# Can neutrinos travel Faster Than Light **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [September 22, 2011, 10:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266 "2011-09-22T22:59:06Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 18
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 5:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/341 "2011-10-18T05:06:14Z")
Oh, and what you say about needing time to think about things is quite true. In the immediate wake of something big like this, the signal-to-noise ratio of the responses is going to be uncommonly low, since the lower-quality authors can mostly get out replies quicker than the high-quality ones. But there’s still some legitimate work in there, from folks who were already working on related projects and just had to plug in a few numbers from this result, or folks who heard about the results through the grapevine before they were posted, or folks who just work really, really fast. ---
**Author:** ![Indistinguishable](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/90ced4/32.png) [@Indistinguishable](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Indistinguishable)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 5:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/342 "2011-10-18T05:33:18Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > Simply the fact that so much stuff is being published (elect. And print?) so fast, how could p.r.be occurring? I know “peer review” is often used to designate a particular formal process for limiting publication, but how odd it is that what we are seeing right now, with large numbers of independent scientists easily accessing, thinking about, and voicing their opinions on the work of another team of scientists, is apparently not considered in keeping with the ideals of peer review… It seems to me that what you are seeing is so much _reviews from peers_ being published so fast. This isn’t the antithesis of peer review; this is the epitome of it! ---
**Author:** ![Leo\_Bloom](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/leo_bloom/32/10377_2.png) [@Leo\_Bloom](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Leo_Bloom)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 5:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/343 "2011-10-18T05:44:33Z")
> [@Indistinguishable](#): > > I know “peer review” is often used to designate a particular formal process for limiting publication, but how odd it is that what we are seeing right now, with large numbers of independent scientists easily accessing, thinking about, and voicing their opinions on the work of another team of scientists, is apparently not considered peer review, and, indeed, to be taken as antithetical to it… > > It seems to me that what you are seeing is so much reviews from peers being published so fast. This isn’t the opposite of peer review; this is the epitome of it! But academic sifting and sifting of responses are supposed to restrain cacophony. Hell, perhaps there will be special issues, conferences, maybe annals of things, and, perhaps, new physics departments. But you have to walk before you can run, blah blah. (BTW, as an ex-editor for a peer-reviewed journal, and as a submitter of my own work, I’ve seen my share of asshole reviews.) ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/344 "2011-10-18T06:03:37Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > Without the Internet, how long do you think it would have taken, say, in 1910? Or 1750? > > I’d like to urge caution all around. The latest news needs to be verified as much as the original news, although the chances that it will be seem greater. Honestly, decades. As in at LEAST two. 😕 Thankfully, we have pretty much instant communication today. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:07am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/345 "2011-10-18T06:07:06Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I have no clue what they mean by “failed to take relativity into account”. The articles say that the problem is that the satellites are moving at high speed, but that effect is actually smaller than and in the opposite direction from the general relativistic effect of them being in free-fall. And the calculations to compensate for that are built into all GPS systems-- It’s relevant even for consumer use. Honestly, I’m guessing on that too, as relativity is implicit in GPS calculations. I suggest you chat it up with Phil Plait, as HE is welcoming the suggestion. My DIRECT AND PERSONAL experience with GPS, in a military environment and high precision environment is that the suggested error by the paper is right there with planet X inside of Mercury. ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/346 "2011-10-18T06:11:15Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > **Frylock,** I’m just suggesting that a 2-week delay in getting confirmation or refutation might be PDQ today, and equivalent to years of scientific dialogue a century ago.How many yacht navigators need to compute their time or distance down to the neutrino level? Two weeks have passed, no REAL refutation has come. 😕 As for WHO would be required to compute their location and time down to the neutrino level, may I suggest two people? The Other. The Doctor. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/347 "2011-10-18T06:14:08Z")
> [@Musicat](#): > > But, IIRC, the corrections are applied to the satellite signals periodically before transmission. My point was that the signals are sufficient for ordinary navigation, but maybe not good enough for measuring neutrino speeds without additional, finer corrections. To be brutally honest, _I_ have used GPS to coordinate targeting information down to the METER. I suggest, with respect, that you reconsider GPS precision. We ALSO used GPS for crypto, on a high precision basis to communicate. ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/348 "2011-10-18T06:16:12Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > A general point, here: Everyone and their dog is currently trying to explain the OPERA results (either explaining how neutrinos could travel faster than light, or explaining how CERN screwed up). The arxiv is full of responses. Most of the responses are complete garbage, some are good but incorrect, and possibly, there _might_ be one on there that’s actually correct. But it’s very difficult to tell which are which, especially for someone not working in the field. So what you’ll see is bloggers and other popular media picking replies essentially at random, and hyping them. The implication of this, in turn, is that most of the blogs you see talking about the solution to the problem are wrong. I’d LOVE to parse it, but I suspect that the math would trigger a massive headache that would result in a naked singularity. 😉 ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/349 "2011-10-18T06:17:14Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > What the heck ever happened to peer review? Sheldon came out with a paper what, six days after the OPERA report? I know he’s a Nobelist, and all, but still, does he get a free pass? > > And all this “garbage,” “good but incorrect,” stuff? Obviously the incorrect stuff happens (and should happen) in any scholarship; but peers–aside from the intellectual equivalent of back scratching and price fixing–need time to God forbid think about things. Well, peer review is INITIALLY GIGO. Right now, we’re on the garbage. REAL information is to follow. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/350 "2011-10-18T06:22:19Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > Oh, and what you say about needing time to think about things is quite true. In the immediate wake of something big like this, the signal-to-noise ratio of the responses is going to be uncommonly low, since the lower-quality authors can mostly get out replies quicker than the high-quality ones. But there’s still some legitimate work in there, from folks who were already working on related projects and just had to plug in a few numbers from this result, or folks who heard about the results through the grapevine before they were posted, or folks who just work really, really fast. OK, honestly, I DID review their paper. S/N was uninteresting, it is what it is, by experimental data. Of interest is, PURE data suggested phase shifting of a significant number of data points. That would NOT be an experimental artifact, but a data reporting artifact, IF data collection isn’t in consideration of issue. So, IF the data IS accurate, there are only a few existing, problematic models that predicted it. IF true, THAT _IS_ exciting. In a grand, unification, kind of way. 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![Wizard\_One](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/w/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Wizard\_One](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Wizard_One)\ **Post date:** [October 18, 2011, 6:28am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/351 "2011-10-18T06:28:00Z")
> [@Leo\_Bloom](#): > > But academic sifting and sifting of responses are supposed to restrain cacophony. Hell, perhaps there will be special issues, conferences, maybe annals of things, and, perhaps, new physics departments. But you have to walk before you can run, blah blah. > > (BTW, as an ex-editor for a peer-reviewed journal, and as a submitter of my own work, I’ve seen my share of asshole reviews.) I know THAT one ALL too well, in government circles. My documentation and enumeration, even considering space aliens landing, met over 99 percentile. No, no space aliens landed in our location, the land of Stupidia. 😉 BUT, numbers are numbers. The INFORMATION is a cumulative set OF those numbers. Consider the nature of the General. He orders three companies of men to a position. No information back is what? The unit forgot to report back? The unit is dead? Radios screwed up, hence, crypto lock? An explosion destroyed their transceiver? My butt itched? At present, I’ll go for the latter. In REALITY, I do other things. 🙂 So do YOU. "D ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2011, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/352 "2011-10-19T16:52:54Z")
For those still following along, the ICARUS experiment, another neutrino experiment at the Gran Sasso laboratories, has [published a paper](http://arxiv.org/abs/1110.3763) looking for the weak Cherenkov-like radiation superluminal neutrinos should give off, and found none, further strengthening the case against a superluminal neutrino interpretation of OPERA’s results. This isn’t the final word – and indeed, the energy distribution of neutrinos observed by OPERA itself basically points to the same conclusion, so one could regard this experiment as an independent verification of OPERA’s inconsistency --, but it means that if we want to keep some form of faster-than-light effect as a possible explanation, we have to move to more and more exotic (and less and less likely) physics, such as proposals where FTL is only achieved along short distances or for transient states. So basically, we’re down to neutrinos entering another dimension (cue spooky ‘outer limits’ music), or some kind of oscillation into a hypothetical ‘sterile’ neutrino, i.e. one that doesn’t even interact weakly, and hence, would not be subject to the mechanism proposed by Cohen and Glashow. ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2011, 9:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/353 "2011-10-19T21:07:14Z")
The signal-to-noise ratio I referred to before isn’t the SNR of the experimental data points, but of the responding papers: Some of the responses are good and constitute “signal”; many are shoddy in one way or another and constitute “noise”. Honestly, I don’t expect any _really_ good responses until after we have the results from the updated MINOS experiment. Either they’ll get the same results as CERN, or different ones, and either way we’ll learn a lot about what’s going on here. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [October 19, 2011, 9:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/354 "2011-10-19T21:49:06Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > The signal-to-noise ratio I referred to before isn’t the SNR of the experimental data points, but of the responding papers: Some of the responses are good and constitute “signal”; many are shoddy in one way or another and constitute “noise”. > > Honestly, I don’t expect any _really_ good responses until after we have the results from the updated MINOS experiment. Either they’ll get the same results as CERN, or different ones, and either way we’ll learn a lot about what’s going on here. Did you see the one about the reference frame of the satellite? any thoughts? ---
**Author:** ![Chronos](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chronos/32/134_2.png) [@Chronos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chronos)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2011, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/355 "2011-10-20T01:12:18Z")
I think they would have to have gone out of their way to not take that into account, since all of the standard GPS clock-synchronization systems do, and that even if they somehow hadn’t, the effects should have mostly canceled out, not added together. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2011, 3:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/356 "2011-10-20T03:35:56Z")
> [@Chronos](#): > > I think they would have to have gone out of their way to not take that into account, since all of the standard GPS clock-synchronization systems do, and that even if they somehow hadn’t, the effects should have mostly canceled out, not added together. Here’s a reference to it - I didn’t have time before [http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27260/](http://www.technologyreview.com/blog/arxiv/27260/) Note: he says the effect gets doubled, 32ns at both ends ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2011, 8:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/357 "2011-10-20T08:09:24Z")
Note that the author has [already retracted](http://home.kpn.nl//vanelburg30//Publications.html) the first version of his argument (see the section ‘Apology to the GPS Community’ on the linked page), and is now offering an amended one, which is usually not something that bodes well. I haven’t read the new preprint though, so I can’t really comment. However, a 32 ns error would be huge for GPS, corresponding to an uncertainty of about 10 meters, and if you read the review ‘[Relativity in the Global Positioning System](http://relativity.livingreviews.org/Articles/lrr-2003-1/)’, they’re worrying about far smaller, more obscure corrections (I also think that the effect van Elburg claims explains the OPERA results is basically addressed in the section on GPS coordinate time and TAI – TAI meaning the international atomic time --, but I’m no expert on these kinds of things). ---
**Author:** ![ZenBeam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/z/3ab097/32.png) [@ZenBeam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ZenBeam)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2011, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/358 "2011-10-20T11:44:00Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > Note: he says the effect gets doubled, 32ns at both ends Well that’s the question: _Why_ would the effects at the two ends add, rather than cancel. ---
**Author:** ![RaftPeople](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/6f9a4e/32.png) [@RaftPeople](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RaftPeople)\ **Post date:** [October 20, 2011, 3:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/359 "2011-10-20T15:35:20Z")
> [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](#): > > Note that the author has [already retracted](http://home.kpn.nl//vanelburg30//Publications.html) the first version of his argument (see the section ‘Apology to the GPS Community’ on the linked page), and is now offering an amended one, which is usually not something that bodes well. I haven’t read the new preprint though, so I can’t really comment. > > However, a 32 ns error would be huge for GPS, corresponding to an uncertainty of about 10 meters, and if you read the review ‘[Relativity in the Global Positioning System](http://relativity.livingreviews.org/Articles/lrr-2003-1/)’, they’re worrying about far smaller, more obscure corrections (I also think that the effect van Elburg claims explains the OPERA results is basically addressed in the section on GPS coordinate time and TAI – TAI meaning the international atomic time --, but I’m no expert on these kinds of things). His point isn’t that there is a problem with GPS (I don’t believe), but rather that using the GPS and ground based clocks in this particular experiment creates some complexity when determining frame of reference - which results in 2 different values of distance traveled by the neutrino depending on whether viewed from the satellite or the ground based clock frame. (I think - but I could be totally wrong - I’m just some guy reading some stuff). ---
**Author:** ![Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/half_man_half_wit/32/21766_2.png) [@Half\_Man\_Half\_Wit](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Half_Man_Half_Wit)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2011, 11:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266/360 "2011-10-21T11:35:13Z")
> [@RaftPeople](#): > > His point isn’t that there is a problem with GPS (I don’t believe), but rather that using the GPS and ground based clocks in this particular experiment creates some complexity when determining frame of reference - which results in 2 different values of distance traveled by the neutrino depending on whether viewed from the satellite or the ground based clock frame. (I think - but I could be totally wrong - I’m just some guy reading some stuff). Yes, and that’s exactly the sort of thing the ‘Relativity in GPS’ is there to address. Hell, they even take into account effects caused by different rotational speeds of points on the Earth’s surface at different latitude, and things like that. So I’d say it’s really unlikely that this is the source of the apparent superluminality. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266.md?page=17) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/can-neutrinos-travel-faster-than-light/597266.md?page=19)