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| 24162 | Planck introduced the idea that energy can be quantized |
| Full Idea: By deriving his radiation law, Planck had inadvertently introduced the idea that energy itself could be 'quantized'. | |||
| From: Jim Baggott (The Quantum Story: 40 moments [2011], 01) | |||
| A reaction: He earlier assumed energy is continuously variable. I presume this means that the older idea of energy is now subsumed into the concept of fields, which are quantized into particles. The powers of nature are found in the fields. |
| 24163 | Free electrons have clouds of virtual particles, arising from field interaction |
| Full Idea: A free electron doesn't simply persist as a point particle travelling along a predetermined, classical path; it is surrounded by a swarm of virtual particles arsising from self-interactions with its own magnetic field. | |||
| From: Jim Baggott (The Quantum Story: 40 moments [2011], 19) | |||
| A reaction: It seems to me important for amateurs and mere philosophers to hang on to this idea of virtual particles, because they undermine any attempt to impose a macro picture on sub-atomic events. |
| 24161 | Thermodynamics sees nature as a continuous flow of energy, as radiation and as substance |
| Full Idea: Thermodynamics reinforced a vision of nature as one of harmonious flow. Energy, which could be neither created nor destroyed, flowed continuously between radiation and material substance, in themselves unbroken continua. | |||
| From: Jim Baggott (The Quantum Story: 40 moments [2011], 01) | |||
| A reaction: Interestingly, Einstein's Special Relativity e = mc2 seems to endorse this view, by equation energy and mass. I've always wanted to know what energy is, but no one seems to know. |
| 24160 | Particle measurements don't seem to reflect their reality |
| Full Idea: It seems that we can no longer assume that the particle properties we measure necessarily reflect or represent the properties of the particles as they really are. | |||
| From: Jim Baggott (The Quantum Story: 40 moments [2011], Pref) | |||
| A reaction: [He cites a 2006 experiment] This gives an interesting response to the Copenhagen Interpretation - that observers appear to be creating the reality they observe, because they only have 'observations', with no reality to correspond to them. I like it. |