WEBVTT - Rerun: Working with the Large Hadron Collider 0:00:04.400 --> 0:00:07.800 Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio. 0:00:12.039 --> 0:00:15.040 Hey there, and welcome to tech Stuff. I'm your host, 0:00:15.160 --> 0:00:18.120 Jonathan Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio, 0:00:18.560 --> 0:00:22.680 and usually I love all things tech, but today I'm 0:00:22.760 --> 0:00:26.200 having some issues, been having some technical glitches that I've 0:00:26.239 --> 0:00:31.040 been trying to fix, and unfortunately it means that the 0:00:31.080 --> 0:00:33.839 episode I had planned today, which was a follow up 0:00:34.360 --> 0:00:38.720 an additional space suit episode, is probably gonna have to 0:00:38.760 --> 0:00:41.600 wait till tomorrow. I'm going to My plan is to 0:00:41.640 --> 0:00:44.760 have that one published instead of a tech News episode. 0:00:45.360 --> 0:00:47.840 But I don't want to leave you without an episode 0:00:48.159 --> 0:00:51.519 of the show, so I thought we would play this 0:00:51.560 --> 0:00:56.000 episode that originally published on January seven, two thousand nineteen. 0:00:56.640 --> 0:00:59.960 It's an episode where Daniel Whiteson of Daniel and Jorge 0:01:00.200 --> 0:01:04.319 Explain the Universe, joined the show to talk about his 0:01:04.440 --> 0:01:09.520 work in experimental particle physics and how his work with 0:01:09.560 --> 0:01:13.840 a large Hadron collider what it was like. And you know, 0:01:14.560 --> 0:01:17.679 if we're going to talk about technical glitches, the LHC 0:01:18.000 --> 0:01:22.000 is a good topic because that's an entire, you know, 0:01:22.440 --> 0:01:26.800 particle acceleration facility that had more than its share of 0:01:26.840 --> 0:01:32.520 technical difficulties, including you know, reportedly birds. But I hope 0:01:32.560 --> 0:01:35.800 you enjoy this episode and I'll be back to chat 0:01:35.840 --> 0:01:39.920 with you again towards the end. Today we have a 0:01:40.160 --> 0:01:45.520 very special guest on our show, someone who has worked 0:01:46.200 --> 0:01:50.680 on really interesting problems. Is a rare occasion that I 0:01:50.720 --> 0:01:54.040 get to talk to someone who has experienced in high 0:01:54.360 --> 0:01:59.000 energy particle physics. So I want to introduce to all 0:01:59.040 --> 0:02:01.960 of you, if you haven't listen to his amazing podcast yet, 0:02:02.160 --> 0:02:06.720 Daniel Whitson. Dr Daniel Whitson, Welcome to the show. Hi, 0:02:06.840 --> 0:02:08.839 thanks a lot for having me on. I am so 0:02:08.919 --> 0:02:12.600 glad to have you here now. Daniel. You are one 0:02:12.720 --> 0:02:16.800 half of the podcast team of Daniel and Jorge Explained 0:02:16.840 --> 0:02:20.040 the Universe, and thank you for taking time away from 0:02:20.040 --> 0:02:24.960 explaining the universe to grace my humble show with your presence. 0:02:24.960 --> 0:02:27.920 I greatly appreciate it. Well, thanks a lot for having 0:02:27.919 --> 0:02:30.440 me on. You guys talking about really fascinating stuff. So 0:02:30.480 --> 0:02:33.760 it's a pleasure to be here. It's been a pleasure 0:02:33.840 --> 0:02:35.840 listening to your show. We'll talk a little bit more 0:02:35.840 --> 0:02:38.320 about that towards the end of the episode, but just 0:02:38.400 --> 0:02:42.720 so that my listeners kind of understand where you you're 0:02:42.800 --> 0:02:46.560 coming from before we get into work with the Large 0:02:46.560 --> 0:02:50.320 Hadron Collider and CERN and particle physics. Tell us a 0:02:50.320 --> 0:02:53.720 bit about yourself, all right, Well, I'm devastatingly good looking, 0:02:53.919 --> 0:02:57.079 which is why I have a podcast, and m familiar 0:02:57.160 --> 0:03:01.239 my my. The most important thing to know about me 0:03:01.280 --> 0:03:03.280 in this context, I guess, is that I am a 0:03:03.360 --> 0:03:07.200 high energy physicist, which means that I'm interested in studying 0:03:07.200 --> 0:03:10.760 the universe at the smallest scale, and I do so 0:03:10.919 --> 0:03:14.280 by smashing stuff together at the highest energy. It's like, 0:03:14.360 --> 0:03:16.240 you know, you want to understand how things work, take 0:03:16.280 --> 0:03:18.720 them apart, and that's basically what we do, is we 0:03:18.760 --> 0:03:21.320 try to take the whole universe apart and understand how 0:03:21.360 --> 0:03:24.400 it works. So I'm a professor at the University of 0:03:24.440 --> 0:03:29.040 California at Irvine that's in Orange County, and I work there, 0:03:29.080 --> 0:03:31.600 and I work also at the Large Hadron Collider in Geneva, 0:03:31.800 --> 0:03:35.120 where the actual collider is, and we have a big 0:03:35.160 --> 0:03:37.800 team of people smashing particles together and trying to figure 0:03:37.840 --> 0:03:40.080 out what is the smallest bit of matter and how 0:03:40.080 --> 0:03:42.640 does it all fit together? And where how did everything 0:03:42.720 --> 0:03:44.880 start and how is it going to end? And we 0:03:44.960 --> 0:03:48.560 basically try to tackle those really big, sexy questions. Yeah, 0:03:48.640 --> 0:03:52.280 I I love the way you describe that, the idea 0:03:52.360 --> 0:03:56.360 of taking apart the very basic particles that make up 0:03:56.720 --> 0:04:00.360 stuff and and and finding out what makes at work. 0:04:00.400 --> 0:04:04.240 It's very relatable to all the stories of the various 0:04:04.280 --> 0:04:08.280 innovators who got their start taking apart the various pieces 0:04:08.280 --> 0:04:12.160 of technology they have, often to the the detriment of 0:04:12.240 --> 0:04:14.600 their family, and then learning how it works, and then 0:04:14.600 --> 0:04:16.680 hopefully being able to put it back together again. Except 0:04:17.040 --> 0:04:21.680 we're looking at reality here, how the the very fabric 0:04:22.120 --> 0:04:26.000 that makes up existence works. And uh. I also I 0:04:26.040 --> 0:04:30.640 watched a great presentation that you and Jorge gave in 0:04:30.680 --> 0:04:34.200 which you talked about your book and you talked about 0:04:34.400 --> 0:04:38.840 the gaps and scientific knowledge, and that also made me 0:04:38.920 --> 0:04:42.800 feel like I am all a smart person, only because 0:04:42.839 --> 0:04:46.080 in the past I have described our understanding of the 0:04:46.160 --> 0:04:49.599 universe like we're staring through a key hole and we 0:04:49.640 --> 0:04:52.600 can only see a little bit of the illuminated room 0:04:52.640 --> 0:04:55.520 that's beyond the keyhole, and there's stuff and shadows, So 0:04:55.520 --> 0:04:58.280 there are things that we don't really see, and there 0:04:57.839 --> 0:05:00.560 are elements that are out of you and and to us. 0:05:00.600 --> 0:05:02.880 That's that's our understanding of the universe. We only see 0:05:02.880 --> 0:05:07.400 a very narrow band of what really exists out there, 0:05:07.880 --> 0:05:13.120 and our goal is to expand that over time. That's right, 0:05:13.200 --> 0:05:16.080 and the most amazing thing in my perspective is that 0:05:16.120 --> 0:05:19.799 we've only recently discovered that we are looking through the keyhole. 0:05:19.839 --> 0:05:21.280 I mean, for a long time we thought we were 0:05:21.279 --> 0:05:23.520 saying everything. We thought, well, we've seen the way the 0:05:23.640 --> 0:05:25.440 universe is. Now, we just need to figure out how 0:05:25.480 --> 0:05:27.640 to explain it. We made a lot of progress and 0:05:27.680 --> 0:05:30.799 the last fifty year, in the last twenty or fifty years, 0:05:31.040 --> 0:05:33.120 we've discovered that there's a lot of stuff out there 0:05:33.160 --> 0:05:36.880 that we don't have any understanding of, dark matter, dark energy, 0:05:37.360 --> 0:05:41.600 huge chunks of the universe which completely defy our our explanation. 0:05:41.800 --> 0:05:43.880 That doesn't mean it can't be explained. You don't have 0:05:43.920 --> 0:05:46.479 to go to like weird woo woo crystal energy stuff. 0:05:46.480 --> 0:05:48.920 It just means that there's a lot more science left 0:05:49.000 --> 0:05:51.680 to do. And for me, those are wonderful moments in 0:05:51.720 --> 0:05:53.840 the history of science when you you know, you pull 0:05:53.880 --> 0:05:56.799 back a layer of reality and discover, oh my gosh, wow, 0:05:56.839 --> 0:05:59.680 things are totally different from what we expected, or you know, 0:05:59.720 --> 0:06:02.039 turn is out we were only studying the the tail 0:06:02.120 --> 0:06:03.560 of the elephant, and we need to look at the 0:06:03.600 --> 0:06:06.359 rest of it. And and that's exciting, not because the 0:06:06.400 --> 0:06:09.320 science is humbled and realizing that we don't understand everything, 0:06:09.360 --> 0:06:12.360 that's that's a wonderful experience. It's exciting because it means 0:06:12.360 --> 0:06:15.559 there are discoveries left to come, right, means that maybe 0:06:15.600 --> 0:06:19.400 some of the most dramatic, most insightful realizations about the 0:06:19.480 --> 0:06:21.640 nature of the universe might still be ahead of us. 0:06:22.240 --> 0:06:24.240 I like thinking about how in the future and a 0:06:24.279 --> 0:06:28.520 hundred years people might look back with great knowledge of 0:06:28.520 --> 0:06:31.480 how the universe works and wonder what it was like 0:06:31.560 --> 0:06:34.240 to be us when we lived in such ignorance, right 0:06:34.560 --> 0:06:37.040 when we didn't know so many things about so many 0:06:37.080 --> 0:06:40.680 basic things about the universe. Um And what you said 0:06:40.680 --> 0:06:43.320 earlier really resonate with me about trying to figure things 0:06:43.320 --> 0:06:45.920 out by taking them apart. I think that there's an 0:06:45.920 --> 0:06:48.400 innate curiosity in being human. I mean, that's what makes 0:06:48.560 --> 0:06:52.359 being human fun, it makes being being alive worth It 0:06:52.440 --> 0:06:54.840 is that we are driven by this desire to know 0:06:55.040 --> 0:06:57.640 to understand the things around us. So if you're the 0:06:57.680 --> 0:06:59.599 kind of person who's like, how does a blender work? 0:06:59.680 --> 0:07:01.960 Let me take it apart? Or you know how does 0:07:02.000 --> 0:07:03.800 this thing in my car work when we look under 0:07:03.800 --> 0:07:06.679 the hood and poke around, then you're basically a physicist. 0:07:06.720 --> 0:07:08.720 You're the kind of person who wants to understand things 0:07:08.720 --> 0:07:10.840 by taking them apart, by boiling them down to the 0:07:10.880 --> 0:07:14.520 most essential elements, and using that to explain your car, 0:07:14.600 --> 0:07:16.640 and then also your blender and then other things you 0:07:16.760 --> 0:07:22.240 haven't seen before. Right, It's about learning generalizable universal truths. Yeah, 0:07:22.280 --> 0:07:25.560 and and I would also argue that the history of 0:07:25.560 --> 0:07:28.600 of humanity has been one in which we have attempted 0:07:28.640 --> 0:07:32.680 to explain the why things are the way they are 0:07:32.920 --> 0:07:36.760 for for all of our history, and the as we 0:07:36.920 --> 0:07:40.960 eliminate gaps piece by piece, and knowing that we still 0:07:41.000 --> 0:07:44.240 have enormous gaps left to fill in, we start to 0:07:45.040 --> 0:07:48.080 really hone in on that over time we're able to 0:07:48.240 --> 0:07:52.160 replace things where we had the explanation of a uh. 0:07:52.200 --> 0:07:56.760 Well though, that that's the gods battling it out in Olympus, 0:07:56.760 --> 0:07:59.760 and that's where the thunder comes from. To know now 0:07:59.800 --> 0:08:02.080 we a deeper understanding to the point now where we 0:08:02.160 --> 0:08:05.960 even are able to get a grasp on the idea 0:08:06.040 --> 0:08:09.680 that as humans, as as we are the way we 0:08:09.720 --> 0:08:14.080 have evolved, we have limitations in our perception. There are 0:08:14.280 --> 0:08:17.200 things that we are capable of perceiving because we have evolved. 0:08:17.440 --> 0:08:20.880 It was advantageous, it made sense in our environment, But 0:08:20.960 --> 0:08:24.120 that doesn't mean that's everything there is out there, which 0:08:24.440 --> 0:08:27.960 kind of leads into discussions that I've heard about, you know, 0:08:28.040 --> 0:08:31.360 the various dimensions that we were capable of perceiving. Some 0:08:31.440 --> 0:08:35.199 of those obviously we can. We can observe the physical dimensions, 0:08:35.679 --> 0:08:37.960 and then once you start figuring that out, you say, well, 0:08:39.200 --> 0:08:42.440 it may be a leap to you to think there 0:08:42.440 --> 0:08:45.240 are so many more dimensions or potentially more dimensions than 0:08:45.280 --> 0:08:48.560 the ones we can perceive. But we also know that 0:08:49.080 --> 0:08:52.280 we can't see things in the infrared or ultra violet 0:08:52.720 --> 0:08:56.840 UH wave forms, but with technology, we can convert that 0:08:56.880 --> 0:08:59.040 into light that we can see. And once you start 0:08:59.240 --> 0:09:01.480 looking at things is like that level where you say, oh, yeah, 0:09:01.480 --> 0:09:04.600 I guess we have developed tools that let us go 0:09:04.800 --> 0:09:08.920 beyond our limitations in our perception. Then it kind of 0:09:08.960 --> 0:09:12.439 opens up your mind into the idea of now I 0:09:12.520 --> 0:09:15.720 kind of understand how there can be things like dark 0:09:15.800 --> 0:09:19.280 energy and dark matter that are beyond our current capability 0:09:19.320 --> 0:09:23.720 of detecting it. Because it took thousands of years for 0:09:23.800 --> 0:09:26.640 us to get to the point where we could, uh 0:09:26.880 --> 0:09:31.040 could even indirectly observe stuff like beingfrared and the ultraviolet. 0:09:31.360 --> 0:09:33.280 So that's sort of the approach I take with people 0:09:33.320 --> 0:09:36.440 as well, the idea that it feels like you're taking 0:09:36.440 --> 0:09:38.720 a big leap when you start going into things like 0:09:38.800 --> 0:09:42.320 particle physics, when you start talking about quantum quantum effects, 0:09:42.320 --> 0:09:45.240 because everything seems so strange. It doesn't it doesn't work 0:09:45.320 --> 0:09:49.400 the way the classical physics work, and it's it feels 0:09:49.440 --> 0:09:51.240 like you're asking people to take a leap of faith. 0:09:51.240 --> 0:09:53.840 But once you start to build on those blocks, they say, okay, 0:09:53.840 --> 0:09:56.120 all right, now I'm with you. Now I got it, 0:09:56.920 --> 0:09:59.600 And that kind of brings us over to the work 0:09:59.679 --> 0:10:02.400 that we see over at at CERN and the large 0:10:02.559 --> 0:10:05.640 hey drunk collider. Now, one thing I like to remind 0:10:05.679 --> 0:10:08.040 people about before before we get there. I think he's 0:10:08.040 --> 0:10:10.760 touched on a really interesting topic there. You know, Um, 0:10:10.800 --> 0:10:13.080 I think people have been thinking about mysteries for a 0:10:13.080 --> 0:10:15.960 long time, right, And for a long time the world 0:10:16.080 --> 0:10:18.400 was really mysterious. It was obvious that there were mysteries 0:10:18.400 --> 0:10:19.920 you could just go outside, and there were things you 0:10:19.920 --> 0:10:23.040 didn't understand. What is lightning? Right, Um, and it's sort 0:10:23.080 --> 0:10:26.359 of it was a common feeling that the world was mysterious, 0:10:26.440 --> 0:10:28.920 you know, like there are more things in the heavens 0:10:28.920 --> 0:10:30.960 and earth than are dreamt of in your philosophy, right, 0:10:31.000 --> 0:10:34.040 it's even in literature. But we've sort of lost that. 0:10:34.080 --> 0:10:35.760 I think a lot of people these days, when they 0:10:35.800 --> 0:10:39.280 walk around, they feel like they mostly understand stuff like, yeah, 0:10:39.320 --> 0:10:41.480 we know how weather works. Maybe we can't predict it exactly, 0:10:41.520 --> 0:10:44.080 but we understand the mechanism of it and gravity we 0:10:44.120 --> 0:10:47.600 have an understanding of that. And the sense of experiencing 0:10:47.679 --> 0:10:50.800 mystery on the daily basis is sort of gone because 0:10:50.840 --> 0:10:53.800 science has made so much progress in explaining the various 0:10:53.800 --> 0:10:56.760 bits around us. And I want to remind people that 0:10:57.080 --> 0:11:01.120 the bigger questions, the larger questions questions we're asking ourselves, 0:11:01.160 --> 0:11:03.120 like why are we here? How should we live? How 0:11:03.320 --> 0:11:05.800 what is the history of everything? Those questions are still 0:11:05.880 --> 0:11:09.079 totally unanswered. And uh, And as you said, I think 0:11:09.240 --> 0:11:12.160 is really insightful about how we don't even know what 0:11:12.240 --> 0:11:14.600 we don't know, because there's a lot of things that 0:11:14.640 --> 0:11:17.400 we've only recently discovered we don't we we didn't understand 0:11:17.520 --> 0:11:20.080 right that there's things happening around us that we're not 0:11:20.160 --> 0:11:23.559 aware of various kinds of particles moving and even different 0:11:23.600 --> 0:11:25.600 kinds of light that's invisible to us, as you said, 0:11:26.040 --> 0:11:28.240 And there's really no limit on how much of that 0:11:28.240 --> 0:11:30.720 there can be, right, I mean, we know certain things, 0:11:30.720 --> 0:11:33.520 we know dark matters invisible. We know neutrinos are invisible. 0:11:33.840 --> 0:11:35.640 There could be other things out there that are also 0:11:35.720 --> 0:11:38.080 invisible that we just haven't even yet discovered that they're 0:11:38.120 --> 0:11:40.600 there through some sort of very slight hints. Right, So 0:11:41.000 --> 0:11:44.120 the amount of discoveries left remaining in the future is enormous, 0:11:44.120 --> 0:11:46.880 which is the kind of thing that gets me all excited. Yeah, 0:11:46.920 --> 0:11:50.560 I I have a feeling, Well, first of all, I 0:11:50.559 --> 0:11:52.400 have a feeling I'm gonna need to fly out to 0:11:52.480 --> 0:11:55.600 California and have have like just maybe a four hour 0:11:55.679 --> 0:11:57.920 long conversation with you, because I haven't feel like that's 0:11:57.920 --> 0:12:00.760 exactly what's going to be needed. But is I This 0:12:00.840 --> 0:12:02.520 is the sort of stuff I love to talk about 0:12:02.679 --> 0:12:06.280 just to anyone who will, you know, be patient enough 0:12:06.320 --> 0:12:09.160 to let me chatter at them. Let let me ask 0:12:09.200 --> 0:12:11.640 you a question that you you mentioned about how we 0:12:11.720 --> 0:12:13.640 used to explain things in terms of gods, and I 0:12:13.679 --> 0:12:15.960 think that makes a lot of sense because humans are 0:12:16.000 --> 0:12:20.560 good at like identifying agency and willfulness in places where 0:12:20.559 --> 0:12:22.920 there aren't any. Right. But there's another element to that, 0:12:22.960 --> 0:12:25.280 which is the sort of the narrative. Right, These gods 0:12:25.320 --> 0:12:28.160 don't just have personalities and wheels that had stories the 0:12:28.160 --> 0:12:30.320 reasons why they were doing what they were doing. And 0:12:30.360 --> 0:12:32.959 I feel like storytelling is a big part of who 0:12:33.000 --> 0:12:35.319 we are as a species, and it's still even though 0:12:35.320 --> 0:12:37.360 we're not explaining things in terms of gods, it still 0:12:37.440 --> 0:12:41.440 drives our science. Like you know, if you asked me, um, 0:12:41.480 --> 0:12:43.120 what would you do if you knew the final answer 0:12:43.200 --> 0:12:45.360 to particle physics? Like if you could explain the whole 0:12:45.480 --> 0:12:48.440 universe in terms of one particle? Um, you know that, 0:12:48.480 --> 0:12:50.840 I would say, then we would want to tell a story, right, 0:12:50.880 --> 0:12:52.800 We want to tell a story about what that means 0:12:52.840 --> 0:12:55.240 about the universe and why the universe? Why is the 0:12:55.320 --> 0:12:57.280 universe this way and not the other way? First we 0:12:57.320 --> 0:12:59.640 have to figure out what way is the universe, and 0:12:59.640 --> 0:13:01.960 then we want to know, like why that way. In 0:13:02.000 --> 0:13:05.360 the end, we're still telling stories to ourselves about how 0:13:05.400 --> 0:13:07.200 the universe came to be and what it means and 0:13:07.200 --> 0:13:09.240 how we should live our lives. So it's a very 0:13:09.360 --> 0:13:13.240 human endeavor. Well, certainly, I mean, we we call it matter, 0:13:13.480 --> 0:13:16.800 and we know about antimatter, but we chose the optimist 0:13:16.920 --> 0:13:20.720 route right when we describe, when we describe these things 0:13:20.720 --> 0:13:24.120 that are antithetical to one another, and they they annihilate 0:13:24.160 --> 0:13:26.400 one another when they come into contact. And for some 0:13:26.440 --> 0:13:29.280 reason that we don't fully understand, we had slightly more 0:13:29.640 --> 0:13:32.760 matter than we had antimatter, and therefore we've got stuff. 0:13:33.600 --> 0:13:35.760 I mean, if we had been pessimists, we would call 0:13:35.840 --> 0:13:39.840 the stuff we have the antimatter. Right, So clearly there's 0:13:39.840 --> 0:13:42.920 a narrative issue there that's right. So here, seriously, here's 0:13:42.920 --> 0:13:45.160 the question. Then the question is do you think if 0:13:45.200 --> 0:13:48.040 we met an alien species of physicists, do you think 0:13:48.080 --> 0:13:50.760 they would be asking the same questions or would they 0:13:50.840 --> 0:13:53.199 be satisfied with our answers? Or do you think the 0:13:53.280 --> 0:13:56.679 kind of questions we're asking are inherently human in some 0:13:56.720 --> 0:14:00.520 way that we don't even understand? What an excellent question. Now, obviously, 0:14:00.600 --> 0:14:02.679 from the scientific perspective, I have to tell you that 0:14:02.720 --> 0:14:05.200 I have a very small sample size of intelligent life 0:14:05.200 --> 0:14:08.360 forms that I can work from. I only have the one. Really, 0:14:09.240 --> 0:14:11.040 you you mean, you're the only intelligent life form you're 0:14:11.120 --> 0:14:13.760 I don't know, I mean of entire I'm talking about 0:14:13.920 --> 0:14:17.160 entire species. I guess I'm not not only I mean, 0:14:17.200 --> 0:14:21.120 I could get super nihilistic and and and very egotistical 0:14:21.120 --> 0:14:23.960 and say, well, I can only experience my own experience, 0:14:23.960 --> 0:14:27.200 and therefore I know I'm intelligence. But I'm just granting 0:14:27.240 --> 0:14:34.160 everybody else that consideration. Um, that's this. This gets into 0:14:34.200 --> 0:14:37.720 philosophy and then, which I also fascinated by. But I'm 0:14:37.720 --> 0:14:41.280 a pregnantist, so eventually I get very irritated. Um, that's 0:14:41.280 --> 0:14:46.320 an excellent question, and and honestly, the it's one that 0:14:46.400 --> 0:14:49.200 I haven't given a lot of consideration too, largely because 0:14:49.960 --> 0:14:52.880 I have accepted the fact, or at least accepted the 0:14:52.880 --> 0:14:58.600 notion that any sufficiently intelligent species that may exist somewhere 0:14:58.600 --> 0:15:03.280 else would be so very different from what we experience 0:15:03.760 --> 0:15:07.680 that that the word alien only begins to describe how 0:15:07.760 --> 0:15:12.240 we would uh define such a species, and that perhaps 0:15:12.640 --> 0:15:17.080 their approach to understanding and explaining the universe to themselves 0:15:17.280 --> 0:15:21.120 would be very different. But it seems like it would 0:15:21.160 --> 0:15:24.400 follow a similar pattern. But I say that only because 0:15:24.440 --> 0:15:27.840 that's what that's what has happened here. I don't have 0:15:27.880 --> 0:15:31.880 anywhere else to draw any conclusions from. So, um, it's 0:15:31.920 --> 0:15:34.440 so hard to imagine outside of your experience, right, It's 0:15:34.480 --> 0:15:37.320 it's very, very difficult. Even in science, when we discover 0:15:37.400 --> 0:15:40.080 something new, we're always describing it in terms of the 0:15:40.160 --> 0:15:43.520 things we know. Like we want to know what is light? 0:15:43.680 --> 0:15:46.280 Is it a little particle? Is it a little way? 0:15:46.320 --> 0:15:48.440 Because of the things we know, Right, when we find 0:15:48.520 --> 0:15:51.280 something that's totally new and different, we don't even really 0:15:51.280 --> 0:15:53.760 have the words to describe it. So imagining what it's 0:15:53.800 --> 0:15:55.840 like to be an alien scientist is I think it's 0:15:55.840 --> 0:15:58.320 an impossible question. So yeah, and that's that's why I 0:15:58.360 --> 0:16:01.040 posed it to you. It's why it's I I while 0:16:01.080 --> 0:16:05.400 I find science fiction endlessly entertaining, I love science fiction. 0:16:06.160 --> 0:16:09.480 I also always I roll my eyes a little bit 0:16:09.760 --> 0:16:12.480 when I see the Star Trek approach of every alien 0:16:12.560 --> 0:16:15.400 race is a humanoid with slightly different bumps on their head, 0:16:16.760 --> 0:16:19.400 and they speak the English the same way. Yeah, the 0:16:19.480 --> 0:16:23.240 Universal Translator has no problem picking up what their speech 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:25.240 patterns are. So that like, even when you use the 0:16:25.320 --> 0:16:29.600 Universal translator, uh the you know, d O sex Macina 0:16:30.040 --> 0:16:31.760 coming in and saying, oh, yeah, this is going to 0:16:32.080 --> 0:16:35.160 translate everything magically. You think you kind of thing a 0:16:35.240 --> 0:16:38.760 sample size, don't you before you really get a grasp 0:16:38.800 --> 0:16:40.880 on it. But I mean, we have a hard enough trouble, 0:16:41.080 --> 0:16:44.800 hard enough time even on Earth sometimes understanding human cultures 0:16:44.800 --> 0:16:48.160 from around the globe, you know, understanding how to interact 0:16:48.160 --> 0:16:50.080 with aliens. I think it's going to be hopeless. Like 0:16:50.120 --> 0:16:53.120 if we ever heard a message from aliens, and you know, 0:16:53.200 --> 0:16:55.280 even decoding it would be a huge problem if you 0:16:55.280 --> 0:16:58.480 could even get past that. I have challenges understanding some 0:16:58.560 --> 0:17:01.200 of my relatives, and we all speak the same language 0:17:01.200 --> 0:17:03.840 and arguably come from the same Sure are you sure 0:17:03.880 --> 0:17:05.200 they all come from Earth? I mean that might be 0:17:05.280 --> 0:17:07.840 an explanation. I got an uncle that's questionable, but pretty 0:17:07.880 --> 0:17:11.240 much everyone else I got a pretty good handle on. Alright, 0:17:11.560 --> 0:17:13.639 this is this is great. This is gonna be an 0:17:13.640 --> 0:17:16.119 eighteen partner. Guys. I'm just gonna sit here and and 0:17:16.119 --> 0:17:20.639 and and monopolize Daniel's time for you want to you 0:17:20.640 --> 0:17:23.159 want to talk about the large Dan Collider rather than 0:17:23.160 --> 0:17:27.719 philosophy of alien civilization. I wouldn't say rather, I'll just 0:17:27.720 --> 0:17:30.840 say that those were what my questions were about. Well, 0:17:30.840 --> 0:17:33.639 you know there's one topic which connects them, um, which 0:17:33.760 --> 0:17:37.320 is the one way we might discover an alien civilization 0:17:37.760 --> 0:17:43.280 is by first detecting their particle physicists. I have not 0:17:43.400 --> 0:17:46.640 heard this. It might be if somebody's if aliens are 0:17:46.680 --> 0:17:49.480 building like enormous particle colliders like the size of a 0:17:49.520 --> 0:17:53.040 solar system, and we might eventually like sweep through the 0:17:53.160 --> 0:17:56.800 essentially the pollution from that part from that particle accelerator 0:17:57.200 --> 0:17:59.320 and discover them in that way. That would be pretty 0:17:59.320 --> 0:18:01.920 crazy way defined an alien species, but that would be 0:18:01.920 --> 0:18:04.080 awesome because they would It would tell us that, hey, look, 0:18:04.359 --> 0:18:06.480 particle physics is not just a human thing, it's a 0:18:06.600 --> 0:18:09.399 universal thing. Everyone wants to know what the universe has 0:18:09.400 --> 0:18:11.680 made out of, and everyone's figuring it out by smashing 0:18:11.680 --> 0:18:14.760 step together. So that would be pretty exciting discovery. It 0:18:14.840 --> 0:18:18.160 is interesting I had not heard about that particular kind 0:18:18.200 --> 0:18:22.879 of an idea. I've heard of, of course, enormous constructs 0:18:22.880 --> 0:18:25.119 that could especially when you talk about things like the 0:18:25.160 --> 0:18:27.320 Kardashov scale and you're thinking about like the dice and 0:18:27.440 --> 0:18:32.520 sphere and that kind of stuff. These hypothetical um machines 0:18:32.600 --> 0:18:34.840 that would need to exist in order to to take 0:18:34.880 --> 0:18:39.120 advantage of, say an entire solar system's energy output, which 0:18:39.160 --> 0:18:41.800 would be necessary to reach those higher levels of civilization 0:18:41.840 --> 0:18:45.320 that we've heard about, but I hadn't heard about. I 0:18:45.320 --> 0:18:49.080 hadn't thought about a particle accelery the size of a 0:18:49.080 --> 0:18:51.919 solar system. To be perfectly honest, the Large Hadron Collator 0:18:51.960 --> 0:18:54.239 is is a big enough beast for me to try 0:18:54.280 --> 0:18:56.920 and get my mind wrapped around. I mean they're a 0:18:56.920 --> 0:18:59.600 pretty big and pretty expensive. So yeah, the solar system 0:18:59.640 --> 0:19:02.760 sizelder is going to take another level of civilization before 0:19:02.800 --> 0:19:05.399 we can afford that kind of equipment. Yeah, Daniel and 0:19:05.440 --> 0:19:08.199 I will be back with more about the LHC and 0:19:08.359 --> 0:19:10.639 just a moment, but first let's take a quick break. 0:19:18.080 --> 0:19:22.680 So getting to the Large Hadron Collider, Uh, that would 0:19:22.720 --> 0:19:25.040 you know? And CERN as well. A lot of people 0:19:25.080 --> 0:19:28.359 think of of CERN is just because the Large Hadron 0:19:28.359 --> 0:19:30.760 Collider got so much press a few years ago when 0:19:30.800 --> 0:19:32.959 it was when they were preparing to bring it up 0:19:32.960 --> 0:19:35.280 online and they were starting to stub up the energy levels. 0:19:35.480 --> 0:19:37.520 I think a lot of people just associated those two 0:19:37.520 --> 0:19:41.080 as being uh the only real like the CERN is 0:19:41.119 --> 0:19:43.560 just that's the agency to oversee the Large Hadron Collider. 0:19:43.760 --> 0:19:46.960 I like to remind people that CERN is also the 0:19:47.080 --> 0:19:51.720 organization where because CERN exists. We have a worldwide web. 0:19:51.960 --> 0:19:54.800 I mean the web started from Tim berners Lee, who 0:19:54.840 --> 0:19:58.159 was working for CERTAIN at the time. So, uh, I 0:19:58.280 --> 0:20:00.880 like to remind people that it's beyond that. But let's 0:20:00.920 --> 0:20:03.880 talk a bit so. So CERTAIN is a European agency 0:20:04.480 --> 0:20:09.960 that is a scientifically oriented agency looking into things like these, 0:20:10.040 --> 0:20:13.399 these high energy reactions. And the large Hadron Collider is 0:20:13.440 --> 0:20:17.000 a particle accelerator. Uh, kind of give us an overview 0:20:17.240 --> 0:20:21.360 of what the LHC is for for someone who has 0:20:21.440 --> 0:20:24.720 heard the term but they don't really get they don't 0:20:24.760 --> 0:20:29.600 grock it entirely, alright, sure, Um, the large hadron collider. 0:20:29.640 --> 0:20:32.760 The basic idea is, let's figure out what's inside matter. 0:20:35.200 --> 0:20:37.320 Let's figure out what's inside matter, and let's do that 0:20:37.400 --> 0:20:40.280 by smashing particles together. So what you do with the 0:20:40.359 --> 0:20:43.760 large hadron collider the word large it obviously just means 0:20:43.800 --> 0:20:47.159 it's really big. Hadron is a kind of particle, and 0:20:47.240 --> 0:20:49.680 proton is the example of it, so you could also 0:20:49.680 --> 0:20:53.560 call it the large proton collider. Um, And we take protons, 0:20:53.800 --> 0:20:56.480 which are essentially just the nucleus of hydrogen. So you 0:20:56.520 --> 0:20:59.440 start with hydrogen gas, which is easy to get. Heat 0:20:59.480 --> 0:21:01.720 it up. So the electrons boil off, and you're left 0:21:01.720 --> 0:21:04.359 with just the nucleus, which is protons. And what we 0:21:04.400 --> 0:21:06.560 do is we give those protons a kick. We use 0:21:06.560 --> 0:21:09.840 electromagnetic waves to push them, and we push them faster 0:21:09.920 --> 0:21:13.439 and faster and faster and faster until they're going about 0:21:14.920 --> 0:21:17.000 the speed of light. And then we smash them into 0:21:17.080 --> 0:21:19.920 each other. And the idea is, see what comes out. 0:21:20.200 --> 0:21:23.600 See what kind of weird mysterious quantum mechanical magic happens 0:21:23.640 --> 0:21:25.840 to give you new kinds of matter and new weird 0:21:25.920 --> 0:21:29.520 particles um. But as you said, the Large Hadron Collider 0:21:29.600 --> 0:21:33.480 is sort of a flagship property, flagship experiment, but certain 0:21:33.560 --> 0:21:36.920