[...] if this thing pans out (and it's looking more and more like it will) [...]
Totally not, this is still with 99+ % a measurement error. We really understand theoretical physics pretty well, physicist have repeatedly predict measurement outcomes to a part in a million and less, have predicted particles decades ahead of the experiments discovering them. People really underestimate the power of theoretical physics and if there is a conflict between theory and experiment, it will almost always be the experiment that is wrong.
Yes, but they aren't sure what they're measuring. Remember that science (and Occam's razor) requires us to apply the most pedestrian explanations first, like some overlooked experimental error, not new physics. The "new physics" explanation should be the last possibility considered, not the first.
This similar study comes to a much less encouraging conclusion (the abstract acurately summarizes the study):
> Occam's razor is a good guide, but it is not a rule the universe is obliged to follow.
It seems to be, actually, because the rule follows straight from probability theory :).
> The point of the experiment is to zero out all pedestrian explanations.
Doesn't mean they did account for all of them. But that's why they're publishing. They've done all they could, they still get the unexpected effect, so it's time for other researchers to try it and at some point we will finally determine whether it's an error or new physics :).
No, we don't have a non-zero measurement where the prediction was a zero measurement. There are all kind of possible source of parasitic effects, especially because the measured signal is so close to the noise floor. The prediction for the ideal experiment is zero, actually it probably is not due to the impulse of the emitted photons, but for the real experiment the prediction is certainly not zero and the paper discuses and compensates for various parasitic effects.
i assume that this result is notable because they made all the needed corrections and took into account all known phenomena. Like serious scientists would.
They accounted for everything they could think of an that the experimental setup allowed to. It is still very much more likely that they missed at least one source of error than that our understanding of physics is wrong in such a serious way. Not that it is totally impossible that the effect is real, it just is still very, very unlikely.
Well that's why you publish research, isn't it? They accounted for everything they could think of, now they're giving everyone else a chance to spot mistakes.
Yes, of course. I never wanted to attack the paper in any way, I am just trying to say that this positive result will almost certainly turn out to be wrong and one should not draw the wrong conclusion that this is any kind of proof.
Totally not, this is still with 99+ % a measurement error. We really understand theoretical physics pretty well, physicist have repeatedly predict measurement outcomes to a part in a million and less, have predicted particles decades ahead of the experiments discovering them. People really underestimate the power of theoretical physics and if there is a conflict between theory and experiment, it will almost always be the experiment that is wrong.