It's light Jim, but not as we know it...

[d000hg]

For it to be so close to c, my money is on some cock-up. It wouldn't be the first time alleged measurement errors have been the sign of a new part of Physics (Hall Effect IIRC) but it seems unlikely.

[TimberWolf]

For it to be so close to c, my money is on some cock-up. It wouldn't be the first time alleged measurement errors have been the sign of a new part of Physics (Hall Effect IIRC) but it seems unlikely.

My bet's on the GPS. It will be interesting to hear what comes out in the seminar tomorrow.

[TimberWolf]

The Register have some info about a publication and location of a public webcast tomorrow at 16:00 CEST:

The researchers will be publishing their paper on arxiv.org today (23 September). CERN also plans a public Webcast to discuss the observations

Live webcast (tomorrow 16:00 CEST)

It's going to be funny seeing them say they think they've seen a particle go faster than light. CERN must be pretty sure of itself to let this go ahead, and so publicly. A bit of an odd way to break such a big story though, go public, do a webcast, then publish. Perhaps because it's such an odd event. Or perhaps because they are all going mad as hatters in Geneva. I don't suppose there's some kind of Swiss April's fools day in September is there?

[Alf W]

[d000hg]

My bet's on the GPS. It will be interesting to hear what comes out in the seminar tomorrow.

~20m is a big discrepancy for GPS - IIRC neutrino detectors are normally far underground, is that the case here?

[TimberWolf]

~20m is a big discrepancy for GPS - IIRC neutrino detectors are normally far underground, is that the case here?

Yes & yes. Their errors bars are, IIRC, 1/6th of of anomalous result, so say 3m, which is inside even normal GPS accuracy, especially if run 15,000 times over 3 years. But it introduces a new layer of things to test, rather than just distance and time. The GPS radio signal itself travels at the speed of light, and is medium dependent - and perhaps other unknown ways. Or perhaps some uncovered error with GPS, or the clocks used within them?

But they are physicists and they know these things better than most and have been at it a long time, have the backing of CERN, the anomaly had been seen 3 years ago by another group and put down to error and this team was not working alone. All very strange and exciting.

[TraceRacing]

If it does end up re-writing the laws of physics, then the Klingons are gonna get such a suprise in 300 years time

[TimberWolf]

If it does end up re-writing the laws of physics, then the Klingons are gonna get such a suprise in 300 years time

It's a bit weird because these laws of physics have been tested to death since Einstein. They work. But not, allegedly, with neutrinos!

[PAH]

It's a bit weird because these laws of physics have been tested to death since Einstein.

Someone may have found a better hammer.

It happens. Asks the chimps at the start of 2001: A Space Odyssey.

[Mich the Tester]

It is a brave soul who makes such a claim in the face of a century of physics.

The results shall need to be repeated at a difference facility, different team, different equipment before such claims can be verified, surely?

I don't think they've actually made the claim; they've sent their results to US and Japanese accelerator facilities to get them to check the results. The press got hold of it and the story took on a life of its own.