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CERN has just announced that they have detected a new particle consistent with the predicted Higgs boson (a.k.a. "The God Particle"). This is huge! CERN has observed the particle tied to the field that gives everything mass! And its mass is at 125.3 GeV (just shy of 5-sigma confidence).

This is a pretty huge day for physics, the culmination of 50 years of work to detect that elusive but extremely massive particle!

I just wanted to share this with you guys. Anybody else excited about this?

Here are some videos: Joe Incandela, Peter Higgs, and the actual announcement.

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Reverend Jim commented: Heavy! +0

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Member Avatar for Reverend Jim

And why is it called the “God particle”?

Like God, it is everywhere but hard to find, goes the quip. In fact, the origin of the name is rather less poetic. It comes from the title of a book by Nobel physicist Leon Lederman whose draft title was “The Goddamn Particle,” to describe the frustrations of trying to nail the Higgs. The title was cut back to The God Particle by his publisher, apparently fearful that “Goddamn” could be offensive.

Full article here

Member Avatar for pritaeas

The best description I found in this article on ElReg stating what I learned from the CERN statements: "finding a particle that is pretty much almost certainly the long sought-after Higgs boson".

Member Avatar for iamthwee

Great news apparently... Not sure what it means though. I guess it doesn't have the same visual impact when they set off the first atomic bomb.

Member Avatar for Reverend Jim

From the pen of Ashleigh Brilliant

Mr. Higgs was once married, to an American Linguistics lecturer named
Jody but, after he became somewhat famous, she divorced him, feeling
that he was excessively absorbed in his career.
My contribution to this story is the thought that she didn't want to
become known as the HIGGS BOSON'S MATE.

Member Avatar for Ancient Dragon

Anybody else excited about this?

Not really. Its about as exciting as a wet noodle. The discovery of DNA was indeed very exciting because it affects our every day lives. Maybe in a few years my attitude about it will change once we know how, or if, it has a similar affect as DNA had.

Member Avatar for DavidB

Anybody else excited about this?

Not excited, my nose is too close to the grindstone right now to look up and pay attention to the greater world at large, but I do have an interest in scientific developments. Until it affects my day-to-day life, I don't know what to make of it.

It is as if we discovered intelligent life on a faraway planet but had no way to interact with those life forms. So what? We would have no knowledge exchange, no shared development, no boost to technology, no learning of political structure, etc.

Will it yield alternate energy sources for industry? Better structures? We don't know. I doubt its impact will be felt in my lifetime.

Edited by DavidB
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