Anyone Else Staying Up For The CERN Announcement About The Higgs Boson Tonight?

[kentonio]

No. Per your example, it will be 100 years before this could pay dividends regardless of whether we discover it now or in 50 years.

How exactly does that make any sense?

At least we could have rhino races, what the heck are we supposed to do with a Higgs Boson now that we found it?

What are we supposed to do with it? How about open up exciting new areas of research that could potentially change the world? I don't get why you can't see the potential importance in humanity properly understanding matter.

Not being a physicist, I can't conceive of..

Perhaps this is why it's better to leave this stuff to physicsts to decide?

[Elok]

Perhaps this is why it's better to leave this stuff to physicsts to decide?

How about if physicists tell us what profit we can reasonably expect from a given experiment, then we decide? If they decide whether they get money, a certain phrase about foxes and henhouses comes to mind...

[kentonio]

How about if physicists tell us what profit we can reasonably expect from a given experiment, then we decide? If they decide whether they get money, a certain phrase about foxes and henhouses comes to mind...

How could they ever give any even vaguely accurate prediction of profits? Funding science should be something we decide to do or not do based on whether we want to advance scientific knowledge, it's not a business where we can expect reliable rates of return.

[Elok]

I meant for the word "profit" to be understood rather loosely there--sorry if that wasn't clear. Not just money, but the potential benefit we can expect in general. For example, Einstein argued for the Manhattan Project on the grounds that we could use it to make one hell of a big bomb (he later regretted that argument, but that's another matter). I can't say what the Higgs Boson is good for, or what we can do with it, but presumptively somebody else can, and if s/he can't, well, there are plenty of other scientists out there just itching for public funds.

[Imran Siddiqui]

Aside from Ron Paul, who else would agree with this?

So not enough people agree with your nutty views? Welcome to representative democracy!

[kentonio]

I meant for the word "profit" to be understood rather loosely there--sorry if that wasn't clear. Not just money, but the potential benefit we can expect in general. For example, Einstein argued for the Manhattan Project on the grounds that we could use it to make one hell of a big bomb (he later regretted that argument, but that's another matter). I can't say what the Higgs Boson is good for, or what we can do with it, but presumptively somebody else can, and if s/he can't, well, there are plenty of other scientists out there just itching for public funds.

Sometimes 'greatly furthering humanities knowledge' is enough of a benefit.

[giblets]

How exactly does that make any sense?



What are we supposed to do with it? How about open up exciting new areas of research that could potentially change the world? I don't get why you can't see the potential importance in humanity properly understanding matter.



Perhaps this is why it's better to leave this stuff to physicsts to decide?

Oh yes, I'm sure that now the Higgs Boson has been found physicists will decide they want an even bigger collider built. Go ahead and explain how proving the existence of the Higgs Boson will allow scientists to 'change the world'... so far you've failed to name any concrete benefits from this discovery and just given vague platitudes about how wonderful science is.

[giblets]

Sometimes 'greatly furthering humanities knowledge' is enough of a benefit.

I don't want to pay any taxes for that. And why do you think the Higgs Boson "greatly" furthers knowledge? What non-abitrary standard do you have for thinking it furthers human knowledge more than, say, discovering another butterfly species in the rainforest? How many butterfly species is the Higgs Boson worth?

[Elok]

Sometimes 'greatly furthering humanities knowledge' is enough of a benefit.

Even if I grant you that, it's impossible to quantify--that's a problem when it comes to budgets, especially if you've got two or more competing claims of disinterested research to choose from. But I don't grant you that. If the knowledge can't be used in anything like the near term, it should be considered a low priority.

I think even you value it for its utility; there are an almost infinite number of ways we could edify ourselves in a totally, definitely worthless manner. For example, we could do what someone else mentioned and sequence rhinoceros DNA, or catalog minute differences in granule size on a certain beach. The big difference between those and the Higgs is that the Higgs might someday turn out to be useful. But if that someday is far in the future and not definite, why should we finance it? There's limited money, so why should we put it into a long-term fund that matures at an unknown date and yields a totally unknown amount, when there are more reliable pots to put it in?

[Aeson]

Yah... we could have invaded some third world country for a few days, paid boomers their SS checks for an extra few days, or something awesome like that instead.

[Kuciwalker]

Yes, the heroic particle physicists have saved us from bombing yet another country by dangling the shiny LHC in front of our elected representatives. Had they not done so we definitely would have spent the money on something even less useful!

[Hauldren Collider]

Even if I grant you that, it's impossible to quantify--that's a problem when it comes to budgets, especially if you've got two or more competing claims of disinterested research to choose from. But I don't grant you that. If the knowledge can't be used in anything like the near term, it should be considered a low priority.

I think even you value it for its utility; there are an almost infinite number of ways we could edify ourselves in a totally, definitely worthless manner. For example, we could do what someone else mentioned and sequence rhinoceros DNA, or catalog minute differences in granule size on a certain beach. The big difference between those and the Higgs is that the Higgs might someday turn out to be useful. But if that someday is far in the future and not definite, why should we finance it? There's limited money, so why should we put it into a long-term fund that matures at an unknown date and yields a totally unknown amount, when there are more reliable pots to put it in?

I think the correct answer is that there is some sliding scale of near-term and possible far-term payoff, and we obviously shouldn't totally neglect things with long-term payoffs, but we should prioritize the near-term over it to at least some extent. How much we prioritize either is a balancing act question that I think no one on this forum could claim to definitively answer.

[Hauldren Collider]

Yah... we could have invaded some third world country for a few days, paid boomers their SS checks for an extra few days, or something awesome like that instead.

Or we could put that money towards paying off the debt.

[Aeson]

Or we could put that money towards paying off the debt.

If the last 12 years (including the current crop of pols) are any indication, this is the absolute last thing we would ever do.

[KrazyHorse]

Who's this "we" you're talking about? How much do you pay in us federal taxes again?