- #1
peter.ell
- 43
- 0
I know that the law of conservation of energy is not violated by either complete destructive interference or capillary action, but I'm curious then what happens to the energy and where it comes from in these cases, since I can't figure it out.
Consider the case of complete destructive interference by either anti-reflective coatings or active noise canceling headphones. In both cases, two waves interfere completely destructively so as to cancel each other out, and the energy is not simply redistributed to areas of constructive interference because there are none. So what happens to the energy?
And in the case of capillary action, where does the energy come from? Is it all just from the potential energy of the intermolecular forces? If so, than that would mean that water molecules at the top of a tree have less intermolecular forces than water at the bottom, but I doubt this. Plus, the fact that energy must not only bring the water up the tree, but the fact that this water now has gravitational potential energy means that the energy from the upward moving water must be equal to the energy required to move up the tree PLUS all the gravitational potential energy that it will be able to exert if it suddenly fell from the top. Where does all this come from?
Thank you. I know I'm not thinking about this correctly, so I appreciate you enlightening me.
Consider the case of complete destructive interference by either anti-reflective coatings or active noise canceling headphones. In both cases, two waves interfere completely destructively so as to cancel each other out, and the energy is not simply redistributed to areas of constructive interference because there are none. So what happens to the energy?
And in the case of capillary action, where does the energy come from? Is it all just from the potential energy of the intermolecular forces? If so, than that would mean that water molecules at the top of a tree have less intermolecular forces than water at the bottom, but I doubt this. Plus, the fact that energy must not only bring the water up the tree, but the fact that this water now has gravitational potential energy means that the energy from the upward moving water must be equal to the energy required to move up the tree PLUS all the gravitational potential energy that it will be able to exert if it suddenly fell from the top. Where does all this come from?
Thank you. I know I'm not thinking about this correctly, so I appreciate you enlightening me.