[barmar]

I'm glad we finally got rid of those scofflaws.

[BunnyGo]

kenrexford, on 2012-March-16, 09:59, said:

I have absolutely no knowledge of anything going on here with neutrinos. That said, the reason for my post is that my reaction to the "news" about neutrinos was, "That's old stuff."

I mean, I recall hearing back in the mid-1980's that Einstein might be wrong and that neutrinos went faster than the speed of light. If I recall correctly, the reason back then was something about being able to detect a surge in neutrinos before the light reached us when a star went nova, or something. Of course, that probably had some other explanation for some, but the point was that the neutrinos-go-too-fast scenario seems to have been around for a while, hasn't it?

The best part of all that was the name "tachyon" for faster than light neutrinos. Led to all sorts of great SciFi usage, cause it just sounds cool.

[jonottawa]

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that quantum science is nothing but quackery based on half-baked, marijuana-induced theories unfalsifiable due to the lack of sufficiently sophisticated observation/measurement apparatus.

Most of the stuff they spout makes more sense if you picture them taking a hit on a giant bong first.

[barmar]

jonottawa, on 2012-March-16, 15:43, said:

Most of the stuff they spout makes more sense if you picture them taking a hit on a giant bong first.

It may sound like that, but I don't think we would have smart phones if it weren't correct. Most microelectronic technology has to take quantum theory into account.

Similarly, GPS wouldn't work correctly if they didn't adjust for the effects of special and general relativity on time. Special relativity causes the clocks on the satellites to run 7 microseconds/day slower than clocks on the ground, while general relativity causes them to run 45 microseconds/day faster, for a combined 38 ms/day difference. This may not sound like much, but GPS requires timing accuracy of 20-30 nanoseconds, so if the system didn't adjust for this the position measurements would accumulate errors at the rate of 10 km/day.

http://www.astronomy.../Unit5/gps.html

[USViking]

jonottawa, on 2012-March-16, 15:43, said:

I wouldn't be surprised to learn that quantum science is nothing but quackery based on half-baked, marijuana-induced theories unfalsifiable due to the lack of sufficiently sophisticated observation/measurement apparatus.

Most of the stuff they spout makes more sense if you picture them taking a hit on a giant bong first.

Speaking of bongs, have you cleaned the screen on yours lately?

Quantum science has been confirmed by measurement in some cases to several decimal points;
it is perhaps the most fully corroborated scientific theory of all time.

And among other things, these computers we have so much fun playing with could not have been
developed without it:

Contributions of Physics to the Information Age

[barmar]

Good quantum mechanics joke in today's Dilbert:

http://dilbert.com/s...mic/2012-04-17/

[kfay]

Einstein: "Pwned. lol"