Light- Wave/Particle

[TGP37]

Light is both a wave and a particle (high energy particle). A wave doesn't exist by itself as it is a disturbance in a medium propagating outward.

Sound is longitudinal (compression waves) which travels through air, water, metal, etc......a material. The speed of sound travel is dictated by the material.

Then light being a wave must have a medium for that wave to propagate. What is that medium?

Is that medium found in other forms which can change the speed of light, as sound behaves as a wave?


One point, light can be polarized. But still, a wave must be expressed in a medium that is disturbed by energy (light wave). Suppose the magnetic force created by local universe conditions creates the general magnetic tension which oscillates in the presence of the high energy particle (light particle).

Another concept, suppose the medium could be removed and light is prevented to travel as a wave. Would the particle continue onward, but changed into a different energy form since it isn't a wave anymore.

Or is the particles high energy dependent on the wave energy. When the light ray reaches the end of the magnetic medium the wave travels through, the particle begins to deteriorate in energy as it travels. Eventually condensing into matter. Which is pulled back into the star. I always believed light can't go on forever....or else the night sky would be pure white light from infinite stars across inifinite space.



Thoughts? (a break from auto science)

[kamesama980]

It's not so much that it IS a wave or a particle but that it has some behaviors in common with both. Light does not alternate between wave and particle at need (IE wave in a medium, particle in a vacuum). It has characteristics of both at all times. The wave-ness and particle-ness aren't separate.


Light does not have to have a medium (of matter). It travels perfectly well through a vacuum obviously.

Light does travel at different speeds through different materials. IE water, glass, idamond.

Light will go on forever...assuming it doesn't hit anything. the vacuum of space is far from a perfect vacuum. There is space dust, stray various atoms... Some time go out in the country miles from the nearest street light on a clear night with a new moon, sit down and close your eyes for a few minutes to dark adapt them, then look up. the sky IS nearly solid stars, the reason there aren't more is the atmosphere scatters the less intense light. It's amazing light goes as far as it does. How do you think NASA gets images of stuff outside the galaxy hundreds of thousands of light years away? They just need a darn good camera because it's so faint and scattered.

That being said, the light that 'fades' doesn't disappear or turn into matter, it goes in various directions not at the observer or is absorbed and usually turned into thermal energy. sometimes it's re-emitted in a different spectrum (like UV flourescant stuff...UV goes in, visible comes out)

No I'm not a scientist or astrophysicist or anything. Just was into science in high school and early college (still like to read articles and whatnot). Enough that in HS I spent a semester of saturdays at Fermilab at a combination lecture for a few hrs on what they're doing then tour for a few hrs some part of the facility

[tribbles]

Google 'luminiferous ether' (or aether). Such a medium was postulated up until the late 19th century.

[TGP37]

It's not so much that it IS a wave or a particle but that it has some behaviors in common with both. Light does not alternate between wave and particle at need (IE wave in a medium, particle in a vacuum). It has characteristics of both at all times. The wave-ness and particle-ness aren't separate.


Light does not have to have a medium (of matter). It travels perfectly well through a vacuum obviously.

Light does travel at different speeds through different materials. IE water, glass, idamond.

Light will go on forever...assuming it doesn't hit anything. the vacuum of space is far from a perfect vacuum. There is space dust, stray various atoms... Some time go out in the country miles from the nearest street light on a clear night with a new moon, sit down and close your eyes for a few minutes to dark adapt them, then look up. the sky IS nearly solid stars, the reason there aren't more is the atmosphere scatters the less intense light. It's amazing light goes as far as it does. How do you think NASA gets images of stuff outside the galaxy hundreds of thousands of light years away? They just need a darn good camera because it's so faint and scattered.

That being said, the light that 'fades' doesn't disappear or turn into matter, it goes in various directions not at the observer or is absorbed and usually turned into thermal energy. sometimes it's re-emitted in a different spectrum (like UV flourescant stuff...UV goes in, visible comes out)

No I'm not a scientist or astrophysicist or anything. Just was into science in high school and early college (still like to read articles and whatnot). Enough that in HS I spent a semester of saturdays at Fermilab at a combination lecture for a few hrs on what they're doing then tour for a few hrs some part of the facility

Actually, light DOES change from wave/particle when observed.

This is a popular video, you might have already seen it.

But, when you measure a wave, you're measuring the changes in a medium, not a particle or electromagnetic energy. So the question remains, when we determine a specific frequency for the light wave, we aren't measuring the light, we're measuring an ambient presence which is dynamic enough to change at the speed of 4x frequency (1/4 sin wave).

In space, we can measure high energy particles zipping around w/o a frequency attached to it. It isn't a standard electromagnetic frequency, but is highly charged all the same.

Interestingly enough, if light truly does have a particle, then so does radio, microwave, gamma, infra-red, etc. As it is all a part of the electromagnetic spectrum.

Google 'luminiferous ether' (or aether). Such a medium was postulated up until the late 19th century.

Einstein and Tesla had opposing views. In fact, Einstein had to give up his E=MC2 if he publicly acknowledged a presence of ether. The day Tesla was to give a speech about Einstein's false presumptions, he was hit by a car.

“… Supposing that the bodies act upon the surrounding space causing curving of the same, it appears to my simple mind that the curved spaces must react on the bodies, and producing the opposite effects, straightening out the curves. Since action and reaction are coexistent, it follows that the supposed curvature of space is entirely impossible – But even if it existed it would not explain the motions of the bodies as observed. Only the existence of a field of force can account for the motions of the bodies as observed, and its assumption dispenses with space curvature. All literature on this subject is futile and destined to oblivion. So are all attempts to explain the workings of the universe without recognizing the existence of the ether and the indispensable function it plays in the phenomena.“

“My second discovery was of a physical truth of the greatest importance. As I have searched the entire scientific records in more than a half dozen languages for a long time without finding the least anticipation, I consider myself the original discoverer of this truth, which can be expressed by the statement: There is no energy in matter other than that received from the environment.” — Nikola Tesla



Lots of speculation..