The speed of light may have been broken.

[Tach]

Yet the truth about neutrino mass has been out there for some time for those prepared to accept the evidence of experiment at face value: NEUTRINOS HAVE NEGATIVE MASS, meaning that they travel slightly faster than the speed of light.

See for example: cupp.oulu.fi/neutrino/nd-mass.html



Odd that, the way supposition of systematic error is preferred over an acceptance that the universe is not quite as one has been taught!

Nope, you are wrong on TWO accounts:

1. (already pointed out) $$m^2<0 =>m=iz$$ and not $$m<0$$
2. experiment shows that the more energetic neutrinos are faster. Theory of tachyons shows that $$\frac{v^2}{c^2}=1+(\frac{zc^2}{E})^2$$, so higher energy tachyons are predicted to be slower than lower energy tachyons, so neutrinos cannot be tachyons.

On the positive side, you posted an interesting website , though.

 

[origin]

This is a pretty fascinating story. The is already work being done to try and replicat the experiement. At the meeting where the findings were presented there were a lot of tough questions asked but there were no glaring problems with the experimental protocol.

If it turns out that the speed of light was not exceeded there are going to be some red faces. If it turns out the speed of light was exceeded there should be some pretty cool research over the next decades.

 

[James R]

Conclusion of the paper:

Despite the large significance of the measurement reported here and the stability of the analysis, the potentially great impact of the result motivates the continuation of our studies in order to investigate possible still unknown systematic effects that could explain the observed anomaly. We deliberately do not attempt any theoretical or phenomenological interpretation of the results.

Would anybody like to bet that sometime in the next year a systematic error will be discovered?

 

[OnlyMe]

Conclusion of the paper:

Would anybody like to bet that sometime in the next year a systematic error will be discovered?

Probably will turn out that way.

But would it not be more interesting to be there as things change, should it turn out repeatable?

 

[areasys]

So if it turns out that these neutrinos actually DID go faster than the speed of light, what does that mean? Does that open the door to things like warp drives, FTL travel, FTL communication, or teleportation?

 

[Captain Kremmen]

If the distance is known from point A to point B a time of light travel is known, as distance IS light travel time, as if it were a perfect vacuum. There is no need to time light from point A to point B, distance IS time as far as light travel is concerned.

It will take light 1 second to travel 299,792,458 meters, by definition.
It will take light 1/299,792,458 of a second to travel 1 meter, by definition.

There is no need to measure it, it is defined.

The neutrino beats the defined speed of light.

Yes, I do understand what you are saying.
The speed of light is a constant, and distance is defined by it.
So if a neutrino travels more than 299,792,458 metres in a second, the same as light in a vacuum, then it will be travelling faster than the speed of light.

But what I am saying is that the speed of light in a vacuum can only be estimated, not measured, so couldn't that estimation be wrong by a tiny amount.

That would in turn make the definition of distance wrong.
The definition is dependent upon the estimated speed, c, not the other way round.

I don't want to keep banging on about this.
@someone else.
Am I talking nonsense?

 

[origin]

The articles talks about a beam of neutrinos. How could you make a neutrino beam?

 

[OnlyMe]

The articles talks about a beam of neutrinos. How could you make a neutrino beam?

The paper itself mentions the process and shows diagram. Making the beam is actually far easier than detecting a small part of it after it has been made.

 

[OnlyMe]

So if it turns out that these neutrinos actually DID go faster than the speed of light, what does that mean? Does that open the door to things like warp drives, FTL travel, FTL communication, or teleportation?

It would be unlikely, though it really would depend at least in part on how it is that we come to understand it.

Neutrinos are, to the best of my knowledge, the smallest particles with mass that can be considered independently stable. Even working from the scales of protons, neutrons and electrons the speed of light limit seems to hold up well.

A neutrino has a mass some 100,000 times less than an electron and seems to originate with a velocity near c, or in the current context just greater then c. They don't need to be accelerated to that velocity, or that acceleration is instantaneous.

It would be very difficult to project the conditions equivalent to those a neutrino is subject, to ordinary material objects. In this case where ordinary material refers to atomic structures or atoms and molecules. Neutrinos do not interact electromagnetically within the limits of our ability to observe them. They interact with other matter only when they actually hit an atom's nucleus. Even then perhaps only some small part of the time.

It is far more likely that if this were reproduced and confirmed it might lead to some greater understanding of the fine structure of the universe. And as I mentioned earlier perhaps in some part inertia itself.

 

[rpenner]

So if it turns out that these neutrinos actually DID go faster than the speed of light, what does that mean? Does that open the door to things like warp drives, FTL travel, FTL communication, or teleportation?

areasys, if true, it's much worse than that.

All of physical observation to date is consistent with the framework of relativistic quantum field theory being true, which is that space-time has a certain structure of cause-and-effect and that it supports fields of particles in that space-time. Even through this framework supports faster-than-light phenomena, a mathematical theorem of this framework says changes to the quantum fields propagate only at speed c. This means while particles may move faster, slower or at the speed of light, observed signals cannot move faster than the speed of light. Faster-than-light particles, if they exist, in this framework, can carry energy and momentum, but must have a property of non-localization so that they cannot be used to send signals faster-than-light. Also, low-energy particles must travel faster than high-energy particles. Also the mass-squared must be negative.

And if not all of that is true, then neutrinos just don't obey the laws of physics as we understand them -- they would be super-natural relative to the reality we do understand and would require a completely new and superior model to hold both neutrinos and the rest of physics in a common framework. And that's the only way physics would make progress, because the history of physics has, since Newton, been about unification in theory -- there is only one universe, and its parts should have some common organizing principles.

But, neutrinos are not magic. Their existence was predicted from the reliable known laws of physics being inconsistent with energy and momentum studies with some types of particle decay. Their electroweak properties are well-modelled by reliable known laws of physics. So it is widely held that neutrinos are well described by the general framework of relativistic quantum field theory. And we don't have good evidence that they are magic or that all of the predictions of them being faster-than-light are in evidence.

Further, more sensitive observations over much longer distances contradict these current results.
http://scienceblogs.com/startswithabang/2011/09/this_extraordinary_claim_requi.php
http://blogs.discovermagazine.com/b...than-light-travel-discovered-slow-down-folks/

It seems simpler to believe at this point is someone mismeasured an angle or the curve of the Earth, or ignored, double-counted or got the sign wrong on one of the corrections needed because the Earth is an inertial environment, nor is it homogenous and spherically symmetrical, and the end points of the experiment are in relative motion.

So, you can't sensibly talk about FTL travel until you have confirmation of a framework which allows neutrinos to be localizable and faster-than-light and hold the rest of physics. If we only had confirmation that neutrinos are localizable and faster-than-light we still wouldn't have them unified in physical theory and they would stand outside physics, like magic, until we did understand them in a unified physical theory. But right now, we have a very complicated claim that a certain distance and a certain time interval was measured with certain associated precisions that lead one to conclude the claim is neutrinos travelled marginally faster than light. Not all parts of the claim are on the Internet -- many details are in one person's doctoral dissertation and it only takes one sign error or double-counting to render the claim invalid.

 

[Motor Daddy]

But what I am saying is that the speed of light in a vacuum can only be estimated, not measured, so couldn't that estimation be wrong by a tiny amount.

That would in turn make the definition of distance wrong.
The definition is dependent upon the estimated speed, c, not the other way round.

I don't want to keep banging on about this.
@someone else.
Am I talking nonsense?

You missed the point again.

Light travels at a constant speed in a vacuum. By definition, the meter is the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. Since the meter is defined by light travel time, the speed of light is 299,792,458 m/s, by definition.

It can not be different than 299,792,458 m/s because the very definition of a meter is the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

You do not measure the speed of light by measuring the elapsed time it takes light in a vacuum to travel a meter. How would you know what a meter is unless you know the speed of light, as the meter is DEFINED by the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

It is impossible for the speed of light to be different, because the speed of light is defined, not measured.

 

[OnlyMe]

You missed the point again.

Light travels at a constant speed in a vacuum. By definition, the meter is the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1/299,792,458 of a second. Since the meter is defined by light travel time, the speed of light is 299,792,458 m/s, by definition.

It can not be different than 299,792,458 m/s because the very definition of a meter is the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

You do not measure the speed of light by measuring the elapsed time it takes light in a vacuum to travel a meter. How would you know what a meter is unless you know the speed of light, as the meter is DEFINED by the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second.

It is impossible for the speed of light to be different, because the speed of light is defined, not measured.

This while to some extent true is really circular reasoning...

A meter is defined as the distance that light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second and the speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second.

That's circular the meter is defined by the speed of light and the speed of light is defined by the meter.

And we did not even get into a definition of a second, which could be the time it takes light to travel 299,792,458 meters, in a vacuum.

The speed of light has been measured, and defined by that measurement. Standardizing the meter to the speed of light came later and was intended to add constancy to the length of a meter. The previous standard had come to be known to be flawed and inconsistent over time.

 

[Motor Daddy]

This while to some extent true is really circular reasoning...

A meter is defined as the distance that light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second and the speed of light is 299,792,458 meters per second.

That's circular the meter is defined by the speed of light and the speed of light is defined by the meter.

It is not circular.

The constancy of light travel in a vacuum is used as a standard to define the meter. The speed of light is the result of defining the meter by light travel time.

 

[Motor Daddy]

And we did not even get into a definition of a second, which could be the time it takes light to travel 299,792,458 meters, in a vacuum.

With the current definition of a meter as it stands being defined by light travel time means your statement above is circular.

In order to know a meter one must measure light travel time.

However, if you had a different definition of a meter which didn't involve light travel time, then you could define the second by the time it takes light to travel 299,792,458 meters.

 

[OnlyMe]

The constancy of light travel in a vacuum is used as a standard to define the meter. The speed of light is the result of defining the meter by light travel time.

What part of the above is not circular reasoning?

It has only been defined relative to the distance light travels in a vacuum since the early 1980s and the speed of light in vacuum predates that by just under 100 years.

The meter began as a fraction of the distance between the equator and the poles. You can obviously see how with our current knowledge that could be a problem.

The number involved, 299,792,458 should be a dead give away that the length of a meter predated its association with the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second. Who in their right mind would have chosen such number had they not already had some reference for the length of a meter?

Still, the point was that defining a meter based on the speed of light and the speed of light on a meter, is circular reasoning.

 

[Motor Daddy]

What part of the above is not circular reasoning?

It has only been defined relative to the distance light travels in a vacuum since the early 1980s and the speed of light in vacuum predates that by just under 100 years.

The meter began as a fraction of the distance between the equator and the poles. You can obviously see how with our current knowledge that could be a problem.

The number involved, 299,792,458 should be a dead give away that the length of a meter predated its association with the distance light travels in 1/299,792,458 of a second. Who in their right mind would have chosen such number had they not already had some reference for the length of a meter?

Still, the point was that defining a meter based on the speed of light and the speed of light on a meter, is circular reasoning.

You fail to understand what is being said.

I want to create a new unit of measure of distance called the "dltios"
I define the dltios as the distance light travels in a vacuum in 1 second.
The speed of light is therefore 1 dltios/second.

That is not circular, nor does it require measurement to know the speed of light using the unit of measure of distance the "dltios."

 

[CptBork]

Units of time can be unambiguously defined by looking at atomic decays where known frequencies of light are emitted, and measuring the time elapsed after this light of known frequency has completed a given number of cycles. Then you can define distance in terms of how far a beam of light travels in this time or the wavelength associated with each cycle (which will always give you the same result).

The speed of light in vacuum is a constant of nature because that's what every measurement to date has shown, and that's the result which would be consistent with our knowledge of electromagnetism. Unfortunately for Motor Daddy, it's not some arbitrary definition scientists came up with just to be pricks and make sure physics wouldn't agree with his everyday ordinary intuition.

 

[Motor Daddy]

Unfortunately for Motor Daddy, it's not some arbitrary definition scientists came up with just to be pricks and make sure physics wouldn't agree with his everyday ordinary intuition.

The speed of light is actually 1 dltios/second. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

 

[OnlyMe]

That is not circular, nor does it require measurement to know the speed of light using the unit of measure of distance the "dltios."

I had no idea you were talking about dild.., dltios. Now everything make perfect sense!

 

[OnlyMe]

The speed of light is actually 1 dltios/second. Put that in your pipe and smoke it!

So they are also flammable? Do they cause cancer?

This has gotten way off subject and I really like the original subject.