Higgs particle

[Mr_Moore]

Yesterday i saw a very interesting documentary regarding this that mostly focused on the competition between the us and Europe as to who would find it first.
They talked about the importance of finding it and how necessary it was for the development of physics.
They said that unless we find it, everything we knew about physics will crumble.

My first question is, if we do find it, what exactly could it mean for the development of physics?
If they fail to find it, what consequences will it have?

[soko]

My guess is the world will be 99.99% the same regardless of which way this thing goes.

[soko]

I guess I'll elaborate a little more. The existence of the particle is already assumed to be true from some physics calculations. Proving it's existence isn't THAT big of a deal unless you're a scientist.

[Splendour]

The NY Times on the race for the God particle:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/24/science/24ferm.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

[Max Raker]

I don't think finding it will change theoretical physics at all since pretty much all theories assume it exists. If they don't find it they will probably up the energy scale at which they expect to see it. I don't know of any theories that can replace the standard model that do not contain the Higgs particle.

Actually I was wrong about raising the energy scale. In the past thats what always has been done but though the standard model doesn't directly predict its mass, their is an upper bound above which it cannot be responsible for breaking electroweak symmetry. Current collide are at this energy.

[thylacine]

[ QUOTE ]
The NY Times on the race for the God particle:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/07/24/science/24ferm.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1

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In 10 years, when the LHC has found no new particles, it will be known as the oh-my-god-where-the-f*ck-is-it particle.

[Dr_Doctr]

[ QUOTE ]
My guess is the world will be 99.99% the same regardless of which way this thing goes.

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