My partner is a programmer, so thinks in terms of "error bars". As he said, this wasn't a one step set-up, even if the neutrino beam itself is a fairly simple thing, whose speed could be read with good accuracy at 60 nanoseconds faster than light. With a multiple step experiment, each step having an error bar as large as it is described in the paper, the cumulative margin of error means that it is very possible, even likely, that the result is a false positive for the particle travelling faster than the speed of light. The result simply falls within the margin of error for the experiment as a whole.
There is no need to speculate that there was some sort of human error in running and compiling the experiment.
He wants to see the experiment reproduced with the margin of error for each step reduced to 1 tenth its present size, before he'll get excited about faster than light travel of neutrinos. On the other hand, the returned result is intriguing, so even if it's a false positive, there's no harm in it being released. It's the ditzy public and presses' fault if people are going to go around now thinking Einstein's E=mc2, or whole body of work, is now disproven.
Edited, Sep 23rd 2011 11:25am by Aripyanfar
