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Magnets + Lasers?

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Photons are particles. The wave properties are a result of quantum superstates and stuff. The same reason why a microscopic (rather picoscopic) surface of a mirror is not flat at all but consists of atoms, and still reflects/refracts light perfectly.

See the applet on this page. Each incoming photon actually reflects diffusely, in all possible directions at once (superstate) and where the so called 'wavefronts' coincide, they amplify each other. When a single, amplified, reflected photon is observed, the superstate collapses and all other photons (which did not reflect in the correct direction) cease to exist. Note that the reason we see the amplified photon is that the probabiliy is proportional to the wavefront intensity, so we can actually see some photons reflect in a diffuse manner, just a factor billion or so less. When photons can also refract, then the probabilities of the reflected and refracted wavefronts just add up to 100% nicely, so the amount of light seems to be distributed among reflected an refracted beams in some ratio.
 





nikokapo said:
i dont get the distortion thing, i've never seen distortion on a window
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Never seen this?
149144276_7c90d84a52.jpg
 
Switch said:
Uh huh....Yea, that raises a lot of questions in my mind. :P I always thought light has mass because it's being affected by gravity.
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My understanding of it was that if light had mass it would break general relativity. Because Einstein set the speed of light as the upper limit in his equations, anything traveling at that speed has either no mass, or infinite mass... I forget exactly how that works.
 
@Switch: light can't have mass because it is energy.

@junk-awesome :D: so it is the same machine? i'm betting the museum's one had a lower voltage then

@Zom-B: i am sorry but i have never seen such distortion on a window, maybe it is from the imperfection of it's own surface; i mean, it could be concave or convex just because it is not perfect and create that effect, i dont know if magnets could affect glass like that
 
nikokapo said:
@Switch: light can't have mass because it is energy.
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No, all elementary particles are energy in another form. Particles having mass exchange gravitons with others (another elementary particle).
@Zom-B: i am sorry but i have never seen such distortion on a window, maybe it is from the imperfection of it's own surface; i mean, it could be concave or convex just because it is not perfect and create that effect, i dont know if magnets could affect glass like that
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It's because the curvature gets expanded with distance. I made a graph to elaborate.
 

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No, all elementary particles are energy in another form. Particles having mass exchange gravitons with others (another elementary particle).
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so light CAN have mass???? [smiley=shocked.gif] [smiley=shocked.gif] :o




(thx for the pic explanation)
 
Can't you bend light slightly with an electromagnetic field?
 
Nope. Magnetic fields only affect ferrous materials, other magnets and charged particles( in motion).
 
As far as the question "does light have mass".... yes and no. I can get into it if you really want to know about it, but its kind of confusing
 
Electrons have mass don't they? ::) However this is exactly the kind of stuff that goes over my head for now.No worries , I'm going to Uni in october :P
 
depending on which physics definition of mass you use, then it technically can have mass, but is generally though of as having none. I'm going to bed but I'll post the whole explanation tomorrow 8-)
 
Maelstrom said:
Nope. Magnetic fields only affect ferrous materials, other magnets and charged particles( in motion).
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Unless the field is Ridiculously strong. Say, 10 tesla Link
 
nikokapo said:
so light CAN have mass????
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Light HAS mass, it cannot be massless. Light also carries momentum, as is demonstrated in things like crooke radiometers with the spinning vanes. There is a difference between mass and rest mass - a photon has no rest mass, if it would be stationary, it would be massless. This is different from, say, an electron, that has mass when it is stationary, and more mass when it is moving.

Also, magnets have mass, and therefore can bend light. They do not do so any better than nonmagnetic materials of equal weight. So to make life hard, magnets can bend light, but magnetism cannot ;)
 
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