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Analysis and critical views

O.C.Sharma

The Concept of Rectilenier Propogation of Light

Table of Contents

PART 1

GENERAL IDEA 1
RECTILINEAR PROPOGATION OF LIGHT 2
Deviation 3
Properties of the field or fluid 5
The Magic of the Slit 7
Interference and Diffraction of Light 8
Polarization 9

PART 2

CRITICISM AND OUTCOME OF SIMPLE EXPERIMENTS 10

Wave theory and Nature of Light 10

Periodicity 10
Wave Formation 10
Sea Waves 11
Surface Tension 11
Capillarity, rise of water in plants and anti-gravitational growth 12
Michelson and Morley's experiment 13
Inactiveness of the Medium 13

Part 1

General Idea

The “deviation” is bending property of light passing from one transparent medium to other transparent medium. It is well explained in geometrical optics, but it is also that light bends round the obstacles, corners and sharp edges, where no other medium is expected and this bending was difficult to explain on the bases of geometrical optics, which was explained on the basis of new theory called wave theory, which explained the reflection, refraction and polarisation which can’t be explained on the basis of classical geometrical optics hence wave theory was accepted as reason of such bending of light and motion was said to be wave like and not the rectilinear.

But I say that unless there is change in the medium there can’t be any change in the path of light and if the path of light changes there must be some reason or medium. This reason and medium is explained in this paper i.e. the deviation and wave theory is not the reason or wave like motion for propogation of light which is again based on hypothetical medium called ether which is partly given the properties of matter and partly hypothetical , which is not possible with the matter existing. Elasticity is the property of matter existing, if the ether posses this property then it must exist , but all efforts to detect it had failed and if hypothetical , how it can carry such high speed motion . Therefore answer to this question is in this paper the Deviation. The matter is in two parts. Part one is as under:

THE CONCEPT OF RECTILINEAR PROPOGATION OF LIGHT

It is known for a long time that light travels in a straight line. Probably , this was believed due to light falling over an object and casting an image or shadow exactly opposite to the source of light. A simple experiment performed in the laboratory i.e. two pin holes are in one and exactly in straight line, revealed that light travels in a straight line.

An attempt made by Mr. Fermat to show that if light follows longer path but proved that light never chooses longer path but always the shortest one to travel. There were however proofs but based on simple and common observations. A scientific approach in the subject was the requirement to have some valid and concrete results but this was not possible in one and the same medium. Therefore passing of light from one medium to the other medium was the matter of interest and giving some results. The straight line path of light was found bending in the other medium with respect to one from which it enters the second medium. Therefore to study the behavior of light the change in the medium was required, but it was not possible to take as whole medium, therefore short form of medium was required for the laboratory purposes, hence rectangular slabs, prisms and lens were taken for the laboratory purpose as other medium water or air do not have any shape hence can be taken into other suitable vessels. The bending of light in different media revealed some consistency in bending which resulted into a common factor for each material as degree of transparency or commonly known as refractive index of that material or for that type of material. Even though if one instrument is taken say glass slab , we can't proceed to any result unless we are having its definite geometrical and calculatable dimensions.

Therefore the glass slab , lens or prism taken as other medium but having definite geometrical shape. The passing of the light from them is always bending depending upon the geometry and shape of the instrument and also the degree of transparency of the material , it is the object of the matter that why bending takes place and if bending takes place then is there any reason for that?

Later it was observed by some of the Research workers that when light passing round the obstacles, sharp edges and corners it bends and there was no medium other than normal air then how light was found bending , to answer this question a new theory of light came forward with explanation that why light bends near the corners and edges. This bending of light was explained on the basis of wave theory, proposed by Christian Huygens and supported later by some eminent Scientists the bending was found or stated purely as light behavior, therefore no question of other medium to deviate the ray of light , therefore no consideration of geometry of the medium, and the nature of propagation was termed as wave nature.

Though this theory could explain most of the phenomenon including reflection , refraction but the previous theory based on geometrical aspects could not explain this sort of bending in absence of the other medium. Therefore the new theory proposed by Christian Huygens was accepted as the reason for this sort of bending , or accepted as wave theory. Further the phenomenon of interference , diffraction and polarization explained on the basis of this theory could not be explained on the basis of Geometrical optics, in this theory i.e. wave theory , light is believed to travel in the form of waves and not in a straight line.

Though the rectilinear propogation of light was tried to explain by Issaq Newton and he had put forward a theory known as corpuscular theory and tried to explain the reflection and refraction on the basis of this theory but later people failed to explain the latter phenomenon viz. Interference , diffraction and polarization. Therefore wave theory accepted as the reason of bending and wave like motion of light and not as straight line motion.

Though wave theory explained that light propogates in space in the form of waves and due to this nature or wave motion, we get dark and bright bands of light on interference screen , which the theory states that it is due to interaction and addition of the maximum energy portions of two waves or addition and interaction of two minimum energy portions of two waves. Similarly there is darkness behind the slit giving interference or diffraction pattern. Perhaps based upon this is pointed out by Mr. Thomas Young that light adding to light under certain circumstances produces darkness. Later darkness behind the slit is tried to explain by Mr. Frasnel mathematically using Carnu's spirals. It is merely mathematical approach. Further bending round the corners or edges , I mean to say that this is not due to wave nature and statement of Thomas Young and Carnu's spirals explained , the darkness behind the slit is not the answer or clear. Therefore deviation is an attempt to find the reason for bending , and to explain how light adding to light under certain circumstances produces darkness or adds to intensity , also reason for darkness behind the slit. The matter will be taken in to two parts , the 1st part will consist of reasoning and phenomenon , the 2nd part will consist the criticism and some outcome of some simple phenomenon existing in nature and including some already known simple experiments in elementary physics.


THE DEVIATION

I shall take the three instruments viz. the rectangular glass slab , lens and the prism as change in the medium. As the reflection is the same medium phenomena therefore only refraction will be taken into consideration for the purpose. Further if we go through the geometrical shape of the instruments, we find that the rectangular slab is bounded by six parallel surfaces. If a ray of light incident normal to any surface that undergoes no change in the path , whether rare to denser medium or denser to rare medium , but when a ray incident at an angle with the normal that bends in the denser medium towards the normal and when emerging out it goes away from the normal but parallel to incident ray also having a certain shift from the incident ray.

If we see the prism , it is bound by five surfaces , it is as if the top surface of rectangular block is missing and the two side surfaces meeting at top and making the angle of prism. Any ray passing from rare to denser medium in this prism at an suitable angle with normal it undergoes double i.e. ray splits up into constituent colours i.e. in prism a ray undergoes double bending and dispersion simultaneously.

              A                                   A                  B

B           a           C                     C          b           D

molecular gradient normal to the bottom B C

(a) Dispersion due to ordinary prism
(b) Same prism (a) just open at apex A with the same content of matter in (b) as of (a) that is same no. of molecule

The same spectrum and dispersion is possible due to molecular gradient normal to the path of light.

If we see some such other instruments i.e. an instrument bounded by four surfaces is not useful for the purpose and one, bounded by three surfaces do not exist and another bounded by two surfaces but having zero width is useless and one plane is merely an area. But an instrument bounded by two curved surfaces is very useful, it can be cut section of a sphere or common section of two spheres of equal or unequal diameters. When a ray of light falls at the center of lens normally it passes along the axis and do not bend again if ray falls over at any point of curved surface of lens normally or at an angle emerges out as dispersed and passes through the focus, different colours through different focii.

It is clear from above that through there is a change in the medium but bending is not always there but under one condition or other bending is there with the change in the medium whenever there is bending that is due to one factor that the degree of transparency or commonly known as refractive index of that material of the medium. Further if we go through the relation for deviation produced by prism that is d = A(n-1) where d = deviation produced , A= angle of prism and n = refractive index of the material of the prism , we see that if we reduce the angle of the prism to zero we find that prism reduces the expression into zero. If we put n – 1 = 0 or n = 1 we see that product again reduces to zero which means there will be no deviation if the refractive index outside the prism is same or transparency inside prism becomes similar to outside prism i.e. similar or the same medium , means with in the same medium no deviation , which means any change in the path of light is not possible unless there is a change in the medium or unless there is any change in the medium , change in the path of light is not possible.

Hence light is bound by virtue of itself to travel in straight line. It is also clear that within the same medium light will travel in straight line.

And now we shall see why dispersion takes place?

Dispersion is broadly possible in prism as the simplest case and let us consider the passing of light through prism as prism is bounded by five surfaces. The two side surfaces look to be meeting at apex as if top surface is missing and if these three surfaces will be equal , then they will be having equal and opposite angles and the prism can be in the shape of equilateral triangle , if one side is small the opposite angle will be small And prism will be called small angle prism. Anyhow this angle has very important role for dispersion. It means two normals drawn on the two surfaces are never parallel. Hence any incident ray one surface will undergo double bending in prism and because of angle of prism dispersion will take place, but why dispersion , let us see the prism as a parallelepiped or let prism be open from apex in such a way that prism becomes a parallelepiped and the concentration of the molecules of the materials of prism varies at top but remains same at bottom which forms the molecular gradient from bottom to top and the mass and volume of the prism remains same or more precisely it will be the concentration gradient of the molecules which rarified at top due to the opening of two sides and normal to the bottom. When a ray of light passes through such a slab there will be dispersion because of concentration of gradient of molecules normal to the path of light, means the ray of light faces less numbers of molecules one side and more number of molecules on the other side normal to the passage of light.

It is actually not possible to have such an arrangement practically in practice or in solid state of matter but can be achieved in liquid if we put some soluble salt or sugar in water and without stirring or disturbing liquid we have this sort of condition but not useful. It is only to understand the reason.

But it occurs in nature itself it is nothing but our gaseous atmosphere over the earth as gases are matter hence possesses weight and are attracted towards the center of the earth. The heavier being denser with the surface of the earth and the lighter ones rarified with the height or in other words the concentration goes on decreasing with the height and rarified to vacuum several miles above.

This may have any usefulness to the human beings or not, but this concentration gradient occurring in nature is responsible for dispersion of light and we daily see redness of the sky at the rising and setting of the sun. Redness is always visible

having low angle of deviations whereas violet not visible as it mixes up with dark at that time.

We got dispersion with prism because of concentration gradient by virtue of angle of prism which makes the condition with the same homogeneous medium in the prism as when a ray of light passes through prism it passes through molecular concentration gradient along the path of light more number of molecules on one side and less number of molecules on the other side. Hence it or dispersion is a molecular phenomena provided the light can pass through medium or medium is transparent to light. This dispersion is also produced by lens, as lens also acts as a small angle prism therefore producing very small angle of dispersion hence when white light is passed through lens, image is tinged with end colours which is called colour defect of the image or lens, which is actually dispersion due to small angle of the prism i.e. of a lens and not the defect.

Now let us see the bending of the light around corners and edges. It is the basic conclusion of the physical optics that light bends around corner and edges, without any reason but having wave like nature or propagation of light which is proved to be the reason of bending. if there is no reason, in the light of previous discussion, we can say that if there is no reason, light ray should not bend, wave like motion is property of matter or not , or it is really possessed by matter ? should it cause bending to a very high speed traveling ray of light ? It is common observation that when a particle is moving at a very high speed its bending will be very large. It cannot take turn at very very negligible space. Though bending will be due to some action of forces otherwise not.

There are three states of matter, and all are fairly known and studied large number of aspects related with the subject useful or not useful are brought to light as science, information with wide applications useful to the human beings but can we imagine a unique field of matter, that is not solid but under circumstances it may pass through some solid, it is not liquid but remains free , it is not mixing with other matters like water or any other liquid or unaffected by liquid or gases. It is fluid like exists free. It is some sort of field as existing in the form of unique field. If it is a material then it should have some common properties with other states of matter but it has much less common properties, hence it is unique field.

In wave theory wave nature or wave character is accepted as the reason of the light propagation in space. But this is not true. There is some medium present at the edges or the corners which is responsible for bending of light though this is not known and being invisible never recognized by any body. This is a unique field but not similar to any of the three states of matter those are already known. Really it is not solid hence no shape , no weight but associated with the solid state of matter. It is not liquid hence it does not flow and keeps its level horizontal besides this field keeps its character free in liquid hence totally different from liquid. It is gas like but not gas and different from gas.

PROPERTIES OF THE FIELD OR FLUID:

1) This fluid or field is gas like but not gas , weight less but rigidly bound to the solid state of matter as it has an attraction towards the center of the mass of the body irrespective of size and shape of the body

2) It exists in the form of layers over any surface of solid state, for bigger bodies layers are thicker whereas with the small particles layers are fine. Further they reduce a little in thickness i.e. grow thinner up to the boundary to which this field exists and within this boundary there are fixed numbers of layers i.e. not unlimited. This shows that this fluid keeps its boundary itself.

Further if two bodies , say pencils or rods with spherical or parabolic ends or even hand fingers brought closer slowly the boundaries over two ends ( or say at finger tips) cross each other distinctly as the field over the two ends do not affect each other , but compresses a little and this or fine layer formation takes place there when two ends are brought little more closer (straight edge).

DIAGRAM (a) below shows the medium exists over the surface of solid state of matter and takes the shape of that surface. Let us have rod ends or even tips of our hands fingers and let them bring very close to each other, so that the medium over ends cross each other portion 'A' 'B' as shown in the figure (a), portion 'A' 'B' is little darkened. There are three such portions corresponding to three layers of medium, though with the open gap all the layers not seen intersecting like 'A' 'B', which means that (1). Medium keeps its boundary itself and (2). The medium is discrete and not continuous. The darkness in the gap spreads a little. When gap or ends brought little closer to each other and finally medium becomes continuous over the surface when ends fully touch each other.

(a)

DIAGRAM (b) above shows layer formation with a certain minimum width of slit made of two straight edges (closed gap) normal to the plane of paper.

1) Existing of this field in the layer formation over a body is like a displaced medium by a body immersed in such a medium and layer formation over the surface shows that medium is elastic but compression is local due to which layer formation takes place at the surface of the body but not incompressible like liquid state of matter which is displaced as whole when some solid or other volume is added to it.

2) It is not affected by water , therefore keeps its existence free and intact in water also. This means that it does not exists like solid state with liquids.

3) It is transparent and refractive index is greater than air but below water hence less than any glass and not recognized under the optical instruments.

4) It is inactive towards the electricity or magnetism but can become active under

certain conditions e.g. if we say that when electricity is passed through discharge tube we say that the gases are non-conductive under normal temperature and pressure hence electrical current does not pass in the discharge tube. But when we go on decreasing pressure in discharge tube we see that current starts passing due to ionization of gas molecules at low pressure but this is not the case. Actually gases are non-conductive to electric discharge at any pressure but when gas in the discharge tube becomes rare and field becomes continuous then current starts passing. Though character of glow can be that of residual gas but conduction of electricity is because of continuity of field. The field is associated with the walls of the tube and is inactive in presence of pressure of gas but when gas goes out and residual molecules remain in tube far apart, field becomes continuous and current starts passing.

8) It should be noted that it may be easy to remove a gas from a chamber but it is

difficult to remove this field . Henceforth I shall call this field or fluid as medium. If this is the medium existing over the surface of the matter, then can it contribute to bending of light ? Or say how bending takes place. When a ray of light passing through a corner or round the obstacle, it is clear from above that the medium existing over surface, exists in the shape of that surface, of the body. For simple understanding we can’t take an irregular body, but a smooth and regular body the medium existing over it will be in the shape of that surface. For any sharp edge obviously medium will exist in the shape of that edge and that medium over such edge will appear like a very small angle prism. Also from above , this medium over edge exists in the form of layers. The wide layer with surface and gradually thin layers beyond or above but this is always fixed in number and exists up to the boundary of the medium, which means that medium keeps its boundary itself.

Whenever a ray of light incident normally to this edge , ray passes through this prism of the medium and due to very low angle of prism and low refractive index ray deviates at a small angle. This prism of the medium over edge made up of layers looks like a prism composed of sections of prisms of which the prism is made up of.

The bending of rays undergo from each section and give rise to bands of black and white fringes with wider with edge and less wider up to the boundary but this band or bands of fringes is not clear with the source near the edge or what we say the source emitting the spherical wave front. This pattern is there but diffused with the overlapping of rays. Therefore for distinct and clear pattern we take two such edges and place them opposite to each other to form a slit. With a certain minimum width of the slit this sort of pattern is again obtained , but pattern is opposite to that of single edge i.e. if we go 2 (b) above i.e. if we take two pencils or rods with spherical or parabolic ends and if we bring these two ends slowly close to each other we find that the medium existing on both ends slowly cross each other whereas the boundaries of the medium over ends remain intact and cross each other the common portion within the two boundaries becomes a little dark when seen through bright atmosphere, but medium from both the sides compress a little i.e. to a certain minimum width within the tow edges wide band or bright band go to the center and the less wider layers go to the wall sides of the edges. If these two edges are brought more close to each other this pattern remains steady for a moment and collapses just before the edges touch or meet together, but before touching the two edges medium becomes dark and spreads like the field is attracted by the walls of the edges in the gap and the pattern vanishes.

This is the formation of the slit in all interference and diffraction experiments, but when the source is near the slit the pattern is not clear because of so called spherical wave front or overlapping rays. Therefore the pattern is still diffused. Therefore in interference we have tried to get two similar or identical sources called coherent sources i.e. originated from the same source for the reason that to obtain same pattern of original. Hence similar or coherent sources those have from same wave front, same path difference, same amplitude etc. but later we will see that all this was not necessary but patterns form these coherent sources when cross each other at a suitable distance they add in intensity and become more clearly visible in the field of view of eye piece.

These two similar or coherent sources produced with the image of one or primary in Lloyds’ mirror or the two patterns produced by fresnel’s biprism. in both the cases the clear pattern or the character of pattern is carried by light rays or made visible and deviate through very small angle prisms or similarly in Lloyds’mirror the patterns get added at a certain distance and pattern becomes fairly visible in the field of view.

Now let us see that why bending takes place. The existence of medium in layer formations over the surface and over an edge is similar, it is only that the shape of the layers is like that of the surface exposed. In case of two edges brought very close to each other the medium existing over one single edge is similar in layer formation but patterns are different to those the two edges come to very close to each other. In case of two edges when come close we find that two prisms of very small angle meet at their apexes. When such edges brought further close to each other the pattern remains steady for some time then collapses before the meeting of the edges practically.

When we say edge or a prism of medium over edge we see two things one the shape of the medium is like that of edge hence medium over edge behaves as a small angle prism. Further layer formation renders this prism as this is made up of numbers of sections of prism placed one above the other to constitute one such small angle prism. This happens because of layer formations similar to convex lens to which we assume that it is made up of number of sections to constitute one lens but lens has curvilinear surface against what we have with prism. Still we get small dispersion due to small angle and different foci for different colours where we usually say that this is the colour defect of the lens but this is the proper dispersion of low angle prism i.e. of lens hence not defects.

When two such low angle prisms of the media meet like edges or at apexes within the slit they take the shape of a double cylindrical diverging lens of long or very long focal length within layer pattern inside the slit with broad layer or band definitely at center due to the property of diverging lens, hence broad center on screen and gradually thin layers decreasing in thickness towards the wall of edge. Hence on either side on screen as many number of layers are in the slit those many are the fringes on the screen.

It is not the maximum or minimum energy of light waves to interfere due to wave motion but each and single order of spectrum arising due to layer formation as the individual sections of the low angle prism. Therefore under no circumstances light adding to light produces darkness, but are proper orders of spectra what we say white or bright and dark bands are proper orders of spectra. The bright portion is the part of the spectrum from yellow to red and the dark portion is from green to violet. These two of dark and bright bands corresponds to one and proper order of spectrum and system of bright and dark fringes or bands means system of spectra arising from such each layer of medium in slit.

The bending is small because of low angle prism and low refractive index of the medium. And because of small angle of the prism and small angle of deviation, Beyond this pattern there is no light or hundred percent darkness not explained on the basis of wave theory and not possible to explain but attempt was made by Mr.Fresnel mathematically and taking into account Carnu’s spirals to explain the darkness behind the silt that can be explained only that a double cylindrical diverging lens of very long focal length made of such medium explained above and constituent of number of layers as individual sections of prism deviate the light coming from slit at a very small angle and when whole the pattern from the slit is transmitted on the screen how can be there light behind the slit beyond about 10 to 90 . Therefore the idea of wave length of light is of no use or meaningless. It can be the proportional quantity of two or three parameters but not the waver length hence wave nature is the way adopted to explain the phenomena but not the reality.

THE MAGIC OF THE SLIT :

The medium associated with any edge is not visible or we do not see it practically but with slit made up of two razor blades, we can see this pattern clearly with naked eyes

only in daylight but not in front of a bright source. For this purpose let us have two razor blades and two glass plates as edges then place these two blades within these two glass plates and tie these two plates with rubber-bands so that the system will be rendered as solid unit. Now adjust the two blades to form a slit. Bring them close to each other slowly so as to get the clear pattern of so called fringes and actually setting of layers and see that they are steady. Fringes can be counted as fixed in number not more or less if pattern obtained by adjusting the slit again. This pattern is fairly visible with naked eyes provided we take this slit into day light not in front of a direct source of light wherein flash light we shall not see the pattern though pattern will be always there which is not the property of light but character of the medium explained above. Now let us fill this slit half with water. One can see the existence of pattern within the water and out side of water is undisturbed and intact but clearly visible, which shows that though this medium exists over the surface of solid state but not affected by water and keeps its existence free from liquid. It also shows that this medium is not associated with the liquid state as with solid state whereas it has greater attraction towards the center of mass. Why it has not attraction towers the liquid state ? And it keeps its existence free ? Answer to this can be only that liquid state is the state of loose molecules and this medium has greater attraction or energy so it goes to the binding energy of the molecules rather then existing over the surface. Then medium existing with other solid body does not matter if placed in water or liquid or medium, it keeps its existences free.