Re: The Electron

[Jack Uretsky <jlu@HEP.ANL.GOV>]

This confuses some different  concepts.  See below.

On Wed, 12 Nov 2003, Brian Whatcott wrote:

> Hertz procured a spark from what was effectively a VHF antenna.
> Later, people provided an electrical vibration to drive an antenna.
> Though it may be illusory, there is something straightforward, about
> imagining an electromagnetic wave traversing an antenna, and detaching
> into free space. Extending such a concept of associated magnetic and electric
> vibrations to higher frequencies appears to give no sudden conceptual
>   discontinuity in the visible range. The required emitter size simply gets
> smaller,
> becoming atomic in size for X rays.
>
> Fourier would advise us that a quantum of radio energy could not be
> represented as a single frequency - but the same proviso applies to any
>   short enough pulse of radio energy.
>
> So in truth, a single photon ought not in fact to be associated with one
> frequency. Still, I see some recidivism in the view that one photon is like
> a particle - and a wave train is an array photons in set phase differences.
        Not true.  Light of a fixed frequency "interacts" (is emitted and
absorbed) in discrete photons - parcels having definite energy-momentum.
The mistake often made is to try to assign a "length" to a photon.
Fourier tells us that this is impossible, since the photon has, by
definition, a definite frequency.  As is usual in QM, care must be taken
not to mix incompatible attributes (such as position and momentum).


> Brian W
>
> At 03:30 PM 11/12/2003, you wrote:
> > I agree that the electron is an enigmatic entity, but what I find even
> > more difficult to accept is the association of a specific frequency with
> > a photon of light. I can't imagine any possible mechanism that could
> > connect an oscillation to something traveling at a speed c. Each of us
> > probably thinks that there is one key problem in quantum mechanics -
> > that if we understood this one thing the rest would be easy. I suspect
> > we're fooling ourselves :-)
> >
> > Bob at PC
> >
> > Tom Manz wrote:
> > > The electron is not well understood. No one precisely knows why it has the
> > > charge or mass that it does.
> > >
> > > Understanding the structure of the electron is one of the most difficult of
> > > all physical questions. I presume that it will have to wait to be answered
> > > until a more fundamental theory of physics is discovered which unifies
> > > gravity and electromagnetism.
> > >
> > > String theory does not explain the fundamental charge or mass of the
> > > electron.
> > >
> > > In fact, very little is known about why elementary particles have the
> > > properties that they do. In the Standard Model, the masses and charges of
> > > the particles have to be put in, they cannot be calculated.
> > >
> > > No current theory can predict the charge to mass ratio of the electron with
> > > good accuracy from first principles.
>
>
> Brian Whatcott    Altus OK    Eureka!

--
"Don't push the river, it flows by itself"
                                Frederick Perls