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Bhumrapee Bhum Soonjun

Ms.Orana Meenongwha

English 10/1002

May 23/2018

Relativity and Quantum Mechanics

Introduction

In the recent decades, because of the development of new technology, science had advanced rapidly

and was able to offer physicists a significant opportunity to observe more of the universe. Physicist

nowadays tries to answer this one question; how do things exist as we see it? There have been many

development and proposal of the theory behind the creation of the universe. In the early days, people still

believe that life was created by God and Earth is the center of the universe. As time passed by scientist had

introduced the new theory that better explain the universe. Copernicus, a Renaissance-era mathematician,

provided a new model of our system that placed the Sun at the center of the solar system, rather than the

Earth. Newton, for instance, formulated his laws of motion and gravitation, which give us the picture of

how the motion and the gravity works. In this research paper, the researcher will compare and introduce

the audience to the general and fundamental idea of the classical physics, relativity and quantum mechanics.

Physics nowadays have two schools of thoughts in explaining the universe: one believes in the

Relativity and the other being completely opposite, in term of application, Quantum mechanics. In the 20th

century, one of the most famous physicists of all time, Albert Einstein, formulated his special relativity

theory, which is used to explain motions in the inertial frame. Later in 1915, he proposed the theory of

general relativity which describes the motion of the accelerating objects, including gravity. This is one of

the most successful theories of all time, special relativity had laid the groundwork for another scientist to

develop theory in order to explain how the universe began. Before Edwin Hubble’s observation the 1929
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people believe that we are living the static universe; however, the observation had shown that the redshift

occurring, which mean the galaxy the traveling apart from each other, therefore this can only mean that the

universe is expanding. With this knowledge, Einstein dropped his static universe model and proposed a

new one, the expanding universe model. This led a Belgian scientist named Georges Lemaître to proposed

the big bang theory based on Einstein expanding universe model and his general relativity. In the classical

theory, including general relativity and special relativity, deals with the explanation of the movement of the

massive object such as a star, gravity and etc.

On the other side, Werner Heisenberg, Max Born, and Pascual Jordan developed matrix mechanics

and the Austrian physicist Erwin Schrödinger which develop the quantum mechanics field. Unlike the

classical theory, quantum has to do with very tiny objects, particles. Rather than the Big Bang Theory,

quantum mechanics physicist supports another theory such as string theory, or in some case has no

beginning at all. These two can be said as competing for the field in physic. When one tries to apply their

knowledge in the other field, their equation contradicted and collapsed. In the same time the classical

physicist also doesn’t like the idea of universe being created with probability that can’t be predicted,

Einstein was the main protagonist of this and announced that “God doesn’t play dices”, on the other hand,

quantum physicist don’t like the idea of the universe began with a big bang singularity, because the mass

of the universe at that time would be infinitely dense and small with very high temperature, which relativity

can’t be applied because it is too small, which this fall into quantum mechanics field, because of the

inconsistency of the big bang theory scientist had proposed other theory that explains the origin of the

universe. This leads us to two main underlying frameworks of physic nowadays.

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The development of special relativity: The two postulates

In the development of the special relativity theory, Einstein begins by accepting what is true which

is known as the two postulate, first the invariance of the law of physic to all of the observers and second

the invariance of the speed of light, meaning they are travelling at a constant speed. First thing first lemme

give you some background theory that was proposed before the time of Einstein, the earlier theory first. In

the renaissance times, one of the most well-known Italian physicist, Galileo Galilei had introduced science

with the modern study of a mechanic, the study of motion, which required the quantitative measurement of

the moving body through space and time. This led to fundamental ideas such as, velocity, the rate at which

an object or body cover a distance in a direction per units of time, acceleration, the rate of change in the

velocity, masses, quantity of matter in the body regardless of its volume or any forces that is acting upon it

while, force is a push or pull on a body.

Later on, in the 17th century, another scientist, Sir Isaac Newton formulated his laws of motion,

with the first law to be remained true in the special relativity. Newton’s first law is named Law of Inertia.

It stated that the body in motion will stay in motion unless it was acted upon by an external force and, an

object at rest will stay at rest unless it was acted upon by an external force, which we can deduce that the

body that is not acted upon external force will undergo zero acceleration, which means remaining rest or

continue to move at a constant velocity in the straight direction. Newton also defined space and time to be

absolute, that is not affected by anything external. He stated that time “flows equably”, while space

“remains always similar and immovable”. Moreover, Newton’s work also provides a framework for his law

of gravity. It began with the mythical observation of the falling apple. Then the moon’s orbit came into his

consideration. Newton, therefore, concludes that there must be some invisible force acting between the Sun

and its planets. He formulated the mathematical equation that governs and explain the gravitational force,

which states that everything objects in the universe attract each other with a force that varies proportionally

with the masses of an object and inversely proportional to the distance, squared, between them, the greater

masses the greater the attraction (Newton, 1687).

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However, there is no theory that governs the mysterious behaviour of the speed of light at that time.

It has puzzled philosophers and scientists for many decades. In 1873, Scottish scientist James Clerk

Maxwell demonstrated light is an electromagnetic wave with oscillating electrical and magnetic

components (See model 1.1.1, page 25). Maxwell’s equation predicted that electromagnetic waves would

travel through a vacuum at the merely speed of nearly 3 x 10 to the power of 8 (300,000 m /s) Maxwell J.

C. (1865) A Dynamical Theory of the Electromagnetic Field. However, as this might answer one of the

questions, it had raised another question. If the light is a wave which medium support its movement? As

we seen from the ocean wave and also sound waves, the sound waves travel through the medium which is

called air. It has to be remembered that particle does not travel along with the waves, only energy do, it is

also to be noted that sound waves are a form of energy. So, what exactly vibrate allows the lights to moves.

At that time, it was thought to travel through the medium known as aether, ether. The ether is assumed to

be everywhere and it doesn’t disturb the motion of the star, however, it has to be more rigid than metal so

the light wave can travel through it at very high speed. In anyways, it this seemed to have a contradiction

however, it still seems essential at that time.

However, later in the 19th century an American, former German, physicist A.A. Michelson and

American chemist Edward Morley made a precise observation on measuring the effect of Earth’s motion

on the speed of light. In the classical mechanics, the movement of the Earth would add or subtract from the

measured speed of light waves. The result was the rather astonishing unexpected outcome, the speed of

light remained constant regardless of the Earth’s motion, Michaelson & Morley (1887) . This means that

ether had no purpose at all. This is catastrophic for classical physic, as the laws of classical physic can’t

explain why the speed of light doesn’t add to the of Earth. It leads to one of the most devastating problems

of all time, which later on it was resolved by Einstein’s theory of special relativity. For Einstein first

postulate, he requires the laws of physic to be the same for every observer. This formed a part of the special

relativity. Special relativity is a theory that defined the motion of the object or body in an inertial frame of

reference, the frame of reference (Einstein, 1905).

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In order for us to understand the special relativity, we have to understand some certain terms first.

Inertial frame of reference is the state in which the body is not accelerating, which mean having the constant

speed, or in simpler term the net force of all force that is acting upon an object is equal to zero, which mean

the body is not experiencing acceleration, the object can be either at rest or moving in a constant velocity

in a straight line. The other terms are the frame of reference, which should not be misunderstood with the

word inertial frame of reference, the frame of reference is used special relativity to specify the relationship

between the observer and the outside phenomenon that the observer observes. It is implied that the observer

is at rest.

Let’s start with the first postulate. In the first postulate, Einstein required the laws of physic to be

same for all of the observer in all frame of reference. It also needs to be noticed that there is nothing such

as absolute space and time, since we stand on the Earth which is orbiting on its own axis, which again orbits

the Sun, which the solar system is orbiting around the galaxy, which the galaxy is also moving apart,

therefore, we can derive from this fact that, there is nothing such as absolute space and time, there is only

relative space and time. This relative thing becomes useful in explaining the speed of objects because its

speed has to be measured by referring to something, the i.e. frame of reference. Therefore, we can conclude

that we are moving relative to one’s frame of reference. In the first postulate, the laws of physic are

conserved. For example, if one were to play table tennis on the train one would found that the ball obeys

the laws of physic just as if they were playing on the ground. It has to be noticed that the train is moving at

a constant velocity, which means non-accelerating.

The second postulate is that Einstein required the speed of light to be for all the same observer.

Einstein did a thought experiment, in German call the led a Gedankenexperiments. Einstein describes

himself at the age of 16 riding a light wave and look at, the other light wave. In classical mechanic, Einstein

should see that he is seeing the light wave at the speed of zero, as he was moving at relative to the light

wave at the same speed in the same direction. However, Einstein knew that the Maxwell equation would

require the speed of light to be 3 × 108 m/s in a vacuum. There is also another problem, if the observer

riding the speed of light see the other light wave having the speed of zero, this would mean that the speed
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of light, laws of electromagnetism, would depend on the observer, which is not allowed in the classical

physic, which stated that the law of the physics are the same for all of the observer.

To understand why the speed of light is invariance for all of the observer, we must merge the first

postulate with the second. As it is stated, the laws of physic should be same for every observer in the

universe, and in all frame of reference, Einstein sees not a single reason why the speed of light should not

also be universal. One possible explanation why the light is constant for all frame of reference is that, before

Einstein proposed his theory of special relativity, it was thought that there exist an absolute time and space.

So, our understanding of the universe was wrong, hence the equation which forms the basis for adding

velocity is also wrong. Newton, believe that space and time are absolute, that means space is immovable,

and time flows the same for everyone. Now let’s take this into consideration. Supposed that there are two

observers, one on the train moving north at the constant velocity of 100 km/hour, while the other is

stationary on the side track. After the train set out for an hour, a lightning struck a tree far away from the

initial position 200 km away. According to the Newton, both of the observers would measure time as an

hour, since time is absolute which implies that time flows the same for everyone. However, they would

disagree on the distance from an event. The observer on the train would see that the distance from an event

is 100 km, while the other would measure distance as 200 km. However, as the experiment had shown that

light has the constant speed no matter what.

In this sense it contradicts with Newton’s idea of space and time. Because speed is basically a

distance an object covers over time if the observer measure different distance means they do not agree on

the constancy of the speed of light, therefore one must abandon the idea of absolute space and time. Einstein

also sees another problem arose. The lightning wouldn’t travel to each of the observers at the same time.

Since the speed of light actually takes time to reach the different observer at a different position, one of the

observers would see the events first, in this case, the observer on the train. This is the problem of

simultaneity. Imagine a fixed observer observing two events at the same distance apart from him/her, one

would see the event at the same time, now let’s supposed that there is a moving observer moving behind

the fixed observer, the motion of the moving observer would bring him or her closer to one of the event,
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therefore seeing one the event happen before the other. Einstein, therefore, concludes that simultaneity is

relative, events that are simultaneous one person might not be for the others. With this reason, it led Einstein

to give up on the Galilean transformation and replace it with Lorentz transformation.

Addition of Velocity / The cosmic speed limits

Before the time of Einstein, in the classical physic, we use Galilean transformation to add up the

velocity of an object. When we are considering an object motion, we give the object coordinates relative to

the particular frame of reference. One can give an object position x being a function of time coordinate t.

Therefore, the transformation between the two inertial frame, (t,x) and (t’,x’), must be related to the velocity

u, which is associated with a linear transformation. As already stated, before the time of Einstein, people

believe that space and time are absolute. Because time is absolute, time flows equally for everyone,

therefore, we can deduce that t’ = t. So, the position of x and x’ is assumed to be x’ = x – ut. These are

called Galilean transformation. In this scenario, x is the distance to some specific event as measured by a

stationary observer, and x’ is the distance to some specific event as measured from a moving perspective

of a moving observer. T is a time at which the event takes place for both of the observers. In order to make

the speed of light constant, since it doesn’t follow this rule of addition of velocity, Einstein replaced this

equation with Lorentz transformation which limit the speed of an object that could be added up to, with the

maximum being, of course, the cosmic speed limit, the speed of light. He replaces time with this equation,
𝑥 1
𝑡 ′ = 𝛾(𝑡 − 𝑣 ), 𝛾 is a Lorentz factor, which 𝛾 is equivalent to 𝛾 = 𝑣2
. For space, he replaced it with
𝑐2 √1−𝑐2

𝑥 ′ = 𝛾(𝑥 − 𝑣𝑡). With these two new equation for relative space and time, Einstein derived a new equation

𝑢+𝑣 𝑥
for the addition law of velocity, 𝑢′ = 𝑢𝑣 . This equation was derived from 𝑡 = 𝛾 (𝑡 ′ + 𝑣 2 ) and 𝑥 =
1+ 2 𝑐
𝑐

Δ𝑥 𝑥 ′ +𝑣𝑡
𝛾(𝑥 ′ + 𝑣𝑡), since speed = , therefore we can write 𝑥 , gamma would just cancel out, then we have
Δ𝑡 𝑡 ′ +𝑣 2
𝑐

𝑥
+𝑣 𝑢+𝑣
𝑡′
𝑣 𝑥 , we then substitute the u in, we then have 𝑢𝑣 . In this sense, by the given definition, u and u’ is the
1+ 2 ×𝑡′ 1+ 2
𝑐 𝑐
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speed of any moving objects, as seen by the observer. V is the speed of one of the observer measured

relative to the others, and c is the speed of light. Under this circumstance, it makes sure that the second

postulate of the special relativity is true, because now when the speed of the train measure c that emit a

laser beam also at the speed of light c, will not add up to be 2c as in the Galilean transformation, instead it

will result with c, this confirm that no such thing can exceed the speed of light, when add together.

Some of these equations also leads to the ideas of length contraction and time dilations. Let’s

supposed that there are two person, one is stationary beside the platform, and the other sit on the train at the

speed of ½ of light, c, with a mirror opposite with him and a clock to measure time. Now let assumed that

the person on the train shine a light beam toward the mirror. For the observer on the train will find the light

beam will move toward the mirror and reflect back in a second. For the observer on the train everything

would just look the same. However, for the observer on the track, one would see that the light has travel a

greater distance in a second, since as the train is moving the light also travel with the train for the observer

on the platform would see that the light travel longer distance when compared to the stationary observer on

the train, but how could this be? Isn’t the speed of light the same for every observer? The answer lies under

the fact that the person on the train time dilate, one second for the observer on the train become longer,

therefore for the observer on the platform will see the moving observer clock ticks slower. Therefore, one

would find that as the second person move faster the longer it take for the time interval between each tick

on one’s clock. Therefore, time is relative and each of us have different measuring of time. However, it is

not only the time dilation that occur when you are moving, since only time dilation wouldn’t be enough to

maintain the speed of light something rather than time dilation must also take place, that is length

contraction. Length contraction will cause the train to be shorter for the observer on the platform, it is

having to be noted that length only contract in the direction you are moving forward to, such as right then

length will contract horizontally. The observer on the platform would then see the length of the train contract

proportionally to its speed. Time dilation and length contraction in fact does work together to help maintain

the speed of light to be constant.

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E = mc2

Why can we not travel faster than the speed of light? The speed of light can be said that its play an

infinite speed role in our universe. One cannot simply travel at the speed of light or faster than the speed of

light. This assumption mainly came from the most famous, and probably the most well-known, physic

equation of all time 𝐸 = 𝑚𝑐 2 . It implies, the mass and energy equivalence. This equation, 𝐸 = 𝑚𝑐 2 states

that we mass and energy are interchangeable. With this knowledge, it gave birth to the invention of the

most destructive weapon mankind ever created, the nuclear bomb, which was invented during WWII by

Robert Oppenheimer, known as the father of the atomic bomb. With little masses one, could get out so

many energies out of it, such that of the Sun, the sun uses it fuel, hydrogen and helium atom, to create

nuclear fusion, which convert it rest mass to energy. However, this equation also explains why no one can

travel faster than the speed of light. For one to travel at the speed of light, one has to be massless such as

photon , the light particle, we will discuss more about this in quantum mechanic section. When you move

faster more toward the speed of light, you gain more mass, inertial mass. Inertia is the resist in motion.

Which mean you required a bigger boost, for instance greater energy, to move into a new frame of reference,

Lorentz transformation. In order to achieve the speed of light would take infinite amount of energy, which

is basically impossible. However, this also predict not one can in fact travel faster than the speed of light,

if one were to travel faster than the speed of light one would find that time is running backward. This

𝑣2
equation was derived by, −E + KE2 = KE1 − E × (1 + ). From that equation we have, this,
2𝑐 2

1 1 𝑣2 𝐸
m𝑣 2 = m𝑣 2 − E+ . Then we cancel out some of the variables, m2 = m1 − . M2 – M1 = M,
2 2 2𝑐 2 𝑐2

𝐸
∴𝑀= or 𝐸 = 𝑚𝑐 2 .
𝑐2

Gravity
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The explanation of gravity come in later in 1915. Einstein published his paper on General Relativity, which

in this time describe the motion of accelerating objects or body, unlike special relativity that requires one

to be in an inertial frame, moving at a constant speed, hence no acceleration. Einstein came up with this

idea when he was sitting in his office, suddenly he thinks of himself in an elevator with the broken cable

accelerating downward toward the Earth. He would feel that he doesn’t have weight because the elevator

was falling at the same rate as his body, same speed. Any other object that is in the elevator will also fall at

the same speed, for example, if we release pen from our hand we would still found that it still falls at the

same velocity as us, because weight doesn’t matter. The only thing that makes some object that has low

masses appear to fall down at the slower rate than the other is because of air resistance, without air one

would found that every object accelerate exactly at the same instance, this was tested by a famous scientist

Galileo Galilei that he rolled down two metal balls with different weight, the result was that the two balls

exactly rolled down to a certain that is set in the same time confirming this principle.

Einstein also thought that if he were to look out outside the elevator one would find that he can’t

distinguish whether he is being pulled down or at rest in a gravitational field. Now lets us assume that there

are two holes in the elevator, let’s say that one shine a light through the first hole. When the elevator is at

rest the light shine through both hole as an observer by the passenger within the elevator and outside the

elevator. However, when the elevator is accelerating, the observer would see that the light beam misses the

second hole because by the time the light travels to the second hole, the elevator already moves upward.

For the observer within the elevator, one will find the light had followed a curved path through space,

therefore we can conclude that light move in a curved path within an accelerated system. And if the light

had followed a curved path in the accelerate system, according to the law of relativity, it should also be

bent in the gravity field. In relativity, Einstein stated that time and space are the connected, this is called

space-time.

Einstein uses an analogy that space-time is like a rubber sheet, they can be bend and they are

flexible. Instead of Newton who thought gravity as a force that exerts on the object proportionally to its
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masses and distance, Einstein says that when massive object bend space and time. The amount area that it

bends would depend on it masses. Let’s us use an analogy that, there is a rubber sheet hold tight by cables

on each side, like a trampoline, when one put a heavy object on the sheet, it bends the rubber down. With

that being said, when one put an object near the hole, the object accelerates in toward the middle point

where the heavy object is, this is how we can picture gravity in the theory of general relativity ( See model

1.1.2 also 1.1.3) .

Quantum Mechanics

Introduction to quantum mechanics

Over the 19th century, there has been a development of a theory known as Quantum

mechanics which was a built-up theory over time from physicist to physicist down a long

generation, the first one who to discover this is could be credited to Max Planck, and later followed

down a long list of names, such as Werner Heisenberg, Erwin Schrödinger, Albert Einstein and

many more. It has a variety of uses in nowadays technology from microscopic computer quantum

CPU to MRI scanning. It was one of the most confusing, magical and counter-intuitive fields of

all time, however, it was proved to be true and is necessary. It contradicts our everyday sense and

feels completely non-sense and unreliable for anyone that doesn’t understand it. Many scientists

already quit this field because of the facts that the whole key point of this field is made of

probability, and they don’t like it or it feel completely non-sense to them. Let’s say for example

that particles we didn’t observe can be every possible state, or we can’t know both of the

information at the same time, because of the Heisenberg principle of uncertainty. The cat is both

dead and alive at the same time until we observe it. So, what are this quantum thing and why it is

very important for our physic field?

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In the world of quantum mechanics, we are looking at very tiny particles, unlike relativity

that describes bigger objects. In this field, particles tend to do random and somewhat mysterious

things. They can exist in every possible state, which means its condition, its location, its velocity

and etc until we observe it. It can send information without even seeing each other, it can be from

one part of the universe to the exact opposite. It can occur in both places at the same time. There

is even smaller particle than proton and neutrons, Quarks, Gluon that acts as a glue, up and down

Quark that combine in a specific way to produce different particles. In the world of quantum

mechanics, one has to agree to the fact that everything is made up of probability. Unlike Einstein

that announced that God doesn’t play dice, it was quantum mechanics that believe that God does

play dices.

Quantum mechanics Ideas

Is light a particle or a wave?

This topic had been a long debate over time. In 1678, one of the Dutch scientist Christiann

Huygens publicizes his hypothesis that the light is transmitted in the form of a wave. Since the

light travel in form of the wave, there must be some medium, it was later suggested that the medium

was called “luminiferous aether”. As being stated, since light travel through any object and all

between the empty spaces, the “luminiferous aether” must then be presented everywhere in the

universe. However, there are some other scientists that were unconvinced by his hypothesis and

stated that light is, in fact, a particle, it was Newton who argued this. Around late 18 th century and

19th century Newton hypothesized that light must be particle because, if the light is particles when

it enters water we will see it bend as a result of particles attracting it, hence speeding them up.
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Another reason he provided is that when you step outside a sunny day, you would see your shadow

and if and only if the light is a wave your shadow would look fuzzy, which in turn our shadow

have sharp edge meaning they were made out of particles. Yet, it was his rival Robert Hooke to

convinced people that light is a wave. Later on, in the 19th century, the debated was kind of settled

by Thomas Young, who performed his well-known the double-slit experiment which disproves

Newton hypothesis, and supported Huygens that light is a particle. The experiment was composed

of a double-slit, sources of light and a background. When the light shines through the slits one

would expect that if the light is a wave then the wave would pass through both of the slit at the

same time, which implied that both waves that passed through would actually cancel itself out at

some specific point and form a bigger wave at some certain point. The area where the wave

combines and amplified itself is called constructive interference and where it cancels was called

destructive interference.

Let’s take the analogy of waves as an example, if there is only a source of wave one would

expect that the wave that is produced would travel out in all direction uniformly, regardless of

another factor, but if there are two sources of wave then we can see that at which some certain

point the wave will collide and either producing a bigger wave or cancel out leaving it with nothing.

If the light is a wave then this must be true, which turned out to be true that light cancels out at

some certain point creating a pattern over the board. However, in the late 19th century one of the

most famous experiment of all time and one that takes physicists into great deep consideration

about the behaviour of the light, the Michelson-Morley experiment.

As kind of stated before, the Michelson-Morley experiment hypothesized that if the light

was an eave it must then travel through the somewhat medium called aether, and if it travels

through aether it speed must add up at a certain angle of Earth travelling through space causing
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the speed of light to become faster. However, the result was quite shocking, it turned out that the

speed of light is constant to every observer in all frame of reference, in another word the speed of

light remained the same regardless of in which speed and direction we are moving, moving toward

or from it at certain speed would not affect the speed of light that we observed. Therefore, the so-

called mysterious substances aether must not exist, so how could light be a wave?

In the late 19th century, the answer of how the light propagates through space without

medium emerged from the laws of electromagnetism from Michael Faraday, also the inventor of

the dynamo. In 1831, Michael Faraday discovers a phenomenon which is known as induction. He

states that a moving electrical current induces magnetism and magnetism induce electrical

currents. Michael Faraday experiment depicts a link between electricity and magnetism.

Nonetheless, it wasn’t until 1865 that another scientist James Clerk Maxwell proposed his

theoretical model for electromagnetism and formulated his law of magnetism. He showed that

electrical current magnetic field oscillates and can propagate through space in a wave known as an

electromagnetic wave. Most importantly, he found that EM wave can propagate through empty

space, vacuum, at the velocity of 3 × 108 , exactly the same as the speed of light. It has to be

remember that light is just a little area of spectrum in the electromagnetic wave, also the frequency

of the electromagnetic wave doesn’t affect its speed but its energy. The light then was concluded

to be an electromagnetic wave, which is an oscillating electrical current and magnetic field that

can propagate through a vacuum without a medium.

However, in the 20th century another argument emerged from Albert Einstein that light is

a particle called photon and a flow of photons is a wave, and later Louis de Broglie that put an end

to the debate, he stated that all of the fundamental matter particle and light have somewhat called

the wave-particle duality, this also form the fundamental idea of quantum physic. The double-slit
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experiment was tested again, but now with a single photon, one would expected that if we emit

only a single photon through the double slit, we would expected that it would form a random

pattern on the board since we only shoot a single photon at a time there will be nothing to interfere

with, at first he experiment seemed to be true that it will exhibit a random pattern, however as we

add up the result over time we can see that it create a pattern exactly the same as we send the whole

wave through both slits which will interfere, which result in a certain pattern (See model 1.2.1 and

1.2.2 ). But how could this be, how could a single photon create a pattern as the same as a wave?

The answer is quite counter-intuitive but is proved to be true if we are talking in the quantum

world. The fact that a single photon also creates a pattern the same as light is because a photon

passes through both of the slit at the same instance. This doesn’t apply to only light particles, but

other particles such that of electron too. The same story and event also apply to it. Therefore, it

was concluded by Broglie that wave and particle exhibit same properties and is now call wave-

particles duality.

The photoelectric effect

In the late 19th century, a German scientist Heinrich Rudolf Hertz discovered a

phenomenon now known as the photoelectric effect. He observed that when an ultraviolet light,

one of the frequency range in the electromagnetic wave spectrum, shines on a metal electrode, an

electrode is an electrical conductor which bring one source of power, in this case, electricity, to

another body, with electrical current that runs across them, he found out that the light wave changes

the voltage at the sparking are, which also happened to be happening. However, the observation

could not be explained by classical physic, in a mean time this observation took place decades
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before Einstein proposed his special relativity and light theory in 1905 when it is fully resolved

and form a fundamental part in the quantum mechanics theory.

The photoelectric effect is a phenomenon in which the electrical charge particle, electrons,

are emitted from a material when it receives and absorbs the electromagnetic radiation, EM wave.

The observation really puzzles scientist for decades until it was resolved by a well-known born

German physicist Albert Einstein in 1905. The issue that was puzzling physicist for decades is

why only certain spectrum of light, its type, allow the electron to be emitted from one of the

electrodes to the other while the other spectrum doesn’t allow this? When Einstein proposed the

theory that light is not a wave and not also a particle but both which is called wave-packets.

Einstein view light as not a wave and not particle, if the light is a wave then according to wave

theory, classical physic, the amplitude of the EM wave is the amount of energy that it possess,

hence any frequency of light can cause the photoelectric effect. In theory, if we increase the

intensity of the light then we can make the photoelectric effect take place. However, it doesn’t turn

out to be true, therefore it can only explain that only a certain frequency of light can trigger the

phenomenon to take place. Instead of trying to explain this with classical theory, Einstein views

photon as a discrete energy packet called quanta. In order for an electron to leave its energy level,

one must provide enough energy. So if the photon were to act as a bridge it must have enough

energy to fill the gap and act as a bridge for them. Therefore the energy level of the light wave,

photons, would consider being up to the frequency, certain spectrum, and the energy level of a

photon can be expressed in this equation 𝐸 = ℎ𝑓, or energy level, Planck constant and frequency,

respectively (Planck & Einstein, 1905).

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Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle

The uncertainty principle was introduced to physic in 1927 by Werner Heisenberg, also

called Heisenberg’s uncertainty principle. It was one of the most fundamental ideas in quantum

physic. It was stated that one could not determine one exact particle position and its momentum at

the same time. Let’s start with the general idea, one can not know both a position and velocity of

a particle at the same instance in time, but why? The least confusing way to explain this is that

when you trying to measure one position of an object you must measure it by something, hence

when measuring a particle, which is very small compared to our daily experience right now, we

must use light. We can accomplish this by measuring the crest between the waves. According to

Maxwell quantum theory, one cannot use an arbitrary amount of energy to measure a position of

a particle, one must use at least a quantum. Now let’s take this into consideration if one wants to

measure the exact position of an object one must use more energy in order to achieve higher

frequency between the waves to measure the position more accurately. By this reason, if we

provide an energy towards a particle, that energy will disturb the particle and cause it to change its

velocity. Therefore the greater we know its position we have less knowledge of its velocity, and

vice versa (Heisenberg, 1927).

However, the discovery was much complicated than this. In quantum mechanics,

everything that exists in the universe behaves as a particle and also a wave in the same time, the

wave-particle duality. By definition, a particle is an object that exists in the universe at a point in

space in a given time. Waves on the other side is a disturbance, creating ripple-like looking. We

cannot determine the position of a wave and it also has a probability of being in any locations. One

thing we did know about wave is that we can measure it wavelength which is very essential in

quantum physics because it is closely related to the momentum. The greater the momentum of an
 SOONJUN 18

object has, the greater the frequency. Momentum is P = mv, or momentum is equal to mass time

velocity, respectively. The greater the velocity, the greater the momentum, this also applied for

mass. The greater the mass the greater the momentum one has, imagine a car driving very faster

down the street, one would say that it has also of momentum, also if one sees an elephant one

would also say that the elephant has a lot of momentum even though it is moving very fast, one

could easily think of momentum of how hard it is to stop an object, or to be exact quantity of a

motion that an object has . In general, if we can measure its wavelength, in this sense its frequency,

we can know its momentum, but not its speed. Since we cannot determine the position of the wave

we only know the probability of it existing somewhere at an instant in time. Now if we want to

know both the position of a particle and also the velocity, we must combine this two thing. When

we combine the wave we can see that in some region the wave crest will add up and in other

deconstruct, leaving us with regions of higher wave crest and others that don’t have anything at

all. Now if we want to know more about the position we must add up the wave until it narrows

down to what we can be exact. Now if we add waves up together, we can make a wave packet

which is a quantum object.

Now let’s take this into consideration, since wave is momentum, if we add up more wave

we do know more about it position but also in a meantime we know less of it momentum since we

have to add up more wave in order for us to see the outcomes, however if we want to know the

momentum of an object we need a bigger wave packet, hence a more probability of a particle can

be located in several different point in time, and vice versa. By this reason, quantum mechanics do

not predict an exact outcome, but instead many different possible outcomes.
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Elementary Particles and Forces

Quarks

From time to time, there is new discovery came up and yet more to be discovered, There

are many long arguments and debate in science that takes a century to clarify, elementary particles

is one of them. In the time of Aristotle, it was believed that everything in the universe was

composed of earth, water, fire and air. Aristotle also believed that all matter can be divided into

smaller piece indefinitely. However, as time passes we know that it is not true, other scientist

proposed it was made up of the atom. In Greek, atom means “indivisible”. In the early 19th century,

John Dalton provided an evidence that showed that atom comes together to form molecules, he

was also credited for the development of atomic structure model. Later on, as if it was already

suspected that atom can be divided further on, J.J Thompson, showed that there exists a matter

called electron, a cloudy like matter that surrounds the atom, as time passes we Earnest Rutherford

showed us that atom also has an internal structure. At first, it was thought that the nucleus of an

atom was made up of only two particles, proton and electron, but later in 1932, James Chadwick

discover another subatomic particle now known as a neutron. However, as we now know, protons

and neutron are not, in fact, an elementary particle. A study in 1969, showed that when proton or

neutron collided with another proton or neutron will create tiny particles now known as quark.

Quark comes in 6 flavours, we called them strange, charmed, up, down, bottom and top. Each of

the quark flavours comes in 3 different colours red, green and blue. Obviously, they don’t have

colours, since the wavelength of the quark is much smaller than the wavelength of light, so it is

just a more creative way that scientist came up with naming things. The study of this is called

quantum-chromodynamics. Furthermore, there is also leptons, Gauge boson and scalar boson.
 SOONJUN 20

Now, this is separated into 2 groups, first fermions, the quarks and leptons, then the bosons group,

the gauge boson and scalar boson ( See model 1.3.1 ).

Spin

In quantum physic, we classified elementary particle via it spin value. So what exactly is a

spin, spin is the intrinsic value that one particle has. It is also often described as a value angular

momentum that a particle carries. We can use spin to identifies a certain type of elementary

particles. The physicist had divided the standard model, the elementary particle chart, into two
1
types based on the properties. First the fermions, the fermions have a spin integers of 2 , and it also

follows Pauli’s exclusion principle. The other half is called the boson group, which do not follows

Pauli’s exclusion principle, but instead, it follows Bose-Einstein statistics and has integer spin.

Pauli’s exclusion principle stated that it does not allow for two electrons with same spin value to

share the same shell. In an atom, electron shell is divided into s p d f.

Superposition

This is one of the most counter-intuitive ideas in quantum mechanics because it sounds

completely non-sense when compared to our daily life, this principle is called the superposition.

Superposition is a state which particle is in until we observe it. Superposition tells us that particle

takes up every possible state before it is observed, that means it can be in any location, in any

conditions, and etc. This phenomenon describes the double-slit experiment, that when one shoots

a single photon through the slit, we would get the same pattern as if we shoot the whole wave of

the photon. This happens because of the fact that photon actually passes both of the slit at the same

time creating an interference pattern, this also applies to others particles such as that of the electron.
 SOONJUN 21

Because in the quantum world everything acts as both wave and particle, this happens. This is also

present in another famous thought experiment by Erwin Schrödinger. He did a thought experiment

that he put a cat into a bunker with a bomb, that has 50 percent chances of killing the cat after a

minute passes. After a minute had passed we would think that cat has been dead or alive, but the

principle stated that before we observe it the cat could take up any possible state, hence the cat is

both dead and alive at the time. However, in the perspective of a cat, the cat would either see a

bomb explode or not depends on its chances. Until we observe that the cat state become entangled

with us and its superposition collapsed into the outcome that we observe. This principle is governed

by Schrödinger equation. With this principle comes a variety of implications.

The Catastrophe

In the recent century, these physic theories already have been tested by so many

experiments that everyone would have to agree with them for now. In the past century, the charge,

parity and time symmetry have been thought to be unbreakable, however, it wasn’t until 1956 that

a paper was published that stated that the parity symmetry hasn’t been tested on the weak force

yet. In that year a professor of Columbia University decided to make an experiment on this topic.

It was found that the weak force does, in fact, violate the parity symmetry. Physicists were

unconvinced and didn’t accept the result until they got to test by themselves. It was at this moment

that physic was broken down, creating one of the most devastating crises of physic of all time.

However, it was one of the individuals that were broken down, meaning they all didn’t break down

at the same instant, if that were to happen then we have to rewrite all of the physic frameworks we

have now. Later on, physicist combined the two symmetry, C and P to what we knew as CP, the

charge-parity. It was thought to be unbreakable until, again, 2 physicists published their paper on
 SOONJUN 22

CP violation. The CP was violated again, a physicist has no other choice but to combine the three

symmetry into one which is now known as CPT or the charge-parity and time symmetry. It is

might be true that one of the individual or CP can be violated, but not all at the same time. If the

CPT were proved to be violated we have to rewrite all of the quantum mechanics and relativity

again, because it was based on this foundation.

Conclusion

From these two theories, it provides a framework for physic and probably all the scientific

invention nowadays. There have been many inventions that were invented based on these

frameworks that were laid by this two theories. On the quantum mechanics side, we have MRI, or

magnetic resonance imaging, quantum computer and etc. MRI is based on protons quantum spin

in our body which can be used to project an image of our body system, also the quantum computer

is based on a quantum bit, which is different from the classical computer because it is in a

superposition state, which the information can be in either zero or one. From general relativity, we

have GPS, the global positioning system, magnets and etc. Without general relativity, the satellite

wouldn’t be able to calculate the position of us on Earth correctly due to disruption by the gravity

field. These two theories had proved themselves to be the one of the most successful theory of all

time, which now we all have to agree upon it.

The GUT, or grand unified theory, was a further development from a quantum mechanics

standard model that combines the three out of four fundamental forces, weak interactions, strong

interactions and electromagnetic forces into one force. Yet, it didn’t include gravity, which in
 SOONJUN 23

status quo cannot be defined by quantum mechanics, but it was rather described by the general

relativity of Einstein.

The TOE, also known as the theory of everything, the ultimate theory, the master theory

or the final theory is the last step that we could reach in order to explain every phenomenon in the

universe with a set of equations. In order to achieve the theory, physicists must combine both GUT

and the theory of gravity by Einstein general relativity, which is the last force that GUT doesn’t

govern. There are quite a number of candidates in theory, such as string theory. That promise to

explain the universe throughout, however, it was hard for a physicist to prove its 11 dimensions.

In this research paper, the researcher a had shown the development of physic over a period

of time and how rapidly it was advancing in the past centuries. From the time of Aristotle to

Newton of classical mechanics era, till the time of Einstein that gives birth to both relativity and

quantum mechanics. Though it was Einstein himself who contribute a lot to the birth of quantum

mechanics, he still denied it as being completely irrational and unpractical. However, as we have

seen that both of the theory are correct and one could not agree on one more than the other. Every

equation that describes the universe since the beginning of the fate of our universe were derived

and based on these two theories. In many attempts, the physicist had tried to combine this two

theory that governs different field in physic into one. But, that theory kept disagreeing with each

other, and they failed to explain each other phenomenon prediction that has been proved to be true.

We do not know that these theories are correct or not. Maybe tomorrow when we wake up, there

will already be an experiment that disproves these theories already, and we have to start from a

scrap again.
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Illustration

Model 1.1.1
Light wave oscillating components : Electric-magnetic field

Model 1.1.2
General relativity : Space distortion - Gravity
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Model 1.1.3
Einstein prediction of gravitation ripples between two massive blackholes colliding
(First detected by LIGO on 14 SEP 2015, roughly 99 years after Einstein prediction in 1916)

Model 1.2.1
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Model 1.2.2

Model 1.3.1
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Appendix
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Classical mechanics equations and laws

Newton

Laws of inertia, states that the object in motion will stay in motion, unless it was acted

upon by external forces

F = ma, force equal masses time acceleration

For every action there is equal and opposite reaction

Gravity equation

𝑚1 𝑚2
𝐺
𝑟2

Galileo Galilei

Gravity : everything falls at the same rate regardless of mass, in the vacuum

Galilean transformation x’ = x - ut

Special and General relativity laws and equations

First postulate

The speed of light is constant speed, with the speed of 299 792 458 m / s or

approximately 3 × 108

Second postulate

The laws of physic is the same for every observer in all frame of reference
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Lorentz transformation

𝑥
𝑡 ′ = 𝛾(𝑡 − 𝑣 )
𝑐2

𝑥 ′ = 𝛾(𝑥 − 𝑣𝑡)

𝑢+𝑣
𝑢𝑣 .
1+ 2
𝑐

Quantum mechanics

Photoelectric effect : certain wavelength of light induce the electrical current, causing electron to

jump off an metal plate

Heisenberg principle : We cannot know both the position and momentum of a particle in the same

instance, because when we measure the energy of a photon will disturb the momentum of a particle

and cause it to change, and vice versa.

Schrödinger cat : The cat is both dead and alive until we observe it

Superposition state : a state which particle takes when it is not observe. A particle can take up

every possible state, location, condition and etc.

Spin : intrinsic property of a particle, or angular momentum

Standard model : A model which is use by physicist nowadays.

Quarks : make up proton and neutron

Higgs boson : give you masses

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Reference

Antony, L. Light. New York, Britannica

Baker, J. (2013). 50 quantum physics ideas you really need to know. London: Quercus.

Einstein, A. (1905). DOES THE INERTIA OF A BODY DEPEND UPON ITS ENERGY-CONTENT? DOES

THE INERTIA OF A BODY DEPEND UPON ITS ENERGY-CONTENT?

Gergersen, E. Relativity and Quantum mechanics. New York: Britannica

Hawking, S. (2017). A brief history of time. New York: Bantam Books.

Hawking, S. (1994). Black holes and baby universes and other essays. Toronto: Bantam Books.

Lavender, G. (2017). Quantum physics in minutes. London: Quercus.

Maxwell, J. C. (1865). A dynamical theory of the electromagnetic field.

doi:10.5479/sil.423156.39088007130693

Smith, J. H. (1979) Introduction to special relativity. Paris: InterEditions.