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All you physicists out there: CERN may have broken light-speed barrier

  • gorocks99
    I do stress may because there's probably a billion things that could have been just barely off and given a false reading: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/science/8782895/CERN-scientists-break-the-speed-of-light.html
    Antonio Ereditato, spokesman for the international group of researchers, said that measurements taken over three years showed neutrinos pumped from CERN near Geneva to Gran Sasso in Italy had arrived 60 nanoseconds quicker than light would have done.

    "We have high confidence in our results. We have checked and rechecked for anything that could have distorted our measurements but we found nothing," he said. "We now want colleagues to check them independently."

    If confirmed, the discovery would undermine Albert Einstein's 1905 theory of special relativity, which says that the speed of light is a "cosmic constant" and that nothing in the universe can travel faster.
  • sleeper
    Pretty cool.
  • justincredible
    I've heard that ernest "finishes" faster than the speed of light so Einstein's theory of special relativity has already been undermined long ago.
  • justincredible
    But for serious, I hope the numbers all check out. This would be awesome.
  • majorspark
  • justincredible
    majorspark;907122 wrote:
    I see your warp speed and raise you ludicrous speed.

  • Glory Days
    yeah....but so what?
  • chicago510
    Glory Days;907260 wrote:yeah....but so what?
    Changes everything, really. So many physical calculations are based on the speed of light (c=3x10^8 m/s) being the absolute maximum possible speed matter can travel.
  • 2kool4skool
    Glory Days;907260 wrote:yeah....but so what?
  • gut
    60 nanoseconds faster than 300M meters per second? What is that, like .000000000000000000000000000000000000001% error?
  • ernest_t_bass
    justincredible;907119 wrote:I've heard that ernest "finishes" faster than the speed of light so Einstein's theory of special relativity has already been undermined long ago.

    What the fuck is this shit!?
  • redstreak one
    This is old news, just check out the thread on 40 times on here. We have 4 or 5 guys that run at the speed of light! :D
  • Glory Days
    chicago510;907262 wrote:Changes everything, really. So many physical calculations are based on the speed of light (c=3x10^8 m/s) being the absolute maximum possible speed matter can travel.
    yeah....but so what? nothing in our everyday life will change, especially in our lifetime with this new discovery.
  • chicago510
    Glory Days;907355 wrote:yeah....but so what? nothing in our everyday life will change, especially in our lifetime with this new discovery.
    I'm no particle physicist, I only took a year in undergrad, but Einstein theorized that things that traveled faster than the speed of light could travel through time, previously thought to be impossible.

    I agree that it won't have tangible impact on human life anytime soon, but the theory of relativity changed the world, e=mc^2 defines the reason that nuclear power can be generated, and if this finding is true then we may find new equations that change things.

    Quotes from the physicists:

    Even this small deviation would open up the possibility of time travel and play havoc with longstanding notions of cause and effect. Einstein himself — the author of modern physics, whose theory of relativity established the speed of light as the ultimate limit — said that if you could send a message faster than light, “You could send a telegram to the past.”Alvaro DeRejula, a theorist at CERN, called the claim “flabbergasting.”

    “If it is true, then we truly haven’t understood anything about anything,” he said, adding: “It looks too big to be true. The correct attitude is to ask oneself what went wrong.”
  • berry
    Hard to believe they calculated based on hand held timing. The FAT readings will show a slower speed and clear up any confusion.
  • ManO'War
    And they would have to factor in the wind effect.
  • jmog
    Pretty interesting stuff.

    The particle/Einstein/modern physics class I took as an undergrad was one of the most interesting classes I took as an engineer.
  • dwccrew
    justincredible;907119 wrote:I've heard that ernest "finishes" faster than the speed of light so Einstein's theory of special relativity has already been undermined long ago.
    Only with his students.
  • hoops23
    chicago510;907377 wrote:I'm no particle physicist, I only took a year in undergrad, but Einstein theorized that things that traveled faster than the speed of light could travel through time, previously thought to be impossible.

    I agree that it won't have tangible impact on human life anytime soon, but the theory of relativity changed the world, e=mc^2 defines the reason that nuclear power can be generated, and if this finding is true then we may find new equations that change things.

    Quotes from the physicists:
    Yep, very interesting find, indeed. Hope the #'s check out.
  • ernest_t_bass
    ManO'War;907544 wrote:And they would have to factor in the wind effect.

    Lol
  • Glory Days
    chicago510;907377 wrote:I'm no particle physicist, I only took a year in undergrad, but Einstein theorized that things that traveled faster than the speed of light could travel through time, previously thought to be impossible.

    I agree that it won't have tangible impact on human life anytime soon, but the theory of relativity changed the world, e=mc^2 defines the reason that nuclear power can be generated, and if this finding is true then we may find new equations that change things.
    still only just theories. if these particle thingys traveled faster than the speed of light, did they actually end up in the past?
  • Polar Bear 73
    berry;907489 wrote:Hard to believe they calculated based on hand held timing. The FAT readings will show a slower speed and clear up any confusion.
    Yeah, but the guy doing the timing had 5 cups of coffee, so he was really, really fast with the stop watch.