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As a former experimental particle physicist, I don't think string theory or supersymmetry is going to be a description of nature. I say that despite spending a

As a former experimental particle physicist, I don't think string theory or supersymmetry is going to be a description of nature. I say that despite spending a couple of years searching for SUSY. But I still think the cost of building a LHC++ (that is, the FCC or the SPPC) is justified. The current theoretical "dead end" or maybe swamp fundamental physics is in is precisely due to a lack of data. Of course, there are a lot of smaller experiments that one could do, also in particle physics, that have great value. One example was the Muon g-2 measurement, another is anything neutrino physics. We can get a lot of interesting input and test our theories without going to the "energy frontier". Physicists understand this very well. But there are a bunch of questions that you can only really answer if you go to those higer energies. As for the costs, 100 billion is a lot, but not when you compare it to other large infrastructure projects, or especially military spending (and note the Chinese proposal SPPC would be a lot cheaper!). I think if we could shave off 100 billion of military expenses and put it into basic research, it would be a great win for society. That's not realistic you say, with all the threats out there? Great, I agree, but now we have a nice project! Lets put as a common goal that we want to be able to do this kind of research, and then improve our societies nationally and globally so that we can reduce our military spending and do this kind of research. 100 billion ($/€) is the amount that Germany is spending as a special budget in response to Russia's aggression, in order to become the nation with the 3rd highest military spending on the planet. If it weren't for the war in Ukraine, we could put it all into such a project. If we had averted COVID in it's early stages - like we did with SARS-1 and MERS - imagine all the resources we could have put into research instead.

magicalhippo 4y ago
But if you have say 100 billion, why put it into "yet another collider" rather than say condensed matter physics and quantum information research? To me, a non-physicist, it seems those areas have a lot more potential to deliver science that will benefits us. Alternatively, if one really wants to pursue beyond the standard model physics, it seems to me multi-messenger astronomy has a much better chance of delivering decisive data, so shouldn't we put that money into better observatories?
- threeseed 4y ago
  > But if you have say 100 billion, why put it into "yet another collider" rather than say condensed matter physics and quantum information research? Because the only reason you have $100 billion to spend is that it's a large scale infrastructure project. And that money is trickling down to member states through contracts to a mix of businesses who hire white and blue collar workers. It is equal part economic stimulus, political marketing and scientific research. You can't just ask for the last part and ignore the first two.
- SiempreViernes 4y ago
  First of all, the proposed design is estimated to cost 21 billion EUR. Secondly condensed matter and quantum information already get plenty of money: superconductivity alone is a market worth around 5 billion dollars, google is spending billions of its own money into quantum computers. But sure, lets give these starving fields that produce commercial products a some tax-payer dollars at the slight cost of completely de funding high energy physics, I'm sure that will get the scientist there to care about the proton despite them very consciously choosing to do something else.

magicalhippo 4y ago

But if you have say 100 billion, why put it into "yet another collider" rather than say condensed matter physics and quantum information research? To me, a non-physicist, it seems those areas have a lot more potential to deliver science that will benefits us. Alternatively, if one really wants to pursue beyond the standard model physics, it seems to me multi-messenger astronomy has a much better chance of delivering decisive data, so shouldn't we put that money into better observatories?

threeseed 4y ago
> But if you have say 100 billion, why put it into "yet another collider" rather than say condensed matter physics and quantum information research? Because the only reason you have $100 billion to spend is that it's a large scale infrastructure project. And that money is trickling down to member states through contracts to a mix of businesses who hire white and blue collar workers. It is equal part economic stimulus, political marketing and scientific research. You can't just ask for the last part and ignore the first two.
SiempreViernes 4y ago
First of all, the proposed design is estimated to cost 21 billion EUR. Secondly condensed matter and quantum information already get plenty of money: superconductivity alone is a market worth around 5 billion dollars, google is spending billions of its own money into quantum computers. But sure, lets give these starving fields that produce commercial products a some tax-payer dollars at the slight cost of completely de funding high energy physics, I'm sure that will get the scientist there to care about the proton despite them very consciously choosing to do something else.