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Finding the 'God Particle' will validate Intelligent Design
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Now that I have your attention, let me explain the meaning behind the title of this article. Sometimes things aren't what they seem. Sometimes the same words mean different things to different people. For most Americans, God and Intelligent Design (ID) are terms that go together like peanut butter and jelly. The God Particle and Intelligent Design are clearly not a match to folks in the scientific community. Since I'm a "Science and Tech" and not a "Religion and Spirituality" Examiner, I will focus on the science and leave the religious aspects to others.
Now on to the technology that's designed to create the "God Particle":
The Large Hadron Collider (LHC) is the world's largest and most powerful particle accelerator. At a cost of $8 billion, the LHC is located in a tunnel 27 kilometers (17 miles) in circumference 175 meters beneath the Swiss-French border near the city of Geneva Switzerland. It was built by the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) with the goal of testing various theories of high-energy physics.
On September 10, 2008, a beam of protons were successfully launched in the main ring of the LHC. Unfortunately, on September 19th, the collider was shut down due to problems with two superconducting bending magnets. It is anticipated that the problems will be resolved and the LHC will be operational again in October 2009.
When the LHC finally gets going at full power, trillions of protons will be set in motion along the magnetic track and set racing in opposite directions at speeds exceeding 99.999999 percent the speed of light while engaging in more than 500,000 head-on collisions each second. At 99.999999 percent the speed of light, a proton will cycle the 17 mile track more than 11,000 times every second.
The reason for the ultra high-energy head-on proton collisions derives from the worlds most popular equation; Einstein's famous E=mc2. That formula represents the notion that energy ("E") and matter or mass ("m") are interchangeable like convertible currencies (with "c" being the speed of light which represents a fixed conversion rate). Since the speed of light "squared" is an enormous number; more than anything else, E=mc2 represents the notion that a very small amount of matter can be converted into a whole lot of energy and, conversely, a whole lot of energy is required to produce a very small amount of matter. By accelerating the protons to incredibly high speeds, there collisions provide a momentary burst of tremendous energy which quickly converts into a broad array of other smaller pieces of matter commonly referred to as particles.
Among the vast array of other smaller particles which may be created immediately following the proton collisions is the Higgs particle, better known in popular parlance as the "God Particle". One of the mysteries of physics is the nature and origin of mass. What is mass and where does it come from? In October 1964, a number of physicists proposed an answer to this mystery. Included in that group of distinguished researchers was an English physicist by the name of Peter Higgs. Higgs suggested that space itself is pervaded by an invisible field, much like electromagnetic fields generated by radio and cellphone signals, that acts like molasses.
According Higgs' theory, when we apply a force to accelerate something (change its speed and/or direction), a molasses like field acts as a drag force which gives an object its mass. Since the 1970's, the physics community has incorporated this theoretical Higgs field as a centerpiece of the so-called standard model. However, the remaining component of the standard model that has yet to be confirmed is Higgs' "molasses" field. Scientists are predicting that if there really is a Higgs field, the energy created by the collisions in the LHC should be strong enough to chip off small chunks of that field creating what are referred to as Higgs bosons or, if your prefer, "God Particles". If these particles are created and detected, the standard model will finally be complete.
So the finial puzzle is why this yet to be discovered particle is referred to as the "God Particle" and what does its potential discovery have to do with Intelligent Design. The term "God Particle" first appeared in a book written about 15 years ago by a Nobel Prize winning physicist by the name of Leon Lederman. At pages 22-23 of his book, The God Particle, Lederman states that:
“This boson is so central to the state of physics today, so crucial to our final understanding of the structure of matter, yet so elusive, that I have given it a nickname: the God Particle. Why God Particle? Two reasons. One, the publisher wouldn’t let us call it the Goddam Particle, though that might be a more appropriate title, given its villainous nature and the expense it is causing. And two, there is a connection, of sorts, to another book, a much older one…
Lederman's book then goes on to quote Genesis 11:1-9, the Tower of Babel about mankind dispersing. Finding the "God Particle", he says, would be like undoing the the confusion that followed.
And what about the God Particle's connection to Intelligent Design? Well, who can dismiss the fact that an $8 billion machine built to create God Particles, extra spacial dimensions, black holes and other exotic bits of matter is not the product of an Intelligent Design. Only not the kind of Intelligent Design one associates when referring to God but the Intelligent Design of a large group of talented engineers.
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