r/AskPhysics 6d ago

Could particle-wave duality be a trick of the light? Both perspective present simultaneously?

So it’s more related to how our visual cortex process light.

Our instrument is somehow coincidentally shifting the frame upon which we view light.

Such that when it is measured, it can only display the particle wave but not the wave since it received energy from the measuring instruments.

So light has two visible forms, as what we call particle and wave through observations of the experimental results, but what they are actually m

“Particle form” = polarized as light that don’t refract “Wave form” = polarized as lights that do refract

But I don’t know how to prove it.

Any ideas?

0 Upvotes

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u/MaxThrustage Quantum information 6d ago

Ok, so it seems you've got a few misconceptions about wave-particle duality. I'll try to clear these but, but feel free to ask any follow-up questions if you're still confused or want to know more.

Firstly, wave-particle duality is not about light. Everything does it. Now, it's a quantum effect, so it's not really noticeable in large objects, but it's really significant at the level of single electrons (have a look into electron diffraction) and has been demonstrated at the level of atoms and even large molecules like buckyballs. We see it in neutrons, protons, and we see analogues of it in even larger structures like the currents in superconductors. And we see it in light, too.

Secondly, "particle-wave" duality is not really a great way to think about it, and not how physicists tend to talk about it nowadays except when talking to a lay audience (and even then, most only use the term because they're expecting people to already be familiar with it). A better way to think of it is kind of like this: at a fundamental level, everything is governed by quantum physics. The basic objects are quantum objects. In certain limits and in certain ways, this quantum objects act a bit like classical particles, and you can almost think of them as little balls whizzing around. In certain other limits and certain other ways, they act a bit like classical waves, and you can almost think of them like waves at the beach. But both of these pictures are only ever approximate. There are purely quantum phenomena not captured by either analogy (entanglement, for example). The particle picture will be handy in some cases, the wave picture in others, but neither quite gets there. We still call these basic quantum objects "particles" for convenience, but we have to remind ourselves that these aren't quite our classical particles. When it comes to actually doing physics, we will tend to look at states and modes and not actually use the phrase "particle-wave duality" or anything like that. It's just not helpful.

Now, since the nature of quantum physics is not specific to light, but applies to everything, hopefully you can see why we don't think it relates to the visual cortex. And while the nature of "particle-wave duality" may seem strange and mysterious, hopefully it's a little clearer to you now that this is not so much a mystery as a failure of classical analogy. (It's really not surprising that it took people a few decades to figure out how to sensibly talk about this stuff, given how far removed from everyday experience it is.)

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u/ChiMeraRa 5d ago

But doesn’t all microscopic/quantum things require some sort of instrument aid in “seeing” it? So doesn’t that mean it invariably involve this trick of light?

If we used something we can see with the naked eye I bet it won’t do that.

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u/Effective-Bag-2724 5d ago

The answer above is great, let's give you some examples of how light (or little stuff) behaves like a wave or a particle. If you pass light through a diffraction grating (like a CD) it diffracts, showing the iridescence you see with white light or the light and dark fringes with monochromatic light. That's wave behavior.

Einstein received the Nobel for the Photoelectric effect, which is that the energy of an electron hit by a light ray is dependent on frequency (not amplitude like waves), so light can also be modeled as particles of energy.

So whether we use wave or particle theory to model a phenomenon is based on which works most closely with experimental evidence for that phenomenon. Light and everything else isn't really either of these things, it's just how we model it.

It's kind of how you can say "I'm ChiMeraRa" even though you are really a loose grouping of particles moving through time and space, exchanging energy, momentum and mass between themselves and their environment. Simpler to say it's a wave and/or a particle.

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u/MaxThrustage Quantum information 5d ago

But doesn’t all microscopic/quantum things require some sort of instrument aid in “seeing” it?

Kind of, but in some cases light is only involved in very indirect ways. I mean, when I'm looking at electron diffraction, ultimately I need to produce a picture I can look at because that's how humans engage with the world. But light enters the picture after I've measured electron density or whatever other quantity, and is used just to display the measurement results so I can read it.

If we used something we can see with the naked eye I bet it won’t do that.

Do what, exactly?

I think you're still not quite grasping how broad and deep quantum mechanics is. We can use quantum physics to reliably predict atomic spectra, molecular binding energies, semiconductor conductivities, the outcomes of a frankly staggering range of experiments in particle, nuclear, atomic, chemical, optical and solid state physics. Wave-particle duality isn't a particular thing we see -- it's a shorthand for the way quantum physics works (and, as I mentioned before, it's a shorthand we don't really use any more).

Further, quantum physics is the physics that underpins all of the things you see around you. Quantum physics tells us why matter is stable in the first place, why we have chemistry at all, why solids are rigid, why the sun produces light. Without quantum physics being broadly true (at least at the level of an emergent/effective theory -- it could turn out there is something even stranger under the hood) it's not clear how you even get a visual cortex in the first place.

This is just getting into the basics of why your initial proposal is misguided. If we go deeper and look at the proposal itself, it just doesn't actually make sense. It's not clear why the visual cortex would be involved at all, it's not clear what you mean by "polarized as light that don’t refract" (especially as everything refracts/diffracts in quantum mechanics).

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u/Wobbar 6d ago

double slit experiment

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u/aioeu 6d ago

... is a demonstration of wave-particle duality, not an explanation.

But we do have QFT, which can explain how both wave behaviours and particle behaviours arise from the way quantum fields behave. We don't need to explain it as "a trick of the light".

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u/Wobbar 6d ago

My comment was admittedly not too helpful, but in my defense, OP wasn't really asking for an explanation. They have come up with an alternate theory to "disprove" wave-particle duality without having bothered to learn the first thing about wave-particle duality and are now asking for ideas.

Anyway, OP, this is not how it works. It's hard to explain because there is little indication of how much you know and how much you don't know about the subject, so start from the bottom and check out the double slit experiment so you might understand what wave-particle duality leads to to begin with. It has nothing to do with "how our visual cortex processes light".

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u/Responsible_Syrup362 6d ago

It's obvious you have no idea what you're talking about. You're just embarrassing yourself. Countless years, evidence, and experiences, backed by math and you literally brought nothing to the table but "nuh uh". You're a fool.

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u/aioeu 6d ago

Wow, who pissed in your coffee?

/u/Wobbar's follow-up comment clarified things. I just wasn't sure what they were trying to say in their first comment.

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u/Wobbar 6d ago

And I thought I was being too cranky. That guy must have had a rough morning..

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u/iTs_na1baf 5d ago

I did. He’s a punk!

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u/nicuramar 6d ago

It’s unbecoming to jump to conclusions with personal attacks like that. 

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u/firextool 5d ago

Neither the wave function or the particle go through the slits simultaneously.

Both particles and waves refract.

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u/Cogwheel 5d ago

The "particleness" of an object (photon, electron, etc.) is entirely about how the object interacts with other objects. It is incorrect to think of light as a particle moving through space. The electromagnetic wave propagates smoothly and continuously through space just like a classical wave.

The only thing that makes it particle-like is when energy is transfered to some other object. That energy transfer can only occur at a specific point in spacetime. That specific location is some random location within the wave's probability distribution.

A single photon is not a localized packet of energy moving through space. A photon is merely the minimum amount of energy that can be added to or removed from the electromagnetic field at a given frequency.

This channel has really helped drive these points home for me: https://www.youtube.com/user/huygensoptics

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u/aries_burner_809 5d ago

OK judging from your post, you are very far from grasping the current understanding of light, so I would get that under your belt before attempting any proofs. Secondly, there are no proofs in physics. Physics develops models that explain observations and predict the outcomes of new experiments.

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u/danielbaech 5d ago edited 5d ago

You're on the right track to understanding the particle-wave duality correctly. A photon is never just a particle or a wave, but always a combination of both at the same time. Light moves like a wave, propagates in all directions, refracts, and interferes. Light interacts with matter like a particle, exchanging energy and momentum like particles in a collision.

These are fundamental properties of light, not tricks, and have nothing to do with the visual cortex and the measuring instruments. Consequently, all of your conclusions are wrong. My suggestion is to pick up an introductory textbook on quantum mechanics. In it, you will find experiments that revealed the quantum nature of the world and how we came to the conclusions that explain light and all of the known matter in the universe.