Did CERN just break physics?

Scrutinize · 26 Sep 2011 at 11:31

Engy Benjie said:
It might be the case that the particles were travelling at the speed of light but taking shortcuts through another dimension. It may just be perceived to be travelling faster from this one.

so what you are saying is that neutrinos are trolling us?

i would be more inclined to believe that they are travelling faster than the speed of light / creating a neutrino signal or there is an error in the test equipment than; jumping across multiple dimensions and then still actually ending back on course and in the correct dimension to arrive at the destination test equipment.

it would be good to test this from a satellite to the moon so over a more meaningful/substantial distance.

Hatter The Mad · 26 Sep 2011 at 11:38

mrk1@1 said:
i would be more inclined to believe that they are travelling faster than the speed of light / creating a neutrino signal or there is an error in the test equipment than; jumping across multiple dimensions and then still actually ending back on course and in the correct dimension to arrive at the destination test equipment.

Actually it is perfectly possible... after all, you or I can recreate an effect where photons may enter a operate in a parallel universe and come back to interfere with itself: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment

mmj_uk · 26 Sep 2011 at 11:39

DAnDan said:
Far too trivial for them to have missed out .

Well how have they accurately measured the shortest distance from A to B if it's just going through the Earth?

Amleto · 26 Sep 2011 at 12:45

Hatter The Mad said:
Actually it is perfectly possible... after all, you or I can recreate an effect where photons may enter a operate in a parallel universe and come back to interfere with itself: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment

whoah there. nothing in double slit suggests anything about parallel universe :eek:

Hades · 26 Sep 2011 at 13:10

This will be interesting to watch. I'm surprised it hasn't been bigger news. If the results do prove to be correct then that alone would be worth the cost of building CERN.

Hatter The Mad · 26 Sep 2011 at 13:30

Amleto said:
whoah there. nothing in double slit suggests anything about parallel universe

I did say 'may' - cant I apply the quantum multiverse idea to why this particular effect occurs?

Fuzz · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:17

Prof cox has tweeted this morning it looks like it was erroneous measurements.

Back to class everyone, party's over.

Amp34 · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:25

DAnDan said:
He's just another person who doesn't understand what scientific "theory" actually means.

Actually if you're agreeing with SkScotchegg then you don't understand what scientific theory is. Just because it can be seen to be working now doesn't mean it is correct. It is correct at this current time and is likely to be correct with our current knowledge but for all we know it could be a gross simplification of the facts.

A theory is called a theory because although it is correct as far as we can tell today it isn't irrefutable.

He is correct in most of his post. While I not jumping on the "wow amazing, things can travel faster than the speed of light" bandwagon people rubbishing this result because of a 50 year old theory are rather closed minded. For all we currently know it could in fact be the case that rather than E=MC^2 it could have a few random constants and variables too small for us to have realised until now.

Hatter The Mad · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:27

SkScotchegg said:
E=MC2 gave us the atomic bomb, so doesnt that mean that its been proven to work and therefore cant be "just a theory"?

Sin_Chase said:
Lol at the backroom scientists who can, with so much confidence, sit there and state categorically that it's impossible, referencing E=MC2 as irrefutable fact for no reason other than "Just because"

Because you understand the concepts involved, right?

Nobody does, they only theorise them and test them for soundness. Why do you believe you, and the persons you are quoting, are incapable of being wrong about a theory.

E=MC2 is a theory, nothing more. It might never be "broken" in the time of the human race as we currently know it. But for you to sit here now and truly believe that it never will be based on what we believe to be true now then just...well....lol.

You can speculate, but you certainly cannot dictate.

Read this. Just replace the word 'evolution' with 'E=MC2': http://www.notjustatheory.com/

|Thomas| · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:30

Amp34 said:
He is correct in most of his post. While I not jumping on the "wow amazing, things can travel faster than the speed of light" bandwagon people rubbishing this result because of a 50 year old theory are rather closed minded. For all we currently know it could in fact be the case that rather than E=MC^2 it could have a few random constants and variables too small for us to have realised until now.

It does have an additional constant, E = gamma*MC^2 is correct for objects not at rest, where gamma = 1/sqrt(1-(v/c)^2)

Where's my Nobel prize?

Docaroo · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:45

Hatter The Mad said:
Actually it is perfectly possible... after all, you or I can recreate an effect where photons may enter a operate in a parallel universe and come back to interfere with itself: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Double-slit_experiment

Woah woah woah woahhhh woah woah.....

No!!!

This experiment does not hint about parallel universes! The effect of the Double-Slit is explained via quantum mechanics operating in one unverse. There is no need to invoke other universes to this result!!

Now let me reiterate the main point about this neutrino result:

IF the result is proved to be a correct statistical result, this doesn't mean the neutrinos are phyiscally moving faster than the speed of light. I really think you will find this quite impossible.

What it means, is that they have moved from point A to point B quicker than light could get there via a straight line.

Like I said, it would make much more sense if the neutrinos took a shortcut through other dimensions of spacetime than to physically move faster than light!

I still think a measurement/statistics error will come out to be the culprit.

Dunks · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:48

I wonder how many people here actually have even a basic grasp of the areas of quantum mechanics being discussed?

Not that I do, but then I'm not throwing around wiki links like I know what I'm talking about

Hatter The Mad · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:49

Docaroo said:
Woah woah woah woahhhh woah woah.....

No!!!

This experiment does not hint about parallel universes! The effect of the Double-Slit is explained via quantum mechanics operating in one unverse. There is no need to invoke other universes to this result!!

Now let me reiterate the main point about this neutrino result:

IF the result is proved to be a correct statistical result, this doesn't mean the neutrinos are phyiscally moving faster than the speed of light. I really think you will find this quite impossible.

What it means, is that they have moved from point A to point B quicker than light could get there via a straight line.

Like I said, it would make much more sense if the neutrinos took a shortcut through other dimensions of spacetime than to physically move faster than light!

I still think a measurement/statistics error will come out to be the culprit.

Hatter The Mad said:
I did say 'may' - cant I apply the quantum multiverse idea to why this particular effect occurs?

Scrutinize · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:52

Docaroo said:
Like I said, it would make much more sense if the neutrinos took a shortcut through other dimensions of spacetime than to physically move faster than light!

I still think a measurement/statistics error will come out to be the culprit.

that is only because physics tells us exceeding the speed of light is impossible yet other dimensional travel is theoretically possible, both could be right or wrong, but you cannot claim any kind of certainty about it.

Amp34 · 26 Sep 2011 at 15:53

|Thomas| said:
It does have an additional constant, E = gamma*MC^2 is correct for objects not at rest, where gamma = 1/sqrt(1-(v/c)^2)

Where's my Nobel prize?

And now we may add another constant for this...

That's my point...

Docaroo · 26 Sep 2011 at 16:00

mrk1@1 said:
that is only because physics tells us exceeding the speed of light is impossible yet other dimensional travel is theoretically possible, both could be right or wrong, but you cannot claim any kind of certainty about it.

But the certainty is quite high... and I mean statistically the change of it being wrong may as well be zero.

I know Special Relativity is a "theory", but like someone already mentioned, a theory is pretty high up on the "we're pretty damn sure this happens" list...

It's like the Theory of Evolution! It's backed up by countless observations, and every prediction made under SR turns out to be correct when we can observe and test it.

So yes, I want to say that I am very, VERY certain

Docaroo · 26 Sep 2011 at 16:01

And yes, everyone is like... armchair physicist and blah blah - but this is a computing forum! Many of us have actually studied physics (I myself did Astrophysics as a second study to Geology at University) and so we do know a little bit about what we are talking about!

LeJosh · 26 Sep 2011 at 16:06

mrk1@1 said:
that is only because physics tells us exceeding the speed of light is impossible yet other dimensional travel is theoretically possible, both could be right or wrong, but you cannot claim any kind of certainty about it.

Einstein believed that, then it was accepted as fact by the scientific community as at the time there was no way to disprove him, I believe, quote me if I'm wrong.

Now that we have high-energy colliders and the concept of neutrinos being faster, it may well be very possible that they were faster than light.

To reitarate though, I'm an arm-chair physicist too, until next year.

Scrutinize · 26 Sep 2011 at 16:21

Docaroo said:
But the certainty is quite high... and I mean statistically the change of it being wrong may as well be zero.

no it isn't, it is modelled & theorised based on what hasn't been observed or can’t be observed and measured. this is a far cry from evolution

I know Special Relativity is a "theory", but like someone already mentioned, a theory is pretty high up on the "we're pretty damn sure this happens" list...

It's like the Theory of Evolution! It's backed up by countless observations, and every prediction made under SR turns out to be correct when we can observe and test it.

So yes, I want to say that I am very, VERY certain

the theory of evolution as we know it was modelled on what had been physically observed and research into fossils etc. it has been developed as more evidence has been sought.

|Thomas| · 26 Sep 2011 at 16:35

mrk1@1 said:
no it isn't, it is modelled & theorised based on what hasn't been observed or can’t be observed and measured. this is a far cry from evolution

You can show directly from the postulates that information cannot exceed the speed of light without causality violation (as I described in the other thread). Therefore to accept the possibility of FTL travel without causality violations one has to disregard the postulates in some form. These have been verified a ridiculous number of times.

Imagine it as a logic problem. Assume fact A is true, A can be measured and is verified experimentally. A implies through logical deduction that B must also be true, B cannot be measured but we cannot find any exceptions to B.

If you accept that B might not be true, then you are saying that A is also not true. Indeed, consistent measurements of A imply the validity of B.

edit: I'd also like to say I'm not an armchair physicist. By no means am I an expert (4th year undergrad theoretical Physicist), but I have studied SR fairly heavily in my time

.