God does not play dice ~Albert Einstein Einstein, stop telling God what to do! ~Niels Bohr This is part three of a multi-part series on quantum mechanics. In part one, I discussed how we discovered that light is both a wave and a particle. The dual nature of light suggests that massive particles like electrons might be waves too. In part two, I gave a theoretical underpinning to the dual nature of electrons: treating electrons as waves completes the Bohr Model of the atom and explains the Rydberg Formula. However, legendary physicist Richard Feynman once said: It doesn’t matter
quantum mechanics
Physics / Quantum Mechanics / Science And Math
Unreal Truths: Matter Waves and the Bohr Model of the Atom
Everything we call real is made of things that cannot be regarded as real ~Niels Bohr This is the second part of a multi-part series on quantum mechanics. In part one, I described and motivated particle-wave duality for light. I demonstrated that light waves are also particles (photons). But does this duality go the other way? Are particles like electrons also waves? As I hinted last time, the answer is yes. These are called matter waves, and their story is very interesting. The Mystery of the Emission Spectrum Last time, I discussed the emission spectrum of hydrogen, and the
Physics / Quantum Mechanics / Science And Math
The Charming Doubleness: Particle-Wave Duality
But the beauty here lay in the duality, in the charming doubleness… ~ Thomas Mann (Felix Krull) I apologize to those of you who have requested a topic. The current requests are all pretty in-depth and I want some time to think about how to explain them properly. So, in a bid to buy time, I’m going to do a multi-part series on quantum mechanics. In this part, I’ll describe some of the experimental results motivating the fundamental principle of quantum mechanics: particle wave duality. As amazing as it may seem, quantum mechanics tells us that every particle is