Ether has long been used for explaining the propagation of
light. Aristotle discussed Ether. Given electromagnetic waves, the implication
that light has to propagate through something seemed reasonable. Ether went the way of phlogiston and caloric
when Michelson and Morley split a light beam, then bounced the two perpendicular
rays back to each other and found no difference in diffraction. If it can’t be
measured then forget about it.
The Dark Matter theory accounts for the difference between
observed mass and the behavior of galaxies by positing an entity that exists in
a vacuum yet has mass. Dark Matter seems a misnomer as it allows for the
transmission of light. Exists in a vacuum, has mass and propagates light,
sounds like Ether to me.
Abandoning Ether leads to the wave particle duality and
quantum theories. Why is it that a child
without any apparent ability of concentration or interest can intently spend
their entire playground time pouring sand through a sieve? The very purposeless futility of it provides
its own satisfaction. This tremendous
sense of stasis is the most terrifying human quality. When one examines failed theories it is
tempting to think that there should be some intuitive way to determine
correctness. This thinking, argument by metaphor, drives scientists’ nuts. There
are people who are always wrong and love senseless activity. I have sympathy
for the other child who walks over and hits the first one with a toy shovel. If
you must talk Alternate Universe, you should not disparage Ether.
Mass without volume seems nonsense, mini black holes? Until
you examine the other theories.
Another bizarre theory is explaining the red
shift with expanding universe.
Occasionally we look up and see the sun and the moon
together in the sky. We can see that the two bodies are round and that the sun
reflects off the moon. Why did this seem mysterious? Until we observe that the sun’s reflection on
the moon does not correspond to the sun’s position in the sky. How did we
figure out anything? Nature is
duplicitous.
Ether or no, gravity bends light. The light of our
observations has been through innumerable gravity events, culminating with
being drawn in by our own sun. Such observations deserve skepticism. Or Ether
causes the red shift.
Recently the Michelson/Morley experiment has been extended
to discover gravity waves. An extremely large and sensitive instrument, it chattered. Two of them were built to compare the
results. Eventually the expected badumbump of the gravity wave occurred on both
instruments. But when the results were examined it was found that the chatter
matched as well. Perhaps the chatter is a consequence of distant dissipated
gravity waves, or Ether.
