Faulty Cable To Blame For Superluminal Neutrino Results 414
smolloy writes "It would appear that the hotly debated faster-than-light neutrino observation at CERN is the result of a fault in the connection between a GPS unit and a computer. This connection was used to correct for time delays in the neutrino flight, and after fixing the correction the researchers have found that the time discrepancy appears to have vanished."
First post ! (Score:5, Funny)
Check the direction (Score:5, Funny)
Did they remember to plug it in with the direction marks [amazon.com] pointing to the computer?
updated joke (Score:4, Funny)
A neutrino walks into a bar. The bartender says, "We still don't serve neutrinos here".
Loose cables? (Score:5, Funny)
Is there any way we can pin this on Julian Assange?
Monster Cables (Score:5, Funny)
That's why I use Monster Cables for my neutrino experiments. It increases the roundness of the bass end, creates a punchier mid-range, and makes my neutrinos less superluminal.
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:5, Funny)
I am glad they went through the proper process of verifying all the hardware and have gotten to the bottom of this little fiasco - but wow, they have to be biting their lips in frustration.
Why is this a fiasco? After all they discovered a pretty cheap way for FTL - just use defective cables!
Re:Face it (Score:5, Funny)
We will never get off this rock. Interstellar travel is impossible, and always will be.
We will all grow old and die here, and that's it.
You must be a real blast at parties.
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:5, Funny)
"I also expect a cable manufacturer is likely to be getting a strongly worded email in the near future."
Not really, Monoprice does not really care if the customer is doing science with their low price cables.
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sure Denon will have a "faster than light" TOSLINK cable for sale for $1,000+ in no time. Better to get those audio bits before time itself.
Re:Face it (Score:5, Funny)
Hey, leave poor Marvin alone. He has a brain the size of a planet and that makes up for his sometimes less than eager personality!
Re:Hooray! (Score:5, Funny)
at the moment they have merely found out that "data" sent over the fiber-optic cable arrives 60ns earlier then assumed
How does that happen? I've worked at fiber using telecom companies since 96 (customer and provider sites) and I've never heard of a loose cable causing 60 ns of constant delay. Random jitter as the connector bounces around? OK yeah. Intermittent loss? OK yeah.
You can trivially make a fiber "60 ns longer" but thats quite a length of extra fiber, not a tiny fraction of an inch.
My guess is someone thought they were purchasing a X yard long fiber cable, but the helpful installers put in a X meter long fiber without telling anyone, and the stereotypical telecom BS about loose connectors is the coverup for the situation. Or the gear is buggy, it stopped being buggy, and all the tech did was tighten the connectors, so "it must have been the connector". Uh huh, yeah, heard that one before.
A television repairman is condemned to Hell for his practices of deceiving and overcharging customers. On his orientation tour of the netherworld he is led past people boiling in pits of lava, having their organs pecked out by beasts and others being flayed, over and over. Thus his fear is great as he is taken down a cavern to his own assignment of eternal doom. A demon shows him to a door, which he opens to find leads to a seemingly endless cavern piled high with television sets, DVD players, cable decoders, etc. "You must fix each and every one of them", proclaims the demon. The repairman relaxes and says, "Well, that doesn't seem so bad after all." "Ah," replies the demon, "but every one of them has an intermittent problem."
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:5, Funny)
They're so fast they're already out [amazon.com]!
Re:Face it (Score:5, Funny)
As if the geekoid weirdo spouting off about terraforming Mars is the life of the party.
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:3, Funny)
They're so fast they're already out [amazon.com]!
Mod parent +Informative, please!
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:5, Funny)
I am glad they went through the proper process of verifying all the hardware and have gotten to the bottom of this little fiasco - but wow, they have to be biting their lips in frustration.
Why is this a fiasco? After all they discovered a pretty cheap way for FTL - just use defective cables!
This model hasn't worked for government, why should it work for Science?
Because, unlike government (chaotic by nature), science is deterministic?
Joke (Score:4, Funny)
The bartender says "We don't allow your kind in here".
A faster-than-light neutrino walks into a bar.
Faster than light coverup (Score:2, Funny)
The relativists hold control of the physics community, suggesting anything can travel faster than light is the physics equivalent of blasphemy.
The results brought into question the unquestionable doctrine, and hence they had to be explained away. It is considered as unacceptable as the idea that the Earth wasn't flat or that the Earth orbited the Sun was.
Just like the Roswell incident was explained away as due to a "weather balloon".
Einstein's theory may have been a refinement over Newton, but it still isn't the Truth!
Meanwhile, back at the bar... (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Face it (Score:4, Funny)
i would rather share a drink with him than the guy telling me i am gonna die alone on this planet just like everyone else....
From what I've read, you're supposed to go with the topic that's most likely to get you laid.
[Listen to us slashdorks speculating about what a party would be like.]
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:4, Funny)
nature is deterministic, not science.
WHOOSH!
Also, tell this to any subatomic particle next time you meet one face to face. Meantime, please abstain from opening the Schrodinger's cat box.
Re:Glad they found the error (Score:2, Funny)
I also expect a cable manufacturer is likely to be getting a strongly worded email in the near future.
They probably received it alreacy before the scientists found the faulty cable. It's Italy, so there are probably also some faulty internet cables.