Stephen Hawking says God particle discovery makes physics boring

Professor Stephen Hawking has two reasons to be sad about the discovery of the Higgs boson particle earlier this year — it lost him a $100 bet and he would’ve been happier if a more “exotic” and fanciful solution to the problem of the mass of the universe had been discovered.

In a speech at the Science Museum in London where he was opening an exhibit all about the Hadron Collider, Hawking said of the newly famous near-mythical boson: “Physics would be far more interesting if it had not been found.”

Everyone’s second favourite boffin after hot new science nerd Brian Cox also talked about his own deep personal loss that came from the discovery, explaining: “I had a bet with Gordon Kane of Michigan University that the Higgs particle wouldn’t be found. The Nobel Prize cost me $100.” [Metro]