I haven't exactly been keeping up with my 'check the news every week' resolution but this week I am and to be honest I couldn't have picked a better week! They are closer to finding the Higs Boson at LHC (Large Hadron Collider).
It is my understanding that the Higs Boson is basically a particle that allows matter to have mass. Although I don't think it is a particle like I automatically imagine because quarks aren't and I'm guessing quarks are made from Higs Bosons and stuff. Well, I don't exactly understand it all but one day I will! The search for the Higs Boson is vital because they are saying without it the standard model of the atom is seriously flawed...
They probably won't be able to make a definite statement about the discovery for about a year because apparently although they have found 'a spike' in their data they of course have to run many repeats and checks. They measure certainty with a sigma system where a 5 sigma is an acceptable discovery and 3 is just an observation.
I'll end with a joke about the Higs Boson; The Higs Boson walked into a church, the priest saw him and said 'you can't be in here, people call you the God particle - it is blasphemous' the Higs Boson turned to leave and said 'alright I'll go but without me you can't have mass' ba-dum-tshhh...
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