4 ms·

Can this be used for neutrino detection? Instead of ice + light sensor, you use sweatshop + human. Someone should do the math, perhaps in the right country it i

Can this be used for neutrino detection? Instead of ice + light sensor, you use sweatshop + human. Someone should do the math, perhaps in the right country it is cheaper to use mass indentured labor than electronics. (This is just a thought experiment, I am not supporting sweatshops)

flukus 10y ago
I think the mental pressures from confining people into completely dark rooms underground for hours on end might produce some false positives. Probably wouldn't tell us much about the characteristics of the light either.
- dalke 10y ago
  We've done it before. Geiger and Marsden were the first to observe what is now often called the Rutherford gold foil experiment, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geiger%E2%80%93Marsden_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geiger%E2%80%93Marsden_experim... . They used a microscope to look at the flashes of fluorescent light created after the alpha particle scatters from the foil. (We could repeat this experiment in upper-level physics lab class. The teacher said it takes about 20 minutes for the eye to become sensitive enough to see flashes. He said then that the eye could see a single photon. Looking around now, I confirmed that papers of the time only said that was needed no more than 10 quanta.) So while there may be some false positives, it's not high enough to make it useless.
antognini 10y ago
I seem to remember doing a similar problem in an order of magnitude astrophysics class I took. We calculated that there were good odds that at least one person on the planet detected a neutrino from Tycho's supernova when it interacted with the vitreous body of the eyeball. (This is from memory, so don't quote me on it --- I may have remembered the sign wrong!)
Cerium 10y ago
This concept is explored in Neal Stephenson's Anathem. To avoid spoilers, I will be vague. One of the orders in the novel runs such an experiment. They have many people watching a pool or water or ice, and they independently record flashes they may see. If everyone sees the same thing, then they have captured a neutrino.
- ajuc 10y ago
  That book is awesome sci-fi for so many reasons.
Ankaios 10y ago
Someone should do the math, perhaps in the right country it is cheaper to use mass indentured labor than electronics. We prefer to call them "grad students." They also tend to be good at making cheap electronics.
nkrisc 10y ago
Yeah let's just pack a bunch of people into a 1 kilometer cube to detect some neutrinos!
- coldpie 10y ago
  While that's obviously hilariously unethical, we are beginning to use biology in combination with machines to real effect. I wonder if we couldn't breed useful biological detectors and skip having to engineer them.

flukus 10y ago

I think the mental pressures from confining people into completely dark rooms underground for hours on end might produce some false positives. Probably wouldn't tell us much about the characteristics of the light either.

dalke 10y ago
We've done it before. Geiger and Marsden were the first to observe what is now often called the Rutherford gold foil experiment, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geiger%E2%80%93Marsden_experiment https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geiger%E2%80%93Marsden_experim... . They used a microscope to look at the flashes of fluorescent light created after the alpha particle scatters from the foil. (We could repeat this experiment in upper-level physics lab class. The teacher said it takes about 20 minutes for the eye to become sensitive enough to see flashes. He said then that the eye could see a single photon. Looking around now, I confirmed that papers of the time only said that was needed no more than 10 quanta.) So while there may be some false positives, it's not high enough to make it useless.

antognini 10y ago

I seem to remember doing a similar problem in an order of magnitude astrophysics class I took. We calculated that there were good odds that at least one person on the planet detected a neutrino from Tycho's supernova when it interacted with the vitreous body of the eyeball. (This is from memory, so don't quote me on it --- I may have remembered the sign wrong!)

Cerium 10y ago

This concept is explored in Neal Stephenson's Anathem. To avoid spoilers, I will be vague. One of the orders in the novel runs such an experiment. They have many people watching a pool or water or ice, and they independently record flashes they may see. If everyone sees the same thing, then they have captured a neutrino.

ajuc 10y ago
That book is awesome sci-fi for so many reasons.

Ankaios 10y ago

Someone should do the math, perhaps in the right country it is cheaper to use mass indentured labor than electronics. We prefer to call them "grad students." They also tend to be good at making cheap electronics.

nkrisc 10y ago

Yeah let's just pack a bunch of people into a 1 kilometer cube to detect some neutrinos!

coldpie 10y ago
While that's obviously hilariously unethical, we are beginning to use biology in combination with machines to real effect. I wonder if we couldn't breed useful biological detectors and skip having to engineer them.