God Particle Found, But Does Anyone Care?

[Lord and Master]

Ok back to the interesting stuff, albeit slightly SF-ish;
If the Higgs Boson tells all other particles what mass they have does it have any itself?
Wouldn't it have to be everywhere and everywhen (as particles constantly pop in and out of existence all over the place) and wouldn't this satisfy the charming 18th Century "Luminiferous Aether" tradition? (to say nothing of the risible nickname!)
If it tells photons that they have zero rest mass how can it interact with them without being superluminal?
If tachyons exist wouldn't they too be informed by Higgs and if so how?
Could the Higgs in fact be weaponised to corrupt targets atomic structure by misinforming same about what mass it "should" have (y'know, lying on command in order to subvert)?
Or even used to create wormholes/ singularities in a similarly "dishonest" interaction?
Finally, for now at least, does this put paid to the notion of anti-gravity once and for all?

We care a lot!

[ender516]

A quick trip to Wikipedia for an introduction to the Higgs field says it is a quantum field, like the electromagnetic field, both of which exist everywhere, and the particles associated with them (Higgs bosons and photons, respectively) are oscillations in those fields. Photons are not deflected by electromagnetic fields, as they have no charge. I would guess that the Higgs boson would not be deflected by the Higgs field and has no mass.

[carlsagansghost]

We should be careful with the way we use our knowledge of this 'God' particle.

Any attempt to 'play God' with such a particle may lead to unfortunate complications that could highly destructive. I dread to think of the implications if we were to cause the neutrinos to mutate (the planet might warm up greatly, and viciously).

[Lord and Master]

A quick trip to Wikipedia for an introduction to the Higgs field says it is a quantum field, like the electromagnetic field, both of which exist everywhere, and the particles associated with them (Higgs bosons and photons, respectively) are oscillations in those fields. Photons are not deflected by electromagnetic fields, as they have no charge. I would guess that the Higgs boson would not be deflected by the Higgs field and has no mass.

A further googling tells us the Higgs has nothing but mass...
here
Not sure what the real implications are of that but superficially does it mean they hunt in pairs? (so they can tell each other how fat they are like teenage girls do)
Also, without googling now, I'm dubious of the assertion that the electromagnetic field exists everywhere as its just a combination of an electric field and a magnetic field, both of which require a raisin d'etre, if you will...

Neutrinos could be the least of our worries

[ender516]

Just from my pre-quantum physics knowledge, I know that a charged particle possesses an electric field which decrease with distance by an inverse-square law, but never goes to zero. So there is an electric field everywhere, although multiple fields from oppositely charged particles might sum to zero at certain points. Magnetic fields are produced by moving charges, and again (though I am less certain of this) obey an inverse-square law.

[Army of GOD]

Just from my pre-quantum physics knowledge, I know that a charged particle possesses an electric field which decrease with distance by an inverse-square law, but never goes to zero. So there is an electric field everywhere, although multiple fields from oppositely charged particles might sum to zero at certain points. Magnetic fields are produced by moving charges, and again (though I am less certain of this) obey an inverse-square law.

You're right.