faster than light?

Speed of Light Broken

First, who broke it and how are they going to fix it?

Another scientific theory bites the dust. I get this warm fussy feeling each time that happens, how about you? :noidea:

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

Since the neutrinos that were measured traveled through the earth, did that somehow affect its speed...

I know that the neutrinos hardly interact with matter at all, but is it understood well enough to say that it is the same as neutrinos traveling in a vacuum.

 

The "excess" speed was only a tiny fraction of lightspeed, not, say, three times or three hundred times faster than light. Had the experiments produce the latter, differentials in orders of magnitude, I'd say our theories would need significant revision. A variance at such an infintesimal percentage, however, (if it is genuine and not noise or error), wouldn't undermine the fundamental principles and relationships of our theories but would just indicate that they're not yet fully refined, i.e. E=MC^2 +/- X, where X is some influence we hadn't discovered yet.

Nonetheless it is very intriguing to see that this "X" remained completely hidden and unexpected for most of a century, a century of mankind's most rapid and profound expansion of our knowledge of the universe. Nature ain't simple. (Which presents something of a paradox when the quest of discovery works best when hewing to Occam's razor: the simplest is often it).

 

Since the measured difference is so small, it could be that the speed of neutrinos is the speed limit of the universe and the speed of light approaches that limit. We aren't sure if light is slowed down slightly by unknown means which don't affect neutrinos as greatly.

We don't know if we will measure the speed of another weakly interacting particle that is yet slightly faster than neutrinos.

 

Faster than light travel? Of course, how else does the ISS Enterprise get to other planets

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

Its a game changer for sure.

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

Not so much of a game changer, as an eye opener...

Many in the scientific community are bound by the constraint of C...

However, by their own admission, there is no UT of everything... regardless of how they try, gravity (an observable and tested law of physics) still falls out especially when we approach C or when the mass is too great...

I believe we will modify the mechanics of the generally accepted model we currently use, when we determine what the properties are of the subatomic particles we still have difficulty in detecting, much less measuring, after we have better tools to understand what is going on in the subatomic interactions...

Right now, we are only throwing mudballs at each other and really can't determine what all the splattering results mean... we do know more than we did 30 years ago, but still... it was less than 200 years ago that a whole lot of folks didn't think man could fly across an ocean... and not too long before that, that the world was flat.

As we gather better tools to use to understand the universe in which we exist, we will have a better understanding of why some things appear to happen instantaneously, and why this test appeared to say C ain't as fast as it gets.

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

By current theory, the speed of light through a vacuum is the absolute upper speed limit. As light passes through a medium it slows down because it is absorbed and re-emitted each time it strikes a particle. It jumps the gaps at the same speed.

There are a few particles that traverse a medium at speeds faster than light. However, and this is a big however, they are still going slower than the speed of light in a vacuum.

Tom

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

I say we let them off with a warning, they only exceeded the speed limit by 1 part in a Billion.

 

...by going thru dimensions with Warp Drive - your neighbor Scotty to the north of you can explain it all.

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

If the results hold up, it doesn't mean we throw relativity out the window. The neutrinos were found to be travelling 0.00025% faster than C. Einstein's math has been shown over and over to be an excellent predictor of the way space and time bend - that hasn't changed. All that can change is the set of ideas we've extrapolated from his excellent math and some of the assumptions - like the speed of light being the fundamental rate at which cause & effect ripple through the universe.

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

It's part of a progression.... Aristotle was superseded by Newton, later by Einstein. Their works still have truths - we just don't have the absolute truth.

 

Experimental error. The team is from Italy, the same nation who brought us the Fiat. 'Nuff said :_>

 

Re: Speed of Light Broken

The result will not be replicated. If it is confirmed that neutrinos can go faster than c I'll eat one :_>

 

That's bording on racist mate!

You wouldn't be too happy if I brought some similar comment about America. And wasn't it Fiat that bought out your third largest car manufacturer employing 50,000 Americans?

 

Typical.....

As far as Fiat Buying out Dodge.....well, kinda hard to say who came out on the wrong end of that deal.