Physics education research, electronic materials, and the musings of Christopher Moore, Ph.D.
Physics education research, electronic materials, and the musings of Christopher Moore, Ph.D.
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Does a smaller light speed in a medium rule out the wave theory of light?
The light speed measured by Foucault in water does not fit with a wave theory of light because the light beam is normal to the interface and in this case the incidence angle is zero.
I have seen that abstract theoretical considerations or more complicated experiments previously proposed give headaches to actual theoreticians, therefore this simple cut off experiment suppose only the modification of an angle value. The experiment is at level of actual elementary physics or at level attaint by antique Greeks.
The link :
http://www.elkadot.com/corpuscular/ligh … usculs.htm
I advice actual theoreticians to hurry up with this experiment because the next text will indicate the absurdity of Huygens principle when is applied to explain light comportment.
The Sleep of Reason Produces Monsters (Goya); The Absence of Reason Produced Modern Physics.
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Does a smaller light speed in a medium rule out the wave theory of light?
Nope. Light propagates slower through a medium since the light is absorbed by the atoms in the material, then re-emitted some short time later. Light always moves at a constant speed. However, when it is incident on a material, it is transformed into an excited energy state -- that is to say, it ceases being a photon. The excited atom goes back to its lowest energy state and the excess energy is emitted as a photon.
Think of it this way. A photon hits a particle. The particle gobbles up the photon. The photon is no longer a photon; it is now energy the particle uses to do jumping jacks. After a short period of jumping jacks, the particle collapses onto the sofa. Energy being conserved, the particle spits out a new photon. This all takes some time, which is why the speed of light appears to propagate slower in a medium.
The wave theory has all of this stuff within it. It fits VERY well.
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A response to this post is now up on the blog:
http://www.ilovephysics.com/2009/07/15/ … -a-medium/
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