3 ms·
Disclaimer: I'm no physicist Are you thinking of the Michelson-Morley experiment? Interestingly, even after the development of special relativity, Lorentz and
by andars 12y ago
Disclaimer: I'm no physicist
Are you thinking of the Michelson-Morley experiment? Interestingly, even after the development of special relativity, Lorentz and Einstein [1] continued to discuss the possibility of an ether. Dirac also discussed the topic in 1951 [2]. The fact that it continued to be discussed by these scientists has always made me wonder whether the idea would ever return.
[1]: http://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Ether_and_the_Theory_of_Relativity http://en.m.wikisource.org/wiki/Ether_and_the_Theory_of_Rela...
[2]:
http://www.researchgate.net/publictopics.PublicPostFileLoader.html?id=5307e6ddd2fd64c2528b464e&key=9c9605307e6dd83eef http://www.researchgate.net/publictopics.PublicPostFileLoade...
- marcosdumay 12y agoTechnically, the Aether was only proved to be isotropic to an Earth bounded reference frame, and only locally here at Earth's surface. That the Aether does not exist is only the simplest explanation (by a huge margin), but there are infinite possible theories that satisfy the experiments. Also, as the anisotropy is the only relevant characteristic of the Aether, thus most people prefer to consider the case settled.