[A Davis]

I am enjoying this, it definitely is food for thought, tell me more Sophie or give me a link. I still think that energy stored by an electron in an excited energy level is a good analogy to that of the energy stored in a spring, when the electron falls back down to it's original level it loses its energy and emits a photon the spring also lose it's compression energy.

[Vern]

I am enjoying this, it definitely is food for thought, tell me more Sophie or give me a link. I still think that energy stored by an electron in an excited energy level is a good analogy to that of the energy stored in a spring...

That's an interesting way to think of it, but then wouldn't space itself need that tensor property. The electromagnetic wave would then be a moving disturbance of that property.

[yor_on]

Yep SC.
The photon is best described as a wave.
And waves are particles, electron waves:)
http://www.colorado.edu/physics/2000/periodic_table/waves_vs_particles.html

Also it might be so that we can't assign a 'path' to that photon.

That as there have been experiments done with polarized photons wherein it been found that when you set up the experiment so that you split the 'photon streams' to be distributed two ways, each polarized differently, to the same goal there was no interference pattern shown. Without that 'two way marking' of the photons, and with only one polarization or none, the photon stream always created a interference pattern.

So marking them seems to destroy their 'free choice'
One system when observed after result.
Another if interfered with (polarizing and splitting the photon stream) before?

But in a way that's not the same as saying that they won't have a path, is it?
To me they may have 'paths' even though our 'observations/interactions' change the results.
Like HUP could be seen as stating that it isn't impossible for a particle to have all properties at the same 'time'.
It just states that it is impossible to observe it.


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It seems to me that there is an important difference there?

Either it is impossible according to HUP with or without observation.
And then there is something 'really strange' going on:)

Or it is just that we too are one of the 'interactions' in spacetime.
And will change results as we change the experiments 'pre-requisites'?

Not that this isn't strange too:)
But it is to me 'simpler' to understand.

[lightarrow]

The interaction of a photon with an atom ( or something) must take time because it is a resonance phenomenon - the effect needs time to build up.

Yes; I agree; that's why I suspect a photon exists as just one cycle. One cycle takes just exactly the amount of time it takes to absorb a photon.

But it's so difficult to make a little computation? For visible light at 600 nm (~ orange colour) the frequency is 5*10¹⁴ Hz, that is, the period (= duration of a single cycle) is 2*10^-15 seconds. Have you ever heard about a pulse of light so short? Usually atomic transitions last ~ 10^-8 seconds...

[JP]

Have you ever heard about a pulse of light so short?

Yes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femtosecond_laser  Though these are generated through interference, not through a single atomic transition.

[Vern]

But it's so difficult to make a little computation? For visible light at 600 nm (~ orange colour) the frequency is 5*1014 Hz, that is, the period (= duration of a single cycle) is 2*10-15 seconds. Have you ever heard about a pulse of light so short? Usually atomic transitions last ~ 10-8 seconds...

I had not thought about this before. It is interesting. Are we saying that single photons can not exist? Or is it that single photons must be composed of multiple cycles? If it is multiple cycles, would it always be the same amount of cycles?

[lyner]

That's a idea which, yet again, brings into the question how you can possible regard what goes from a to b as being any sort of a particle? I claim that the time for a transition in one atom could be different for the transition in another atom (no reason why it should be the same). That would imply the photon, produced by one atom would be a 'particular size / extent' but it might need to be a 'different size' to be absorbed by another atom.(Same quantum energy, of course).
That, again, suggests that the only time you need to invoke the quantum idea is during the actual interaction.
I am still waiting for someone to refute my idea on any grounds other than that's what we were taught.
I have a feeling that anyone who really knows their stuff avoids the noddy particle idea.  We must avoid relying on 'faith' in matters like this.

[lightarrow]

Have you ever heard about a pulse of light so short?

Yes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Femtosecond_laser  Though these are generated through interference, not through a single atomic transition.

Exactly, I referred to atomic transitions (of course).

[Vern]

That's a idea which, yet again, brings into the question how you can possible regard what goes from a to b as being any sort of a particle?

Well, I don't but I suspect there might be an electromagnetic disturbance that goes from a to b that has the potential of becoming mass. Either directly when there is enough of it or indirectly by contributing to the mass of another particle.

This idea of nothing existing in between as a contributes something to b seems a little alien but I can see that it could be consistent with QM type observations.

[lightarrow]

But it's so difficult to make a little computation? For visible light at 600 nm (~ orange colour) the frequency is 5*1014 Hz, that is, the period (= duration of a single cycle) is 2*10-15 seconds. Have you ever heard about a pulse of light so short? Usually atomic transitions last ~ 10-8 seconds...

I had not thought about this before. It is interesting. Are we saying that single photons can not exist? Or is it that single photons must be composed of multiple cycles? If it is multiple cycles, would it always be the same amount of cycles?

Sincerely I don't know how a photon is made, but I don't think it could be thought as been simply made of EM waves. Anyway, IF you identified a photon with a train of EM waves, the number of cycles would depend on the kind of transition and so it wouldn't be fixed. Atomic transitions' (average) lifetimes can vary a lot; think, e.g., to metastable states (those used in lasers) which can be millions of times longer than the "usual" transitions' lifetimes of 10^-8 s.
Photons are very complex "beasts".

[lyner]

If we start off with the proviso that we will never have it all sewn up and that we can't hang on, regardless, to any of the existing models and have the possibility of making progress with understanding.
I couldn't be less surprised that you should say that my idea is 'alien', Vern. You have to be prepared to ditch so many established ideas and to ditch them on a regular basis.
But it isn't so hard if you realise that each model may only be a temporary one.

I don't say that 'nothing exists in between'. The energy is there and the wave model tells what is going on. Classical em theory describes so many phenomena very adequately - including radiation pressure. The quantum theory only needs to be invoked at times of interaction.
Why should we hang on to 'corpuscles' except for the reason that they are eminently acceptable and familiar.
Apart from reasons of 'comfort' I can't think of any reason why photons should all have the same length - particularly if they only need to 'exist' in order to describe the interactions each end.
Lightarrow - photons don't have to be just made up of waves if they are only there whilst there are both waves AND matter involved. To use a term which is often used elsewhere, you could, perhaps, say that photons 'mediate' the interaction between waves and matter rather than between charge systems.
Perhaps the 'Feynman diagram' should be elaborated with a wave phase in between two photons rather than just a photon. I wonder what he would have had to say to that.

[yor_on]

Or the photons might just be 'froth' on the surface SC:) And the outcomes depending on our handling/expectations of the experiments? As a state 'matter' have very peculiar properties. It allows us for example. And it includes several types of 'living material', both flora and fauna.

The only reason I can see to that we are so comfortable with it, is that we are born into it.
To me it's still very strange. I've seen some ideas where 'matter' foremost might be a concept of geometry.
But then, I guess? We would be 'geometric anomalies', as we so freely and 'consciously' can navigate our 3D world in time.

There are definite differences between matter and what we call light.
You might want to say that a computer, if clearing the Turing test, could be seen as 'intelligent'.
But then again, it's not light, it's matter.

Maybe a quantum computer could be seen as 'in between' though?
But photons are very strange, they are also 'in between'.

[Vern]

Sincerely I don't know how a photon is made, but I don't think it could be thought as been simply made of EM waves. Anyway, IF you identified a photon with a train of EM waves, the number of cycles would depend on the kind of transition and so it wouldn't be fixed.

Very interesting lightarrow; I think we have identified the most basic reality of the universe; the photon. If we can understand that, we will have that illusive principal that John Wheeler postulated:

Some principal uniquely right and uniquely simple must, when one knows it, be also so obvious that it is clear that the universe is built, and must be built, in such and such a way and that it could not possibly be otherwise.

I have a hunch about what that principal may be but it depends upon a single cycle of an EM wave to comprise one photon. Otherwise the hunch loses the ability to predict quantum phenomena, relativity phenomena, and all else.

 

[Vern]

I couldn't be less surprised that you should say that my idea is 'alien', Vern. You have to be prepared to ditch so many established ideas and to ditch them on a regular basis.
But it isn't so hard if you realise that each model may only be a temporary one.

It is a very interesting idea as I said. I sometimes speculate about a possibility that a sender atom sends out some kind of signal that it has available a packet of energy and that it only sends that packet if it finds a suitable receiver.

I guess that concept could be tested if it could be determined whether a neutron would delay its demise if there was not a receiver for the energy it must release to do so.

[lyner]

Jeez, yor-on
What was all that about?
I have read it several times.
Help me.

[lyner]

As far as duality is concerned - it is possible that we must really look for something which is 'outside' both sets of Wave and Particle. They are both, themselves, only models, in any case. They are things with which we are familiar - that's all. We've never actually seen a wave (even a wave of visible light is only detectable by its electrochemical effect).

[yor_on]

Jeez, yor-on
What was all that about?
I have read it several times.
Help me.

Deep huh?
Yep, oh yes, that's me, a deep dude:)
To deep for myself here possibly:

(He*k, how shall I dig myself out this time?

Nah, it was just me thinking about if photons have all those different paths.
Why not take the next step and say that they really are everywhere.

Although they will only 'materialize' as an interaction, and some interactions are more probable than others:)
Also that those interactions not only are related to the 'firsthand' interactions, but as much related to in which way we choose to observe that 'firsthand' interaction.

If it would be so, then what is this 'space' containing all those 'paths'?
Would it f ex. be possible to manipulate space to show a photon where it shouldn't be as seen from what we are used to expect?

But I do find matter strange:)
So I was wondering what could be seen as a 'intelligence' without matter involved.
And maybe a quantum computer could be it?
If one manipulate light.

A ordinary computer is just a piece of matter working electromagnetically.
So it doesn't fulfill my expectations.
As far as I know 'matter' is a must for any type of life we know of?

But you're correct SC, that hole was a little deep:)

Btw: I asked if all matter expands when 'energized' in another thread
(sort of, at least:)
Not all expands it seems.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2004/11/041119015323.htm

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As for geometry, well I've seen some ideas.
One is string theory as i understands it.
And you have others discussing 'knots' and other topological 'transformations'.
Not that I find them impossible.
 
Some are very difficult for me to understand though.
Ah well, next life perhaps.

(Joking, I think?

[Atomic-S]

As far as duality is concerned - it is possible that we must really look for something which is 'outside' both sets of Wave and Particle. They are both, themselves, only models, in any case. They are things with which we are familiar - that's all. We've never actually seen a wave (even a wave of visible light is only detectable by its electrochemical effect).

I believe this to be correct. The first thing we have to throw out the window is the picture of the electromagnetic field such as was used above in the diagram of an EM wave. According to one text, instead of the E and M vector values at each point in space (and time), upon which virtually all the foregoing discussion is based, we must instead think in terms of a quantum Psi which is a function of E and M, and also of X, Y, Z, and T. This Psi is calculated by the wave-like Shroedinger equation very similar to the way an electromagnetic wave would be calculated from the classical Maxwell's equations, except that now E and M are additional independent variables (actually, six independent variables, because they are vectors), so that the resulting "wave" has sinusoidal and similar forms not only in space and time, but also with respect to each of the 6 new variables, namely field strength. Because energy is proportional to field strength squared, Shroedinger's equation requires that the wave function be "bounded" in each of these six nonspatial "directions", with the interesting consequence that, just as with a classical wave contained in a box, only certain modes are possible. Since these are in the "direction" of field strength, they correspond to different classical wave amplitudes, the result being that only certain amplitudes are possible. This is the way the classical electromagnetic field, when viewed under quantum formulation, becomes quantized, and admits of only discrete energy levels (at any one classical wavelength). How do you "draw" a diagram of such a form of electromagnetism? I do not know, but the important thing is that such a wave function can absorbe and reliece energy only in discrete quantites -- hence PHOTONS. The photons thus are derived from wave considerations, using a completely reformulated understanding of what the electromagnetic equations are like, the key to which lies in the bizarre notion that the field vectors are not independent functions of space and time as in the classical formulation, but are themselves additional independent domain variables of which the field is a function. Such a mathematical object satisfies both of the seemingly contradictory requirements: that the energy travel in the manner of a classical wave, but be absorbed and emitted only in discrete quanta. 
  (Strictly speaking, this calculation is carried out not with the E and M vectors themselves, but with the closely related scalar and vector potential values -- the time-derivatives of the three vector potential components (per point), and the three space derivatives of the scalar potential.) Itis put in this form to make it compatible with Shroedinger's equation.

[lightarrow]

Atomic-s, I agree on the fact that photons are not simply EM waves, but it's also quite difficult to describe them with a wavefunction. Since a position operator doesn't exist for photons, you can't write a wavefunction which square modulus represent the probability density to find the particle in space.

[Vern]

Very interesting Atomic-S; I don't find myself at odds with anything there but don't see how it means we must discard the classic model.
Amplitude in the model is represented by the height and width of the curves. If it is one cycle, amplitude must be constant; this gives us the source of quantum phenomena.

Then if we allow one photon's fields to contribute to the saturation amplitude of another, we have a good candidate for the phenomena of gravity. The contribution of external fields would cause the point of saturation to be offset toward increasing field strength of the external fields.