OT: What's This About Light Speed...and Germany?

OldPhysics

OldPhysics

Joined
Sep 2, 2006
Messages
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It has been suggested by several of our fellow Busse addicts that those nutty German scientists have broken the speed of light!! :eek::eek:

What? Is this even possible?:confused:

Is my idol, Albert, spinning (and likely precessing) even now in his grave (Princeton, NJ)? :confused: :confused:

A little research:

"Two German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light by using 'microwave photons.' According to Einstein's special theory of relativity, it would require an infinite amount of energy to accelerate any object beyond the speed of light. However, Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen, of the University of Koblenz, say they did it by using a phenomenon known as quantum tunneling. The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons — energetic packets of light — traveled 'instantaneously' between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart."

"New Scientist, however, is running an article that suggests Einstein can rest easy. Aephraim Steinberg, a quantum optics expert at the University of Toronto, explains that the German physicist's results aren't necessarily wrong, they are just being interpreted incorrectly."

Darn you, PM and JohntheTexican!! Now I'm going to have to read Steinberg's article. Hopefully, I will be able to avoid spraining my pre-frontal cortex and lateral cerebellum. Fortunately, I have actual experience in quantum optics, so I should at least come back in one piece...and, probably, even sane.

See you again soon. :thumbup:
 
not to worry op. that experiment was actually conducted in my garage, and the two "prisms" were bottles of beer.
 
MORIMOTOM said:
not to worry op. that experiment was actually conducted in my garage, and the two "prisms" were bottles of beer.
Click to expand...

Well, that would explain the spurious observations...

But as I am well aware that your garage is nowhere near Koblenz, Deutschland...I'm still going to have to read that paper!! :eek:
 
WOW!!!

But so I can understand would that would be like Cobalt riding a 25 mile time trial in under an hour?



OldPhysics said:
It has been suggested by several of our fellow Busse addicts that those nutty German scientists have broken the speed of light!! :eek::eek:

What? Is this even possible?:confused:

Is my idol, Albert, spinning (and likely precessing) even now in his grave (Princeton, NJ)? :confused: :confused:

A little research:

"Two German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light by using 'microwave photons.' According to Einstein's special theory of relativity, it would require an infinite amount of energy to accelerate any object beyond the speed of light. However, Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen, of the University of Koblenz, say they did it by using a phenomenon known as quantum tunneling. The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons — energetic packets of light — traveled 'instantaneously' between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart."

"New Scientist, however, is running an article that suggests Einstein can rest easy. Aephraim Steinberg, a quantum optics expert at the University of Toronto, explains that the German physicist's results aren't necessarily wrong, they are just being interpreted incorrectly."

Darn you, PM and JohntheTexican!! Now I'm going to have to read Steinberg's article. Hopefully, I will be able to avoid spraining my pre-frontal cortex and lateral cerebellum. Fortunately, I have actual experience in quantum optics, so I should at least come back in one piece...and, probably, even sane.

See you again soon. :thumbup:
Click to expand...
 
Tony G said:
WOW!!!

But so I can understand would that would be like Cobalt riding a 25 mile time trial in under an hour?
Click to expand...

I'm not sure.

I'd have to do the math.

But...it could be!! :eek::):foot:

[To make it work out smoothly, we might have to transform Cobalt into a shower of microwave photons first. Surely Mrs. Cobalt wouldn't mind?]
 
OldPhysics said:
Well, that would explain the spurious observations...

But as I am well aware that your garage is nowhere near Koblenz, Deutschland...I'm still going to have to read that paper!! :eek:
Click to expand...

That would explain the results of the prisms being placed much farther apart.

The advantage of this comes when the photons tunnel to the bottles and pop the tops automatically.

Prost!
 
I'm not so sure... they may be onto something. A little piece of photon stuff at 700,000,000 mph would take at least a moment to travel 3 feet, rather than an instant. Maybe it's in the translation of terms. When I push the button on my Photon flashlight it seems to take a moment before it lights up the trail... :Dss.
 
OldPhysics said:
It has been suggested by several of our fellow Busse addicts that those nutty German scientists have broken the speed of light!! :eek::eek:

What? Is this even possible?:confused:

Is my idol, Albert, spinning (and likely precessing) even now in his grave (Princeton, NJ)? :confused: :confused:

A little research:

"Two German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light by using 'microwave photons.' According to Einstein's special theory of relativity, it would require an infinite amount of energy to accelerate any object beyond the speed of light. However, Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen, of the University of Koblenz, say they did it by using a phenomenon known as quantum tunneling. The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons — energetic packets of light — traveled 'instantaneously' between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart."

"New Scientist, however, is running an article that suggests Einstein can rest easy. Aephraim Steinberg, a quantum optics expert at the University of Toronto, explains that the German physicist's results aren't necessarily wrong, they are just being interpreted incorrectly."

Darn you, PM and JohntheTexican!! Now I'm going to have to read Steinberg's article. Hopefully, I will be able to avoid spraining my pre-frontal cortex and lateral cerebellum. Fortunately, I have actual experience in quantum optics, so I should at least come back in one piece...and, probably, even sane.

See you again soon. :thumbup:
Click to expand...


they did do it wrong, Jamie. They did defeat the speed of light, but they did it by illussion. They used prisms to bend light and decrease the arc or path making it appear that the photons travelled their distance faster than light, but they did not. Interesting little trick. Photoms are already travelling at light speed so all they had to do was shorten their path and make it appear as though they arced the same distance.Sneaky Germans. Good parlor trick though.
 
Well if we cannot break the speed of light thern why do we have a noun for things that can do so? OK OP what is the noun?
 
Not to nit-pick, but are we talking c in a vacuum, what I assume to be c-max ? That, barring the sci-fi author's FTL drive, should be the "universal" speed limit. Photons travel at the c of the medium that they travel through, though there is (still?) Cerenkov radiation: "Radiation, in the form of bluish light, produced by charged particles moving through a transparent medium at a speed greater than the speed of light in the medium. Though I'm sure there's a relatively simple explanation (OP ?), I'd like to know how any (charged) particle travels faster than light can through any transparent medium. Assuming that Cerenkov hasn't been discredited or reinterpreted out of validity, there is an (limited) example of FTL travel by an object with mass.
As to quantum-tunneling, have they determined that electrons DO obey the cosmic speed limit as they flit about in their orbitals ? Don't they move through 'our space' and/or tunnel from point to point, existing at A, then at B w/o existing in 'our space' in between ? Oh, well, I've displayed enough ignorance for one topic. Love to hear a few thoughts from someone who has actually studied advanced physics (OP), instead of just reading about it. Pete
 
I always knew that speed limit stuff was BS. I just need to figure out how to make the warp engines.
 
OldPhysics said:
"Two German physicists claim to have broken the speed of light by using 'microwave photons.' According to Einstein's special theory of relativity, it would require an infinite amount of energy to accelerate any object beyond the speed of light. However, Dr Gunter Nimtz and Dr Alfons Stahlhofen, of the University of Koblenz, say they did it by using a phenomenon known as quantum tunneling. The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons — energetic packets of light — traveled 'instantaneously' between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart."
Click to expand...

Same Gunter as "our" Gunter and the Sunshine Girls?

Seems suspect...
 
Old Physics:

Hasn't the conformation of Bell's theorem demonstrated that information—or something—travels faster than light? I’m not sure the conformation of Bell’s theorem doesn’t have Albert gently rotating. Obviously information—or whatever it is—isn’t the same as photons, which have mass.

I’m no physicist. I only know enough to ask a stupid question.
 
Breaking the speed of light ain't nuthin'

My wife's elbow moves that fast when she catches me looking at another knife, gun, or ....... Well you get the picture.;)
 
according to Einstein, physics is an observed science. the laws in which we believe our universe to be governed are only laws (not theories) because we only see them doing one thing. like gravity. we dont think it can be beat. as long as you have a mass and a distance, you've got gravity. and because we havent found anything without mass, you will have gravity.

so we've only ever seen something else go faster than the speed of light anyhow. "whats faster than light" you say?


dark
 
Cobalt said:
they did do it wrong, Jamie. They did defeat the speed of light, but they did it by illussion. They used prisms to bend light and decrease the arc or path making it appear that the photons travelled their distance faster than light, but they did not. Interesting little trick. Photoms are already travelling at light speed so all they had to do was shorten their path and make it appear as though they arced the same distance.Sneaky Germans. Good parlor trick though.
Click to expand...

Cobalt may be on to something here...

Well, I've been unable to find their actual technical work -- at least on the Internet. All I get are these short journalistic pieces by people who don't understand what the researchers are actually saying. Most of what is reported is pretty much 'crap,' to use the technical term.

I have several thoughts at this early stage.

1) The experiment as described (poorly, I might add!) is an extremely delicate one. Easy in the early phases, but very difficult to do properly as the two halves of the combined prism are separated. I can think of at least a dozen things that could go wrong with their experiment, and the rather useless documents I found don't help me debug their design. No problem -- eventually I'll either find proper documentation or other researchers will attempt to reproduce their results, which is (after all) how scientists explore ideas and solve problems. [Remember the initial furor over 'cold fusion,' before other researchers started trying to reproduce the initial results? And then, how quiet it got?]

2) Cobalt may have a piece of the answer. The photons employed are microwave photons -- the experimentallists produced them and know their energy fairly precisely. As soon as the stream of microwave photons meets the first face of the combined prism, the uncertainty principle comes into play. The experimentalists may literally be unable to 'track' the path of the photons from that point, even in theory. That can lead to curious complications. This sort of uncertainty doomed a number of previous experimental observations that initially appeared to demonstrate objects travelling faster than c (light speed in a vacuum).

It's still early. No need to condemn the experimentallists -- I suspect they are very talented and professional. But these sorts of experiments are really very hard to do.

I'll try to follow this until there's some resolution.

As to Information. There are many conflicting definitions of what this really is. If you look up 'quantum entanglement,' you will indeed find examples of situations where something like 'information' does seem to pass at speeds beyond c. The whole subject is esoteric, arcane, and currently fraught with a lot of semantic difficulties. Happy reading!! :D
 
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