If we were able, somehow, to question a scientist from the future, and we asked them, "Is a photon a particle or a wave?"
They would probably answer, "What is a photon?"
If stars are where astrologists say they are,
and photons have the amount of energy that physicists say they do,
then photons don't exist.
If those distant stars are sending out enough photons to reach Earth in great enough numbers for us to clearly see, then each star is putting out so much energy that nearby planets would be destroyed.
But, we clearly see the stars, and our planet is not being destroyed by our sun, which we assume is a star, so, what is wrong with our understanding?
Our assumptions:
- We believe our sun is a star.
- We believe that the stars are light years away (even the closest ones).
- We believe the stars we can see are in the Milky Way Galaxy, and that other galaxies and their stars are further away than that.
- We believe that light travels forever unless it runs into something.
- We believe that light is made up of photons.
- We believe that light travels at the speed of light.
- We believe that photons travel at near the speed of light. (there is arguments over this)
- We believe that photons have a tiny amount of mass. (or energy)
All of these are assumptions and cannot be proven right now.
No, really, the stars could be theater lights hung from the firmament. We don't know, we haven't been out there to see. We can only say what we see with our eyes, binoculars and telescopes.
Even the vaunted Theory of Relativity has only the most threadbare evidence. (which can be explained by other theories)
That many photons would destroy everything nearby
Alpha Centauri is believed to be 4¼ light years away.
And, you and your friend are standing 1 meter apart gazing at Proxima Centauri.
A light year is defined as 9,460,730,472,580,800 meters
We put that into a calculator to find the angle tanθ = opposite/adjacent
and we find out the calculator cannot handle numbers that small. Nor work out the arcTan of it.
So, we are just going to have to imagine a photon in each meter of space in all the space 4¼ light years from Proxima Centauri.
And then, imagine all of those photons leaving the star at the same time. Imagine any planet close to that star being hit with so many photons that all you could see is bright white. The seas would boil, the rocks would boil, anything would be obliterated. And if not, would be sent hurtling away from the star. (Physicists have noted that photons hitting an object is a measurable force, and thus, our ideas of solar sails)
And this is math from the closest star to us. It is horrifyingly worse for stars further away.
Surface area of a sphere is 4πr². If you increase the radius from 4¼ light years, to 8½ for the next nearest stars, then you increase the area that photons have to fill by 4 times. 4 times as many photons needed. And we have only a small list of stars within 20 light years.
So, which of our assumptions are wrong? It could be all of them.
It could even be the entire notion of photons.
Maybe photons do not exist.
We talk about photons being waves. (what a strange statement)
If you go down to the beach, you can see waves. Can you take a bucket and get a bucket full of wave? No, you just end up with a bucket full of water, and nothing resembling a wave.
If you go out into the surf, you can feel the force of a wave moving past you, or use it to propel you on a surfboard.
So, a wave is a force that moves through the medium.
Light definitely seems to be a force (it can be measured in several ways, including the CCD in your camera), but we don't have a medium that it moves through. We used to define that medium as the Luminiferous Aether. But, Modern Materialistic Physicists disproved that with the smallest number of tests, and only testing on Aether theory, and still, found something, and called it nothing. So, they say that the Aether doesn't exist. (maybe they are wrong)
If the photon is a wave, in the Aether, then it really doesn't exist. Just like the waves down at the beach don't really exist. And then the thing we are calling a photon is just the leading edge of a wave/packet. (we don't have good words for a single wave)
And, if so, then this solves our problems of us seeing Proxima Centauri whenever, and wherever we look up at the sky (as long as it is dark, and it is the correct season, and the clouds aren't in the way) We are each seeing a part of a wave that is radiating out. The wave is everywhere. Just like the wave exist all up and down the coast simultaneously.(-ish)
There are all kinds of other characteristics of light that make the idea of photons rather absurd. Things like polarization and shadows. (look at the shadows cast through leaves from a partial eclipse. All the shadows are tiny crescents.)
We lose a lot of understanding when we try to force light into being a particle.
But, that is what Modern Materialistic Science has to do. They have particles on the brain. Everything has to be a particle. Gravity, magnetics, all particles. Even if we have never seen these particles. Or logically, they shouldn't exist.
It is really time that we give other universe models a try. Like the Electric Universe Models. There were so many ideas and theories about the Aether just 100 years ago. We should really dust off some of those and start doing more tests.
The ideas of a photon being a particle really get into more and more ludicrous explanations. But, to just discard the idea of a photon being a particle is verboten in Modern Materialistic Science.
Science that won't allow scientists to go where the evidence leads them is not science.