Homer Simpson predicted the mass of the Higgs boson in a 1998 episode of The Simpsons, according to a science writer.
In The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace episode, Homer is shown in front of a blackboard working on an equation.
Twelve years later, scientists at the Large Hadron Collider discovered the Higgs boson.
Simon Singh, author of The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets, told a literary festival audience that the series is staffed by writers with an interest in maths.
"The Simpsons is the most mathematical TV show on prime-time television in history. A lot of the writers on The Simpsons are mathematicians," he said.
"That equation predicts the mass of the Higgs boson. If you work it out, you get the mass of a Higgs boson that's only a bit larger than the nano-mass of a Higgs boson actually is.
"It's kind of amazing as Homer makes this prediction 14 years before it was discovered."
The Simpsons may "encourage and nourish" maths lovers, Singh said, adding that he hoped teenagers would be inspierd by the fact the show's creators shared their interests. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
 |
By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
|
"Homer Simpson predicted the mass of the Higgs boson in a 1998 episode of The Simpsons, according to a science writer.
In The Wizard of Evergreen Terrace episode, Homer is shown in front of a blackboard working on an equation.
Twelve years later, scientists at the Large Hadron Collider discovered the Higgs boson.
Simon Singh, author of The Simpsons and their Mathematical Secrets, told a literary festival audience that the series is staffed by writers with an interest in maths.
"The Simpsons is the most mathematical TV show on prime-time television in history. A lot of the writers on The Simpsons are mathematicians," he said.
"That equation predicts the mass of the Higgs boson. If you work it out, you get the mass of a Higgs boson that's only a bit larger than the nano-mass of a Higgs boson actually is.
"It's kind of amazing as Homer makes this prediction 14 years before it was discovered."
The Simpsons may "encourage and nourish" maths lovers, Singh said, adding that he hoped teenagers would be inspierd by the fact the show's creators shared their interests."
But did he solve the pickle matrix problem? |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
|
By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
|
not sure if you can answer this, but here goes....
read somewhere yesterday, a guy saying the maths showed that the biggs hoson must exist. or something approximating that + we just had to find it.
here's da question.
how can maths prove anything other than math proofs?
or is it simply the case that adding the weight of elements didnt equal the weight of the compound.
not sure how this could apply at sub atomic level
|
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
I think you'll find that the Higgs boson was predicted in 1964. All they did on the Simpsons was to put some of the maths on a blackboard - you don't have to be a methematician to do that, though you would have to have an interest in maths to even know about it.
It's what the LHC was built for - the physics predicted it's existence, the prediction is quantified by maths, the LHC was built specifically to hunt it down. |
Reply privately, Reply in forum +quote
or View forums list | |
» Add a new message to this topic
Gotta love Homer. This is why Lisa is so clever.