Comment by tzs | Hacker News Reader

Comment by tzs | Hacker News Reader

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What kind of game changing things are you thinking of? Colliders help us learn what model is correct (or rather let us eliminate incorrect models) of very low level physics. We don't remotely have any technology to do anything with physics at that low a level, so isn't knowing which model may be correct pretty much going to remain of theoretical and philosophical interest only?

It's good to figure that out, but it isn't going to change anything about our higher level understanding of physics is it? By higher level I mean the physics that affects chemistry and biology and material properties of interest to engineers, and things like that.

A good strong space program, on the other hand, can give us over the next 100-200 years clean energy (solar collected from space stations, beamed to Earth), resources (asteroid and lunar mining), better instruments for astronomy (useful for answering philosophical questions about the origin and ultimate fate of the universe that are arguably as interesting as the questions colliders can help answer), better materials through zero G manufacturing, and perhaps a defense against the next big meteor or comet based mass extinction.

At some point electromagnetism was a "low level" theory, but now you've taken advantage of all that basic research by typing that comment up in a computer and publishing it for the world to see. The practical application of this sort of stuff is rarely obvious, and sometimes decades out, but it's certainly there.

Same for quantum mechanics.

To understand semiconductors properly, you need quantum mechanics - once an obscure theory that Einstein never accepted.

Today's hard discs rely on the Giant Magnetoresistance (GMR), an effect based on the spin polarizations of electrons. Spin is a property that can only be understood with quantum mechanics, there's no proper classic theory (and I guess there never will be) of spin.

I disagree that electromagnetism was ever a "low level" theory in the sense that I'm using. What I mean by a high level theory is that it deals with things that we can reasonably manipulate and interact with in an extended fashion.

What I mean by a low level theory is something that deals with the very lowest level building blocks of the universe--things that are locked away inside the "elementary" particles, or that mediate forces like the strong force. We can, with enough energy, coax them out to play--for microseconds, and in small quantity.

I'm not saying we shouldn't be doing research into the low level stuff. I'd just like to see something more concrete than "game changing potential for us as a species" to justify the argument that the SSC would have been a better project to fund than the ISS, given that we couldn't have both.

What an absurd comment. Newtonian physics seemed sufficient and special and general relativity seemed academic until we applied them both to build GPS. You stand on the giant shoulders of theoretical physicists from the moment you open your eyes every morning. How dare you deny them any available tool to continue to keep you in the style to which you've become accustomed.

All the applied research and aerospace programs you're referring to would not have been possible without the strong foundation that theoretical research provided.

Think you're going to build a star drive by continuing to throw matter in the opposite direction as fast as you can? Some hard working theorist who you deem to be too philosophical could be coming up with the fundamental laws of nature that we need to go to the stars if guys like you hadn't denied funding for the SSC.

Bear in mind that investment in space was also pretty important for the development of GPS.

> How dare you deny them any available tool to continue to keep you in the style to which you've become accustomed.

Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be pushed back by scientists with particle accelerators. Who's gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have a greater responsibility than you could possibly fathom. You weep for the funding, and you curse the Higgs boson. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That the funding's expense, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while nerdy and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don't want the truth because deep down in places you don't talk about at parties, you want me pushing on that wall, you need me pushing on that wall. We use words like spin, fermions, color. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent figuring out something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very theory that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a textbook, and learn some theory. Either way, I don't give a damn what you think you are entitled to.

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