Science as Art

In the news last week was an announcement that physicists at CERN’s huge particle accelerator in Switzerland believe they have observed neutrinos exceeding the speed of light by about 60 billionths of a second, in traveling about 730 miles. Theoretically since 1905, light speed, 186,282 miles per second, has been the limit. With such a rift looming within accepted science, of course this announcement is provisional and the team is asking other physicists to test their results.

Well! I’m always thrilled when a sacred tenet of science is jostled on its pedestal, suggesting that science after all is the art of discovering really new stuff, rather than being a repository of unchangeable fact. After all it is a form of art, not art’s opposite.

In the 1960s and 70s, for seventeen years my life was entangled with that of an astronomer whose colleagues were leading physicists of the time. On hearing I was a sculptor, some of these esteemed beings would volunteer their opinion that science is actually a branch of art. Some would even encourage my inclinations toward trampling in their fields. So I take great pleasure in expressing my opinions about this new violation of the rules, for if the CERN observation is confirmed, it might open windows for some ideas proposed in my Artist for President campaign!

But first: that’s a big if … maybe the observation has an explanation. How about time dilation? The neutrinos get to their destination having traveled at least at light speed. The internal clock of each neutrino runs slower at that speed. Meanwhile the time recorded by clocks at either end indicate the neutrinos get from start to finish slightly faster than expected. Is this a false reading coming from relying on stationary clocks, when clocks aboard the neutrinos moving at light speed could be the only ones recording the correct travel time? The calculation needed, it seems to me, is whether the 60 billionths of a second of excess speed can be explained by the tiny difference in what the stationary and moving clocks would have recorded.

Hmmm. Have I just talked anyone out of the idea that the light speed barrier may actually have been penetrated? I hope not, ‘cause I do want to explore possibilities that are suggested if the barrier is permeable after all. Might we find out that spooky things like extra sensory perception, psycho-kinesis, karma and the like actually have scientific explanations? We need such spooky things to keep us on our toes, so we don’t sink as readily into conviction that we already know all we need to know.

Is there a difference between science (or politics) and other arts? I suggest the only difference is that each art has its own disciplines, and we get better at whatever art we practice by pursuing and growing its particular disciplines zealously, over time.