Scientists Baffled By Seemingly Faster-Than-Light Particles

[Yopaz]

I always find it interesting when they are baffled by that fact that a guy who lived 50 years ago theories are might just get proven wrong as science marches forward.

As we advance more and more people with propose things that at the time will fit the facts as we know them only to be possibly one generation later be proven wrong as our ability to find and deduce facts becomes better.

The evolution theory is 100 years old. Newton's laws are roughly 300 years old. Just because a theory is old doesn't mean it's invalid. I am sure even you would be surprised if you read an article states scientists have found out Newton's laws are wrong.

Well yes they are already wrong in certain cases like calculating Mercury's orbit around the sun which is why we have other theories besides Newton's theories.

OK, bad example, but the principles are still still correct. It's not like we're going to find out that we can drop something out of the window and it will stay outside there because there was something Newton missed.

However the point I wanted to make was that when something like this comes we react because it changes what we thought was established as facts. If Einstein had said 1 year ago that nothing could move faster than the speed of light then this wouldn't come as a big revelation.

 

[klasbo]

Nothing is faster than light. Albert Einstein said so. And yet, recent findings at the CERN physics lab seem to suggest otherwise.

This was James Clerk Maxwell, not Einstein. Einstein took the idea that the speed of light was constant and ran with it, used some geometry and a second degree polynomial approximation and ended up with ymc² ~~ mc² + (1/2)mv², where y is the the time dilation formula (Lorentz factor) and (1/2)mv² is a form of energy, hence mc² is a form of energy.

In a recent CERN test, scientists uncovered another bizarre quirk. They fired the standard neutrino burst, and somehow that cluster of particles reached Italy .00000006 seconds faster than the speed of light.

If you have any familiarity with physics at all, you're likely aware that this sort of thing simply is not supposed to happen. Traditional theory dictates that as an object approaches the speed of light, its mass increases exponentially, slowing the object and preventing anything from ever beating The Flash in a footrace.

Mass doesn't actually increase as your velocity increases, but the Lorentz factor sure does, which means that you need exponentially more and more energy to increase your velocity. (An interesting side note: Since mass and energy are two sides of the same coin, this means that you are "using" a lot of mass to increase an objects velocity. And a lot of mass in a small area means a black hole...)

http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/badastronomy/2011/09/22/faster-than-light-travel-discovered-slow-down-folks/

If neutrinos travel faster than light, then we should?ve detected the neutrinos from Supernova 1987A before we saw the explosion itself. That exploding star was formed when the core of a massive star collapsed, detonating the outer layers. The collapsing core blasted out a furious wave of neutrinos strong enough to be seen here on Earth, over 160,000 light years away.

The distance from the detector in Italy to the source in Geneva is about 730 km. The travel time at the speed of light is about 2.43 milliseconds, and the neutrinos appear to have outraced that speed by 60 nanoseconds. If true, that means they were traveling just a scosh faster than light, by about 1 part in 40,000. The neutrinos from SN1987A traveled so far that had they been moving that much faster than light, they would?ve arrived here almost four years before the light did. However, we saw the light from the supernova at roughly the same time as the neutrinos.

It's not a definitive counter-claim, but it strongly suggests that this is just a measurement error. The source and the detector are 730km apart, and you need to know the distance between these to an accuracy of 3m for this result to be even remotely valid. It's going to turn out to me a measurement inaccuracy. I, too, am betting my dilithium on it.

Also, I heard about this result 60ns before they announced it.

 

[uzo]

I've always called bullshit on matter being incapable of travelling faster than light. I'm certainly not any kind of scientist, but I got in an argument with my physics teacher in high school - it was a simple contradiction of facts that screwed the whole thing. We watched a doco about the Big Bang, and as they explained to expansion of the universe (from 'instant' 1 to year 3 billion or so).

Anyway, they explained the speed of the expansion of matter - and bingo.

The first fucking thing in the fucking universe was matter travelling faster than fucking light. Did every scientist in existence fail at logical deduction 101?

 

[Alcamonic]

And I was expecting a black hole to come out of it... oh well.

I study some chemistry and nature science at school, and I don't really see what the whole fuss is about. Sure, this good old guy Albert made some equations about his theories. I really refuse to believe that he was 100% sure about everything, maybe about the limitations of technology back then.

Also, all power to the engines!

 

[Zersy]

That is wonderful and all but where the hell is my hoverboard !

Your telling me we reached Faster then light speed before a skateboard that doesn't use wheels ?

 

[Ledan]

I KNEW IT!
I have never believed this whole "nothing can go faster than the speed of light" stuff. Sure, you might not be able to see where the object is, but that doesnt matter as to the actual physical location and speed of the object.

Note: I know nothing about physics...... but it just sounds silly to me that matter isn't allowed to go faster than light.

Also: this wont mean time travel. It will just mean that we can have objects that travel faster than light. Therefore, if a large object is traveling faster than the speed of light, it will hit you before you see it.

 

[Captain Pancake]

FTL travel man! It's happening. It's a thing.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

I always find it interesting when they are baffled by that fact that a guy who lived 50 years ago theories are might just get proven wrong as science marches forward.

As we advance more and more people with propose things that at the time will fit the facts as we know them only to be possibly one generation later be proven wrong as our ability to find and deduce facts becomes better.

The evolution theory is 100 years old. Newton's laws are roughly 300 years old. Just because a theory is old doesn't mean it's invalid. I am sure even you would be surprised if you read an article states scientists have found out Newton's laws are wrong.

Well yes they are already wrong in certain cases like calculating Mercury's orbit around the sun which is why we have other theories besides Newton's theories.

OK, bad example, but the principles are still still correct. It's not like we're going to find out that we can drop something out of the window and it will stay outside there because there was something Newton missed.

However the point I wanted to make was that when something like this comes we react because it changes what we thought was established as facts. If Einstein had said 1 year ago that nothing could move faster than the speed of light then this wouldn't come as a big revelation.

Ok just because of that I wasn't sure what you were trying to say. Yes what you are saying is true as in general cases we would still use Newton's formulae like in school but in exact cases you need the more complex formulae.

 

[fenrizz]

So what. A century of study has know went up in smoke.

I always find it interesting when they are baffled by that fact that a guy who lived 50 years ago theories are might just get proven wrong as science marches forward.

As we advance more and more people with propose things that at the time will fit the facts as we know them only to be possibly one generation later be proven wrong as our ability to find and deduce facts becomes better.

From what little * understand about the subject matter this does not prove Einstein wrong any more than Einsteins Relativity Theory proved Newton wrong.

They are both still valid.
But now there seems to be an exception, deosn't prove it wrong, just that it needs to be updated.

 

[Glademaster_v1legacy]

Well yes they are already wrong in certain cases like calculating Mercury's orbit around the sun which is why we have other theories besides Newton's theories.

And Einstein's relativity fails to properly chart the Voyager flight path, and cannot account for galactic swirls without the ever so convenient cosmological constant. Like its predecessors, relativity also is showing its age... and has been for at least twenty years.

But, I feel like we've had two other whole topics on this with in depth physical discussion on this already. So, let me try and paraphrase from before:

~No, this didn't break physics.
~No, this was probably not random quantum effects (as 15,000 runs of statistical significance doesn't tend to go hand in hand with the unpredictable and uncertain nature of QM).
~No, this has nothing to do with Group Velocity and particle packet physics (as that would again have variations large enough to bar statistical consistency).
~Neutrinos are cheaters.
~This doesn't make FTL travel in the intergalactic sense any more feasible, there are other theories for that.
~And... let's wait for more, but I'm all for smacking parts of Relativity with a shovel and making sure that they are never seen or heard from again!

I'm betting that if it's not a measurement error, it's an unforseen or unaccounted-for effect of relativity or quantum mechanics. The particle didn't exceed c, it only appears to have done so.

It traveled a distance greater than what light would have traveled in the same time, it had to go faster at some point if all measurements are without error. That... or it ripped a hole in space.

I don't know why you are saying to me as I have already said in other threads the relativity is not perfect which is why we have stuff like String Theory and want to find a sort of theory of everything that wants to link everything together without flaws. So yes I already know all this but I am assuming you didn't know that I knew that if you want you can check other posts I have done in similar threads where I say in slightly more words Relativity has flaws.

At least thanks for saying it without being a flaming **** and calling me an idiot as that is what most people do.

 

[slyph]

"Sorry mate, we're closed."

A neutrino walks into a bar.

 

[Lukeje]

The first fucking thing in the fucking universe was matter travelling faster than fucking light. Did every scientist in existence fail at logical deduction 101?

I don't think you really understand cosmic inflation...

 

[DigitalSushi]

The laws of physics. Immutable until proven otherwise.

well this breaks the Special Theory of Relativity.

using the all encompassing "its only a Theory" argument makes me feel like a self satisfied smug idiot, I feel dirty.

This stream of tiny particles is tasked with passing through layers of rock, water and dirt, and by measuring the speed at which it reaches the Italian lab, researchers can get a better understanding of how physics works at the sub-atomic level.

Well that explains it!, Italians have a propensity for making things go fast

Exhibit A)

Spoiler

Have an a picture of a Ferrari at an exciting jaunty angle to prove my point!

 

[LorienvArden]

Specificly its a µ-meson, which is one of many types of neutrinos. Yes, if they verify this, the theoretical physics got some major rewriting ahead of it.

 

[ike42]

I still don't see the big deal.

We already knew about this, quantum entanglement/teleportation, etc.

Yeah that's pretty much my take. The particles either teleported through some sort of quantum tunneling, or there was just an instrument error that measured them appearing before they actually did.

 

[Jowe]

Just to get one little pet peeve out of the way;

Mass does NOT increase as your velocity approaches c. Rather, what changes is the relationship between momentum and energy (what you find is that the energy required to increase your momentum increases exponentially, as you approach c).

OT: This could make for a few interesting years, though I suspect nothing will come of it. If it does it means that my physics syllabus is going to change considerably...

But as the energy increases exponentially, as does mass as E=MC^2 so as energy tends to infinity the mass tends to infinity/3x10^8^2 which also tends to infinity.

OT; Probably some sort of quantum effect that has yet to be discovered but very strange for matter to be clocked at over c.

also people saying stuff about tachyons shouldn't really, cause they would be undetectable and very different to whats happening with this (in my opinion)

 

[Khravv]

Now I just cross my fingers and hope someone invents a FTL drive during my life time.
who is ready for some space travel?

 

[Wyes]

Just to get one little pet peeve out of the way;

Mass does NOT increase as your velocity approaches c. Rather, what changes is the relationship between momentum and energy (what you find is that the energy required to increase your momentum increases exponentially, as you approach c).

OT: This could make for a few interesting years, though I suspect nothing will come of it. If it does it means that my physics syllabus is going to change considerably...

But as the energy increases exponentially, as does mass as E=MC^2 so as energy tends to infinity the mass tends to infinity/3x10^8^2 which also tends to infinity.

OT; Probably some sort of quantum effect that has yet to be discovered but very strange for matter to be clocked at over c.

also people saying stuff about tachyons shouldn't really, cause they would be undetectable and very different to whats happening with this (in my opinion)

I'm not trying to belittle anybody, but the idea of relativistic mass is outdated, yet for whatever reason everybody seems to love the idea.
E = mc^2 only applies at rest, for moving particles the equation is actually E^2 - (pc)^2 = (mc^2)^2, where p is the momentum (mass x velocity) of the object in question. If the velocity is zero, then p is zero, and so you regain E = mc^2. Note that this full equation also accounts for the energy of massless particles like photons, namely for photons; m = 0, p = h/λ (where h is Planck's constant, and λ is the wavelength of the photon in question, note this is actually equivalent to mv, and you can talk about the wavelengths of particles with mass also), and so you get E = (h/&#955c (or something very similar to this).

Read this .pdf [http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/hep-ph/pdf/0602/0602037v1.pdf], from the fifth subheading down. The whole thing is interesting, but if you're not familiar with maths it may be a little confusing (though from your response, you should be okay).

 

[Madara XIII]

Eh, they have already theorized that particles exist that can go faster than the speed of light, and have been looking for "light booms", which is created when particles accelerate past the light "barrier" so to speak, like a sonic boom.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tachyon

Wouldn't Quarks also fall into that category?