Hello, in a hypotetical room in which electricity and magnetism were disabled, would light exist? Greetings, uh-lee

... well technically, nothing would exist ...

[edited by - Nypyren on July 18, 2003 5:23:10 PM]

quote:

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Original post by uh-lee
Hello,
in a hypotetical room in which electricity and magnetism were disabled, would light exist?

Greetings,
uh-lee

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Physics in general is kind of an all-or-nothing deal.

I like pie.

Well, what I'm after is this:
If light was an electromagnetic wave, it obviously couldn't travel in that room.
If it was pieces (photons) to my limited understanding of that it could travel.

Now those are all just models trying to describe the characteristics of light. Is there any method to really get an understanding of what would happen in such a room.

> ... well technically, nothing would exist ...

If one had such a room in a box made of glass, and had the sun shining on that box, would it cast a shadow? If so where would the energie that was in the light be then? If 'nothing' existed it could hardly become warm (or have _any_ temperature at all)?

[edited by - uh-lee on July 18, 2003 5:59:16 PM]

It would act like a Larry Niven stasis cube, ie. it would look like a perfect mirror to an outside observer.

I think that such a situation would alter many facets of the laws of physics, making it difficult to observe any particular one.

"in a hypotetical room in which electricity and magnetism were disabled, would light exist?"

A first response is no.

A reflective thought would ask "how is electricity and magnetism disabled?"

In a chamber that prevents radio waves from entering or leaving, radio waves can still be propagated and detected inside the chamber. But a chamber where physical laws do not allow radio waves will not permit their propagation.

And, as radio waves (like visible light) are merely a small portion of the electromagnetic spectrum, I think your answer lies in answering the question "How are they disabled?".

Sounds like a cop-out, I know, but that''s Science folks!




Stevie

Don''t follow me, I''m lost.

Since Maxwell''s equations would have no solution inside your box, then no, light, nor any other band of the electromagnetic radiation spectrum, could propogate through your box.

What happens to radiation striking your box totally depends on how you disabled the electromagnetic field in the box...

Timkin

Thanks for the responses,
I had assumed that one could take such a room as a given, without knowing why there wouldn''t be an electromagnetic field. How could you disable it (is it at all possible)?
Why would it be important for the results _how_ you disabled the field?

Because all physical laws are inter-related. If you simply "suspend" one law, the others ain''t work so well :-D