Re: [Phys-l] Massive photons in TPT

[John Denker <jsd@av8n.com>]

On 11/10/2010 04:44 PM, Bill Nettles wrote:
> Is anyone else bothered by the Elisha Huggins article in TPT which
> analyzes photons gaining energy as they "fall" using mg(delta Y) =
> -delta E?  He says that he gets the right answer, but Bohr got the
> right answers for the hydrogen atom energy states. Why did he do it
> this way, and should we teach our students this?  I'm not good enough
> at general relativity (long ago and far away) to present a proper
> derivation, but I thought most on here settled on mass being the
> absolute value of the momentum 4-vector; so, photons don't have rest
> mass.  Does GR let us treat the photon like Huggins does in this
> article?

I haven't seen the article so I really shouldn't comment, but
it seems safe to say that anything involving photon mass is
extreeemely heretical.

I would also say that if you are going to do something heretical, 
you have a duty to explain what you are doing and why ... rather
than just slipping it in "on the fly".