Understanding the Ether Test: Scientists' Determination and Implications

[Eepl]

How I understand how scientists determined if there was ether or not was through a test. This test was to send light from the equator to the north pole and to send light an equal distance along the equator.

If there was to be ether then the photon traveling along the equator would take longer to reach it's destination because it would be traveling through more ether. But it took the same amount of time for the photon to reach bolth sites.

But did the scientists calculate that there mesuring instruments were also going slower on the equator.

The person traveling on the equator would be aging slower then the person on the north pole, because there is more space in the space-time continuum along the equator. So if it took the photon "relativly" the same amount of time to reach bolth sites then wouldn't it have actually gone slower along the equator like the scientists thought it would?

Sorry, had it on my mind and needed a good opion.

 

[meteor]

I don't know what experiment are you speaking about, but the scientists concluded the no existence of ether thanks to the Michelson-Morley experiment, that uses the Michelson interferometer. This instrument has two arms separated by an angle of 90 degrees, and each arm measures 1.2 m long. You enter light in the instrument and split the beam, so some rays go through one arm, and other rays through the other arm. The beams of light, after bouncing in the end of the arm, rejoin where they were split, and form and interference pattern in a screen. If there's ether, the rays of one arm will arrive to the screen before the rays of the other arm, and the interference formed will be destructive. It happened that the interference formed was constructive

 

[Eepl]

If there was ether then traveling back would have alowed the photon to travel faster then normal, therefore equalizing the effect and there would be no measuable time difference. Like an airplane traveling against 100mph winds then traveling with them. The speed would have been taken away on the way there, but added back traveling with the wind. It will be imposible for us to actually and literally test for ether, because the universe has this strange equalibrium where as everything is "relative."

 

[meteor]

One ray goes in the direction of the advancement, and the other ray goes perpendicular to the direction of the advancement.
If light goes in a fix velocity through the ether, the ray that was sent in the direction of the advancement will arrive before to the screen because since the ray was sent, the screen has also advanced in that direction

 

[Eepl]

Sorry dude, I reread your post and got it. Please refer to my reply edit above.

 

[meteor]

Er...I was confused. If there's ether,the beam that travels perpendicular to the movement of the interferometer arrives first to the screen. Here's an explanation of the Michelson-Morley experiment
http://en2.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michelson-Morley_experiment

 

[Eepl]

In the last 24hrs. I have quite a stroke of luck. My friend emailed me an idea that I am now working with.

I finally see the problem at hand.
-No scientist has ever really tryed to define ether. This is why all tests have come up with no real answer. On the website that you posted it said that there was the "most famous screw-up" or something like that. I am now in the prosses of further defining space-time. This will also explain what "ether" is and what scientists were looking for.

I hope to have this written up, and you may see it in the near future in "Theory Development".

Oh... I highly sugest The Universe in a Nut Shell by Stephan Hawking. The way that he explains the universe still leaves it greatly open to possability, but still in the relm of reality.