F N E E R W M S I FERMILAB AU.S. DEPARTMENT OF E NERGY L ABORATORY Learning and Growing 8 Photo courtesy Iowa State University Volume 25 INSIDE: Friday, April 19, 2002 Number 7 2 THE Question 6 The Larger View f 12 Commuter Special 14 Upward Bound INTERACTIONS Communicating particle physics in the 21st century Join the dialogue: This week’s question for THETHE discussion: What’s your response to THE Question? QuestionQuestion To: Fermilab Public Affairs Subject: THE Question I have worked at Fermilab for 12-plus years. Often in conversation I’m asked about Fermilab, and the one question that always comes up is, “What good is the information you’re discovering?” So what I’m looking for is examples I can give them. I have heard that the physics we are doing and the results we find are 20 years ahead of their time. Meaning we won’t realize what to do with the information for a very long time. Anyway, I’d like your help to answer this one ‘special’ question. Email from a Fermilab employee Respond online at by Judy Jackson www.fnal.gov/pub/ferminews/ interactions/index.html “What good is the information you’re discovering?” or send email to Generations of particle physicists have grappled with this question, and many [email protected] have attempted to address it, from various perspectives and with varying success. At a time when THE question is gaining insistence in the national dialogue on science policy, it may be useful to take another critical look at the reasons why we do particle physics research and how both we and others perceive its value for our nation and the world. 2 FERMINEWS Friday, April 19, 2002 UNDERSTANDING THE UNIVERSE FOR UNDERSTANDING’S SAKE “What, then,” Albert Einstein, asked, “impels us to devise theory after theory? Why do we devise theories at all? The answer is simply: because we enjoy ‘comprehending’.… There exists a passion for comprehending, just as there exists a passion for music.” For most particle physicists, this passion for comprehending is surely why they have chosen high-energy physics—for what Einstein called the “joy and amazement at the beauty and grandeur Photo by Fred Ullrich of this world of which man can just form a faint “Joy and amazement at the beauty and grandeur of this world of which man can just form a notion…” faint notion.” —Albert Einstein Many of Einstein’s successors continue to uphold UNDERSTANDING THE UNIVERSE the view that basic science represents human BECAUSE IT PAYS OFF potential and civilization at their highest and best, the kind of endeavor that characterizes a great The results of basic science, however, very often nation. While particle physics may ultimately have benefits for society that go beyond the mere contribute to the security and economic well-being joy of understanding. In a 1996 speech, Nobel of society, this reasoning goes, its true worth lies Prize winner and former Fermilab Director Leon in the understanding of the ultimate nature of Lederman put it this way: the universe. As Frank Oppenheimer once said, “In 1680,” Lederman said, “Understanding is a lot like sex. It’s got a practical “Isaac Newton worked on purpose, but that’s not why people do it normally.” the abstract problem of Unlike sex, however, the passion for comprehend- gravity and changed the ing may not hold the same thrill for other audiences world. In 1820, Michael that it has for particle physicists. In a February Faraday discovered a keynote address to the American Association for connection between the the Advancement of Science, Office of Science exotic phenomena of Photo by Reidar Hahn Leon Lederman: “The more and Technology Policy Director John Marburger electricity and magnetism, exotic, the more abstract the discussed government support for particle physics and his discoveries knowledge, the more profound and astronomy. electrified the world. will be its consequences.” Einstein’s 1905 conceptual ”The justification for funding these fields,” obsession with space and time led to nuclear Marburger said, “rests entirely on the usefulness energy and the operation of accelerators for of the technology needed for the quest, and on the knowledge, for cancer therapy and for machines joy we experience in simply knowing how nature that provide luminescent x-ray photographs of works. (A joy, I am afraid, that is shared fully by viruses and toxins. In 1897, the ‘useless’ electron a rapidly declining fraction of the population.)” was discovered. In 1977, Fermilab discovered (Italics added.) the bottom quark and in 1995, the top quark was Is the joy of particle physics apparent only to found. The lessons of history are clear—the more particle cognoscenti? In a March 26 story on exotic, the more abstract the knowledge, the more the beauty of physics, New York Times writer profound will be its consequences.” Dennis Overbye wrote that while Einstein The down side of the usefulness of particle physics “maintained that it should be possible to explain to society is the unpredictability of the payoff. By scientific principles in words to a child… his definition, the applications of basic science are followers often argue that words alone cannot unknown—if we could predict them, it would be convey the glories of physics, that there is a beauty applied science, and those who stood to benefit apparent only to the mathematically adept.” would fund it. But basic science is inherently risky. If that is true, it may be awhile before the glories Who knows how or when its results will bear fruit, of physics take hold in the general population. or whom they will benefit? FERMINEWS Friday, April 19, 2002 3 INTERACTIONS Everything, after all, is made from subatomic particles. Once you have a concise theory explaining Communicating particle physics how they work, the rest should just be filigree.” st in the 21 century The ultimate goal of particle physics, the “grand unification” of all the particle and forces, will, the Perhaps the best-known application of fundamental joke goes, reduce the complexity of the universe to physics came from the development of the atomic a single law that can fit on the back of a T-shirt. bomb in the Manhattan Project in World War II. (“I discovered grand unification and all I got was Throughout the cold war, support for high-energy this lousy T-shirt”?) physics stayed strong—just in case, many believe, the nation needed a new Manhattan Project. Today, But this reductionist perspective, the view that, the case for a connection between particle physics ultimately, it all comes down to particles, may be and security appears less compelling. Despite in trouble. Perhaps, say other scientists, it’s high-level warnings of the potential impact on more complicated than that. Complex systems national security, federal funding for the physical don’t necessarily reduce to the interactions of sciences continues to fall. fundamental particles, according to some solid- state physicists. In the words of Nobel Prize “Defense Department Agency Severs Its Ties to winner Philip Anderson, “More is different.” an Elite Panel of Scientists,” read the headline in a March 23 New York Times story by James Glanz For at least some scientists, a simple theory of on the end of a decades-long relationship between everything may simply be irrelevant. In Marburger’s the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, words to the AAAS audience, science is “finally or DARPA, and a group known as Jason, an within reach of a new frontier, the frontier of “advisory panel of elite scientists,” including some complexity.” of the nation’s best-known particle physicists. ARTICLE PHYSICS AND THE FABRIC The story quoted the Defense Department on the P reason for the change: “…a spokeswoman said OF SCIENCE the move was in fact a reflection of Jason’s inability High Energy Physics Advisory Panel Chair Fred to adjust its priorities to a post-cold-war world, Gilman recently emphasized the interconnected- where the physical sciences are no longer as ness of science in a letter accompanying HEPAP’s important as information and computer sciences Long-Range Plan for the Future of High-Energy to the nation’s security.” Does all science come Physics. down to particles? Not THE UNIVERSE ON A T- SHIRT “One cannot tell where the next scientific or necessarily. “More is technical breakthrough will occur,” Gilman wrote, different,” say many Boston University theorist Ken Lane is frustrated “or what combination of fields it will depend solid-state physicists. that particle physics is a hard sell compared to, upon….An effort to revitalize the physical sciences say, research on the human genome. is needed not only because of their intrinsic “I don’t get it,” Lane said recently. “Particle physics importance, but because of the coupling of is the most fascinating science that there is. And progress across the sciences.” I’ll tell you one thing: there was physics long As an example of such connections, particle before there was DNA, and long after there isn’t physicists like to cite former NIH director Harold any more DNA there will still be physics.” Varmus’s 2000 statement that today’s spectacular Perhaps only a physicist would find that a advances in medical science would not have comforting thought. occurred without the previous work of high-energy While Lane’s invidious comparison of physics and physicists, chemists and other basic scientists. DNA may be faulted for a certain lack of political Particle physicists tend to find Varmus’s argument correctness, his frustration reflects a long-held view convincing—but not everyone responds that way. that particle physics has a unique place among the David Kramer, of Science and Government Report, sciences, namely that when you get down to it, reported on the release of HEPAP’s Long Range particle physics is the basis for them all.