Faster than light neutrinos.

[TEG]

DailyTech - CERN Physicists Observe First Faster-Than-Light Long-Distance Travel

Neutrinos and the speed of light? Not so fast ...

The bartender says, “We don’t serve your kind in here”... A faster-than-light neutrino walks into a bar …

Tesla > Einstein?

 

[Lloyd]

Tesla's comment here is taken slightly out of context here. I read and have not verified that he was speaking about Cosmic Rays, and that is what 'they' refers to in this quote.

 

[Doug_G]

And I'll bet that the neutrino measurement doesn't hold up.

 

[TEG]

Definitely a story that has gone 'viral' recently.

 

[rolosrevenge]

But the scientists themselves released the data not to conclude that the Neutrinos (and not the TMNT ones :tongue: ) were moving faster than light, but for the community to help them find what they were doing wrong to account for the discrepancy in the data. The authors do not believe that the Neutrinos are really going that fast.

 

[bobw]

Fermilab reported a similar result some time ago. They didn't believe it either. If it isn't an experimental artifact, it's huge. They show real class in putting out their data for all and sundry to see and critique.

 

[bonnie]

And I'll bet that the neutrino measurement doesn't hold up.

I was just about to post this!

 

[Norbert]

And I'll bet that the neutrino measurement doesn't hold up.

I watched the presentation at CERN. In the Q&A section right after the presentation, they tried to disprove it right there, even though a large team had been re-checking and testing their results for 6 months, including by other groups. I'm thinking that in 5 years, they still won't have a satisfying explanation inside of relativity.

 

[Doug_G]

I watched the presentation at CERN. In the Q&A section right after the presentation, they tried to disprove it right there, even though a large team had been re-checking and testing their results for 6 months, including by other groups. I'm thinking that in 5 years, they still won't have a satisfying explanation inside of relativity.

Yeah, but Supernova SN1987A afforded the ability to measure the speed of neutrinos, and the results that came back were consistent with the speed of light. And that is over much larger distances than this experiment.

 

[Norbert]

Yeah, but Supernova SN1987A afforded the ability to measure the speed of neutrinos, and the results that came back were consistent with the speed of light. And that is over much larger distances than this experiment.

That was mentioned in both the presentation and the Q&A. One difference is that those neutrinos are of much lower energy. Also, I speculate, they might have been missed when they arrived earlier (that time perhaps being miscalculated because the equations used didn't apply).

Whereas the results by MINOS in 2007, in the US, where of similar nature, though of much lower statistical significance (they'll now be repeated with more precise timing in a few months). These results hadn't been taken as seriously because of the much lower sigma, but otherwise they do confirm the results at CERN.

 

[Doug_G]

That was mentioned in both the presentation and the Q&A. One difference is that those neutrinos are of much lower energy. Also, I speculate, they might have been missed when they arrived earlier (that time perhaps being miscalculated because the equations used didn't apply).

Not likely, because the neutrino detectors are constantly monitored and they weren't expecting the burst of neutrinos. They typically detected one or two a day. So they didn't know not to look early, and surely they caught all of them.

The energy level could obviously have an effect, but photons travel at the speed of light and have different energy levels. A shorter wavelength photon has more momentum, but no mass.

Whereas the results by MINOS in 2007, in the US, where of similar nature, though of much lower statistical significance (they'll now be repeated with more precise timing in a few months). These results hadn't been taken as seriously because of the much lower sigma, but otherwise they do confirm the results at CERN.

Well if this is true, it certainly is "new physics". It would be the first ever violation of special relativity.

 

[Norbert]

Not likely, because the neutrino detectors are constantly monitored and they weren't expecting the burst of neutrinos. They typically detected one or two a day. So they didn't know not to look early, and surely they caught all of them.

Perhaps, I was just speculating (as I said), but do we know as a fact that there wasn't any separate burst, perhaps attributed to a separate event? If the formulas where wrong, who knows if they didn't perhaps arrive 50 years earlier? Again, just speculating.

The energy level could obviously have an effect, but photons travel at the speed of light and have different energy levels. A shorter wavelength photon has more momentum, but no mass.

Neutrinos have a small but non-zero mass, so again, a difference.

Of course, photons usually travel at the speed of light.

Well if this is true, it certainly is "new physics". It would be the first ever violation of special relativity.

Unless there are additional dimensions allowing a short cut, or something like that. But Quantum Physics did already more or less prove several effects which Einstein considered more or less impossible.

 

[Lloyd]

So a verification of their experiment............. Continue to monitor Nutrinos from the cosmos. If a burst of nutrinos is detected without accompanying photons then their experiment would be upheld. To date this has not happened, thus I am skeptical!!

 

[Norbert]

So a verification of their experiment............. Continue to monitor Nutrinos from the cosmos. If a burst of nutrinos is detected without accompanying photons then their experiment would be upheld. To date this has not happened, thus I am skeptical!!

As far as I understand, MINOS might be able to reproduce the experiment in a few months, and that would be considered a verification. However, given the significant implications, probably there isn't any single verification which would satisfy everyone.

 

[Doug_G]

Perhaps, I was just speculating (as I said), but do we know as a fact that there wasn't any separate burst, perhaps attributed to a separate event? If the formulas where wrong, who knows if they didn't perhaps arrive 50 years earlier? Again, just speculating.

SN1987A was a truly unique event; the only supernova to have gone off in the Milky Way or one of its satellite galaxies since the invention of the telescope (it was in the LMC, which a satellite galaxy). Supernovas in other galaxies are too distant for the neutrino flux to be detectable.

Neutrinos have a small but non-zero mass, so again, a difference.

Yes, which forces them to travel very slightly slower than the speed of light. The reason for trying to accurately measure the speed was to determine that mass. The result of faster-than-light was completely unexpected and very possibly anomalous.

Unless there are additional dimensions allowing a short cut, or something like that. But Quantum Physics did already more or less prove several effects which Einstein considered more or less impossible.

Not really; the two theories really talk about completely different things. The effects of Quantum Mechanics and Relativity rarely cross paths, and when they do the theories aren't at all compatible mathematically, so there's no way to perform a calculation. They can do various approximations, which generally work okay, but even though that works well it's all a bit kludgey. Thus the hunt for a unified theory encompassing both.

 

[VolkerP]

implications are significant for relativistic theory. They might shatter the foundations of current physics, like the X rays did around 1900.
I dare to suggest that any practical application in daily life is years away.
The neutrino is such an evasive particle, finding out it can travel faster than light is like telling some bushmen (=us) the difference between 3G and 4G while they beat their drums...

 

[Doug_G]

So a verification of their experiment............. Continue to monitor Nutrinos from the cosmos. If a burst of nutrinos is detected without accompanying photons then their experiment would be upheld. To date this has not happened, thus I am skeptical!!

A supernova could happen on the far side of the Milky Way's bulge, and we wouldn't be able to see it due to extinction from the dust clouds in the plane of the galaxy. The only way we'd know it was there would be from the neutrino pulse.

 

[Nik]

DailyTech - CERN Physicists Observe First Faster-Than-Light Long-Distance Travel

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You know, before I clicked on this thread I was sure it was going to involve something like "What's faster than light? A Neutrino in a Tesla Roadster" I'm so disappointed...

 

[TEG]

It is in the 'off topic' section.

What got me to post it here was partly all the people quoting Nikola Tesla saying he predicted this...

Plus the rampant variants of the "punchline first" jokes flooding social networks.

 

[Norbert]

SN1987A was a truly unique event; the only supernova to have gone off in the Milky Way or one of its satellite galaxies since the invention of the telescope (it was in the LMC, which a satellite galaxy). Supernovas in other galaxies are too distant for the neutrino flux to be detectable.

Still, I don't know when they started "monitoring", but if the neutrinos arrived before that time, then nobody would know.

Yes, which forces them to travel very slightly slower than the speed of light.

According to current theory.

Not really; the two theories really talk about completely different things.

In this case, I'm wasn't talking about the theory of relativity itself, but about what Einstein thought about Quantum Physics. While Quantum Physics hasn't been shown to contradict relativity (yet), it is still unlike what Einstein, as a person, thought it would be, quantum entanglement being one example, leading to the so-called EPR paper which he co-authored.

Quantum entanglement - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

So despite the interest, the flaw in EPR's argument was not discovered until 1964, when John Stewart Bell demonstrated precisely how one of their key assumptions, the principle of locality, conflicted with quantum theory.

Meaning, even the perhaps best physicist of all times could be wrong. That's science, get used to it.

As with Einstein, Schrödinger was dissatisfied with the concept of entanglement, because it seemed to violate the speed limit on the transmission of information implicit in the theory of relativity.[12] Einstein later famously derided entanglement as "spukhafte Fernwirkung"[13] or "spooky action at a distance".