERN's critics point out that Hawking Radiation is a controversial theoretical construct which has never been born out by observation. What if there is no such thing as Hawking Radiation? The black hole will keep growing.


I assume the CERN people know what they're doing, and I'm dying to know the outcome of the experiment, but I'll sleep a little easier when all this is behind us.


The first video I put up (at the top of the page) gives an overview of the LHC (Large Hadron Collider) that'll become fully operational later this year. The other video shows Peter Higgs, one of the people who got the whole thing started. I don't understand a lot of what he's saying but the man is fascinating to listen to.



BTW, I forgot to mention why the question of mass is on the front burner these days. The accelerating expansion story I mentioned is one reason but there's more. The reason is that we now know the masses of all the quarks, etc. that make up matter. The problem is that when you add these masses up they don't equal the mass of the particles they're part of...not by a long shot. So where does the rest of the mass come from? It must come from something outside the quarks, maybe from a field of some sort. If it exists, that might be the Higgs Field. Interesting, huh!?

15 comments:

  1. Anonymous4:07 AM

    its a cool theory but Im reminded of the ether

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  2. physics and all this theoretical stuff always sounds so interesting. but the problem is: in a lot of it, you either get talked down to (a fair share of the tv specials), or the math goes way over my head (such as any book by hawking). there needs to be a happy medium where they talk to you like you're an intelligent adult, but are willing to take the time to at least explain the concepts while remaining light on the math.

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  3. Anonymous8:35 AM

    I love this stuff Eddie. I love physics but I'm still in high school and really don't know more than, let's say, what there is on Wikipedia. Your story is easy to follow and very interesting.

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  4. This explains early morning erections, and is more plausible than Einstein's earlier theory of emerging urine.

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  5. About the expanding universe: It might be accelerating because of a repellent force called negative gravity. Nobody knows what that would consist of, it's just a hypothesis.

    The only gravity we know of attracts rather than repels but the negative gravity people claim there must be another gravity, one which is even weaker than the gravity we know of, but which repels things on a vast scale.

    How does this fit with the Higgs Field? It doesn't. It's a seperate idea. Gravity is so weak compared to the other forces that even now physicists can't find any quantum manifestation of it. The graviton that Einstein posited has never been found. Gravity is still the least understood force.

    If there is such a thing as negative gravity then it must be even weaker than normal gravity. It's effect can only be seen on a vast, cosmological scale. The concept is so vague and difficult to put to the test that physicists ignore it. It doesn't enter into any calculation we make.

    If the same effects can be explained by the Higgs Field then everybody will rest easier. But we won't know whether there really is a Higgs Field until the LHC is turned on.

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  6. I hate it when the media come up with emotionally loaded buzzwords to sensationalize science.

    The 'God particle'? That's stupid. Even theoretical physics can't escape the media's runaway hype machine.

    How about a more descriptive nickname, like the 'sludge particle' or they can just shorten it to the 'sludgeon'.

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  7. not interesting, but fascinating. God, how I hate the physics teacher I had in school.

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  8. Anonymous9:31 PM

    please show us the note Spielberg gave you

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  9. "negative gravity. Nobody knows what that would consist of, it's just a hypothesis. another gravity, [...] but which repels things on a vast scale."

    If you are tempted to think, hey, everyone could come up with this idea, ... you're right. I know this from conversations with physics researchers who are more than usually frank. Gravity is gravity.

    To call gravity an imaginary something that does the opposite of gravity, is baby-talk (nothing wrong with that per se).

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  10. In response to the last note about overall mass not being equal to the sum of its parts, so to speak, one idea came to mind. Those particles are moving. Doesn't Einstein's theory of relativity postulate (in part) that the faster something travels, the heavier it becomes? Perhaps this is the reason for the discrepancy.

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  11. This is an appetizing dosage of food for thought, and I haven't even watched the vids yet!

    Thanks Eddie!

    - trevor.

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  12. If fields are leaked from parallel universes, they must cross a dimensional barrier. Why, I could create a whole 3D feature from a single 4th-dimensional 16-field layout! You simply "slice" it 4th-dimensionally into individual 3D poses.

    If there's anyone out there who knows Maya programming, I need to add a new channel for a 4th axis which is simultaneously at right-angles to x, y, & z. I'm also looking for a layout artist who does piecework.

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  13. Well, it's not quite as easy as parallel dimensions. If M-theory can be trusted, our universe is 4 dimensions (x,y,z,t) vibrating through 11 or 12 dimensions. One theory as to why gravity is so weak is that it isn't contained in that 4-dimensional "brane" but leaks across higher dimensions. Hopefully, the LHC will help shed some light on things like the Graviton and the H-Boson so we can further refine our theories.

    As to the Black Hole scare, most of what we know about Black Holes is theoretical as well, and Micro Black Holes are different animals than their celestial counterparts. It's been suggested that Micro Black Holes are the unexplained larger particles that have been observed as part of the cosmic radiation striking the upper atmosphere.

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  14. Johnny: That's shocking! You mean we might be bombarded with micro-black holes every day?

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  15. It's entirely possible, although they are probably rare if they exist. 's an article I found on the subject in English instead of math.

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