A retired circus clown yesterday claimed that Professor Peter Higgs, the renowned physics professor, had stolen his idea for the elusive “God particle”.
Bozo the Clown, excitedly told us last night from his retirement home in Bognor Regis: “I was chatting to me fiancée at the time, Gloria the trapeze artist, one wet Saturday afternoon in August 1963. We was up to our arses in mud in a bleedin’ field near Edinburgh University. When I remarked to ‘er that the rain was getting really ‘eavy, Gloria said that it didn’t matter, we had no control over the elements. Then she said she was going to the 6 o’clock mass to see if God would sort it out. She were a Catholic, see? Matter, mass, ‘eavy, God, elements, see? See? That got me thinking, see, about an elemental particle that imparts mass to matter. A sort of God particle, like. When she got back, I explained my theory ‘er, she sort of glazed over and said she was leaving me for Sam the Bearded Lady. The next year, I was flicking through Physical Review Letters in the dentist’s waiting room after I’d ‘ad me front knashers kicked out by an ‘orse, when I found Peter Higgs’s bleedin’ paper. He must have been hanging around the tent and overheard us. He even ‘ad the nerve to call it the ‘iggs bozon to rub poor old Bozo’s red nose in it. Couldn’t believe it.”
A spokesman for the Nobel committee, who are thought to be seriously considering Peter Higgs for a top prize, said “These wild accusations are of no real con-CERN.’’