6
2 The Ether and the Wave Equation
through an undiscovered mechanical medium called ether, as sound waves moved
through the air. The last step was ‘only’ to experimentally discover this mechanical
transport medium for electromagnetic waves. This, however, could not be achieved.
The experiments reached new levels of cunning, and the explanations for their negative results became more complex and complicated. The climax of these attempts
was reached with the decade long experiments made by A. A. Michelson. Using an
inventive experimental arrangement dating back to J. C. Maxwell, here one tried
to use the interference of light itself to prove the state of motion of the ether. The
idea and the principle construction of the Micheson experiments will be discussed in
Chap. 24. A modern SRT test experiment using the Mössbauer effect is described by
D. C. Champeney, G. R. Isaak and A. M. Khan [9], cf. also E. Liebscher [57]. We
refer also to M. P. Haugan’s and C. M. Will’s [39] review article on modern SRT
test experiments on the occasion of the hundred year jubilee of the publication of
A. A. Michelson’s and E. W. Morley’s [65] famous paper in the Am. J. Sci. Here,
we wish to remark that the first successful measurements were made by Michelson
in 1881 in a cellar of the Astrophysical Observatory in Potsdam-Babelsberg; please
refer to the documentation of U. Bleyer et al. [5].
No less a person than Maxwell, the inventor of the theory of electromagnetic phenomena, was for the whole of his life very convinced of the existence of a mechanical
ether as a carrier of electromagnetic waves. Even the young Einstein was until 1901
of the same conviction; see A. Pais [71]. However, all attempts failed. The search
for the ether was like a never-ending expedition. The explorer was like a lost man
in the desert, who would, in the search for escape keep stumbling across his old
footprints. The ether was a physicist’s nightmare from which they were awakened in
1905 by Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity. This historical date finally liberated
Maxwellian electrodynamics once and for all from the domination of mechanics.
It in fact became a self-sufficient theory. Moreover, the laws for the propagation of
electromagnetic waves now became the key for a new comprehension about space
and time. The principles of electrodynamics became the new fundamental of theoretical physics. The field of acoustics was now in comparison suddenly just a storm
in a tea cup. The electromagnetic waves now had a higher priority than the acoustic
waves. A scapegoat had to be found and made responsible for the wasted years. The
scapegoat was the ether. Even though Einstein [12, 13] in 1920 warned the physicists
not to start a witch hunt, they denied it not only its mechanical civic rights of a state
of motion, and they also declared the ether for non-existent and even went as far as
to remove the term ether from the dictionary.
We will now turn our thoughts to those physical properties that all waves possess,
independent of their physical nature be they electromagnetic or acoustic.
The transportation of energy is of central importance for physics and engineering.
We can store chemical energy in a certain material form, e.g. coal, petrol, a battery,
etc. These materials can be transported to the place where we want to extract the
energy. Such transport systems like pipelines or oil transports and transportation via
rail or via road need to be controlled and if necessary renewed or repaired.
However, energy is transported by waves in a completely different manner. Each
wave is loaded with a certain amount of energy which is transported through a
2 The Ether and the Wave Equation
through an undiscovered mechanical medium called ether, as sound waves moved
through the air. The last step was ‘only’ to experimentally discover this mechanical
transport medium for electromagnetic waves. This, however, could not be achieved.
The experiments reached new levels of cunning, and the explanations for their negative results became more complex and complicated. The climax of these attempts
was reached with the decade long experiments made by A. A. Michelson. Using an
inventive experimental arrangement dating back to J. C. Maxwell, here one tried
to use the interference of light itself to prove the state of motion of the ether. The
idea and the principle construction of the Micheson experiments will be discussed in
Chap. 24. A modern SRT test experiment using the Mössbauer effect is described by
D. C. Champeney, G. R. Isaak and A. M. Khan [9], cf. also E. Liebscher [57]. We
refer also to M. P. Haugan’s and C. M. Will’s [39] review article on modern SRT
test experiments on the occasion of the hundred year jubilee of the publication of
A. A. Michelson’s and E. W. Morley’s [65] famous paper in the Am. J. Sci. Here,
we wish to remark that the first successful measurements were made by Michelson
in 1881 in a cellar of the Astrophysical Observatory in Potsdam-Babelsberg; please
refer to the documentation of U. Bleyer et al. [5].
No less a person than Maxwell, the inventor of the theory of electromagnetic phenomena, was for the whole of his life very convinced of the existence of a mechanical
ether as a carrier of electromagnetic waves. Even the young Einstein was until 1901
of the same conviction; see A. Pais [71]. However, all attempts failed. The search
for the ether was like a never-ending expedition. The explorer was like a lost man
in the desert, who would, in the search for escape keep stumbling across his old
footprints. The ether was a physicist’s nightmare from which they were awakened in
1905 by Einstein’s Special Theory of Relativity. This historical date finally liberated
Maxwellian electrodynamics once and for all from the domination of mechanics.
It in fact became a self-sufficient theory. Moreover, the laws for the propagation of
electromagnetic waves now became the key for a new comprehension about space
and time. The principles of electrodynamics became the new fundamental of theoretical physics. The field of acoustics was now in comparison suddenly just a storm
in a tea cup. The electromagnetic waves now had a higher priority than the acoustic
waves. A scapegoat had to be found and made responsible for the wasted years. The
scapegoat was the ether. Even though Einstein [12, 13] in 1920 warned the physicists
not to start a witch hunt, they denied it not only its mechanical civic rights of a state
of motion, and they also declared the ether for non-existent and even went as far as
to remove the term ether from the dictionary.
We will now turn our thoughts to those physical properties that all waves possess,
independent of their physical nature be they electromagnetic or acoustic.
The transportation of energy is of central importance for physics and engineering.
We can store chemical energy in a certain material form, e.g. coal, petrol, a battery,
etc. These materials can be transported to the place where we want to extract the
energy. Such transport systems like pipelines or oil transports and transportation via
rail or via road need to be controlled and if necessary renewed or repaired.
However, energy is transported by waves in a completely different manner. Each
wave is loaded with a certain amount of energy which is transported through a