That’s pretty cool isn’t it? sending little bitty tiny bits of matter faster than what is perceived to be possible. I’m quite perplexed but it does sound good. So can you build a box out of neutrinos, stick, say, a doctor in it, and send him on adventures through time and stuff?

Is no one going to have a go at this faster than light thing then? I dunno, STW, the force is not strong.. I was hoping for some expert opinion.

I’d like to know how the particles knew the way from Geneva to a lab in Italy, all underground? Under the Alps. I suspect smoke and mirrors.

They took a short cut.

really really fast! faster than the speed of light! apparently. Where is the usual onslaught of STW fact and opinion though on these kind of matters?

What ever happened to quantum entanglement? Isn’t that a form of instantaneous signalling across time and space?

Also, this chap proposed travel faster than light some time ago and his book while offering no definitive evidence, is actually a good description of the dogma he faced:

This book is great too, whereby time is examined in terms of its necessity in physics:

And of course, we can’t forget one of my great heros, David Bohm, who proposed a solution in the form of the implicate order, a higher dimension of reality to explain the paradoxes in this one!

So yeah, don’t forget that there is no agreement as to how to actually interpret findings from quantum experiments, so no wonder the whole shebang is looking shakier than me riding McMoab on a penny fathing! The Higgs Boson particle never turned up this week, and also the theory of dark matter when kaput too so not a great week for physicists!

sorry simonralli you have totally bewildered me even more than the speeding particles! I’ve seen the higgs boson in films.

The Higgs Boson particle never turned up this week, and also the theory of dark matter when kaput too so not a great week for physicists

Hardly, unless you assume a conspiracy to maintain the physics status quo. I’d say it was actually a great week for physicists.

Sounds like a great week for physics. Think of the funding that’ll be available to come up with an alternative theory.

Mogrim – chill – am just being flippant. If the lil’ol Higgsy doesn’t turn up it means a new direction for physicists. Thing is, are they really explaining the ground of all reality, or are they projecting their own consciousness into the experiments expecting to find what they refer to as particles while having no explanation for consciousness or the fact that all of science has to be done through the prisms of our senses??! 😀

thing is I want to believe in the idea of .. something new, expanding the current idea of knowledge sounds good to me. Pushing things forward. I want to believe in that. But I’m a bit thick and easily persuaded.

All sounds pretty fab. Though did they measure distance point to point on the map, whereas if they’re doing it underground wouldn’t the curvature in the earth shorten the distance a fraction which could account for the seemingly ‘faster’ speed? I’m sure they’d thought of that though.

umm, we’re talking about stupidly small, indescribable tiny pieces of matter travelling faster than the speed of light. You tell me! I’m sure they take these things into account. being a serious scientific study that may put normal type physics into disrepute. not sure what I’m talking about btw…

Was just a thought. I wonder if they’re the kind of super-intelligent scientists that have trouble switching on a kettle though! Faster than light particles – yes; make a cuppa – er, eh?

What you should really be concentrating on is what tyre choice said miniscule particles made, prior to attempting to circle this underground raceway.. I mean, little room for the odd wash out or two travelling at that speed – and what pos & neg pressures were they running in their forks eh? I’d recommend carrying spare pads at least, given the speeds they’re likely to achieve..

(all right, i’ll shut the **** up now, and get on with cooking a moroccan for tea.) Not a real moroccan obviously, that would be inhumane, and probably not as tasty. Recipe available if higgs boson doesn’t appeal.

lol, good point. I’d imagine someone in the position of measuring and quantifing particles travelling over the speed of light knows what they are doing. Generally. “they projecting their own consciousness into the experiments expecting to find what they refer to as particles while having no explanation for consciousness or the fact that all of science has to be done through the prisms of our senses?” interesting!

bazookajoe – Member
Was just a thought. I wonder if they’re the kind of super-intelligent scientists that have trouble switching on a kettle though!

This is some sort of urban legend of what very smart scientist are like, in my experience people who are very very good at things like physics are pretty practical in many ways to. I met more middle mangers who are useless at anything practical / real world than I have very clever scientists.

I can make a decent cuppa though haven’t a clue about faster than light sub-atomic particles.

you lot are rubbish.

Time travel is impossible. Otherwise we’d be overun with visitors from the future blabbing about where they’d come from.

It is pretty astounding though. And the mind boggles at the measuring – 0.00000006 seconds (!!!!) faster than expected with the particles arrival being detected by bricks with an ultra-sensitive covering. I really hope another team can verify it with a similar experiment.

allthepies – Member
Time travel is impossible. Otherwise we’d be overun with visitors from the future blabbing about where they’d come from.

Depends, maybe a tiny bit in the future these scientists had paved the way for time travel only for that volcano in the other thread to whoof it all away

bricks though!

it’s a funny one. What did you do at work today? oh, I broke the laws of physics as they stand. no biggie. meanwhile Cheryl Cole has a new boyfriend. I suppose we’ve got to wait for proof if she is actually seeing this bloke.

Neutrinos? I didn’t think they were ‘matter’ in the conventional sense, they obey different rules, pass ‘through’ normal matter at a sub atomic level. This is all quantum physics, it’s a whole **** up other game with stuff occupying two places simultaneously, can’t quite understand how they can measure it.

I know, pretty cool stuff though eh! they exist but are lighter than, oh I don’t know, I’ve read about them and now I’m even more confused.

edit: too confused by sub atomic particles.

Kevevs

Have you read “The Dancing Wu Li Masters”? That is a great introduction to quantum physics. Also, I always feel the word “particle” can confuse people, especially when so much quantum physics analysis happens in a mathematical space called Hilbert space and some people have critiqued quantum physics as completely losing touch with reality. It is also possible to lose the addiction to the concept of particle and indeed fundamental particle, as when you have found that, have you really understood the ultimate ground of reality? How do you explain the existence of this particle?

If you read Bohm, he goes down a route of seeing these particles as units of “meaning”. You can also look at quantum systems rather than particles, and see everything as one big cosmic dance, fully interconnected in dynamic relationship, rather than separation.

to be honest Simonralli2 “The Dancing Wu Li Masters” doesn’t sound like something I’d be interested in right now. No offence. you have an interesting point of view though mate, hope that doesn’t sound as condescending as it sounds 😉 I’m open to all sorts. Today tiny particles going faster than the speed of light are my thing!

set a shamanic demon apon him or vodoo the hertic Simon 😉

I’m scared now. What do you do with four bags of prawn cocktail crisps when you’ve eaten the rest of the 24 pack? I don’t like ’em. Science needs to know…

Time travel is impossible. Otherwise we’d be overun with visitors from the future blabbing about where they’d come from.

But if particles are going faster than light then wouldn’t that mean travelling into the future is possible but travelling into the past is not?

I think it’s more like tiny invisible particles beyond our recognition travelling a millionth (billionth?) of a nanosecond faster than light. something like that. I’m no expert! the whole idea is cool and interesting to me. I don’t think there is any real future of deloreans or police boxes made out of superfast nutrinos coming our way though. shame.

Just pretend the prawn cocktail crisps are tomato crisps, i’m sure that’s what the flavouring on the ingredients list on the packet says anyway.

I’ll check, you may be right! I just can’t do it, eating crisps out of a pink bag is just wrong. I Don’t care about Einsteins special bollucks going tits up. Why put prawn cocktail in a mega 24 pack when they could’ve at least thought about chicken or smokey backon. the b*stards.

Awaiting peer reviewed articles on this one.

yep. double blind test with the prawn cocktail and the tomato flavour.