Physicists at Europe's CERN laboratory have discovered a fundamental particle that bears a strong resemblance to the long-sought Higgs boson. This elusive particle is the latest piece of physics' Standard Model to be confirmed. While at the Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting this week in Germany, physics laureates gave their views on the July 4 announcement to the Nature video team.

8 Comments

1. 1. rloldershaw 11:56 PM 7/6/12

   
   All hail the boffins who have brought us:
   
   44 years of no-show "strings"
   
   40 years of no-show "WIMPs"
   
   30 years of no-show "supersymmetry+sparticles"
   
   40 years of no-show "extra-dimensions"
   
   80 years without a decent explanation of the fine structure constant
   
   50 years without an explanation of the vacuum energy density crisis and the hierarchy problem
   
   Is it not time for a new generation of scientists to get us out of the swamp of mediocrity and arrogant delusion?
   
   Robert L. Oldershaw
   http://www3.amherst.edu/~rloldershaw
   Discrete Scale Relativity
   Fractal Cosmology
   

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2. 2. Dan Visser 06:15 AM 7/7/12

   HIGGS-PARTICLE FOUND IS AN UNCERTAIN ANNOUNCEMENT.
   June 4 2012 CERN announced to have found the Higgs-particle (4.5 Sigma-certainty), which is not quite entitled to carry the predicate of discovery (therefore 5 Sigma-certainty is needed). A CERN physicist with knowledge (his name is not mentioned in the press-announcements!?) said: "The discovery was not necessarily definitive". So I start to be a little suspicious, because the announcement seems to feed the CERN-budgets and the 'fixed idea' of a Higgs-particle to exist. There is theoretically proof enough it might be something else. In one of my proposals I suggest, it might be a Higgs-Limited-Boson-Surface (Higss-LBS), which is not a singular Higgs-mass. The LBS-version combines a new equivalent particle by suggesting the inflation-field-particle (inflaton) and the Higgs-LBS (mass-creation) are united in one (new) "dark energy force". This new force enables to generate a 'limited force surface', which restores the symmetry between a left-and right-handed neutrino. This force explains the expansion of the Big Bang in a new cosmology, called the Double Torus Universe. Moreover, if SUSY-particles do not exist (super-symmetric particles in the never proved String-theory, as well as in the Standard Model of Particle Physics), then the singular Higgs-mass would be much larger than now theoretically is assumed. And what is the shocking case: In 2011 CERN confirmed there is not a single piece of evidence-certainty that SUSY particles exist. In this respect I think back of 2010, when Christopher Forbes (UK), PhD-Math and Physics, estimated the value in the range of 12.097 - 13.8674 TeV/c2.
   Hence, why should I believe CERN now "discovered" the Higgs-particle in a lower range? This announcement looks like a mixture of 'politics and science', in favor of politics, instead of the integrity of science (as in the 20th century and earlier back in time). 'Politics', 'funds' and 'fixed idea' nowadays interfere. I need more proof for the Higgs-particle and so does the entire community!
   
   Dan Visser, Almere, The Netherlands.
   Reference: www.darkfieldnavigator.com
   Independent Cosmologist
   

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3. 3. dadster 06:44 PM 7/7/12

   After all,Higg's boson is basically a mathematical abstract entity trying hard to get materialized as a physical phenomena.
   The possibility that it might have materialized cannot therefore be entirely ruled out,owing to the quantum-world -truism that one can create one's observations (phenomena) by one's constant ,continuous and consistent intention of observing it because the observer is also an inevitable ingredient of the observation!
   
   Physicists trying to get some mileage for spending such a huge heavy funding, even inviting prof Higgs who is still alive to come over , verify and endorse their findings !
   
   I take it with a pinch of salt only , for now ,at least !
   But that does not count, I know.
   
   We will hear a lot more on this from now on!
   And , make physics and science more interesting for everybody .
   and that counts !
   
   Science do not offer answers ( thats the job of religion) , but every answer leads to more questions.
   That's what makes science enchanting , attractive,enticing, bewitching,tantalizing,un-cloying, ever-green,challenging and worthy of pursuit !
   
   And, in this case, without a doubt , through these controversial observational findings science has fulfilled its role to the maximum possible extent !
   
   Very promising indeed !

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4. 4. dadster in reply to rloldershaw 07:28 PM 7/7/12

   You are right,Bobby.Cant someone convincingly postulate a different model than the standard model taking into account what is seen and experienced like "Life-energy" instead of all the hogwash like strings,super-symmetry,quarks, gravitons and other "particles", you have so ably enumerated ? Cant someone take science out of this discrete particle-zoo into a continuous wave field even it be probability waves doing away with discontinuities basically at cosmic scales making discontinuities a local effect of scaling ? The universe cannot be functioning with bankers mathematics jumping from one dollar to two dollars after 1.99 dollars ( corrected to two decimal points only ) as there are no legal tender in-between to carry out the money transaction.Just because the bankers and corporations fund science projects like LHC,scientists need not be bullied into accepting discreteness in the whole of cosmos too. Bio-sciences have given enough notice that there are more entities in our own limited stretch of universe than material physicists are dictating . Life-sciences experience phenomena not familiar to material physicists that material physicists would rather not touch it with a barge pole but rather push it into realms of metaphysics.Life-scientists find in the characteristic behavior of micro-organisms phenomena that's more related to quantum uncertainties,quantum probability fields , randomness, chaos , quantum entanglements, spontaneity and such other exotic behavior patterns of life-forms perhaps having driven by another type of energy than the electromagnetic energy that's found in dead matter and mere inertial mass that has no life-energy in it. The fact that material physicists have not yet been able to produce in their labs a single form of life from purely inorganic matter, although nature produces it more prolifically than even inorganic matter has not stopped them from dominating the field of science with their theory of "objective measurements"( which ,of late they have conceded as something not possible at all scales of the cosmos; subjectivity and intentions of the observer influencing material measurement of phenomena are inevitable) and,the insistence on quantification by numbers every entity and aspect of phenomena ,is being continued to be dictated .The laws of life-sciences for the formation of the DNA , formation of bio-intelligence and human emotions,the universal instinct of survival found in every life-form cannot be explained through the laws of material physics.
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

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5. 5. vinodsehgal1957@yahoo.com 12:41 AM 7/8/12

   When matter particles come into existence, don't they carry in-built mass with them? What is the need of a an external mechanism or Field to provide mass to matter particles? What is the meaning a matter particle without mass?
   
   Even if some external field be required like hypothesized Higg Field, why it should be quantisized having a a boson of mass of 125 GeV. Higgs Boson has to endow mass to variety of matter particles with wide range of mass with nutrino having almost negligible mass, electron having 0.511 MeV mass to top quark having 171 GeV mass. Why nature should play in so weird manner that a boson having mass of 125 Gev will endow mass to all particles spanning a very wide range of mass spectrum. Non-quantization of Higgs Field or boson with varrying energy like photon or a boson with mass lower than the lowest mass of particle could have revealed direct, straight and simple behavour of Nature

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6. 6. dadster 05:41 PM 7/8/12

   Why should we digitize cosmos,make it discrete and discontinuous? why cant we conceptualize cosmos as a continuous entity? Of course,our measuring instruments and measuring processes are all digital to facilitate manufacture of commercial or military products,but that doesn't mean that cosmos should also be so conceived. .Examples abound even in our everyday uses of the transcendental numbers like "pi',"e",( the base of natural logarithms),"the imaginary number"i"which together make up a real digit"one"( Euler's, e^-iπ/2=1).Then,there are radicals like(root of 2)which can be drawn but never could be measured accurately.Doesn't all these mathematical entities indicate the fact that cosmos is not digital or discrete but a continuous entity whose nature could better be expressed not in the syntax of particle physics but that of wave mechanics? In order to accommodate particle physicists we are made to abandon the concept of"action-at-a distance",even when we are willing to accept concepts like,"Quantum entanglements"and the "continuum" of the fabric of space-time".Why then postulate force-carriers like the"garviton" and now"Higgs bosons"as if energy need a carrier which has to exist as a particle only! And,this concept is mulishly held through out even though "light waves" carry energy around cosmos,while even particle physicists merrily concede that photons have no inertial mass.Just because material physicists are people who deal with inertial "mass" which is a discontinuous entity,does not give them the liberty to reduce everything in cosmos to rank discontinuities although,matter-scientists at their convenience admit to the wave nature of matter( de Broglie).That which imparts"resistance-to-change-of-velocity" ( or inertial mass)to matter could very well be the manifestation of the"energy-ripple-field" existing as continuous waves in the space-time continuum.Other effects of such rippling energy field is, gravitation,"dark matter,dark energy and "life-energy",all of which are definitely not matter-based energies as,it exhibits un-matter-like characteristics, such as the"instinct-of-survival"( evident even in microbes),the characteristic quality of life-energy and,the quality of "self-organization" and "self -reproduction".Lets therefore conceive"continuity"as the fundamental quality of cosmos needing Digitization only for measurement purposes in experiments,without mandating its necessity throughout Cosmos because,that's not the fundamental characteristic quality of cosmos as we have seen and feel intuitively too.

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7. 7. vinodsehgal1957@yahoo.com 02:41 AM 7/9/12

   To Daster
   My intuitional instincts dictates me that any physical entity which is "produced", has come into existence at any time in the past can not be "continuous infinite whole". Space is presumed to have come into existence at BB or at some other point of creation, there fore, it has to be discontinuous. Further, infinity can not be one sided. If infinity exists, it has to be two sided. Since Space had a begining, therefore, it can not be infinite whole. May be there might be infinite multi BBs which may lead to infinite continuous space. We do not about this. But if there was only one BB 13.73 GYs ago, space has to be limited in extent and discontinuous.
   
   Mathematical nos. pi and e are mathematics constructs existing within our mind and do not represent any physical entities.
   
   An electromagnetic Wave strictly speaking is also a discontinuous wave with a break at each wavelet. Atoms emit photons as well absorb photons in discrete manner. Between emission of two photons, there exists a time break, and between two wavelets exist a space break up. These time break up and space break up may be the quantas of space and time

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8. 8. Eugene Sittampalam 11:52 AM 7/15/12

   . It is most counterintuitive, if not a fairy-tale-like absurdity, especially in physics, that a body should be endowed with a quantity of (intrinsic mass, or matter, by something external to the body.
   Physical quantities, such as mass and energy, like space and time, have to be defined - ideally sans dimensions, as 'unit mass' and 'unit energy'. Since mass and energy are equivalent (as per e=mc^2 ), it would be more appropriate instead to define 'unit mass-energy.'
   And, ideally, the smallest quantum of (detectable) mass-energy would serve best for this unique status in the physics of the future. To circumvent any space limitation here, please do access the following where I have made a similar comment (the first one there) on the subject:
   http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/story/2012-07-04/God-particle-science-big-bang/56009718/1
   A parting thought…
   With this seeming final discovery of even the so-called God Particle in the LHC, it may go to our mortal heads that we know a lot today; but the strange truth is: The more we learn, the more we become aware also of the ENORMITY of our ignorance.
   True learning is thus a humbling experience; it causes us to be meek, in the noblest sense of the word;
   and makes us that much better beings for a that much better world.
   Little wonder, it was of to such a final stage of the evolution of man was once said by that Great and Eternal Guru transcending space and time:
   And the meek shall inherit the earth.
   May He guide your thoughts endlessly.
   Thank you all for your valuable time here - Adios!
   

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