CERN claims faster-than-light particle measured

[AirWolf]

What's the margin of error on a device capable of measuring 300000km/s? +/- 1000km/s?

 

[Scooby_Doo]

Well, light goes pretty fast so how do you study its composition et cetera. I was just been curious, nothing shady going on.

If I gave you a rock to analyze you would be able to give me a pretty detailed explanation. But if I asked you to analyze the same rock going 299792458 metres per second you would struggle no?

Scientists have managed to freeze light...

 

[Stefanmuller]

What's the margin of error on a device capable of measuring 300000km/s? +/- 1000km/s?

Was just wondering about that too. How accurately can we measure such high speeds?

Sent from my HTC Hero using MyBroadband Android App

 

[Archer]

What's the margin of error on a device capable of measuring 300000km/s? +/- 1000km/s?

Lets go back to primary school physics
speed = distance / time
Clearly the ditance part isnt an issue in this case, its 730km
So all thats left is to measure the time. Is 60 nanoseconds difficult to measure? No, its in fact incredibly easy, even an entry level PC could do it

 

[AirWolf]

Lets go back to primary school physics
speed = distance / time
Clearly the ditance part isnt an issue in this case, its 730km
So all thats left is to measure the time. Is 60 nanoseconds difficult to measure? No, its in fact incredibly easy, even an entry level PC could do it

So they actually measured it over 300000km, hey?

The error would be in both distance and time as there would be extrapolation on both.

 

[Bobbin]

Pretty sure I heard somewhere they do have some sort of margin for error, that being 15-20 nanoseconds. So this 60ns way exceeds that.

Hell if some dude way back when could measure the speed of light surprisingly accurate with wheel spokes and a laser I'm sure today we are doing a pretty good job of it.

 

[AirWolf]

Pretty sure I heard somewhere they do have some sort of margin for error, that being 15-20 nanoseconds. So this 60ns way exceeds that.

Hell if some dude way back when could measure the speed of light surprisingly accurate with wheel spokes and a laser I'm sure today we are doing a pretty good job of it.

True. And if were possible to break the speed of light, it would have been done a long time already.

 

[Archer]

So they actually measured it over 300000km, hey?

The error would be in both distance and time as there would be extrapolation on both.

Yes, and thats where margin of error comes into play, hence the ±10 nanoseconds

 

[Archer]

True. And if were possible to break the speed of light, it would have been done a long time already.

Actually, it has been done.....
Read up on quantum entanglement.
Also, if something has no mass, it will easily go FTL

 

[The_Unnamed]

Airwolf and Archer need to change their avatar. I keep thinking they are the same person talking to themselves.

 

[Archer]

Who must I PM about getting a custom one?

 

[The_Unnamed]

Who must I PM about getting a custom one?

RPM

 

[Palimino]

That is plainly wrong. A photon is defined as being the fundemental particle of which light is made up of.
What you are saying above is like saying 1m is in theory 1000mm. It has nothing to do with theory, its simple definitions.

What a photon is made up of though is up for discussion.

Where does this wave/particle (defined by the observer) dichotomy come in then? A ‘photon’ sounds like a particle.

 

[Naks]

Where does this wave/particle (defined by the observer) dichotomy come in then? A ‘photon’ sounds like a particle.

Wave particle duality - you learn about that in high school physics. De Broglie was the man on that subject.

 

[Archer]

Where does this wave/particle (defined by the observer) dichotomy come in then? A ‘photon’ sounds like a particle.

That comes in because light (and hence the photons its made of) behaves both like a wave and a particle

Simple examples
Light can be polarised -> wave
Light has different colours at different wavelengths -> wave
Light does not require a medium to travel in -> particle
Photoelectric effect (solar energy) -> particle

 

[Elimentals]

Wave particle duality - you learn about that in high school physics. De Broglie was the man on that subject.

That comes in because light (and hence the photons its made of) behaves both like a wave and a particle

Simple examples
Light can be polarised -> wave
Light has different colours at different wavelengths -> wave
Light does not require a medium to travel in -> particle
Photoelectric effect (solar energy) -> particle

Now we start entering the quantum mechanics world.

Now thats a rabbit hole that needs to be approached with caution, for fear of going insane

 

[Apache]

Scientists have managed to freeze light...

Post link please.

 

[Rkootknir]

Post link please.

Here are a couple of links describing the research:

http://science.nasa.gov/science-news/science-at-nasa/2002/27mar_stoplight/
http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/2001/01.24/01-stoplight.html
http://www.nature.com/news/1998/010125/full/news010125-3.html

 

[Bobbin]

Water itself is made of particles but flows in waves I don't see the fuss

 

[The Stig 2.0]

Apparently there have been hypothesis about tachyonic neutrinos since the 1980's.
According to wikipedia: "In 1985 it was proposed by Chodos et al. that neutrinos can have a tachyonic nature.[8] Today, the possibility of having standard particles moving at superluminal speeds is a natural consequence of unconventional dispersion relations that appear in the Standard-Model Extension,[9][10][11] a realistic description of the possible violation of Lorentz invariance in field theory. In this framework, neutrinos experience Lorentz-violating oscillations and can travel faster than light at high energies. On the other hand, the above-mentioned proposal by Chodos et al. was strongly criticized by some researchers, [12] but this criticism was subsequently shown to be incorrect.[13]"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tachyon
http://www.actaphys.uj.edu.pl/vol29/pdf/v29p0113.pdf

I don't now how reliable or well-known these papers or if the even describe the same phenomenon, but if they do, the recent experiment at CERN might just support the hypotheses developed in the 80's.
But that's for scientists to decide - not me