# Higgs boson: so who'll get the Nobel? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [July 6, 2012, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367 "2012-07-06T00:11:04Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 12:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/1 "2012-07-06T00:11:04Z")
A victory has many fathers they say. See subject. ---
**Author:** ![Esox\_Lucius](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/848f3c/32.png) [@Esox\_Lucius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esox_Lucius)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 1:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/2 "2012-07-06T01:48:20Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > A victory has many fathers they say. Who’s your daddy, Higgs boson? 🙂 Stephen Hawking thinks Peter Higgs should get it for predicting the particle. On the other hand, George Gamow predicted the CMB, but Penzias and Wilson won the Nobel for accidentally discovering it, and later John Mather and George Smoot won for measuring it. ---
**Author:** ![Askance](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/askance/32/8281_2.png) [@Askance](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askance)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 1:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/3 "2012-07-06T01:49:12Z")
Reported for possible forum change, as it seems to be a matter of opinion rather than factual. ---
**Author:** ![MikeS](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/919ad9/32.png) [@MikeS](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/MikeS)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 2:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/4 "2012-07-06T02:22:27Z")
Another complicating factor is that while Higgs got his name attached to the boson, [three groups](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Higgs_mechanism#Discovery) (totaling six physicists) came up with the idea independently. Unfortunately, a Nobel Prize can’t be shared among more than three people/organizations, so some of them will be SOL. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 2:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/5 "2012-07-06T02:46:59Z")
Have recent or past events regarding the Higgs Boson conferred great benefit on mankind? ---
**Author:** ![Saint\_Cad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/saint_cad/32/18907_2.png) [@Saint\_Cad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Saint_Cad)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/6 "2012-07-06T03:03:36Z")
> [@Esox\_Lucius](#): > > Who’s your daddy, Higgs boson? 🙂 > > Stephen Hawking thinks Peter Higgs should get it for predicting the particle. On the other hand, George Gamow predicted the CMB, but Penzias and Wilson won the Nobel for accidentally discovering it, and later John Mather and George Smoot won for measuring it. Let’s just throw Jocelyn Bell in the list too for having the misfortune of being a grad student when she discovered pulsars. ---
**Author:** ![colonial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/34f0e0/32.png) [@colonial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/colonial)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:26am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/7 "2012-07-06T03:26:41Z")
> [@Esox\_Lucius](#): > > Who’s your daddy, Higgs boson? 🙂 > > Stephen Hawking thinks Peter Higgs should get it for predicting the particle. On the other hand, George Gamow predicted the CMB, but Penzias and Wilson won the Nobel for accidentally discovering it, and later John Mather and George Smoot won for measuring it. Numerous physicists deserved the Nobel more than Penzias and Wilson, who literally had no idea what they were looking at. They thought CMB noises were being caused by pigeon shit on their antenna! Ralph Alper predicted CMB around the same time as Gamov, and Robert Dicke and James Peebles of Princeton University rediscovered CMB prediction, and were about to look for it when they learned of the serendipitous discovery by Penzias and Wilson not far away in Holmdel NJ. ---
**Author:** ![colonial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/34f0e0/32.png) [@colonial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/colonial)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/8 "2012-07-06T03:30:35Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Have recent or past events regarding the Higgs Boson conferred great benefit on mankind? That requirement may never have been in force for theoretical physics. Nor should it be. Relativity and Quantum Mechanics were decades away from practical application when first discovered. ---
**Author:** ![Pasta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@Pasta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pasta)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/9 "2012-07-06T03:48:53Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Have recent or past events regarding the Higgs Boson conferred great benefit on mankind? Fortunately, Alfred Nobel didn’t mention mankind in his will when creating the physics prize. It is to be awarded to whomever “shall have made the most important discovery or invention within the field of physics.” (Should Olympic golds go to the runners who have most benefited mankind, or to the ones who ran the fastest?) ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 3:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/10 "2012-07-06T03:54:08Z")
> [@colonial](#): > > That requirement may never have been in force for theoretical physics. > > Nor should it be. > > Relativity and Quantum Mechanics were decades away from practical > application when first discovered. Those were major advances in human knowledge, bestowing great benefit from the knowledge of their existence. Did the theorizing of the Higgs Boson, by Higgs or others do such thing, or have the recent tests to confirm those theories done that? I agree it’s a tough standard to hold theoretical physicists to. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 4:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/11 "2012-07-06T04:07:29Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Those were major advances in human knowledge, bestowing great benefit from the knowledge of their existence. Did the theorizing of the Higgs Boson, by Higgs or others do such thing, or have the recent tests to confirm those theories done that? Well, surely, it is also a major advance in human knowledge… Why is that enough for the other theories, but not this? ---
**Author:** ![kaylasdad99](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kaylasdad99/32/3398_2.png) [@kaylasdad99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kaylasdad99)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 4:10am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/12 "2012-07-06T04:10:44Z")
> [@Askance](#): > > Reported for possible forum change, as it seems to be a matter of opinion rather than factual. How about Cafe Society? _On next season’s **The Big Bang Theory** , how many episodes will we get before Sheldon tries to take some credit?_ ---
**Author:** ![colonial](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/34f0e0/32.png) [@colonial](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/colonial)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 4:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/13 "2012-07-06T04:28:27Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Those were major advances in human knowledge, bestowing great benefit from the knowledge of their existence. Did the theorizing of the Higgs Boson, by Higgs or others do such thing, or have the recent tests to confirm those theories done that? > > I agree it’s a tough standard to hold theoretical physicists to. I think antimatter would be a rough anology with the Higgs. Antimatter was a necessity of nature which so to speak sprung from Quantum Mechanical equations developed by Paul Dirac in the late 1920s. Antimatter’s discovery a few years later is considered the first emperimental confirmation of QM. Simiularly the Higgs is a necessity of nature predicted by the equations of the so-called Standard Model of physics, a further, extensive QM development which describes the strong and electroweak forces (but not gravity). The discovery of Higgs confirms the truth of the Standard Model in somewhat the same way antimatter confirmed the truth of QM. ---
**Author:** ![Pasta](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ecccb3/32.png) [@Pasta](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Pasta)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 4:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/14 "2012-07-06T04:48:36Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > Those were major advances in human knowledge, bestowing great benefit from the knowledge of their existence. They may or may not have bestowed benefit, but that’s beside the point. Nobel didn’t make the Prize for advancements that had benefits to humanity. It’s for achievements that are important within the field of physics itself. If (obvious, immediate) benefits are required, entire subfields of pursuit would be disallowed (_e.g._, cosmology). (It’s a separate discussion as to whether QM was seen as anything beyond a curiosity outside of the field of physics in 1918.) Regarding the thread topic at hand: no one has mentioned the experimental effort. The prediction of the Higgs wasn’t the biggest theoretical leap we’ve had in the past century, but the discovery of the Higgs was pretty friggin’ tough. Of course, the experimental effort has even more people to sift through looking for appropriate prize recipients… ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 4:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/15 "2012-07-06T04:49:49Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > Well, surely, it is also a major advance in human knowledge… Why is that enough for the other theories, but not this? I was asking to find out if it surely is, because I didn’t know. **colonial** gives a pretty good answer above. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 4:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/16 "2012-07-06T04:57:16Z")
> [@Pasta](#): > > Nobel didn’t make the Prize for advancements that had benefits to humanity. It’s for achievements that are important within the field of physics itself. If (obvious, immediate) benefits are required, entire subfields of pursuit would be disallowed (_e.g._, cosmology). I believe he did specify great benefit to humanity. But that doesn’t mean it’s immediate and direct benefit. Nobels aren’t awarded every time a new atom is created. Some things are breakthroughs, others aren’t. And I did just want to find out an answer to that question. It sounds like it is greatly beneficial to human knowledge by confirming the Standard Model of model of physics, and establishing it as fact to an extremely high degree of certainty. ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 6:08am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/17 "2012-07-06T06:08:56Z")
> [@colonial](#): > > …Antimatter’s discovery a few years later is considered the first emperimental confirmation of QM… “Emperimental.” What a great portmanteau word: empirical and experimental. It would be great if it became part of standard vocabulary. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 6:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/18 "2012-07-06T06:12:20Z")
Perhaps, but what does it indicate or connote that “empirical” or “experimental” alone fail to? ---
**Author:** ![coremelt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/4491bb/32.png) [@coremelt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/coremelt)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 7:37am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/19 "2012-07-06T07:37:20Z")
> [@TriPolar](#): > > It sounds like it is greatly beneficial to human knowledge by confirming the Standard Model of model of physics, and establishing it as fact to an extremely high degree of certainty. Except that we haven’t yet, there is still a lot of uncertainty as wether the new particle that the LHC has found has the actual properties of the Higgs predicted by the SM. All we know so far is there is a new particle at about the right GeV. ---
**Author:** ![si\_blakely](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/d9b06d/32.png) [@si\_blakely](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/si_blakely)\ **Post date:** [July 6, 2012, 8:00am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367/20 "2012-07-06T08:00:18Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > A victory has many fathers they say. [Brian Cox](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brian_Cox_%28physicist%29) is photogenic enough 😉 Although his grasp of thermodynamics is a bit shaky… [QUOTE=D:Ream] [Things can only get better](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Things_Can_Only_Get_Better_%28D:Ream_song%29)… [/QUOTE] Si [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/higgs-boson-so-wholl-get-the-nobel/627367.md?page=2)