God Hates the Higgs Boson

October 13, 2009

"Well, one could even almost say that we have a model for God [...] that He rather hates Higgs particles, and attempts to avoid them."

This is a rather bold statement, and oddly enough, it was made by an otherwise distinguished physicist in an unpublished article. Unpublished (and slightly tongue-in-cheek) it may be, but this forms the background of Dr Holger Bech Nielsen's research that has appeared in publications over the past 18 months. Nielsen, of the Niels Bohr Institute in Copenhagen, and co-author Masao Ninomiya of the Yukawa Institute for Theoretical Physics in Kyoto, Japan, have been hinting about this subject for some time, but in a recent New York Times essay, Nielsen directly blames God for our Higgs boson woes.

The two researchers propose that the search for the Higgs Boson is jinxed, and forever will be, because this bizarre particle has the ability to travel back in time. In a nutshell, Nielsen and Ninomiya reckon that the creation of a Higgs particle during the energetic collision inside a particle accelerator -- such as the Large Hadron Collider (LHC) -- will cause a chain of events that will ripple back in time, stopping its creation in the future. Nielsen and Ninomiya seem to think there is some kind of natural quantum censor that prevents the Higgs particle from being produced.

"...the hypothesized Higgs boson, which physicists hope to produce with the collider, might be so abhorrent to nature that its creation would ripple backward through time and stop the collider before it could make one." --Dennis Overbye, NY Times Essay, Oct. 12 2009.

It sounds like a particle physics version of Back To The Future and the "Grandfather Paradox" (i.e. if a man could travel back in time to kill his grandfather, would he cease to exist?), and it is certainly a very interesting question. But where's the evidence?

Nielsen and Ninomiya think that the troubled path to the potential discovery of the Higgs is proof that their theory is valid. Take the 1993 closure of the United States Superconducting Supercollider, after billions of dollars had been invested in the project. Why would the project be canceled? Could it be that the collider discovered the Higgs in the future, only for that future Higgs particle to send a signal to the Universe that it cannot be discovered, thereby triggering a natural safety mechanism in the temporal fabric of spacetime, ensuring US Congress pulled the plug on the project after $2 billion had been invested?

Right....

And what about the September 2008 LHC troubles when a transformer broke down and then a quench vaporized the connection between two of the accelerator's superconducting magnets, ensuring a 14 month delay in particle collisions? And what about the recent arrest of the suspected Al Qaeda sympathiser? This must be proof that the LHC discovered the Higgs particle in the future, triggering the Universal safety mechanism to prevent--

You get the picture.

Although things are already starting to sound like a Dan Brown novel, the fact that the researchers decided to bring God into it makes the whole story even crazier.

I have an alternate theory. Could it be that the hunt for the Higgs boson is just really hard? After all, to produce a Higgs particle requires a lot of energy and the particle accelerators required are the most advanced pieces of scientific equipment ever built in the history of mankind. This fact alone means that prototypes cannot be constructed; all the practical experiments carried out at the LHC (for example) will be one of a kind. Mistakes are bound to happen and the experiments will need to be adapted to cater for unforeseen variables.

So, is "God" sabotaging the LHC? I think there are far simpler explanations.

Source: New York Times

Comments

[xtfer]

I guess that explains the baguette then.

[WFD]

There was a time when people feared rockets believing that a hole would be punched into the sky releasing all of our air into God's void. Some said the first rocket failures were an act of God, but we know better now. Some said God never intended for us to fly, or he would have given us wings, but we now can fly after the many early failures. The LHC is no different. We are trying something new and untested, and failures may actually aid us in finding success. That's how science often works throughout our long history of experimentation.

[stephenadams]

it might not necessarily be Krishna's chicanery. I read a recent article that described a sort of quantum amnesia that would be caused in observers(i.e. humans), if they were ever to witness a decrease in entropy(if a decrease in entropy ever occurred, any observers would lose all memory of the event). I might be off here, but what I know about the Higgs Boson is that it is an elementary, or fundamental particle; wouldn't it be a decrease in entropy for man, himself being a result of particle physics, to create one of the building blocks of the universe? wouldn't this be science's way of redefining the immaculate conception almost beyond redefinition?

[Nancy Houser]

Most scientists don't actually bow down to an actual "God" so I am in awe that one would actually blame him for the LHC's undoing. Instead, why not look a little deeper into their own development and see what has been missed. Like you said, it is probably something simple....other than "God".

[Michael Gmirkin]

"But where's the evidence?"

Touché! ;o]