Electromagnetic radiation and photons

AI Thread Summary
Light is perceived as both wave energy and particle motion, while other forms of electromagnetic radiation are primarily viewed as waves due to their lower energy levels. All electromagnetic radiation, including microwaves and radio waves, exhibits both wave-like and particle-like properties, but the particle nature is more detectable at higher frequencies like visible light and gamma rays. The dual nature of all particles, including electrons and protons, supports this concept. As the frequency of electromagnetic radiation increases, the particle characteristics become more apparent, while wave aspects become less detectable. This highlights the complexity of electromagnetic radiation and its behavior across the spectrum.
Geo212
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Why is light viewed as both wave energy and particle motion, whereas other forms of electromagnetic radiation is only seen as waves? Light is just a small part of the spectrum, so, surely all electromagnetic radiation should be viewed in the same way.
 
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All electromagnetic radiation is both particulate and wave like in nature. In fact all particles ( electrons , protons...) are also wave like in nature at the same time. Everything has a dual nature.
 
As has been said, all EMR is composed of EM waves that interact through photons. This particle nature of EMR is most easily detected at higher frequencies such as visible light, UV, X-Rays, and gamma rays where the energy of each photon is easily detected. In the lower frequencies, such as microwaves and radio waves, the particle nature of light is not able to be detected since the energy of each photon is much to low to detect individual photons. You could say that as the frequency of the EMR increases, it becomes easier to detect the particle aspects and harder to detect the wave aspects.
 
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