Faster than light?
Idris
Posts: 2,317
Physicists at the lab near Geneva say they've observed subatomic particles moving faster than the speed of light. If confirmed, it would defy Einstein — and upend our understanding of physics
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la- ... 7738.story
:ugeek:
Cool, anyone up for some potential time travel?
http://www.latimes.com/news/science/la- ... 7738.story
:ugeek:
Cool, anyone up for some potential time travel?
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http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I8RxKyQL ... re=related
If you hate something, don't you do it too...~
All other physicists are skeptical of this finding. My opinion is that if it is true (they timed it correctly... which seems unlikely over such a small distance) the particles went through different dimensions to get there. In other words, they didn't follow the curvature of space/time and went "straight." Like going from here to China but cutting through the Earth to do so. Who knows what those other dimensions look like... but they almost certainly do exist.
Come on Professor Hawking... explain this for us!
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: These are the dark matter engines I invented. They allow my starship to travel between galaxies in mere hours.
Cubert J. Farnsworth: That's impossible. You can't go faster than the speed of light.
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: Of course not. That's why scientists increased the speed of light in 2208.
Cubert J. Farnsworth: Also impossible
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: And what makes my engines truly remarkable is the afterburner, which delivers 200% fuel efficiency.
Cubert J. Farnsworth: That's especially impossible.
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: Not at all. It's very simple.
Cubert J. Farnsworth: Then explain it.
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: Now that's impossible! It came to me in a dream, and I forgot it in another dream.
If the particle is in fact travelling through other dimensions, I would think theoretically that the greater the distance used in the experiment, the more opportunities that the particle would have to "utilize" the inter-dimensional travel, and thus the greater the perceived divergence from the speed of light.
/armchairphysicist signing off
Can't wait to read more on this. On that note, if anyone's interested in this topic, may I recommend the following books for their layman's take on an extremely opaque and complicated topic:
- Quantum: Einstein, Bohr, and the Great Debate about the Nature of Reality (by Manjit Kumar)
- Three Roads to Quantum Gravity (by Lee Smolin)
Of course, if this recent faster-than-light discovery turns out to be true, much of what is in those books will be turned on its head.
As long as it won't cost a billion dollars for me to go to every PJ show and be home right after they are done, so I can sleep in my own bed.
Cool article! Thank you for posting! :geek:
I went to a lecture on their findings the other day and the consensus seems to be there is something wrong with the experiment. The speed of neutrinos(the particle they found) has been accurately measured in the past. The example they gave was a supernova a few years back, supernovas emit a lot of neutrinos. The supernova was detected using powerful telescopes and the neutrinos hit earth exactly when they should have. If these findings were true, they would have hit earth ~a year before the supernova was detected and we would have detected the massive increase in neutrinos.
Basically the 60ns is outside of the uncertainty, but it wouldn't take much of an error being discovered to put in within the range of uncertainty. So, what will happen next is a few people will try to duplicate the results. In all likelihood, they won't be able to. The scientist running the CERN experiment will keep looking for an error and the might find it, they might not. But their experiment doesn't prove anything unless it can be replicated.
Thanks!
Until then,
Gotta love the thinking here..we don't "believe" the results, sure we checked the machine over and over again, but it goes against everything we know and believe. So it must be wrong. Suddenly faith is whats driving some of these scientists
http://www.geek.com/articles/geek-ceter ... -20110923/
Faith? I'd say past experience is what is driving their lack of certainty, which is a lot different from what you are inferring, if I am understanding you correctly.
"With our thoughts we make the world"
Past experience(s) leading them/us to preconceived notions of what something is. Something that is wildy dangerous.
This is what i'm saying,
You should read the actually report released by the CERN scientist and not some magazine article. Even they don't believe the results. The speed of neutrinos were measured during the SN1987A supernova, which is a far better measurement than what we see over ~750km. This isn't a bunch of physicist sitting around clinging to the old ways of Einstein. There appears to be something wrong with these results and several other people will try to duplicate them. If these results can't be duplicated, then they are meaningless. If the results can be duplicated, then there will be a major paradigm shift in physics. But lets not pretend Physicists are only questioning this because of "preconceived notions".
Did I not use a ? mark on the title of the thread, I said "them/us" when referencing preconceived notions.
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wildly dangerous,
Moving on, I can already tell that I'm going to enjoy speaking with you more!
My position remains the same, with this as with most everything else, things must be proved. Its always going to be relative. Of course Eienstein is not wrong regarding things being relative, thats just obvious.
This is just one one the theory of relativity has been proven and is used in every day life. There are countless other examples.
I just cannot think that we're totally wrong about all this. But then again, Newton's Laws of Gravity turned out to be incorrect but applicable at the level of the "small" (on Earth). Maybe that's what we'll determine here... but I highly doubt it. I would bet a large amount of money that their results will be proven to be incorrect.