“There is no need for the hypothesis of a benevolent creator.”
In 2009, this newspaper interviewed the now Nobel Prize-winning physicist, Stephen Weinberg, about dark matter and particle research at CERN in Geneva and Walden. We are publishing it online for the first time as an obituary.
“It would be really exciting to show the nature of dark matter in Geneva,” Stephen Weinberg said during a 2009 interview in Bern, where this photo was taken.
Photo: Cortis & Sonderegger / 13 photos
Professor Weinberg, the particle accelerator at Cern, the Large Hadron Collider (LHC), should finally start in mid-November. Is it justified to spend more than four billion Swiss francs to find some new particles?
The LHC is more than just having a few particles. It is about discovering the laws of nature. The particles we’re looking at are a step in that direction. It fits with what we think of as the laws of the universe.
This is worth billions of francs?
We actually discussed this question in the United States in the late 1980s and early 1990s. In Texas, we’ve been working on a project similar to the Large Hadron Collider, the Superconducting Collider, or SSC for short. Congress suspended the Supreme Security Committee. It was a democratic decision. We couldn’t convince the public that this project was worth the money.
To read this article in full, you need a subscription.
“Alcohol buff. Troublemaker. Introvert. Student. Social media lover. Web ninja. Bacon fan. Reader.”
More Stories
Joy in politics and science
When research becomes dangerous
A cure for high health insurance premiums