3 ms·

I don't understand what's wrong with the article headline. For years, the theorists were ahead of the experimentalists and were just waiting for the Higgs to be

I don't understand what's wrong with the article headline. For years, the theorists were ahead of the experimentalists and were just waiting for the Higgs to be confirmed while they simply speculated about what might be next. This, for the first time in a long time, would put experimentalists ahead of theorists. That could easily 'crack wide open' a new set of theories to explain the possible particle. Hardly click-bait here, IMO - the content is sufficiently exciting relative to the headline.

pdonis 10y ago
> I don't understand what's wrong with the article headline. "Crack Wide Open" implies, to me, that this discovery somehow shows that particle physics is on a wrong track and needs to drastically change course. (In other comments I've pointed out statements in the article itself that give the same impression.) That's not the case at all. Particle physics has been stalled because of the lack of new experimental data to help theorists extend their models. This discovery, if it pans out, will help particle physics to start up again, exactly as particle physicists have wanted to do for quite some time.
- jessriedel 10y ago
  "Crack Wide Open" does not imply that at all. It implies a difficult problem that suddenly yields. When the police officer on the murder drama says this clue will "crack the case wide open", he doesn't mean they've been doing their police work wrong.
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  - pdonis 10y ago
    > "Crack Wide Open" does not imply that at all. In isolation, it might not. Taken by itself the phrase is open to multiple interpretations. But in the context of the article as a whole, I think it does.
    - erikpukinskis 10y ago
      I agree with jessriedel. I don't think the implication is there. I also think it's generally bad for discussion to do what you are doing, which is to latch on to a very specific interpretation of a single phrase, and pushing to get everyone else accept that interpretation, instead of taking other comments as additional information about how the words can be interpreted and allowing for those different interpretations to coexist.
      - pdonis 10y ago
        Personally, I think that what is bad for discussion is to do what Scientific American did, which is to talk about a scientific discovery in terms that make it seem much more radical than it really is, for no reason that I can see beyond trying to attract readers. The headline is only one aspect of that, as my other comments in this discussion (not just this subthread) should make clear.
- sebastos 10y ago
  Yes, particle physics has been stalled for some time, and suddenly a new piece of evidence is going to supply long awaited traction in creating a better explanation. In other words, it's going to crack wide open. You've never heard this phrase in the context of, say, a fictional detective talking about an unsolved murder? "I'm about to crack this case wide open!" Sounds to me like you just never quite understood what people meant by Crack Wide Open. It doesn't mean the theory is going to crack under pressure, forcing us to completely abandon it. It means deeper science, previously stuck inside a 'tough nut to crack', is finally going to be revealed. EDIT: wow, looks like somebody else had the same exact comment to make. At least it corroborates the point..
x1798DE 10y ago
> I don't understand what's wrong with the article headline. The issue to me with clickbait headlines in general is that they have zero information content. Think about how a decent scientific paper is structured - the title gives the broadest possible overview of the content, then the abstract gives a summary of the content, then the paper itself gives the details. To me, the ridiculously overstated nature of most clickbait headlines is the lesser problem.
btilly 10y ago
Only if theorists can come up with good ideas for what it is. This is not the first known violation of the standard theory. The standard theory did not predict neutrino mass, and did not predict neutrino oscillation.
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pdonis 10y ago

> I don't understand what's wrong with the article headline. "Crack Wide Open" implies, to me, that this discovery somehow shows that particle physics is on a wrong track and needs to drastically change course. (In other comments I've pointed out statements in the article itself that give the same impression.) That's not the case at all. Particle physics has been stalled because of the lack of new experimental data to help theorists extend their models. This discovery, if it pans out, will help particle physics to start up again, exactly as particle physicists have wanted to do for quite some time.

jessriedel 10y ago
"Crack Wide Open" does not imply that at all. It implies a difficult problem that suddenly yields. When the police officer on the murder drama says this clue will "crack the case wide open", he doesn't mean they've been doing their police work wrong.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- pdonis 10y ago
  > "Crack Wide Open" does not imply that at all. In isolation, it might not. Taken by itself the phrase is open to multiple interpretations. But in the context of the article as a whole, I think it does.
  - erikpukinskis 10y ago
    I agree with jessriedel. I don't think the implication is there. I also think it's generally bad for discussion to do what you are doing, which is to latch on to a very specific interpretation of a single phrase, and pushing to get everyone else accept that interpretation, instead of taking other comments as additional information about how the words can be interpreted and allowing for those different interpretations to coexist.
    - pdonis 10y ago
      Personally, I think that what is bad for discussion is to do what Scientific American did, which is to talk about a scientific discovery in terms that make it seem much more radical than it really is, for no reason that I can see beyond trying to attract readers. The headline is only one aspect of that, as my other comments in this discussion (not just this subthread) should make clear.
sebastos 10y ago
Yes, particle physics has been stalled for some time, and suddenly a new piece of evidence is going to supply long awaited traction in creating a better explanation. In other words, it's going to crack wide open. You've never heard this phrase in the context of, say, a fictional detective talking about an unsolved murder? "I'm about to crack this case wide open!" Sounds to me like you just never quite understood what people meant by Crack Wide Open. It doesn't mean the theory is going to crack under pressure, forcing us to completely abandon it. It means deeper science, previously stuck inside a 'tough nut to crack', is finally going to be revealed. EDIT: wow, looks like somebody else had the same exact comment to make. At least it corroborates the point..

x1798DE 10y ago

> I don't understand what's wrong with the article headline. The issue to me with clickbait headlines in general is that they have zero information content. Think about how a decent scientific paper is structured - the title gives the broadest possible overview of the content, then the abstract gives a summary of the content, then the paper itself gives the details. To me, the ridiculously overstated nature of most clickbait headlines is the lesser problem.

btilly 10y ago

Only if theorists can come up with good ideas for what it is. This is not the first known violation of the standard theory. The standard theory did not predict neutrino mass, and did not predict neutrino oscillation.

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