Higgs Boson Day

Today I read the announcement that two scientists won the Nobel Prize in physics for their Higgs boson research. The subject has intrigued me since I first heard about it, and perhaps it’s time for me to work toward some level of understanding. If the two men won the award for “. . . figuring out how the universe’s most basic building blocks acquire mass and form the world as we know it today,” then surely it must be worth learning more about. Science is a fascinating subject; I wish I had been more enthusiastic about it in my earlier years. One thing that has always amused me, however, is that some things that were “fact/set in stone” were later shown to be erroneous. For example, just when students all over the world were memorizing the parts of an atom, up pops the quark. It makes me think that scientists should start every statement with “We think . . .”  Anyway, perhaps today should be declared Higgs Boson Day