Inspired by:
http://fqxi.org/...
So basically I figured, intent in the cause/effect of quantum meta physics modeling was the problem in creating a Higgs particle. I was wondering how do you get around intent?
Then I remembered what the Hassids do here Brooklyn. They aren't allowed to touch electrical devices on Saturdays with the intent to use them. I know of a little trick they use.
They put their babies by the electrical device or switch, hoping the baby flips it. Since the baby has no intent behind its movements, it was still technically okay for the baby to operate the switches.
So if it works for the Hassids, why not on the LHC controls?
And thus, Baby on the Boards.
Dick stood in amazement; all four hundred and twenty of the LHC inducers had gone south. He knew then the project was cursed, or the more outlandish theories of the universe might actually be true. He let a long sigh and decided the answer to his dilemma was probably a mixture of both.
"What was this time," Dick yelled into the universal intercom, already the series of failure reports from the various inducers strung along the project area were filtering in. He swung around in his chair, pondering how this could keep happening, especially to him. He had had the Midas touch since university, solving ever great riddle of the universe after another.
"Like child's play," he muttered, and thinking of his wife and newborn boy, who recently arrived, paged them. He needed a creature comfort right now; his life's work was in ruin again.
"The magnets over heated in about two hundred of them," replied the head systems engineer over the intercom. "A hundred or so lost power for no reason, getting teams to break down the barriers to take a look under the hood. Fifty or so the particles took an unexpected path, and the rest, well the rest..."
"FUBAR?" sighed Dick.
"Yes sir, FUBAR," replied the engineer. "I'll let you know when we know."
Dick got out of his chair and walked over to the system grid. He had spent years developing replicators so each LHC system was exact; each particle accelerated would be exact. Heck, he even made sure a replicator made the replicators so they would be exact, taking all chaos out of the system. Yet even then, no matter how many Higgs inducers he built, not a single one would produce an event.
He kicked the wall. He briefly thought about ramming his head into the wall, knowing the recoup time would be months before they could try again. He thought, the best way to go about this would be to get a running start. He was about to do so when the door open.
"Honey?" he said hopefully, knowing his wife was on the way.
A deep laughter emerged as the door revealed his mentor, Dr. Smitz, who had also spent his life failing at exactly what Dick was now a failure at.
"No dear boy, quite the opposite," Dr. Smitz bellowed as he waltzed over to the system grid, watching the various failure reports. "I see we had another complete meltdown."
"Yep, third time this year alone. That makes seventeen fail events for me, for a grand total of roughly four thousand fried inducers."
Dick joined him at the system board, noting LHC Inducer 234 had done something spectacular.
"Look at that one!" Dr. Smitz giggled, noting the same system. "According to the read out, you have a mouse in the machine!"
"Except we know there are no mice on this planet," replied Dick. "I guess it's better than the time the failure was reported as a telegraph wire breaking. That was at least original. We haven't used the technology in over three hundred years."
"I still like my popsicle reports," laughed Dr. Smitz, referring to the string of failures on his own part to create a Higgs particle. "The report always said the popsicles were in the shape of a log cabin as well! I tell you what, if I ever figure that one out, I believe I might even one up God!"
"How many times did you fail?"
"Always. Just as you will."
Dick stopped, Dr. Smitz had never said this before, he had always been his biggest supporter, convinced that Dick would be the one to finally solve the problem and produce a Higgs, the holy grail of physics.
"Why will I always fail?"
"The same reason everyone who takes on this quest fails. Why did the original atom smasher fail in Texas?"
"Ants ate the wiring."
"Why did CERN fail in Switzerland?"
"The system was to complex."
"Why did the Hoppfield device fail in the Artic?"
"Supposedly because polar bear hairs got into the machine, but I have never really bought into that. I think it was still to complex."
"Why did Yogomota Ring fail on Mars Base 2?"
"Because of the gravity well, but they didn't know it existed yet."
"Why did the Ersland Harbour Device fail in the heliosphere port?"
"Intergalaxtic cosmic interference. Come on Dr. Smitz, is this a history lesson, or a do you know something I don't?"
Dr. Smitz was about to say something when Dick's wife and baby boy come in. Dick smiled and motioned for his wife to seat down. Dr. Smitz waved at the baby, the striking resemblance to Dick himself could not be denied. The baby looked so happy in his mother's arms, quite at home in Dick's command module chair.
"As I was saying," Dr. Smitz continued, "was that all these great thinkers before you and I, we all shared one thing in common."
"The goal of creating a Higgs particle. I know, I spent my life studying their work, as I did yours."
"Yes, yes dear boy. And with that goal, came what?"
Dick thought for a moment, but was sidetracked as his son started giggling and waving his arms widely for his daddy. His wife laughed, so much like his father she thought.
Dick stood there, and it hit him.
"We all had intent."
"Yes, we all had..."
The baby again got rowdy and started to shuffle out of his mother's grasp.
"Intent," Dr. Smitz and Dick said together, wide-eyed in horror as the saw the baby free itself from its mother and firmly plant its unguided hand on the power button for the Higgs inducers.
Time officially ended for them, and forty-two things happened simultaneously.
Most were minute, littered across the dimensional strings like flax from a broken thread of yarn across the quilt of the whole.
Only things of note, was a young German professor in one thread opened a box, and found out his cat was actually dead.
The other concerns the baby. Not realizing he had become a destroyer of worlds, he drifted through a time hole until he found himself nestled in some hay.
Away in a manager.
With three strange men offering him gifts.