[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Sorry, are you claiming that Photons are non existent, and that the entire of Quantum theory is unsound, or are you not?
How you came up with that idea is beyond me, but obviously not. I'm saying that you're exhibiting blind faith with respect to photons. You're claiming photons exist because we can see, my counter-point was that you're saying that because you know it's the theory of modern physics, not neccessarily because you understand it, and in the past people could have said "light is a wave because you can see" or "light is a collection of particles because you can see" depending on which theory they followed. Being able to see light does not make you understand or believe the quantum theory. Heck, Plato thought that light was emitted from the eye, and even the mighty Euclid backed him up on this! Being able to see something doesn't prove the existance of photons. In order to do so, you have to accept theories of modern physics. Quite frankly, given the evidence and how well it works, I think anyone who does not trust this theory at this point is missing the mark.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]Planck's constant is only the first step of quantum mechanics, although a very important one, and has been verified by experimental data. Firstly by Einstein, who did lots of THEORETICAL experimentation as you've claimed, but secondly by Millikan, whose painstaking experimentation seems to agree awfully closely with Einsteins theoretical number crunching... Perhaps a little too closely to be coincidence?
To make it more obvious, if you see how Planck developed his theory, you have no choice but to conclude that he's correct. Like I said, the thoeries of the day were working so well that Planck himself was hoping for a "better" explaination to come along. You seemed to be exhibiting blind faith before I challenged you. I'm curious as to why you never fired back with fact when it comes to photons, but merely said "because you can see", but it just made it easier for me to support my point.
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]As for Christianity - well, you may well see more in your book than I did. Personally I think it's a charmingly quaint tribal history for a group of people I've never really had that much admiration for - let alone a wish to emulate. I can't speak, as you say, for what you might have experienced in your life or not - but if God has taken a direct hand with you, then you probably should have reminded him that there's a lot of other things that could use his attention while he's stirring himself.
God is capable of walking and chewing gum at the same time. Don't you think he can multi-task?
[b said:
Quote[/b] ]And if *I* am a litle uncertain as to exactly what a Photon is, that's hardly proof here or there as to whether Einstein didn't know what one is. I am not too dismayed that, under certain conditions, particular photons exhibit the characteristics of a wave form. After all, I work in an industry that creates 3D worlds out of triangles, so I understand better than most that a curve is really a series of intermediate points joined together - the closer the points and the farther the observation distance, the more complete the illusion.
Matter also has a wavelength, which is a property of waves(search for De Broglie's waves to find out more). Therefore, it doesn't surprise me that a photon would exhibit the characteristics of a wave form either.
I'm curious as to why you are reluctant to admit that you're not exhibiting blind faith by taking what a scientist says as fact without full knowledge of the topic at hand. Science is a major portion of my studies and I'm forced to rely on the superior knowledge of my senior peers. Sometimes I don't fully understand it myself. Some things such as time dialation and lengths changing as you approach the speed of light is difficult to visualize. Still, it seems to work, so I have to accept it.
Anyways, I'm going to take a rest from my normal aggressive debate style and add some humour to the discussion with a funny story that I think you all might get a good kick out of, I did. Eon, you mentioned Robert Millikan earlier, and this story is about him and his students.
Ok, so when you're preparing a science paper, often your professor will add his name to it and he'll get all the glory for it if it becomes successful. It comes with the territory I suppose. Anyways, Millikan was notorious for this. There was a rock in California where one of the religious groups in the area had wrote "Jesus Saves" on it. I believe it was visible from the highway but I'm not positive. Anyways, here's the funny part. Later on, Millikan's students went up the the rock and wrote added to it, "but Millikan takes the credit". When my uncle, who has a Ph.d in chemistry, told me about that, I laughed so hard! I mean, picture it. You're driving along the highway and you see a rock that reads:
"Jesus Saves
but Millikan takes the credit"