On Wed, 24 Sep 2008 11:21:18 -0600, somebody wrote:

> * I challenge anyone to provide a single practical application that the
> discovery of the top quark (mass) has enabled.
> 
> * I challenge anyone to provide a single practical application that the
> discovery of the top quark (mass) may one day enable. Top quark was
> discovered more than a decade ago at Fermilab, an older generation
> collider than LHC.

Straw man argument.  Assuming that there isn't one *yet* doesn't mean 
there will never be one.  Sometimes it takes years for discoveries like 
this to find their way into practical application.

> * Side effects and peripheral benefits does not justify an endavour of
> this magnitude. If you are going to suggest grid computing as a benefit,
> why not suggest pouring all 10 billion dollars into it? That would give
> much bigger and surer yields.

Until you actually *do* the research, you don't know what the benefits 
will be.  That's why it's called research.

> * Moon program (or in general, manned space exploration programs)
> are/were huge wastes of funds as well. If there were any merits to it,
> we would have visited the moon in the last 40 years. It was
> one-upmanship, clear and simple. Post-facto justifications,
> "space-age-technology" hype as a result is NASA trying to save face.

And yet at the same time, without having done the scientific research 
necessary to put a man in space (and on the moon), we wouldn't have done 
microgravity research at all - because we wouldn't have found it.

And of course the fact that new moon missions are planned should tell you 
that there was in fact some merit to doing it - since we're going again.

> * I'm not a science luddite. Far from it. However, not all science is
> equal, economically and ethically speaking. There are points where the
> law of diminishing returns makes certain pursuits - how shall I put it
> tactfully - stupid. Science without regard to the human factor is just
> stamp collecting.

So knowledge has no value?

> * Sure, most of mathematics is theoretical, but it's much, much cheaper
> to do mathematics, and one can pursue _many_ branches for a fraction of
> the cost. LHC is akin to spending 10 billion dollars to find the 10
> billionth prime. Sure, an impressive feat on paper, but a _singular_
> feat, and with no feasible practicle applications.

Huh, yeah, math is cheaper, so let's put the brain trust to work solving 
Jojo's theorem instead of working on something worthwhile like cancer 
research?  Again, you make an assumption about practical applications 
based on your knowledge and experience and on *now*, not on what might 
come in the coming years, or what might not if the research wasn't done.

> * Laymen are, unfortunately, impossibly confused about the depth and
> breadth of physics and media and publicists prey on this. HEP (high
> energy physics) is a deep, deep end, far removed from mostly applied
> branches of physcis such as quantum optics, quantum computing, condensed
> matter, solid state... etc. I would much welcome a 10 billion dollars
> investment in any or all of those fields, that have proven or at least
> feasible returns on investment.

So because it's too difficult for the layman to understand, it shouldn't 
be done?  That would nix most (if not all) cancer research, since the 
chance of the layman understanding it is practically nil.

> * Some of you claim "yes, but what if we scoffed at this or that
> research in the past..." To those, I remind you of Sagan's (yes, I'm
> aware of the irony, as I believe much of cosmology to be a waste of
> resources too) quote (paraphrased) : "They laughed at Galileo, they
> laughed at Einstein. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown". In other
> words, just because we benefited from expensive experiments in the past
> (though not many, if at all, at this magnitude), we cannot assume any
> expensive experiment is worthwhile. Each case needs to be investigated
> for its own merits.

At the same time, we can't assume any expensive experiment is *not* 
worthwhile.  Unless you've got a crystal ball that will tell you what's 
valuable and what isn't, you don't find out until you actually *do* it.

> * And it's not true that we did not foresee any practical applications
> for the major breakthroughs in the past. It's a romatic myth that
> scientists are always working against the grain and that science is
> completely an unpredicable and wild pursuit.

Sure.  But it's also not true that everything we did that brought a 
scientific breakthrough was predicted - yet those breakthroughs did occur 
because investment was made.  Does it always pay off?  No.  But until you 
do the experiment you won't know that - which is why investors decide 
what to put their money in and take a risk - they do a risk analysis and 
are looking for a return on that investment.  Sometimes it pans out.  
Sometimes it doesn't.

> * Having said that, there have been many dead ends in science too.
> History tends to push them under the rug. Spending has been limited,
> though. As the frontiers are pushed, ever more expensive experiments are
> needed.

Exactly.  But until you go down the road to a dead end, you won't always 
know that it *is* a dead end.  At the same time, very often what is 
learned by going down the road to a dead end helps you with the next 
experiment.  I would venture to say that it's incredibly rare for there 
to be *nothing* of value learned from doing an experiment, even if the 
science doesn't pan out, because you *always* learn from the process of 
doing the experiment.  *Always*.

> * Hence my question, what possible practical expectation is there from
> this experiment? Feel free to ask around. No honest scientist will give
> you an answer.

Sometimes you can't know until you do the experiment.  Just because 
there's no predicted practical application doesn't mean there won't be.

> * Finally, is anyone as naive to think that LHC will be the final
> experiment that explains everything? We have all the way to go to Planck
> energy (well, yes and no, there are suggestions we need not, which is a
> good thing, as we possibly cannot, but my general point is valid): LHC
> will at best answer some questions and posit some even finer ones. Do we
> then build a 10 trillion dollar collider? What about 10 zillion? Where
> do you draw the line in such a singleminded pursuit? For if you believe
> a line needs to be drawn, "where" is a valid question. If not, well,
> even if you don't closely follow high energy physics, you surely can
> agree on probabilistic grounds that it would be a fantastic coincidence
> for you and I to witness the end of physics.

If you can say with certainty what the result of the experiment will be 
without the experiment being done, then you should rent yourself out to 
these organizations, I'm sure they'd love to save lots of money by having 
you just tell them the outcome of every experiment before they actually 
do it.

Jim

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