Gian Giudice, a theoretical physicist, delivered a very interesting talk about the seemingly precarious situation that our entire universe is in. I first heard about the Higgs boson particle, I knew that it was a huge leap in theoretical physics, but I had no idea what kind of effect it would have on the way that we look at the universe. The Higgs boson particle was observed in the particle accelerator when scientists collided protons. This particle seems to prove that the Higgs field, a big cloud of undetectable, omnipresent energy that gives matter its mass.
All of this wouldn't be very interesting, except for how closely it relates to our lives. The Higgs field has a consistent density that makes particles have just the right mass, but also allows them to have such a mass, that they can actually stay together. Giudice explained that, if the field had a density only double what it is, the only possible element would be Hydrogen, and we would not exist.
Another phenomenon that you need to understand, is the Ultra-dense Higgs field. This field is like the normal Higgs field's evil twin, billions of times denser than the normal field. This field, because of something called Quantum Tunneling, can basically jump around throughout the universe. Giudice explained it like a bubble in boiling water, it appears, almost out of nowhere and grows until it reaches the surface. In a similar way, the ultra-dense field pops up in any place in the universe and expands at light speed until it, again, pops into a new place in the universe. The issue with this is that if it popped up next to earth, we would be destroyed completely and all of the atoms in it's grasp would dissociate and be destroyed, but the likelihood is very low.
As Guidice put it, our universe is like a group of campers that pitched their tent on the edge of the cliff, and its on loose dirt. He revealed that we really have nothing to worry about, because we would be long gone before there is even a small chance of it coming to us. In all, the talk was very interesting, and Guidice proved his absolute genius, while keeping a sense of humor alive.
We live on a knife's edge
Hey Bobby, I'd never though I'd be reading about physics on a literature blog! I've also heard a little bit about the Higgs particle, or the "God" particle as people like to call it, but never really educated myself, so thanks for teaching me! I'm no theoretical physicist, nor do I know a thing about quantum physics in general, but what if they were able to harness a much much much smaller version of the Ultra-dense Higgs field and find a way to use it to teleport other particles around it to other places. I'm sure that's impossible, but just a thought.
ReplyDeleteHey Bobby, this was a pretty sick topic. I had never heard anything about this before, even though the topics of space and the universe really interest me. The idea of there being no end to space honestly kind of freaks me out, where if I think about it for too long, I start to feel crazy. It's pretty cool that this thing can pop up all around the universe, randomly. What Nick said about harnessing something smaller but with the same general stuff going on to use to teleport things, sounds totally impossible, but really cool if it were a thing.
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