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While it is one project it also is an umbrella to fund a large number of smaller projects. Whole institutes were funded and build in part to develop detector co

While it is one project it also is an umbrella to fund a large number of smaller projects. Whole institutes were funded and build in part to develop detector components for the LHC. A project like this gives everyone a common goal and pushes technology development in sectors that are critical to Europe's high tech economy. It also has consequences for the IT sector in Europe. Before cloud companies had to deal with PetaBytes of data, scientists at CERN and elsewhere developed techniques for filtering, storing and analysing this data with sophisticated statistical tools (and machine learning). You can easily scale your analysis run to thousands of machines all over the world and transparently get access to the huge experiment datastore. There is no other scientific field in Europe that has developed a similar level of sophistication and scale. The initial idea behind the Human Brain Project was to build a similar infrastructure for Neuroscience research. But instead of the cooperation in Particle Physics it resulted in fierce opposition, out of fear that funding would be shifted away from national funding agencies and independent researchers and doubts over the ambitious goals of the project. If you think about it a project like CERN, that successfully contributed to understanding of the fundamental forces of nature is in some ways much more ambitious than a centralised program to understand the Human brain. But the latter got badly derailed multiple times simply because the participants did not have the single minded will, focus and consensus that the Particle Physics community has been able to maintain for almost 70 years now.

JumpCrisscross 6y ago
> it also is an umbrella to fund a large number of smaller projects Then justify the spending on those merits. Spending for the sake of spending isn’t a great argument. Why is a new supercollider a better use of resources than, say, a new telescope? Or a suite of gravitational wave or neutrino detectors? A host of fusion research reactors? The opportunity cost of spending shouldn’t be ignored just because it isn’t entirely useless.
- orbifold 6y ago
  Because sometimes it is better to keep a large number of people occupied with one specific goal instead of trying to convince them to do something else. This ultimately boils down to people, most of them are very smart and capable and could do any number of other things, but basically want to work on fundamental particle physics. You couldn't easily convince them to build a telescope instead (a totally different set of people finds that fascinating) or any of the other things you listed. Besides there are (smaller) collaborations that work on all of these other things you mentioned as well. Furthermore there is good motivation to keep nuclear / particle physics research as centrally organised as possible because the people working on it would be equally capable of producing nuclear weapons. For example a good number of the people working with CERN in France sit right across the Institute that developed their nuclear weapons.
  - vikramkr 6y ago
    I dont think the idea is to keep these particle physicists occupied. I think the idea is to fund other underfunded areas of physics while the particle physicists keep playing with the LHC.
- vidarh 6y ago
  It's not either or. E.g. ITER cost more than LHC, and the successor to ITER is in the works with construction expected to start years before this new collider would. $23bn is a lot of money, but it also is a pittance when you're planning a project that will take ~30 years to be operational. E.g. for comparison the EU is planning ~$100bn for its science programs for the next 7 years; on top of that all the member states have their own projects, and non-EU European states have their own science funding. As such, we're talking low single digits percent of overall European science funding, but even so CERN may not be able to fund $23bn from their own funding alone, and may seek out international sources of funding for this project.
  - avar 6y ago
    It's really not low single digit. Firstly it's a proposal for ~€100bn (not ~$100bn), the current program is ~€80bn. Secondly if you look at the spending[1] more than 50% of it by any reasonable measure is "soft" science funding (such as reinvesting in high-tech industry). I'm happy CERN is doing it's thing, but let's not hide the ball here, any way you look at it it's a huge portion of the EU's fundamental science research budget. 1. https://www.fch.europa.eu/sites/default/files/Horizon%20Europe%20-%20The%20next%20EU%20Research%20%26%20Innovation%20Programme%20-%20Petrova%20%28ID%204761634%29.pdf https://www.fch.europa.eu/sites/default/files/Horizon%20Euro...
    - vidarh 6y ago
      > Firstly it's a proposal for ~€100bn (not ~$100bn), the current program is ~€80bn. €100bn is $113bn; ~€80bn is $90bn. $100bn is close enough. > It's really not low single digit. EU budget != European science funding. The $100bn number was used to illustrate that the amount is not that huge, with the addition that "on top of that all the member states have their own projects, and non-EU European states have their own science funding." As I pointed out elsewhere, e.g. Norway, which is one of the 23 CERN members but not an EU member, has an annual R&D budget of $6bn. Over the roughly 30 year period of this project, that's $180bn. Even if you assume half of that is what you consider "soft" funding (quite likely), Norway alone could fund all of CERN and this new collider (of course that would devastate Norway's other science programs). As it stands, Norway's contribution to CERN is about $30m/year, which adds up to the highest per capita contribution of any CERN member. The UK for example pays less than half as much per capita. It is overall likely (I haven't checked) that CERN adds up to less than a single percent of the science budgets of its member states alone. The CERN member states make up less than half of European countries (though most of the biggest and richest), so it's fairly safe to assume it takes up less than a percent of overall European science funding.

JumpCrisscross 6y ago

> it also is an umbrella to fund a large number of smaller projects Then justify the spending on those merits. Spending for the sake of spending isn’t a great argument. Why is a new supercollider a better use of resources than, say, a new telescope? Or a suite of gravitational wave or neutrino detectors? A host of fusion research reactors? The opportunity cost of spending shouldn’t be ignored just because it isn’t entirely useless.

orbifold 6y ago
Because sometimes it is better to keep a large number of people occupied with one specific goal instead of trying to convince them to do something else. This ultimately boils down to people, most of them are very smart and capable and could do any number of other things, but basically want to work on fundamental particle physics. You couldn't easily convince them to build a telescope instead (a totally different set of people finds that fascinating) or any of the other things you listed. Besides there are (smaller) collaborations that work on all of these other things you mentioned as well. Furthermore there is good motivation to keep nuclear / particle physics research as centrally organised as possible because the people working on it would be equally capable of producing nuclear weapons. For example a good number of the people working with CERN in France sit right across the Institute that developed their nuclear weapons.
- vikramkr 6y ago
  I dont think the idea is to keep these particle physicists occupied. I think the idea is to fund other underfunded areas of physics while the particle physicists keep playing with the LHC.
vidarh 6y ago
It's not either or. E.g. ITER cost more than LHC, and the successor to ITER is in the works with construction expected to start years before this new collider would. $23bn is a lot of money, but it also is a pittance when you're planning a project that will take ~30 years to be operational. E.g. for comparison the EU is planning ~$100bn for its science programs for the next 7 years; on top of that all the member states have their own projects, and non-EU European states have their own science funding. As such, we're talking low single digits percent of overall European science funding, but even so CERN may not be able to fund $23bn from their own funding alone, and may seek out international sources of funding for this project.
- avar 6y ago
  It's really not low single digit. Firstly it's a proposal for ~€100bn (not ~$100bn), the current program is ~€80bn. Secondly if you look at the spending[1] more than 50% of it by any reasonable measure is "soft" science funding (such as reinvesting in high-tech industry). I'm happy CERN is doing it's thing, but let's not hide the ball here, any way you look at it it's a huge portion of the EU's fundamental science research budget. 1. https://www.fch.europa.eu/sites/default/files/Horizon%20Europe%20-%20The%20next%20EU%20Research%20%26%20Innovation%20Programme%20-%20Petrova%20%28ID%204761634%29.pdf https://www.fch.europa.eu/sites/default/files/Horizon%20Euro...
  - vidarh 6y ago
    > Firstly it's a proposal for ~€100bn (not ~$100bn), the current program is ~€80bn. €100bn is $113bn; ~€80bn is $90bn. $100bn is close enough. > It's really not low single digit. EU budget != European science funding. The $100bn number was used to illustrate that the amount is not that huge, with the addition that "on top of that all the member states have their own projects, and non-EU European states have their own science funding." As I pointed out elsewhere, e.g. Norway, which is one of the 23 CERN members but not an EU member, has an annual R&D budget of $6bn. Over the roughly 30 year period of this project, that's $180bn. Even if you assume half of that is what you consider "soft" funding (quite likely), Norway alone could fund all of CERN and this new collider (of course that would devastate Norway's other science programs). As it stands, Norway's contribution to CERN is about $30m/year, which adds up to the highest per capita contribution of any CERN member. The UK for example pays less than half as much per capita. It is overall likely (I haven't checked) that CERN adds up to less than a single percent of the science budgets of its member states alone. The CERN member states make up less than half of European countries (though most of the biggest and richest), so it's fairly safe to assume it takes up less than a percent of overall European science funding.