About me: I have prehensile eyebrows. I speak 9 languages fluently, one of which other people can also speak. When backed into a corner, I fit perfectly - having a right-angled arse.
mistermack wrote:I know nothing of why light is slowed in various materials.
I always ASSUMED that it was because it was getting internally deflected and reflected, so that it's path was effectively lengthened.
Like light hitting a pair of mirrors and bouncing between them for a while before continuing onwards.
I've got no recollection of where I got that from, but it seemed logical enough.
I used to think that it was because it was absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms in the material and that the thing that 'slowed' the photons down was the delays in absorption and emission, not the actual photon getting slower? I don't have the slightest clue what is really happening.
Yeah, I said that earlier. Another view is that of interference between the electron and photon waves. I reckon it's those bloody quantuims though - bastits!
A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return. Salman Rushdie You talk to God, you're religious. God talks to you, you're psychotic. House MD Who needs a meaning anyway, I'd settle anyday for a very fine view. Sandy Denny This is the wrong forum for bluffing Paco Yes, yes. But first I need to show you this venomous fish! Calilasseia I think we should do whatever Pawiz wants. Twoflower Bella squats momentarily then waddles on still peeing, like a horse Millefleur
mistermack wrote:I know nothing of why light is slowed in various materials.
I always ASSUMED that it was because it was getting internally deflected and reflected, so that it's path was effectively lengthened.
Like light hitting a pair of mirrors and bouncing between them for a while before continuing onwards.
I've got no recollection of where I got that from, but it seemed logical enough.
I used to think that it was because it was absorbed and re-emitted by the atoms in the material and that the thing that 'slowed' the photons down was the delays in absorption and emission, not the actual photon getting slower? I don't have the slightest clue what is really happening.
Like I said, I've got no idea. I'm too lazy to look it up. But I would have thought that if the light was absorbed and re-emitted, it would just shine in all directions, rather than maintain it's direction.
That's just a wild guess though.
While there is a market for shit, there will be assholes to supply it.
About me: I have prehensile eyebrows. I speak 9 languages fluently, one of which other people can also speak. When backed into a corner, I fit perfectly - having a right-angled arse.
Geoff wrote:"We don't allow faster than light neutrinos in here" said the bartender.
A neutrino walks into a bar.
Stolen!
A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return. Salman Rushdie You talk to God, you're religious. God talks to you, you're psychotic. House MD Who needs a meaning anyway, I'd settle anyday for a very fine view. Sandy Denny This is the wrong forum for bluffing Paco Yes, yes. But first I need to show you this venomous fish! Calilasseia I think we should do whatever Pawiz wants. Twoflower Bella squats momentarily then waddles on still peeing, like a horse Millefleur
Xamonas Chegwé wrote:OK, here's a weird suggestion...
What if light doesn't ever actually travel at lightspeed?
Photons can spontaneously transform into paired particles which (almost) instantly annihilate each other, returning a photon. They do it all the time - even in a vacuum. There is a seething, churning soup of particles being created and destroyed in every tiny corner of "empty" space. And there are other, more complex creations and destructions happening as well.
And all of this popping in and out of existence takes TIME. The net result being that light is not travelling as fast as it could conceivably travel, even in a vacuum. It takes slightly longer for light to get anywhere because of all of the quantum buggering about!
So, what about neutrinos? They have zero (or extremely low) mass. They hardly ever interact with most other particles. They can spontaneously transform into other kinds of neutrinos (the effect which the experiment in the OP was set up to measure) but these could well be massless as well.
Could it be that neutrinos actually travel closer to the maximum allowable speed in the universe than light does? Could it be that all previous calculations of c have failed to allow for quantum fluctuations slowing down electromagnetic particles and that c is actually bigger than we thought - the speed of neutrinos?
Just rambling. Feel free to shoot it down in flames.
Plausible hypothesis. Now do the maths to prove it
You spelt maffs rong.
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Xamonas Chegwé wrote:What if light doesn't ever actually travel at lightspeed?
Ignoring the possibility of experimental error for the moment, I think it's more likely that the neutrinos simply travel faster than c. Theoretical superluminal particles - tachyons - have been posited since the 1960s and are consistent with relativity. They would have imaginary rest masses, and would not be able to decelerate below the speed of light, just as normal particles can't accelerate above the speed of light. Indirect measurements of neutrino rest masses have often resulted in negative best estimates for the squares of their masses, consistent with what one would see for tachyons, though the error bands have permitted zero or slightly positive estimates to date. Apparently the idea that neutrinos travel faster than light isn't as new as the news reports imply.
I posted a more detailed discussion with links to sources at my blog here:
Rum wrote:Dumb question, but I don't know the answer and it might have some relevance - do neutrinos have any mass?
As I understand it, the possible masses they may have have been steadily reduced by observation, but it remains an open question as to whether it is a very low mass, or a zero mass. If their mass was zero, then XC's earlier speculation is by no means impossible.
If their mass is imaginary, then Warren's speculation is perhaps the way to go...
About me: I have prehensile eyebrows. I speak 9 languages fluently, one of which other people can also speak. When backed into a corner, I fit perfectly - having a right-angled arse.
A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return. Salman Rushdie You talk to God, you're religious. God talks to you, you're psychotic. House MD Who needs a meaning anyway, I'd settle anyday for a very fine view. Sandy Denny This is the wrong forum for bluffing Paco Yes, yes. But first I need to show you this venomous fish! Calilasseia I think we should do whatever Pawiz wants. Twoflower Bella squats momentarily then waddles on still peeing, like a horse Millefleur
Xamonas Chegwé wrote:What if light doesn't ever actually travel at lightspeed?
Ignoring the possibility of experimental error for the moment, I think it's more likely that the neutrinos simply travel faster than c. Theoretical superluminal particles - tachyons - have been posited since the 1960s and are consistent with relativity. They would have imaginary rest masses, and would not be able to decelerate below the speed of light, just as normal particles can't accelerate above the speed of light. Indirect measurements of neutrino rest masses have often resulted in negative best estimates for the squares of their masses, consistent with what one would see for tachyons, though the error bands have permitted zero or slightly positive estimates to date. Apparently the idea that neutrinos travel faster than light isn't as new as the news reports imply.
I posted a more detailed discussion with links to sources at my blog here:
If the speed discrepancy was bigger, I'd be a lot more excited.
But why would tachyons only move so close to the speed of light. Why not double, or treble the speed?
If we couldn't detect light at all, and observed the world using only sound, you wouldn't get that excited if sound was measured travelling a miniscule percentage faster. Chances are it would only be an anomaly of sound, rather than a new form of energy we call light.
While there is a market for shit, there will be assholes to supply it.
The other question I haven't seen answered is, do neutrinos ALWAYS travel at the speed of light, ( or slightly faster ) or have they been observed travelling slower?
'Kin ELL' !!!
Wikipedia wrote:
Most neutrinos passing through the Earth emanate from the Sun. About 65 billion (6.5×1010) solar neutrinos per second pass through every square centimeter perpendicular to the direction of the Sun in the region of the Earth.[3]
I didn't think there were so many of the little buggers.
While there is a market for shit, there will be assholes to supply it.
About me: I have prehensile eyebrows. I speak 9 languages fluently, one of which other people can also speak. When backed into a corner, I fit perfectly - having a right-angled arse.
mistermack wrote:The other question I haven't seen answered is, do neutrinos ALWAYS travel at the speed of light, ( or slightly faster ) or have they been observed travelling slower?
'Kin ELL' !!!
Wikipedia wrote:
Most neutrinos passing through the Earth emanate from the Sun. About 65 billion (6.5×1010) solar neutrinos per second pass through every square centimeter perpendicular to the direction of the Sun in the region of the Earth.[3]
I didn't think there were so many of the little buggers.
Fortunately for anyone that lives on the Earth, the vast majority of them pass straight through the planet and out the other side without interracting with anything in it. They're like ghost particles.
A book is a version of the world. If you do not like it, ignore it; or offer your own version in return. Salman Rushdie You talk to God, you're religious. God talks to you, you're psychotic. House MD Who needs a meaning anyway, I'd settle anyday for a very fine view. Sandy Denny This is the wrong forum for bluffing Paco Yes, yes. But first I need to show you this venomous fish! Calilasseia I think we should do whatever Pawiz wants. Twoflower Bella squats momentarily then waddles on still peeing, like a horse Millefleur
. And then when they come back, they can 
