Recent content by ahrkron

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    Hello! Thanks! Was this an automatic greeting for long-absent members? Thanks for the greeting...

    Hello! Thanks! Was this an automatic greeting for long-absent members? Thanks for the greeting anyway! :-) Glad to see the forums still working after so many years. I'll try to drop by more often. Cheers.
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    CERN's Large Hadron Collider Makes Its First Beam Circulation

    In terms of the benefits from this endeavor: 1. The technologies developed for the analysis of the massive amount of LHC data may have a strong impact in the way people use computers (google for "the grid") 2. In the medium term, several thousands of solidly trained scientists will be able to...
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    CERN's Large Hadron Collider Makes Its First Beam Circulation

    If things go well, the first collisions may occur pretty soon, although at a relatively low energy. However, it should already be enough to do several fine-tunning tasks in all systems by searching for some well-known particles so that all instruments can be better calibrated; for example, by...
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    Is this an accurate representation?

    Either way, my point is that the video linked makes it look as if dimensions 4, 5, etc. have to do with time, histories, universes, and such, while ST refers to space-like dimensions (along which, as in regular special relativity, one can have Lorentz boosts that "mix" them with time,... but...
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    Is this an accurate representation?

    Not at all... the dimensions of string theory (ST) are ten (or so) space dimensions. The video you point to departs from possible analogies with String Theory when it starts looking at time as the fourth dimension (the analogy is fine up to then, but it would need to make the point that...
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    Nonlocality - fact or fiction?

    A macroscopic one, involving daily-life-size objects... which pretty much precludes any QM effects to show clearly, The reason locality is so strongly ingrained in our interpretation of the world is that it works so well for our interaction with all of the objects in our usual surroundings.
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    Why does a ball bounce back when thrown at a wall?

    One interesting point, marginally related with the issue, is that infinitely rigid objects are incompatible with special relativity. If you had a 1-km infinitely rigid rod, you could push one end to send a signal instantaneously to the other end.
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    How fun is particle physics research? (re:computation work)

    Also, take into account that "mostly computational work in C++" need not be a boring job. Particle physics is one of the subjects in which you can put to good use most of the advanced multivariate analysis techniques that have been created (neural networks, boosted decision trees, ad-hoc...
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    Higgs Particles: Big Mass, Bigger Detection Challenge?

    LHC is proton-proton. Fermilab's Tevatron is proton-antiproton.
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    Higgs boson detection is it possible as of 2008

    It is possible because, if the Higgs mechanism is the correct description of EWSB, then there should be a particle associated with it (the Higgs boson), the properties of which have been studied extensively for a number of years. A big part of making these measurements has to do precisely...
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    CDF ZZ Event Display: Lepton 1 Ambiguity

    I don't know the details of CDF electron identification, but I assume electrons are id'd based on calorimeter depositions, while muons depend on the muon chambers. If so, then the extra "debris" from the ppbar collision could have deposited enough energy in the calorimeter to pass the electron...
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    Gravity and the Space-Time Web

    I think he is referring to the fact that the explanation in terms of stretched nets seems to rely on gravity already working, so that the balls can make the dents. To some extent, such "explanation" is a petitio principii, but it is convenient because it's easy to imagine. The actual formal...
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    Pair creation and annihilation

    The wikipedia article is a nice starting point for this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casimir_effect There is also a beautiful picture related to it in http://antwrp.gsfc.nasa.gov/apod/ap061217.html
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    Measuring velocity and position of a particle

    You are already assuming then that you knew the original direction of the electron, but let's go on... The main problem here is that, in order to know that the electron came out in the same direction of the original electron, you again need to make a measurement of its momentum. It is...
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    LHC Magnet Test Failure: Latest Updates and Delay Information

    The problem is that total the energy in the havy ion collisions is shared among all the protons and neutrons on each ion nucleus, while the important quantity to make a Higgs is the energy of the two particles that interact strongly. Think of each heavy ion nucleus as two bags of marbles...
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