Macroscopic violation of special relativity
Surfer
This looks like a genuine result...
-- Surfer
Macroscopic violation of special relativity
G. Nimtz, A. A. Stahlhofen
http://arxiv.org/abs/0708.0681
Abstract:
"Feynman one of the founders of Quantum Electronic Dynamics (QED)
introduced in his diagrams virtual particles as intermediate states of
an interaction process. Such virtual particles are not observable,
however, from the theoretical point of view they represent necessary
intermediate states between observable real states. Such virtual
particles were introduced for describing the interaction process
between an electron and a positron and for much more complicated
interaction processes. Other candidates for virtual photons are
evanescent modes known from optics. Evanescent modes have a purely
imaginary wave number, they represent the mathematical analogy of the
tunneling solutions of the Schr\"odinger equation. Evanescent modes
are present in the optical processes of total reflection and in
undersized wave guides for instance. The most prominent example of the
occurrence of evanescent modes is frustrated total internal reflection
at double prisms. In 1949 Sommerfeld pointed out that this optical
phenomenon represents the analogy of quantum mechanical tunneling. The
evanescent modes and tunneling violate the theory of special
relativity, obviously, they represent the exception which proves the
special theory of relativity. We demonstrate the quantum mechanical
behavior of evanescent modes with digital microwave signals at a
macroscopic scale of the order of a meter and show that evanescent
modes are well described by virtual photons as predicted by former QED
calculations."
Bill Hobba
"Surfer" <sur...@no.spam.net> wrote in message
news:lsq9c3d2q74t281uh...@4ax.com...
It can't. QFT is based on SR and QM - it can't predict things that
contradict its foundations.
Bill
Jerry
I find it frustratingly difficult to figure out from
their paper just what they were measuring. Crucial
details were left out of their description of the
experimental setup and the nature of their measurements.
1) Where were the detectors located in relation to the
Perspex prisms?
2) In comparing the closed versus separated prisms, were
the detectors moved in constant relation with the prisms,
or were they fixed in position? Either way, one needs
to compensate for the differing thickness of Perspex
through which the microwaves passed.
3) How did they compute the time delay of their pulses?
What shape of pulses did they use? How do they compensate
for the varying thickness of Perspex between source and
detectors in the differing geometries of their experiment?
4) Just what do they mean by the time delay? Measured with
respect to what?
5) No graphs of their results? Just a single sentence:
"The measured time delay in both reflection and
transmission of the digital pulse is about 100 ps"????
What does that single sentence MEAN????
I can't figure out ANY of this stuff from their
description!!!
Jerry
Jerry
> I find it frustratingly difficult to figure out from
> their paper just what they were measuring. Crucial
> details were left out of their description of the
> experimental setup and the nature of their measurements.
>
> 1) Where were the detectors located in relation to the
> Perspex prisms?
> 2) In comparing the closed versus separated prisms, were
> the detectors moved in constant relation with the prisms,
> or were they fixed in position? Either way, one needs
> to compensate for the differing thickness of Perspex
> through which the microwaves passed.
> 3) How did they compute the time delay of their pulses?
> What shape of pulses did they use? How do they compensate
> for the varying thickness of Perspex between source and
> detectors in the differing geometries of their experiment?
> 4) Just what do they mean by the time delay? Measured with
> respect to what?
> 5) No graphs of their results? Just a single sentence:
> "The measured time delay in both reflection and
> transmission of the digital pulse is about 100 ps"????
> What does that single sentence MEAN????
>
> I can't figure out ANY of this stuff from their
> description!!!
Oh yeah...
6) What sort of value of d (separation between prisms)
did they use? I presume on the order of a wavelength???
Such essentials are not stated.
If the authors mounted the detector of the exit surface
of the far prism, and found constant delay of a pulse as
the prisms were separated between 0 and some small
number of wavelengths, I suppose that might be evidence
supporting the authors' assertions. But that wasn't
at all the type of data that they presented...
Jerry
Bill Hobba
"Jerry" <Cephalobu...@comcast.net> wrote in message
news:1187318488.8...@d55g2000hsg.googlegroups.com...
Jerry, are you sure what is being claimed is even a violation of SR? It
looks to me like the same old rehashed garbage asserting that non local
'effects' such as quantum tunnelling somehow violate SR. They don't,
because they can't be used to send information faster than light.
Thanks
Bill
>
> Jerry
>
Jerry
> "Jerry" <Cephalobus_alie...@comcast.net> wrote in message
Yes, I believe that they are indeed making that claim:
"In consequence of the phase time approach of Eq.1, the
zero phase shift of spreading evanescent modes implies that
barriers are crossed in zero time."
They claim that not just microwaves are capable of crossing
barriers in zero time; they claim even sound waves are capable
of tunneling in zero time:
"This universal tunneling time seems to hold even for sound
waves (i.e. phonons) as measured by Yang et al. at 1 MHz and
by Robertson et al. at 1 kHz in a sound tunneling experimental
set-up. Presumably, the virtual behavior of photons discussed
here applies for all fields with wave solutions having
purely imaginary wave numbers."
I can certainly accept a zero or nearly zero -phase shift-
as the prisms are separated. For all I know that is what
they are really measuring, and it's really the old phase
velocity versus signal velocity deja vu all over again.
But without adequate experimental details, I don't know
-what- in heck this paper is all about.
It -is- supposed to be a paper reporting experimental
results...
Jerry
Sue...
The paper disclaims the practicalithy of measuring
what it purports to measure:
<<
Evanescent modes have a purely imaginary wave number k.
This violates the Einstein relation
E2 = (hkc)^2 (2)
>><<
The evanescent mode can thus
be located in the nonclassical region only if a refractive index
n is added with:
n = (ko^2 (n2^2sin2( ) - n12))1/2
thus raising the evanescent mode into the classically
allowed region. >>
http://arxiv.org/abs/0708.0681
As expressed in the 1920 paper:
"The [ ] Incompatibility of the Law of Propagation of
Light with the Principle of Relativity [is only] Apparent"
http://www.bartleby.com/173/7.html
...near/far field energy conservation is not an issue
so that interpretation is not disproved. The 1905
interepretaion, including inertia, doesn't require
disproving because is recognised as
mathematically absurd since 1918.
C. S. Unnikrishnan
http://www.iisc.ernet.in/currsci/dec252005/2009.pdf
Sue...
>
> Jerry- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
bz
news:1187317527.9...@r29g2000hsg.googlegroups.com:
I have several questions after looking at the paper:
If they REMOVE both perspex blocks[keeping distance between source and
detector constant], how much time delay is there?
I would expect the blocks to SLOW DOWN the microwaves. Does the time delay
increase when the blocks are inserted in the path? By how much?
When the blocks are moved apart, I would expect signal attenuation but no
change in transmission time[source and detector distance kept constant].
Exactly what do they see?
If the 'zero tunneling delay' hypothesis were correct, I would expect that
the time delay to decrease as the 'length of the tunnel' becomes a greater
part of the total path length. Is that what happens? Show me the data.
Lack of experimental details was part of the problem with the 'cold
fusion' debacle. It made it more difficult for others to find the mistakes
they had made in their calculations. The same may be true here.
--
bz
please pardon my infinite ignorance, the set-of-things-I-do-not-know is an
infinite set.
Jerry
I notice numerous threads discussing this same paper, which
has apparently created quite a splash among the crackpot
community.
Chris Lee has provided a critique of this paper which
overall does a much better job than I did destroying
Nimitz's claims.
http://arstechnica.com/news.ars/post/20070816-faster-than-the-speed-of-light-no-i-dont-think-so.html
Lee notes, as I did, that the experimental detail in
the paper is practically non-existent, but goes much
further than I did in that he explained the nature of
the evanescent wave. Unfortunately, Lee is unclear when
speaking about the group velocity versus phase velocity
issue, and concludes things about the experimental
setup that I couldn't figure out at all, including
a conclusion that Nimitz's equipment is "triggering on
the pre-pulse noise generated by these high frequency
components."
In reality, I don't see sufficient detail in the paper
to conclude ANYTHING about what Nimitz was measuring.
As an experimental paper, Nimitz's paper is the purest
junk.
Jerry
Bill Hobba
I think we really need to be careful here. It has been known for many years
that things like wavefunction collapse occurs instantaneously ie the value
of the wavefunction changes globally instantaneously. But that does not
violate SR for all sorts of reasons eg QFT, not plain vanilla QM based wave
functions, is the correct framework, and the requirement it can be used to
send information and probably a ton of others if I thought about it for a
bit longer - which I don't really want to do since it is obviously a rather
silly claim to begin with.
Thanks
Bill
>
> Jerry
>
Jerry
I have changed my views significantly since yesterday.
This is because I see a feature of Nimtz's experimental setup
that points beyond mere crackpot stupidity. Rather, this
feature points to actual -fraud-.
Let me start by repeating the link to Nimtz and Stahlhofen's
paper:
http://arxiv.org/ftp/arxiv/papers/0708/0708.0681.pdf
Note that one element of their setup initially makes no sense
at all. Why in the world should the receiving antenna have been
"movable parallel to the prism's surfaces"? Making it movable
provides all sorts of wonderful opportunity to fudge the data.
Are your pulses arriving later or sooner than you want? Move
the receiver down to a narrower or thicker part of the prism!
Now look carefully in Figure 1, the right diagram. With the
prisms separated, the total path through Perspex with refractive
index n=1.6 is significantly less than the path length through
Perspex shown in the left diagram! It is quite possible that with
the prisms separated, the the arrival time of pulses at the
receiver microphone might even be -advanced- relative the the
arrival time with the prisms together. This sort of result would
not be acceptable even to a crackpot!
Allowing the receiver antenna to be "movable parallel to the
prism's surfaces" allows Nimtz to adjust the geometry of the
experimental setup so that the pulse delays come out just the way
he wants them to come out.
I conclude that Nimtz is not merely deluded. Nimtz has generated
fraudulent results.
Jerry