Our universe might exist on a knife edge?

Discussion of the end of the world brought about by ultra high energy colliders.
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chelle
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Our universe might exist on a knife edge?

Post by chelle » Sat Dec 21, 2013 11:20 am

After that recent question by LSR about 'the vacuum bubble', I've been looking at what's going on lately, and came across this interesting 'End of the World' talk by Dr. Gian Giudice at TedxCern mainly about the Higgsfield:
http://www.ted.com/talks/gian_giudice_w ... _edge.html


I've posted him my *sparks* question (see below), curious if he might give some answers:

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I have a rather basic question/hypothesis about the LHC and the Higgsfield that I would like to ask you a question about, because in your talk you mentioned how edgy and narrow the margin is for life thanks to a 'perfect' temperature of the Higgsfield.

So here's my question; how much of a collision Flux can the Higgsfield take before starting to rattle matter up within the collision area ... sort of turning up the heat of the Higgsfield. Because as a reference the LHC has a Flux that is a billion time higher than anything we can witness in nature, except a BlackHole or SuperNova perhaps (see pic.).

The reason why I'm asking is because nothing of this sort of continuous pounding of the machine that might have an effect on its environment through 'vibrations/heat' in the Higgsfield seems to be discussed anywhere, and your talk is the first one that I encounter that talks about something slightly similar. The LHC is also like a magnifying glass so the more energy is focused at one point, the more the Higgsfield should start to be disturbed, with a Higgsboson here and there as a bubble that pop's up, but all matter within the area should also start to be weakened, just like vegetables start to be cooked in boiling water after some continuous heating, no?

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chelle
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Re: Our universe might exist on a knife edge?

Post by chelle » Sat Dec 21, 2013 5:15 pm

I got a reply from Dr. Giudice :)
So here's my question; how much of a collision Flux can the Higgsfield take before starting to rattle matter up within the collision area … sort of turning up the heat of the Higgsfield.
In order to destabilize the Higgs field you would need an enormous energy. Something that not only the LHC but no conceivable collider could do. However this was possible at the beginning of the universe, when the temperature was larger than 10^13 GeV.
Because as a reference the LHC has a Flux that is a billion time higher than anything we can witness in nature (except a BlackHole or SuperNova perhaps), I'm adding a graph to show the difference.
The actual energy of LHC collision is much smaller than that of the most energetic cosmic rays.
The reason why I'm asking is because nothing of this sort of continuous pounding of the machine that might have an effect on its environment through 'vibrations/heat' in the Higgsfield seems to be discussed anywhere, and your talk is the first one that I encounter that talks about something slightly similar.
No imaginable particle collision could destabilize the Higgs field. What you need is a coherent phenomenon, like that reached at high temperatures.
The LHC is also like a magnifying glass so the more energy is focused at one point, the more the Higgsfield should start to be disturbed, with a Higgsboson here and there as a bubble that pop's up, but all matter within the area should also start to be weakened, just like vegetables start to be cooked in boiling water after some continous heating, no?
You can produce a single quantum excitation (Higgs boson), but not a coherent effect on the field vev.
Dance, even if you have nowhere to do it but your own living room.
Wear Sunscreen by Baz Luhrmann - Mary Schmich

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