# The Higgs boson does not exist
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613
**Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
**Created:** [August 30, 2011, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613 "2011-08-30T12:16:31Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 12:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/1 "2011-08-30T12:16:31Z")
So say CERN scientists [with 95% probability](http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/08/23/a-higgs-setback-did-stephen-hawking-just-win-the-most-outrageous-bet-in-physics-history/):
> [@](#):
>
> But the Higgs boson never appeared. Running continually at an unprecedented energy level of seven trillion electron volts since March 31, 2010, the LHC has been amassing petabytes of data that are being analyzed by a grid of interlinked computers worldwide in search of the missing boson. And yesterday, August 22, at the Biennial International Symposium on Lepton-Photon Interactions at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai, India, the bombshell was dropped: CERN scientists declared that over the entire range of energy the Collider had explored—from 145 to 466 billion electron volts—the Higgs boson is excluded as a possibility with a 95% probability.
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 12:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/2 "2011-08-30T12:21:05Z")
So what does this mean?
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### Author:  [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 12:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/3 "2011-08-30T12:29:19Z")
> [@Alessan](#):
>
> So what does this mean?
From the article, it means that the most popular theories about where the mass of particles comes from - which use the Higgs - are likely wrong. And Hawking gets to gloat a lot.
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### Author:  [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 12:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/4 "2011-08-30T12:47:57Z")
Well the article actually says
> [@](#):
>
> To be sure, the new, negative results presented in Mumbai yesterday are of a different nature. They state that, with a 95% probability, the Higgs does not exist within the range of energies the LHC has so far explored, between 145 and 466 billion electron volts. The probability of nonexistence is not overwhelming—there is still a 5% chance that the Higgs is hiding somewhere within this energy range. And, more importantly, the lower energy range from 114 to just under 145 billion electron volts, a region of energy that Fermilab has determined, through earlier experiments, may harbor the Higgs, has not been ruled out.
So instead of a confidence of 99.99997% that a particle exists, they’re saying with 95% confidence it does _not_ exist in the range they examined.
Either way, it’s a very neat result.
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 12:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/5 "2011-08-30T12:48:33Z")
QUOTE=Der Trihs;14199065]From the article, it means that the most popular theories about where the mass of particles comes from - which use the Higgs - are likely wrong. And Hawking gets to gloat a lot.
[/QUOTE]
Oh. Well, that’s also progress (the theories part - not the gloating).
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### Author:  [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Capt.Ridley_s_Shooting_Party)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 1:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/6 "2011-08-30T13:17:30Z")
> [@Grey](#):
>
> Well the article actually says So instead of a confidence of 99.99997% that a particle exists, they’re saying with 95% confidence it does _not_ exist in the range they examined.
>
> Either way, it’s a very neat result.
Yeah, but haven’t the lower energies been examined by other colliders before, though?
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### Author:  [@Grey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grey)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 1:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/7 "2011-08-30T13:30:59Z")
“the lower energy range from 114 to just under 145 billion electron volts, a region of energy that Fermilab has determined, through earlier experiments, may harbor the Higgs, has not been ruled out” - from the article in question.
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### Author:  [@Sailboat](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sailboat)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 1:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/8 "2011-08-30T13:45:28Z")
> [@](#):
>
> at the Tata Institute of Fundamental Research in Mumbai, India
I should apply there! I have spent literally _years_ in intensive study that sound like they’d be applicable.
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### Author:  [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 1:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/9 "2011-08-30T13:49:07Z")
> [@Capt.Ridley\_s\_Shooting\_Party](#):
>
> So say CERN scientists [with 95% probability](http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/guest-blog/2011/08/23/a-higgs-setback-did-stephen-hawking-just-win-the-most-outrageous-bet-in-physics-history/):
I think you misunderstand. CERN are saying there is a 95% probablity that the Higgs bosun does not exist within a particular energy range, not that there is a 95% chance it does not exist. It might exist at a lower or higher energy.
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### Author:  [@ITR\_champion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ITR_champion)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/10 "2011-08-30T14:35:07Z")
In yer face, Stand Model of particle physics!
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### Author:  [@Philster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Philster)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/11 "2011-08-30T14:43:06Z")
But we can still say _Higgs boson_, right? I mean, we can’t lost that from the vocabulary.
\*“What in the name of Higgs boson are you talking about?”
“I don’t give a Higgs boson one way or the other!”
“Ok, I got your Higgs boson right here!”
-
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### Author:  [@Rhythmdvl](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rhythmdvl)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:43pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/12 "2011-08-30T14:43:30Z")
It means we may not be a Type-13 planet after all. Whew!
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### Author:  [@Joey\_P](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Joey_P)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/13 "2011-08-30T14:46:03Z")
> [@Alessan](#):
>
> So what does this mean?
There is no god particle.
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### Author:  [@Jenaroph](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jenaroph)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:48pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/14 "2011-08-30T14:48:08Z")
> [@Alka\_Seltzer](#):
>
> I think you misunderstand. CERN are saying there is a 95% probablity that the Higgs bosun does not exist within a particular energy range, not that there is a 95% chance it does not exist. It might exist at a lower or higher energy.
Exactly - there are a few haystacks they’re looking at with the theory that there’s a needle in one of them. They’ve thoroughly examined one haystack. It’s premature to say that the needle doesn’t exist because it wasn’t in that one.
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### Author:  [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/15 "2011-08-30T14:50:23Z")
Sounds pirate-y to me. “Arr Jim lad. Furl up the mains’l er I’ll heave yer carcass to ol’ Higgs Bosun meself afore ye kin blink twice, arr…”
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### Author:  [@billfish678](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/billfish678)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 2:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/16 "2011-08-30T14:52:49Z")
> [@Jenaroph](#):
>
> Exactly - there are a few haystacks they’re looking at with the theory that there’s a needle in one of them. They’ve thoroughly examined one haystack. It’s premature to say that the needle doesn’t exist because it wasn’t in that one.
And even not finding it in the one haystack isnt as “bad” as it sounds. There’s still a 1 in 20 chance they just missed it. Throw in the possibilty that the Higgs doesnt quite act like they think it should or something about their detection strategy isnt quit like they think it is and that 1 in 20 chance bumps up a bit more.
Its looks a little sad for the poor old Higgs but the little fella aint dead yet.
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### Author:  [@cmyk](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cmyk)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 3:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/17 "2011-08-30T15:20:31Z")
Yep, as with anything else, the Higgs Boson will always be in the last place you look.
Then again…
> [@Confucius](#):
>
> The hardest thing of all is to find a black cat in a dark room, especially if there is no cat.
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### Author:  [@Alessan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alessan)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 3:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/18 "2011-08-30T15:44:48Z")
Wouldn’t finding out that the HB doesn’t exist be as important a discovery as finding out it does?
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### Author:  [@Alka\_Seltzer](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Alka_Seltzer)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/19 "2011-08-30T15:54:07Z")
> [@Alessan](#):
>
> Wouldn’t finding out that the HB doesn’t exist be as important a discovery as finding out it does?
Yes, absolutely. A negative result would be just as valuable as finding the Higgs.
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### Author:  [@Maiira](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Maiira)
#### Post date: [August 30, 2011, 4:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/the-higgs-boson-does-not-exist/594613/20 "2011-08-30T16:17:07Z")
[stupid, fight-my-ignorance hijack] I humbly beseech the Dope: can someone please explain to me what, exactly, the Higgs boson is? Pretend I am five years old, or something, because while I’ve read about it, I just can’t grok it for some reason. [/sfmih]
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