Question about the properties of light

[Duane Morse]

Well, if you can convert matter to energy, and visa versa, and matter equals energy, then are they not the same thing? Could not matter be simply converted energy?
Before any matter existed, there was only energy, correct?
So all of the matter had to have come about only from energy, wouldn't it?

 

[Morat]

  They're not the same thing. You can convert matter to energy rather easily. Just take an equivilant mass of antimatter and smack the two together. Einstein's E=MC^2 predicts exactly how much energy will be released. But you can convert energy into cars, as well, when you build one.

   If, for instance, you pump the energy densities up enough (particle accelerators), then you see matter start to come apart into it's more component parts (quarks, for instance).

   Matter, by it's very nature, has a great deal of energy bound in it (it has to do with things like the strong and weak nuclear forces). It's all different types of energy, though. Chemical, electromagnic, nuclear, etc. All methods of generating energy work by changing matter in such a way as to force it to release energy.

   For the most part, matter is considered "that which has mass, takes up space, and obeys Newton (and Einstein, for that matter)".

 

 

[Duane Morse]

So then light would be considered matter by that definition, wouldn't it?

 

[Morat]

  Light is both a particle and a wave. It consists of photons, which are particles. These photons have an electric field. When moving, the interactions between fields creates an EM wave.

 

 

[Duane Morse]

But light has mass, it is affected by gravity, it takes up space if it is a particle, and it obeys the Newtonian and Einsteinian theories, doesn't it?
So then light must be matter by that definition, would it not?
Solar-sails rely on light having mass, don't they?

 

[Morat]

  I just said it did. Light is both a particle and a wave. And yes, gravity affects light. That was one of the four major predictions Einstein made, and I believe the first to be verified.

 

 

[Duane Morse]

So then couldn't all matter be simply light photons that are bound up with the different energy forces?

 

[Morat]

  No. Because different particles have different properties and different masses.

 

 

[Morat]

  Are you going somewhere with this? Because unless you've got something invested in that particular concept, it'd be easier just to send you to an basic website on physics.

 

 

[Duane Morse]

Could you explain this part a bit more?
And with the last question I would like to stipulate that I am not talking just about the visable spectrum, but the entire EM spectrum, or maybe any and all energy in its totallity. I should have capitalized "L".

By your answer I am assuming you are talking about particles such as gold, hydrogen, etc., the different elements. Is this correct?

 

[Duane Morse]

I am trying to go somewhere with it, I am just not sure how or exactly where yet. I am trying to get a grasp on an idea that has been floating around in my head.

 

[Duane Morse]

And talking it out with someone that understands certain things better than I do helps more than reading sometimes.

 

[Morat]

  No. Those are elements. Elements are made up of a specific number of protons, neutrons and electrons.

  Protons mass more than electrons, and neutrons more than protons. Protons have a positive charge, electrons a negative charge.

   Photons have their own mass and charge. Same with other particles.

 

 

[Duane Morse]

And the protons, neutron, and electrons are made up of what?
How were they formed?

This is what I have been reading while we have been talking. From
http://universe.gsfc.nasa.gov/docs/science/nature.html

Scientists know of four fundamental forces; there's gravity and the three quantum forces: electromagnetism (light), strong forces (the glue holding protons together), and weak forces (seen in radioactivity).

All of the fundamental forces may have been united and indistinguishable at the moment of the Big Bang. Scientists have already found that electromagnetism and weak forces are one in the same at very high energies...

Strong forces may also be tied into the electro-weak at even higher energies.

By all this it seems that the interaction of the fundamental forces are responsible for the formation of matter in whatever form, and that all the forces are actually one force but at different energy levels. Isn't that what they are trying to define with the unified theory? Trying to find the one fundamental force that everything else stems from?

 

[Morat]

  That would be the Higgs, Alex. (Sorry, old reference). Yes. Proponents of the Standard Model think that ultimately reality consists of one particle, and one field. (Well, one type not just a single particle). All the one's were seeing now are the low-energy versions.

   Amusingly, it's often referred to as the God particle.

  Protons, neutrons and electrons are made of quarks. Nothing smaller than a quark has ever been seen.

 

 

[Duane Morse]

I was just going to say it sounds like they are trying to find and define God.
Do quarks display both wave and particle properties also?

 

[Morat]

  No, they're not. Unless you think god is a single particle and field, without consciousness or anything other than a relatively trivial set of properties.

  No, quarks do not. Light does because of the way photons interact.

 

 

[Lacmeh]

No, they don´t want to find God. They want to find the unbreakable particle. For long, the elementar particles were believed to be electrons, neutrons and protons. With better mass accelerators, they could break up neutrons and protons and see, that they are in turn made up with three different particles. Now we see, that those quarks (which make up protons, eleectrons and neutrons) are in turn again made up by different particles. That bugs those scientists and they want to get to the particle, that is elementary. Many other things hang on this, like the electronic elementary charge.
The bonding forces inside a proton or neutron are so strong, that it is impossible to seperate them long enough for study. You can´t even see or detect them directly.

I would guess, that photons are special concerning their double properties as wave and particles. You must not forget, that Einstein´s Theroy, that things get heavier, the faster they go has been proven correct. With light speed as limiting factor. You get infinitesmal heavy at lightspeed.

I admit it is a long time, i had Physics, but as far as I know, photons don´t have a charge. Or the lightwaves would bend in every electric field.

The E=mc2 formula gives us the information, which amount of energy we have to pour in to create matter and how much energy we get out when destroying matter.

 

[Duane Morse]

In the beginning, before the creation, God could very well be a single particle, or point, with a relatively simple set of properties. All of the complexity comes from God, but that does not mean that God is that complex. But the complexity would be an inherent part of God. Just as Life itself was an inherent part of God until God had a Son through/with/by the creation.

Steven Hawking said in a recent paper that he thinks the universe may have begun as a single particle on top of a mountain of potential energy.

The thing is he can not figure out how the potential energy was converted into kinetic energy. Or where this mountain of potential energy came from. But the potential energy was somehow converted into kinetic, and flowed out from the single particle forming a trough, the bottom of which we are in now, the physical universe. But all the forces came from this single particle, or point. As did all of the matter.

Could quarks display both properties of wave and particle, but at an energy level or frequency that we, as yet, cannot measure or detect?

 

[Morat]

  No. Once more. Photons are particles. Light, which is made of particles, is both a wave and a particle stream. The moving particles generate the wave, which makes them move. A single photon sitting off by itself is merely a particle with a simple field.