Faster than the speed of light?

[Mendoza]

I thought this was going to be another kll song thread.

I thought it was going to be a thread about how fast Brighton fans sing goo-olsussbysea

 

[sten_super]

However as DTES said, it was done on a small scale in a plane around the planet. If both clocks were in space to start with and all conditions were the same (they weren't in the planes test) and one travelled a very long distance and returned you may get a diefferent result.

The tests that have been carried out are a lot more robust than any of us are making out though. Do you really think that if these differences could be easily explained by problems with the test itself then the results would be subject to a hell of a lot more debate? It's not like 2 guys thought 'you know what'd be fun today, I'll stand here with a stopwatch, you get in a plane with a stopwatch, fly round the world and let's look at the results when you get back'.

I'm not saying that our explanations are nailed on, that there's nothing more we can learn about these things - there's clearly shedloads more. But I don't think disputing widely accepted theories and results (without anything to back up any counter-assertions) is the best way to go about it.

 

[Triggaaar]

In Brian Cox's "Why Does E=mc2", the answer to why the constant speed through spacetime is c (the speed of light) is a significant chunk of the entire book - plus the equations don't translate well to NSC.

Forgive me if I'm being simple here: I assume c has been measured accurately, because we have the ability to measure it. But are we able to prove E=mc2 as accurately (ie, testing the level of energy can't be as easy, because you can't release the energy without making a mess)? If not, then it could equally be that E=mc2 is a tiny bit out, and that reality is E=mp2 (where p is the speed of the particle).

 

[Cadiz Seagull]

Shit! Does this mean I have to give my Physics O Level back?

 

[k2bluesky]

Amazing this received so little publicity, probably the biggest discovery in human history and may well change all thinking on the universe and planet we live on, not to mention the possibilities of time travel and interstellar travel, crack this and the stuff grabbing all the headlines like share prices and money won't mean f*** all (hurry up that day please)

 

[00snook]

There's nothing in special relativity that prevents faster than light travel. You cannot however accelerate something from below to above as it would take an infinite amount of energy.

And it would require 0 mass

 

[DTES]

Forgive me if I'm being simple here: I assume c has been measured accurately, because we have the ability to measure it. But are we able to prove E=mc2 as accurately (ie, testing the level of energy can't be as easy, because you can't release the energy without making a mess)? If not, then it could equally be that E=mc2 is a tiny bit out, and that reality is E=mp2 (where p is the speed of the particle).

Sorry for the delay - have only just logged on since Friday so haven't spotted this post from before.

Yes, we have measured c accurately. e=mc2 though was't derived through experiment initially, it was done through following the logical steps of the maths as in the book. In these equations, "c" isn't just stuck in at the end. The starting point is Einstein's assumption that the speed of light (c) is the same for all observers (this has been verified). This "c" is then present throughout the workings, and follows all the way through the equations to the conclusion that e=mc2.

In other words, if c were actually p (the speed of the particle), the following it back up the chain, p would also be the constant speed of light that all observers see... which it isn't.

 

[DTES]

However as DTES said, it was done on a small scale in a plane around the planet. If both clocks were in space to start with and all conditions were the same (they weren't in the planes test) and one travelled a very long distance and returned you may get a diefferent result.

A small scale perhaps, but to a phenomenal degree of accuracy; we're not talking "to the nearest second" or anything here. To be precise (for the Hafele-Keating experiment flying the atomic clocks around the world), relativity predicted a time dilation of 275 nanoseconds (0.000000275 seconds) and the atomic clock came back having gained 0.000000273 seconds (with experimental accuracy of +/- 7 nanoseconds).

If you want bigger scale experiments to test relativity though, there are plenty more here: Tests of Relativity

 

[perseus]

Get the Doctor, Who?

There was a young lady named Bright
Who could travel much quicker than light
She vanished one day, in a relative way
And returned on the preceding night.

 

[Tricky Dicky]

Amazing this received so little publicity, probably the biggest discovery in human history and may well change all thinking on the universe and planet we live on, not to mention the possibilities of time travel and interstellar travel, crack this and the stuff grabbing all the headlines like share prices and money won't mean f*** all (hurry up that day please)

What, bigger than discovering fire, or that gingerbread biscuits dunked in tea are fab ?

 

[Nottseagull]

If SatNavs didn't make an adjustment to the signals they get from the satellites (to account for the satellites travelling slower through time than we are) then they'd be wrong - and the error would increase by 10 metres a day!

That, to me, is ludicrous; I'm quite sure that satellites travel through time at 60 minutes per hour just like the rest of us. I think this adjustment you mention that eliminates a ten metre discrepancy must be the distance the Earth has turned from the time when the data request was sent from the satellite to the time it was received on Earth.

 

[Nottseagull]

Atomic clocks will not be affected by such things as pressure.

Not necesasarily pressure then, but there could be other factors, like Gravity, effects resulting in the atomic clocks density changing (possibly minutely and not really detectable but enough to influence the result) or maybe some unknown influence / forces at work.
Scientific fact is always something that is deemed correct until proven wrong and is not and possibly never will be a 100% certainty.

Guy Fawkes you are quite correct and DTES is simply wrong. Accuracy is affected by something as basic as temperature differences, as explained here
Atomic clock - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I'm afraid I have lost confidence in you DTES and I agree entirely with all GF's arguments in this thread.

 

[birthofanorange]

Having read through as much of all the above as I could take in, the biggest and most surprising discovery is the lack of input by CP fans....where are they??

That said, I'd like it explained (and humour me if it has been asked elsewhere), that if travelling at lightspeed infers that time has effectively 'stopped' - and I know that the slowing of time has been proven, as referenced in earlier posts - surely exceeding lightspeed would infer that time is passing 'negatively'...as in going backwards?

If such a thing is possible, can it drop me off a week or so ago, and offer me an alternative reality?

 

[JCL]

Fascinating thread!

But after minutes of painstaking deep thought, I believe that I have come up with the ultimate, real-world practical application for this incredible new (to be verified) discovery..

IF and only if, we could isolate & capture one of these faster than light particles….

Couldn't we stick one up Dicker's a**e and then just maybe it might have an effect on his game?…

 

[Sir Nigel of Eagleshire]

Having read through as much of all the above as I could take in, the biggest and most surprising discovery is the lack of input by CP fans....where are they??

Having only just found this thread I am rather busy trying to digest this information.... will revert.

 

[Pondicherry]

That, to me, is ludicrous; I'm quite sure that satellites travel through time at 60 minutes per hour just like the rest of us. I think this adjustment you mention that eliminates a ten metre discrepancy must be the distance the Earth has turned from the time when the data request was sent from the satellite to the time it was received on Earth.

I am not an expert but off the top I my head - the multiple satellites that provide GPS do have clocks on and the clocks do have to be adjusted because of time travel but the main cause of this as far as I was aware was Earth's gravitational field which is stronger on Earth and causes time to slow - relative to the satellites.

 

[Guy Fawkes]

I am not an expert but off the top I my head - the multiple satellites that provide GPS do have clocks on and the clocks do have to be adjusted because of time travel but the main cause of this as far as I was aware was Earth's gravitational field which is stronger on Earth and causes time to slow - relative to the satellites.

But is it time slowing or is it due to other forces affecting the accuracy of the clocks?
Why the assumption that time alters to create the difference when it could easily be caused by other forces or influences that we may just not understand yet that result in the differences found with the speed that the clocks run at

If time slows as you travel faster and slows down so that it would be impossible to travel faster than light as previously thought, how would these photons that have been discovered originate? If they were created in an experiment and found to travel faster than light, but the previous argument, as the speed of light would be in the present and as things slow as they approach it and nothing can travel faster than it as it is the speed of light / time then it would have to originate in the future.

So how could it be created and measured if it should work in reverse. ie, it would originate from the end point, travel backwards to the point that it should have been created? If it is shown to come from the proper point of origin / creation and travel away from it and is measured at the end point (as happened in this experiment?) doesn't it prove that time slowing, etc is wrong as it shouldn't be possible under the accepted thinking?

 

[DTES]

That, to me, is ludicrous; I'm quite sure that satellites travel through time at 60 minutes per hour just like the rest of us. I think this adjustment you mention that eliminates a ten metre discrepancy must be the distance the Earth has turned from the time when the data request was sent from the satellite to the time it was received on Earth.

Counter-intuitive? Certainly? Ludicrous? Not at all.

It has nothing to do with the turn of the Earth - don't forget there is no data request for there to be a discrepancy from (the processing power to communicate 2-ways with every single GPS device on the planet would be beyond imagination).

The satellites simply each emit a signal, and based on the information your SatNav/GPS receives from each it calculates it's position - adjusted for the (relativistic) time dilation effect that gravity has on the satellites.

Guy Fawkes you are quite correct and DTES is simply wrong. Accuracy is affected by something as basic as temperature differences, as explained here
Atomic clock - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
I'm afraid I have lost confidence in you DTES and I agree entirely with all GF's arguments in this thread.

Apologies if I was wrong in posting that temperature cannot affect an atomic clock - you are right that it can. However, the link that you yourself posted shows that that cannot explain the result found in the tests of relativity.

Atomic clocks first cool the atoms to near absolute zero temperature by slowing them with lasers and probing them in atomic fountains in a microwave-filled cavity.

Both the clocks on Earth and in the air were at the same temperature; temperature does not explain the results.

Interesting though that you lose confidence in me. I'm not the man who discovered relativity, or one of the many men who have tested it since. It's not me you're losing confidence in - it's every single one of them (unless it's just my appalling wording and foolish misunderstanding of the temperature effect... in which case fair enough, but the scientists are still right )

But is it time slowing or is it due to other forces affecting the accuracy of the clocks?

It's time slowing.

Why the assumption that time alters to create the difference when it could easily be caused by other forces or influences that we may just not understand yet that result in the differences found with the speed that the clocks run at

Because that very "assumption" was predicted and calculated to a phenomenal level of accuracy before the differences were actually seen (or tested), based upon relativity that had already passed several other tests of its accuracy. (e.g. those shown on my earlier link: Tests of General Relativity - note some of these are on far larger scales than orbiting the Earth)

If time slows as you travel faster and slows down so that it would be impossible to travel faster than light as previously thought, how would these photons that have been discovered originate? If they were created in an experiment and found to travel faster than light, but the previous argument, as the speed of light would be in the present and as things slow as they approach it and nothing can travel faster than it as it is the speed of light / time then it would have to originate in the future.

So how could it be created and measured if it should work in reverse. ie, it would originate from the end point, travel backwards to the point that it should have been created? If it is shown to come from the proper point of origin / creation and travel away from it and is measured at the end point (as happened in this experiment?) doesn't it prove that time slowing, etc is wrong as it shouldn't be possible under the accepted thinking?

Just to check I'm understanding this correctly - you're referring to the neutrons that were discovered, not photons?

Would it prove that relativity was wrong if this experimental result was right? Possibly - even probably - yes. Hence the scepticism. Either there was an error in this one test somewhere, or there was something wrong (or an alternative explanation) for every single other test ever performed on relativity.

Not only would you have to explain the time dilation of these couple of atomic clocks on the planes/Earth, but you'd have to explain Mercury's orbit odd around the Sun (which completely agrees with predictions when relativity is taken into account), gravitational lensing, light travel time delay tests, the equivalence principle, etc etc).

For me, that means that unless (until?) this experiment is independently repeated and verified, it shouldn't be taken as fact.

 

[beorhthelm]

Not only would you have to explain the time dilation of these couple of atomic clocks on the planes/Earth, but you'd have to explain Mercury's orbit odd around the Sun (which completely agrees with predictions when relativity is taken into account), gravitational lensing, light travel time delay tests, the equivalence principle, etc etc).

or... you keep relativity for all that stuff and add a new theory on top for >light speed. like they already do in other areas of physics.

 

[DTES]

or... you keep relativity for all that stuff and add a new theory on top for >light speed. like they already do in other areas of physics.

Hmm. Maybe that would be possible, but it would seem a little odd given that the very existence of >light speed has the potential to undermine the fundamental tenet of relativity. Light being the same speed for all observers is odd enough at <light speed travel, but it's a very odd concept indeed if the observer itself - the neutrino - is travelling at greater than light speed, as that would require light itself to travel at greater than light speed?

My money is still on this experiment being proved wrong when it is repeated independently. But I guess we'll have to wait for that...