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'We have broken speed of light'
Telegraph ^ | 8/16/07 | Nick Fleming

Posted on 08/16/2007 10:15:43 AM PDT by LibWhacker

A pair of German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light - an achievement that would undermine our entire understanding of space and time.

According to Einstein's special theory of relativity, it would require an infinite amount of energy to propel an object at more than 186,000 miles per second.

However, Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen, of the University of Koblenz, say they may have breached a key tenet of that theory.

The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons - energetic packets of light - travelled "instantaneously" between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart.

Being able to travel faster than the speed of light would lead to a wide variety of bizarre consequences.

For instance, an astronaut moving faster than it would theoretically arrive at a destination before leaving.

The scientists were investigating a phenomenon called quantum tunnelling, which allows sub-atomic particles to break apparently unbreakable laws.

Dr Nimtz told New Scientist magazine: "For the time being, this is the only violation of special relativity that I know of."


TOPICS: Germany; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: alfonsstahlhofen; alternateuniverses; broken; burnthematthestake; einstein; germany; gettheattackdogs; grammarpolice; gunternimtz; hisneighborswiestein; hyperdrive; koblenz; light; makeitso; mtheory; nimtz; paralleluniverses; quantummechanics; relativity; speed; stringtheory; torchesandpitchforks; warp; warpdrive; warpspeed
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To: Old Professer

Bean Bag?.......Yeah some people believe photons travel in groups or packets........like illegals in pick-up trucks.........


141 posted on 08/16/2007 10:53:43 AM PDT by Red Badger (All I know about Minnesota, I learned from Garrison Keilor..................)
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To: TommyDale

I don’t even know why we are debating something we only know from a Telegraph article.


142 posted on 08/16/2007 10:54:00 AM PDT by ari-freedom (I am for traditional moral values, a strong national defense, and free markets.)
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To: ElectricStrawberry
3ft at a rate of 186,000+ miles per second....

They can measure a time of 0.000000003 seconds accurately?

That's about a foot per nanosecond or 3 nanoseconds total. That's a pretty easy measurement these days. After all you are probably running a 3 GHz computer. That means one clock cycle on your computer is about a third of a nanosecond.

143 posted on 08/16/2007 10:54:18 AM PDT by InterceptPoint
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To: hosepipe

LOLOL!


144 posted on 08/16/2007 10:55:03 AM PDT by Alamo-Girl
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To: Al Gator
To go faster than light, you just jump a ride in the 5th dimension where time stands still, then pop back here when you get to where you were going. Trouble with all this is that you get to where you are going before you hopped the ride, and therefore forget why you went in the first place, or even that you had gone at all.

This really happens to me.. OFTEN.

I walk into a room and can't remember why.

145 posted on 08/16/2007 10:55:33 AM PDT by NoControllingLegalAuthority
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To: TommyDale
Sort of hard to believe that they could measure so accurately at 3 feet.

I think the primary error source would be due to timing the arrival of the pulses.

With modern frequency standards, you can get timing to fractions of a nanosecond, which corresponds to distances of a lot less than 3 feet. For a properly calibrated system, the "error regions" around each detector would not overlap, and you should be able to detect the phenomenon in question, if it occurs.

Or ... you could measure the speed of light.

146 posted on 08/16/2007 10:55:38 AM PDT by r9etb
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To: LibWhacker
'We have broken speed of light'

Well you darn well better fix it. I have a lot to do and I'm not doing it in the dark.

147 posted on 08/16/2007 10:55:42 AM PDT by 70times7 (Sense... some don't make any, some don't have any - or so the former would appear to the latter.)
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To: ari-freedom

“I don’t even know why we are debating something we only know from a Telegraph article.”

The answer is a slam dunk.

Its because all the geeks and eggheads can crawl out of the woodwork and trot out their book learning to impress all the chicks!

cmon now, that was too easy.....


148 posted on 08/16/2007 10:56:48 AM PDT by Al Gator (Refusing to "stoop to your enemy's level", gets you cut off at the knees.)
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To: rickomatic

Here you go pancake bunny...

http://www.amazon.com/Faster-Than-Speed-Light-Speculation/dp/0738205257


149 posted on 08/16/2007 10:57:38 AM PDT by in hoc signo vinces ("Houston, TX...a waiting quagmire for jihadis.")
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To: LibWhacker
I’m no rocket scientist but, how do you measure something that’s going 186,000 miles between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart?
150 posted on 08/16/2007 10:59:03 AM PDT by McGruff
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To: NoControllingLegalAuthority

“I walk into a room and can’t remember why.”

See! I KNEW I wasn’t the only one! Now I just have to tell those guys in the white coats that I finally found a witness. Don’t go anywhere.


151 posted on 08/16/2007 11:00:10 AM PDT by Al Gator (Refusing to "stoop to your enemy's level", gets you cut off at the knees.)
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To: LibWhacker
I wonder if these researchers thought to calibrate their Timex stopwatch prior to running this experiment.
152 posted on 08/16/2007 11:00:17 AM PDT by CHEE (Only a true victory will end the War on Terror)
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To: LibWhacker

"We canna go any faster or she'll blow!"

153 posted on 08/16/2007 11:00:26 AM PDT by FReepaholic (Boomchakalakalaka Boomchakalakalaka)
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To: wolfinator
Do photons have mass?

I don't think so. They're Protestant.

154 posted on 08/16/2007 11:00:27 AM PDT by HoustonTech
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To: RadioAstronomer; Physicist; PatrickHenry

Ping.


155 posted on 08/16/2007 11:01:02 AM PDT by Lurking Libertarian (Non sub homine, sed sub Deo et lege)
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To: LibWhacker
For instance, an astronaut moving faster than it would theoretically arrive at a destination before leaving....

If the rest of relativity isn't any better than that, then it (relativity) belongs in the landfill of dead science theories along with evolution.

156 posted on 08/16/2007 11:02:58 AM PDT by jeddavis
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To: Red Badger
Let’s say the photons are like marbles in a pipe that is full from end to end. You push one marble in one end, and a marble pops out the other end. The marble didn’t travel, it just took up a place that made another marble leave its place. Einstein’s speed limit is secure...........

Well, no. In order for your thought experiment to explain this result, the pressure from your finger would have to propagate through the string of intervening marbles, to the last marble, faster than light speed. And since neither marbles nor any other real substances are incompressible, I think you'd run into relativity troubles at the atomic level.

Applying your analogy to a string of photons, you're basically saying that the amplitude perturbation (which affects the wave properties of light) somehow travels faster than the photon particles.

I don't think the analogy works.

157 posted on 08/16/2007 11:03:58 AM PDT by r9etb
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To: Gator101

Pfft... I have no time for smugglers who drop their shipments at the first sign of an Imperial cruiser.


158 posted on 08/16/2007 11:04:26 AM PDT by MeanWestTexan (Kol Hakavod Fred Thompson)
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To: LibWhacker

Nonsense! Muhammad Ali was the first to break the speed of light. He said he was so fast that he would flip off the light switch in his hotel room and be in bed before it got dark!;)


159 posted on 08/16/2007 11:04:31 AM PDT by Frank_2001
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To: LibWhacker
They scoffed too when Orville Wright invented his brother Wilbur!
160 posted on 08/16/2007 11:04:42 AM PDT by HenpeckedCon (Can I please freep just a little while longer Dear?)
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