Ask any question you want about Physics

originally posted by: p75213

originally posted by: dragonridr

originally posted by: p75213

originally posted by: dragonridr

originally posted by: p75213
At the bottom of the page on this site - www.allaboutcircuits.com...
there is a circuit showing a neon bulb in parallel with an inductor and the sentence "If current through an inductor is forced to change very rapidly, very high voltages will be produced."
Well it appears not only do we have high voltages but also high currents and consequently high energy levels. According to my calculations the energy released by the voltage spike is greater than the energy spent to charge the coil. Why not collect that energy in a capacitor/capacitors and use some to drive a load while the remainder is returned to the coil to repeat the process.

A capacitor stores DC current think of it as a battery. You could add an inductor to store AC but the time would not be sufficient to charge the coil. In other words you would end up with less energy then you started with.

I'm talking about dc. Not ac. In particular the circuit mentioned in my previous post. It's at the bottom of the page. You will see a coil in parallel with a bulb. Voltage Spike My proposal is to replace the bulb with a capacitor.

OK what your not getting is the voltage increase is by converting DC to AC. You create AC by creating a spark gap. Instead of constant current you get spikes aka AC.Same as a converter I bought for the car I can use it to run a TV. But it starts out with 12 volts.

What your not getting is the following quote from the aforementioned link "If current through an inductor is forced to change very rapidly, very high voltages will be produced". Forget ac. Just think about the one off situation when the collapsing magnetic field from the inductor induces a voltage spike across the same inductor. The output energy from the inductor to the capacitor is greater than the energy required to "charge" the inductor.

Inductors don't do anything with direct current as far as increasing anything. They will alter the frequency converting DC to AC. They are used to create oscillators and filters. This is faradays law of induction.


en.m.wikipedia.org...

Thought is add this as well explain's induction

en.m.wikipedia.org...

You can even use this to get free cable but that's another story.

originally posted by: p75213
At the bottom of the page on this site - www.allaboutcircuits.com...
there is a circuit showing a neon bulb in parallel with an inductor and the sentence "If current through an inductor is forced to change very rapidly, very high voltages will be produced."
Well it appears not only do we have high voltages but also high currents and consequently high energy levels. According to my calculations the energy released by the voltage spike is greater than the energy spent to charge the coil. Why not collect that energy in a capacitor/capacitors and use some to drive a load while the remainder is returned to the coil to repeat the process.

Your calculations are wrong.

The very high voltage is produced by increasing the resistance of the circuit. This of course changes the time constant of the circuit.

When the switch is opened, however, it suddenly introduces an extremely high resistance into the circuit (the resistance of the air gap between the contacts). This sudden introduction of high resistance into the circuit causes the circuit current to decrease almost instantly.

The energy released is equal to the energy stored.

a reply to: Hyperboles

energy output will be less than energy stored as there are losses in whatever load you use

originally posted by: moebius

originally posted by: p75213
At the bottom of the page on this site - www.allaboutcircuits.com...
there is a circuit showing a neon bulb in parallel with an inductor and the sentence "If current through an inductor is forced to change very rapidly, very high voltages will be produced."
Well it appears not only do we have high voltages but also high currents and consequently high energy levels. According to my calculations the energy released by the voltage spike is greater than the energy spent to charge the coil. Why not collect that energy in a capacitor/capacitors and use some to drive a load while the remainder is returned to the coil to repeat the process.

Your calculations are wrong.

The very high voltage is produced by increasing the resistance of the circuit. This of course changes the time constant of the circuit.

When the switch is opened, however, it suddenly introduces an extremely high resistance into the circuit (the resistance of the air gap between the contacts). This sudden introduction of high resistance into the circuit causes the circuit current to decrease almost instantly.

The energy released is equal to the energy stored.

How the hell did I not read that.

Free floating subatomic particles have been found to "float" outside the nucleus. When a subatomic particle is outside the nucleus, is it then able to utilize and expand that particle on the atomic level? If so, would that allow whatever is encompassed by that subatomic particle to then become subatomic?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

My understanding is that gravity is still misunderstood, as there is only theoretical explanations to describe it. On the other hand, the Law of Gravity exists. That Law has yet to be understood, but affects everything, regardless of understanding it; all Natural Laws do this. Gravity, as we understand in general, breaks down between atomic and subatomic levels. That begs the question, what is gravity? If you think you know what it is, and that it's "force" is immutable, how do subatomic particles float outside the nucleus of EVERY atom? Perhaps magnetics and vibration are at play?

originally posted by: Truthbeknowntoall1
Gravity, as we understand in general, breaks down between atomic and subatomic levels.

If you're trying to say we don't have a quantum theory of gravity, that's true but that's an odd way to say it and perhaps not entirely accurate. It's an unsolved problem in physics:

Quantum gravity: Can quantum mechanics and general relativity be realized as a fully consistent theory (perhaps as a quantum field theory)? Is spacetime fundamentally continuous or discrete? Would a consistent theory involve a force mediated by a hypothetical graviton, or be a product of a discrete structure of spacetime itself (as in loop quantum gravity)? Are there deviations from the predictions of general relativity at very small or very large scales or in other extreme circumstances that flow from a quantum gravity theory?

That begs the question, what is gravity? If you think you know what it is, and that it's "force" is immutable, how do subatomic particles float outside the nucleus of EVERY atom? Perhaps magnetics and vibration are at play?

When Newton gave us his law of gravitation he said he didn't know what caused it, and we still don't. But we do understand how it behaves even better than Newton did and that's all we need to know to answer the question about why gravitational interaction isn't apparent at an atomic level, it's because gravity is so weak.

In addition to not understanding the cause of gravity, we also don't understand why it's so weak compared to other forces. It's another unsolved problem in physics called the "Hierarchy problem":

Hierarchy problem: Why is gravity such a weak force? It becomes strong for particles only at the Planck scale, around 10^19 GeV, much above the electroweak scale (100 GeV, the energy scale dominating physics at low energies). Why are these scales so different from each other?

originally posted by: p75213
How the hell did I not read that.

I think you got excited about the free energy you thought you found from having output greater than input.

originally posted by: KrzYma

Photons is an idea not a real thing.

When you go in a dark room and flip on a switch and the room is no longer dark, it was thought that the stuff coming from the bulb should have a name, 'photon' was chosen. Though you may be hinting towards correctness when you say some details about the understanding of the exact physical existence of 'that which has been called photon' may be lacking. Think about a rock, think about how many types of rocks there are. Likely we have more ideas about rocks than prehistoric man, on the way from prehistoric man to now there were likely some ideas about rocks that were incorrect. You are not trying to say, 'there is no such thing as light', you are saying the ideas that make up the understanding of exactly what light is is likely not absolutely perfectly correct, fully complete. You are suggesting there is Truth X, and there is word "photon" which is trying to = Truth X, but at this point in time "photon" might = Truth X + idea y - idea z + idea q + perception s + opinion d = "current idea of photon"

Which causes you to say something like: Photons is an idea not a real thing.

The theory of photons contains a lot of ideas (as does the theory of rocks, and cars, and people etc.) but you are not denying that there is a physical reason that when a light switch is turned on, a dark room can be visible, that likely it has to do with "somethings" emanating (controversial word?) from the photon bulb.

Are you suggesting there should be different theories of Light? Em radiation? That Photon and all the ideas (that you are suggesting do not fully = Truth) is one theory of light, and there should be other theories of light?

That you believe you can look at Photon theory and say: idea y is not proven, idea z is not expressible, idea q is not provable

Make up your own words for your own light theories?

Time is an idea and not a physical something.

At the same time, we must admit, that there is a real physical difference in universal reality between a person running a mile around a track in 5 minute, a person running a mile around that track in 10 minutes, and a person running a mile around that track in 15 minutes? And that by using that fact of difference, relationships might be related in relation to things like energy, momentum, space, gravity?

Time is the fact the configuration of 'physical somethings' change. Time is measurements and comparisons of all the ways and relations of 'physical somethings' changing (location, groupment, speed)

Time does not exist as physical thing so does something like spacetime not !

spacetime is/was partially the idea that in order for the effects of that which is called 'gravity' to be possible, 'outer space' had to be full of stuff. So think of like hills and mountains. Think about if one of those runner mile tracks was perfectly flat (like normal race tracks), and think about if another one of those runner mile tracks was over mountains. Can you see how that would influence levels of energy, and recordings of time? So too, if body A is traveling x, or light is traveling y, and its expected to travel from A to B at a particular speed, in a particular time, but over a perfectly flat environment, but in space there are bumps and hills that the body and maybe even light ride up and over, then you see the situation at hand?

originally posted by: KrzYma
now... if you understand what I'm saying you will understand why the so called Aether was not detected.

It sounds like a very uneducated description of field theory with some dictionary abuse thrown in, but conceptually it's along the same lines as Dirac's attempt to use "aether" in relation to "particles" instead of Newton's idea of the luminiferous aether which gave a medium for the light waves to "wave" in. As previously noted, the scientific community rejected such usage of the word "aether", but you and Dirac shouldn't feel too badly, they also rejected Einstein's usage of "aether" related to general relativity. Apparently they like more specific meanings and definitions for terms, and don't like 10 different people trying to give 10 different meanings to the same word. Seems like a logical approach.

Radiation waves are the movements in density of those charged particles ( Magnetic Field with speed C ), not the movement of they point of origin ( instantaneous ) Electric Field.

Your idea doesn't explain how light propagates in a vacuum.

And again...
Photons is an idea not a real thing.
Time is an idea and not a physical something.

I fail to see what you hope to accomplish by making these statements. They mean absolutely nothing until you define "real thing" and "physical something" and you can get into really silly philosophical debates about that without ever making any progress or accomplishing anything. They are both experimentally verifiable so whatever they are they show up again and again in measurable, repeatable experiments.

Arbitrageur !!
T=T0/sqrt(1-(2GM/Rc^2)) is a formula that works, no doubt about that formula...

This formula comes from the mainstream model that you say is wrong? Yet you still claim your model is right but you can't predict these experimental results with it? Do you see the problem with your lack of logic here?

But T is not something you can take and do something to it or do something with it.
It is just something you can calculate or count ( is what the clocks do )

Time does not exist as physical thing so does something like spacetime not !

The lack of defined terminology essentially makes this more useless babbling. The NIST experiments with clocks and the resulting differences in clock rates are well-defined. When you elevate one clock yes you have affected the rate of that clock. The researchers didn't claim they personally altered the passage of time, just that they put the clocks at different altitudes where the passage of time is naturally different due to the differing distance from the center of the Earth.

originally posted by: DanielKoenig
When you go in a dark room and flip on a switch and the room is no longer dark, it was thought that the stuff coming from the bulb should have a name, 'photon' was chosen.

That is absolutely NOT how "photon" was chosen. What came out of the light bulb was light and the man who coined the term photon said photons are NOT light:

The origin of the word "photon"

It would seem inappropriate to speak of one of these hypothetical entities as a particle of light, a corpuscle of light, a light quantum, or a light quant, if we are to assume that it spends only a minute fraction of its existence as a carrier of radiant energy, while the rest of the time it remains as an important structural element within the atom. It would also cause confusion to call it merely a quantum, for later it will be necessary to distinguish between the number of these entities present in an atom and the so-called quantum number. I therefore take the liberty of proposing for this hypothetical new atom, which is not light but plays an essential part in every process of radiation, the name photon.

So it was being called things like a "quantum of light" and if you had a number of those they didn't want that to be confused with "quantum number" which was something else, so they gave it a different name, photon, which stuck.

originally posted by: Truthbeknowntoall1
Free floating subatomic particles have been found to "float" outside the nucleus. When a subatomic particle is outside the nucleus, is it then able to utilize and expand that particle on the atomic level? If so, would that allow whatever is encompassed by that subatomic particle to then become subatomic?

I am unsure if your first statement is meant to say that electrons/protons and neutrons can be free floating, in which case yes sure... but thats not a discovery as such. If you mean sub-components of said objects then you are mistaken.

What has been found to float around at normal energies in a stable/semi-stable manner.

Sub-atomic - anything dealing with particles that are smaller or composite parts of an atom
Protons and Neutrons can exist outside the atom, as can electrons. A free neutron is not stable and has a half life of about 5 minutes, the electron and proton are stable.

Expand the particle on the atomic level? If you mean, can i take a proton and make it bigger, the answer is yes and no. You can take a proton and fuse it with something else yes, its essentially how the sun works, does this happen for free? No, you need energy to do it. Depending on the process, you get more energy out than you put in but it isn't as simple as just mixing it together and giving it a shake.

If you mean subatomic as in quarks then no, no quark has ever been observed to float alone.

If you mean higher energy species of leptons such as muons or tau, then yes, muons can take the place of electrons in an atom and create muonic atoms.

Here's another question that may or may not have a clear answer. If not, then I'm interested in an educated opinion.

What came first? Did moving charged particles create the EM spectrum, or did the EM spectrum create charged particles?

originally posted by: Arbitrageur
That is absolutely NOT how "photon" was chosen. What came out of the light bulb was light and the man who coined the term photon said photons are NOT light:

"In physics, electromagnetic radiation (EM radiation or EMR) refers to the waves (or their quanta, photons) of the electromagnetic field, propagating (radiating) through space carrying electromagnetic radiant energy. "

I was not attempting to give an accurate historical depiction of the process of discovery and labeling and ignorance and argument, but more of the attempt to suggest to kryzma, not to throw the baby out with the bathwater, the baby being 'that which actually exists' the bathwater being what kryzma believes they can argue are faulty ideas of that baby.

"It would seem inappropriate to speak of one of these hypothetical entities as a particle of light, a corpuscle of light, a light quantum, or a light quant, if we are to assume that it spends only a minute fraction of its existence as a carrier of radiant energy, while the rest of the time it remains as an important structural element within the atom..."

So you are suggesting that there is a difference between light and photons? EM radiation is not photons? Photons do not come out of lightbulbs? You are suggesting photon is 'em radiation before it radiates' inside atoms? And then when an atom emits this photon, the photon ceases being able to be called a photon, and now must be called light, a particle and/or a wave of light? Until it gets absorbed by another atom, and becomes a photon again?

"It would also cause confusion to call it merely a quantum for later it will be necessary to distinguish between the number of these entities present in an atom and the so-called quantum number. I therefore take the liberty of proposing for this hypothetical new atom, which is not light but plays an essential part in every process of radiation, the name photon." So it was being called things like a "quantum of light" and if you had a number of those they didn't want that to be confused with "quantum number" which was something else, so they gave it a different name, photon, which stuck.

Yeah, this is semantic nonsense. When you turn on a light, something comes out of the bulb. It is called light, it is called em radiation, it is not called photons?

originally posted by: BELIEVERpriest
Here's another question that may or may not have a clear answer. If not, then I'm interested in an educated opinion.

What came first? Did moving charged particles create the EM spectrum, or did the EM spectrum create charged particles?

It depends on the context of your question. If you're talking about modern times the photons need to have a rather high minimum energy for pair production (at least 1.022 MeV for the creation of a pair of charged particles) to occur and photons now have a lot less average energy than in the primordial universe so it doesn't happen as often. Now it's more common for moving charged particles to create EM radiation.

The earliest physics of the universe aren't fully understood but we talk about Epochs such as these:

Planck Epoch
Grand Unification Epoch
Inflationary/Electroweak epoch
Quark Epoch
Hadron Epoch
Lepton Epoch
Photon Epoch
Big Bang Nucleosynthesis

In general terms I think of the modern particles I'm familiar with outside the LHC as "condensing" or cooling from the very hot and energetic initial conditions of the universe. I suppose the answer to your question depends on how you look at the charged particles in the quark epoch which contained a quark-gluon plasma something along the lines of the energy levels that are probed by the LHC. The earlier epochs are harder to understand because they are beyond what the LHC energies are capable of reaching.

Speaking of the grand unification epoch I saw in another thread you were about to write a unified field theory. Maybe someday you will but I think you need to learn some more physics first.

originally posted by: DanielKoenig
I was not attempting to give an accurate historical depiction of the process of discovery and labeling...

What you said suggested otherwise:

it was thought that the stuff coming from the bulb should have a name, 'photon' was chosen.

Chosen in past tense implies historical origin so if that wasn't your intent then choose your words more carefully.

Yeah, this is semantic nonsense. When you turn on a light, something comes out of the bulb. It is called light, it is called em radiation, it is not called photons?

Terminology evolves as knowledge grows. Not every word in modern science means what it did when the word was coined which applies to not only photons but many other things. Sometimes meaning changes a little and sometimes a lot, and sometimes coined terms remain misnomers. I made a thread about one of the worst examples of this:

Science quiz: Is the Earth's North Magnetic pole a North Magnetic Pole?

a reply to: Arbitrageur

"In physics, electromagnetic radiation (EM radiation or EMR) refers to the waves (or their quanta, photons) of the electromagnetic field, propagating (radiating) through space carrying electromagnetic radiant energy. "



"In physics, electromagnetic radiation (EM radiation or EMR) refers to the waves

(or their quanta, photons) of the electromagnetic field

, propagating (radiating) through space carrying electromagnetic radiant energy. "


"electromagnetic radiation refers to the waves


(or their quanta, photons)"



This means, the waves quanta? As you were suggesting, there is a difference between the wave, and its quanta?

A wave is composed of quanta? ( and a wave is as a whole, quantized itself, as 1 quanta of wave) 1 EM wave may be composed of thousands or millions of quanta/photon?

An EM wave is not a photon, EM waves are composed of photons?

But photons themselves are also waves? But a photon is not an EM wave (a photon is not EM radiation), but a photon is a wave? (and a particle, a quanta, quantized, wave)

An EM wave itself is a particle? It is quantized (it is not 0 or infinite or sporadically mutating) Or it is made of particles?

An ocean wave is a wave? It is quantized, it is composed of particles, h20 particles, which themselves have their own wave function, an h2o particle is not an ocean wave, an ocean wave is an ocean wave but it is made of h2o particles

What is EM radiation besides photons?

What quanta/energy do photons posses and what quanta/energy Does EM radiation posses?

a reply to: DanielKoenig

Waves/radiation describe how changes in the EM field propagate.

Photons describe how the field interacts with matter, in quantised units.

So there are no photon particles flying around.


Now you might go further and say that interactions is what really matters and describe the EM field as a quantum/photon field.

But in the end both fields and photons are human concepts to help reason about what we observe.

a reply to: DanielKoenig

Lol comedy central. you are hilarious

originally posted by: DanielKoenig
This means, the waves quanta? As you were suggesting, there is a difference between the wave, and its quanta?

If you mean the quote coining the term "photon", that was from Gilbert Lewis.

A wave is composed of quanta? ( and a wave is as a whole, quantized itself, as 1 quanta of wave) 1 EM wave may be composed of thousands or millions of quanta/photon?

An EM wave is not a photon, EM waves are composed of photons?

But photons themselves are also waves? But a photon is not an EM wave (a photon is not EM radiation), but a photon is a wave? (and a particle, a quanta, quantized, wave)

Search "wave-particle duality". We don't have all the answers.

One interpretation of quantum mechanics that purports to "solve" the mystery is Bohmian Mechanics where the particle is fundamental and the wave properties are ancillary. But no interpretation of quantum mechanics had 50% support in the video in the opening post, including Bohmian mechanics, so like all other views in interpretation it's a minority view. But also as the OP video says, the more you think about the Copehhagen interpretation, the more likely you are to see problems with it.

Bell couldn't understand why Bohmian Mechanics wasn't more widely supported or at least taught to students as one possible model, but some say it's because Bohm was a dirty rotten filthy stinking commie who was investigated by the House Un-American Activities Committee. He refused to testify, was arrested, suspended from his job at Princeton and effectively run out of the United States, so with all that going on maybe it's not such a mystery why a lot of his colleagues didn't want to jump on his bandwagon when he was practically "persona non grata" in the US and maybe they didn't want to also lose their jobs and be run out of the country. Others say it's because we simply don't have any proof of the pilot waves.

I don't think this video accurately portrays the concept of Bohmian Mechanics aka the de Broglie-Bohm Pilot Wave theory, but it's been cited as an analogy (obviously an imperfect one) and this video shows some parallels. Is it a particle or a wave? It's purported to be a particle guided by a wave, which gives it properties of both.

The pilot-wave dynamics of walking droplets

The debate continues and so do the experiments:

Pilot-wave-theory-gains-experimental-support

Since the discussion has again turned to the OP, I repeat from page 332, slightly edited:

Arbitrageur, mbkennel and I had quite a discussion that lasted for several pages on quantum philosophy starting back around page 287 of this thread. I retain my belief that quantum mechanics can be easily understood by proposing that any entity collapses to a size dx = hbar/2dp when it receives a momentum change of dp during an interaction, and that it collapses to the entire region where no collapse is required if a portion of it would be required to collapse but it does not collapse anywhere within the required portion. This isn't quite the same as Copenhagen, although it is close, especially with Heisenberg's (I think it was he) proposal that "the observer" can actually be an apparatus. My interpretation is that no observer or apparatus is needed, just an interaction or requirement of an interaction in a portion of the wave function. The problem with my proposal is only that relativity does not allow it because of the relativity of simultaneity not allowing for instantaneous collapse. (If the collapse is not instantaneous it could occur at two places.) But my interpretation is allowed by the absolute theories. And then everything can make sense once again in physics.

I may have never been clear on one point about the above simple philosophy (simple enough to contain in just the single paragraph above). The point to clarify is that I assume that entities are always waves, never particles. It is just that the size of the wave sometimes gets rather small (for instance a light spec on a wall) compared to the size it has at other times (for instance when light impinges on a wall containing two slits).

Note also that a short wave packet will contain a wider spread of frequencies than will a long wave packet - that is, you have a dx times dp relationship just from that fact alone. Hence, the uncertainty principle is a rather natural outcome from this way of looking at things. (That part of what I propose is rather well known. Wikipedia even has a page on it.)

This philosophy also gets rid of all the nasty infinities associated with points. The only problem with accepting this rather common sense approach is that special relativity is a point-like theory in four space with relative simultaneity. It is relativity alone that precludes us from making sense of our world.

a reply to: Arbitrageur


Thanks for the answer. Yeah, I would love to play a role in discovering the Grand Unified Theory. For now, I'm just learning basic principles, but I do plan on learning the math needed to understand deeper concepts. For the moment, I'm focusing on Quantum Field Theory and Feynman diagrams.

I will say that the key to unifying physics is ditching the concept of space-time and reintroducing a family of aethers, IMO. I think both General and Special Relativity need some fixing...but, that is just my opinion as of yet. It may change as I learn more.

It is a fallacy to believe you understand the current status of the field and to tell those in the field that they are wrong without actually having mastered or demonstrated understanding in the first place.

You openly admit that you are learning the basics... please don't 'learn' this here on ATS, because what you will learn is a mish-mash of spaghetti information with some strands of reality mixed in with absolute garbage.

You think General and Special relativity need some fixing, and yet less than 1 week ago you didnt understand the prinsiple algebra or meaning of anything in the simplest of equations.

Im not saying dont bother trying, what I am saying is, understanding that you don't yet understand is the first step to actually learning. You want to learn what the mainstream knows and does, then im sorry but you need to go to university and do a research degree. Arm chairing can get you a good amount there, but if you want to challenge your 'enemy' so to speak, you have to actually understand what they believe and think before you can claim that they are wrong or propose a fix with the same language and level of detail required.

Put it one way...

The greatest minds of the last century have been looking for holes and problems with SR and GR.... and as yet, not found anything glaring.

You started... 2 weeks ago? and you already think you know enough to say there are problems and where the holes are? quite confident really.

Do try, I actively encourage it, but, self awareness and knowing where the box is, and exactly what is inside it is key to understanding how we fill in what is outside the box.