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European physicists clock neutrinos traveling FASTER than the speed of light.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/44629271/ns/technology_and_science-science/#.Tnuyk9RXHcI

This discovery might just wreck Einstein's theories and rewrite the book entirely.

Damn it!

I was just about to post this!

Zappit - now confirmed to travel faster than the speed of Hylian!

Engage.

I remember another experiment (I think it was from australia?) that even managed to prove that the speed of light was not a constant. That pretty much just collapses the whole house of cards right there.

Zappit said:

Zappit - now confirmed to travel faster than the speed of Hylian!

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Sounds like Nick's prom night

Oi!

Yeah, it's true.

OMG OMG OMG....

I'm skeptical, and I'm not going to jump on the OMG bandwagon.

My best guess is that someone forgot to carry the 1.

Mathias said:

OMG OMG OMG....

I'm skeptical, and I'm not going to jump on the OMG bandwagon.

My best guess is that someone forgot to carry the 1.

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イェアh、イロヴェ帆wテェycオヴェレdて
er, yeah, I love how they covered their ass in the article w/ the independent verification thing.... but that leads me to ask what happened to getting independent verification prior to seeking press? Are they short on cash?

Biannoshufu said:

イェアh、イロヴェ帆wテェycオヴェレdて
er, yeah, I love how they covered their ass in the article w/ the independent verification thing.... but that leads me to ask what happened to getting independent verification prior to seeking press? Are they short on cash?

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What? That's how science works... You discover something and see if someone else can reproduce your results. They published their results in a journal (most likely) and it got picked up by the press at a physics conference.

I'm not a physicist by any stretch of the imagination, but things do travel faster than light in mediums other than a vacuum. My initial thought was that the reporter was a dumbass and neglected to mention that the experiment was done in a pipe filled with a matrix or something, but he's quoting the scientists throughout the article, so I don't think that's the case.

I'm really interested to see how this goes over in the physics community. Those fuckers are brutal when it comes to conferences, talks, and poster sessions. Biochemists will wait till you're done talking before they rip you apart with questions doubting your work, physicists yell at you while you're explaining your derivations.

I mean it could be that the results are dead on, and we'll have to modify our definitions on Relativity. That's the awesomeness of science. It's not a static thing. The current model might need to be modified such that further evidence might show that these neutrinos are taking shortcuts through dimensions in space that cause them to travel faster than light. Who knows? The first step they're taking is to confirm their results by a secondary source.

xkcd summed up my thoughts perfectly. I'll wait to get excited. Although the author (no idea what his/her name is) amused me in the alt text. GPS has been used to monitor continental drift for decades.

Mathias said:

I'm not a physicist by any stretch of the imagination, but things do travel faster than light in mediums other than a vacuum.

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Ehh... i'm actually pretty sure that the speed of light in a vacuum being the the fastest something can go is like one of the pillars of Einstein's relativity...

Or where you talking about light going slower through other mediums?

E=MC2 ...ish?

I thought... wasn't there some australian experiment last year that showed the speed of light to be variable through identical mediums? Or am I misremembering?

way over my head, but warp speed sounds awesome!!!

@Li3n said:

Ehh... i'm actually pretty sure that the speed of light in a vacuum being the the fastest something can go is like one of the pillars of Einstein's relativity...

Or where you talking about light going slower through other mediums?

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Yes, idiot.

Yes, there was an experiment with photons(?) traveling through a medium of Cesium gas, or something.

Yup. Seems it's been tested at least as far back as 2009.

--Patrick

Mathias said:

Yes, idiot.

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Considering that photons don't penetrate the majority of matter in the first place how would that come up at all?
Added at: 12:39

PatrThom said:

Yes, there was an experiment with photons(?) traveling through a medium of Cesium gas, or something.

Yup. Seems it's been tested at least as far back as 2009.

--Patrick

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Photons are light... and the difference is this: "Wang said the effect is possible only because light has no mass; the same thing cannot be done with physical objects."

While neutrinos have been proven to have mass i believe.

Holy crap, just shut up already.

Mathias said:

Holy crap, just shut up already.

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Oh, so it was just you assuming everyone else is mentally retarded... otherwise i don;t see how you could have even entertain the idea that they just discovered that something goes faster through a rock then light...
Added at: 13:51
Also, can anyone confirm this:


Because seriously, we need to clone him already.

I'm settling this argument right now:



There.

@Li3n said:

Oh, so it was just you assuming everyone else is mentally retarded... otherwise i don;t see how you could have even entertain the idea that they just discovered that something goes faster through a rock then light...
Added at: 13:51
Also, can anyone confirm this:

Because seriously, we need to clone him already.

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Listen, please learn to read everything and comprehend the whole context of the thought before you open your mouth.

"I'm not a physicist by any stretch of the imagination, but things do travel faster than light in mediums other than a vacuum. My initial thought was that the reporter was a dumbass and neglected to mention that the experiment was done in a pipe filled with a matrix or something, but he's quoting the scientists throughout the article, so I don't think that's the case."

I was under the impression that the researchers had a pipe built to the other facility as a light control for their experiment. Light travels slower in things like air and water. Therefore it is possible and has been proven and observed that elementary particles do travel faster than light. It's called Cherenkov radiation. Now, run along and be a dumbass somewhere else.

And just reading about neutrino detectors a second ago, illustrates what I meant about not being a physicist. Apparently, the detectors do have phototubes that are used to monitor the events I'm talking about.

I thought Cherenkov radiation was the discharge given off by FTL stuff "slowing down" to normal speed? Like, "Oops! I'm going too fast. Here, let me shed some energy."

--Patrick

Mathias said:

I was under the impression that the researchers had a pipe built to the other facility as a light control for their experiment. Light travels slower in things like air and water. Therefore it is possible and has been proven and observed that elementary particles do travel faster than light. It's called Cherenkov radiation. Now, run along and be a dumbass somewhere else.

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See, that's the missing piece that fills in that gap where the jump in your logic was from my PoV...

See, at first i was confused, but then i realised you probably meant something along those lines, which is why that post of mine read:

""Ehh... i'm actually pretty sure that the speed of light in a vacuum being the the fastest something can go is like one of the pillars of Einstein's relativity...

Or where you talking about light going slower through other mediums?"

The 2nd part was about clarification... which i obviously have to annoy out of you every time (not that it's not fun)...

PatrThom said:

I thought Cherenkov radiation was the discharge given off by FTL stuff "slowing down" to normal speed? Like, "Oops! I'm going too fast. Here, let me shed some energy."

--Patrick

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It's actually stuff if the media that's getting charged from the FTL particles and quickly shedding that energy back into their ground state.

The bartender says "We don't serve fast-than-light particles in here."

A neutrino enters a bar.

Gusto said:

The bartender says "We don't serve fast-than-light particles in here."

A neutrino enters a bar.

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