How did physicists predict anything about the Higgs boson?

[kashiark]

Perhaps asking this question is like someone who just learned how to add asking about differential equations, but I decided to go ahead and ask it anyway. The reasoning behind the Higgs field and its associated particle makes sense; however, how could physicists possibly predict its mass and charge? I can see how they could predict this, but how did they know it was a scalar particle?

 

[ZapperZ]

Perhaps asking this question is like someone who just learned how to add asking about differential equations, but I decided to go ahead and ask it anyway. The reasoning behind the Higgs field and its associated particle makes sense; however, how could physicists possibly predict its mass and charge? I can see how they could predict this, but how did they know it was a scalar particle?

Read the short "history" of the Higgs from Peter Higgs account.

http://physicsworld.com/cws/article/print/19750

Zz.

 

[Naty1]

Zapper: great reference...Very interesting to see how pieces fall together into a new theory...