Finding new physics will require a new particle collider • Hacker News Board

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#141

Post by erikpukinskis » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:01 PM UTC

vixen99 wrote: post #37

rubidium wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These don’t get built by countries. They get built in countries. The home country matters and they’ll need to put up funding, but it’s an international workforce.

Is it supposed there are enterprises located in China exempt from oversight or control by the CCP? To what extent would decisions made within the enterprise be subject to President Xi's vision of complete control?

My understanding is, when it benefits them they will make a loophole to give some degree of autonomy. But they can revoke it as easily as they offer it.

But I don’t really know anything about China.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#142

Post by eigenspace » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:05 PM UTC

djaque wrote: post #110

hpcjoe wrote: post #108

As a (non-practicing) physicist, I've always disliked the penchant of some in the HEP community to say what this article says. They (the HEP community) tends to equate physics with HEP physics. It's not. When this is pointed out to the people espousing this odd viewpoint, they usually respond with some passive aggressive comment. I've seen/experienced much of this during my time in research. New physics not requiring…

Well said. Whenever I bring up that point on physics subreddits I also get tons of passive aggressive comments. It's super toxic. The HEP people in my own department also seem to believe that anything other than beyond the standard model physics isn't fundamental or isn't pure enough to care about.

I think a lot of it comes from the fact that they used to be the golden child of science, but the influence and prestige of HEP has been a victim of it's own success. HEP just doesn't hold the same importance it used to, and that stings for the people who dedicated their lives to it.

As they pushed to higher and higher energies and events with lower and lower cross sections, they're solving problems that matter less and less, and are increasingly less likely to be useful in any way.

Of course, it's still incredibly interesting to know about the fundamental building blocks of the universe, but without a promise of practical applications, or at least a convincing argument that they'll find something interesting with this new collider, I find it really hard to justify the price tag.

Would knowing what physics does at 100TeV be any more valuable to us than a great work of literature? I'm not sure.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#143

Post by sandwall » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:17 PM UTC

hpcjoe wrote: post #108

As a (non-practicing) physicist, I've always disliked the penchant of some in the HEP community to say what this article says. They (the HEP community) tends to equate physics with HEP physics. It's not. When this is pointed out to the people espousing this odd viewpoint, they usually respond with some passive aggressive comment. I've seen/experienced much of this during my time in research. New physics not requiring…

100% as a fellow non-HEP (practicing) physicist -- There's so much more to physics.

Science, at least from the funding perspective, has always leaned toward what's fashionable -- "nuclear" dominated following WW2, "particle" has had it's moment, and we're moving full force toward "quantum" (& "AI"!)

Scientists seeking funding bend themselves in knots to ensure they include all the key words in their grant applications

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#144

Post by bergstromm466 » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:27 PM UTC

tsimionescu wrote: post #42

roenxi wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Something that really sunk in for me while arguing with people on HN is that the entire Nuclear power industry is ~60 years old and provides around ~10% of humanity's electricity [0]. Even after the effective moratorium from 1985. It seems very unlikely that we've really run up against the limits of what physics can do for us. That is an enormous change and it isn't even a lifetime ago. One more development like that…

> If I really wanted to start a fight I'll argue that diverting all welfare spending to scientific research would probably result in a greater net good over two generations. Why welfare spending? Why not corporate subsidies? Or just forcefully seize the entire assets of some number of non-scientists, chosen at random? Cutting out welfare as a whole seems to be the single spending cut most likely to kill the largest n…

Yes, this is the grandiose technocratic elite who believe they can save the world. A bit exaggerated, but I find these kinds of comments scary, misguided and naive, as well as very revealing of the underlying ideologies and oversimplified & mechanistic views of society.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#145

Post by tobbykop » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:28 PM UTC

hpcjoe wrote: post #108

As a (non-practicing) physicist, I've always disliked the penchant of some in the HEP community to say what this article says. They (the HEP community) tends to equate physics with HEP physics. It's not. When this is pointed out to the people espousing this odd viewpoint, they usually respond with some passive aggressive comment. I've seen/experienced much of this during my time in research. New physics not requiring…

We already have quantum computers, at this point that’s not new physics it’s engineering. And if the well established frameworks don’t settle your thirst for understanding quantum mechanics, thats about philosophy not physics.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#146

Post by l33tman » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:38 PM UTC

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #119

kochthesecond wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think its too dismissive to claim it will have 0 practical applications. Often this type of fundamental research take decades to result in something useful in an unexpected way. We can only go where the roads lead us, who are we to dismiss the roads not taken.

You're dismissing other roads not taken. What is more likely to revolutionise physics - spending $20bn on an incremental increase in collider energies, on spending $20bn funding a new generation of PhDs and postdocs exploring quantum gravity fundamentals? At this point practical HEP shows every signs of being a boondoggle. There are plenty of hard theoretical questions that haven't been answered, but with a few excep…

I'm not sure just increasing funding to thep would generate new ideas, why would they not just funnel it into the same "safe" programmes as they have done the last 25 years? There are some small "fringe science" programmes here and there, but we probably shouldn't pour all money into those either..

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#147

Post by xref » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:40 PM UTC

tobbykop wrote: post #145

hpcjoe wrote: post #108

As a (non-practicing) physicist, I've always disliked the penchant of some in the HEP community to say what this article says. They (the HEP community) tends to equate physics with HEP physics. It's not. When this is pointed out to the people espousing this odd viewpoint, they usually respond with some passive aggressive comment. I've seen/experienced much of this during my time in research. New physics not requiring…

We already have quantum computers, at this point that’s not new physics it’s engineering. And if the well established frameworks don’t settle your thirst for understanding quantum mechanics, thats about philosophy not physics.

That’s as silly as saying “we already have particle colliders, at this point they’re just an engineering problem”. It completely misses the forest for the trees.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#148

Post by l33tman » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:43 PM UTC

jariel wrote: post #136

People have failed to mention the fact that the LHC has turned out to be kind of a failure, at least it hasn't given the populist soundbites needed to support its' success. Nothing really 'new' came out of it and it was very expensive. People seem to be ignorant that everything has a populist aspect, and very expensive things always do. The politicians who foot the bill are thinking "We just spent bazillions and what…

When you fund a huge project using state money, not just physics projects but anything, it's as much about all the side-effects. A 10 year $10B project.. I mean, those $10B will not go into a bank account, they will be used to funnel work (both in related physics and engineering) down the years. It's amazing how they pushed some manufacturing methods to build LHC and I'm sure those methods will be used for some other good, for example.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#149

Post by dylan604 » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:45 PM UTC

hpcjoe wrote: post #108

As a (non-practicing) physicist, I've always disliked the penchant of some in the HEP community to say what this article says. They (the HEP community) tends to equate physics with HEP physics. It's not. When this is pointed out to the people espousing this odd viewpoint, they usually respond with some passive aggressive comment. I've seen/experienced much of this during my time in research. New physics not requiring…

So, what other types of physics is not well understood and requires funding to further research. We know F=ma, things in motion stay in motion, blah, and so on. We know a current flowing down a path will generate a magnetic field. We electrons moving to a lower energy path will release energy. We know light bends in a lens, and how to make that useful. Essentially, the funding for pure research and discovery is going to be more exciting than how to take a current understanding of physics into a way of making money. Plus, that kind of research should be undertaken by private investment.

Re: Finding new physics will require a new particle collider

#150

Post by battery_cowboy » Sun, May 10, 2020, 5:49 PM UTC

eigenspace wrote: post #142

djaque wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well said. Whenever I bring up that point on physics subreddits I also get tons of passive aggressive comments. It's super toxic. The HEP people in my own department also seem to believe that anything other than beyond the standard model physics isn't fundamental or isn't pure enough to care about.

I think a lot of it comes from the fact that they used to be the golden child of science, but the influence and prestige of HEP has been a victim of it's own success. HEP just doesn't hold the same importance it used to, and that stings for the people who dedicated their lives to it. As they pushed to higher and higher energies and events with lower and lower cross sections, they're solving problems that matter less…

> they're solving problems that matter less and less, and are increasingly less likely to be useful in any way

Can you expand on why you think this? I'm not a physicist, but I feel like one shouldn't discount the possibility of useful discoveries. I'd love to hear if there are reasons that's not true.