Re: OT: Michelson-Morley (Re: Breeding orcs and other baddies)

stephen@xxxxxxxxxx <stephen@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
> Christopher Kreuzer <spamgard@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>> stephen@xxxxxxxxxx <stephen@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>> Stan Brown <the_stan_brown@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>>>> Fri, 21 Oct 2005 18:00:31 GMT from Paul S. Person
>>>
>>>> In more ordinary language, they showed that light could not
>>>> possibly be a wave traveling through something (as sound waves
>>>> travel through air and water waves travel through, well, you know).
>>>
>>> No, they did not show that. Light could still possibly be
>>> a wave travelling through the aether. Go read about Lorentz
>>> to see how that is possible.
>
>> I think you mean "entrained aether", where the Earth or other objects
>> 'drag' the aether, creating an area of still aether where we would
>> expect a null result.
>
> No, I meant the sort of aether Lorentz proposed. As I said,
> go read about Lorentz.

OK.

[...]

I think I see what you mean now. It is a very similar trick to the one
with epicycles, as you say.

>>> Their experiment did rule out one type of aether, but
>>> it did not rule out all types of aether. However their experiment
>>> and Einstein's interpretation of it did result in
>>> scientists generally abandoning the concept of the aether.
>
>> And the many other experiments since. Some of the laser
>> interferomtery experiments get some amazingly accurate results, with
>> path lengths of many kilometres.
>
> There has never been an experiment that falsifies
> the Lorentz aether as it is experimentally indistinguishable
> from Einstein's special relativity. However Einstein's
> approach was more elegant and led to new physics whereas
> the Lorentz aether was more of an epicycle that did not
> seem to lead anywhere.

I read that Maurizio Consoli has proposed an experiment where you carry
out a Michelson-Morley experiment in a dense gas (rather than a vacuum).
It seems that Lorentz's theory for light predicts equivalent results to
those of the special theory of relativity only when considering a
vacuum. So carrying out experiments in a dense enough medium might
enable the two theories to be distinguished.

Christopher

--
---
Reply clue: Saruman welcomes you to Spamgard

.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: Aether is the empty space in which the Universe sits
    ... >> Lorentz work may have mathematically sound but theory is not. ... invisible lumineferous aether, which means 'light-bearing-medium'. ... "Lorentz pointed out that the Michelson-Morley experiment resut is obtained ... >> than creating a whole new field in physics where none is required. ...
    (sci.physics)
  • Re: Aether is the empty space in which the Universe sits
    ... >> Lorentz work may have mathematically sound but theory is not. ... invisible lumineferous aether, which means 'light-bearing-medium'. ... "Lorentz pointed out that the Michelson-Morley experiment resut is obtained ... >> than creating a whole new field in physics where none is required. ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Martyrs for the cause
    ... | Statements about theories prior to 1895, contained within Lorentz' 1895 ... | Kindergarten-level rants. ... The analagous situation to the Earth moving through aether and distorted ... | current crop of relativists claim that aether theories would all cause the ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: MMX, Rotation and Lorentz
    ... Lorentz not only derived the contraction and time dilation, ... the MMX experiment. ... Lorentz's uses the word aether ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Martyrs for the cause
    ... green flying elephants are not consistent because you say so. ... Statements about theories prior to 1895, contained within Lorentz' 1895 ... > aether pressure. ... to an aether pressure -- per se -- is misguided. ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)