The 'God particle'

Originally posted by FabianFnas
Religion is not to be discussed in this Forum. I gladly discuss religion in Spiritual Forum. Let's continue the discussion there.
I'm glad you reminded me.

This discussion is about the role of religion in science. It's much more fit to be here than there.

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Well, Newton was always perplexed as to what created gravity in the first place. He decided it must have been God. It seems the elusive Higgs boson is thought to be responsible for the existence of mass. Is that why it's known as the 'God particle'?

I object to the very name.

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Well, Newton was always perplexed as to what created gravity in the first place. He decided it must have been God. It seems the elusive Higgs boson is thought to be responsible for the existence of mass. Is that why it's known as the 'God particle'?

Yes. What's interesting is that the Higgs boson is expected to give scientists insight into a "unified field theory" that explains everything except gravity.

This is from a 2004 article that appeared on the BBC News website:

"Physicists have observed 16 particles that make up all matter under the Standard Model of fundamental particles and interactions.

But the sums do not quite add up for the Standard Model to be true if these particles are considered alone. If only 16 particles existed, they would have no mass - contradicting what we know to be true in nature.

Another particle has to give them this mass. Enter the Higgs boson, first proposed by University of Edinburgh physicist Peter Higgs and colleagues in the late 1960s.

Their theory was that all particles acquire their mass through interactions with an all-pervading field, called the Higgs field, which is carried by the Higgs boson.

The Higgs' importance to the Standard Model has led some to dub it the "God particle".

Dr Renton said he hoped that once the large hadron collider was up and running in 2007, the Higgs boson would be detected within a year or two.

The LHC is a more energetic accelerator which will allow a much higher mass range to be explored. It will also be capable of producing much more intense particle beams which means that data can be aggregated much faster.

It is also possible the Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory outside Chicago, US, could make the discovery.

Researchers there are hopeful they can secure enough data to prove the Higgs' existence before the LHC comes online."

The complete article is here:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3546973.stm

Originally posted by Bosse de Nage
Well, Newton was always perplexed as to what created gravity in the first place. He decided it must have been God. It seems the elusive Higgs boson is thought to be responsible for the existence of mass. Is that why it's known as the 'God particle'?

I'm not sure but the impression I've got is that giving mass property to matters is somewhat like the first step in "creation". Immediately after the big ban, matters are massless, but as the temperature drops sufficiently there emerges a field called Higg's field that is scattered with Higg's bosons. Any matters in the field that associate with Higg's boson obtain mass, and I guess matters obtaining mass further leads other interactions to be made possible?

Interesting physicists coming up with good stories, I think they are very clever people to do all equations writing up and everything (because I can't, like they do), but it is nice to be able to see a definite back up evidence for their stories for sure.