Bob Collins
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Last September, the science community was overcome with a mixture of giddiness and skepticism over tests showing neutrinos traveled faster than the speed of light, proving Einstein wrong.
I admit: I was intrigued by the possibility of another dimension, even while acknowledging that I was probably a fool.
I was.
It turns out, the CBC reports, a bad cable is responsible for the “discovery.”
ScienceInsider, a blog run by the American Association for the Advancement of Science, said “sources familiar with the experiment” are now blaming the original result on a fibre optic cable connecting a GPS receiver to an electronic card in a computer. The GPS is one of the devices used in the measurement of the neutrino’s travel time. The cable connection appeared to have been loose, and tightening it shortened data travel times by 60 nanoseconds.
“Since this time is subtracted from the overall time of flight, it appears to explain the early arrival of the neutrinos,” the article said. “New data, however, will be needed to confirm this hypothesis.”
Moral? Never doubt Einstein.
