Friday, August 17, 2007

Bumping the Speed Limit

In one episode of Futurama, we learn:

Cubert J. Farnsworth: That's impossible. You cannot travel faster than the speed of light.
Professor Hubert Farnsworth: Exactly. That's why scientists increased the speed of light in 2208.
Cubert J. Farnsworth: That's also impossible.
Groening and company were only about 200 years off, as two German scientists have claimed to have broken the speed of light. How?
The pair say they have conducted an experiment in which microwave photons - energetic packets of light - travelled 'instantaneously' between a pair of prisms that had been moved up to 3ft apart.

* * *

The scientists were investigating a phenomenon called quantum tunnelling, which allows sub-atomic particles to break apparently unbreakable laws.
That's all well and good, but why can't I do 70 mph in Pennsylvania?!?

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