Einstein gets owned - maybe. ATTN: NERDS

[MarkVI]

http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...105740b51e9e9f

Pretty cool:



GENEVA (AP) — A fundamental pillar of physics — that nothing can go faster than the speed of light — appears to be smashed by an oddball subatomic particle that has apparently made a giant end run around Albert Einstein's theories.

Scientists at the world's largest physics lab said Thursday they have clocked neutrinos traveling faster than light. That's something that according to Einstein's 1905 special theory of relativity — the famous E (equals) mc2 equation — just doesn't happen.

"The feeling that most people have is this can't be right, this can't be real," said James Gillies, a spokesman for the European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, outside the Swiss city of Geneva.

Gillies told The Associated Press that the readings have so astounded researchers that they are asking others to independently verify the measurements before claiming an actual discovery.

"They are inviting the broader physics community to look at what they've done and really scrutinize it in great detail, and ideally for someone elsewhere in the world to repeat the measurements," he said Thursday.

Scientists at the competing Fermilab in Chicago have promised to start such work immediately.

"It's a shock," said Fermilab head theoretician Stephen Parke, who was not part of the research in Geneva. "It's going to cause us problems, no doubt about that - if it's true."

The Chicago team had similar faster-than-light results in 2007, but those came with a giant margin of error that undercut its scientific significance.

Outside scientists expressed skepticism at CERN's claim that the neutrinos — one of the strangest well-known particles in physics — were observed smashing past the cosmic speed barrier of 186,282 miles per second (299,792 kilometers per second).

University of Maryland physics department chairman Drew Baden called it "a flying carpet," something that was too fantastic to be believable.

CERN says a neutrino beam fired from a particle accelerator near Geneva to a lab 454 miles (730 kilometers) away in Italy traveled 60 nanoseconds faster than the speed of light. Scientists calculated the margin of error at just 10 nanoseconds, making the difference statistically significant. But given the enormous implications of the find, they still spent months checking and rechecking their results to make sure there was no flaws in the experiment.

"We have not found any instrumental effect that could explain the result of the measurement," said Antonio Ereditato, a physicist at the University of Bern, Switzerland, who was involved in the experiment known as OPERA.

The CERN researchers are now looking to the United States and Japan to confirm the results.

A similar neutrino experiment at Fermilab near Chicago would be capable of running the tests, said Stavros Katsanevas, the deputy director of France's National Institute for Nuclear and Particle Physics Research. The institute collaborated with Italy's Gran Sasso National Laboratory for the experiment at CERN.

Katsanevas said help could also come from the T2K experiment in Japan, though that is currently on hold after the country's devastating March 11 earthquake and tsunami.

Scientists agree if the results are confirmed, that it would force a fundamental rethink of the laws of nature.

Einstein's special relativity theory that says energy equals mass times the speed of light squared underlies "pretty much everything in modern physics," said John Ellis, a theoretical physicist at CERN who was not involved in the experiment. "It has worked perfectly up until now."

He cautioned that the neutrino researchers would have to explain why similar results weren't detected before, such as when an exploding star — or supernova — was observed in 1987.

"This would be such a sensational discovery if it were true that one has to treat it extremely carefully," said Ellis.

[joelash302]

Simple solution: E = M(C^2) for all M > a neutrino. I should have been a physicist.


In all seriousness, this is pretty amazing work. Could make some interesting changes to the concept of deep space travel and how we approach it as we evolve.

[deadpool9]

I agree.
Einstein was brilliant though, and I would hardly say this discredits anything he has done. Einstein didn't have access to a subatomic particle accelerator AFAIK.

While I think the idea of time travel forward is absolutely absurd, this could open doors as to things such as light speed (or whatever they had on Star Trek where they went really fast, lol.)

[ko300zx]

I agree.
Einstein was brilliant though, and I would hardly say this discredits anything he has done. Einstein didn't have access to a subatomic particle accelerator AFAIK.

While I think the idea of time travel forward is absolutely absurd, this could open doors as to things such as light speed (or whatever they had on Star Trek where they went really fast, lol.)

It WILL happen.

[desslok]

Its crazy to think of what Einstein achieved with the tools he had avaiable to him at the time. Also the way that other scientists accepted or rejected his theories, or just thought he was crazy. I would surely hope new things are found as we progress.

[MarkVI]

It WILL happen.

That's Hyperspace so i doubt it. But warp speeds...yeah that could happen

Its crazy to think of what Einstein achieved with the tools he had avaiable to him at the time. Also the way that other scientists accepted or rejected his theories, or just thought he was crazy. I would surely hope new things are found as we progress.

I think so too -- and if you think about it, the oddest and strangest pictures of the universe are usually the most correct or insightful....reality is very unusual

[ko300zx]

That's Hyperspace so i doubt it. But warp speeds...yeah that could happen

And up until recently, we thought nothing could ever move faster than light! I like to dream...


All this nerd talk is giving me a premature semi thinking about the season premier of The Big Bang Theory tonight.

[dukend]

[desslok]

That's Hyperspace so i doubt it. But warp speeds...yeah that could happen


I think so too -- and if you think about it, the oddest and strangest pictures of the universe are usually the most correct or insightful....reality is very unusual

When they found that diamond planet, I. Just thought in wonder most of the day. I am both amazed at that they can tell about our universe, and by what is not known. Imagining what could be there, but we have no instrument to detect it. Mind blowing when you really stop and think.

[ko300zx]

When they found that diamond planet, I. Just thought in wonder most of the day. I am both amazed at that they can tell about our universe, and by what is not known. Imagining what could be there, but we have no instrument to detect it. Mind blowing when you really stop and think.

Most certainly the ultimate mind-blow.

[sawoobley]

Einstein is laughing his head off right know. "It took the whole world 56 years after my death to own me. Had I lived longer I would have been several centuries ahead of the rest of you slubs."

[beef0270]

Great read. I am curious how this holds up after outside scrutiny

[PerpetualMotion]

And up until recently, we thought nothing could ever move faster than light!

Nothing is set in stone until proven differently. So, as far as I'm concerned, nothing is faster than the speed of light until the results are confirmed.

[feelsg00dmayne]

Nothing is set in stone until proven differently. So, as far as I'm concerned, nothing is faster than the speed of light until the results are confirmed.

strong username to thread relevancy ratio.

[JasonDB]

Einstein is laughing his head off right know. "It took the whole world 56 years after my death to own me. Had I lived longer I would have been several centuries ahead of the rest of you slubs."

The best part would be if he was just trolling us with the speed of light speed barrier thing, because he would be laughing going, "It took the whole world 56 years after my death, and billions of $$$ in research grants for the world to find out I was just trolling them. lulz"

[NCepeeist]

man this is bringing back some memories of my physical chemistry class and quantum mechanics and ****. I hated that class.

[MarkVI]

man this is bringing back some memories of my physical chemistry class and quantum mechanics and ****. I hated that class.

Pchem FTL. no thank you.

[JValjean724]

I agree.
Einstein was brilliant though, and I would hardly say this discredits anything he has done. Einstein didn't have access to a subatomic particle accelerator AFAIK.

While I think the idea of time travel forward is absolutely absurd, this could open doors as to things such as light speed (or whatever they had on Star Trek where they went really fast, lol.)

Forward time travel is absolutely possible and has already happened.

Nothing is set in stone until proven differently. So, as far as I'm concerned, nothing is faster than the speed of light until the results are confirmed.

Same. I'm pretty skeptical.

Even if it were true, as they said in the article Einstein's Special Relativity has worked amazingly well to predict various phenomena and is what allows technology such as GPS to work so it would still be widely used as is classical Newtonian physics for speeds <<c. Not to mention the amount of energy required to reach a speed greater than c on the macroscopic level would be astronomical even if it were possible.


Also, this is directly related to Maxwell's equations as those are what gave Einstein the idea that c was the ultimate speed limit of the universe. If it weren't, then it would mean that photons could be viewed as static waves in a certain reference frame.

[PR1MO]

It always seems odd to me that when they search for planets that could potentially sustain life, they rule out places based on the fact that it couldn't support forms of life that we are aware of. In truth there could be forms of life out there that live in planets we would currently consider inhospitable.

This is pretty cool news though, makes you realise that everything we "know" about the universe isn't really much at all.

[NCepeeist]

Waiting on hearing that other dimensions are inhabitable.

[PerpetualMotion]

It always seems odd to me that when they search for planets that could potentially sustain life, they rule out places based on the fact that it couldn't support forms of life that we are aware of. In truth there could be forms of life out there that live in planets we would currently consider inhospitable.

This is pretty cool news though, makes you realise that everything we "know" about the universe isn't really much at all.

Did you ever hear about (this was last year) a bacteria that lives off of arsenic? Pretty cool, yo.

[desslok]

It always seems odd to me that when they search for planets that could potentially sustain life, they rule out places based on the fact that it couldn't support forms of life that we are aware of. In truth there could be forms of life out there that live in planets we would currently consider inhospitable.

This is pretty cool news though, makes you realise that everything we "know" about the universe isn't really much at all.

Yeah, its funny, like ethnocentrism, but more like carbonocentrism. Some scientists assume that things have to be carbon based to live just cause that's all they know. Or should I say knew with that new bacteria discovery. Even stuff on earth though trips me out, like the deep sea organisms that feed off of heat from deep volcanic activity, etc.

[ko300zx]

Nothing is set in stone until proven differently. So, as far as I'm concerned, nothing is faster than the speed of light until the results are confirmed.

Agreed, but I would like to think they will confirm them. I'm just getting ahead of myself.

It always seems odd to me that when they search for planets that could potentially sustain life, they rule out places based on the fact that it couldn't support forms of life that we are aware of. In truth there could be forms of life out there that live in planets we would currently consider inhospitable.

This is pretty cool news though, makes you realise that everything we "know" about the universe isn't really much at all.

We know very little. I sometimes just sit and imagine what could possibly be out there and think about what we do know is out there. Like Dess said, mind blowing. I could fap for hours to astronomy shows on the Discovery channel.

[kkaustin812]

Einstein is no more wrong than newton. It could just be another modification to relativistic mechanics as relativity was to classical mechanics. Doesn't make it "wrong" IMO.

Also, there's kind of a loophole that a particle could travel faster than light if it was created with that speed (i.e. wasn't accelerated, it just "was").

[joelash302]

Agreed, but I would like to think they will confirm them. I'm just getting ahead of myself.



We know very little. I sometimes just sit and imagine what could possibly be out there and think about what we do know is out there. Like Dess said, mind blowing. I could fap for hours to astronomy shows on the Discovery channel.

I'm cancelling our trip to the science museum.

[ParsonBrown]

Do you nerds even lift?

There is definitely a lot of testing and verification to be done before this is settled. IF it is proven that an object can travel faster than the speed of light, and we don't want to ruin everything we know to date....I could see the equation being modified to (very generically speaking here) E=xMc^2. Where "x" is a variable/factor/coefficient that adjusts for the mass of the object. The goal in the end is to see how fast something can go. Since the atom is not the least common denominator, but maybe the one we know the best...as we establish/learn the limits of the sub-atomic particles we can fine tune the "x" factor????

This is definitely not my field of expertise, but I took a class once a long time ago

[ko300zx]

I'm cancelling our trip to the science museum.

I'll wait til I get home

[deadpool9]

Not to mention the amount of energy required to reach a speed greater than c on the macroscopic level would be astronomical even if it were possible.

To put that into perspective, I saw something the other day from Stephen Hawking saying for us to even achieve such speeds on earth, we would have to invent a method of transportation that would allow us to circle the globe 7x/sec.
That is almost incomprehensible about how fast that is.

[illiniStrive]

I hate CERN. we had the largest particle accelerator in the world till they built their ****

yes mad

[adamg8504]

Einstein's response:



And yes Tevatron isn't the largest particle accelerator any longer but Fermilab is moving on the newer technology...Project X.