Surprise - FTL Particles (Maybe)

[Lance R. Casey]

Assuming that there was an error, here is a fresh suggestion of where it might lie.

[Clarke]

Oh, yes, musn't forget gravitational time dilation. 

[Txur’Itan]

Assuming that there was an error, here is a fresh suggestion of where it might lie.

Good Find.

I may not be properly understanding their argument, or what their connection to the scrutiny might be.

I thought clock synchronization protocols are very heavily scrutinized, they should have been the first suspect devices, and they should be the easiest errors to identify.

I find it fascinating, but rather strange that rotational velocity would not have "slowed" the particle down or caused it to miss the detector completely if that was truly a factor in causing errors that would need to be accounted for in timing.  

Oh, yes, musn't forget gravitational time dilation. 

I sure did not. 

As I was wondering earlier, if there could be a way to measure the age of the particle, then what time had passed at two endpoints could be counter referenced against the age of the particle(s). However, I think that measurement is a bit out of reach.

[Lance R. Casey]

The argument is that the experiment used a single, physical device to synchronize the time stamps at the two experiment sites, and since this device therefore needed to be transported between those sites it would have been subject to relativistic corrections in the process -- which may not have been accounted for properly. Such changes would be very, very small, but so is the (apparent) time-of-flight discrepancy.


---

...and although that's the gist of the paper in question, the OPERA people say it is based on a misunderstanding and will be amending their own paper to more clearly describe their method. Stay tuned, as usual.

[Lance R. Casey]

Here is another "maybe".

[Txur’Itan]

Here is another "maybe".

I am wondering if the peer review is grasping at straws to align the experiment with conventional views, rather than adjusting theories to suit the data?

The linked suggestion on this article appears to be stating the solution is to arbitrarily modify time of flight calculation to arrange the data within standard theories.

http://arxiv.org/abs/1110.2685

[Clarke]

Here is another "maybe".

I'd be really surprised if CERN hadn't done that math already, considering that you need to get any useful results out of the GPS system.

[Lance R. Casey]

OPERA has repeated the experiment, with increased accuracy, and achieved the same result.

The timing method and setup is the same as before, however, which means that any hitherto undiscovered systematic error in those parts of the original experiment would still exist. The chance that the result is correct has been upped a notch, but the final word can only come through independent confirmation or contradiction, and all eyes are now on MINOS.

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

I'm worrying that the experiments are quite precise, but not accurate. Something about it points suspiciously to a systematic error - the percentage past light speed is really really small. It could be that the particles are actually traveling at light speed but the clock in the experiment is JUST a TAD bit fast...I think that a conclusive experiment would involve actually racing the particles with photons and not just making conclusions out of the known speed of light.

And if they are actually FTL, that doesn't really violate Special Relativity. Special Relativity predicts that nothing can accelerate beyond the speed of light, but actually allows particles that were above the speed of light from their creation. Such particles, according to S.R, would in fact have a law forbidding them to decelerate past the speed of light. It might be so that these neutrinos are actually such FTL particles that are decelerating from, say 2c, but their mass is getting higher as they decelerate close to c. However, the mass didn't become enormous, so my theory might not hold very well...

[Txur’Itan]

I am not convinced that the results of the CERN data are conclusive.

I am also not convinced that the "Cherenkov radiation measurement" is sufficient on its own to dismiss the CERN findings either.  Primarily because it ignores the travel time component.

Additional Cherenkov radiation not detected

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

I'm not even 100 percent convinced that a cherenkov radiation-like effect would apply to neutrinos.

In any case, there is something about neutrinos that is very special-- and very important to truly understanding the 'big picture' in physics, as well as cosmology.

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

Yeah. We only have a mechanism of Cherenkov radiation produced when a particle goes faster than the speed of light in a medium; i.e. it outraces light in water or steel or even air. Whether or not truly FTL particles would even produce Cherenkov radiation is not certain.

[Txur’Itan]

The disappointing but inevitable end to the speculation.

[Irtaviš Ačankif]

 
'ivoG relativiti..

[Seze Mune]

The disappointing but inevitable end to the speculation.

A loose cable?!?  

"The non-existence of the Higgs is much more likely to be true than neutrinos travelling faster than light," says Professor Jim Al-Khalili of the University of Surrey, who famously offered to eat his underpants if the latter proved true. "The longer we go on not finding it, the less likely it is that the Higgs really exists."

Jim Al-Khalili and the loose cable connection!  

The Higgs-boson and the LHC

[Tsyal Maktoyu]

Really? Of all things, a loose cable?

[`Eylan Ayfalulukanä]

Very interesting! I knew that it would end up being something overlooked, and sometimes, it is the obvious that gets overlooked.

One of the properties of any kind of oscillating energy traveling through a medium, is that the 'impedance' of that medium needs to be the same at all points for the maximum amount of energy to travel. If there is any discontinuity in the 'impedance', some of the energy 'reflects' off this discontinuity and returns to the generator. While this is usually thought of in an RF environment (Does VSWR sound familiar to anyone here?), where transmission lines, antennas, cavities, tuning networks, etc. are involved, it also happens with light.

Imagine that this connector is just loose enough that an infinitesimal gap exists between the two media being coupled together. This represents an impedance discontinuity or 'impedance bump' as we call it in practical situations. The gap is small enough where the attenuation to the light energy is within working limits. But now, some of the light 'reflects' of the gap and returns to the source. In many cases, this energy will 'reflect' off the source, and attempt to make the trip down the cable over again. Although some of the energy of this second signal will return off the impedance bump, most of it will make it to the receiver, and hopefully be absorbed in the constant impedance of the receiver.

So, now, there are two signals making it to the receiver (more actually, as this process happens over and over, but usually only the primary and first couple of reflections are of any concern). One is the primary, the second is weaker, and delayed by double the optical length of the cable. The detector may be 'fooled' by this second signal, and the result is a signal displaced in time.

Loose cables are the bane of any electronic system. A week or so ago, on a day when things in general were not going well, I was replacing a cable going to a patch panel in a rack in the TV station I work at. Much of the wiring on this patch panel had been installed in 2005-2006, and not disturbed much since. In the midst of a bunch of really strange stuff going on, I had forgotten that one of our video server channels had picked that same moment to stop working. Later that afternoon, after I had extricated myself from all the other issues that had come up that day, I found one of our staff on the phone with the manufacturer of our video server. Facepalm. I had forgotten about the dead server channel (Our video server has 10 SD and 4 HD channels, it was one of the HD channels that was not working). Not happy that someone was trying to do what I should have done, I ended up getting involved. By the time all the troubleshooting had been done primarily by the factory technician and the other employee, they had determined that this port on our server had failed, and were working on sending us a replacement. While this was being worked out, I got to thinking about things, and did some simple troubleshooting. To make a long story short, the 'dead server port' was actually a loose cable that had not been properly tightened when it was first installed in 2006! (BNC connector) I pulled on the cable, and it came right off the patch jack. I then remembered I had been in there replacing the cable I had previously mentioned. I must have jiggled the cable with the loose connector just enough to make it break contact. In any case, things were working again as soon as I reattached and properly tightened the connector.

Moral of the story? This can happen to anyone!

[Seze Mune]

Loose connections!  I have 'em all the time........   

[Txur’Itan]

Oeyä
Ma
EYWA!

Independent verification is even more crucial than ever. I can't wait!

WOW JUST WOW

[Seze Mune]

So...who knows what the long-overlooked problems will bring in terms of results?  It begs the question of whether the LHC scientists have fully controlled for ALL variables with regards to GPS.  For example, when you read the following, you wonder whether and how the scientists have insulated their measurements from something like THIS happening:

"NO AEROPLANES fell out of the sky and no one died. But in late 2009 engineers noticed that satellite-positioning receivers for a new navigation aid at Newark airport in New Jersey were suffering brief daily breaks in reception. Something was interfering with the signals from orbiting global positioning system (GPS) satellites. It took two months for investigators from the Federal Aviation Authority to track down the problem: a driver who passed by on the nearby New Jersey Turnpike each day had a cheap GPS jammer in his truck."

The Economist: no jam tomorrow