Woody Sideman said:
Perhaps it is my lack of education in this area.
ummm..yeah, maybe. I highly recommend that you get "Six Easy Pieces; the Feynman lectures on physics". Listen to them about 6 or 7 times, then try to tackle things like Bose-Einstein condensates and quantum 'secure' computers, etc.
As far as the sound wave explanation is concerned, I think Newton's cradle would work perfectly well in a vacuum, so I don't think sound has any relevance.
As far as the elctrically charged explanation is concerned, I think the cradle would still work if the balls were made of non-conductive material. I think I do understand that light changes speed in different mediums (it slows to about 35 kph in a Bose–Einstein condensate)
What I guess you didn't understand was that I was referring to the speed of sound THROUGH THE BALLS. Sound doesn't only travel in air.
The speed of charge I was referring to is the speed of the transfer of charge from atom to atom inside the material of the balls. That would be the maximum theoretical speed of sound through a perfectly elastic material, and would approach the speed of electricity through the balls, somewhat less than the speed of light, since the conduction of electricity requires the transfer of electrons from atom to atom (except in a superconductor), which takes more time than a photon simply flying past them.
Everything we know as 'solid' exists because of electrical charges among the particles. We do NOT know, however, what a charge really is, and the explanation of particles by using combinations of smaller and smaller particles is kind of like defining something wet by saying it is "wet-like".
It's all very confusing.:frown:
Woody
Yes. I'm sure it is when all you have to go on is the 'science' of people in our grant-sucking establishments, who, let's face it, aren't all that much different than Boyd Bushman and his "babble". (maybe a couple of published papers away)
And people wonder why I think that most of the scientists in the world are always wrong about stuff. Maybe it's because THEY ARE. Just wait a couple of funerals, and the paradigms will change. Statistically, when you consider the number of scientists (Top or otherwise), and the number of correct ideas they publish, they are actually feeding us deterrents to knowledge most of the time, and getting paid handsomely for it. Anyone up for a prayer session at the next Grant Submission Deadline? You gotta beeLEEEVE!!!