Just to provide a little perspective about our universe.

[GALTGULCH8]

[Selene]

A particle that travels faster than the speed of light? Uh oh, move over Einstein...

http://www.bbc.co.uk...onment-15017484

The Cern team prepares a beam of just one type, muon neutrinos, and sends them through the Earth to an underground laboratory at Gran Sasso in Italy to see how many show up as a different type, tau neutrinos.

In the course of doing the experiments, the researchers noticed that the particles showed up 60 billionths of a second earlier than they would have done if they had traveled at the speed of light.

This is a tiny fractional change - just 20 parts in a million - but one that occurs consistently.

The team measured the travel times of neutrino bunches some 16,000 times, and have reached a level of statistical significance that in scientific circles would count as a formal discovery.

But the group understands that what are known as "systematic errors" could easily make an erroneous result look like a breaking of the ultimate speed limit.

That has motivated them to publish their measurements.

"My dream would be that another, independent experiment finds the same thing - then I would be relieved," Dr Ereditato told BBC News.

But for now, he explained, "we are not claiming things, we want just to be helped by the community in understanding our crazy result - because it is crazy".

Edited September 24, 2011 by Selene

[GALTGULCH8]

Another rational perspective about our place in the Universe from a scientific point of view:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q70eS-uecYM&feature=related

[GALTGULCH8]

http://www.wimp.com/comprehenduniverse/

[BaalChatzaf]

This is a tiny fractional change - just 20 parts in a million - but one that occurs consistently.

The possibility of instrumental error or error in experimental design is not yet eliminated. Nor has this measurement been replicated by another group elsewhere. Even the people who announced this finding are asking the help of the scientific community to uncover an error if they can. The falsification of relativity theory is a tad premature.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Selene]

This is a tiny fractional change - just 20 parts in a million - but one that occurs consistently.

The possibility of instrumental error or error in experimental design is not yet eliminated. Nor has this measurement been replicated by another group elsewhere. Even the people who announced this finding are asking the help of the scientific community to uncover an error if they can. The falsification of relativity theory is a tad premature.

Ba'al Chatzaf

Yes, I can read also Bob, lol

Much too premature, but it does raise an interesting possibility because it would radically change a significant amount of assumptions which, I believe, would include time travel...right?

Adam

[BaalChatzaf]

Yes, I can read also Bob, lol

Much too premature, but it does raise an interesting possibility because it would radically change a significant amount of assumptions which, I believe, would include time travel...right?

Adam

Not necessarily. If it turns out that under some circumstances neutrinos can take an alternate route through an extra dimension (very outre possibility) it does not equate to time travel. Kurt Goedel (yes that Kurt Goedel) showed that Einstein's General Theory of Relativity allowed for time travel along closed time-like curves (see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed_timelike_curve).

Stand by. Physics has just gotten "interesting" again. When experiment takes the lead showing that theories may have only restricted applicability, the world becomes a very exciting place. Physics was turned on its head during the thirty pluss years from 1895 to 1925 when classical physics was over shadowed by quantum theory. Radioactivity was discovered by Beqerel and Boltzmann's work show that atoms were honest to god real (some physicists did not believe it, particularly Ernst Mach). I was hoping for a major shake up and my wish may yet be granted.

Another "by the way". Neutrinos may be tiny but they are weird. The physics of neutrinos may have just gotten a boost and half. Those little devils just do not want to be simple and straightforward. If neutrinos which have a very small mass can go faster than light -in space- that would surely upset the special theory of relativity, which is one of the pillars of quantum field theory. BUT if the latest result were generally applicable, the neutrinos from the super duper nova 1987A should have arrived here five years prior to the light signal. They did not not. They showed up three hours earlier and this can be explained by light photons bouncing around the gas envelope produced by the super nova while neutrons that are not very interacting went straight three at slightly less than light speed (this would be predictable by special theory of relativity).

Here is another thought to conjure with. The discovery of the anomalous motion of Uranus did not prove that Newton's law of gravitation was wrong, just like that. An alternative explanation was found: another planet! Sure enough that is how Neptune was discovered. Newton's law of gravitation was later falsified by the anomalous precession of the perihelion of Mercury's orbit. The moral of the story is: it is not all that easy to falsify a theory that has ton's of evidence backing it up.

My bet is

1. Possible timing errors in the synchronization of clocks at both ends of the tunnel using the GPS.

2. Deformation of the tunnel along which the neutrinos traveled due to gravitational effects of the Moon or possible seismic causes. These have not been positively eliminated yet

and as I mentioned previously, an alternate route through an extra dimensions. This is the most intriguing possibility and will be the hardest to show.

Also we await confirmation by another group. There is always the possibility of verification bias. Another group using another tunnel and NOT getting the superluminal result would show there was some condition local to the experiment that accounts for the anomalous velocity reading.

Ba'al Chatzaf

[Selene]

2nd test affirms faster-than-light particles

A second experiment at the European facility that reported subatomic particles zooming faster than the speed of light -- stunning the world of physics -- has reached the same result, scientists said late Thursday.

The "positive outcome of the [second] test makes us more confident in the result," said Fernando Ferroni, president of the Italian Institute for Nuclear Physics, in a statement released late Thursday. Ferroni is one of 160 physicists involved in the international collaboration known as OPERA (Oscillation Project with Emulsion Tracking Apparatus) that performed the experiment.

While the second experiment "has made an important test of consistency of its result," Ferroni added, "a final word can only be said by analogous measurements performed elsewhere in the world."

That is, more tests are needed, and on other experimental setups. There is still a large crowd of skeptical physicists who suspect that the original measurement done in September was an error.

http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-502223_162-57327392/2nd-test-affirms-faster-than-light-particles/

[BaalChatzaf]

2nd test affirms faster-than-light particles

A second experiment at the European facility that reported subatomic particles zooming faster than the speed of light -- stunning the world of physics -- has reached the same result, scientists said late Thursday.

The "positive outcome of the [second] test makes us more confident in the result," said Fernando Ferroni, president of the Italian Institute for Nuclear Physics, in a statement released late Thursday. Ferroni is one of 160 physicists involved in the international collaboration known as OPERA (Oscillation Project with Emulsion Tracking Apparatus) that performed the experiment.

While the second experiment "has made an important test of consistency of its result," Ferroni added, "a final word can only be said by analogous measurements performed elsewhere in the world."

That is, more tests are needed, and on other experimental setups. There is still a large crowd of skeptical physicists who suspect that the original measurement done in September was an error.

http://www.cbsnews.c...ight-particles/

Tests made by another group of physicists who are skeptical of the outcome would go a long way to eliminate observer bias. Generally an experimental result is not accepted until reproduced by parties other than those who did the first experiments. Also an experiment with a different design strategy the corroborates the first experiment would give more credibility to the original result.

Stay tunes, wait and see. The last word has not been said.

ruveyn