Chapter 260: The Trisolaran Analysis

In the 235th year of the Crisis Era, Humanity's Smart Covering Project was completed.

Trisolaran World, Council of Governors meeting.

No. 7 (Leader): "With the completion of Humanity's Smart Covering Project, what do you think is the purpose of the Covering Plan?"

Science Governor: "We are also puzzled by this. Such a gigantic Sophon-Blocked Zone consumes astronomical resources on a daily basis.

"If it were only for particle collider experiments or other hidden projects, they could have built a much smaller 'cover.'

"Now it seems as if they are about to carry out some planetary-level engineering. In our understanding, only the production of Sophons would require such a large-scale project, but obviously, it is impossible for humans to possess the technology to create Sophons."

If Lin Sen were to hear this statement, he would certainly ask, "Are you that smart? Does the Leader know?"

Strategy Governor (Newly appointed): "There must be some plan hidden beneath the Cover, but it certainly cannot be a Sophon project. If humans now have the technology to create Sophons, we would need to consider fleeing immediately.

"I believe it is Human's thinking inertia. Humanity has abundant resources, so they don't value resources as much as we do. They prefer saturation solutions for many of their plans, and they like to implement large projects without concern for the resources they consume.

"Another aspect is Humanity's pathological pursuit of confidentiality. They can even allocate nearly a quarter of a project's resources just for secrecy, which to us is utterly unimaginable.

"As for the purpose of the planetary-level Covering Project, my guess is that it's preparation for some future large-scale project, with the most likely possibility being Humanity's large fleet construction. This can be judged by the materials they transport into the Cover in the future."

Lin Sen indicated that he must thank this smart gentleman, because, indeed, Humanity's large fleet would be built under the Cover.

No. 7 (Leader): "Can our Sophons enter the Cover to explore, and how big is the risk? If humans are conducting particle collision experiments under the Cover, do we have a chance to interfere?"

Science Governor: "Our only chance is when humans conduct particle collider experiments, they will shut down the internal Sophon-blocking field within the Cover. This also presents an opportunity for Sophon exploration, although it may also be a trap. They might open the Sophon-blocking field when conducting particle acceleration, but that would prevent humans from obtaining valid experimental results.

"However, it poses a great risk to us. If the internal Sophon-blocking field is not shut down, and Sophons try to unfold in lower dimensions and observe, we will also lose this Sophon.

"Regarding Humanity's particle collision experiments under the Cover, our ability to interfere has already become very weak. Sophons, existing in 11 dimensions, can only observe at a microcosmic scale. Sophons mainly rely on electromagnetic signals to observe the macroscopic world, and the wavelength of electromagnetic signals is usually much larger than the size of Sophons.

"Even if we can interfere with their particle collision experiments on a microscale, because of the limited observational capabilities of Sophons, we cannot use the light-speed movement of Sophons for multi-threaded interference.

"Besides, Human particle collisions are conducted with a large number of particles; therefore, our interference is very limited. With the performance of Humanity's supercomputers now, they can analyze and rule out the influences of our interference."

The essence of high-energy particle collision experiments is to smash particles, reveal their interiors, and calculate the internal model of the particles based on the collision results.

In fact, Humanity to this day has not clearly understood the proton structure model. The common belief is that a proton is made of two up quarks and one down quark, held together by the Strong Interaction Force.

But this is just one mainstream view. Two hundred years ago, Humanity realized that the proton model is just one of thousands of quark models, with the 3-quark model and the 5-quark model being common.

The role of the high-energy particle collider is to capture and analyze new particles produced after collisions through the detectors surrounding it, and by analyzing the properties, trajectories, and energy distributions of these particles, infer the internal structure and interactions of protons.

And the proton also exists within an 11-dimensional space, which is completely different from the three-dimensional space we normally envision, its inner complexity is so great that it could even harbor intelligent civilizations.

As for whether the target particle, Sophon, would be shattered by collision, that naturally would not happen, since the proton is not a three-dimensional sphere. Mastering the collision angle, or to be precise, the angle of dimensional structure, means the Sophon wouldn't be shattered, but instead, this could lead to different experimental results following the collision with high-energy particles.

It can be simply understood that the structure of Sophons is extremely complex. They can use the hardest part of themselves to shatter the test particles in the accelerator in various ways, preventing humanity from detecting and calculating the inner model of protons using supercomputers based on the test setup.

Humanity would need up to hundreds of millions of years to study the proton model with Sophon interference.

The Science Governor continued, "However, there's no need to worry excessively. Although we are unclear about the specific progress of the human particle collider experiments undercover, we are aware of the research progress of the Solar System Accelerator.

"We can cross-reference and understand their progress. For example, if certain research is being conducted undercover and yields results, then the likelihood of similar research being done on the Solar System Accelerator would decrease; they might continue to pursue this research direction subsequently.

"Humanity does not know which research direction is the right one; they can only try them one by one, and there are basically no shortcuts in this process.

"Each research direction requires a wealth of experiments for support, so we can guess their research progress by observing their experimental directions.

"Humanity is still in the 'blind men feeling an elephant' stage in its research of the microscopic world, lacking a comprehensive understanding of fundamental particles.

"Therefore, we are not afraid that humanity might hide their research progress. Unless they can abandon the Solar System Accelerator or have already made breakthroughs in microphysics that put them on a similar level to us."

Supreme Leader (No. 7): "Indeed, though we have reduced interference with their microscopic particle research, it's unlikely that humanity could conceal breakthroughs in microscopic theory from us. This is not something that can be achieved through individual talent alone.

"It requires innumerable experiments and calculations. Our progress in this area is rapid because we have an overwhelming advantage in computation. Microscopic research is an accumulative and sedimentary process, not something that happens overnight.

"I believe there must be other strategies at play with Lin Sen's Project Cover. Humans certainly don't mind resource consumption, but they wouldn't engage in meaningless expenditure either.

"Lin Sen's plans are always interlinked; the Project Cover must have other plans in coordination, and we absolutely must not let down our guard regarding the Project Cover. Even if it means sacrificing a few Sophons, it's a necessary cost."

Strategy Governor: "After simulations and considering humanity's needs for particle colliders, we calculated that humans might turn off the Sophon-Blocked Zone about 10% of the time, which means if we probe with Sophons, there's a 90% probability that the Sophons will be destroyed."

Supreme Leader (No. 7): "No, that's too high a rate of loss. Over the next 40 years, we also need to keep track of humanity's progress. At the same time, we must understand everything under Project Cover before the arrival of the great fleet to the Solar System.

"I can only give you 20 Sophons at most. According to your calculations, you'll only have two chances to probe, which is far from sufficient.

"Furthermore, even if humanity turns off the inner layer of the Sophon-Blocked Zone of Project Cover, many of their plans are certainly stored in new, smaller Sophon-Blocked Zones; we must achieve multiple and comprehensive Sophon probes."

Strategy Governor: "This is the gamble with humanity. We need to comprehensively analyze the progress of human microscopic technology research and predict the possible timing of their particle collider experiments. We'll conduct our probes at these times to maximize the success rate of our probes.

"Within the next 10 years, I don't see much point in Sophon probing. I'll try to save the opportunities for the 10 years before the outbreak of war."

Supreme Leader (No. 7) pondered for a while: "Having dealt with Lin Sen for so long, he must have predicted your thoughts. I suggest that you also arrange a Sophon probe within the next 10 years!"

Strategy Governor: "Yes, Supreme Leader!"