Is The Large Hadron Collider Being Sabotaged From The Future?

[arthwollipot]

http://io9.com/5380647/is-the-large-hadron-collider-being-sabotaged-from-the-future

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/13/science/space/13lhc.html?pagewanted=2&_r=2

A pair of otherwise distinguished physicists have suggested that 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, like a time traveler who goes back in time to kill his grandfather.

[shawmutt]

Just the title was enough to make me giggle.

[JihadJane]

Al Qaeda dunnit.

[Dancing David]

Kinda silly.

[laca]

Haha, yeah that's probably why we can't build perpetual motion engines as well.

[Cainkane1]

I don't think the future exists yet and the past is behind us. I seriously doubt that any situation the collider might create is not somewhere in the Universe going on right now. Look at a black hole for instance.

[shawmutt]

So black hole are actually LHC experiments gone terribly terribly wrong throughout millenia?

[uruk]

Or maybe terribly right. The black holes could have once been the stars of invadeing alien civilzations and we used the LHC to destroy thier solar systems in our present to prevent them from attacking in our futur.

Hey maybe there's a ripping good story in that?......Naaaaaaa

[sol invictus]

"Otherwise distinguished" is right. What nonsense.

[Hindmost]

Yeah, sorry about that. I only meant to observe. Had my flashlight laser energy setting too high zapped a hole in the helium thingy.

glenn

[INRM]

How would a Higgs Boson causes a ripple backwards through time? I don't understand how that even would arise.

Also, why do they need to create some kind of gigantic random number generator in order to predict if things will be safe. If you don't want to run the test over something so ridiculous, just don't run the test. Otherwise, just run the test and forget about the random-number generator.


INRM

[The_Fire]

Wouldn't that be kind of redundant?
I mean: If the LHC is stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC, which means that said future event wont happen, how can the LHC be stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC.........



Yes, I'm a paradox-nerd.......

[Audible Click]

Wouldn't that be kind of redundant?
I mean: If the LHC is stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC, which means that said future event wont happen, how can the LHC be stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC.........



Yes, I'm a paradox-nerd.......

QFT (Paradox nerd too)

[CatOfGrey]

Also, why do they need to create some kind of gigantic random number generator in order to predict if things will be safe. If you don't want to run the test over something so ridiculous, just don't run the test. Otherwise, just run the test and forget about the random-number generator.


I'm not sure how it applies in this particular case, but random number generators are used to generate a large number of hypothetical scenarios. Then these scenarios are used to 'stress test' the equipment. Using the random number generators makes it most likely that all the parameters in a test are fully considered.

I have one word in response to the Higgs Boson time-travel comment.

"Thiotimoline"

[Alice Shortcake]

I'm more worried by the fact that I can never see this device mentioned in print without reading it as "Large Hardon Collider".

[Gate2501]

I feel that a similar phenomena is occurring with myself in World of Warcraft. I cannot seem to break 2000 in 2v2 arena. I feel that the only explanation is that when I do reach real ultimate gladiator ratings in the future, I will become a horrible self absorbed D-bag, destroying RL friendships due to my relentless and public E-peen flexing.

I have gone back in time to defeat myself in arena and keep my ratings below 2k to avert this disaster.

After all, it couldn't be that I am not uber skilled.

Come to think of it, maybe this is also why I can't lose those last 10 pounds...

[AvalonXQ]

Or maybe terribly right. The black holes could have once been the stars of invadeing alien civilzations and we used the LHC to destroy thier solar systems in our present to prevent them from attacking in our futur.

Hey maybe there's a ripping good story in that?......Naaaaaaa

The Timegod, a rewrite of the classic The Fires of Paratime. Highly recommended.

[steve s]

How would a Higgs Boson causes a ripple backwards through time? I don't understand how that even would arise.

INRM

Watch the final episode of Star Trek:TNG. All will be explained.

Steve S.

[uruk]

Yes, that is what I need, an overly complicated explination followed by overly simplistic metaphore which makes the solution understandable.

[portlandatheist]

I'm more worried by the fact that I can never see this device mentioned in print without reading it as "Large Hardon Collider".
Thanks. From now on, I won't be able to either. This is just as disappointing as when someone points out a dead pixel on your monitor that you didn't know was there. :)

[Audible Click]

I'm more worried by the fact that I can never see this device mentioned in print without reading it as "Large Hardon Collider".

I like that name. The visual in my mind is exceedingly funny.

[Checkmite]

Wouldn't that be kind of redundant?
I mean: If the LHC is stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC, which means that said future event wont happen, how can the LHC be stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC.........


Igor Novikov ftw!

[dudalb]

I halfway think somebody is trying out a really lame Sci Fi Story Plot to see how it flies.......

[Lensman]

If Isaac Asimov & EE Smith got together, would they be a pair o' docs?

Can a paradox be paradoctored? :D

[Gord_in_Toronto]

If Isaac Asimov & EE Smith got together, would they be a pair o' docs?

Can a paradox be paradoctored? :D

I must have seen Ike and Doc Smith together at one time. All three of us were at TriCon (the 24th World Science-Fiction Convention) in1966.

In that time line Star Trek was in black and white for some reason. :confused:

[temporalillusion]

This is evidence for the MW interpretation!

Observing the Higgs Boson is completely not allowed in the universe, so of course we will find ourselves in universes where all attempts to detect it fail. ;)

[Andrew Wiggin]

"otherwise distinguished" is the key here. I imagine this will result in them being considered a bit less distinguished in the future.

A

[alfaniner]

Thrice Upon a Time by James Hogan has an eerily similar storyline.

[Dave Rogers]

"otherwise distinguished" is the key here. I imagine this will result in them being considered a bit less distinguished in the future.

A

I'd see it more as meaning "distinguished when sober", and would assume that they were considered to be fully distinguished again by about the following lunchtime.

Dave

[Cuddles]

"Otherwise distinguished" is right. What nonsense.

Indeed. It's no wonder string theory gets such a bad name when it's proponents come out with stuff like this.

Wouldn't that be kind of redundant?
I mean: If the LHC is stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC, which means that said future event wont happen, how can the LHC be stopped/sabotaged by a future event caused by the LHC....

Actually, no. The problem is that the news articles seem to have rather mangled what the actual letter (note that it's not a real paper) says. They don't claim that the LHC will go horribly wrong in the future, with the effects coming back in time to stop it happening. They say that the universe protects itself by preventing anything from happening in the first place. Their idea is that we could do an experiment to test this by randomly drawing cards. You decide in advance that if you pick a particular card, you won't run the LHC. If that card is drawn, this proves their theory since it would be unlikely to happen by chance and therefore must be due to the universe ensuring the card is picked in order to prevent the LHC.

Yes, I'm being serious. That really is what they actually say. And it wasn't published on April 1st. Incredible.

[Checkmite]

"otherwise distinguished" is the key here. I imagine this will result in them being considered a bit less distinguished in the future.

A

I'm giving them the benefit of the doubt and assuming the suggestion was not serious in nature.

[Andrew Wiggin]

I'd see it more as meaning "distinguished when sober", and would assume that they were considered to be fully distinguished again by about the following lunchtime.

Dave

So this is a case of PWI? Publishing while intoxicated?

A.

[Terry]

So this is a case of PWI? Publishing while intoxicated?

A.

Please people, I beg you. Don't let this happen again. Don't drink and derive.

[richardm]

So this is a case of PWI? Publishing while intoxicated?

I think it's far more likely that they're just joking.

[sol invictus]

Only one of their papers on this is published. (One is far too many, though.)

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/spires/find/hep/www?rawcmd=FIND+A+NIELSEN%2C+H+and+a+ninomiya&FORMAT=www&SEQUENCE=

I don't think it's a joke, it goes back at least to summer 2007. Meanwhile Nielsen at least has written quite a few other papers, most of which look reasonable.

http://www.slac.stanford.edu/spires/find/hep/www?rawcmd=FIND+EA+NIELSEN%2C+HOLGER+B+or+ea+niels en%2C+H+B+or+ea+nielsen%2C+holger+bech&FORMAT=www&SEQUENCE=

[Dave Rogers]

I don't think it's a joke, it goes back at least to summer 2007. Meanwhile Nielsen at least has written quite a few other papers, most of which look reasonable.

To be fair, he's also made a clear, unambiguous, and eminently falsifiable prediction. If the Higgs boson is observed, then his conjecture is conclusively refuted.

I wonder whether he's read Larry Niven's science fiction story, "Rotating Cylinders and the Possibility of Global Causality Violation," which postulates very much the same scenario. Maybe this belongs in the time travel thread.

Dave

[Andrew Wiggin]

To be fair, he's also made a clear, unambiguous, and eminently falsifiable prediction. If the Higgs boson is observed, then his conjecture is conclusively refuted.

I wonder whether he's read Larry Niven's science fiction story, "Rotating Cylinders and the Possibility of Global Causality Violation," which postulates very much the same scenario. Maybe this belongs in the time travel thread.

Dave

Good story. One of many of Niven's stories that leave me feeling sorry for the poor sucker in the end, in this case, the minister calling from the dark side of the planet, who gets to see the sun go nova on the light side because he just happens to be on the phone with the guy who made the causality violating decision.

Just remember, folks. Causality violations make babee jeebus cry.

A.

[Phrost]

I'll send $20 via PayPal to the first JREFer who names their child "Higgs Boson _surname_".

$50 already if your last name happens to be Boson.

[Andrew Wiggin]

I'll send $20 via PayPal to the first JREFer who names their child "Higgs Boson _surname_".

$50 already if your last name happens to be Boson.

Higgs Boson Wiggin just doesn't have the ring to it that 'Universe Destroyer Wiggin' has. I don't think I'll be taking you up on your kind offer.

Actually, I keep joking with my wife that we should name our first born "andrew christian wiggin II" or 'andy christ' for short. I don't think she's going for that.

A

[Aitch]

Their idea is that we could do an experiment to test this by randomly drawing cards.


Makes a change from drawing Scrabble tiles from a bag... ;)

[shawmutt]

Higgs Boson Shaw...I love it!

Now to just...reverse...that...vasectomy using my newly developed large hardon collider...

[arthwollipot]

I mentioned this story in the lastest episode of the podcast.

[orange31]

"In the case of the Higgs and the collider, it is as if something is going back in time to keep the universe from being hit by a bus. Although just why the Higgs would be a catastrophe is not clear. If we knew, presumably, we wouldn’t be trying to make one."

Disclaimer I'm a non-physicist (perhaps the same as 'not-a-physicist' :),

But I find it curious -

1) Since these guys are physicists, shouldn't their research (?sic) papers have a wittle bit about why the Higgs boson could be so dangerous?

2) Why would Future Superdude, who is trying to save us, believe CERN scientists would honor their part of the bargain on the card draw and shut down the collider?

3) Is there any peer review process at all on Physics arxiv? It seems that if there isn't, most of the stuff posted on it is real (not junk) science....or am I incorrect?

4) This really seems like a practical joke, I think someone else already mentioned the prior example" Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity " by Alan D. Sokal Department of Physics NYU, published in a real journal, Social Text, in 1995.

If you're not familiar with it, it's pretty funny
http://www.physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/transgress_v2/transgress_v2_singlefile.html
http://www.physics.nyu.edu/faculty/sokal/

..if the current proposal isn't a joke....what is it?

[sol invictus]

1) Since these guys are physicists, shouldn't their research (?sic) papers have a wittle bit about why the Higgs boson could be so dangerous?

Yes.

2) Why would Future Superdude, who is trying to save us, believe CERN scientists would honor their part of the bargain on the card draw and shut down the collider?

No reason.

3) Is there any peer review process at all on Physics arxiv? It seems that if there isn't, most of the stuff posted on it is real (not junk) science....or am I incorrect?

There is no peer review on the arxiv, it's a pre-print server. There is a very basic test the administrators use to decide which section of the arxiv a paper should appear on. If it looks crackpot, they tend to put it on the general physics section (which no scientists read) even if the authors requested something else. I'm not sure exactly on what basis they make those decisions.

But there is a kind of peer review in the sense that peers only bother to read papers that look interesting to them...

4) This really seems like a practical joke, I think someone else already mentioned the prior example" Transgressing the Boundaries: Towards a Transformative Hermeneutics of Quantum Gravity " by Alan D. Sokal Department of Physics NYU, published in a real journal, Social Text, in 1995.

Possibly. But I happen to know that Nielsen has discussed this "work" at conferences. If it's a joke, it's in bad taste and has been carried very far.


..if the current proposal isn't a joke....what is it?

Insanity?

[dv82matt]

2) Why would Future Superdude, who is trying to save us, believe CERN scientists would honor their part of the bargain on the card draw and shut down the collider?

There's no future superdude. The idea is that the Higg's Boson itself is causing effects that ripple back in time and prevent it from ever being created.

I suppose that the analoguos process under the Many Worlds interpretation would be that creating the Higgs Boson destroys humanity somehow and thus we always find ourselves in a branch where the Higgs Boson was not created.

[dv82matt]

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/large-hadron-collider/6514155/Large-Hadron-Collider-broken-by-bread-dropped-by-passing-bird.html

[alfaniner]

At first I thought one article read "dropped a piece of bagel." I just figured the pigeon took one look at that giant torus shape and said "Screw this! I'm going for the big bagel!"