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[alway]

IIRC, there actually has been something experimental related to time-travel through a variation of quantum entanglement. However, it still follows all the rules so to speak. Thus while the two events' outcomes are tied together, it can't actually give any information or something like that (I didn't read much into it, but it should be out there somewhere if you can dodge the quacks shouting about their miracle snake-oil from the future which binds our consciousness to aliens in another universe or something).

Edit: here it is; mathematical, though not experimental yet it seems.
http://www.wired.com/wiredscience/2011/01/timelike-entanglement/

[Duuvian]

I take comfort in the realisation that somewhere, there are aliens that can't comprehend savanna.

Hehe, they'd have reverse scuba swimsuits.

[Starver]

I take comfort in the realisation that somewhere, there are aliens that can't comprehend savanna.

Hehe, they'd have reverse scuba swimsuits.

Reminds me of the book "Heaven", by Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen (or vice-versa).  Not only reverse-scuba-gear, but also a reverse boat being used by the same species.  ("Sails" on the interface between ocean and atmosphere, rather than on the interface between atmosphere and ocean.  IYSWIM.)

They're the guys who also did the actual sciencey bits of "The Science Of Discworld" (and tSoD2 and tSoD3).  And a rather interesting book called Wheelers.  Jack is a specialist of note, in particular, in visualising (and justifying) non-anthropomorphic aliens, of all kinds.  And with all kinds of 'biologies' behind them.

But that's probably even less to do with bosons than time-travel is.  Just thought it worth noting, in passing.

[Lagslayer]

Good science fiction is ALWAYS note worthy.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Update: The Higgs Boson is now at 5.9 sigma.

[Osmosis Jones]

Update: The Higgs Boson is now at 5.9 sigma.

Awesomesauce!

[DrPoo]

So.. totally useless fucking particle for anything else than masturbating the ego's of quantum physics socalled "scientists"?
I mean, we cant cure all cancer with a higgs boson, we cant even make massless material. Nothing.

Just another useless brick. Like discovering what kind of colour that was your great grandma's favorite, just as useful.

OR

Did i miss anything?

[freeformschooler]

So.. totally useless fucking particle for anything else than masturbating the ego's of quantum physics socalled "scientists"?
I mean, we cant cure all cancer with a higgs boson, we cant even make massless material. Nothing.

Just another useless brick. Like discovering what kind of colour that was your great grandma's favorite, just as useful.

OR

Did i miss anything?

Please read through the entirety of this article.

http://www.cracked.com/blog/7-ridiculous-things-people-believe-about-god-particle/

[Remalle]

Just gonna leave this here.

Fakeedit: damnit, freeformninja!

[Leafsnail]

Remember that completely pointless parlour trick, electricity?  I can't believe so many scientists wasted their lives on that fucking useless phenomenon.

[alway]

The Higgs, and the properties of it, is important because it shows where our current understanding of physics is more accurate, and where it is less accurate. And whenever we find our current understanding of physics to be off by a bit, it is a precursor to discovery. It lets us know where new theorycrafting is needed to explain that which is not adequately explained. When those new theories explaining the new phenomena are created, then it's a waiting game for more experimental data showing where they are right and where they are inadequate.

Take relativity for example. Newtonian mechanics were shown to be incomplete because they could not explain a pair of phenomena which had been observed:
A. The speed of light was finite
B. The speed of light was the same regardless of observer's velocity
None of the known laws could explain how this could be; if you speed up, light should slow down relative to you, as per their understanding of how velocity worked. And so, after pondering on those for a while, Einstein eventually figured out an extension of known physics whose effects would both explain the new phenomena while also containing the explanation for previously known phenomena (for low energies and such, relativistic physics is nearly indistinguishable from Newtonian physics).

[MetalSlimeHunt]

The Higgs Boson is vital to understanding how things have mass. It doesn't even directly have anything to do with quantum physics.

Do not belittle science.

[MaximumZero]

Pff. Science. Like that's ever given us anything useful.

[kaijyuu]

Agreed. I'm quite happy with my magical internet and computer which is run on the screams of the damned.

Black magic gives me all these wondrous things. What have YOU done, science?!

[MaximumZero]

All right... all right... but apart from better sanitation and medicine and education and irrigation and public health and roads and a freshwater system and baths and public order... what has Science done for us?