What's New with the Higgs Boson Thing? Do We Really Want to Know?

Marvelous, marvelous science this thing going on with the so-called Higgs Boson particles. The Guardian and The Telegraph have reported that scientists experimenting on such matter over there at CERN, somewhere in Geneva, Switzerland, have made huge milestone most recently and said to have zeroed-in on discovering the Higgs Boson particle 99.999999% sure. The .9’s is a bit longer than what I have stated, that’s according to The Telegraph.

This very interesting particle have hugged science news pages for years now and have been featured in many television documentaries, especially that one ultra-glossy presentation from Discovery Channel. One thing that adds so much attention to it is its own very strange and mysterious nature; somewhat salacious information, something so much of the unknown.

And that’s what Higgs Boson particle is all about – so much of the unknown.

Unlike any other particle in the known universe – such as atom, proton, and quarks – this one had been known long before it was discovered. It was a creation of postulation and hypothesis merely, that some kind of imaginary region in the universe is traversing without so much being caught by mortal eyes, and this was called “the higgs field”, which the Guardian describes as a huge swimming pool in the universe and the Higgs-Boson particle is swimming, or rather, swaying within it, dragging along heavily with his clothes on.

The Higgs boson is named after Peter Higgs, who in 1964 wrote one of three ground-breaking papers alongside the work of Robert Broutand François Englert and Tom Kibble, C. R. Hagen and Gerald Guralnik covering what is now known as the Higgs mechanism and described the related Higgs field and boson.

The particle is also termed as “God’s particle”, apparently because of its very eponymous nature, that is said to be the origin of all things, the very matter to where all things and matters have gained mass from. More atomic than atom, more core than neutron.

If discovered ultimately, what does Higgs Boson particle would benefit mankind? Such is the billion dollar question. Especially that the equipment built in order to experiment upon its existence is worth in the billions, the Large Electron–Positron Collider (LEP), a huge tunnel 27 miles long, in order to stimulate particles colliding with each other at a very high speed, a velocity unthinkable on the Earth’s surface that they’ve built it underground.

Perhaps, just like the discovery of the nucleic matters such as atom and neutron, Higgs Boson particle, or the discovery and use of it, would lead to advancement in energy and more or less, in mass weaponry. Do we really need to have much more powerful explosive than the uranium-based nuclear bomb?

Scientists have theorized that discovery and understanding the elemental nature of the particle will allow humankind comprehend much more the 'Standard Model', about how every matter in the known world behaves.

But hey, this is too much science for us. In the end we ask, do we really need to know what’s “God’s particle” is all about?