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Cosmic Lollipop
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- TL;DR Summary
- Does medium permittivity change the speed of light?
Based on Maxwell equations, we can determine the speed of light as:
$$c=\frac{1}{\sqrt{\epsilon_{0}\mu_{0}}}$$
Where ##\epsilon_{0}## is the electric permittivity of vacuum and ##\mu_{0}## is the magnetic permittivity of vacuum. This notation makes me believe that in other mediums those parameters can acquire other values, implying that the speed of an electromagnetic wave changes depending on the medium and that goes against Einstein's second postulate of special relativity. What am I missing?
$$c=\frac{1}{\sqrt{\epsilon_{0}\mu_{0}}}$$
Where ##\epsilon_{0}## is the electric permittivity of vacuum and ##\mu_{0}## is the magnetic permittivity of vacuum. This notation makes me believe that in other mediums those parameters can acquire other values, implying that the speed of an electromagnetic wave changes depending on the medium and that goes against Einstein's second postulate of special relativity. What am I missing?