Hitches blamed over CERN's 'faster-than-light' claim.

[El Mahdi]

Paging our resident physicist [MENTION=177]Umbran[/MENTION]

Scientists who last year found particles that appeared to break the Universe's speed limit are looking at two technical issues that could have skewed the controversial finding, CERN said on Thursday.

The European Centre for Nuclear Research (CERN) confirmed a report by the US journal Science on Wednesday that the team were verifying a cable connection.

"It may have caused a slight discrepancy (in the results), and they are checking to see if this is the case," CERN press officer Arnaud Marsollier told AFP by phone.

They are also verifying a timing instrument called an oscillator, he said.

"This is a complicated experiment with a multitude of cables and equipment," said Marsollier.

Hitches blamed over CERN's 'faster-than-light' claim - Yahoo! News

 

[Umbran]

Yep. The equipment involved is terribly complex. It is entirely possible that some technical glitch skewed results.

This is the primary reason that verification by other teams is really central to a finding. Different people, using different equipment, in a different place - if they both get the same answer, then you may have something.

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

Shortly before the problem was discovered, this was probably heard:

"Yes, I checked that connection. Yes, that one too. YES. Look, what do you think I am, some kind of idiot? I know how to do my job, and I'm damn good at it- there isn't a single bit of tech in this area I haven't gone over a dozen times so...waitaminiit. Oooohhhhh !"

 

[El Mahdi]

It might be time to call a cable repairman. They should have it fixed by next week. Just make sure somebody is there all day to wait for them...

 

[Thunderfoot]

Corollary to DA's comment adding in EM's hypothesis...

Physicist to Physics technician - Yes, I checked the connections - I do have a PHD you know.

Uneducated Cable Guy hired to check the connections - Well, here's your problem, you're using a 220V converter on a 110V line, let me just flip this filter switch... There, what's it look like now?

Physicist - . . . . . . Damn....

Technician - *snort* *snort* *giggle*

 

[Umbran]

Corollary to DA's comment adding in EM's hypothesis...

While comic, no, it isn't that simple. By reports I've read, this isn't a, "Well, duh! If you'd had your head out of your over-educated butt, you'd have seen this," kind of issue.

We are talking about timing events over hundreds of miles, with time differences in small fractions of seconds. Transmission times matter, and clock ticks in oscillators matter, to levels of precision that your standard cable guy can't begin to approach.

 

[Starman]

When I first saw the thread headline I thought it said, "Hitchens blamed over CERN's 'faster-than-light' claim" which seemed really weird to me. Sure he was famously contrarian, but it seemed sort of out of character for him to be coming back from the dead to mess with physics experiments.

 

[Thunderfoot]

[MENTION=177]Umbran[/MENTION] - yeah I knew it wasn't I was strictly posting for comic relief.

Frankly I believe three things about physics...

1) Physics are the laws of the universe
2) Newtonian Physics are key (simple, elegant, concise - if it isn't it's most likely wrong, string theory I'm looking at you..)
3) Laws are made to be broken - everything is malleable/debatable.

 

[El Mahdi]

<!-- BEGIN TEMPLATE: dbtech_usertag_mention --> 3) Laws are made to be broken - everything is malleable/debatable.

One of my number one rules in life is "It's easier to beg forgiveness than ask permission."

However, I've found that rule doesn't work as well when applied to breaking the Laws of Physics...


(Ouch!)

 

[freyar]

Thought I'd chime in since I've been reading quite a bit about it over the last couple of days. As of today (Feb 25, 2012), the most recent posts over at the Of Particular Significance Blog give a pretty good overview.

Anyway, a few points. Umbran's right about this being a ridiculously difficult measurement. Just to emphasize, a detector like this probably has thousands of cables (electrical and fiber optic), and we're not talking about it being very loose or even necessarily detectably loose by hand. So it's tough to track down.

Something that's also important: CERN does not run the OPERA experiment, though it does seem to be running some interference for OPERA with the press (presumably due to more experience). The only thing CERN has to do with OPERA is providing the neutrino beam and hosting some of the timing equipment (I think).

And, last but not least, it's become clear that there is really zero evidence for violation of special relativity. In fact, at the moment, it's not clear if they will be able to reanalyze their previous experimental runs to place larger "error bars" or if the equipment errors can't be analyzed ex post facto. However, there will be a new run in May (as well as other independent experiments) to try to nail it down.