'God Particle' expected to be found soon

wow thats pretty incredible. How amazing would it be to find out if we have been right or wrong about the universes creation? I'm very interested in what the outcome will be.

while I don't necessarily buy into strict divisions of knowledge, it is a stretch to think that 'science' can tell us something meaningful about 'theology.' The reason is a great number of scientist are philosophically unsophisticated and draw haphazard, unwarranted conclusions. For all the talk about religious folk polluting scientific discourse, it seems to me the charge is as justified when levied against some science popularizers (especially, the 'new atheists').

religious beliefs need not (but might) be justified on the basis of scientific evidence. if the newest deliverances from science were to hold serious influence over my religious beliefs, I would be scouring scientific journal after journal in search of something that might further validate or disconfirm my beliefs. that seems foolish.

Logic has time and time again returned us to a state of mitigated skepticism. A reassessment of the term "religion" could open the discussion to something much broader- that is a belief structure based in matters of faith, rather then fact.

Following this logic, it turns out there's is quite a lot about the world that is grounded in faith, rather then truth. The "laws" of gravity are a good example of this (as opposed to Newtonian physics, Relativity has long speculated the phenomenon we call gravity is really our interpretation of the curvature of space time).

The beauty of faith is that it does not require fact, and thus neither does religion. It's really up to the individual to decide how much fact they're basing as a requirement for faith.

The "God Particle" is a slippery slope. The atom was one such particle, then quarks. Mechanics is not the answer- there is something on a quantum level within the physical realm that may just require a lot of faith to fully comprehend.

I think there is a lot of equivocation when people use the term faith. For some, it means belief despite evidence...for other, belief in spite of evidence and for others, faith has no relationship to evidence whatsoever.

So I guess its important to define 'faith' before we get too far along in discussions about Faith and Reason. It would also do some good to talk about belief formation, as we aren't able to form beliefs voluntarily (e.g., no matter how much $ I offered up, you couldn't fool yourself into believing pink elephants visited your room last nite).

What irks me most is that some critics of religion assume all religious believers believe in the face of convincing evidence to the contrary. Not all, or even most, believers think this way. And even if they did, it isnt clear they are violating any laws of reasoning.

Religious beliefs can be properly basic beliefs (that is, beliefs not grounded in other beliefs). In this sense, religious beliefs are no different from other basic beliefs (like, other minds exist and I exist). These beliefs cannot be justified in reference to other beliefs, nahmean?

I'd have to disagree with the notion that one can not voluntarily manifest their own beliefs- this is a matter of debate. While one's belief structure may be the result of emotional and psychological cognition over specific stimuli/phenomenon, etc- we do make a conscious choice on whether to accept said interpretations or to delve further. Much like the evolution of instinct, beliefs form within the mind- we think, therefore we form belief and consequentially, faith.

On the notion of evidence and religion however, it should be obvious that evidence can be manifested in support of any particular belief. We have evidence for and against global warming, for and against Creationism vs. Evolution. So really.... it seems as if we fall back on our beliefs/instinct (as a means of survival) for a majority of our paradigms on the world.

As I said initially, this should put us in a state of mitigated skepticism- nothing is impossible.

....wow, so how does this relate to the god-particle article

hmm. why care what the particle is called ? i know 3 people who are now working at CERN and they couldn't care less what it's called - nor do they spend a single second wondering if "god" is even in the mix . "god" won't be found hiding in a particle .

starving,

you're right, i should've been more careful when claiming that, we don't have control over our beliefs. To be more precise, we don't have complete control over all our beliefs. I think my example about pink elephants demonstrates this. My point here, though, is that belief formation is not directly related to 'evidence' (logical or evidential) but is rather a complicated matrix of social and personal impulses.

In fact, some beliefs are not 'formed' at all...they just seem to appear. And this can be the case for some religious believers. And if this is the case, then they need not appeal to external evidence for justification. They are basic beliefs that resist justification by an appeal to more foundational beliefs (like belief in other minds, or the belief that I exist).

All this relates to the god particle, i think, because people mistakenly think that there is some sort of 'evidence' that can justify or invalidate religious belief. My view is that religious belief can be justified, but not necessarily out of an appeal to evidence, rather by an appeal to the direct experience of the belief.

Now, when people pose scientific objections to belief, the believer can respond by challenging the science by using science and/or logic, or SHE might rightly claim she is uninterested in what 'science says' as she understand she is justified in virtue of her direct experience.

in other word, god particle...get lost.

If a black hole doesn't swallow the Earth first!!!

Bottom line: if discovered, what will the Higgs boson (God particle) allow us to do?

I think that the idea of a god particle - a particle that, essentially, answers most of our questions about life, the universe, and everything - is not at all ludicrous. There is speculation that dark matter or energy might be acquired through this particle accelerator, but the fallacy of this scientist is in calling it the "god" particle, and linking it to theology. It should be an entirely seperate subject. This is not to imply, however, Stephen Jay Gould's "NOMA," or non-overlapping majesteria, is in play. Gould theorized that science and religion are entirely opposing fields of thought, and that they musn't, and in fact can't, dabble in the affairs of the other. I disagree on the grounds that, in Booksbrown's words, "properly basic beliefs," may not need evidence, but others, whose premise IS grounded in other beliefs, require some amount of incentive. Despite the fact that that sentance was more conviluded than any other I've ever written, what I am trying to say is this. Things like gravity, evolution, and germs are beliefs, yes, but they are evidenced beliefs. The traditional omnipotent god is not only unevidenced, but it defies conventional science, and it is thus arbitrary to attach any need for evidence. If it turns out that god exists, than the supernatural is possible, and science itself is entirely arbitrary. It's a paradox, and I haven't done a good job of articulating it, but I'm tired. I choose to believe that I can trust my scientific rationality, and based on this assumption, I draw my conclusion that religion makes no logical sense. It is entirely an issue of perspective, so if your own lense requires no evidence, then so be it. Belief may or may not require evidence, but it truly depends on the believers worldview. So, the problem with which we are confronted, is that some Nobel laureate used the metaphore of God. In reality, the "god" particle is scientific, and so, it requires the evidence that will hopefully be supplied by the particle accelerator. End of story.

With any luck, these guys will create a second big bang in their lab.

I'm Scared

this is what i think - you remember that scene in raiders of the lost ark when the nazis opened up the ark and the wrathful demon-ghosts were unleashed and wasted everyone except indy and that chic ? that's what's gonna happen with the higgs boson particle - there will be a few hundred peeps standing around whose eyes will be popping out of their melting heads when the secrets of god almighty's creation are revealed - just like in the movie .

Books Brown, you should read the trilogy of books called "His Dark Materials" by Phillip Pullman. The first book, the Golden Compass was already made into a movie. The second book is in limbo about who is going to distribute it; it flopped in the us with only $70million in revenue, while it earned $380million in worldwide distribution.

I have read all three books and I must say they truly illuminate this topic very well.

Dark matter is the original stuff of the universe before the big bang (let there be light) was the first thought of the self-aware dark matter. It's first thought was "let there be light" and the big bang exploded into the proto-universe. In the story, the first Angel, Jehovah, who is called the Angel of Light declares himself the "most high god" because he was the first and he set about the task of urging the proto-universe into the state we see it today. This Jehovah did the whole Adam and Eve thing and he set up the first law by commanding them not to eat of the tree of Knowledge of Good and evil. However, the true god embodied in the image of the Serpent (Sophia meaning Wisdom) liberated man from the Authority of Jehovah by showing them the path to Wisdom and Truth.

In the story, dark matter is called dust in a parallel universe, while in our universe it is called dark matter. In the parallel universe the church is afraid of dust because their experimental theologians believe that those elementary particles are "original sin", while in our universe, dark matter is actually alive and responds to human thoughts and can communicate with people if they empty their minds of conditioned thought processes and allow their minds to be unfettered by thoughts, fears, woes. The shadow particles are directed by human will and they do not differentiate into right or wrong, good or evil. They are what they are and they don't judge, they just cooperate with any act of will; angelic or human.

The first rebellion against Jehovah was defeated by Enoch who was taken body and soul into heaven. He becomes an Archangel called Metatron and Jehovah makes him Regent of the Kingdom of Heaven. Metatron presides over the entire multiverse, millions of parallel universes. The second rebellion is the subject of the books. I won't give away the end, but let me say that it's a tear jerker to say the least.

But I have digressed somewhat off topic, but the books do a fine job of illustrating the theological and scientific implications of such a discovery. God particles that are the source of all life and the one string that binds all living things together sounds a lot like the Holy Spirit of the Bible.

Malathion, thanks for the belly chuckle, I loved your response. It was so visual and visceral.

What we can do with these particles is perhaps prove that all life shares a common energy field called consciousness that is energized by these particles and connects all of us through a string. Although we each have a unique point of view and memory of the experience of life, we all ultimately share one consciousness.

This would be the final reconciliation between Religion and Science. They were in conflict because Religion refused to be dragged kicking and screaming into the light of knowledge and understanding. But once science can prove that their are sentient subatomic particles that are all connected by a string then this will be the closest thing to God that science can illustrate in scientific terminology. Then they will have to come up with new theological sounding terms to describe the observable phenomena of the God particle.

thx jubal . all the arguments i've heard so far have to do with the intersection of christianity and science - how about substituting another religion ? how about Taoism , as in "The Tao of Physics" ? how about forgetting all the specifically christian issues calling a particle "the god particle" entail . christianity has never failed to be the least likely religion to facilitate the advancement of science ( remember all the "heresies" ? ) , and adds nothing whatsoever to any intelligent discussion of particle physics . "faith" has it's place , but not here . "theology" is patently medieval , and is absolutely irrelevant , as it has been since the renaissance . if anyone has to bring "religion" into the conversation , how about allowing the possibility that perhaps other religions are more conducive to facilitating understanding - i highly recommend "The Tao of Physics " for anyone seeking a better fit , without all the hassles of christian theology . actually , it would be even more enlightening to look into Hinduism and spend some time reading up on what "Om" is ( it's the "sound" -vibration- which animates the universe , and the "frequency " on which the "cosmos" moves - a far more advanced concept than anything christian theology , at any time , has produced ) . saying that only the christian "god" is pertinent to any discussion of "origins" amounts to racism , at the worst , and sheer ignorance at best .

i duno if this is true or whatever. but rest assure if he does figure it out he will go missing with his research shortly there after. it happens everytime.

dco... in regards to science conflicting with religion. You do know that it was in the environment and support of the notion that because there is a rational God, who created an ordered system of nature, not just chaotic random happenings, that science was birthed.

woa jdchristianson that is deep. i did not know that but i had my own hypotheses about that. thanks for the confirmation.

"The heavens declare the glory of God: the skies proclaim the work of his hands. Day after day they pour forth speech; night after night they display knowledge.
-Psalms 19:1-2
(written thousands of years ago, see the encouragement for science here?)
Revelation also states that in the last days the knowledge of man will be great. Does the Bible have to explain all the details? Wouldn't it be boring if there was nothing to explore in life, including the face of God? (who is Spirit -Jesus)

Einstein and many physicyst have shared the beleif that "Our goal is to see the hand of God working in the universe." Einsteins faith is part of what made him special what drove him to ask questions that others deemed irational, and though ostracized by the religous community Newton and Galileo were both men of faith, Gelilleo's daughter was even a nun. I wonder if they could have imagined such a particle or the advancement their simple rules of observation and experimentation would lead us towards.

Whos God?

no need to get offended nor offensive 7c0m9. if nothing else he is merely quoting text and not removing it from context or changing the contents as to not offend others that may see it as that. so its up to us to see it for what it is and interpret it our own way. this is how wars get started. lets try to avoid the beginnings of evil.

The most interesting thing about this story is the fact that the experiment Higgs hopes to have performed with the Large Hadrion Collider, otherwise known as the LHC, could theoretically, create a black hole! If so, this is all for naught.

what kind of questions are going to answered?
existence? nothingness? chaos theory? human nature? the meaning of life?
or will the manifestation of this "momentous discovery" be used in a similar fashion to so many other scientific leaps, to cause distruction, suffering and an ever increasing seperation between human beings, themselves, and the natural world?
how we can claim to have any special liberty is phenonimal. when we are the only species who merely by waking up, destroys. evil is not an 'entity' that can be removed, it exists within most, if not all of us.
Science can give us so much, and with this can we not try to aid so much of we cherish in this world?

peace & love

Funny. I thought we were all "God Particles".
Nice to see John Houseman still working.

I can just see it now. They finally find a way to prove their theory by replicating the Big Bang and Boom! No one's left to explain anything to anyone...
And then we just start all over again.

Should we really be recreating the Big Bang on the only planet we have?

It's amazing how far science has come...

Beliefs can be justified and unjustified. It seems to me we want to avoid unjustified beliefs and hold to our justified beliefs.

So how do beliefs get justified? Or more directly, how might belief in God as an immaterial, omniscient, personal, loving being be justified?

Some people think that this type of belief can only be justified by an appeal to evidence. Further, some people think that the only types of things that count as evidence are material facts (e.g., the Big Bang, The Shroud of Turin, factors related to the anthropic principle) about our universe. So, for people like DCO, its important to bang religious believers on their head and ask for evidence for their belief.

While I think there is material evidence that can be marshalled that might justify religious belief, IT IS NOT NECESSARY TO APPEAL TO EVIDENCE IN ORDER TO JUSTIFY RELIGIOUS BELIEF. This is because, religious beliefs are like some of our other beliefs (properly basic beliefs) that are not built on other foundational beliefs.

For example, my belief that Sacramento is the Capitol of California rests on my belief that Sac is a city, Ca has a capitol, the newspapers generally report accurate info, etc. This belief has foundational beliefs that support them. But we also hold other beliefs that do not rest on antecedent beliefs. The fact that you exist, other minds exist and yes, that God exists, can be justified by direct experience. In the same way someone might doubt that you really exist (you might be a brain in a vat) but you KNOW you do exist (in virtue of your direct experience) the believer can also claim that she KNOWS God exists in virtue of her direct experience.

So, while I think that religious believer can marshall scientific evidence (here, historical, archeological, textual evidence all fits) in order to justify their religious beliefs THEY NEED NOT. and that just gets some so called scientific rationalists in tizzy.

oh, well.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reformed_epistemology

Suppose there is this particle that condenses energy into matter. That doesn't make it "God". It's just another impersonal force of physics, much like gravity. Unless the religious are willing to call every physical force "god", I don't know how this proves their case that there is one.

Exciting discovery though. If proved true, at last we'll have an answer on how stars and planets formed after the big bang.

i've never seen science [or anything else really] bring people together @ any point so far in my 25 years here on earth, so i'm not really sure that this potential discovery will have any real impact on unifying us earthlings...unfortunately, i think too many people still see science as being elitist & tune out whenever its discussed.

gods going to be very very angry

Books - I attempted to say in my post (though I doubt as to how successful I was) that religious belief does NOT require evidence. I was trying to point out that it is not, as you say, a basic belief. For that matter, nothing is a basic belief. The idea that one can believe something (such as "I exist") without that being based on another belief is ludicrous. If you seperate things onto such an existential level, you end up with an infinite regress of beliefs: "I believe I exist" is based on "I believe I have experienced existance," which is based on "I believe experience would evidence existance," which is based on "I believe evidence is necessary for belief," which is based on "I believe I exist." Existentialism is a viscious cycle, and in my mind, an arbitrary one. If you really want to get down to it, everything is a belief, because we believe knowledge is possible. What I will say is this: From my perspective, one which requires evidence, methodology, and proof in order for me to accept something as the truth, God is irrational. I totally understand that others do not need the same amount of evidence, and that they may rationalize a belief without the incentive I would require. It's simply a matter of subjectivity. I have my way, and everyone else has their own way. I do not think that I typically "bang religious believers on their head and ask them for evidence for their belief." Occassionally I may disagree by a large margin, but any time I ask for evidence, it would not be to divorce a person from their beliefs, but to attempt to rationalize the belief for myself. I never intend to evangelize, and if it seems so, flag my post and make me aware, because it is an attrocity to be such a hypocryte. I would never want to tell someone how to live their life. Belief is far more credible if it is evidenced, but evidence is not always necessary. For my own beliefs, however, evidence IS necessary. You could look at scientific rationalism as my own sort of dogma. I do not agree that religious belief is justified historically, archaeologically, or textually, but you very well may. Also understand that the ONLY portion of religion that I require evidence for is the existance of a God. This is, however, a paradox. If God exists, then the supernatural is possible, and my entire worldview is uprooted. So you see, it is impossible for me to accept God. Not because of ignorance, but the lense through which my mind sees. Of course I've TRIED just accepting God, but my experimental prayers go unanswered. I think it's settled at "I cannot believe."

Sorry to prolong this tangent, though.