Re: Questions (Space)

Tina Hall <Tina_Hall@xxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

Jonathan L Cunningham <spam@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:

The point is, that it's the little balls of metal that are the things
that move. If you think of light as made of photons, it is the
photons that move,

Photons would be something I can imagine even, but no one mentioned
them. (I would like to know more about how they come to be, though.)

I imagine them as little fuzzy balls, about 10cm across for light, or
about 1 km across for radio wave photons. It's not true, but just how I
imagine them.

Because they can get through small holes, it might help to think of them
as fuzzy balls made out of something like sponge, or foam rubber, that
can be scrunched up small, and then pops out full size again.

Or maybe like some kind of sticky fog, which remains in a clump and
doesn't dissipate. (So it can float through a mesh, people can walk
through the big ones (radio photons) etc.)

I don't usually think about what they're made of though. Just how they
behave.

For a wave motion, *nothing* moves from A to B. If you think of light
as an EM wave (instead of photons), then nothing physical moves.

Where's the problem in assuming that the photons create a wave when
measured (like you do with electrons)?

No problem at all, if you like it.

I prefer to think of them as fuzzy balls (see above). And then I can
remain happily puzzled why they act like waves. A picture is not the
thing: it's only useful if it helps you think about the reality.
Picturing a photon as creating a wave wouldn't help me.

I just don't see the problem people say there is when trying to
reconcile the theories. There must be one; the folks dealing with this
sure know a lot more than I.

Mostly, they do the maths. Mathematicians don't *need* a picture to do
maths (or they have the sort of picture which doesn't make sense to
anybody else).

But the wave is just the intensity (rising and falling), no? They don't

I've no idea what the wave is. Sometimes it's called a "probability
wave". I can't see any way for this to make sense. I know what is
*meant* by it. Meanings don't have to accord with common sense.

Does reality have to make sense?

But waves can still transport energy (compare ocean waves: you can
build wave power generators to extract energy from them, but the water
doesn't travel across the Atlantic: all the actual water particles
move in circles).

Should I imagine a star (sphere) of photons that (one 'shell' after the
other) raise their hands and wave at the next one (so to speak), the
movement 'rippling' outwards?

It's up to you. I prefer to imagine a swarm of fuzzy balls (see above).

So since light is both particle and wave, it both travels and doesn't
travel. At this point, anyone whose head isn't hurting hasn't
understood the problem! :-)

You're right there. I don't understand the problem. :) (And my head
isn't hurting, yet.)

Usually people get confused when told that something both travels and
doesn't travel. You may be an exception. Perhaps you'll have the big
insight which makes sense of quantum mechanics ... trouble is, no one
will believe you because you don't do the math. (And most of the rest of
us wouldn't understand this big insight anyway.)

Jonathan

--
"I think too much - therefore I am mad!"
Agatha Clay playing Lucrezia Mongfish.
.

Relevant Pages

  • Re: how does light cause interference phenomena?
    ... electronics noise is a useful signal for measurement purposes. ... A flute produces a near perfect sine wave. ... a particular transition of energy states produces single energy photons ...
    (sci.physics.relativity)
  • Re: Lets fight
    ... When it behaves exclusively as a wave, ... So it is reasonable to say that there are still photons ... of particles: photons and electrons. ...
    (talk.origins)
  • Re: Is TomGee the God of Physics?
    ... The fourier transform of the voltage/current wave form ... A LOT of photons make up the signal. ... > radiation first in the form of radio theory I have a more grounded ... The 1s electrons of a Copper atom probably don't know or care about anything ...
    (sci.physics)
  • Re: nature of electrical influence
    ... >>> How does emitting photons create an attraction? ... my model excludes photons as having localized particle ... photons are purely wave phenomenon. ... >>> electrons, if the waves have the same frequency, but are out of phase ...
    (sci.physics)
  • Re: the two slits versus schrodingers cat
    ... one should understand both vector spaces ... > If you want to interpret this in the wave picture: ... > all the photons in it travel in the same direction (straight towards ... > right in the mean, since, as I said, the photons essentially travel on ...
    (sci.physics)
Quantcast