On Thursday, June 5, 2025 at 2:53:01 PM UTC-6 John Clark wrote:
On Thu, Jun 5, 2025 at 1:35 PM Alan Grayson <agrays...@gmail.com> wrote: *> The frequency is just a number that defines a photon's energy. Nothing to do with an extended wave.* *Nothing? Nothing at all? Not quite. There is a simple equation that shows the relationship between the frequency of light, its wavelength and its speed, its c=λ⋅f. And because of that very simple relationship you can easily perform a fun experiment at home:* *Measuring the speed of light with a microwave oven and a chocolate bar <https://www.fizzicseducation.com.au/150-science-experiments/light-sound-experiments/measure-the-speed-of-light-with-chocolate/>* *If frequency and wavelength are just numbers and have no relationship with physical reality then I don't see how you could use them to calculate the speed of light which most certainly does have a relationship with physical reality.* *As far as I know, it's never been shown that photons have spatial extent. So, the frequency and wavelength are just numbers that allow us to calculate a photon's energy. AG* *>> It's a logical necessity that 2+2 be equal to 4, but there is no such logical necessity that energy be conserved.* *> On the contrary, in classical mechanics one can show that the sum of kinetic and potential energy is constant. AG * *The conservation of energy is an empirical observation, it is not a logical necessity. * *It is in a logical necessity in Classical Mechanics. AG* *That's why the ancient Greeks were able to figure out that there was no largest prime number but they were unable to figure out that energy was conserved, they were good theoreticians but lousy experimentalists.* *There were some good experimentalists among the ancient Greeks, such as the fellow who measured the circumference of the Earth (can't recall his name). AG * * >> And if the energy was preserved I could ask "preserved by what?". * *Stupid question. Its sum is the same before and after interactions.* *It's easy for me to imagine a universe that had different laws of physics in which interactions did NOT conserve energy, but I find it impossible to imagine a universe in which 2+2 is equal to anything except 4, or one that had a largest prime number. * *John K Clark See what's on my new list at Extropolis <https://groups.google.com/g/extropolis>* ca2 -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Everything List" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to everything-list+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. To view this discussion visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/everything-list/4b1bcab8-3f4e-4097-bbbd-dfa0fab621b6n%40googlegroups.com.
