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CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

physicsworld.com

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Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#61

Post by port11 »

mike-the-mikado wrote: post #24

As someone who supports pure science research, I would be interested to understand if any of the discoveries of CERN (and related projects) in the last 50 years (say) have proved to have practical application. (Specifically, "discoveries", not technology developed in support of the research)

Fundamental research is entwined with practical applications, you can’t have the later without the former. Europe is known for FR, while everyone else seems to be better at commercialising. It’s alright, progress for us is progress for everyone.

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#62

Post by naasking »

port11 wrote: post #61
mike-the-mikado wrote: post #24

As someone who supports pure science research, I would be interested to understand if any of the discoveries of CERN (and related projects) in the last 50 years (say) have proved to have practical application. (Specifically, "discoveries", not technology developed in support of the research)

Fundamental research is entwined with practical applications, you can’t have the later without the former. Europe is known for FR, while everyone else seems to be better at commercialising. It’s alright, progress for us is progress for everyone.

That's not an answer to the specific question asked. Not all types of fundamental research have the same potential for material benefits, or the same cost.

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#64

Post by SoftTalker »

pjmlp wrote: post #16
murkt wrote: post #3

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can they alter humanity? What's the difference for humanity since CERN found Higgs particle? In what ways could the potential dark matter particle detection alter humanity?

Cancer treatment goes back to particle physics research at CERN, the Web was born there, cloud was previously known as Grid Computing at CERN, Three examples of how humanity would not be as we know it today without CERN. As Alumni, there are many other changes that trace back to CERN. We don't sit only on the H1 beer garden and go skiing.

> the Web was born there

The internet existed, hypertext existed, it was just happenstance that it was put together there. It would have happened somewhere, maybe not exactly the same protocol but the same end result.

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#65

Post by naasking »

assaddayinh wrote: post #57

What changeable vectors are there except to scale up the energy levels? Can particles be altered prior to collission with the existing system to observe interesting effects?

Wakefield accelerators would be orders of magnitude smaller and higher energy than radio frequency colliders like the FCC. If it has to go to particle physics, this money would be better spent on that research.

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#66

Post by biophysboy »

mike-the-mikado wrote: post #24

As someone who supports pure science research, I would be interested to understand if any of the discoveries of CERN (and related projects) in the last 50 years (say) have proved to have practical application. (Specifically, "discoveries", not technology developed in support of the research)

No. It is purely a model tester.

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#67

Post by chrystalkey »

arthurfirst wrote: post #49
chrystalkey wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Said the grumpy grandpa, shaking his hand at the cloudy sky. I dont know what value that comment contributed, funding research is always a long shot. And often times it fails, but that is kinda its purpose, we dont know what we dont know.

your comment made me smile like a grandpa :) Also lighten up! oh... damn black hole...

Haha nice :) Yeah those black holes are everywhere these days when you dont look...

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#68

Post by chrystalkey »

crote wrote: post #51
chrystalkey wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Said the grumpy grandpa, shaking his hand at the cloudy sky. I dont know what value that comment contributed, funding research is always a long shot. And often times it fails, but that is kinda its purpose, we dont know what we dont know.

You could use the same argument to justify spending $1B on searching for the Loch Ness Monster. The problem is, you can only spend money once. If you're spending $1B on the FCC you aren't spending that same $1B on all kinds of other research. With the LHC there was a very clear goal: verify the Standard Model and prove (or disprove) the existence of the Higgs boson - and hopefully discover some unexpected stuff along…

I see your point, but thats a really bad comparison. We are pretty certain that there is no giant dinosaur in a lake, but in terms of fundamental research there is a lot we cannot really explain a great many things. We dont even know if we are "looking" correctly, with the right concept in mind.

I agree that money spending must be carefully considered, but for this research there really is no replacement. You can shuffle public spending around, but an Experiment not dont will explain no part of the Universe. If the countries and Supranationals that are able to dont fund them we will be stuck with what we know now until they do.

It is a lot of money, but it is also the only way. Does that meaningfully stop the EU and all others from doing their thing? I would argue no. We can still afford it and so we should.

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#69

Post by IncreasePosts »

dmix wrote: post #39
turtlesdown11 wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

Do you have a source on that? I can't find anything besides he went to a Gala where he was in a photo with Maxwell and made an investment in a company her brother ran.

Schmidt is a notorious SV playboy but all of his known extra marital partners have been well into their 20s

Re: CERN accepts $1B in private cash towards Future Circular Collider

#70

Post by chmod775 »

naasking wrote: post #62
port11 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fundamental research is entwined with practical applications, you can’t have the later without the former. Europe is known for FR, while everyone else seems to be better at commercialising. It’s alright, progress for us is progress for everyone.

That's not an answer to the specific question asked. Not all types of fundamental research have the same potential for material benefits, or the same cost.

> Not all types of fundamental research have the same potential for material benefits, or the same cost.

It is hard to gauge this is in advance though. If you were sure what you were gonna find, it wouldn't be much of a discovery. Historically it has sometimes been decades before manufacturing and practical applications caught up to frontier research. For an extreme example, mankind knew of electricity in some form for 2400 years before doing anything practical with it. If all the people who prodded at it instead thought "man I can't imagine what this could be useful for" and found something else to do with their time, we'd live in a very different world.

Our civilization can afford to aim higher than incremental improvements on pixel density for screens on which to spectate people kicking a ball around. Personally I find frontier discoveries to also have much greater entertainment value than sports events and will happily fund them with a tiny fraction of my tax dollars.

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