4 ms·

Your comment is a bit strange. Light doesn't travel as photons. Photons exclusively exist at the site and instant of detection of the wave of probability of det

Your comment is a bit strange. Light doesn't travel as photons. Photons exclusively exist at the site and instant of detection of the wave of probability of detection that light really travels as. When light is redshifted, it loses energy, therefore the wavelength becomes longer.

tsimionescu 3y ago
That is not the current understanding of quantum mechanics, as far as I know. Wave/particle dualism says that different experiments can either view light as a wave or a particle (never both) and that speaking about the nature of light when an experiment is not being performed is non-scientific by definition. Importantly, light very much behaves like a conventional wave in many real experiments - the interferometer experiment being one of the oldest and most well known. It is not a probability wave in that case, but an actual physical wave (now known to be an oscillation in the electro magnetic field, but long assumed to be a mechanical wave in the luminiferous aether).
- _0w8t 3y ago
  Experimentally one never observes waves. Light is detected based on its interaction with electrons and that is always by an electron absorbing a quanta of energy, not via some continuous process as would be the case with waves. Classically one can imagine that as if electron was hit by a particle. But then we have light diffraction and interference, which classically is described as a wave. So from a classical point of view light travels as a wave but interact as a particle. As of nature of the light, then consider that there is a reformulation of a classical electrodynamics that eliminates electromagnetic waves all together. There are only electrons that interacts with each other directly with no waves in between. Feynman spent quite some time trying to develop quantum electrodynamic based on that. He failed. Still the point stands that we never observe light directly but only through its effects on electrons and other charged particles. So it could be that what we call light is a theoretical artifact and there is no light in reality.
  - consilient 3y ago
    > So from a classical point of view light travels as a wave but interact as a particle. And the classical point of view is wrong. Photons resemble classical particles in a few respects, and classical waves in a few others, but at the end of the day they're neither. > Still the point stands that we never observe light directly but only through its effects on electrons and other charged particles. This is true of literally everything. "Direct" observation does not exist. Every atom, every cell, every person, every planet, every star - you know them by their effect on your sense-data, or else not at all.
    - blueprint 3y ago
      photons dont exist, dude, except in connection with and at the site of the detector. study some qft and then you can go talk about it on the internet with authority. and yes direct observation exists. that's what measurement is. and that's all you can ever "observe" unless you incorporate the wavefunction, which also doesn't "exist".
      - jpk 3y ago
        This comment is needlessly hostile. It's ok to correct someone if you think they're wrong, but this tone isn't conducive to curious conversation.
        blueprint 3y ago
        so it's the tone of my textual words? i think you're mistaking my laughter at their blatant and willful ignorance for hostility, and quite honestly it sounds like you're projecting that hostility. from the start I've been incorrectly downvoted and critiqued while being the primary commenter in this child thread providing a semblance of correct view. to be quite frank i deserve an apology, not some nitpick that comes from your personal assumption about my tone. but i know i won't get one because it's not hostility you care about at all. a lot of you commenters here are pretty hilarious. but not in a good way.
- blueprint 3y ago
  you are wrong, and you don't "know". the waves interfere with themselves unless they are measured. then the plate measures interfered waves in the form of singular photons, not waves. look it up. silly downvoters.

tsimionescu 3y ago

That is not the current understanding of quantum mechanics, as far as I know. Wave/particle dualism says that different experiments can either view light as a wave or a particle (never both) and that speaking about the nature of light when an experiment is not being performed is non-scientific by definition. Importantly, light very much behaves like a conventional wave in many real experiments - the interferometer experiment being one of the oldest and most well known. It is not a probability wave in that case, but an actual physical wave (now known to be an oscillation in the electro magnetic field, but long assumed to be a mechanical wave in the luminiferous aether).

_0w8t 3y ago
Experimentally one never observes waves. Light is detected based on its interaction with electrons and that is always by an electron absorbing a quanta of energy, not via some continuous process as would be the case with waves. Classically one can imagine that as if electron was hit by a particle. But then we have light diffraction and interference, which classically is described as a wave. So from a classical point of view light travels as a wave but interact as a particle. As of nature of the light, then consider that there is a reformulation of a classical electrodynamics that eliminates electromagnetic waves all together. There are only electrons that interacts with each other directly with no waves in between. Feynman spent quite some time trying to develop quantum electrodynamic based on that. He failed. Still the point stands that we never observe light directly but only through its effects on electrons and other charged particles. So it could be that what we call light is a theoretical artifact and there is no light in reality.
- consilient 3y ago
  > So from a classical point of view light travels as a wave but interact as a particle. And the classical point of view is wrong. Photons resemble classical particles in a few respects, and classical waves in a few others, but at the end of the day they're neither. > Still the point stands that we never observe light directly but only through its effects on electrons and other charged particles. This is true of literally everything. "Direct" observation does not exist. Every atom, every cell, every person, every planet, every star - you know them by their effect on your sense-data, or else not at all.
  - blueprint 3y ago
    photons dont exist, dude, except in connection with and at the site of the detector. study some qft and then you can go talk about it on the internet with authority. and yes direct observation exists. that's what measurement is. and that's all you can ever "observe" unless you incorporate the wavefunction, which also doesn't "exist".
    - jpk 3y ago
      This comment is needlessly hostile. It's ok to correct someone if you think they're wrong, but this tone isn't conducive to curious conversation.
      - blueprint 3y ago
        so it's the tone of my textual words? i think you're mistaking my laughter at their blatant and willful ignorance for hostility, and quite honestly it sounds like you're projecting that hostility. from the start I've been incorrectly downvoted and critiqued while being the primary commenter in this child thread providing a semblance of correct view. to be quite frank i deserve an apology, not some nitpick that comes from your personal assumption about my tone. but i know i won't get one because it's not hostility you care about at all. a lot of you commenters here are pretty hilarious. but not in a good way.
blueprint 3y ago
you are wrong, and you don't "know". the waves interfere with themselves unless they are measured. then the plate measures interfered waves in the form of singular photons, not waves. look it up. silly downvoters.