3 ms·

All ether theories weren't really falsified, just discarded on a metaphysical basis as being redundant.

• CamperBob2 11y ago
  I wouldn't say that. The Michelson-Morley experiment demonstrated that if there was a luminiferous ether, it had no measurable inertia. That pretty much falsified the ether as anything that we'd recognize as "real."
  • Ono-Sendai 11y ago
    I've never read about the ether needing to have inertia. Also, a modern version of the ether is pretty well accepted - quantum fields that occupy all of space. Particles etc.. are disturbances in this field. Ether is something of a tainted term these days so quantum fields are not referred to as ether.
    • chc 11y ago
      Quantum field theory doesn't seem very much like the luminiferous ether. This seems like finding a new species of grasshopper that lives on a mountain, and saying, "Ah-ha, I've found Zeus! Zeus is a thing that lives on a mountain and has never been seen before, so this must be Zeus!"
• deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]