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Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

backreaction.blogspot.com

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Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#171

Post by stjohnswarts »

LordDragonfang wrote: post #75
FollowingTheDao wrote: post #65

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, she is the Trump of Science. And I do not say that be be demeaning of either. While I do not care for Trump, he knows what he is doing when it comes to showmanship, and so does she.

This comparison strikes me as much more unfavorable than you admit, because while Trump is categorically not an expert on what he purports to be (running a successful business) Sabine is clearly an expert in her field.

Yeah while not on the same order of magnitude it's like "You're a great orator, I mean your technique has a lot in common with Hitler's talents as an orator"

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#172

Post by ravi-delia »

lisper wrote: post #43
mannykannot wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

On the one hand, it does not strike me as unreasonable to point out that experience suggests that this, too, will turn out to be an experimental or methodological error. Nor do I think it is unreasonable to point out that this result, if correct, would not validate supersymmetry (if that is, in fact, the case.) On the other hand, the fact that supersymmetry isn’t a theory, but a property of a class of models that can…

Falsifying supersymmetry is like falsifying Ptolemaic epicycles. You can never falsify it with data because epicycles can always be constructed to fit any data set [1]. Likewise, a sypersymmetric theory can be constructed to fit any set of parameters. But fitting the data is not enough. You have to fit the data with substantially fewer parameters than data points. That's the challenge. [1] https://www.youtube.com/wat…

I feel like that example assumes the conclusion. A better analogy would be "spinning objects theories". It's a category so broad you could always find something which works, but since it's not really thought of as a particular solution, it isn't so vulnerable to overfitting. Epicycles were bad largely because they gave a false impression of closing in on reality; every new round of additions consisted of smaller and smaller tweaks. Spinning object theories are even more broad and adaptable, but since they aren't basically one solution you don't have the same issue. When Kepler found a spinning object theory which worked, it wasn't overfitting.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#173

Post by stjohnswarts »

FollowingTheDao wrote: post #90
LordDragonfang wrote: post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This comparison strikes me as much more unfavorable than you admit, because while Trump is categorically not an expert on what he purports to be (running a successful business) Sabine is clearly an expert in her field.

Trump is successful with media, not his businesses.

Really all he's managed to do is hang on to the money his father left him. He is good at hiring lawyers & accountants that can put a wall between his personal fortune and corporate business that inevitably go bankrupt.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#174

Post by SiempreViernes »

robonerd wrote: post #88
SiempreViernes wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not really, in the sense that Hossenfelder only advocated for subtracting resources from particle physics, never about what should be funded instead.

> never about what should be funded instead. This isn't entirely true. In this blog post ( http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2019/04/does-world-need-lar... ) she recommends: > "One of the key motivations for building a larger particle collider that particle physicists like to bring up is that we still do not know what dark matter is made of. But we are not even sure that dark matter is made of particles. And if it’s a…

> better telescopes, better sky coverage, better redshift resolution, better frequency coverage

And all of this is being built currently or already exists (ELT, ASSN, Vera Rubin, SKA, CTA), so it's not clear what she's advocating.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#175

Post by FollowingTheDao »

tick_tock_tick wrote: post #153
FollowingTheDao wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As the island of improvement grows, so grows the shores of suffering. But can a dataset really encapsulate human suffering? Is there a lower percent of people suffering but are they each suffering more individually? What is the quality of the suffering? Is it better to suffer 30 years with pain or to die after a month of it?

> But can a dataset really encapsulate human suffering? Yes > Is there a lower percent of people suffering but are they each suffering more individually? No > What is the quality of the suffering? Lower > Is it better to suffer 30 years with pain or to die after a month of it? Depends on quality of life.

>> But can a dataset really encapsulate human suffering?

> Yes

Suffering its subjective so it is impossible. And you proved it with:

> Depends on quality of life.

because quality of life depends on how much suffering you can live with.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#176

Post by ravi-delia »

SubiculumCode wrote: post #26

It is not my field, but the post, the video, has all the markings I see of outrage influencers on youtube: acting like they know better than everyone else, making broad swipes and claims, posting monetized videos with exaggerated eye popping photo covers, and the whole "I used to be them but saw the light and left schtick.", claims of scientists lying, without the honesty of naming names. Well, I'd rather get this ki…

Speaking as someone who works with people on the math side of things, the author is a contrarian but not super far outside the norm. This is far from a "tabloid", this is real criticism from within the field. The tone is abrasive, but every technical field has people like that. I definitely dislike the layman audience she has built up, since just reading criticism without understanding what's being criticized is a recipe for truly stupid takes, but all of these are opinions plenty of people support, even in particle physics.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#177

Post by rad88 »

ianai wrote: post #103
tambourine_man wrote: post #85

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fair enough, I wasn't aware. I'll check it out. I think you mean this: “Lost in Math: How Beauty Leads Physics Astray” https://www.amazon.com/Lost-Math-Beauty-Physics-Astray/dp/04... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q1KFTPqc0nQ I still find the tone off putting, reminds me of the fox and the grapes fable, not sure if it's known to most cultures. Nevertheless, I'll watch the video and reexamine my opinion.

I’m just generally increasingly off put by the internets incessant “quibbling”. This seemingly endless juxtaposition of antithesis to follow any thesis. At some point that becomes just more noise, and that can be used by an agenda. I still found her point valid and interesting and not at all noise. My takeaway is more that new physics might well be out of our energetic grasps until we build some much larger accelerat…

Adding more because I've read her book (not to quibble). I wouldn't say the point is that new physics is out of reach until we build more expensive accelerators. She herself is a theoretical physicist, has theories she'd like to see tested and proposes experiments that could do so. I think she's saying rather that particle physics involves enormous opportunity costs -- decades long / billion dollar experiments -- and that the research agenda is not scientifically justified, but is sociological and even aesthetic in origin.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#178

Post by mannykannot »

robonerd wrote: post #101
mannykannot wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Indeed. Are you suggesting, perhaps, that the promoters of the LHC were making claims that they knew could not be satisfied by it - or, perhaps, that nothing they said could reasonably be interpreted as such a claim? The trouble is, I don't know which specific claims Hossenfelder is basing her allegations on.

She explains that here http://backreaction.blogspot.com/2018/03/the-multiworse-is-c... Quote: Before the LHC’s launch in 2008, many theorists expressed themselves confident the collider would produce new particles besides the Higgs boson. That hasn’t happened. And the public isn’t remotely as dumb as many academics wish. They’ll remember next time we come ask for money. The big proclamations came almost exclusively f…

Thanks for this information. I agree with Dr. Hossenfelder about naturalness, but personally, I don't think that (or anything else here) justifies saying, about those who promoted the LHC with their expectations, that they were "either incompetent or lying or both." Irresponsible? maybe, depending on how influential their position was and how forcefully they made the claim.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#179

Post by ravi-delia »

k2xl wrote: post #77

I just started watching (and enjoying) Sabine's YouTube channel after one of her posts were shared on HN the other week. I am surprised to find so many people here have negative opinions on Sabine. I've probably seen a dozen videos about the double slit experiment but her explanation about it (and why the other videos were not precise/accurate) was really eye opening for me as a layman. Also her explanations about de…

She's a contrarian physicist. Every good physicist has one weird opinion, but she's collected every one of them and used them to beat anyone in hearing range over the head. No single take is far from the norm, but in terms of layman's content it's easy to get a really warped idea of the dominant paradigm.

Honestly I think fewer people would have an issue with her if she was like 80% less abrasive, no matter how out there her ideas are. So keep watching, but be aware that there are conflicting viewpoints with more significant backing.

Re: Did the W-boson just “break the standard model”?

#180

Post by [deleted] »

tshaddox wrote: post #124
SiempreViernes wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you heard how the military makes a lot of technology that benefits society? Well, it's the same principle for esoteric experimental science: unique requirements leads to new tech being developed and then you can turn around, and if you find some use for some bit of the new tech you can tout it as a "boon to society".

> Have you heard how the military makes a lot of technology that benefits society? I’ve heard that, yes, as well as NASA inventing velcro and zippers and teflon, and all of it has a faint tinge of “not actually true at all” to it.

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