- #1
curioso
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I am not a physicist but I do have a non-mathematical science background and I am a serious physics appreciator. I am new to this site and have a pressing question I would like to ask a physicist.
High school and even college level physics texts desribe the reflection and refraction of light as bouncing and bending phenomena respectively. But how can this be? At the quantum level do photons really "bounce" off of electron clouds -- and do the paths of individual photons really "bend" as they move from one transparent medium into another. I find this a little hard to swallow.
Are these phenomena not really absorption and re-emission events?
Thanks.
High school and even college level physics texts desribe the reflection and refraction of light as bouncing and bending phenomena respectively. But how can this be? At the quantum level do photons really "bounce" off of electron clouds -- and do the paths of individual photons really "bend" as they move from one transparent medium into another. I find this a little hard to swallow.
Are these phenomena not really absorption and re-emission events?
Thanks.