Over the last year or so, I’ve been, in the most nerdy way possible, increasingly excited about the impending start-up of the LHC (the Large Hadron Collider). As a result of this excitement, I have subjected more than one person to an enthusiastic and long-winded outpouring of amateur particle physics that I barely understand.

But I can’t help it. I’m excited. This is, by certain measures, the largest machine ever constructed. It is designed to collect data that will, in theory, illuminate some very basic things about our universe.
And if that weren’t enough, Dr. Brian Cox, who is currently my favorite rock-star astrophysicist (sorry Dr. deGrasse Tyson), is working at the LHC.

A lot of news about the LHC has focused on the supposed danger of the collisions in the accelerator causing the formation of black holes that will destroy the world or even the universe. This is misguided fear. Although the level of energy that the LHC will allow scientists to work with, is of an order of magnitude larger than what has been possible before, it is a level of energy that is common in the wild. Particle collisions like the ones that will happen in the LHC are happening in our atmosphere all the time, due to solar radiation. The LHC will allow us to actually observe and collect data on a very common phenomenon. Although from a strictly scientific standpoint, it is not impossible that a dangerous black hole will be formed, it is on an order of probability so low that it hasn’t happened yet (that we know of) in our atmosphere.

More interestingly to me than the black hole is the “hole” in the Standard Model. The Standard Model is a complicated but relatively elegant mathematical equation that accounts for… everything. It is a mathematical description of reality as we know it. And although it fits on one page, there’s a hole in it. There is a section of it that demands the existence of a particle that we have yet to observe. This is the Higgs Boson particle. It is a theoretical particle. It is a marker in the standard model that allows it to work. Without the Higgs Boson, the standard model has no way to explain why matter has mass.

Like any large scientific endeavor, no one knows what the data that the LHC will allow us to collect will reveal. But there is little doubt that it will either confirm or deny the existence of the Higgs Boson particle. If it confirms it and we see the little dude, then the Standard Model is stronger, and we move on. If it denies it, then we’re really in for some exciting stuff. It means we have to re-think a whole lot of things. Either way we win. That’s the beauty of science.

The Higgs thing is just one of a whole raft of stuff that will be worked on with this dilly.

I’m a complete amateur with this stuff. I look at the standard model and I can’t understand it AT ALL. But my life is filled with things I don’t understand, and that doesn’t diminish my excitement for them. This is pure research. Aimed at answering fundamental questions. And although the stuff that is found will have military and commercial ramifications, it is not a military project. It is not a corporate project. I think this is to be celebrated. I think it’s exciting.

And if you’re still stuck on this: Yes. I have favorite rock-star astrophysicists.

If this means that I’m a nerd then I embrace that.

Here’s a vid that’s been getting a lot of play lately, in case you haven’t seen it: